Monster Paradise Chapter 15: Sand Ogres
The Association's personnel were already awaiting the participants at the other end of the doorway.
Once the last participant stepped through the dimensional door, Yue Yu stepped through the door.
"We are going to conduct an inspection of your storage spaces. Please cooperate with the personnel." As she announced the inspection, she turned and nodded at the 12 staff members behind her.
As the 12 staff members began the inspection, she continued with her announcement "All Equipment above the rank of BlackIron are prohibited. This also applies to any other armor ,weapons or support gear ranked above BlackIron. All drugs outside of healing drugs are barred as well. This includes Blood Suppression Toxins and other poisons. As for coated gear, it has to be cleansed before being allowed. If you do not wish to do so, the gear will be confiscated."
"Rations and climbing tools are barred as well…"
Yue Yu paced around the crowd as they were being inspected, her back erect and a stern look on her face as she narrated the rules.
A pile of confiscated goods started piling up as the staff member continued with their inspection. A large portion of this pile was made up of rations. There was an occasional BlueCopper Equipment stashed in the pile as the would-be smugglers were caught by the staff. On the side were weapons coated with Blood Suppression Toxin, that were awaiting cleansing.
Lin Huang was equally affected by this inspection. His rations were confiscated and even his water bottle was about to be confiscated. He had to pour away the water and overturn it to prove that it was empty before the staff allowed him to keep it.
His Armor Piercing Bullets were singled out as well. The staff took it to Yue Yu for inspection. However, they returned it soon after. She saw that the bullets belonged to a normal firearms and while they had the power of a BlueCopper attack up close, there were only 10 bullets so she returned them.
The entire inspection lasted till 918 am.
As the staff member finished up their inspection, the SOS beacons were distributed to everyone. Finally, Yue Yu gave her final announcement. "We will seal these items for now and return them to you after the exam with the seals intact."
"The time now is 923 am. I'll give you guys a bonus of 7 mins. 15 days later at 930 am, whoever reaches the destination by then will have passed this exam."
"One last piece of news, during the exam, the communication abilities and navigation tools of your ImperialHeart Rings will be sealed for this exam. Only its storage ability will be left unsealed."
A wave of groaning ensued as everyone was caught off-guard by this news. They've been had.
Revelling in their misery, Yue Yu raised her voice as she shouted " The exam officially begins!"
A few participants dashed off the moment she said this. The rest of the group soon followed as they recovered from the bad news.
The Thightanic bade Lin Huang farewell before keeping up with the rest of the group. Lin Huang being the weakest in the group naturally had the slowest speed so he didn't dash off like the rest but instead proceeded at his normal pace.
As the last candidate faded into the distance, he kept his cool and maintained his current speed.
When Lin Huang had finally left the starting point, Yue Yu shook her head as she said " Looks like he's just an average person. I thought he had a trump card hidden away. With his current speed, traversing 40km in a day would be an accomplishment. He probably won't make it past the halfway point."
Lin Huang knew there was no way he could keep with the pack with his current endurance level. If he tried to do so, he would collapse from exhaustion. Earlier on when the head examiner mentioned the area and exam contents, Lin Huang started searching HeartNet for a map and other relevant details in order to formulate a battle plan.
According to his previous plan, he needs to traverse a minimum distance of 115 km in order to stick to his 13 day schedule. This calculation did not include the time needed to scavenge for food and water.
Based on his previous experience from Earth, he knew that would barely make it to the halfway point with his current stamina of an average person. However, people with a combat rank of BlackIron could easily run a 100 km. Thus, he decided to tame some of the desert monsters. Monsters with a high speed were especially suitable for use as a mount.
While he was formulating his battle plan, he noted down the dwellings of several monsters. He planned to make use of his summoning abilities by collect Monster Card fragments and summoning his own mount.
This entire process might take up some time but a desert monster was much faster than a human of an equivalent rank. The loss in time would be more than made up for by the speed advantage.
With this in mind, Lin Huang took a different path from the pack and headed to the marked dwellings.
Sand Ogres were a race of human-looking giants. They had a bulky stature and mainly fed on meat. They bore a resemblance to humans in that they were bipedal but looked like deformed children. Some had 3 heads, some only had one head but possessed an additional mouth or eyes.
BlackIron Sand Ogres had a height of at least 5m. The tallest among them were reported to have reached 10m. Their strength was several times that of their human counterparts and possessed a tremendous striking force.
These monsters weren't actually Lin Huang's first choice. The reason he changed his mind was because of their communal tendencies. He needed to kill a lot of ogres in a short time to gather the required fragments. However, the main reason was their proximity to the entry point.
After half a day's worth of walking and stinging thirst, he finally arrived at the dwelling just as night was about to fall. The ogres' dwelling would naturally be situated a water source as such Lin Huang was not worried. Just as expected, he spotted a freshwater lake in the distance.