It was supposed to be a casual game, but the Long March dungeon brought tears to everyone's eye

It's still raining.

Without Xiao Wu, the line shortened and became quieter.

Ruan Ruan walked between Eagle Eye and Mad Brother, her right hand always pressed against her left chest.

Every ten or so steps, she would nervously press her finger against her soaked military uniform.

It was hard, still there.

Two taps, still there.

This movement occurs at an extremely high frequency, even bordering on pathological.

"Ruan Ruan, is your heart bothering you?"

Kuang Ge, panting heavily, wiped the rain off his face.

He saw that Ruan Ruan's face was pale, her lips were purple, and her right hand was constantly clutching her chest.

They thought Ruan Ruan had developed a heart problem from the fright she had just witnessed, or that it was due to organ spasms caused by hypothermia.

"Come on, give me the things."

As he spoke, Kuang Ge reached out to pull on the straps on Ruan Ruan's shoulders, wanting to share some of the weight on her shoulders.

"Don't touch me!"

Ruanruan suddenly shrank back, like a frightened cat.

Crazy Brother's hand froze in mid-air, stunned by the shout.

Ruan Ruan seemed to realize that she had overreacted.

She bit her pale lips, staring in terror at Kuang Ge's mud-covered hands, then glanced at her own chest.

"There are matches in here."

"I...I'm fine, I'm just a little nervous..."

After listening to Ruan Ruan's explanation, Kuang Ge remained silent for a while, then suddenly understood the meaning behind Ruan Ruan's somewhat neurotic touching of her chest.

That was something even heavier than that large black pot that weighed dozens of kilograms.

"...Okay, I won't touch it." Madman withdrew his hand and encouraged, "You...protect it yourself."

At this moment, the old squad leader who was walking at the front suddenly stopped.

There is a slightly elevated "dry area" above the water, or rather, a place where the mud is a little harder.

"Ten-minute break." The old squad leader's voice sounded a little weak. "Everyone... gather your strength."

No one cheered, no one spoke, everyone collapsed onto the muddy ground.

Hawkeye leans on Crazy Bro, and Crazy Bro leans on the marching pot.

Kuang Ge's eyes were fixed on the pot, and on a leather strap tied to the pot's handle.

Those were Old Li's belongings.

After all that running around, they must have been starving.

The belt slows down the rate at which their "willpower" breaks down by 50%, but it cannot stop their hunger.

What was destined to collapse, still collapsed.

Hunger has always been a constant theme when climbing snow-capped mountains and crossing grasslands.

"You crazy kid, you want to eat."

The old squad leader noticed the look in Kuang Ge's eyes.

His words were not a doubt, but a statement.

After a moment of silence, Kuang Ge gritted his teeth and spoke frankly.

"Yes, I want to eat! The whole class is starving!"

"Look at Xiaohu, look at Xiaodouzi, they can't even crawl anymore!"

"It's just a belt, not a gold bar..."

That's what he said, but what Crazy Brother said next was in a low voice.

"But it's not the time to eat it yet..."

Even if they can't fight hunger through willpower.

Even in their current state, they'd all get their comeuppance sooner or later.

Even the system's final note was, "Take it and cook it, it might save your life."

But now is not the time.

The old squad leader looked at Crazy Brother with considerable surprise, finding him so calm and rational.

He stared at the pot silently for several seconds before slowly speaking, expressing his agreement.

"That's right, that's a memento that Old Li left us."

"Don't move."

The old sergeant glanced at the listless young soldiers beside him and sighed softly.

Seeing that the rain had stopped, the old squad leader unbuckled his belt.

Eat up.

What can I do if I don't eat?

The cooking pot was quickly set up, and the diced leather belt was thrown into it.

"Glug... Glug..."

A familiar scent wafted through the air, as if I had returned to the snow-capped mountains.

Kuang Ge and his gang were already used to eating belts.

This is their most treasured "food".

"Cook it a little longer." The old squad leader stirred it with a twig. "This stuff is hard; it'll hurt your teeth."

After cooking for a full twenty minutes, the old squad leader finally spoke.

"Alright, eat."

There was no politeness, no formality.

