Being a Cloud Hunter

Qu An and Xiao Ming ran in the direction they had just picked out at the same time. The chase was about to begin.

[Help, help, this camera is shaking so much. I'm getting shaken to death.]

[I suddenly understand why the director of Full Speed Ahead! added a livestream. It's shaking so much, I can barely see anything.]

[They're running so fast.]

[Did anyone see whether Feng Danke got caught? He was so close.]

[No, the director cut away from the camera.]

[Aaaah, I'm so anxious watching this.]

[I think I saw Pang Ba. Pretty girl, run faster! Don't get caught!]

Xiao Ming and Qu An had already shaken them off through the winding alleyways. The two of them were now hiding in a room filled with various opera costumes and headdresses.

"Your instincts are pretty accurate." Qu An gave Xiao Ming a thumbs-up. Only the two of them understood what he meant.

On the way over, Xiao Ming had told Qu An that his sense of danger was very accurate. Since the two had jokingly said they would win the Acceleration King title together, that led to what had just happened.

Before long, they received the news that Feng Danke had been caught.

"He was too close. At that distance, it would've been really hard to outrun a hunter who had barely started catching people," Xiao Ming sighed.

"Indeed."

Before long, the phone rang again. They had thought another mission had arrived, but when Xiao Ming checked it, he saw the notification that Lin Shange had been caught.

4 hunters remaining, 14 acceleration team members remaining.

Xiao Ming had a fairly deep impression of Lin Shange. He had not expected her to be caught so quickly.

Remembering what Qu An had previously told him about Lin Shange being tied to Guan Jun, Xiao Ming wanted to ask whether Guan Jun would try to revive Lin Shange. But after glancing at the two cameramen beside them, he kept his mouth shut.

The cameras were really an eyesore. During the first recording, he had nearly been caught by a hunter because a camera had blocked his way.

Before Lin Shange was caught, she had been with Meng Na. The two had run toward the pool, and viewers watching the livestream from the hunters' perspective had also seen them before they were caught.

[I remember xmx seemed to be looking where to run just now. He probably saw there was a pool over here.]

[He's not that amazing. Can fans stop showing off so hard?]

[It feels like Lin Shange is about to get caught. She's so close.]

[Meng Na has already run completely out of sight. Didn't they say the two of them were really close?]

[What do you mean? This is a racing variety show. It's only the beginning, of course she should prioritize herself.]

[Stop making things up. They really are close.]

[The camera got cut away again. No idea whether Lin Shange escaped.]

[If it was cut away, she was probably caught. The director is so dumb, trying to hide it makes it obvious. If someone escaped like Meng Na did, the director wouldn't cut the camera at all.]

Feng Danke and Lin Shange, two acceleration team members, had fallen before achieving anything. The acceleration challenge was fraught with danger. Hopefully, the remaining acceleration team members would hide well.

At that moment, in an opera theater within the Opera Base, Dong Yong was framed by other opera performers who were jealous of him. They claimed he had stolen their belongings, and physical evidence was even found in Dong Yong's bag. For a time, everyone was condemning him.

In the previous episode, the Space Pirates had suddenly interfered with the connection between the marshal of the Interstellar Empire and the acceleration team members on Earth, carrying out their first act of sabotage.

This time, seeing Dong Yong trapped in a situation where he had to prove his own innocence, the leader of the Space Pirates came up with a plan. A banknote and an alarm device were placed on every acceleration team member, while sixteen banknotes went missing from the bag of Dong Yong's opera troupe leader.

"If the stolen goods are on you, then you won't be able to escape no matter what, right?"

The banknotes had been placed on the acceleration team members along with their phones at the very beginning of the show.

Xiao Ming took out the banknote he had kept in his pocket and began to speculate about its purpose. "A one-hundred-yuan note doesn't look like something meant for us no matter how I look at it. It feels like there's some kind of trap, like we stole someone's money."

"Maybe this money really was stolen," Qu An guessed as well.

The other acceleration team members had also received the one hundred yuan. The marshal of the Interstellar Empire noticed something was wrong and accessed footage from the entire venue, only then discovering the plot. To help the acceleration team members, he issued the first mission: a storage device had been placed inside the Seven Fairies Opera Troupe.

Xiao Ming's phone soon rang, confirming their guess.

Mission One Released

Every acceleration team member carries a 100-yuan banknote, which belongs to the leader of the Seven Fairies Opera Troupe. If they still possess the banknote when 72 minutes remain, the alarms on the acceleration team members will sound. However, the banknote cannot be transferred through gifting, buying, selling, or discarding. The acceleration team members must head to the Seven Fairies Opera Troupe, place the 100-yuan banknote into the device, and verify their fingerprints to deactivate the alarm.

The alarms were about to sound, and the hunters would come running at the noise. The acceleration team members should return the banknotes quickly.

"So it really was stolen?" Xiao Ming was surprised. He had only said it casually.

