Kingdom of Corrosion
Chapter 656 - 313 Challenge_2

Chapter 656: Chapter 313 Challenge_2

This was still because the Orient Express’s top speed was limited to 120 kilometers per hour, with conventional trains having an even lower average speed.

The Spider Train had two main tactics: small spiders and spider silk. It wasn’t clear if it had any other abilities.

Upon successful completion of the challenge, everything would return to normal, Lin Wu would be resurrected without any loss, and the stationmaster would grant the trio an electronic map. In addition to showing the location of the Orient Express, the electronic map could display all the switches within 500 meters.

There was also bad news; the stationmaster informed the three that the total number of Spider Trains wasn’t just one, but 42. Each train had its own target, and after eliminating its target, they would transform into patrol trains, working together with other Spider Trains to corner the players’ trains.

Despite the vast spider rail network and the lengthy tracks, the stationmaster still kindly reminded the trio to be on the alert for the Spider Trains’ patrol soldiers.

Following the bad news was some good news: damaging the Spider Train or destroying the small spiders could potentially yield some items. Apart from armor-piercing rounds, there were also accessories that could be installed on the train carriages, such as anti-spider nets. Once these accessories were obtained, they could be installed during a stop at a factory station by the train conductor.

Aside from factory stations, there were many other functional stations. For example, medical stations that could restore all personnel to full health and food stations that could increase satiety by 50%. According to the map, functional stations made up 10% of all the minor stations, while the remaining 90% were marked by question marks. Only after passing the minor stations or using certain items could their functions be illuminated on the electronic map.

The stationmaster specifically explained that among all the question mark stations, there was a resurrection station, but it could only resurrect players who died on the last day, not those who had perished on earlier days.

The last and most important point was that the Spider Train relied on visual pursuit of the players’ train, and to completely shake off the Spider Train, one had to make flexible use of switches to change tracks. After losing the Spider Train, as long as the patrol train didn’t discover and target them, they could continue to drive safely.

However, the stationmaster also stated that as the event progressed, the game rules would change.

At 7:59 AM, the three were teleported back to the train by an irresistible force. At 8:00 AM, the train began to glide, and the 23-hour chase event thus began.

Maya first took a few minutes to check the map, then she and Qinglang planned their route in the driver’s cabin, with the principle of traveling at maximum speed unless something unusual occurred. The system then issued the first task: Find the locator.

Upon leaving the platform, an evil villain had installed a locator on the train, and the Spider Train was currently chasing the Orient Express at full speed, guided by Locator 1. Players had to find and destroy the locator within 10 minutes; otherwise, the Spider Train would appear one kilometer behind the Orient Express.

This was an intermittent task that occurred every half hour. If the locator was found and destroyed, the Orient Express would not be chased for the next 20 minutes. If the locator was not found, and the Spider Train caught up, the task would no longer appear. If the Orient Express managed to shake off the Spider Train for more than 30 minutes, or successfully removed the locator for more than 30 minutes, this task would reappear.

In theory, as long as the locator was found each time and all patrol Spider Trains were avoided, the Orient Express could complete the entire course with no worries. However, the stationmaster had already made it clear that the rules would change.

The Orient Express had only six carriages and was very clean and clear, so theoretically, this task was not difficult. But after searching all the carriages in three minutes, the trio found no sign of the so-called locator. One possibility was that the locator was hidden inside items like the seats, requiring a meticulous search of places where items could be concealed. Another possibility was that the locator was not inside the train, but outside of it.

Lin Wu climbed to the top of the train through the chimney to search, but to no avail. Qinglang and Maya’s meticulous inspection of each seat also yielded nothing, with only three minutes left.

Maya told Qinglang to stop the train.

In the last two minutes, Maya and Lin Wu crawled underneath the train and found a locator the size of a matchbox inside a cavity beneath the bonfire carriage.

The Orient Express safely reached 8:30 AM.

Twenty-five minutes later, Maya pulled a locator out from under the cushion of a seat in the passenger carriage.

The Orient Express safely reached 9:00 AM.

Another 25 minutes passed, and Qinglang found the locator in the cargo warehouse.

At 10:00 AM, the task failed. The trio had not found the locator hidden in the strings of Maya’s backpack. Locator 1 of the Spider Train finally made its spectacular entrance.

But it was only a brief appearance, as the next 30 kilometers was unlimited speed track, and the Orient Express, going at 120 kilometers per hour, left the Spider Train unable to even catch a whiff.

During this time, the system broadcast a notification to all players: Certain trains were eliminated from the game. Within the first three hours of the event, five trains had been eliminated, including the Debacle, a train the players had a brief encounter with.

In response to players finding the locator by reducing carriages, Dawn came up with a new measure at 11:00 AM: activation of a station locator system. Every time a train passed a station, the location information would be sent to the corresponding Spider Train, which would instantly appear two kilometers away, initiating chase.

Even so, the Orient Express maintained stability, using the vast supply of coal and the electronic map to repeatedly shake off the Spider Train by leveraging the 120-kilometer-per-hour speed and switches. At this point, Maya had already outlined an eight-shaped railway line about three hundred sixty kilometers long, with three hundred kilometers of it being unlimited speed. However, the remaining sixty kilometers were divided into two sections with a speed limit of 60. The advantage was that these two limited-speed sections were far from any station.