"He's been gone for two hours," Zhu Yao said, her tone uneasy.
"Didn't they say they might talk all night?" Tail scratched her ear, looking utterly bored.
Zhu Yao let out a soft sigh. "Maybe I'm just too nervous."
This was her first time inside Wanghai Cliff. She had never imagined that the interior of this seemingly barren mountain would house so many technological marvels.
What was most surprising was that they were all still fully operational.
She didn't know how the Director managed it, but the mystery he exuded left her deeply unsettled.
If Li Ban hadn't agreed to come inside for a detailed discussion with the Director, she would have rather talked out in a forest besieged by monsters.
Although she, Li Ban, and even Huinv were Priests, there were too many factors in the Recycling Station that could hinder a Priest's strength.
Compared to other places, this area was thick with the aura of technology, instinctively unsettling anyone who had grown accustomed to the wilderness and forests.
Just then, a bedroom door opened. Guo Kao walked out, spotted the three of them in the living room, and approached with a smile.
"Man, suddenly not having to travel makes me feel terribly idle."
The Recycling Station offered no entertainment. Their only food and drink consisted of rye and plain water.
Once people had free time, there was truly nothing for them to do.
And the people here had no interest in simple pastimes like playing cards.
In contrast to the two women's discomfort, Guo Kao actually liked it here.
Other places were just as boring. At Wanghai Cliff, at least his interest in finding something to do had been piqued.
"Say, if I stayed behind to be the Director's assistant, do you think he'd accept me?"
"Probably not," Zhu Yao replied ruthlessly. "Many people have wanted to work for the Director, but he has never taken anyone in."
Let alone the advanced technology he possessed, just that miraculous bell of his that could repel monsters was enough to make a vast number of camps desperate to cooperate with him.
If the Director truly wanted to recruit people, he wouldn't still be living here alone with Allen, whose intellect was somewhat impaired.
"Ah, what a pity."
Tail suddenly stood up. "You followed us to the Continental Center—wasn't it to leave with Li Ban?"
Even if he hadn't known before joining, after being with them for so long, how could he not know Li Ban's ultimate goal?
Could he really have come to the Continental Center just to continue working for other camps?
"Ah." Guo Kao smiled gently, completely unfazed, and patiently explained. "I just figured that even if we're going to brave the Sea of Monsters, it won't happen in a day or two. We need manpower, we need supplies, and we need to design an attack plan. For something this massive, planning for eight to ten years would be perfectly normal. Even at the shortest, it should take two or three years, right? During this time, we need to find all sorts of ways to stockpile resources."
Tail blanked for a moment. "Oh, right."
Guo Kao's reasoning made her feel like she was the one who was unprepared, having followed Li Ban here in a moment of hot-headed impulse.
"When I followed Priest Qian Que into the Sea of Monsters, we also prepared for three years." Zhu Yao sat by the coffee table, cupping her glass of water without drinking. Her gaze turned distant as she recalled the past.
"To ensure we had enough spiritual rhinoceros, we didn't dare take too long to prepare, but we still recruited a lot of manpower and found many facilities here that could be used for combat. Priest Qian Que even came to Wanghai Cliff to speak with the Director. But no one has ever been able to stay at Wanghai Cliff for more than three days."
Zhu Yao could still recall the heavy look on Priest Qian Que's face when he returned that day.
Priest Qian Que had told the more than forty Priests in the group that the road to hope was incredibly arduous. Many of them would likely die on the journey before even laying eyes on the Northern Continent rift.
However, those Priests, who had only recently entered the Recycling Station, had not yet shed their inner pride.
They acknowledged the difficulties, but adamantly refused to give up.
There was nothing they could do. In a world devoid of spiritual rhinoceros in the air, the longer they delayed, the slimmer their chances of victory became.
The outcome of their battle in the Sea of Monsters that time—had been absolutely disastrous.
It had been so catastrophic that Priest Yao, who had once been like a goddess, was dragged down into the mud overnight, reduced to the spiritual rhinoceros-depleted, injury-riddled Zhu Yao who had lost all her companions.
This was also why she had kept peering toward the hallway just now, only to shrink back again and again.
She wanted to see Li Ban, yet she dreaded seeing a heavy expression on his face or hesitation in his eyes.
She was afraid he would return and gravely announce to everyone:
"We will very likely all die there."
Her pale, slender fingers slowly tightened their grip on her clothes. If... if it didn't work out this time either—she would rather just die inside.
Zhu Yao blinked, having already made up her mind. Regardless of the outcome, she would never come back. She would either successfully escape the Recycling Station or die trying in the Sea of Monsters.
The others had no idea Zhu Yao had processed so much in that fleeting moment, and began discussing other things.
"We can't stay at Wanghai Cliff for more than three days?" Tail suddenly felt a pang of nostalgia for the warm room, then immediately realized how ridiculous she was being.
