Thanks to the Map, Xu Xin wouldn't lose his way, nor would he end up going round in circles in the forest like most would. As such, he didn't need to leave any marks and walked straight in one direction.
After walking for an unknown amount of time, that mysterious voice once again rang out in his mind.
[Reminder, do not leave for more than three kilometers away from your treehouse, or something unthinkable will happen.]
It seemed that he was at the edge of the three-kilometer radius. Xu Xin stopped in his tracks and observed his surroundings. At this time, he had already walked out of the resource area. From his perspective, most of the plants around him were glowing white, with only a few dots of green.
Xu Xin checked the specks of green light, and regretfully, they were all normal green-grade resources that were plentiful in his resource area.
"Yin!" The red panda Cocoa, who was hanging from Xu Xin's shoulder, suddenly cried out and jumped down.
"What's wrong, Cocoa? What did you find?" Xu Xin quickly asked.
Cocoa tugged at Xu Xin's pants, indicating for him to follow it.
The treehouse was at the center of the round exploration area, and Xu Xin was at the easternmost point. Cocoa was leading him southwest.
The little fellow must have discovered something. Xu Xin was overjoyed. This little guy was his Lucky Star.
It was a direction that he had never been to before.
The stream flowed from the west to the east. He had walked along the stream to the west of the resource area and planted his treehouse there. Then, he walked all the way east through the resource area to his current position.
Cocoa was bringing him to the south of the resource area. He had never been there before, so even the Map was black. Fortunately, there were no red dots in the darkness, which made Xu Xin feel at ease.
As he followed behind Cocoa, Xu Xin gradually noticed the difference.
The surroundings were similar to the places he had been to before, just a white poplar forest. Because it was summer, the ground was covered with grass and shrubs. However, Xu Xin could vaguely feel that the grass and shrubs on the ground seemed to be slightly different from what he had seen before.
He felt that something was wrong, but he couldn't immediately detect it. This made Xu Xin fall into deep thought.
Cocoa, who was walking in front, turned back from time to time, afraid that Xu Xin would be lost. Seeing that he had slowed down because of his deep thoughts, it immediately came over and tugged at his pants.
"Cocoa, why are you walking in this direction?" Xu Xin felt that he was about to finally find out what exactly was wrong with this place.
"Yin?" Cocoa tilted its head.
It seemed like there was no point in asking. This little fellow was probably just relying on its intuition. Xu Xin shook his head helplessly and continued to observe the shrubs and weeds.
"Hm?" He seemed to have noticed something. He looked at the grass and shrubs before him and tilted his head to the left, then to the right. Suddenly, he had a look of realization and clapped his hands together, "I get it now!"
"Yin!" Cocoa jumped in fright and somersaulted in the air.
Xu Xin finally understood why he kept feeling that the weeds and shrubs here were slightly different from the ones he had seen before.
The weeds and shrubs that grew naturally in any place were bound to be in a mess and grew wantonly. All the places he had passed by before were such. They were like fields that no one had tidied up, overgrown with weeds and extremely chaotic.
However, the weeds and shrubs here were different. If one observed carefully, they would notice that they were all slightly slanted in one direction. Although it was a very slight slant, Xu Xin could still tell the difference between disorder and order.
There was no wind in the forest at the moment, so it wasn't caused by the wind. If it was the wind, the weeds and shrubs should be swaying, but they weren't.
Xu Xin raised his head to look at the white poplars around. To his surprise, even though the white poplars and their branches didn't seem to give off a sense of direction, every leaf seemed to be pointing in the same direction as the grass and bushes on the ground.
There must be something in that direction that was attracting these plants.
After confirming his thoughts, Xu Xin's mood brightened up. He took out a big red berry from his bag and smiled, "Here, Cocoa, this is your reward! Without you, I wouldn't have been able to discover this pattern so quickly. "
When Cocoa saw the red berry in Xu Xin's hand, it immediately stood up on its hind legs and grabbed his pants again.
After Xu Xin fed Cocoa the red berry, the red panda's steps became lighter and it jumped around while letting out happy cries.
Looking at the little guy in front, Xu Xin relaxed and smiled as he shook his head.
The further they walked, the more Xu Xin could feel the grass and shrubs on the ground were slanted. At this point, he could already tell that the surrounding grass and shrubs were no longer pointing in one direction, but a single point.
He knew that he was about to arrive. However, there were no red dots on his Map, and there were no high-grade colors in his sight. There were only large patches of white and sporadic green.
Meanwhile, Cocoa, who was walking in front, had slowed down. It seemed to be hesitating if it should continue walking forward, as if it would encounter danger ahead.
"Cocoa, come back," Xu Xin didn't let Cocoa lead the way anymore. They didn't know what they would encounter further in, and he didn't want anything to happen to his precious red panda.
Upon hearing this, Cocoa jumped back onto Xu Xin's shoulder and lay there obediently. It wrapped its tail around his neck and rested it on his other shoulder. Its eyes were fixed to the front.
The direction of the grass and shrubs on the ground was becoming more and more obvious, and Xu Xin's heart was gradually becoming more and more excited.
This was a treasure chest! Who could reject a treasure chest?
Xu Xin was walking forward quickly when a sense of danger suddenly rose in his heart, causing the corner of his eye to twitch.
In his consciousness, a red dot on the map was slowly lighting up in his position.
"Sh*t!" Xu Xin immediately pushed the tree beside him with both hands, forcing his direction to change, and quickly fell to the side.
Just as he dodged to the side, the ground beneath his feet, as well as the ground in front of him, suddenly cracked open. Countless sharp vines drilled out from the ground and pierced straight up!
Each vine was as thick as an arm, and red silk threads seemed to be flowing on the dark green vines. It looked just eerie.
"Yin, yin, yin! ...Yin?" Cocoa fell to the ground due to Xu Xin's actions. Just as it was about to complain, it saw the vines that had suddenly burrowed out from the ground. Its eyes widened as it watched everything before it.
The strange vines burrowed out of the ground and twisted into one in the air, turning into a giant drill, before turning around and charging towards Xu Xin.
"F*ck!" Xu Xin couldn't help but curse. With another roll, he barely dodged the second attack from the vine.
"Bang!" The vines, which had turned into a drill, stabbed into the ground beside him. Countless stones flew in all directions and hit Xu Xin's arms and cheeks, causing him to feel pain.
Fortunately, after the vine stabbed into the ground, it seemed to have exhausted all its strength and stopped moving.