Chapter 642: Chapter 21: Prehistoric Survival Challenge
[Have you lost faith in life? Do you want to understand the meaning of life?
Do you truly want to... live?]
[Please, don’t be naive. The Time Travel Administration Bureau isn’t so cruel as to make you gladiators against beasts, deriving joy from your pain and struggle.
According to Article 15 of the Space-Time Administration Bureau, we have no right to decide the life or death of any being.
Before selecting challengers, we must conduct a rigorous psychological test to ensure that the challengers are voluntarily autonomous and qualified to complete the challenge.]
[Whether you’re a first-time participant or a seasoned survivor of a round,
please note that the following rules will appear only once; they are crucial to your survival during the challenge, as well as the generosity of the ultimate reward.
Whatever you do, do not break the rules. Strive to become the winner within the framework of the rules to win the mysterious grand prize.
The rules are as follows:
1. This challenge is a multi-person challenge with competitive attributes, and there is no time limit.
The total number of participants is 100, divided into 50 teams. Members are randomly assigned and cannot voluntarily regroup with others until a companion voluntarily withdraws or fails the challenge.
2. The challenge venue is restricted to the late Pleistocene Western Siberian Plain on the Eurasia continent, where you will have close encounters with prehistoric giants unseen by modern humans.
Grassland mammoths, ancient tusked elephants, aurochs, cave lions, cave hyenas, ferocious polar bears, and hairy rhinoceroses, among other prehistoric beasts, might become your partners.
Of course, they are even more likely to become your competitors, so be careful not to get swallowed by them, turning into droppings scattered across the grassland.
3. Due to an irresistible factor we call "creature migration chaos," the challenge site, in addition to giant animal groups from the Eurasia continent, also has a high probability of featuring contemporaneous North American, South American, Australian, and island creatures.
Don’t worry, they will merely add some flair to your otherwise monotonous challenge life.
After all, the American lion, fear wolf, short-faced bear, blade-toothed tiger, Newtown giant bird, terror bird, and Aster sculpture have never appeared alive in the zoos of your world. Appreciating their majestic forms will surely benefit you greatly.
Moreover, since they are also carbon-based life forms, we trust that with your intelligence and wisdom, you will manage to live in harmony with them.
4. The total area of the challenge field is 600,000 square kilometers, with altitudes ranging from 50 to 3000 meters, and the periphery clearly marked with isolation boundaries.
Challengers ignoring warnings and forcibly leaving the challenge field are considered to have voluntarily withdrawn and will be permanently stranded in this world, forfeiting the eligibility to receive rewards. This consequence is solely the responsibility of the challenger.
5. The challenge ends when all 49 groups withdraw or fail, leaving the last two to split the reward and end the challenge.
6. To reduce the challenge duration for the challengers and increase its fun, the Space-Time Administration Bureau will sporadically distribute airdropped supplies marked with a laser beacon, which challengers can compete for autonomously.
Note: Airdropped supplies are not included in the final reward set at the end of the challenge; the number of airdrops received does not affect the ultimate reward value.
7. Challengers will arrive at the site alone. Apart from clothing, they are not allowed to carry any other items. The Administration Bureau will randomly issue practical survival tools to challengers, ensuring no duplicates within the same group.
Enjoy this prehistoric journey with your companions by working together.
Of course, if you’re confident enough, seizing survival tools from your partner may also be a good choice.
8. The time spent by challengers on-site will not proportionally consume their time in the real world. Upon completing the challenge, 0.003 seconds will elapse in the real world.
9. The challenge cannot be paused once it starts. Death during the challenge also results in death in the real world. The Space-Time Administration Bureau is not responsible for the challenger’s life safety and will not compensate for any fatalities.
10. All rights of interpretation for this challenge belong to the organizer. For disputes, please contact the Time Travel Administration Bureau.]
[Additional clause: To ensure this challenge is sufficiently interesting, do not despair and end the challenge prematurely, nor collaborate in private to undermine the competitive nature of the challenge.
In this restored prehistoric world, the brutal Ice Age will arrive faster.
Trust me, even with the concerted efforts of 100 people, you can’t stand against the Ice Age, as we’ve deliberately lowered its temperature just a bit.
Don’t worry; it’s only minus sixty-five degrees.]
...
Following the not-too-lengthy challenge rules is a brief introduction to the challenge site —
The late Pleistocene, approaching the Quaternary Ice Age.
The challenge site is largely located in what is now the Western Siberian Plain. Known as the Mammoth Plain during the Pleistocene, its vast land is dotted with sparse forests and extensive grasslands, with polar deserts to the north and permafrost to the south.
