Chapter 200: The Adorable Trio
Chapter 200: The Adorable Trio
"The airdrop supplies have arrived!"
King Arthur patted his dragon steed, and it immediately rose up into the air, flying after the nearest airdropped supply.
Everyone else hurriedly also followed along.
.
The "airdrop" was a concept that was also derived from the battle royale game from a century ago.
After the game had been in progress for a set amount of time, the director would instruct the server to spawn planes like the ones seen in the Metaverse, and these planes would then airdrop supplies onto the map.
These loot crates were completely randomized, so there was no telling what was going to be inside them.
Some contained good supplies, some were duds, and there were even some that were empty.
However, in any case, this was essentially a free lottery, so everyone was happy to participate.
In particular, at this point in the game, many of the supply points had already been looted, so these airdropped supplies were even more valuable.
King Arthur was able to fly, so he reached the loot crates in the air before everyone else and caught the first one.
However, Diana was a massive target, and the airdrop had attracted the attention of everyone else in the area. As a result, as soon as King Arthur caught the first loot crate, a gunshot immediately rang out from down below, following which a sniper rifle bullet struck his dragon steed in the abdomen.
The bullet possessed immense penetrating power, managing to punch through Diana's scales and inflict an injury. However, thanks to her enormous size, such a small injury was far from life-threatening.
"Diana, protect your heart and your head!"
Golden light began to radiate from King Arthur's palms, and two pieces of golden armor instantly appeared on Diana's chest and head to protect her vitals.
The snipe rifle possessed immense penetrative power, but its bullets were lacking in destructive power, and therefore quite easy to defend against.
"The bullet came from that direction."
At this point, King Arthur had already caught the loot crate, and on the ground below, Adam and the others immediately sped toward the direction that the bullet had come from.
However, by the time they arrived on the scene, there was already no one to be found.
"They were probably a team that was solely focused on ambushing others."
Even though this was only Adam's first battle royale, he had seen some footage of previous editions of the event, and he knew that there were quite a few teams in all editions that were constantly lurking in the shadows to ambush others while avoiding direct confrontations unless they had a massive advantage.
Generally speaking, these teams weren't very powerful, but they all possessed very annoying abilities, such as Goblin's team from earlier, or this sniper, who switched locations after each shot. Adam recalled that in the previous edition of the battle royale, there was a team of thieves that focused solely on stealing from others.
These team combinations were able to exploit certain loopholes in the game, so they generally ended up doing quite well.
An example of this was the team of four thieves from the previous edition of the battle royale. All four of them possessed pitiful combat prowess, but they were all capable of concealment, and one of them was very fast, another one had the ability to mask the telegnosis of others, the third one could temporarily control one's mind so that they completely let down their guard, and the final member of the team was able to punch holes through walls.
They were like a team of rats that were constantly scurrying across the map, stealing from supply points, airdrops, and other battle royale participants.
Unfortunately, their greed got the better of them, and they decided to try and steal from a team with a member that had a very potent alert ability much like Rattlesnakes. As a result, two members of the team were killed. If it weren't for that lapse in decision-making, they would've had a perfect performance in the battle royale.
Compared with Rattlesnake, Hook's alert abilities were inferior, but his tracking abilities were superior. After making a mark on the spot, Hook pulled out a handful of powder before tossing it up into the wind.
"They've gone in that direction. Should we go after them?"
"No, let's wait until after the airdrops are done."
These teams that liked to ambush others were generally had very good self-preservation abilities. Otherwise, they wouldn't have dared to participate in the battle royale.
If it weren't for the fact that the airdrops were still ongoing, Adam would've been inclined to hunt them down. These thieves often had some cards on them, and Adam was very eager to get his hands onto some skill cards to help his cause.
"Should we split up and go to a few more airdrop sites?" Nie Yiyi was looking at the loot crates falling out of the sky with an eager expression. "If we wait any longer, the supplies could be taken by others."
"Splitting up is very risky, but then again, doing anything in the battle royale carries an element of risk. Let's split up and gather as much airdropped supplies as we can, then meet back up here once the airdrops are done."
With that decision made, the trio immediately dispersed. Even Hook, who possessed next to no combat prowess, had concealed himself in a cloud of mist and departed to try his luck. His usefulness in battle was extremely limited, but his abilities made him quite a good thief.
After everyone split up, Adam began to rush toward the nearest airdrop site in his direction.
At the same time, he invoked Mummy, Hellhound, and Sludge, and the three anomalies also rushed away in different directions.
"Go after those crates, but make sure not to get too far away from me, and come back right away if you run into any danger," Adam instructed through his psychic connection with the three anomalies.
Invoked anomalies couldn't stray too far away from the invocator, but thankfully, the crates that were visible to Adam weren't too far away. The only problem was that the three anomalies were all extremely weak. Even after absorbing some of the anomalic power in Sithu's psychic world, Hellhound and Sludge were still only level two anomalies, ranking them alongside powerful B tier combatants or bottom-dwelling A tier combatants. In a one-on-one basis, they were basically no match for any of the participants in this battle royale.
Mummy was obviously quite a bit more formidable than the other two anomalies, but given its terrible condition, its powers were severely limited.
This was why Adam had instructed them to come back at the first sign of danger. Essentially, Adam had only sent them to try their luck and see if they could get to any airdrop points where there weren't any other battle royale participants in the nearby vicinity.
Around five minutes later, Adam arrived in front of the first crate, but he had only just arrived when a group of three people burrowed their way out from underground nearby.
"We spotted this loot crate first!"
The three of them all had different animal heads, belonging to a mole, a white rabbit, and an armadillo, respectively. All three of them were semi-psychic mutants, but in contrast with the other psychic mutants that Adam had encountered in the past, these three were quite adorable in appearance, and they didn't appear to be very bright.
"That's right! We saw it first, so it's ours!"
"Yes, it's ours!"
Psychic mutants were all adapters with mental problems, and these three were clearly also mentally handicapped.
However, Adam didn't dare to get complacent. The fact that they were able to survive to this point despite their less-than-stellar intelligence indicated that they had to be quite powerful.
"I recognize you!"
"I remember him as well. I've seen his past matches. This is just a form that he uses to fool people! He seems to be very weak in this form, but he becomes a lot more powerful after he turns into that clown!"
"Are you trying to take our stuff?"
The three of them were speaking in tandem with one another, as if they each had their own lines to deliver.
"Who are you?" Adam asked instead of answering their question. "I don't recall seeing the three of you in Shadow City."
"We were recruited to participate in the battle royale by North Leg King."
"We're not from Shadow City."
"We're here to make money!"
"In that case, we can settle this peacefully. I don't want any points cards, so you can take all of the points cards in this crate, but in exchange, I want all of the skill cards. What do you think?"
Having come into contact with psychic mutants in the past, Adam was somewhat familiar with their mental state. At their most vicious, they could be more abhorrent than even the most deplorable of individuals, but on the flip side, they could also be extremely naive and childish.
An example of this was Mice King, who had been fooled into playing a pointless game with Adam and was completely oblivious to the fact that all of the people in the club had already escaped.
Judging from their outward appearance and their way of speech, it was clear that these three were even more naive than Mice King. Even though they were psychic mutants, the appearances of their psychic bodies still reflected their mental state, and when dealing with naive people, trickery was clearly the best strategy.