Thunderstorms struck the reefs of many players who hadn’t upgraded yet.The number of online players kept dropping.Right now, most people were busy inside their houses; there were few voices in the chat channel.Everyone knew it was the cruel time again.No one knew how many from each district would survive, nor what would happen tomorrow.Yun Luohe opened her eyes at first light.She’d barely slept last night, busy collecting all kinds of materials until late, and lightning hammered the sky the whole night—loud enough to make your head throb, making it hard to fall asleep.Still, she crashed in the latter half of the night and slept a few hours.With so much on her mind, she woke on her own at seven.It wasn’t yet eight; the thunderstorm still rumbled, but the sky was slowly calming.Morning fog surged out and wrapped the entire reef.Other reefs looked the same.The storm had ripped the sky, yet the sea lay very calm.Compared to last night, the temperature this morning had dropped so sharply it felt unnatural.—First day of autumn.Overcast, temperature: 16 °C.The gray-blue fog grew darker. At first the fog and the sea weren’t the same color, but gradually the fog dissolved into the water, staining the whole sea.The sea’s color turned strange, stirring a strong sense of unease.Yun Luohe stood by the window. She didn’t rush out; she watched the changes outside through the glass.The bleak autumn wind yellowed the plants on the reef. Besides a few already-withered stands, the lawn outside had taken on a golden tint.Autumn had finally come, but things didn’t look good.Under the weird fog’s influence, plants were starting to change.At 08:00, the system voice arrived right on time.[Congratulations to all players who survived to autumn. Reward: Survival Package.][Congratulations to Player Yun Luohe. In the Summer Desert Event, your five-person squad ranked first overall with your personal contribution the highest. Rewards: Eye of the Desert ×1, Desert Rose Stone ×1, Blue Crystal Ore ×50, Desert Teleportation Array Blueprint ×1, Seed Maker Blueprint ×1, Desert Map ×1, Ostrich Egg ×5, Cactus Seed ×1.][Eye of the Desert: Opens the gate to the Desert Secret Realm.]Wasn’t this exactly the token Yun Luohe had given Liu Xiaoluo, that amber pendant?Liu Xiaoluo had used it before to open the Secret Realm, and Yun had pulled a lot of good things out of that place.[Desert Rose Stone: A masterpiece of nature’s craftsmanship. Used to make top-grade decorations, increases Reef Score.][Seed Maker: Insert mature crops to produce the corresponding seeds. (Excludes mushrooms and tree fruit.)][Materials: Blue Sapphire Fragment ×1, Blue Crystal Stone ×10, Star Sand ×10, Symbiosis Crystal Fragment ×1.]For the extra Desert Teleportation Array Blueprint, Yun planned to ask her friends if anyone needed it.Apparently the desert had more than one array node, so even though she had already built a teleportation array, new blueprints could still drop.Yun opened the Autumn Survival Package.Inside were some basic supplies, one Immunity Pill, and one bottle of Antidote.[Immunity Pill: After taking, you are unaffected by radiation fog for 5 hours.][Antidote: On use, clears 80% of radiation factors in the blood. Sanity +20.]After stowing the package contents,Yun opened the chat channel.“Has anyone gone out? Is this fog poisonous? It looks weird.” @All the best reads are at Jinjiang Literature City“Absolutely something’s off. I’m not going out.”“What, are we just staying inside all day?”“Maybe it clears after dark. Just make some tools indoors during the day.”“You’re too scared. It can’t be instant death the moment you step out. The game isn’t that sadistic.”“True. I’ll go take a look.”“Crap, my Sanity dropped!”Yun opened her character sheet.[Name: Yun Luohe][Sex: Female][Age: 26][Current District: 2][HP: 100][Stamina: 100][Sanity: 88][Strength: 85 (Upgradeable)][Agility: 78 (Upgradeable)][Luck: 40 (Upgradeable)][Trait: Perception +18]A Sanity stat had been added.It wasn’t full—she hadn’t even gone out and it was only 88.If she went out, wouldn’t it drop even faster?She didn’t know what would happen to players if Sanity fell too low.After weighing it, Yun decided to go out and see for herself. She had a bottle of Antidote, after all. She couldn’t just sit at home and waste time.“Don’t get near the densest radiation fog. One breath and you drop 20 Sanity. Damn, my scalp’s tingling.”“What happens if Sanity is too low…”“…you start seeing things, your mind goes slack, you feel woo—”“The above kicks in if it drops be—”“—40, and it keeps dropping. I took an Antidote and only then started to recover, but—”“No way, the fog senses living things and moves in on its own. I just stepped out and the fog that was pooling at the edge of the reef suddenly came at me.”“Not to nag, but you guys aren’t wearing masks when you go out?”