When Chen Zhou opened his eyes and looked out through the visor of his protective helmet, he saw an endless expanse of greenery, a dark blue sky, and a sinking red sun.
A few tall trees resembling pines took root beside him, their sparse canopies reaching more than a dozen meters above the ground.
The chirping insects occasionally produced a chorus of hissing sounds. In the distance, he could see a group of giant beasts covered in long brown hair walking on the grassland.
They seemed oblivious to the small creature that had appeared nearby the woodland, leisurely swinging their noses and dragging their heavy bodies forward. Before long, they crested a dirt hill and disappeared from Chen Zhou’s view.
...
"Damn it!
I took every precaution, but still got tricked by that old bastard Ivan..."
He wasn’t sure if his memory was faulty or if the super-dimensional time travel caused a brief reversal of time, but the helmet he remembered taking off was still firmly affixed to his head, causing a feeling of suffocation as he stood in the wilderness.
Muttering a curse, he deftly removed the helmet and began recalling the rules of this challenge. Chen Zhou started to search for the survival tools issued to him by the Time Travel Administration Bureau.
Unfortunately, after thoroughly checking his clothing, he could find nothing besides the protective suit and a few portable tools. It seemed the Space-Time Administration Bureau had overlooked him.
"Could I really run into such a bug? Where are my tools?"
Unwilling to accept defeat, he snapped a thick branch and began sweeping away and clearing the tall grass around him, until he resignedly accepted the fact—
As an accidental entrant in the challenge, he enjoyed a "privilege" ordinary people didn’t have, being given no survival tools whatsoever.
Even more terrifyingly, he also couldn’t find the "companions" mentioned in the challenge rules, which meant he might have to face this brutal and savage challenge all alone.
...
Looking at the wavering sun and the dim grassland, Chen Zhou, having come to terms with reality, decided that he should first address the issues of shelter and food.
Survival tools weren’t that important, after all. If push came to shove, he could always "borrow" from other challengers.
Faced with survival threats, where getting enough food was uncertain, there was little room for "morality" in Chen Zhou’s mind.
Moreover, the very essence of the challenge was exceptionally cruel. Even if he didn’t engage in snatching, the challengers would kill and devour each other until only the final victor remained.
Under such circumstances, even a superhuman couldn’t afford to be "kind-hearted."
The rules of the Space-Time Administration Bureau wouldn’t grant anyone undue leniency. Here, unlike a solitary island or the generally stable modern society, every challenger had to recognize this fact.
...
Fortunately, the previous 28 years of island living and the more than two years of extreme sports in the real world equipped him with many survival and emergency techniques.
While he couldn’t create survival tools out of nothing, Chen Zhou could still easily make a fire, hunt, and set up a simple shelter.
He had already decided he must first settle himself, stockpile enough food, and then set out to find other challengers.
It would be better to wait for the first airdrop supply; then, once all challengers converged on the supply point, he could move out.
Otherwise, searching for 99 people across this complex 600,000 square kilometer terrain would be incredibly difficult. Without the lure of supplies, he might wander here for a year without seeing a single person.
Thinking about this, Chen Zhou removed his protective suit, folded it, and placed it aside. Then he snapped a thick branch, shaping its end into the shape of a shovel, and began digging a pit in the grassland.
Judging by the current temperature and the dryness of the air, it was likely summer on the Mammoth Grassland, windy with significant temperature differences between day and night, and overall dry.
If he didn’t dig a pit and started a fire directly on the grassland, it could easily lead to a wildfire.
Chen Zhou was less concerned about harming the ecological environment; he was more worried about losing control of the fire and ending up roasted himself.
His physical condition now was vastly different from his first challenge. Soon, a sizeable shallow pit appeared at the edge of the forest.
The increasingly dim surroundings couldn’t hinder Chen Zhou’s exceptional vision. He circled twice near the shallow pit in the forest, quickly gathering sticks, wooden strips, and dry tinder for fire-starting.
He pressed the top of a thin stick against a rough stone surface, sharpening it into a cone shape, then peeled the bark off the thick wooden strip and carved out a groove with a stone wide enough to hold the thin stick.
He tore the dried grass leaves serving as tinder into pieces and stuffed them into the groove, then squatted down, puffed his cheeks, and was about to spin the thin stick to generate sparks from friction—when he suddenly looked up sharply—
Not far from the pit he had dug, a blue light was flickering.
In the hazy glow, a tall and robust figure slowly formed, like a newborn emerging from the void, wailing as it landed.
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