She stood up. "I'm going to sleep. If Li Ban and the others reach any conclusions, remember to knock and tell me."
With that, she retreated to the bedroom that temporarily belonged to her.
Guo Kao also chuckled. "True enough. I shamelessly tagged along with this group anyway. Whatever the plan turns out to be, I'll just follow orders."
Zhu Yao thought Guo Kao would also return to his bedroom to rest, but he remained seated across the coffee table, showing no signs of leaving. He seemed to be worrying about the future as well.
Ed still paid no mind to the conversation happening behind him.
He hadn't yet grown tired of playing with the automatic sensor doors in front of him.
He stepped back once more, waited for the doors to close completely, then chuckled as he stepped forward again, watching them slide open.
But this time, when the doors opened, Li Ban was standing on the other side.
"Whoa!" Ed jumped in fright.
Zhu Yao immediately sat up straight on the sofa, splashing a few drops of water from the cup in her hand.
Her eyes locked onto Li Ban immediately. There was still light in his gaze, and a smile on his face. He looked slightly serious, but he carried no crushing weight.
Only then did Zhu Yao set down her water cup, covertly wiping the splashed droplets from the back of her hand with her thumb.
"You talked for over two hours. Do you have a plan?"
"We do. The Director is going to provide us with equipment that can only be described as a pleasant surprise. Before we head to the Sea of Monsters, we also need to recruit some people—at least twenty, at most thirty Priests to go with us."
"Ah!" Zhu Yao gasped, covering her mouth in shock.
She wasn't surprised by the numbers, but rather—
"The Director is actually willing to provide us with combat equipment?"
The Director, who had always just recorded events and never intervened, was actually willing to help them?
Just how on earth had Li Ban managed to persuade the Director?
Guo Kao also looked over in astonishment, though he refrained from blindly interrupting.
Looking at the three people in the living room, Li Ban felt as if a lifetime had passed.
To them, he had gone to speak with the Director for two hours.
In reality, they had only conversed for an hour. The remaining hour and a half had been spent calibrating equipment, as Li Ban ran simulation after simulation of leading a team into the Sea of Monsters.
In the blink of an eye, half a century had gone by.
Li Ban couldn't even imagine how the Director had managed to persevere through countless experiments up until today, having never found a successful method to leave the Recycling Station in the simulations.
"Yeah." Li Ban didn't elaborate on his history with the Director. It couldn't be explained, nor was there a way to do so.
"All you need to know is that the Director will help us as much as possible. But even with the Director's support, we must continue our preparations. Plunging into the Sea of Monsters won't suddenly become easy just because of our prep work."
"Right, I know," Zhu Yao nodded. "I'll go talk to Priest Huinv. We'll try to find as many Priests as possible."
Guo Kao also stood up, rubbing his chin. "Can we use the name of the Director of Wanghai Cliff? If so, our recruitment efforts will be much simpler."
"You can." Li Ban agreed on the Director's behalf without even needing to ask.
That was because, in the Neural Platform's simulations, he had done far more outrageous things.
In one simulation of breaking through the Sea of Monsters, he had straight-up used Wanghai Cliff as bait and blown up a horde of monsters.
When the Director watched this scene from the outside, he hadn't said a word. Once Li Ban stopped the simulation, the two of them had even briefly discussed the feasibility of that very plan.
So Li Ban could practically do whatever he wanted now. As long as it didn't harm the Director, the man was willing to pour every bit of the resources he had accumulated over the years in the Recycling Station into helping them escape.
However, just as Li Ban was returning, the Director had also given him a warning:
"In actual combat, you will inevitably have to make choices. It's impossible for everyone who goes with you to survive—or rather, the vast majority won't survive. At the final moment, remember: don't look back."
In the simulations, Li Ban would constantly rack his brains to keep as many people alive as possible.
The Director believed that was exactly why Li Ban kept failing.
Right up until Li Ban temporarily exited the Neural Platform, he still hadn't successfully entered the rift.
But that was fine. The Director had run experiments here for thousands of years.
Li Ban didn't expect himself to succeed in a single night.
"Go get some rest first," Li Ban told the three of them. "We'll be staying here for the time being. Tomorrow, I'm going to make a trip to Heaven Beyond Heaven to take a look."
"Then I'll go with you," Zhu Yao offered immediately. "Should we bring Priest Huinv too?"
Li Ban considered it for a moment. "She's a Priest of the Imperial Dynasty, so there's no need for now. I'm just going to have a look around."
Now that he knew Heaven Beyond Heaven connected to the Unreturning Place, Li Ban had essentially abandoned any plans to escape through there.
Heaven Beyond Heaven was completely overrun with bugs.
Meanwhile, the waterfall at the Unreturning Place acted like a fine, sturdy net, blocking most of the bugs from passing through.
But if Li Ban and the others wanted to push through that net, they would inevitably tear massive holes in it.
