The chaos on Feng Lingyue's side made the corner of Jack's mouth curl into a satisfied smile. He thought to himself:

‘Just a little more fuel on the fire, and these students will be easy to control.’

However, most of the classmates who had been transported from the center of the sports field were more or less familiar with the company's full-dive game.

Someone said disdainfully: "A game with no log out button? Are you kidding?" But after frantically searching through his system page for a good while, his expression darkened bit by bit.

Someone else refused to believe the game's rules and charged out stubbornly like a bull. No one could stop him. Mere seconds after leaving the campfire's radius, he collapsed to the ground.

Lu Lin noticed this classmate rushing out, but his health bar dropped far too fast. Even though Lu Lin had picked up speed, she only just managed to make it to the side of his frozen stiff corpse.

The system panel displayed:

[Unknown Player lv1, Deceased]

He hadn't been teleported away. He hadn't data-dissolved and vanished like monsters did after death. Instead, he had become a frozen corpse. A real corpse.

His actions were no different from a shock grenade, turning the already panicked crowd into an atmosphere even more deathly silent than the ice and snow.

"Haha." Only Jack let out a cold laugh in his mind. This foolish act was no different from doing him a huge favor.

But Lu Lin's arrival also introduced a new variable to the dispute.

"Lu Lin darling, you... you're not afraid of the Blizzard Environment outside!" Seeing a familiar face, Feng Lingyue's large glasses were filled with a sense of grievance. Her imposing manner softened all at once. She was no longer that aggressive Guild Leader Feng, just a fragile female university student.

She threw herself at Lu Lin and complained: "Lu Lin darling, you're actually a high-level player! You've done well, you've done your confidentiality work well! If only all players kept their test qualifications secret like you do!"

What Feng Lingyue spoke of was, of course, the game testing non-disclosure agreement. All players who accept the test are forbidden from leaking it. Even at a time like this, she still cared about the company's rules.

Then, her eyes brimming with hope, she said: "Did Lu Lin darling receive a company quest to help us get out of this game bug?"

Lu Lin didn't want to tie herself to the company and answered honestly, "I just came to take you back to the cafeteria for lunch."

‘Someone from the company?’

Jack caught onto this keyword that filled him with dread. The knuckles of his fingers suddenly cracked loudly. His heart flustered, and the wound on his back began to ache faintly. His system displayed Lu Lin's information:

[Unknown Player, lvl?]

An unseen level meant her stats far outstripped his own. She had likely already reached the version's level cap of 20.

The company had cultivated many high-level accounts internally; everyone in the Hunter's Guild knew that. Not to mention, he himself had been injured by the company's people before. Could this woman be one of them?

Jack turned to his teammate and asked, "Did anyone see how she got here?"

His teammate whispered in his ear, "She just teleported in. She arrived a bit later than the others, so her spawn point was further away."

‘Just got here? Could it be the company discovered us and sent her here on the fly?’

"She came alone?"

"Yes."

Though he received an affirmative answer, Jack's mind was full of swirling thoughts. The mission assigned by his superiors could not fail. He feared the unexpected.

Noticing their captain's troubled expression, a pair of gentle hands rested on his shoulder. It was the female Wizard from the party. She said softly, "Jack, calm down. She's only one person. Besides, if she really is from the company, there's no way she can ignore those students. Even if she's strong, five against one—the advantage is ours."

‘Five against one…’

Right. This time, his team was a standard five-man party: Tank, Assassin, Wizard, Priest, and Archer. The other side was just one person.

Jack regained his confidence, the assurance his party behind him gave him. He cleared his throat and said, "Guild Leader Feng, are you two done catching up? If so, let's get down to business."

Jack's gaze shifted to Lu Lin. "This friend is called Lu Lin, right? From what you said, you only came looking for Feng Lingyue?"

Lu Lin didn't deny it. Instead, she countered, "How did you all appear here?"

Exactly. The sudden appearance of the portal had brought the Qingbei students to this place, yet this five-man party seemed as if they'd been waiting for quite some time.

A possibility surfaced in Lu Lin's mind:

‘Could these people be targeting the Qingbei students? But what do they want?’

Hearing Lu Lin's question, Jack's expression soured. "We of the 'Hunter's Guild' have our own Hunter's Guild methods."

"You're people from the Hunter's Guild!" Upon hearing this, Feng Lingyue at her side suddenly donned an expression of extreme loathing and was about to say something.

Lu Lin stopped her, shaking her head, indicating to leave this to her.

Lu Lin decided to press her questioning further: "The company's players enter the game to test game projects. The in-game Adventurer's Association mainly explores dungeons. May I ask what the members of the Hunter's Guild do?"

"Hah. Although I don't know why Guild Leader Feng has cast herself as one of the company's people, bearing such hatred for the Association, Miss Lu Lin here understands the bigger picture. Correct. We hunters of the Hunter's Guild are, naturally, here to hunt monsters. Dungeons are our hunting grounds, though we prefer to call them 'instances'."

Jack continued, "We hunters just grind instances and farm materials. Miss Lu Lin, with such a formidable account, you naturally have rich experience. You must have encountered the bug of being unable to log out. From our experience, only by conquering the dungeon can one exit the game. Might Miss Lu Lin have any other methods?"

Jack spoke as if he were quite familiar with the situation, as if frequently encountering the unable-to-log-out bug.

Of course, Lu Lin had no other way to leave the game. She lifted her head and looked around. The vast, boundless snowscape revealed no other life, and the path ahead was even harder to discern. Conquering this dungeon would be no easy task.

The other party was so confident; perhaps there was an adventurer in their party who had joined the Association and could help guide the way.

‘Was it that Matsushita?’

The conversation she'd overheard on the way here—that Matsushita didn't seem very familiar with the others. His face and name were out of place with the rest of the party.

A thought forming, Lu Lin then asked, "So, Mr. Jack, you wish to invite me to form a party to conquer the instance?"

"Quite the opposite!" Jack suddenly gave a wicked grin, turned around, and waved towards the group of Qingbei students behind him:

"The Hunter's Guild and the company have never gotten along, as you can tell from Feng Lingyue's attitude. Since Miss Lu Lin's identity cannot be confirmed, we won't risk partying with her. Our party will absolutely not coexist with Lu Lin."

"I've changed my mind. Any of you kids who want to follow, come along. I'll lead you to conquer the dungeon and leave this wretched place."

"Of course, you can also stick with that Lu Lin. The company is an official organization after all; maybe they have their own internal methods. But, all of you classmates best think carefully. This is still a game world, and she is no Game Master. I have a fully equipped five-man party here, while she is all alone. Think about that corpse lying dead over there."

The group of fifteen students immediately split. Eleven of them followed the five and left.

Including Feng Lingyue, only four chose to stay with Lu Lin.