“I’m so thirsty…”

Bella muttered weakly.

The others didn’t say it out loud, but everyone felt the same way.

Even awakened ones couldn’t survive without food or water. They could endure longer than normal people, sure—but this survival test lasted ten days. Nobody could last that long without eating or drinking. And that was assuming they stayed still, not fighting or moving.

Water is the real problem. The stuff in Areas 1 and 2 is poisoned. Only in Area 3 do those water-filled fruits grow—and Gwangcheon picked them all clean.

Distillation or purification didn’t work either. Older hunters had tried countless methods, but the moment the water was processed, it simply vanished. It was as if the dungeon itself forbade any method of obtaining drinkable water except the one it had set.

Toby pressed his lips tightly, scanning the group. Everyone’s faces were growing darker.

“There’s still food left in Area 3,” Ao spoke up. “No way Gwangcheon could have collected everything. They’re too few in number.”

“Right. We shouldn’t stop. Let’s keep searching,” Rio added.

The five-academy alliance moved on again, scouring Area 3 for any untouched points.

And finally, they found one.

“…Just one left,” Ao said in a tired voice.

There were seven resource points in Area 3. Six were already stripped bare.

“Hah. How is this even possible?” Rio laughed bitterly.

“The food and water points change location every time,” he continued. “So how could they know where to go and clear them out this fast?”

“It’s impossible unless they know every spawn point,” Muimi murmured.

“And we’re all supposed to share this?” Zen asked.

Silence fell.

The single point held barely more than two servings of food and water. The alliance had twenty members.

“Mm…”

“……”

The air grew tense as they all stared at the pile of fruit. They’d burned plenty of energy chasing and searching already.

“Wait.”

Toby’s voice cut through the silence.

“This is a trap set by Gwangcheon.”

Everyone turned to him.

“A trap? What do you mean?” Maria asked.

“They deliberately left this point untouched.”

“How can you be sure?” Zen shot him a doubtful look.

“Look at that tree.” Toby pointed to a waist-high shrub.

“See? The stems where the fruit used to be are broken.”

A few students bent closer.

“…He’s right.”

“The stems are still there. Someone picked them.”

Their eyes widened.

“They left this to turn us against each other,” Rune said grimly, arms crossed.

Toby nodded, lifting his gaze to the sky.

[238:41:32]

Only an hour and twenty minutes had passed since the test began. The sun now blazed directly overhead.

“Let’s move out of Area 3,” Toby said.

“What?” Rune blinked.

“The fruit here takes three days to respawn. Same for Area 4, but in Area 4 we can find unlimited water. And most important—we need to find a safe zone before nightfall.”

At the word night, everyone’s expressions stiffened.

“As you know, on Bottle Island, monsters rarely appear by day—but at night, they come endlessly, hunting us. Safe zones are essential. Monsters won’t respawn inside them, and they only exist in Areas 4 and 5.”

“Toby’s right,” Ao agreed. “We should move now. If Gwangcheon didn’t stop here, they’ll already be in Area 4. They must’ve grabbed food, then gone straight for the boss.”

“To enter Area 4, you need the jewel dropped by the Area 3 boss,” Rune recalled.

“Exactly. And bosses in Areas 1 through 3 only respawn after twenty-four hours,” Toby said.

“Then we don’t have time to waste!” Rio looked alarmed.

“If Gwangcheon gets the boss first, we’ll be trapped in Area 3,” Taeil added gravely.

“Right. That’s the one thing we can’t allow.” Toby nodded again.

But deep down, a nagging unease gnawed at him—the same dread he’d felt the moment he saw this “trap.” He didn’t voice it, but it clung to him still.

“Hey, Yein! This is it, right?”

Lumina held up a fist-sized blue jewel.

“Yeah. That’s the key to Area 4,” I said with a smile.

“Without it, if you try to approach the eastern coast, you’ll just get sent back to Area 3.”

Bottle Island’s entire structure was bound by teleportation magic. Each zone had a rule for moving on, and without it you were forced back.

The caves and tunnels worked the same way. If you tried climbing the cliffs to reach Area 2, you’d end up teleported back to Area 1’s western beach instead.

“Then since we’ve got the jewel, let’s hurry. The others are probably still hunting for the boss.”

“Mm.”

Lumina jogged to me as I climbed onto Seo Yui’s back. Our squad set off eastward.

“…Doesn’t feel right,” Seo Yui said as she ran. “If we take this, the others are stuck here until tomorrow when the boss respawns.”

“Yes,” I replied simply.

“And we already took nearly all the fruit. They won’t have anything left to eat. So they’ll be forced to eat the bugs from Area 2—”

“AAAH! Don’t say it! Don’t make me picture it!” a scream came from behind.

“If they can’t handle it, they can always walk back to the entrance,” I said. “They ganged up twenty against four—this much payback is fair.”

“Exactly. They should be grateful we didn’t drop the Inferno Orb on their heads,” Meiling snorted.

“…Yeah. The chairman raised the score values just to push everyone against us. Right now, beating survival is all that matters,” Seo Yui said, cutting off her thoughts and focusing on running.

