By the time they returned to the base, the sky hung low overhead.
Ichinose's message—"Hold off on the next batch"—still sat at the top of Gu Heng's terminal.
The campfire had barely stabilized before the rain began to fall.
It wasn't a downpour.
It was the kind of cold rain that slowly turned roads into mud.
Yukimura looked up at the sky.
"Not a good night for traveling."
Every terminal trembled in their palms at once.
Northern Rain Slope checkpoint: temporarily open. Confirmation points: 2 Window: 00:25
Sudo was the first to look up.
"Two points are still points."
"We can still make it if we leave now."
Ike Kanji was tempted as well.
"After getting deducted that many points, wouldn't it be a huge loss to give up another two?"
Yukimura didn't respond to that.
He opened the route page, his expression far from pleasant.
"To reach Northern Rain Slope, we have to cross a low stone ridge."
"Once it starts raining, the ground will get slippery."
"From here, the fastest route takes eighteen minutes."
"If we return the same way, it'll take at least another eleven."
He pressed a finger against the edge of the route.
"The window is only twenty-five minutes."
"In other words, all four people have to confirm there. We can't stop along the way."
Gu Heng watched the countdown on the terminal. Two points were not much, but the location was clearly wrong: Northern Rain Slope lay against the outer treeline, where the canopy broke visibility into fragments, and there was only one stone ridge stable enough to walk across.
If anyone paused in the middle, those behind would be forced to close in. It wasn't that they couldn't go. It was that if they did, everyone would be left with a