I'm Just Playing Hide-and-Seek!

This Patrol Examiner must be deeply poisoned, her body slack, to the point where Ji Ruo's full-strength slap knocked out even her teeth.

Still, the result was good—the Patrol Examiner slowly came to, her eyes still carrying a trace of confusion.

Ji Ruo caught a glimpse and learned her name from the examiner's badge: Li Nannan.

He frowned slightly. Instinct told him something had gone wrong with this martial exam—a Patrol Examiner being stashed away as emergency rations by a Nine-Eyed Demon Spider in a cave!

But what exactly had gone wrong, Ji Ruo didn't know.

And now wasn't the time to dwell on it.

"Teacher, we're candidates in this martial exam. This is the Nine-Eyed Demon Spider's nest. Those two activated the rescue device!"

Ji Ruo quickly summarized the situation.

Though poisoned, Li Nannan was still a Qi Pulse Realm martial artist. Once awake, she soon recalled the chain of events.

She grabbed Ji Ruo's arm urgently, her voice rushed: "Ged out of here. Deep in the cave, these Nine-Eyed Demon spidels have evolved a Spideh Queen, strength matching a peak Qi Pulse Realm!"

Before she could finish, Li Nannan froze.

Because her teeth had been knocked out and the paralytic venom from the Nine-Eyed Demon Spider still lingered in her body, her speech was slurred, air leaking through the gaps.

Moreover, she saw the webs inside the cave burning fiercely, flames spreading deep into the cavern, while ash drifted slowly from the scorched areas—there wasn't much fuel in the nest, so the fire passed quickly.

With the sharp eyesight of a Qi Pulse Realm martial artist, Li Nannan could see the Spider Queen that had defeated her earlier, shrieking furiously behind the flames.

Ji Ruo nodded seriously: "Teacher, I know. We're waiting for you to lead us out!"

The other three hadn't yet recovered from the shock of Ji Ruo's heavy slap, their minds still reeling.

"Lead... lead you out?" Li Nannan was stunned. She was injured and heavily poisoned—not fatal, but no match for that swarm of Nine-Eyed Demon Spiders!

But then she saw the dozen or so Nine-Eyed Demon Spiders chasing Ji Ruo and the others. From their size, they were only at the ninth-level Martial Apprentice tier.

Killable.

"Alright, follow me!"

Li Nannan stood up, shook her still-dizzy head, and blurred past Ji Ruo and the other three, charging toward the dozen Nine-Eyed Demon Spiders.

On the way, she casually pulled the Miao Saber from Ji Ruo's back. All Ji Ruo and the others saw was a flash of blade light, faint gold-red blood energy mingling with the saber's silver gleam, weaving and dancing through the cave. In an instant, the blocking spiders were slaughtered!

A Qi Pulse Realm martial artist was a true warrior, every aspect already surpassing human limits.

Li Nannan's brief battle was almost elegant—the only mark against it was that she didn't call out her technique names while fighting.

"Go!"

As Li Nannan moved, her blood energy surged, circulating the poison through her body. Her frame wobbled, and she couldn't help spitting out a mouthful of foul, faintly purple toxic blood, yet she still remembered to turn and urge the students to flee quickly.

What she didn't know was that these four candidates had spent almost the last two days running, and had already become experts at it.

When Li Nannan charged out, Ji Ruo and the others instinctively started running too.

As Li Nannan turned back, she happened to see Ji Ruo sprinting past her.

Ji Ruo shouted politely: "Thanks, teacher!"

The others followed suit.

"Thanks, teacher!"

"Thanks, teacher!"

"Thanks, teacher!"

Li Nannan: "?"

Ji Ruo and the others had only learned the Basic Movement Technique, their escape speed like a crawling turtle compared to a Qi Pulse Realm martial artist, but Li Nannan didn't keep up with the students.

She briefly assessed her own condition, listening to the screeching of the swarm behind her, and smiled bitterly. Fighting off dizziness, she called out loudly: "Don't look back. The Ten Thousand Beast Mountain Secret Realm has undergone unknown changes. Be careful, and don't worry about me."

Though forcibly awakened, mustering her blood energy to kill the dozen blocking spiders had been her limit. Now that she'd opened an escape path for the students, her spirit slackened, and a powerful wave of dizziness surged over her.

She couldn't escape. She could only let the students flee as far as possible—what a pity not to fulfill her duty as a Patrol Examiner!

Ji Ruo, running at the front, heard this and paused mid-step. Without much thought, he turned back, hoisted Li Nannan—who was about to use her last shred of clarity to hold the rear—onto his shoulder.

"Why does everyone love playing the rear guard so much?"

Li Nannan, slowed by the severe poison, was a beat late. Her vision suddenly flipped, startling her, and she said urgently: "What are you coming back for?! You're young. Protecting you is my duty as a Patrol Examiner. I can die, but you can't. If you carry me, none of us will make it! Leave me!"