“But Yein,” Lumina asked, “how did you know where all those fruit trees would be?”

“They look random, but there’s a pattern.”

“A pattern?”

“Yeah.”

I’d figured it out after joining HAUT about eight times in the game.

Area 3’s food spawns followed five possible layouts. Once you found the first point, you could deduce the rest.

That’s why we’d been able to sweep up the fruit so fast.

And the boss’s spawn was tied to those patterns too.

So our movements had wasted no time.

Of course, we hadn’t needed to strip every last fruit. In Area 4, we could gather far better food right away.

The only reason we’d picked everything clean in Area 3 was simple—

to make life miserable for the alliance.

By now they’ll have found the Area 3 boss’s nest and realized it’s empty. With only two servings of food and water, they’ll be forced to face the night in despair.

If Toby had any sense, he’d lead them back to Area 2 to spend the night.

On Bottle Island, nightfall meant a flood of monsters.

In Area 3, they averaged level 25. The students’ average level was around 30, and they had real combat gear, so fighting wasn’t impossible. But rest? Out of the question.

So Toby would likely take them to Area 2, where the monsters were weaker, around level 15— and they’d choke down insects to fill their stomachs.

“They’re gone… gone!!”

George of Dai Academy shouted, his voice raw with frustration.

They had been the first to discover the Area 3 boss’s nest.

But the nest, where the cannon bird should have been brooding, was empty.

“……”

Taeil couldn’t hide his expression. He dragged a hand across his mouth, sighing heavily.

Too fast. Did Gwangcheon really know every spawn point, even the boss nests?

Even with twenty students working together, they were always a step behind.

“…Let’s at least call the others. We should share the situation. Mayu.”

“……”

“Mayu. Fire a signal.”

“O-oh, right.”

Snapped out of her daze, Mayu raised her staff and shot a magic flare into the sky.

“Wait a second.”

It was Poff who spoke.

Mayu paused, turning toward him.

“Is there even a point in keeping this alliance?”

The three others froze, eyes trembling.

“We’re twenty strong, yet we’ve gained nothing. If we split now, each team might at least keep its own spoils. No more dividing food or points.”

“……”

Taeil couldn’t answer immediately.

Poff’s reasoning made sense.

Together like this, even if they found food, it always had to be divided. Boss kills, strongholds, quests—they all rewarded points, but only a handful could claim them, never everyone.

And distributing fairly? That was wishful thinking.

Taeil had considered all this before. The only reason he’d joined the alliance was the hope of resisting Gwangcheon as a united front.

“…You’re right. Leaving the alliance may be worth considering. But not now.”

He looked Poff straight in the eye.

“If we walk away without a word, that’s stabbing the others in the back. We can’t stoop to that.”

At his words, they all recalled what had happened to their seniors in a previous HAUT.

Their lips clamped shut.

“When we leave, we’ll do it openly. For now, we call the others. Mayu, please.”

“…Got it.”

She raised her staff and fired the flare.

Moments later, all five academies gathered before the empty nest.

“Again…”

Ao muttered helplessly.

So it’s come to this, just as I thought.

Toby covered his mouth with a hand, holding back the sigh that threatened to escape.

Ever since encountering Gwangcheon in HAUT, he had been forced to confront his own helplessness, again and again.

But even in despair, he kept his mind working. What was the best course left?

“…We’ll return to Area 2.”

Everyone looked at him.

“With the number of monsters at night, staying here is suicide. In Area 2, we can set watches and rest four hours each while rotating to fight.”

“What about food and water?” Zen asked.

“There’s one thing in Area 2 we can eat. We’ll make do with that for tonight.”

At those words, Muimi and Cho Inhu’s faces froze.

“…Toby. You don’t mean that, do you?” Inhu asked, sweat dripping down his temple.

Toby nodded.

“Agh…”

Muimi collapsed to the ground.

“What? What is it?!” Zen asked, startled.

“Let’s go. We’ll need to start gathering right away to feed twenty people,” Toby said firmly, already moving.

“Wait! What is this ‘food,’ huh?” Zen chased after him.

“…Can’t remember the last time I prayed so hard to be wrong,” Ao whispered, staring down at Muimi slumped on the ground.

“There are times in life when you just have to give up,” Cheongryong murmured beside him—his voice drained in a way no one had ever heard before.

That night.

The five-academy alliance gathered in the cave linking Areas 1 and 2.

The sight of plump, writhing white protein lumps robbed ten of them of their appetites completely.

Three put the things in their mouths, only to run for the forest gagging.

The other seven forced them down their throats.

When the sun set, monsters began spawning endlessly around the cave, just as Toby had warned.

No one argued against his plan to split into two groups, ten each, keeping watch and fighting in turns for four hours.

But the battles never ceased, and thirst clawed at their throats while hunger gnawed their bellies raw.

No real rest was possible.

By dawn, the alliance stumbled back into Area 3 with bloodshot eyes.

They staked out the boss’s nest, waiting.

And the moment the cannon bird respawned, they tore it apart in fury.

When the jewel dropped, they clutched it tightly and dragged themselves toward the eastern coast, faces weary and worn.

(End of Chapter)