About five minutes passed. Zhou Qiang, seeing that enough time had gone by, called out to those above, "You can come down now. It's safe down here."
As soon as Zhou Qiang's voice fell, the remaining eight people hanging on the sky ladder could no longer contain themselves and scrambled down as fast as they could.
"Brother!" Zhou Qian rushed towards Zhou Qiang as soon as she landed. Zhou Qiang didn't stop her, pulling her hand and shielding her behind him.
Xu An descended without speaking, her eyes scanning the surroundings. Due to the mist, visibility was extremely low, less than ten meters.
She hadn't noticed it on the lighthouse, but upon reaching the ground, she realized how terrifying the fog had become.
The entire city was engulfed in a vast, hazy mist.
Everywhere were ruins of shattered walls and collapsed buildings. This seemed to be a city, with wreckage of crashed cars scattered across the streets and scorched marks on the dry trees.
The city's power grid had long since ceased to function. Although it was daytime, the dense fog cast a bleak, gray hue over everything.
"This area looks like it's been cleaned up," Xu An said, walking over to a overturned vehicle. She spotted a torn piece of clothing still snagged on it.
"This clothing looks like it was hung up recently. It smells of rotten flesh, likely scraped off a zombie."
Liu Dong nodded. "We also speculated that Captain Qin Chuan might have lured the zombies away, but we don't know his exact location. We need to hurry with the rescue, or I fear it might be too late."
Xu An understood the gravity of Liu Dong's words. However, like Zhou Qiang's earlier silence, it wasn't that they didn't want to save Qin Chuan.
Before descending, none of them knew the situation on the ground would be so dire. Not only were there zombies behind them, but also an impenetrable mist ahead.
Who knew what unknown dangers awaited them in the fog?
Xu An gazed at the misty sky and, after a moment of hesitation, made her decision.
"Search the surroundings for any traces left behind, like torn pieces of clothing or bloodstains."
For Qin Chuan to have successfully lured away a small zombie horde, there had to be a reason. Either he carried a piece of bloody meat with him, or he had injured himself to attract the zombies with his blood.
Otherwise, Qin Chuan's lone presence wouldn't have been enough to draw all the zombies away.
Upon hearing Xu An's words, everyone else realized it and hurried to search the vicinity for any remaining traces.
Xu An wasn't idle either. She deliberately rummaged through her backpack. Zhou Qian, standing beside her, asked curiously, "Xu An, what are you looking for?"
"Rope."
"What do you need rope for?"
Zhou Qian didn't understand, but others did. They began searching their own backpacks for ropes.
Before descending, they knew the ground was shrouded in mist, so everyone had prepared some emergency tools.
"I'm looking for rope to tie everyone together, so we don't get lost," Xu An patiently explained to Zhou Qian.
After hearing this, Zhou Qian walked over to Zhou Qiang, clearly indicating that they too had brought rope.
When Xu An took out her rope, it was a professional climbing rope. She looked at the others, who were all producing similar professional climbing gear. The best thing about these ropes was that they had carabiners. Once they clipped their carabiners together, they would be very secure.
Just then, Liu Dong's voice came from the east. Xu An and the others had already finished clipping their carabiners, and the rope was long enough not to hinder their movement.
Xu An was closest to Liu Dong and was the first to run over and ask.
"What is it? Did you find something?"
Liu Dong said excitedly, "I found a trace left by Captain. It's him! He lured the zombies away himself and left a marker for us to find him."
Xu An and Zhou Qiang exchanged a look.
"Do you have rope? Let's tie ourselves together and go find your captain."
Liu Dong looked at the ropes on their bodies, a hint of difficulty appearing on his face. "We don't have such equipment."
Zhou Qian stepped forward. "Here." She offered him a rope.
"If you give me yours, what about you?"
"My brother and I will share one. Our range of movement will be a bit smaller, but it's enough."
No one else spoke. Since someone was willing to contribute their rope, the others had no right to object.
Xu An remained silent throughout the process. She had plenty of rope in her spatial storage, but she couldn't take it out. The ropes in her spatial storage were not only brand new but also from before the apocalypse.
No one could guarantee that there wasn't someone among the group who recognized them. If someone did, Xu An would have no way to answer their questions.
To avoid trouble, she merely observed from the sidelines.
Liu Dong initially tried to refuse, but a single sentence from Zhou Qiang immediately prompted Liu Dong to equip the rope and set off with the others.
"Don't you want to hurry and find your captain?"
That one sentence silenced Liu Dong immediately.
"Let's go."
Zhou Qiang took the lead, following the markers Qin Chuan had left as indicated by Liu Dong.
"These markings are unique to our team. Only the captain and team members know them. It's a special symbol. The message Captain left is that he's fine and has moved towards the northeast."
Xu An nodded and said to Zhou Qiang, "Should we call everyone down from above? Since their captain had time to leave a message, it must mean he's handling the zombies with ease. Let's call everyone down, and we can officially start the mission."
Everyone nodded in agreement with Xu An's suggestion.
Immediately, Zhou Qiang took a flashbang from his backpack. This was a prop purchased with money pooled by the ten participants in the competition, intended for transmitting information.
The moment the flashbang ascended into the sky and exploded, Xu An felt the sky ladder not far away begin to shake.
"This flashbang was a good investment. Even with this much fog, it couldn't block its light."
Zhou Qiang looked at the light in the sky with some emotion.
When they were on the second level, they had seen this flashbang. It was very expensive at the time, but it was advertised as being able to transmit information even in foggy weather. Because of this, the ten of them pooled their money and bought twenty of them.
Within three minutes, Zhou Haimei and others had descended from the sky ladder.
The first thing she did upon landing was to look for Xu An.
"Are you alright?"
"I'm fine, Sister Mei. Take out your rope and clip it on. We'll head out first."
Zhou Haimei didn't waste any more time. She took out her pre-prepared rope and securely clipped it to Xu An's.