Yes.

Regardless of what that voice belonged to, everyone had heard it say: upgrading player data.

This phrase was truly unpleasant. They weren’t machines—what did “data upgrading” mean?

Cheng Weicai hesitantly spoke up, “Speaking of which… after coming out of the maze, I feel like my body has become younger…”

“Not really.” Tan Xiao looked at him seriously. “Your face still has plenty of wrinkles.”

Teacher Cheng was deeply embarrassed. “No, not that kind of young—my body, my arms and legs seem lighter and stronger than before.”

“Now that you mention it… I also feel like I’m somehow different…” Tan Xiao scratched the back of his head, glancing around. Seeing a tree by the roadside, he walked over and swung his fist directly at it!

Bang!

The tree didn’t break.

But the rough bark where his fist struck directly cracked! Branches and leaves trembled, with leaves rustling down!

Tan Xiao’s eyes widened in shock—his eyeballs nearly popped out!

“No way…” He murmured, raising his fist again. This time using his full strength, he fiercely struck the tree trunk—

“Behold my Mighty Vajra Invincible Fist!!!”

Bang!

The trunk cracked inside too!

The effect was quite astonishing. However, at the same time, Tan Xiao also painfully clutched his fist and crouched down.

…It hurt.

Seeing this, everyone began trying things out. Some tested strength, some tested speed, some tested physical resilience, and some simply jumped in place to see how high they could jump.

Even Teacher Cheng got down on the ground to do push-ups.

For a moment, the scene looked quite ridiculous.

Only two people didn’t move:

One was Bai Youwei, the other was Shen Mo.

“Looks like the maze’s rewards are more substantial than game rewards. Previous games only rewarded one-time-use items, but the maze can comprehensively enhance physical abilities.” Shen Mo said indifferently. “If someone with this level of physical ability participated in the ‘Tortoise and Hare Race’ game, losing would be almost impossible.”

Bai Youwei slowly nodded. “…Not only that—those who possess puzzle pieces also have one opportunity to abstain from a game.”

When the puzzle piece was held in hand, its function automatically appeared in their minds—

[1. Collecting all puzzle pieces allows clearing all games]

[2. Each puzzle piece additionally possesses one game immunity right]

In this world where life-or-death games could occur at any moment, being able to obtain one chance to be exempted from participating in a game was essentially equivalent to having an extra life!

“But…” Bai Youwei’s fingertip gently rubbed across the puzzle piece. “The information doesn’t tell us how many pieces count as collecting the complete puzzle…”

“Tu Dan said Hangzhou also has fog.” Shen Mo speculated. “If densely populated areas all have mazes appearing, perhaps we can deduce the number of mazes from the number of cities.”

Bai Youwei thought for a moment, then turned to ask Cheng Weicai, “Teacher Cheng, in the domestic city population rankings, where does Hangzhou roughly rank?”

Cheng Weicai was startled, then replied, “Around 20th, I’d say.”

“This ranking probably doesn’t have reference value.” Shen Mo said. “Chongqing, Beijing, Shanghai, and Guangzhou are the cities with the largest populations and were the first to have incidents. Afterward, a large portion of Shanghai’s population migrated to Suzhou and Hangzhou, so Hangzhou’s current population ranking should be far above 20.”

Hearing their discussion, Tan Xiao assumed naturally and asked, “So are we going to Hangzhou?”

Only by entering mazes could they obtain puzzle pieces.

If they wanted to collect all the puzzle pieces, they naturally had to head toward cities with fog.

Shen Mo thought for a moment, then looked toward Chen Hui, Zhang Tianyang, and the other students, asking, “What are your plans going forward?”