The other five had not gone far. Before long, everyone had returned to the place where they had first arrived.
Cheng Shi looked at Chen Chong and found that he had already transformed the greatsword in his hand into a shield.
Order's warriors were one of the few professions renowned for defense, making them highly suited to survival trials.
Shieldsword was a weapon that could freely change forms. It was an A-rank item that could only be obtained above Ladder 1600.
Chen Chong had obtained Shieldsword just after reaching 1600, so it seemed his luck was pretty good.
"I found today's Order Anchor. Youjian Bar was buried beneath the ruins. I dug through the rubble and unearthed one of the bar's rules: Only fruit wine may be drunk today."
As he spoke, Chen Chong flipped his hand and produced another bottle of fruit wine. It was a brand no one had seen before.
Clearly, he had not found it in the ruins this time. It had come from his storage space.
Every player had a portable space the size of a safe, used to store their most important possessions.
Cheng Shi had one too. It contained quite a few strange and unusual things, but he had never expected that someone else would be like him and enjoy keeping drinks in there.
The others were obviously even more puzzled than Cheng Shi. Seeing everyone looking at him, Chen Chong explained with a smile:
"Work gets too stressful. I usually can't sleep at night unless I have a couple of drinks, so I always keep a few bottles on hand. Everyone, take a sip. The radiance of Order will protect you. Don't worry, it's very low in alcohol and won't affect the battle ahead."
The Edict of Passage of Order was to seek Order. Only those who followed certain laws and rules could receive its blessing.
And anyone who wished to accept Order's protection also had to obey the Order they found.
A simple rule anchor could clearly increase everyone's safety rating, so everyone was delighted. They took turns accepting the bottle and sipping from it.
Only Cheng Shi drained half the bottle in several gulps after taking it.
Chen Chong's brow twitched. He suddenly felt that this Priest was somewhat unreliable.
Cao Sansui seemed to have carried out his Edict of Passage smoothly as well. He took out several golden Pocket Watches and began handing them out.
"I anchored time and calibrated all the Pocket Watches. This watch will announce the time five minutes, three minutes, and one minute before the appointed hour. Everyone, pay attention to maintaining your condition. A Time Walker can only decide when the Time Battlefield begins and ends, not what state you are in while inside it."
Cheng Shi accepted the Pocket Watch from Cao Sansui and began examining it carefully.
Clearly, it was a pure-gold Pocket Watch. Even its hands gleamed with golden light, making it look extremely valuable.
Unfortunately, in the current world, gold was not particularly valuable.
Trials that required gold were even easier than trials that required food.
That did not stop some players from continuing to regard gold as precious, using it to make up for regrets from their former lives.
Seeing everyone examining their Pocket Watches, Cao Sansui continued:
"To prevent everyone from having an unclear understanding of the Time Battlefield, I need to remind you all again:
"The Edict of Passage of time is precision and punctuality.
"Once I establish the Time Battlefield, we must activate it on the hour and end the battle and dispute on another exact hour.
"If we can't do that, we'll be trapped in an eternal time loop until we succeed.
"But every loop will erode our concept of time!
"Too many loops will cause us to lose ourselves in the river of time. As for the result, I'm sure I don't need to say more.
"So if you're confident you can solve the problem in one go, don't activate it.
"Time reversal isn't omnipotent."
Players who had survived until now had basically encountered all kinds of combinations of professions and faiths. They were already familiar with this, so they nodded one after another.
Afterward, the other four, including Cheng Shi, spoke up in turn, saying that their Edicts of Passage had gone smoothly.
Seeing that everyone was ready, Chen Chong nodded and suggested, "There are still some buildings east of these ruins that haven't been completely destroyed. For safety's sake, let's hide there first. We'll make further plans after encountering one of the two sides in the war or being forced into battle. What do you think?"
"I have no objections."
Xia Wan's tone remained cold as she continued, "I found the corpses of Bomedeans beneath the surrounding ruins. This is probably a small town somewhere on the Isle of Hope. Someone mentioned in the Hunter Channel's chat history that the Isle of Hope was destroyed by the Bone Legion."
Cao Sansui picked up the thread:
"That's right. We should be near Misty Forest County. There are more people in the Mage Channel who study trial history. If what we're facing really is the Isle of Hope's counterattack, then we're probably about to face the Bone Legion's right wing."
Cheng Shi greatly admired those who studied trial history. He had never researched it himself, nor did he have the patience to do so.
In this bizarre world, simply staying alive already exhausted half his energy.
As for the other half, he had to save it for deceiving people.
Half a month after the Faith Game began, some people noticed that players seemed to be transported into worlds that had once existed during every trial.
Many people were curious about these worlds that existed only within the trials, so they began gathering background information, organizing it, and sharing it with the public in the Professional Channel and Faith Channel.
Unfortunately, Cheng Shi could not find any useful information at all in his Faith Channel.
All the historical fragments about the trial backgrounds came from the Professional Channel.
He really was a Priest.
Chen Chong clearly was not a historian either. He frowned and asked, "So?"
Xia Wan continued, "There's very little information about the Right Wing Battlefield. If I remember correctly, the most frequently recorded one should be..."
Before she could finish, a sharp howl suddenly rang out from the distant sky.