@All the best reads are at Jinjiang Literature CityYun didn’t see the later messages—she’d already stepped outside, a Diatom Filtration Respirator covering her face, only her eyes exposed.Once out, she noticed the fog wasn’t all one color: white, gray, gray-blue, fluorescent green…For now she couldn’t tell what each color signified.Watching carefully, she soon found the fog acted like it had a mind. Whether it smelled her or sensed something, it rushed toward her and quickly wrapped around her.Even with the respirator, some fog still found its way in; a little was unavoidable to inhale.Yun opened her character info again.Sanity was ticking down.Slowly.She didn’t feel anything in the short term.Roubao and Yuntun had no protective gear. Tagging along, they were affected too.Roubao meowed, “Meow! Head hurts.”“Meow! I inhaled it!”Roubao clutched its head, suddenly irritable. It clawed at the ground, nails out, the fur along its spine bristling.Yun hurriedly recalled it into the pet satchel.So the radiation fog hit pets pretty hard too.After stowing Roubao, she looked at Yuntun.It seemed fine, showing no discomfort.“You okay, baby Yuntun?”“Hiss hiss, I’m fine. I don’t feel bad.”“Good. But go in for now.” Yun wasn’t entirely at ease.Yuntun nodded obediently and Yun put it away as well.With the pets handled, Yun focused back on the fog around her.Different colors wove together into a vast, eerie net that draped over her.She inched her steps, trying to find a thinner patch. But the fog seemed alive, shadowing her movements and keeping the encirclement tight.While moving slowly, Yun noticed the gray fog seemed relatively thin and its impact on Sanity weaker.The other colors hit harder.So she tried to avoid the other colors and experimented with various methods to deal with the fog.She tried water and fire—neither helped.After a short round of tests yielded nothing, she headed to the barn and henhouse to check if her animals were affected.To her surprise, fog had seeped in there too.Every chicken in the henhouse lay on the ground, barely breathing.Face hard, ★ 𝐍𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐥𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭 ★ Yun crouched to check them. Each bird leaked green light with gray smoke curling off it—classic severe poisoning.The animals in the barn were no exception. Every one of them had been hit.Damn it.It was bad enough the radiation fog harmed players; it hurt the animals too. She had to act fast. She’d bring out every anti-radiation item she had and use them on the animals.It was urgent. Yun diluted Antidote in water and had every animal drink a little.The effect was obvious: within minutes the gray smoke vanished from their bodies. The green glow remained, clearly still irradiated.Beyond the animals, she found the reef’s trees were mutating under the fog’s erosion. Yellowed leaves sprouted black spots like disease.The ground had changed too. The soil looked off-color, grimy, and it was smoking gray.Worried about the recently planted Starwish Tree, Yun ran to check it.Seeing no change in the Starwish Tree, she exhaled in relief.So the Starwish Tree wasn’t some easily irradiated top-grade species, but the ordinary grasses and shrubs on the reef were all wilting.Given time, they might all die.Back inside, Yun didn’t remove the respirator. She opened her character panel again.By now, Sanity had dropped to 78. The rate wasn’t all that fast, but even with an anti-radiation mask her Sanity was falling—so for players without masks it would be much worse.She couldn’t stay outside too long. Half an hour shaved off a dozen-plus points; a few hours could take her under 60, even 40.She started planning a response. If contact with the radiation fog was unavoidable, then she needed a way to raise Sanity or resist the fog’s effects.She actually had a decent stockpile of anti-radiation supplies.She’d sorted them into a single supply crate—everything radiation-related. She’d study them properly in a bit.In the afternoon, Yun received intel compiled by Tianji Pavilion and some conclusions from Si Qi’s side.Of the different fog colors, only white was safe.The other three colors each represented a different radiation level.Gray fog (Low Radiation): slowly lowers Sanity (−1/minute), reduces visibility to within 5 meters.Blue fog (Mid Radiation): after inhalation, Sanity continues to drop (−2/second), actively entangles, requires Antidote to clear.Fluorescent green fog (Deep Radiation): contact alone drops Sanity, severe cases (−8/second); inhaling too much damages the body and brain.Si Qi’s conclusion: the radiation fog affects players, animals and plants, and water sources.Eating irradiated crops or drinking contaminated water also impacts players—light cases drop Sanity; severe cases reduce Stamina and HP.All this intel was posted to the player forum for free.With the forums now merged across zones, this was a great chance for Tianji Pavilion to make its name.

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