Top Warzone Analyst Chapter 99

After answering the question, Tao Rui watched as the young man across from him suddenly collapsed under the system notification. His teammates around him were all moving closer to him. Though he stood in the middle of the crowd, an inexplicable sense of unease rose in his heart.

He didn’t dare linger. Gripping his rifle, he turned and left, following the route they had planned earlier. Before the Red Team could regroup, he tried to maneuver around them and pick off isolated stragglers.

Yet the scattered soldiers who had been wandering in chaos suddenly became organized. It was as if everyone had foreseen their movements – retreating and regrouping along predetermined directions, attempting to form a massive encirclement.

The scene of the Red Team falling into disorder, which Tao Rui had imagined, never appeared. The Red Team was calm like a machine running on a preset program. They had endured more than four hours of near-torturous standby, patiently stalling with them, waiting for them to strike the “start” command before finally revealing their true strength.

The gun barrels gleaming with cold light were like the sharp fangs of beasts. The hunters maintained a patient, cautious distance, swiftly weaving across the empty and silent night field, laying down a dense, tightening net.

The moment he realized this, the first thought that sprang into Tao Rui’s mind was not shock, nor fear, but absurdity.

He trusted his own observations and judgment. The only reason he had been misled by the Red Team’s movements was because he had underestimated just how cautious they were.

He truly had not expected that, even while holding an overwhelming numerical advantage, the Red Team would still choose to endure hunger and monotony, methodically acting out, right in front of him, the entire process from irritation to exhaustion to seeming resignation.

That level of caution was so extreme it bordered on harshness – so excessive that it felt unreasonable.

The Red Team only needed to eliminate two more of them. Even at a terrible exchange rate of ten-for-one, it would still be enough to overtake them in points.

Even accounting for the uncertainty of the data and the inability to determine exact numbers, if their goal had merely been to kill at least five people, there would have been no need to adopt such a roundabout strategy.

So who exactly was the Red Team’s commander?

As far as he knew, none of the third-year students from UMU or UFU had a style remotely like this.

A storm of information flashed through Tao Rui’s mind, sweeping past and leaving wreckage in its wake. He froze for a second, then immediately forced himself to stop this useless line of thought.

A force only twice their size still couldn’t form a perfectly airtight encirclement, especially when his own side possessed more lethal firearms.

Tao Rui reacted at once, revising their route and circling around from the flank while ordering his teammates to retreat toward the base.

After hours of running through the night, everyone felt a faint sense of powerlessness. Numbly, they followed Tao Rui’s commands, responding to the Red Team’s shameless tactics with only a few terse curses.

Even so, during the retreat they had to keep their nerves taut, staying alert and scanning their surroundings to guard against any possible ambush.

Right now, their lives were extremely valuable.

That was the strongest thought in everyone’s mind.

Military boots struck the hard ground with dull, echoing thuds. The chaotic rhythm of footsteps blended with the fickle northern wind of the night, scattering the warm breaths the youths exhaled from their chests.

The Red Team members were running around like mad, too out of breath to even steady their breathing, yet they still found the energy to shout excited nonsense, fully embodying the festive spirit of “spreading the good news far and wide.”

“Comrades, braised pork knuckle has appeared!”

“Attention all departments: the price has dropped. Cheng Feng updated the market ten minutes ago – she says Tao Rui is now only worth one boneless chicken claw!”

“Tell Tao Rui to show some self-awareness. If he drags this out another hour, in the eyes of our starving commander he probably won’t even qualify as a meat dish anymore! Does he want to become the minced garlic in stir-fried romaine lettuce?”

“Would any informed comrades please report the exact location of the boneless chicken claw?”

“Can’t see their faces, unable to confirm. Just pile all the boneless chicken claws onto one plate first, okay? Sooner or later you’ll suck on the one you like.”

“Shut up, shut up!” Chen Huayue shouted curses against the tide of public opinion. “Anyone who keeps naming dishes is getting muted!”

Everyone fell silent for a moment.

