Future!
Halloway, Hinata Asuka, and Hoshino Tanaka—these three were just ordinary bandits on a border planet somewhere in the main universe.
Yes, just ordinary bandits.
They didn’t even count as space bandits.
After all, to become a space bandit, the first requirement was a spaceship, and the second, a Star-Energy User.
But that didn’t stop them from dreaming of one day becoming space bandits.
So, for ten years.
They had worked hard, robbing and plundering, oppressing the common folk, all to save up enough money to buy a spaceship.
Who could have guessed, just as they were about to take their first step toward that dream, they themselves were double-crossed.
No more spaceship, no more money—not even themselves.
Dozens of them were caught and sold to this hellhole to become someone else’s test subjects.
After enduring a series of inhuman experiments, they were thrown into this hellish jungle, with only a single promise.
If they could hunt down a child in special clothing within the forest, they would regain their freedom.
Normally, words like that were meant to be taken with a grain of salt.
But what if it was real?
They had already hit rock bottom; whatever path they took would only lead up. Rather than end up as some strange beast’s midnight snack, it was better to take a risk and gamble everything on one shot.
People in desperate situations will always cling to any sliver of hope.
With such thoughts in mind, Halloway, their leader, crouched low and gently parted the bushes before him.
Under the towering tree in the distance.
A sturdy, rough-faced trainee sat cross-legged, gnawing ferociously on raw meat from a bag.
They’d found their ticket home!
“498 took so many rations; he’s really in for it tonight!”
Yun Ruoxi, hugging nine bags of food, moved lightly through the dense forest.
There was a reason she only took nine bags of rations.
The packaging on these ration bags was laced with pheromones.
To ordinary people, it was undetectable, but to the beasts in the Misty Forest—who tracked their prey primarily by scent—it was as if someone had highlighted the bags for them.
The camp hadn’t gone entirely overboard.
If you followed the rules and took only nine bags,
You’d still attract some beasts thanks to the pheromones, but at least you wouldn’t draw anything too terrifying.
Unfortunately, desperate trainees like 498 had simply ignored that small line of text.
Only after suffering a few losses would they slowly come to realize the consequences.
Yun Ruoxi found a flat spot, enjoyed a hearty meal, then jogged through the mist for a while to let the moisture wash away any lingering pheromones on her body.
As she ran, a flash of silver suddenly caught her eye in her peripheral vision.
A weapon supply?
She immediately stopped, turned, and ran toward it.
***
Moments later.
On the trunk of a fifty-meter-tall tree, Yun Ruoxi found a silver-white, square iron box embedded within.
“No wonder I couldn’t find it for two days—it was stuck in the tree! So well hidden.”
After a grueling effort, she finally pried the box free and opened it with excitement.
In her arms.
Inside was a metal bracer like a wrist guard, with a conspicuous circular protrusion on the outer side.
It looked intact; there weren’t many other components in the box.
Yun Ruoxi couldn’t immediately tell what it was, so she simply put it on and tried it out.
Click!
With a light mechanical sound, the circular bulge instantly unfolded, transforming into a bronze-colored round shield half a meter wide.
“Hm? This… a folding arm shield?”
Yun Ruoxi recognized the bracer and couldn’t help but laugh wryly.
Just a moment ago, she had been mocking Lin Zhen’s old gloves in her heart, and now here she was, equipped with a “relic” that had been obsolete for at least several thousand years.
Still, better to have it than nothing.
At a single thought, the shield, detecting her neural signal, retracted automatically back into its bracer form.
She carefully wrapped the remaining components in a leaf and tied them to her waist, then set off again.
Now armed—even if it was just a shield—Yun Ruoxi began to seriously consider the matter of Hunting the Sinners.
The biggest challenge in Hunting the Sinners was actually finding the sinners.
The Misty Forest was huge, almost as large as Xiangnan in her previous life, and with tens of thousands of sinners scattered throughout, even a massive commotion would barely make a splash.
To successfully accomplish the goal of Hunting the Sinners, the best time to act was right from the start.
Otherwise, as time went on, the remaining sinners would only grow fewer—and stronger.
Thinking as she walked, Yun Ruoxi soon came to a small creek and was just about to lower her head to wash her face.
Suddenly, a piercing scream shattered the silence of the woods.
A human voice!
Yun Ruoxi’s expression shifted; without hesitation, she waded across the creek and moved swiftly toward the source of the sound.
During the day, there were rarely beast activities in the Misty Forest.
So this was most likely a conflict between humans.
Or, to put it another way, a fight between trainees and sinners.
Did that mean someone had already found traces of a sinner and begun the hunt?
Yun Ruoxi approached, hoping to seize an opportunity, learn something, and perhaps even find out which fierce trainee was involved.
But when she parted the undergrowth, the scene before her made her heart jolt with shock.
It was a battle so brutal as to border on barbaric.
An adult in tattered clothes had been punched straight through the chest and now lay motionless on the grass.
The spreading pool of blood stained the ground crimson.
Nearby, three more people were tangled together in a desperate fight.
A burly man with cybernetic eyes and nose lay on the ground, hands locked tightly around a trainee’s neck, pinning him in place.
Another slightly slimmer, black-haired middle-aged man with some East Asian features straddled the trainee’s body.
He held a sharp piece of scrap iron, pressing it toward the other’s chest with his full weight.
The trainee being restrained had a face flushed red, veins bulging, eyes popping, and gripped the descending iron sheet with both hands, as hot blood streamed from his sliced palms.
498.
“It’s actually 498?” Yun Ruoxi’s pupils contracted.
She hadn’t expected the “hunt” she envisioned to look so brutal, nor did she expect the trainee to be someone she’d just parted ways with.
But thinking about it, it made sense.
They’d both discovered the airdrop first, were closest to each other, and both headed toward the rhombus base. Maybe, the distance between them had never really widened at all.
498’s arms were already starting to tremble, clearly the onset of weakness from lack of oxygen.
“Can’t hold on much longer, huh…” Yun Ruoxi narrowed her eyes, rising silently onto her toes and slipping quickly toward the battlefield.
498 was clearly stronger than the three sinners.
Otherwise, there was no way he could have killed one of them bare-handed in a one-against-three fight.
But now.
He was locked down tight, with no way out, forced to watch as that damned scrap of iron inched closer and closer to his chest.
No, no!
The fear of death sent violent shudders through 498’s body, as if he’d been electrocuted.
“Help…!” 498’s lips moved, issuing a barely audible, airless plea.
Tears welled up in his eyes and streamed wildly down his cheeks.
Was there anyone, anyone who could save him?
He didn’t want to die!
He really didn’t want to die!