Trickster Hunter.

Chapter 523 Lava Crab

“But that doesn’t mean you’re safe just because you’re right next to the edge of the lava pool,” Yang Qiaoxi added. “The rock strata at the edge of the lava pool are very fragile, and they could collapse if they’re subjected to too much force… If you accidentally fall into the lava pool with your car, well, even a god couldn’t save you.”

"That's not necessarily true; it depends on the individual's physical condition," Sun Hang said. "If a physical education student falls in, they might be able to be rescued after being pulled out."

"Does a sports student need emergency treatment? A little iodine will do the trick." Yang Qiaoxi was clearly a frequent internet user and immediately picked up on the joke in Sun Hang's words.

“But then again, there must be quite a few people in this convoy who can withstand high heat like this, right?” Sun Hang’s gaze swept over the other vehicles. “I can sense that some of these people have quite a strong meme.”

“Quite a few,” Yang Qiaoxi said. “The destructive power of the lava pool is incomparable to that of the deadly sandstorm. If you threw an entire convoy into it, I guarantee that at least a dozen people would be able to climb out of the lava pool.”

As the convoy drew closer to Sunfall Ridge, the ambient temperature began to rise to an uncomfortable level—even though the air conditioning in the off-road vehicles was already running at maximum power, the thermometer reading inside the vehicles was still nearly forty degrees Celsius.

"Zhulong, could you take off your scarf?" Sun Hang asked the driver sitting next to him.

"Huh? Oh..." Zhulong was stunned for a moment before realizing that Sun Hang intended to use him as a human air conditioner. He took off his hat, scarf, and gloves while switching between his hands on the steering wheel.

Instantly, a chilling aura filled the carriage, completely dispelling the previous stuffiness.

"Attention everyone, Sunfall Ridge is just ahead!" a hunter shouted over the public communication channel. "Those who are here for the first time, be careful and try to follow the tracks of the vehicle in front."

After merging, the convoy split up again inside Sunfall Ridge. Several larger vehicles climbed up the slope along the edge of a lava pool with a diameter of over 400 meters, while Sun Hang and his group chose to detour through the ravine. Several smaller lava pools were distributed on both sides of the ravine, and the road through these lava pools felt like a floating bridge built of irregular stones.

“This mountain pass is commonly known as the Bridge of Helplessness.” Yang Qiaoxi reduced the speed of the motorcycle to 40 miles per hour. “This is one of the most stable routes to cross the first mountain of the Sunfall Ridge. The only problem is that the road is too narrow. Large vehicles cannot pass through this road and can only climb the slope.”

"Why do you say this place is the most stable?" Sun Hang asked.

The tires of the car in front rolled over the edge of the lava pool less than 20 centimeters away, and Sun Hang could clearly hear a faint cracking sound coming from inside the rock. When their off-road vehicle drove past the same spot, a piece of rock the size of a palm broke off from the edge of the lava pool and fell into the red lava below, where it was swallowed up in the blink of an eye.

“The larger the magma pool, the more frequent the geological activity below, and therefore the more unstable it is,” Yang Qiaoxi said.

"Isn't it said that places where magma pools have already formed won't experience secondary eruptions?" Sun Hang asked疑惑地. "Then what's the difference between large and small pools?"

“According to those experts, the reason why Sunfall Ridge erupts magma like a volcano is because the pressure of the magma layer underground is too great, and these magma pools are formed when magma under high pressure breaks through the surface,” Yang Qiaoxi explained. “They are like pressure relief holes, releasing the stress and pressure inside the Earth’s crust… But releasing does not mean completely eliminating. The larger the magma pool, the faster it expands, and the more fragile the edges of the pool are.”

“The lava pools will all expand, but the speed varies.” Yang Qiaoxi pointed to the road ahead. “I remember the last time I came to Sunfall Ridge, the Naihe Bridge was about fifteen or sixteen meters wide, but now it’s less than ten meters wide… I reckon that in a few years, if we want to cross Sunfall Ridge, we’ll have to find another way.”