One young man cautiously suggested, “Then… how about peach oolong tea? The kind that’s only worth thirty percent sugar now.”

Wearing that refined and gentle-looking face of his, Chen Huayue viciously spat out a curse, “Get the fuck out of here!”

The unserious chatter ended instantly.

A student reported, “We’ve tracked the target. Judging from the movement direction between the two positions, Tao Rui should be retreating toward the base now.”

“Fast reaction,” Cheng Feng muttered. “Like he’s got the nose of a hunting dog.”

Everyone could tell that was purely a remark made out of spite.

Without needing instructions from Cheng Feng, the formation had already shifted. The nearest squads spread out in sequence, attempting to intercept Tao Rui.

“Don’t bunch up, don’t bunch up,” Cheng Feng reminded them repeatedly. “Keep at least ten meters between squads to avoid getting wiped out in one sweep by the other side.”

Everyone understood. They might be tired, but they hadn’t lost their heads yet.

Very soon, a formation resembling a wild goose formation appeared on the map. The scattered members of the White Team were trapped between the two spreading wings of the Red Team.

After confirming the general direction, the Red Team advanced with high morale. The “safe” large-scale skirmish that Cheng Feng had been anticipating finally began.

After wearing the heavy simulation helmets for so long, everyone’s necks were already sore and aching.

Under Tao Rui’s instructions, the White Team members continuously shifted formations, flexibly striking at the Red Team’s tightening flanks. Faced with an unfavorable situation, they no longer hesitated to deploy firearms, trying to reduce the enemy’s combat strength, launching their final assault with a desperate, all-or-nothing resolve.

A desperate fight to the death was indeed effective. As it turned out, the equipment from those thirty supply crates really was excellent life-saving gear. The Red Team’s formation was torn open in several places, and their casualty count was visibly rising – although, due to the Red Team’s positioning, several explosions did not achieve the White Team’s intended effect.

Unfortunately, not all of the crates contained explosive devices, and they had also reserved half of their supplies for setting ambushes at the base. After exhausting their ammunition in a breakout attempt, it was like the final leap of a candle flame before the wind snuffed it out – the light flared briefly, then quickly dimmed.

The surviving Red Team members rapidly repositioned to reinforce their formation, and without giving the White Team time to recover, they launched a full-force counterattack.

In the chaotic, disordered chase, the White Team’s casualty rate quickly crossed the critical 70% threshold.

Watching their score plummet so abruptly, the White Team members, even as they repeatedly told themselves not to give up, still lost the will to resist. It felt as if the pressure on their shoulders and above had grown heavier, their despair becoming almost tangible – like ropes binding their limbs.

The overall situation was already decided; defeat was collapsing like a landslide.

What chance did they still have to turn things around?

The teammates’ emotions fed into one another, dragging everyone further into negativity. The figures swaying in the night looked like walking corpses. Faced with the increasingly energized Red Team, even their dying struggle seemed powerless, sustained only by the unwillingness to give up.

Tao Rui called out a few times on the public channel, but unfortunately, plain slogans could no longer lift the team’s morale. He himself didn’t hold much hope either – uncertain of what else could be said at this point, he simply fell silent.

The rapid gunfire in the headset channel sounded like the horn of death. Tao Rui no longer dared to look at the data panel. Grinding his teeth, he attacked every enemy he could see, persistently fighting until the match was officially declared over, trying to salvage the White Team’s last shred of dignity.

The professional course instructor, unable to wait for the outcome he wanted to see, got up from his seat and began pacing around the open area to loosen his limbs.

Behind him, the eliminated students were also caught in mixed emotions. Some couldn’t bear to watch the tragic scene and turned their eyes away, listening only to the sounds.

“What’s the result of acting on impulse?” the physical training instructor from the Second Military University asked coldly, arms crossed. He had endured most of the match in frustration without speaking, but now finally unleashed his sarcasm. “Thought you were impressive, didn’t you? Felt like you were something special, right? How does it feel now? Should the Second Military’s commander share some thoughts?”

No one could answer; they all fell silent.

The young man who had been called out stammered, “I’m sorry.”