Faced with life and death, everyone reverts to their animal instincts.

Ruanruan received a bowl of soup and three pieces of diced leather.

Madman and Hawkeye devoured their food.

As he ate, Kuang Ge looked at the old squad leader's pants, which were casually tied with a straw rope around his waist, and his eyes reddened.

"Squad leader, you eat too," Crazy Brother called out indistinctly.

The old squad leader only drank one sip of soup.

He secretly transferred his share of the "meat" into Xiao Hu's bowl.

I'm not hungry yet.

The old squad leader told a clumsy lie, then looked up at the gloomy sky in the distance.

After the rain stopped, the dark clouds finally parted, letting in a beam of pale sunlight.

"The sun's shining?" Hawkeye swallowed the last mouthful of his leather soup, wiping his mouth with a hint of surprise. "That old bastard Luo has finally acted like a human being?"

But the old squad leader's expression changed instantly.

He gripped the probing stick tightly, his cloudy eyes fixed on the gaps in the clouds.

"not good!"

The old squad leader's voice was shrill and cracked, filled with a terror that Kuang Ge and the others had never heard before.

"Take cover!! Everyone lie down!! Get down in the mud!!"

Before he could finish speaking, the old squad leader had already pinned Xiaodouzi to the ground.

Madman and Hawkeye hadn't reacted yet.

Lie down?

Why lie down?

On the horizon, the buzzing sound of an engine grew louder and louder as it approached, piercing through the clouds.

That voice was all too familiar to Kuang Ge and the other Blue Star people who lived in the city.

It's the sound of a propeller plane.

But here and now, on this desolate grassland, this sound does not represent civilization, but only death.

"An airplane! It's an enemy reconnaissance plane!"

Hawkeye's face turned pale as he finally understood what the old sergeant was afraid of.

This damn grassland is completely flat.

There were no trees, no hills, nothing that could be called shelter.

Their team was like a splash of ink on a blank sheet of paper; it was crystal clear from the air.

"Get down! Those who want to die, stand up!"

The old squad leader roared, pressed Xiaodouzi down with his body, and then buried his head hard in a puddle next to him.

The cold mud instantly submerged half of his face.

Crazy Brother's mind went blank for a moment, and before he could think any further, his adrenaline surged.

He grabbed Ruan Ruan, who was still confused about the situation, and tackled her to the ground with almost violent force.

"Thump!"

The two of them fell into knee-deep mud, and the foul-smelling, sticky liquid instantly filled Kuang Ge's mouth and nose.

The feeling of suffocation and nausea almost made him vomit on the spot.

"Don't move! Bury your face in!"

Kuang Ge squeezed out a few words through gritted teeth, then pressed down hard on Ruan Ruan's back of the head, forcing her to bury her face in the mud.

She let out a suppressed sob, but clutched her chest tightly, as if afraid of wetting the match.

Hawkeye followed the example of the old squad leader and slammed himself into the mud like a log.

The entire group of dozens of people disappeared onto the grass in just a few seconds.

They buried themselves alive in this stinking swamp.

"Buzz—Buzz—Buzz—"

The roar of the plane grew louder and louder, as if it were exploding right overhead.

Kuang Ge could feel the mud and water vibrating with the sound waves.

He could even picture the pilot on the plane, looking down at the green hell below with the indifferent gaze of someone looking at an ant.

Time seemed to stretch out infinitely at that moment.

one second.

two seconds.

ten seconds.

Kuang Ge's lungs had reached their limit, and his chest felt like it was about to explode.

He dared not move, not even to exhale a single bubble.

He held Ruan Ruan down tightly; Ruan Ruan's body had stopped struggling and become stiff.

In the live stream, the camera was completely blocked by mud and water, turning it into a pitch-black scene.

Only the audio is still working.

All the audience could hear was the buzzing of airplanes and the bubbling of muddy water.

This kind of waiting without seeing the scene is more suffocating than any bloody scene.

"Holy crap...we've run into the enemy already?"

"How are we supposed to fight this? With our heads? They're flying in the sky, and we're rolling in the mud!"

"Don't speak! Listen! The plane is still there!"