Ji Ruo said gravely: "Teacher, my saber's still in your hand. I came back for it."

Li Nannan: "?"

The other three were already used to running. Zhang Quan and Liu Neng knew they were useless and fled without hesitation, aware that staying would only drag Ji Ruo and the others down.

Liang Shixian slowed a little, glancing back while running. Seeing Ji Ruo haul Li Nannan out, he breathed a sigh of relief and sped up again.

"Ji Ruo, where are we running now?" Liang Shixian shouted, the wind roaring past their ears and their heavy, ragged breaths forcing them to speak loudly.

Ji Ruo thought for a moment, then suddenly turned and ran toward the woods on the left: "This way!"

Liang Shixian was taken aback: "But that's a swamp over there, and there's—"

In truth, there had been over twenty Nine-Eyed Demon Spiders chasing them at the start. During their escape, they passed the edge of that swamp, and several thick tentacles reached out from within, dragging some of the Nine-Eyed Demon Spiders inside.

It was only then that Ji Ruo and the others realized it was a swamp.

Thankfully, Ji Ruo had been using [Absolute Sense of Direction] to seek out 'safe' directions, so their escape route wasn't fixed, allowing them to avoid the swamp in advance. Otherwise, they would have been done for long ago.

"Follow me!"

Ji Ruo charged ahead, sprinting straight toward the swamp.

Li Nannan on his shoulder was already barely conscious, and Ji Ruo's frantic running left him no room to care about her comfort. Under the violent jostling, this Qi Pulse Realm martial artist, already poisoned, was jolted into vomiting.

The foul, toxic vomit was both sticky and rank.

But Ji Ruo paid it no mind—he'd be getting dirty anyway soon enough.

Two minutes later, Ji Ruo felt his body sink, the air turning into thick, viscous liquid, offering immense resistance that sharply slowed his speed.

"Slow Demon Eye?!"

Liang Shixian exclaimed in horror; they were all affected.

The Nine-Eyed Demon Spider had given chase!

Ji Ruo instinctively glanced back. There was no spider swarm behind him—at least not within ten meters. That meant the one pursuing wasn't an ordinary Nine-Eyed Demon Spider, but the Spider Queen Li Nannan had mentioned!

The sudden heaviness made Liu Neng stumble and fall.

Then, a fierce will to survive drove him to scramble back up, ignoring the pain, but his running speed grew slower and slower, his stamina draining faster.

He couldn't help but whimper, "We can't make it. We're not going to make it."

"Shut up! Keep running!"

Ji Ruo roared. The swamp ahead was now in sight.

The swamp wasn't large, its shallow water shimmering with rippling light.

The surrounding plants were grotesque, like set pieces from a horror film.

Not only that, but scattered around the swamp were bones of unknown creatures, the mud on them long dried into fine, cracked patterns.

Ji Ruo gritted his teeth, carrying Li Nannan as he sprinted desperately to the swamp's edge. Then he suddenly threw himself down, rolling with the barely conscious Li Nannan through the mud.

The wet mud at the swamp's center suddenly bulged, as if something was trying to burrow out from the depths, though not very quickly.

Ji Ruo growled, "Get over here and roll!"

The others: "?"

They didn't understand why Ji Ruo wanted them to do this, but behind them, furious hisses were already faintly audible.

Panicked, they had no time to question. They slid to their knees at the swamp's edge and rolled in the mud.

In an instant, they all became mud-men.

"Don't move, don't talk, hold your breath. Ever played hide-and-seek?"

Hide-and-seek, of all things!

Ji Ruo lay on his back in the mud, casting the [Camouflage] skill on each of them, then forced himself to stop panting, waiting in silence with a slight dizziness from lack of oxygen.

This skill could be used on others, a [Camouflage] that boosted disguise effectiveness by 40%. Ji Ruo didn't know if it could fool the Spider Queen, but it was their last resort.

The others dared not move, barely breathing. After the sudden stop from intense exertion, everyone could hear their own hearts pounding like drums in their chests.

Li Nannan's breathing was faint; she had long lost consciousness and fallen into a coma.

At that moment, the swamp's monster finally surfaced. Thick tentacles again, but now tinged with a faint purple hue.

They stretched out from the swamp, swaying slightly, wobbling like a drunkard. Clearly, the few Nine-Eyed Demon Spiders it had caught earlier had poisoned it.

But the poison was shallow, barely affecting it.

The others' eyes were wide, frozen in place, terrified of being discovered by the tentacles and dragged into the swamp.

Yet those thick tentacles seemed not to notice them at all, swaying faintly as if confused.

"Hiss!"

Then, the furious Spider Queen arrived.

Now, it all depended on whether the [Camouflage] skill was effective—and whether their plan to redirect the danger succeeded.

There's training arranged by the organization today. The next chapter's timing is uncertain.