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

Almost at the same second that Xiao Chen was swallowed by the swamp, "Salted Fish Sauce" on the recommendation page was laughing wildly.

"Guys! We're reopening for the third time today! And it's a beautiful sunny day again!"

Salty Fish Sauce pointed at the sunny meadow on the screen, his face full of pride.

Whenever it's rainy or I don't get any wild duck eggs, Salty Fish Sauce immediately restarts the game.

"Let's go! Let's charge straight across this meadow!"

Salted fish sauce took the lead, and he kept mentioning it.

"What do you mean 'only believe in sticks'? That old scoundrel Luo is just scaring people—"

Before he could finish speaking, he stepped onto a flat, lush green lawn.

Holy crap!

Salty Fish Sauce's hand trembled, and most of his body instantly sank in, the mud covering his chest.

"Help, help me!"

"A stick, a stick!"

At this moment, if it were on Kuang Ge's side, the old squad leader would have already rushed to the ground to save people.

But the man in the scene, who should have been like a father and brother to the fish sauce, just walked forward mechanically, as if he hadn't heard the fish sauce's cries for help at all.

Little Tiger mechanically passed by, and Little Bean mechanically passed by as well.

They stiffly bypassed the struggling salted fish sauce and continued walking.

"Come back! I'm the player! I'm the protagonist!"

The salted fish sauce struggled frantically in the mud, but sank deeper and deeper.

"Help, help me!"

"I have wild duck eggs! I have a strategy guide!!"

The mud reached up to the neck of the salted fish sauce, and then up to his mouth and nose, while the old squad leader's team marched further and further away.

Salty Fish Sauce was so angry that he took off his VR headset in a fit of impotent rage.

"BUG! It's definitely a BUG!"

"I screamed for help, why didn't you save me?!"

But at this moment, the trend of comments in the live stream of Salty Fish Sauce changed.

"I, I noticed it too... I restarted the game for the third time today, and Xiaohu is ignoring me."

"Me too! I deliberately sold out to the old squad leader to farm wild duck eggs, and he just ignored me and walked away the third time..."

……

Luo An Studio.

After updating the official website homepage, Luo An looked at the system judgment module he had purchased with a large amount of emotional points and sneered.

[Player "Salted Fish Sauce" has been detected maliciously resetting the dungeon multiple times]

[The detected emotional interaction value with the NPC is: 0]

[Judgment: Not qualified to carry on the "flame of civilization"]

[Execution: Withdraw "Heroic Spirit Projection Fragment" and downgrade it to "Basic Pathfinding AI"]

……

Returning our attention to Kuang Ge's live stream, Xiao Chen is gone.

Crazy Brother knelt in the mud, clutching the shoe tightly.

Suddenly, someone flooded the live stream chat, telling Kuang Ge about their newly discovered "NPC intelligence reduction mechanism" and urging them not to restart the game.

If they reopen it, their favorite old squad leader will lose his soul.

But Kuang Ge never even considered that idea.

"stand up."

A hoarse voice rang out above Kuang Ge's head.

Kuang Ge looked up and saw that the old squad leader's face was as hard as iron and his eyes were as red as blood.

He bent down, took the cloth shoe from Kuang Ge's hand with his one arm, and carefully stuffed it into his pocket.

"Xiao Chen is a good kid."

The old squad leader sniffed and slammed the stick he was holding onto the ground.

But we still have to keep going.

"If Xiao Chen dies here, his death will have been in vain."

The old squad leader turned around, his back somewhat hunched, and took the scout stick, symbolizing his leadership, from Eagle Eye's hand.

"Stay close! Follow in my footsteps!"

"No one is allowed to run around anymore! Do you hear me?!"

"I heard you!" Little Bean cried out.

The old squad leader then pulled Kuang Ge aside and handed the marching pot back to him, clearly intending to lead the way himself.

At that moment, the viewers in the three live stream rooms suddenly understood.

Why is it that the hellish difficulty of Crazy Bro's game is so captivating, while Salty Fish Sauce's heavenly start is so unsettling?

Because there are "people" here.

There are people who are afraid of death, who cry, who make mistakes, and who curse, but who will entrust their lives to you in crucial moments.

Meanwhile, the official website homepage of "Red Expedition" has quietly updated with a line of blood-red promotional text:

If truth is manipulated three times, history will respond with deception—when the bloodshed fades, what will be lost will no longer be the characters, but our own eyes.

……

The wind stopped.

The relaxed atmosphere of the "outing" was completely lost.

Ruan Ruan walked in the middle of the group, with Eagle Eye watching the way in front and Crazy Brother bringing up the rear.

But her gaze never left the old squad leader at the front.

Back then, even though the old squad leader had lost an arm and was exhausted, he used his probing stick to "test" – he would poke it in, test the depth, pull it out, and then continue.

His movements were swift and agile, carrying the fierce determination of a veteran.

But now, things are different.

Every time the old squad leader stabbed the stick into the mud, he would visibly press his body down on the stick.

That wasn't exploring the way; that was leveraging existing resources.

He was putting most of his weight onto that wooden stick.

Each time he pulled the stick, he had to restrain his shoulders from shrugging, as if he were having a tug-of-war with the sticky mud.

His legs were shaking.

Even through the mud-covered trouser leg, Ruanruan could see that her calf was trembling with suppressed pain.

"Hawkeye..." Ruan Ruan leaned forward, her voice extremely low and tinged with panic, "You go to the front."

Eagle Eye, who was intently staring at the grass beneath his feet, paused for a moment upon hearing this, then followed Ruan Ruan's gaze to the old squad leader's back.

As a former professional player, his observation skills are top-notch.

He was initially captivated by the sea of ​​flowers, but now that he's calmed down and taken a closer look, Hawkeye's heart sank to the bottom.

The old squad leader's pace became disordered.

Although he still took each step firmly, the slight staggering sensation could not fool Eagle Eye's eyes.

"Squad leader." Hawkeye took two quick steps and caught up to the old squad leader from the side. "Give me the stick."

"I'll scout ahead, you keep watch from behind."

The old squad leader didn't stop or turn around; his breathing was just slightly labored.

"Can you tell the color of mud?"

"Huh?" Hawkeye was taken aback.

"The mud in this meadow is in seven or eight different colors."

The old squad leader pointed to the grass in front of him that looked exactly the same.

"The grayish-black stuff is old mud, which is hard; the yellowish stuff is floating mud, which is hollow underneath; and the stuff with a bit of green foam has puddles underneath."

The old squad leader stopped, turned his head, and his sallow face was covered in cold sweat. His eyes were sunken, but he still managed to squeeze out a disgusted smile.

"You little idiot, you're a pro at shooting, but your eyesight... in this area, you're blind."

"I..." Hawkeye opened his mouth.

If he can't distinguish the so-called mud color, can't he use a probing stick to poke it?

"Go, go back to your seat."

The old squad leader waved his hand and shifted his weight back onto the stick.

"I'm not dead yet, it's not your turn to die in front of me, you new recruit."

Hawkeye gritted his teeth and stepped back.

"No." Hawkeye stepped back to Softie's side, shook his head, and looked grim. "He won't give it to me."

"It's not that he's unwilling to give it to me," Kuang Ge, who had been silent until now, suddenly spoke up.

"He was afraid that we'd fall too..."