Just as they were talking, the car in front suddenly jolted violently, its front end tilted, and the left front wheel immediately went over the edge of the pool, leaving half of the car suspended in the air above the scorching lava!
"Stop immediately!" Zhulong slammed on the brakes, and behind them, the sound of tires screeching against the ground filled the air.

“You…you guys, back up!” A female hunter leaned out of the passenger seat of the front car and shouted, “Our car is four-wheel drive, let’s see if we can back it up.”

At this moment, she could escape danger immediately by simply opening the car door, but if she got out of the car, it would instantly lose its balance and slowly slide down to the side of the lava pool.

"Don't move!" Yang Qiaoxi said immediately. "Step on the brakes, whatever you do, don't move!"

"What's wrong? Is the chassis stuck on the edge of the lava pool?" the female hunter asked, frowning.

"Do you know why you jolted just now?" Yang Qiaoxi parked the motorcycle on the side of the road and jumped off.

"It seems like they ran over a rather large rock."

“That’s not a rock…that’s a lava crab.” Yang Qiaoxi bent down and looked into the gap under the chassis of the car in front. “It’s stuck under your chassis suspension. If you reverse now to let it out, it will probably push you straight into the lava pool!”

The female hunter's expression changed slightly, and her tone became pleading: "Could you help us kill this lava crab?"

"Do you know anything about lava crabs?" Yang Qiaoxi straightened up and asked with a smile.

The female hunter shook her head: "This is our first time in Sunfall Ridge..."

"The Lava Crab is a Class C monster unique to Sunfall Ridge. It feeds on the heat released from magma. Its body exhibits characteristics of both arthropods and mollusks. The shell on its back is composed of chitin secreted from its body surface and calcium carbonate produced by metabolism, and its shape resembles a stone." Before Yang Qiaoxi could even speak, the mainframe had already begun reading the "Monster Encyclopedia" to Sun Hang's ear. "The Lava Crab is docile and will not actively attack humans, but the concentrated body fluid stored in its abdominal glands has extremely high energy. Once threatened with death or killed, it will automatically detonate this liquid. The concentrated body fluid in an adult Lava Crab can reach 150 to 180 grams, and each gram of body fluid, when detonated, is equivalent to 0.2 kilograms of TNT."

One gram of body fluid is equivalent to two hundred grams of TNT, and an adult lava crab is equivalent to a bomb with a TNT equivalent of more than thirty kilograms.

"If you don't want to be blown up into the air right now, don't move," Yang Qiaoxi said. "It's best to turn off the engine too."

The driver immediately did as instructed.

By this time, several mercenaries and hunters had gathered around, but after seeing that what was stuck under the car was a lava crab, many of them took several steps back in shock.

"Damn, this guy's got really bad luck!" one hunter whispered to his companion. "It's practically the same as stepping on a landmine."

"Get away from here! Who knows when this lava crab will explode?" His companion pulled him back. "I've seen people kick a lava crab before, and most of its body was blown to bits... This lava crab is probably dormant, and its head is still dazed from being run over like that... If it wakes up, I reckon this car will be blown up immediately!"

"So what if the car blows up? Just don't blow up the Bridge to the Dead. I don't want to take a detour," said the driver of another car, watching from a distance.

"Zhulong, you're the one who needs to handle your things." Yang Qiaoxi patted the hood of the SUV. "It would be quite troublesome for anyone else." "Mm."

Zhulong nodded and stepped down.

A stream of cold water, like a snake, emerged from his sleeve and snaked its way under the car in front.

Soon, the water flow wrapped around the lava crab that was stuck under the suspension and seeped in through the opening in the "crab shell".

“The lava crab is in a very unstable state and could explode at any time,” Zhulong said. “I’ve temporarily frozen its glands, which will at least buy you ten seconds.”

"Should I just reverse?" the driver of the car in front asked.

"No! If you crush the lava crab's shell, it will explode too!" Zhulong immediately stopped him, then waved to Sun Hang, "Come and lend a hand, lift the car up, and then throw the lava crab into the pool."