“Sorry to whom? To me?” The instructor raised a hand to interrupt. “Don’t. It has nothing to do with me. I’m just a spectator. Even if you rolled around in a cesspit, at most you’d just be entertaining me. Not worth apologizing for.”

The young man lowered his head awkwardly.

After a moment, the instructor snorted, still visibly irritated. “How is it that the Red Team can stay united? With your team split apart like this, whose fault do you think that is?”

The ones who took the lead. The ones with too strong an individualistic streak.

The young man reflected.

He and Tao Rui were exactly that kind of people.

Tao Rui might be more restrained in attitude, but his combat style was even more forceful. Words like yielding or submission probably didn’t exist in his dictionary.

Moreover, conflicts between the two universities had existed for a long time, so from the very beginning, they had never considered the other side as allies – let alone teammates.

“My fault,” the young man said dejectedly.

The instructor turned back, about to speak, when the man beside him patted his arm and reminded him, “Save the reflection meeting for later. Otherwise you’ll end up saying the same thing twice – aren’t you tired?”

The instructor felt that made sense. He lifted his chin, signaling them to focus on the match first and properly watch how their teammates were about to face a crushing defeat.

The battle situation had already lost any real unpredictability. The crowd slowly advanced toward the base.

Tao Rui tried to find an opportunity to rush in and throw the remaining unused grenades, so they wouldn’t go to waste.

But starting from earlier, the usually cautious Red Team had suddenly shifted to an abnormal style of play, leaving him unable to read their intentions.

He was certain some of the students had already detected his position, yet those people didn’t press forward or take initiative. Instead, they kept their distance from him, like a kite being deliberately kept aloft – keeping him suspended, neither letting him escape nor fully engaging.

Just as Tao Rui was about to decide to abandon all restraint and go all-in, a black arc flew out from behind a wall and landed right at his feet.

Tao Rui instinctively threw himself down, covering his head. Only when thick white smoke began to rise and coil across his vision did he realize it was a smoke grenade.

The system quickly displayed negative status effects – [tears], [dizziness], [movement restriction] – indicating it was chemical smoke with a tear-gas effect.

Following the system’s instructions, Tao Rui lay flat and prepared to crawl out. Moving in the direction he remembered, he had only advanced a short distance when he heard rapid footsteps approaching from near to far.

He immediately reached for the gun beside him and lifted his head toward the source of the sound.

But the simulated vision in front of him had blurred into patches of haze – he couldn’t even make out a single silhouette.

Tao Rui blinked hard, only to find that the negative status effects had not disappeared; instead, they were intensifying.

He tightened his grip on the trigger, preparing to fire a random warning shot within system limits. Before he could distinguish the enemy by sound, his submachine gun was kicked away.

He was still wondering who was so rude when, in the next second, his hands were unexpectedly bound behind his back.

There was no such move in the team battle rules at all!

The other person carried a faint, unpleasant smell. When their knee pressed against his back, Tao Rui could tell their weight and strength weren’t particularly great. But restricted by the system’s warning, he didn’t resist immediately – and by the time he came to his senses, it was already difficult to struggle free.

Tao Rui immediately called out, “Cheng Feng?!”

The other party did not respond, only dragging him forward a couple of steps.

Tao Rui’s hands were bound behind his back, and any large movement risked injuring his muscles. Coupled with the red warning lights flashing in the simulation system, he couldn’t figure out Cheng Feng’s intentions and could only ask, “What do you want?”

With a “ding,” the elevator arrived, and Cheng Feng roughly hauled him inside.

After a brief sensation of weightlessness, the elevator doors opened again.

Tao Rui didn’t know which floor he was on, but his negative status effects had finally begun to ease. If he focused carefully, he could faintly make out some outlines of light and shadow.

Cheng Feng kept hold of his arm the entire way, forcing him to follow. After walking a short distance, she kicked the door open.

The metal door slammed against the wall with a harsh, grating impact. Cool night air rushed in through the opening, cold and damp, sending a shiver straight from Tao Rui’s spine.