Everyone was shocked and hurriedly turned to look.
The distant sky had somehow turned pitch-black. Countless black wings beat through the air, blotting out the sky and sun as they approached like a storm.
"...Dread Demons."
Xia Wan's expression darkened as she gave the answer.
Dread Demons were hellish demons with fleshy wings growing from their backs. They fed exclusively on fear and excelled at creating chaos. They were followers of Filth and Decay and mortal enemies of Birth.
Dread Demon
Judging by the terrifying number of them, if they truly engaged in battle, the six of them probably would not even be enough to fill the gaps between the army's teeth.
"There are... way too many!"
Cheng Shi frowned and glanced at the Pocket Watch. He found that the time had just passed the hour and reached 9:01. The Time Battlefield seemed not to have had time to activate.
Cao Sansui's expression also changed. Clearly, he had not expected the pace of this trial to be so fast, much less that they would immediately run into an airborne army.
"Brother Cao, is this the scale of a 1900-tier Game??" Song Yawen asked in shock.
Cao Sansui felt bitter inside. Bullshit. I've never seen this before either.
"Fall back! Hurry! Before they spot us, get inside the cover! They're marching. We have to avoid direct engagement. Move!"
Chen Chong shouted and removed the giant shield from his body. He concealed the light shining from it and led everyone eastward with their bodies lowered.
Song Yawen charged ahead. As soon as he rushed out and came into contact with the shadows among the rubble, his entire body turned into a wisp of smoke and vanished before everyone's eyes.
The Assassin's class skill, Shadow Shuttle.
Assassins traveled through darkness and moved beneath shadows. Within a short distance, they could use shadows to change their position and conceal themselves.
This concealment was not physical hiding. Instead, they entered the shadow plane and disappeared completely.
Xia Wan was no slower. As a Hunter, agility was their defining trait.
However, she did not run blindly ahead like Cheng Shi and Nangong. Instead, she scattered something on the ground as she ran.
Cheng Shi glanced back and saw that she was throwing Genesis Grass Seeds.
These things were certainly not real grass seeds. They were Birth's blessing for the Hunter profession.
They were Life Traps. Any living creature that came into contact with the seeds would be influenced by Birth's will, begin craving reproduction, and rapidly give birth inside its body to an independent individual that went against the host's consciousness.
Just like the pregnant woman who had longed to become a mother before Cheng Shi dealt with her.
This method was practically the primary attack method of Birth's followers.
They never directly destroyed their enemies. Instead, they twisted them and made them walk toward their own destruction.
Although the deity of the Life Path leaned toward Order, order of the will did not prevent distortions in the material world. In certain manifestations, the righteous god of Order was no weaker than the evil gods of Chaos.
It might even be stronger.
"I need at least fifty-seven minutes and forty-two seconds to reset the Time Battlefield. During this period, I can only influence everyone's Time Domain. Pray, friends. Hopefully they haven't noticed us."
"Stop wasting words. Use it now and speed us up!"
Chen Chong growled, increasing his forward speed by another thirty percent.
A Time Walker could manipulate time, which was extremely useful during the Speedrun Phase.
Cao Sansui actually did not want to expend too much mental strength so early, but there was no better option. He tightened his grip on the Pocket Watch and shouted to all his companions beside him:
"Area, fast-forward!"
As soon as his voice fell, the five figures accelerated as if someone had pressed a fast-forward button. In the blink of an eye, they had run nearly a hundred meters.
In another area beside the accelerated zone, the flow of air seemed to have solidified. The entire region was as though someone had pressed pause—even the dust that had been kicked up hung motionless in midair.
The potential energy of time was always balanced within a certain range. When one side sped up, the other naturally slowed down.
Cheng Shi felt as if wind had sprung beneath his feet. It was incredibly refreshing. A place that would originally have taken several minutes to reach was now only a dozen seconds away.
Unfortunately, this acceleration effect could only function within a certain area. Once they left it, their speed immediately plummeted back to normal.
Although Cao Sansui's tier was higher and his condition was clearly better than everyone else's, accelerating such a large area in one go still left him somewhat exhausted. Seeing that he was losing strength, Chen Chong grabbed him, threw him onto his back, and carried him onward.
"Assassin, go ahead first. Clear the ruins and find a base!"
"Nangong, restore the Mage's mental strength! Progeny Priest, don't move recklessly. It's not time for you to exert yourself yet."
"Lay down more traps from the Creation Hunter. The Dread Demon scouts won't remain in the air forever. Once they land, every extra moment we can delay them counts!"
Chen Chong had excellent judgment and commanded with composure. It was obvious that he had reached 1600 through his own strength.
But the current situation was too dire, leaving him no other options. As he ran, he carefully selected broken walls and ruins that could accommodate six people, hoping they could survive this calamity.
However, the battle changed far faster than expected.
Before they could run into the still-standing building ahead, the dense Dread Demon army had already swooped down toward the ruins.
The scouts among them had discovered the players long ago.
"Yaa—saa—"
The terrifying shriek spread throughout the ruins. The Dread Demons' excitement was obvious. It seemed they had found an unexpected delight along their march.
"Too late! The seeds have been triggered! Engage!"
Before you continue