“Actually, let’s not~” Bai Youwei said with a laugh. “Just your little performance alone has had Yuri worried sick. If we pile on too, I’m genuinely afraid he’ll go gray overnight.”

A’da said cheerfully: “Knowing his personality, he really might worry himself gray.”

After laughing, he reined himself in and let out a sigh. “He’s just too guileless… I’ve switched teams so many times, and the reason I’ve stayed here this long is precisely because he’s honest and dependable. Who could have predicted that what was once a strength would turn into such a massive headache.”

A’da gave a rueful shake of his head. “Forget it, let’s not talk about him — talking about him just makes me angry.”

His tone didn’t actually sound angry, though.

Perhaps the feelings had been so deeply bottled up that even after forgiving, some resentment inevitably lingered.

“Oh, right.” A’da suddenly remembered something. “Last night I went to the service station and found out that another team just broke a record. I was going to tell you all about it, but I saw your door closed so early, so — I didn’t want to interrupt.” He gave a knowing grin.

Bai Youwei: “……”

Shen Mo asked calmly: “Oh? Which team?”

“Shake the World!” A’da said. “Even though I have no love for that Nick character, I have to admit the kid actually has some real ability. After we broke the record, they rested for a few days without doing anything — then yesterday they went straight to Demon Island, said to be the highest-difficulty dungeon in history, and scored 937!”

“Demon Island…” Bai Youwei searched her memory carefully. “I remember you all mentioned it before — Demon Island’s previous record was 935 points. So they exceeded it by 2 points.”

A’da looked at her in surprise. “Wow~ Weiwei, your memory is impressive.”

Shen Mo frowned. “There’s only one team spot per year. Now two teams have broken records — which one will the people from the world above choose?”

“Naturally, whichever team finishes all the dungeons first,” A’da replied. “So now it’s a race against time — we need to finish our remaining dungeons before the Shake the World team finishes theirs.”

“But they’ll be faster than us, won’t they?” Bai Youwei pondered. “Their team apparently only has around twenty-odd dungeons left to clear.”

A’da shook his head, the corner of his mouth curving slightly — a smile that was and wasn’t a smile. “I’m not done yet. Yes, they broke a record, but at tremendous cost. One of their core members died inside the dungeon, and another one is alive but severely injured — reportedly could go at any time. So I estimate their team will be in a recruitment phase for the near future… Plus, they only exceeded the previous record by 2 points. There’s still room for improvement — unlike us, with 999. Rock solid~”

After hearing A’da’s full analysis, Bai Youwei murmured thoughtfully: “Recruiting new members…”

Last time, when the Shake the World team broke the record for Queen’s Nest, a new member of their team was severely injured. Now they’d broken another record, and their roster had definitely been reshuffled — by that count, the turnover rate within that team was extremely frequent…

She was still turning this over in her mind when the villa’s doorbell rang from downstairs. Ding-ling-ling.

Who would come by at a time like this?

The three of them went downstairs as one, and found that someone had already been let in by Yuri and was walking into the front courtyard —

The visitor was a man around forty years old. His hair was cut extremely short. He had a large, powerfully built frame, his robust muscles filling out his clothes to capacity. His steps were steady and forceful.

He strode into the house, lifted his head slightly to reveal a pair of sharp, dark brown eyes, swept a glance across Shen Mo, Bai Youwei, and A’da, then drew his gaze back without any change of expression.

He said flatly to Yuri beside him: “Let’s talk in your room.”

Yuri nodded and led him to his room.

Natasha didn’t follow. She remained silently outside the door, and explained to the three of them standing at the top of the stairs: “That’s Jason. He came by today because he has something urgent to tell Yuri. I’m guessing… it has something to do with the dungeon walkthroughs.”

—