The door continued to bang against the wall in the howling wind. Everything around him felt steeped in an unsettling abnormality that triggered an instinctive sense of danger.

Tao Rui froze in place, looking around in confusion. His chest rose and fell violently as he shouted, “Have you lost your mind? What exactly are you trying to do?!”

His answer was Cheng Feng’s foot coming from behind without hesitation.

Caught off guard, Tao Rui stumbled forward two steps and fell to the ground. Even though he instinctively braced himself with his arms, his chin was still scraped raw by the rough surface.

He sucked in a sharp breath, still unable to recover his voice from the surge of rage, when Cheng Feng grabbed him by the back of his collar and hauled him up from the ground again.

Tao Rui subconsciously leaned back, his upper back hitting something like a railing at waist height. He tilted his head slightly, only to be immediately forced backward as Cheng Feng pressed against his chest and shoved him over it.

His vision suddenly flipped upside down. The negative status effects were about to fade.

After blinking once more, the scene looked as if it had been washed clean by a light drizzle. Tao Rui saw the simulation system’s clear blue sky, along with a row of inverted ancient trees.

He had never seen this landscape from this perspective before, but he felt no appreciation for it whatsoever.

The dozens-of-meters drop to the ground created an intensely real sense of vertigo. For a moment, his mind went completely blank. When it started working again, all his remaining rationality was focused entirely on the hand gripping his collar.

The instructor’s voice came through the headset with a warning shout: “Cheng Feng!”

Tao Rui felt as if his heart was about to burst through his throat. Blood surged violently toward his brain in waves, pressing against it. Struggling to draw breath into his lungs, he roared, “Let go of me! Are you insane?!”

Cheng Feng’s hand pressed down a little further.

Only then did she speak her first words to him in an extremely cold tone.

“Are you afraid?”

Tao Rui didn’t even know if he had managed to make a sound. To him, Cheng Feng was nothing short of a real madman.

Cheng Feng sneered, “With such a clean, decisive death, you’d still feel fear?”

The instructor’s reprimand sounded almost distant. “Cheng Feng, stop this right now!”

What answered him was an even more merciless shove.

Half of Tao Rui’s body was already sliding past the railing. As his center of gravity kept dropping, even the slightest noise in his ears felt like death’s greeting drawing near.

His pupils began to lose focus, his breathing rhythm collapsed, and a strange choking sound came from deep within his chest.

“Heh… what’s wrong? Don’t soldiers have to be prepared for death? You don’t?”

Tao Rui’s eyes rolled forward slightly, and through the narrow field of vision created by his lowered eyelids, he could make out Cheng Feng’s expressionless face.

Her dark, deep eyes flashed with a cold glint that told him she truly might let go.

Several instructors stood in front of the projection screen, staring intently at the floating display. The entire venue was silent, as if even the air had frozen.

The next second, Cheng Feng’s lips curved upward slightly, and she slowly released her reddened fingers.

The chilly spring wind dried the cold sweat on his skin. Tao Rui’s mind still retained the image of Cheng Feng’s ferocious smile as he lay on the narrow platform just over a meter wide behind the railing, staring blankly with his eyes wide open.

A system elimination prompt popped up, stating the reason: leaving the red zone of the map.

After the rectangular frame flickered for two seconds, the simulation helmet officially shut down, and the world returned to reality.

Below him was a stepped outdoor training ground. Tao Rui glanced down briefly, then turned around to face the sky.

The vast, gloomy night hung overhead, as if the immense darkness might swallow him whole.

The fear of death – once stirred up by the mockery – had now dissipated, but every pore in his body still remembered the sensation of trembling.

Tao Rui closed his eyes, shuddering as he adjusted his breathing, while in his ears he heard Cheng Feng running off briskly in military boots.

“Eat, eat! Braised pork!”

Immediately after, excited shouts erupted from the boys at the base of the building.

“Charcoal-grilled lamb!”

“Soy-sauce chicken!”

“Pork knuckle! I’ve been thinking about pork knuckle all night!”