The young man followed Xu Huo back to the little inn.
Xu Huo hadn't brought him along just to buy a few things and cook. He wanted to learn more about District 026 as a whole.
District 026 was one that had yet to fully merge with the game. In other words, it was currently like E27-014: after arriving, Outer District Players could only enter Dungeons within the district. Without a special method, they couldn't reach the district itself directly.
The reason was probably the environment in District 026. A district's progress toward fully merging with the game depended on the evolution of the district as a whole, and the most important indicator was the evolution of its Players. Even a district that had formed early could be left behind by the game if it wasn't strong enough.
District 026 had a poor environment for Evolution, and its population was small, so it had been unable to merge with the game. Of course, this wasn't necessarily a bad thing for District 026. Resources were scarce and living conditions harsh, but many people here shared the views of the Players who stayed in the slums. Merging with the game might bring even greater dangers.
District 026 was divided into four settlements. Since there were so few people, most of them were concentrated in these four places. Each settlement was separated from the others by an enormous dried-up sea, making travel between them difficult. Xu Huo's settlement was numbered 01—a number the settlement had chosen for itself.
District 026 had never been very technologically advanced, and acid rain was rampant, damaging and interfering with electronic equipment. There were almost no forms of transportation like airplanes. Of course, they were also poor; even if they built roads between the settlements, there would be