"You guessed right again." Qu An's thin lips curved upward slightly.

"Since we have to verify our fingerprints, we'll probably have to go ourselves. And it can only be put into that device, nowhere else. Also, I feel like there's another trap here." Xiao Ming relied on his instincts.

Qu An immediately understood what he meant. "Is it because the money belongs to the Seven Fairies Opera Troupe?"

Xiao Ming nodded, delighted that Qu An could understand his thoughts. "Right. If we walk over there openly, they might think we're actual thieves. So before we put it into the device, we need to hide the money."

"Yes, and I have another guess. Someone here might need this money. If they try to take it, we might not be able to get it back. No matter what happens, we have to keep the money on ourselves," Qu An said.

Whether their long discussion would actually come true, whether they were being overly conspicuous or walking into a trap, remained to be seen.

This segment was released in full by the production team, and the fan discussions were quite entertaining.

[I think they're overthinking it. They just need to go deliver something, right?]

[Putting everything else aside, Xiao Ming and Qu An really have amazing chemistry. I feel like they barely said anything, but the other person understood what they meant.]

[Does this one hundred yuan really have so many tricks to it? It's making me nervous.]

[If qaq and xmx are right, then this mission is nothing but traps.]

[But it feels like as long as they follow the mission requirements exactly, nothing should go wrong.]

They did not know about those doubts and discussions yet. Xiao Ming and Qu An were discussing how to get there, with 26 minutes remaining.

"The Seven Fairies Opera Troupe is some distance away from us, and part of the route is a straight road. It should be very dangerous," Qu An said.

"And there's only this one route," Xiao Ming said.

They knew the show's tricks well. Qu An knew that hunters would definitely be sent to that road. Besides miniature cameras, the sunglasses on their faces also contained earpieces.

After receiving the mission notice, the other acceleration team members, whether they were in groups or alone, all got ready and prepared to rush out.

Meng Na had been caught very early in the first episode, and in the previous episode, she had been caught with only a little over ten minutes left. This time, she had resolved to hide longer, but she had not expected the mission to be so nasty.

Forced to head out, Meng Na heard someone dressed in modern clothing shouting as soon as she stepped outside.

"A great chance to make money! You can even exchange it for a set of clothing that can help you avoid danger!"

Meng Na's eyes lit up. She had not looked closely at the mission earlier, but hearing that it could help avoid danger, she assumed it meant avoiding hunters. Without thinking, she handed over her hundred yuan and received a suit jacket and a hat.

"Come get this hundred yuan back from me in ten minutes."

Meng Na happily agreed, then wore the outfit and hid back in her original spot. She thought she was safe in this outfit, and that there would be more than enough time to retrieve the hundred yuan and put it into the device later.

Would the hundred yuan really be impossible to retrieve after being taken away, as Qu An had said? Stay tuned.

As the hunters moved, viewers also got a rough look at the Opera Base.

[This place looks really beautiful.]

[And I can hear some opera singing. I can't make out the words, but the melody is so graceful and nice.]

[This should be Huangmei Opera. There's a lot of it in Anhui Province.]

[Huh? Then will they have to sing opera too?]

[How could that be? This is Full Speed Ahead!]

[Hard to say.]

[Even though the livestream might be less than two hours long, it basically feels like we barely get to see the guests.]

[Isn't that obvious? The acceleration team members are all hiding.]

[I'm guessing Mission One should be released around now. Let's see which acceleration team member will enter our view.]

[I thought it would be pretty boring, but when they started running around catching people, I got the thrilling feeling that I was catching acceleration team members too.]

[We're all Cloud Hunters /cool/]

The director had originally thought no one would watch the two-hour livestream, but someone had started the topic "#WeAreAllCloudHunters." Since viewers could experience the feeling of catching acceleration team members through the livestream, quite a few people were willing to watch. It was only two short hours, after all; leaving a computer running was no trouble, and the livestream was free.

Xiao Ming and Qu An had already covered half the distance and were about to reach that widest, most dangerous straight road.

The two had been very careful on the way. They encountered hunters two or three times, but hid before the hunters noticed them, so viewers often failed to see Xiao Ming and Qu An during the livestream.

The phone suddenly rang with an announcement.

Notice

Acceleration team members Meng Na and Pang Ba have lost their 100-yuan banknotes. Their alarms have sounded early.

Xiao Ming and Qu An exchanged a look, both wearing expressions that said they had expected it.

Xiao Ming cupped his hands toward Qu An. "Brother Qu is smart."

Qu An raised an eyebrow, the smile at the corners of his mouth deepening as he returned the gesture. "Student Xiao Ming is quite clever too."

"Too kind, too kind. Verifying our fingerprints is more important right now," Xiao Ming said.

"I'll listen to Student Xiao Ming." Qu An looked as though he really was following Xiao Ming's lead, going wherever Xiao Ming went.