Being able to perform an impromptu rap in front of the old principal, various directors, and the Five Elders, Yue Yun admired Nissen greatly.
He seemed less restrained too. Indeed, there was no shame in losing, especially to Wen Xishu...
Who here could claim to be more dazzling than Wen Xishu?
If genius was so easily surpassed, could it still be called genius?
Yue Yun said:
"Alright! I won’t hold us back!"
Wen Xishu looked at Ah Miao. Ah Miao stood there now, radiant and heroic.
"I almost didn’t recognize you, Ah Miao."
"Hehe, I didn’t expect it either. I thought my progress was significant, but didn’t expect, Ah Shu...sigh, I’ll still call you that! I didn’t expect your progress to be even greater!" Ah Miao said happily.
Albert looked at Wen Xishu’s team, reminded a bit of his own early squad.
Back then, he and a few elders, along with Old Jin, had the same atmosphere.
He and Old Jin were exceptionally talented, making the other old folks a bit self-conscious.
Times change, cycles repeat. This made Albert feel, maybe he really was getting old?
Thus, Wen Xishu’s most trusted team was finally formed.
Wen Xishu, Zheng Zai, Ah Miao, Yue Yun, Xiaojin, Nissen. A six-person team was complete.
Wen Xishu didn’t choose Wen Xiangge, due to the need for a conman to smooth over the panic caused by the mutations.
Wen Xiangge claimed to be the second-best conman in the Bunker, and no one dared to claim first.
Wen Xishu looked at these teammates, feeling a joy he didn’t want to admit.
At that moment, he was indeed somewhat like Albert.
Albert, though unhappy with his old friends turning the Bunker into a mess, couldn’t shed that disrespectful image when seeing them.
Wen Xishu’s past made it hard for him to trust anyone, leaving him accustomed to loneliness. But with real friends, that inner joy was undeniable.
He didn’t choose Wenren Mirror, Xun Hui, or Atreus, nor anyone from the Celestial Ladder List as teammates.
Being the top person in Deceit Tower now, he was confident he could command these people in the vortex.
But given the chance to freely form a team, his first thought wasn’t to find the strongest teammates, but to protect the friends he knew in the Bunker.
That afternoon, in the second layer of the Bunker, the safe house.
After Wen Xishu, others began forming teams; the Security Bureau’s elites and the Stone Gambling Association’s elites also chose reliable teammates.
Wenren Mirror and Xun Hui formed a two-person team.
Atreus, Wang Ying, and the top player of the Stone Gambling Association, ranking sixth on the Celestial Ladder List – President Xu Tushi, along with the Association’s elites, formed a team.
The old principal and Evelyn formed a two-person team, somewhat like a strengthened version of Xun Hui and Wenren Mirror.
As for the remaining elders of the Elder Council, they each teamed up with members of the Six Families.
Liu Zhizai formed a team with five top-tier experts from the Miyamoto Family.
Matthew Jones was already the patriarch of one of the Six Families.
Luo Feng was the same, patriarch of the Luo Family, or rather, the former patriarch.
In the safe house, dozens of compatible teams were formed.
Then the first alarm rang in the safe house. As the first alarm sounded, the serene atmosphere was instantly shattered.
Because soon, the safe house was filled with alarms, as if suddenly...the Great Devourer had officially arrived.
Though the second phase, the Vortex Phase, hadn’t yet begun, the first phase, the Mutation Phase, had surprised everyone.
When they saw the dense red dots on the safe house’s monitor...
Everyone had the same thought:
"How are there so many mutants?"
...
...
First layer of the Bunker, southeast corner.
In earlier years, the Bunker didn’t have a so-called "drainage system".
It was said that the first group of people to enter the Bunker just got a lot of materials and began building the Bunker...
But faced with the human need for toilets, they collectively chose to relieve themselves at the edge of the first layer of the Bunker.
Later...even after management efforts, most of the lower-class people still felt that the edges were foul-smelling, and the center was prosperous.
Even decades later... the edges of the first layer of the Bunker still carried some stench of feces and urine.
Countless crimes have occurred here.
This was the slum within the slums. The underground order established by the lower-class resided in the center of the lower layer.
And the edges of the lower layer were where the truly desperate people who sought the center lived.
Their lives were the least valued, and no one cared about their deaths.
"Do you think gaining two more years of life is a good thing?"
"No, Raphinha! You’re just staying in Hell for two more years. Do you think next year you can get into the Three Towers Academy and change your fate?"
"No, no, no, Raphinha, the Three Towers Academy won’t take in a disabled person. Although you’re not disabled yet, you soon will be!"
A boy named Raphinha, looking about sixteen or seventeen, was being brutally beaten by a group of black men wearing only shorts.
They kicked and punched Raphinha’s legs.
Raphinha tried to curl up to protect himself, but was quickly pulled apart by others.
Raphinha couldn’t understand why he was being bullied.
In this kind of place, when you show ambition...
You become an outlier.
At that moment, Raphinha suddenly wanted to die.