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

Songpan Grassland, Day 7.

This den of iniquity, known as "Grassland," has finally shed its last disguise as a "summer outing."

There is no blue sky, no white clouds, only seemingly endless black mud and a deathly silence ready to devour life at any moment.

Crazy Brother felt like his legs no longer belonged to him.

With each step, you have to pull your legs out of the more than half-meter-deep mud.

The sticky, adsorbing sensation felt like countless rotting hands were gripping his ankles from the mud.

"Huff... huff..."

The breath that Kuang Ge exhaled instantly turned into white frost in the cold wind.

A straw rope was tied around his waist, with the other end of the rope attached to his soft waist.

Ruan Ruan's hair was disheveled and stuck to her face, her face was covered in mud, and her eyes were half open and half closed.

He was almost in a semi-conscious state, and was only being dragged forward by Kuang Ge.

Old Li's belt soup did save their lives, but it couldn't turn them into superheroes.

"...There's no way out."

Hawkeye, who was walking at the front, suddenly stopped.

He leaned on a cane, his eyes filled with a murky, bloodshot look.

Ahead lay a vast expanse of water plants.

It looked like solid ground, but when Hawkeye tentatively stuck the stick in, the entire stick disappeared instantly, without even touching the bottom.

This is a dead end.

"Turn left...around."

The old squad leader's voice came from the side front.

Kuang Ge subconsciously raised his head and looked at the figure that had always stood at the front of the group like a lighthouse.

But he was stunned.

The old squad leader's back was trembling.

The trembling was very unnatural; it wasn't because of the cold, nor because of fear.

The old squad leader gripped the stick tightly with his left hand, his body bent like a boiled shrimp.

His empty right sleeve was twitching violently and wildly.

It was as if an unseen ghostly hand was struggling desperately inside the sleeve, trying to tear the fabric and emerge.

"The class monitor?"

Kuang Ge's heart tightened, and he wanted to step forward to help him up.

"Don't come any closer!"

The old squad leader suddenly roared, his voice filled with barely suppressed pain.

He turned around abruptly, his sallow face covered in cold sweat.

Sweat washed away the mud on his face, leaving streaks of pale white marks.

In the live stream, viewers with medical knowledge immediately sent comments.

"Holy crap, this is amputation-related neuralgia! It's most likely to flare up on rainy days or in extremely cold and damp conditions!"

"I heard that the pain is like sawing at non-existent bone, or like being burned or electrocuted; it's unbearable because you don't have a hand anymore, so you can't even rub it!"

"The old squad leader... he's been holding it in?"

The old squad leader leaned against a dead sapling, panting heavily.

His gaze was somewhat unfocused, yet he stared intently at his empty sleeve.

In that instant, he felt as if he had returned to the eve of the war-torn Luding Bridge.

That's where he lost his hand, and that's where he lost half his life.

"Squad leader, take a break."

Hawkeye came over and offered to help.

"Get lost!"

The old squad leader squeezed out two words through gritted teeth, his body trembling violently.

The empty sleeve flicked, as if an unseen hand had given Hawkeye a hard shove.

"This little pain is nothing!"

The old squad leader raised his head, and a fierce glint appeared in his cloudy eyes.

"Back then, Guan Yu endured bone-scraping surgery without uttering a sound. If I have to rest even for this little bit of pain, how am I supposed to lead you out of the grasslands?!"

"Get out of here! All of you, get out of here!"

With his remaining left hand, he fiercely pulled the stick from the ground and started walking again.

That limping, yet stubbornly refusing to fall back left Crazy Brother and Hawkeye speechless.

Just as they were struggling to get around that stagnant pool.

The sky has leaked.

Without any warning, the already gloomy sky collapsed instantly.

A dark, torrential downpour, mixed with ice crystals, poured down.

"Splash—"

The icy rain was like countless whips, lashing everyone hard.

The temperature dropped by more than ten degrees in just a few minutes.

The clothes, which were already soaked, now felt like ice clinging to my body.

"what……"

Little Bean suddenly screamed and plunged headfirst into the muddy water.

"Little Bean!"

Xiao Hu rushed to pull him up, only to find that Xiao Douzi was burning up with fever.

That's either a high fever caused by hypothermia, or hypothermia caused by a high fever.

On this grassland, where there is a lack of medical care, medicine, and food, this is essentially a death sentence.

"I can't take it... Brother... I can't take it..."

Little Bean cried, tears mixed with rainwater flowing into his mouth.

"I'm so cold... I want to eat glutinous rice cakes... I want to go home..."

The crying sounded like a contagious virus.

Ruan Ruan, who had been gritting her teeth and persevering, finally broke down and knelt in the mud, unable to get up.

"I can't see it anymore..."

Hawkeye wiped the rain off his face and looked around in despair.

The torrential rain obscured all visibility.

I can't even see things five meters away, let alone tell which way to go.

The mud underfoot, soaked by the rain, turned every path into a trap.

Furthermore, they lost their way.

Getting lost in the grasslands on the seventh day without supplies meant total annihilation.

Kuang Ge stood in the rain, looking at the fallen Xiao Douzi, the half-dead Ruan Ruan, and the old squad leader convulsing in excruciating pain.

An unprecedented sense of powerlessness overwhelmed him like a tidal wave.

Is this history?

Is this the desperate situation faced by our ancestors in that era?

There were no cheats, no miracles.

There was only cold, only hunger, only death.

The thunder rumbled, as if mocking their overestimation of their abilities.

But at that moment, the old squad leader suddenly stopped.

"Shh!"

The old squad leader suddenly turned his head to the side, his left ear pointing in the direction from which the wind and rain were blowing.

That face, contorted with excruciating pain, now froze into an eerily serious expression.

"...Don't make a sound."

The old squad leader's voice wasn't loud, but it carried an imposing aura that commanded respect.

Kuang Ge was stunned and instinctively shut his mouth.

Even the crying little bean had its mouth covered by the tiger.

What else could there be besides the sound of pouring rain and howling wind?

Hawkeye frowned. His hearing was quite sharp even in the game, but all he could hear was the sound of wind and rain.

"Squad leader, what's wrong? Is it... the enemy?"

Hawkeye picked up the old pistol that had only a few bullets left and put his finger on the trigger.

If they were to encounter an enemy at this moment, Hawkeye would actually feel hopeful.

That means they're about to leave the grassland!