Li Ban truly wanted to leave the Recycling Station, but he didn't want to bring the bug plague down upon the Unreturning Place, Myriad Ancient Pagoda, or the Wizard World—
He figured that all the Priests who had plunged into the Sea of Monsters in the past must have thought the exact same thing.
Even so, he still needed to go take a look at Heaven Beyond Heaven.
Bugs that had managed to survive in the Recycling Station for so many years definitely possessed their own unique traits.
Moreover, there were a few stray individuals among them that could actually break through Heaven Beyond Heaven and enter the Unreturning Place. Perhaps Li Ban could gain some inspiration from their methods of breaking through.
"Could I tag along and take a look?" Guo Kao asked carefully from the side. "It's only now that I've realized my eyes were previously fixated solely on the red fruit forest and Black Beast modifications. The truth is, there are still many things in this world that I have yet to see."
Who would have thought that Guo Kao, who normally looked so gentle and weak, would actually want to go to the Sea of Monsters.
Li Ban thought about it. "Sure. We'll ride Dila over there. When the time comes, whoever wants to see it can follow along."
Perhaps his companions could offer him some unconventional ideas and suggestions.
The night passed in silence.
The next morning, Allen brought breakfast for everyone.
Li Ban, who had already sampled a wide variety of delicacies in the Director's Neural Platform, suddenly found himself struggling to adjust to the wheat flatbreads here.
'Could the Director be using outside cuisine to tempt me, ensuring I won't give up on escaping the Recycling Station no matter what?'
Li Ban thought to himself with self-deprecating humor.
Taking the simple breakfast—a box of wheat flatbreads—Li Ban said to Allen, "Tell the Director we're leaving for a while to go check out Heaven Beyond Heaven."
Allen showed no reaction.
He couldn't comprehend any command longer than five words.
Ed, whose curiosity about the man outweighed his interest in the wheat flatbreads for the first time, kept circling around Allen to get a good look at him.
Li Ban simply went back and wrote a note, handing it to Allen. "Give this to the Director."
This time, Allen moved. He took the slip of paper, gave a wooden nod, and turned away.
"Let's go." Li Ban called for all the team members who wanted to accompany him to Heaven Beyond Heaven.
This time, Tail, Ming Kai, and Guo Kao all signed up.
Knowing that the group would be coming back, Ed had no interest in making the trip.
Priest Huinv didn't want to make the trip either.
It seemed that aside from plunging into the Sea of Monsters again, she remained thoroughly uninterested in anything else.
Heaven Beyond Heaven wasn't exactly close to Wanghai Cliff; a round trip would take three days.
Therefore, to avoid traveling back and forth unnecessarily, Li Ban brought a lot of items with him this time, including some technological equipment provided by the Director.
Fortunately, he had left the reader with the Director, freeing up some room in his Cubic Space for other things.
Having already witnessed the Sea of Monsters, everyone carried an extra layer of pressure in their hearts during this journey to Heaven Beyond Heaven, stripping away much of the carefree joy of soaring through the sky.
Ming Kai, who rarely spoke, intentionally sat behind Li Ban.
"Captain," he asked, his voice hesitant. "Are we really going to enter the Sea of Monsters?"
Li Ban glanced back at Ming Kai, whose eyes were filled with melancholy. "If you don't want to go, I will do my best to arrange for you to join another camp to live out your days."
With the spiritual rhinoceros provided by Li Ban, the gap between Priests and ordinary people had widened once more, nearly reverting to the status quo they had back in the Wizard World.
In other words, ordinary people would be of almost no use during this expedition into the Sea of Monsters.
Weak combat power didn't actually matter.
The most critical issue was that they also lacked the ability to protect themselves.
The Priests would need to reserve all their energy and spiritual rhinoceros for themselves, saving it for the final sprint. It would be nearly impossible for them to spare the focus needed to protect any ordinary people traveling alongside them.
Because of this, Li Ban couldn't guarantee he'd be able to bring them out alive.
Venturing into the Sea of Monsters was a suicidal endeavor for the vast majority of people; he would not force anyone to join.
It wasn't that Ming Kai lacked courage.
He was the only person from Cliffside Camp to leave the Guard Team.
Doing so had already required tremendous bravery.
It was just that the Sea of Monsters was an utterly insurmountable chasm for him.
"I just don't know what use I can be. After seeing the Sea of Monsters, I realized that I'm so weak I might not even amount to a mosquito."
"If you can't enter the Sea of Monsters, would you be willing to assist me in another way?" Li Ban asked.
"What do you mean?" Ming Kai asked blankly.
For a brief moment, the word "bait" crossed his mind.
"The Director won't be leaving either. When the time comes, you guys can stay behind, follow his arrangements, and help pin down the monsters on the periphery of the Sea of Monsters."
"But don't worry—it's just to distract them, not to send you to your deaths."