「July 1st, Yunhua City.」

The city proper was a deathly silence, frozen solid. Ice walls, dozens of meters high, stood everywhere, linking together as if they had transformed this place into a kingdom of snow and ice.

Only a few main roads remained passable thanks to round-the-clock snow removal. But for everyone who traveled these roads, the sight of the towering ice walls on either side brought an intense feeling of oppression and suffocation.

Because of this, several drivers had succumbed to the psychological pressure in recent days, quitting their snow-plowing jobs and letting others take over.

These interconnected ice walls had sealed off the entrances and exits of most Gathering Points. Schools, shopping malls, hospitals, libraries... all of them were blocked.

The Department of Life Support and the Emergency Management Bureau had to frequently deploy boring vehicles to drill holes through the ice walls blocking the entrances, just to deliver emergency supplies.

But even so, during the final phase of the rule, riots still broke out due to insufficient supplies, prolonged water shortages, and low temperatures.

Serious conflicts erupted at many Gathering Points. Even with armed squads stationed there, some people who had suffered mental breakdowns could no longer be deterred by force. When faced with their indiscriminate attacks, the armed squads had no choice but to shoot to kill.

Other Gathering Points collapsed under the weight of accumulated snow. Although officials frequently sent helicopters to spray de-icing agents on the roofs, the sheer number of Gathering Points made it inevitable that some were missed.

The people inside those collapsed Gathering Points faced a moment of indescribable despair.

With the building exits sealed by ice walls, escape was impossible. They could only watch helplessly as the collapsing roofs crushed them or as the blizzard that flooded their rooms froze them to death.

When the Emergency Management Bureau received a distress call from one Gathering Point and managed to dispatch a rescue team, using multiple specialized vehicles to break through the ice wall at the entrance, all they found inside was a collection of human ice sculptures frozen in various poses.

That horrific scene, like something out of a disaster movie, undoubtedly left every member of the rescue team with lifelong psychological scars.

Now, at the Li Mei Hotel, as the Fire Thief’s voice faded and sunlight streamed through the high-rise windows, only a few sparse cheers were heard. They were drowned out by the sounds of weeping and guttural cries.

A group of disheveled people huddled together, weeping and laughing at the same time, celebrating their survival while also releasing all the numbness and despair from the past days.

Xu Xiaotian was among the weeping crowd. He looked at the people around him. The hotel had originally held several hundred people, but now only about three-quarters remained. The other quarter had become cold corpses, stored away in guest rooms.

Such a heavy death toll had mostly occurred in the final week of the rule. Not from infighting or starvation, but from the freezing temperatures and disease.

By the final week, the hotel’s power cables and outdoor ring main unit, just like the water pipes that had frozen and burst long ago, finally gave out under the strain, causing a complete power failure.

Not long after, the indoor temperature plummeted to below minus forty degrees. People layered on cotton clothes, piled on thick blankets, and even crawled into plastic bags. But even so, many were frozen so stiff their bodies ached as if pierced by needles.

After that came numbness, sickness, and death.

Many with weaker constitutions simply couldn’t endure such low temperatures for long. Some even experienced a failure of their thermoregulatory centers, shouting that they were "hot" and actively stripping off their clothes.

Others couldn’t hold them down and could only watch helplessly as they froze to death.

Over that one week, several times more people died than in the previous twenty-plus days. They had to clear out ten guest rooms just to store all the bodies.

Without a doubt, they had fallen in the darkness before the dawn. That was why, upon seeing the light of day again, the survivors couldn’t help but cry and scream, celebrating their own survival.

Xu Xiaotian, who had survived the final phase by relying on the warmth of hot Instant Noodles each day, now finally understood just how difficult it was to survive.

After a good cry, he took out his phone, which had only 3% battery left, and opened his contacts.

Many of the people in his contacts were people he had met after moving into the hotel, but a significant number had died during this rule. Their phones would never ring again.

Xu Xiaotian couldn’t bring himself to delete their names. He scrolled through the list, stopping when he saw the name "Guan Tong." The days of struggle and numbness had made him forget that Guan Tong had left the hotel to survive elsewhere. Seeing the name now, he suddenly remembered.

His fingers trembling, he tapped the screen and sent a message: "Tong, are you still alive?"

...

At the foot of the mountain, by the edge of the camp, Guan Tong looked up at the scorching sun high in the sky. The intense sunlight made him feel a little dazed.

One moment it was a blizzard, the next a blazing sun. The contrast was so stark it was enough to make anyone wonder if they were dreaming, if any of this was real.

Guan Tong believed it wasn’t just him; most of the people who survived this rule would feel something similar.

And this was the power of the Fire Thief. Before this entity, which could manipulate the great forces of nature at will, humans were like tiny ants, struggling with all their might just to stay alive.

The blinding sunlight made Guan Tong lower his head. He knew the challenge was far from over. He had to stay prepared at all times to survive the increasingly insidious rules to come.

Wang Yan and Chen Na had returned to their large vehicle. The mother and daughter, having just had a good cry, needed some time to calm their turbulent emotions.

Guan Tong, for his part, sat on a bench he had made from branches and began to check his rewards for completing the rule.

"Personal Terminal."

[Name: Guan Tong]

[Nickname: Shadow]

[Title: Orderkeeper]

[Psychic Power: 123]

[Sublimation Coins: 150]

[Comprehensive Bio-Information Evaluation: Excellent]

The 150 Sublimation Coins were his reward for passing this rule.

’As for my Psychic Power limit, I recall it was 119 points before the fourth rule began. Now, a month later, it has reached 123, an increase of 4 points. This matches my earlier assessment that under extreme conditions, the limit increases by one point every 7-8 days.’

After checking his stats, Guan Tong opened his storage. The number of items inside had gradually increased as he passed more rules.

[Wordless Book]

[Thermoregulating Technology Underwear] (Equipped)

[Multi-Terrain Marching Boots] (Equipped)

[Basic Food Box - Bronze Level] x1

[First Ascender Challenge Invitation Letter]

[Survival Treasure Chest - Bronze Level] x1

’After the first rule, [Sleep Deprivation], the Survival Treasure Chest gave a fixed title reward. But that title didn’t have any bonuses; it seemed more like the Fire Thief’s way of categorizing survivors.’

’I wonder what I’ll get from this one.’

Thinking this, Guan Tong chose to open it.

[Acquired Random Item: Guiding Flashlight]

’What is this...?’

The item’s strange name piqued Guan Tong’s curiosity, and he immediately checked its details.

[Guiding Flashlight]: The wielder can silently recite the name of a target location in their mind. By consuming 10 points of Psychic Power, the flashlight will emit a guiding beam of light, visible only to the wielder, that leads them to the target location. This is a one-time use, tradable item.