This villain is too popular.

Chapter 381: A city transformed into an occupied zone – a clear foreshadowing.

"Alright, you have three minutes to prepare. Once everything is ready, the assessment will begin."

After saying this, the raccoon keeper left the area.

Upon hearing these words, Mi Yao's two teammates immediately approached him to discuss their next strategy.

"Um, our capabilities are..."

Before his two teammates could finish speaking, Mi Yao didn't even look up, focusing intently on playing with the silver-gray handheld console in his hands.

"No need."

While playing the game, Mi Yao said impatiently, "Once you're inside, hide on your own and don't bother me."

"."

Upon hearing this, the smile on the man's face froze, and his heart skipped a beat.

Did he guess what we were thinking?
You see, the reason they teamed up with Mi Yao was to have Mi Yao distract the pursuers at crucial moments, so they could hide.

Because no matter how you look at it, Mi Yao is the strongest of the three.

It's only natural to arrest him first.

Not to mention that Mi Yao was just a temporary teammate from a random match, so they had no qualms about selling him out.

Comic's words seemed to have revealed their thoughts, so he showed no sign of communicating with them.

Upon seeing this, the male passerby opened his mouth, wanting to say something more, but was tugged at by the female passerby next to him.

The two exchanged a glance, but ultimately didn't dare to say anything more. They could only retreat to the side, discussing their backup plan in hushed tones.

Their situation was also noticed by the other teams.

This made Chen Kong a little nervous for a moment.

After all, he, Anqin, and the cameraman were just a temporary team.

If they encounter danger later, will his teammates, like Mi Yao's teammates, think of 'selling' him first?

Once the seeds of doubt are sown, they are not so easy to remove.
Before Chen Kong could come up with a solution, the raccoon's voice came over.

"Alright, preparation time is over. The second assessment begins!"

With a slightly teasing tone from the raccoon administrator, Mi Yao and his two companions were immediately teleported to a location within the surrounding maze.

At the same time, a large screen appeared above everyone's heads, showing live footage of the maze.

[Assessment Maze City Ruins Area]

As soon as Mi Yao and his two companions landed, they immediately looked around.

Cracked asphalt roads, collapsed modern high-rise buildings, graffiti remaining on the walls, and a few wild grasses sprouting from the cracks in the ruins.

This scene looks exactly like a post-apocalyptic city ruin.

"Let's find a concealed spot to observe the situation first. The star energy detector scans every five seconds, so running around blindly will only reveal our location."

After briefly observing the surroundings, the female passerby among the three spoke up first.

As she spoke, she pulled a palm-sized tablet out of her backpack.

This is a 'terrain and life detector' that she specially prepared, which can draw a three-dimensional model of the surroundings in real time, as well as life forms within a certain distance.

She pressed a button on the tablet, and pale blue stellar energy waves spread out.

Before long, a simple model of the surrounding ruins appeared on the screen.

But the next second, the woman's face turned pale, and the tablet in her hand fell to the ground with a 'thud'.

"What, what's wrong?"

The male passerby quickly picked up the tablet and looked at the screen.

When he saw what was happening on the screen, his pupils constricted instantly.

The 3D model was filled with countless red dots.

Among these red dots, there was one that glowed with an eerie blood red color and was slowly moving toward them.

"The fluctuations of a Cataclysmic Star Beast?!"

"How come there's a Cataclysmic Star Beast in this assessment? Was it let in by the administrator, or was there an accident?"

The passerby's voice was filled with terror, clearly not expecting such a situation. Unlike the two men's panic, Mi Yao calmly put away his handheld game console and looked up into the depths of the ruins.

"That's interesting. I didn't know there was such a big 'surprise' hidden here."

After saying this, Mi Yao did not inform his two 'teammates'.

He turned and walked in one direction from the ruins.

Meanwhile, in front of the holographic screen in the lounge...

Chen Kong stared at the ruins on the screen and suddenly froze.

His gaze was fixed on a dilapidated sign in the corner of the screen, on which the words "Sunshine Kindergarten" could still be clearly seen.

The color, font, and even the paint chips on the sign were exactly the same as the kindergarten he attended when he was a child!
The cameraman noticed his odd behavior, turned the camera to the screen, and asked curiously, "What's wrong? Do you know this place?"

Chen Kong did not answer, and blurry fragments of memory suddenly flashed through his mind.

The collapsed school building, the mother's cries, and the dense swarm of star beasts.
Without dwelling on the memory, Chen Kong shook his head and said, "No, it's nothing. Maybe I just saw it wrong."

Did you see it wrong?

Seeing Chen Kong deep in thought, the cameraman immediately became thoughtful.

But did Chen Kong really misjudge?
Of course not.

Because whether it's the kindergarten on the screen, the primary school not far away, or even a park further away, they are all exactly the same as the city where he lived in his childhood!
"What's wrong, Heavenly Dao?"

"It's nothing, I just suddenly saw something familiar."

Upon hearing this, Caroline immediately looked at the city ruins on the screen.

In just a moment, Caroline found regional features in her 'quantum database' that were highly similar to these ruins.

If the information is correct, then the prototype of this ruin is the SSS-class occupied zone, Meteor Land.

The predecessor of Meteor Land was an ordinary little city in the New Federation called Sky City.

Moreover, this city seems to be the place where Tiandao lived in his childhood.
Thinking of this, Caroline immediately began to ponder.

Because she didn't think the appearance of the city ruins was a coincidence.

At the same time, the secondary audience members at the 13th station also began to ponder.

'Wait a minute, isn't this the city where Lao Tian and Lao Kong lived when they were kids?'

'That should be correct; that park and tutoring center appeared in the previous flashback episode.'

Is it a coincidence, or some kind of hint?

Viewers familiar with the anime production process know that for a mature anime production team, every shot has meaning.

Because these shots require a huge number of people and a lot of resources to produce themselves.

Unless it's a production team that's just dabbling in anime and doesn't care about costs.

Otherwise, any footage like these that gets released must have been rigorously reviewed.

With the addition of this hide-and-seek scene, the core area seems to be the city where Tiandao and the others lived when they were young. No matter how you look at it, it seems to be something the production team did on purpose.

Is this setting the stage for a special plot later, or is there something special about this assessment?

"It's hard to say; this assessment might not be as easy as it seems."

'Do you think the Cataclysmic Star Beast that appeared this time might be the same one I encountered in the Heavenly Dao's flashback arc when I was a child?'

'The one ahead seems to actually be possible.'

Beyond speculating about the plot, some viewers from the anime/manga/game (Anime/Manga) community have made even more connections.

So far, the scenes depicting the childhood of Tiandao and the others have only appeared briefly in flashback episodes.

Following the formula of classic shonen anime, these places will definitely have foreshadowing in the end.

Furthermore, Sky City has now become an occupied zone, the Land of Meteorites.

The explorers' mission is to explore the occupied territories.

Therefore, in the subsequent plot, there might be instances where Tiandao and others revisit the same places.

P.S.: That concludes today's update. I was going to catch up on yesterday's, but I'm too tired to write anymore, so I'll leave it for now.

(End of this chapter)