"All right……"

Somewhat reluctantly, Sun Hang placed his hand under the rear bumper of the car in front of him and gently lifted it. At the same time, more than a dozen mycelium quickly burrowed under the car, wrapped around the lava crab that had been frozen into an ice block, and flung it into the lava pool next to him.

The football-sized lava crab tumbled dozens of times in mid-air before exploding with a bang less than five meters from the lava. The huge explosion and scorching heat wave swept back towards the people standing beside the pool.

With a sickening cracking sound, fine cracks spread across the rock beneath the vehicle's chassis. The overburdened rock shattered into small pieces, tumbling down the cliff edge of the lava pool. As the cliff edge continued to crumble, the vehicle lost its balance, its front end plunging heavily into the pool.

"Ah!" The female hunter in the passenger seat suddenly screamed, and a slender arm stretched out of the car window, waving wildly as if trying to grab some non-existent lifeline.

The entire vehicle slid rapidly towards the lava pool, but just as the rear wheels were about to dangle in the air, the downward trend came to an abrupt halt.

"Sigh, I guess I'll just go all the way with them."

Sun Hang used one hand to drag the rear bumper of the car back to a safe place.

The two people in the car were slumped in their seats like mud. The joy of surviving the ordeal could not immediately calm their tense emotions. Both of them were breathing heavily, and the cold sweat on their bodies soaked through their clothes, pressing them tightly against the back of the seats.

There may be many people in the convoy who are not afraid of falling into the lava pool, but at least these two are not among them.

"Are your legs still okay? Can you still drive?" Yang Qiaoxi walked to the driver's side and knocked on the window. "There are more than a dozen cars stuck behind us. You can't just stay here forever, can you?"

"Yes...it can drive." The hunter in the driver's seat breathed a sigh of relief and nodded like a chicken pecking at rice. Then he turned to look at Sun Hang and Zhulong, who were walking towards the off-road vehicle, and asked Yang Qiaoxi gratefully, "Did they save us? Could you tell me their names or code names?"

"Let's talk about it after we get out of Sunfall Ridge." Yang Qiaoxi patted the car window and turned back to the motorcycle.

After this minor incident came to an end, the convoy set off again.

"How cold-hearted," Sun Hang suddenly said.

"What?" Zhulong asked, somewhat puzzled.

“I mean, those hunters who were just watching the show,” Sun Hang said. “Many of them could pull that car up, but none of them were willing to do it.”

“In the no-man’s land of the Hexi Corridor, indifference is the greatest kindness.” Yang Qiaoxi said coldly in the team’s communication channel. “When you were in danger, the passersby did not kick you when you were down. You should be grateful to them. As for taking the initiative to rescue you, unless you are a very beautiful woman or a man who fits some people’s liking.”

"What if I'm very rich?"

“If they weren’t after your body, no one would have saved you.” Yang Qiaoxi shook her head. “They would only wait until you died to loot your body. No one would expect the hunters in the no-man’s-land to be grateful… The story of the farmer and the snake really happened here.”

"Looking at it this way, Nagano Soya really is an anomaly," Sun Hang muttered.

“It was just a small favor,” Nagano Soya said with a smile. “Besides, didn’t you also lend a helping hand to a stranger? In that sense, we should be considered the same kind of people.”

"Does it count?" Sun Hang narrowed his eyes.

Meanwhile, in several other vehicles.

"Does anyone know the two people who just rescued people?" asked a bald man with a gloomy face in a van that had been converted into an armored vehicle.

“I know that woman on the motorcycle. She’s Yang Qiaoxi, who runs a tavern in Dragon City. She often delivers goods to Chunfeng,” said a mercenary in the back row.

"Nonsense, who doesn't know Boss Yang! I'm asking about the other two hunters." The bald man licked his slightly chapped lips. "These two are quite strong, and they seem to have a good relationship with Yang Qiaoxi."

"I haven't seen him before; he seems to be a stranger."

Meanwhile, in another Mustang, a hunter in the passenger seat, holding a laptop, frowned at the screen: "Strange, when I entered the images of these two people into the search engine, it crashed. Is it because the temperature is too high?"

(End of this chapter)