An Bai extended both hands and caught the treasures slowly flying toward him. Each treasure was only the size of a palm.
He took out the vines he had previously used to bind his clothes, tore off a short length, and tied the chest and the plastic bottle containing the catalyst together for easier carrying.
As for the mirror, he put it into his pocket.
After dealing with these things, An Bai was just about to continue exploring deeper into this so-called Middle-earth Secret Realm when an invisible force stopped him.
Everything in the Middle-earth Secret Realm began slowly disappearing after these three treasures were sent out.
“Such a great place, and they won’t even let me stay longer!”
An Bai desperately widened his eyes, wanting to look at everything here a little longer.
But at that moment, a flash of golden light passed by. The glare stabbed at An Bai’s eyes until he could not open them, followed by another bout of dizziness.
When An Bai opened his eyes, he had already returned to the tribal ruins from before.
Those stone pillars had also long since disappeared.
“How stingy.” An Bai pursed his lips in displeasure, although he was extremely satisfied with the three treasures he had obtained.
An Bai stood up. After confirming that nothing on him had been damaged, he retraced his steps.
The Gravel Road—the bone-Crushing Mountain.
Before long, he arrived at the ground covered with iron tools and stopped moving forward.
Looking at the rust-covered iron tools stuck into the ground, his eyes burned with desire. He really wanted to get his hands on one!
“Let’s try one more time!”
An Bai approached an iron sword embedded in the ground, gripped its hilt with both hands, and took a deep breath.
He suddenly exerted his strength, and the iron sword actually began to loosen slightly.
“There’s hope!” An Bai grew somewhat excited.
He exerted himself again, and this time An Bai completely pulled the iron sword free.
But before An Bai could celebrate for long, all the iron tools embedded in the ground strangely burrowed into the soil, as if they had never appeared.
Not only that, everything related to the tribal ruins vanished at the instant An Bai pulled out the sword.
All that remained for him was an empty grassland.
Seeing this strange scene, An Bai did not dare linger and decisively headed toward the fogless zone.
For him, today’s gains were already more than enough.
As he walked, An Bai began to feel that something was wrong.
He had not noticed it when he first left the secret realm. He had clearly entered the secret realm only a short while ago, so why had the sky become so dark?
The violet light emitted by the positioning ball also appeared increasingly dazzling as the sky darkened.
“What’s going on? Is night about to fall?”
An Bai opened the Survival Manual. The time displayed on it showed that 15 minutes remained until Nightfall.
“Damn it! The flow of time in the Middle-earth Secret Realm is abnormal.”
He immediately broke into a run, but because there were potholes in the ground, his speed was not particularly fast.
After spending approximately four minutes, An Bai finally left the Thin-Mist Zone.
Only 11 minutes remained until Nightfall. An Bai raced to the positioning ball, picked it up in one motion, and hurried toward the train at top speed.
In merely one minute, An Bai reached the riverside.
Without the slightest hesitation, An Bai threw the iron axe and iron pickaxe to the opposite bank.
Immediately afterward, An Bai took off his clothes and wrapped the three treasures and the positioning ball inside them.
After confirming that the bundle was tied securely, An Bai did not even have time to remove his pants or shoes. He took a running start and leaped directly to a point nearly in the middle of the river.
Thus, in the icy river water, An Bai held the “clothing bundle” with one hand and paddled forward with the other.
“So cold! The current has gotten much stronger too.”
An Bai struggled to swim, his hands and feet becoming considerably stiff from the cold.
By the time An Bai reached the opposite bank, the sky already held a small red crescent moon.
The white fog that had originally remained at the outskirts began to grow active. No one knew how many covetous creatures were hidden within the churning mist.
Picking up the iron axe and iron pickaxe from the ground, An Bai did not dare delay for even a moment and continued running toward the train.
At this moment, An Bai was still 500 meters from his train. Under normal circumstances, he could reach it in one minute.
In his current physical condition, however, it would take at least a minute and a half.
Time waited for no one. As An Bai ran forward, the sky turned completely dark.
The white fog howled in from all directions at tremendous speed, and wolf howls could even be heard within it.
In an instant, the white fog spread across the entire area.
“Damn it, I can’t see my train anymore.”
As the white fog spread and night descended, An Bai felt extremely uneasy.
The positioning ball was especially dazzling in the night, and even his clothes could not conceal its radiance.
“I forgot to turn it off while running.” An Bai regretted it deeply.
He could almost be certain that something had set its sights on him.
An Bai could only run in a certain direction based on his previous memories. This was a situation he had never encountered before.
The wolf howls behind him drew closer and closer, and An Bai’s heart had long since risen into his throat.
Several times, he nearly fell because he could not see the road clearly. An Bai simply followed the momentum of each stumble and ran forward, rolling and crawling.
“Ptooey!” While running, An Bai spat out a mouthful of dirt.
At this point, he looked utterly langbei. His entire body was covered in grass seeds and dirt, and several scrapes from the ground marked his abdomen.
The environment of the grassland at night changed rapidly. In an instant, a strong wind swept in.
It sent grass seeds swirling through the air and pelted them against his face, making An Bai unbearably itchy and leaving him even less able to distinguish his direction.
The train was clearly less than 100 meters away. He could even smell its familiar coal-burning scent.
But the sudden strong wind disrupted his sense of smell.
The wolf howls behind him also drew closer and closer. They were probably less than 100 meters from An Bai.
“Could today really be the day I die?” Faced with such desperate circumstances, even An Bai could not help feeling dejected.
Compared with his situation in the Middle-earth Secret Realm, it was truly the difference between a single thought leading to Heaven and a single thought leading to Hell.
Another even fiercer gust of wind swept in, directly knocking An Bai to the ground.
“Whatever. I’ll take a gamble.”
An Bai climbed to his feet again and looked determinedly toward a certain direction.
With his right hand gripping the previously wrapped “clothing bundle,” he swung his right arm backward 200 degrees and hurled it forcefully in that direction.
With a “clang,” the sound of hard material striking something rang out.
Although An Bai was in a perilous situation, hearing that sound still made his heart shatter.
Those were the treasures I had just obtained! Who knew whether they were damaged?
Fortunately, the throw had been accurate. The violet light emitted by the positioning ball wrapped in the “clothing bundle” happened to illuminate An Bai’s train.
“Awooo!” The wolf pack was now less than 50 meters from An Bai, practically within arm’s reach.
With the positioning ball guiding him this time, An Bai’s feet moved swiftly. He covered the 90-meter distance in less than 10 seconds.
At the same time, the wolf pack behind him followed the positioning ball’s guidance and arrived behind An Bai.
Each of them was as large as a calf, with vicious eyes. Their gazes held nothing but a hunger for flesh and blood.
An Bai hurriedly picked up the clothing bundle near the train and took the opportunity to slip inside the train.
After entering the train carriage, An Bai turned around and let out a thunderous roar at the surrounding wolf pack.
“Aaaah-------eeeek------oooh-------whoop whoop whoop--------”
An Bai simply made as much noise as possible, barely stopping short of pronouncing all 26 letters of the alphabet.
This cry truly startled the wolf pack. They seemed utterly bewildered by the situation before them and stood frozen in place.
“What an opportunity.”
An Bai reacted with lightning speed, seized the door handles with both hands, and swiftly shut the train door.
“Hahahaha, what a bunch of idiots.”
Looking at the wolf pack outside staring blankly at one another, An Bai’s lips curled into a smug smile.
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