Chapter 69
Chapter 69
Since Yu Lingling knew Tongyu couldn’t see, she carefully described what she saw. “Wu Bin went to find Zhao Peng. Back in the tent, Wu Bin seemed very interested in Xu Chao’s monkey.”
Tongyu had committed every piece of information to memory. “Zhao Peng is the parrot, and Liu Qian is the pigeon. Wasn’t Wu Bin following Wang Hao? Why would he go looking for Zhao Peng?”
“It looks like Wu Bin doesn’t know the truth about Zhao Peng and Liu Qian’s relationship.” Yu Lingling was also considering why Wu Bin had chosen Zhao Peng. He must believe this choice would benefit him more. “Now we’ll have to see what Zhao Peng chooses.”
Tongyu understood what she meant. After a moment, he said, “I attached Puppet Threads to Xu Chao.”
If it had been Yu Lingling, she would have planted Puppet Threads on everyone the moment she entered the instance. Whether she used them was one thing; whether she had them in place was another.
Tongyu’s voice was very soft. “I hate people who betray their companions.”
Yu Lingling glanced at him. She suspected this had something to do with his past, but since Tongyu didn’t elaborate, she didn’t ask. “If you plant Puppet Threads on someone but don’t use them, will it cause them any harm?”
When Tongyu planted the Puppet Threads on Xu Chao, some information about his Exclusive Skill had appeared in his mind. “I can only plant Puppet Threads three times in a single instance. If my targets are about as strong as I am, I can control three at once. But if they’re stronger than me, I can only control one at a time. I’m not sure how long I can maintain control, either.”
Yu Lingling noticed that Tongyu had said he could plant Puppet Threads three times, not that he could only plant them on people.
Tongyu continued, “As for whether I can transfer injuries, I’m still not sure.”
Yu Lingling wasn’t in a hurry. “Take your time.”
This was patience she had developed from dealing with her classmates at school. At least Tongyu was smart enough. He might be a little overly sensitive about certain things, but as her brother had said, even a carefully designed program could never be perfect, let alone a person.
Tongyu, however, was getting anxious. “I want to be useful to you as soon as possible.”
Yu Lingling’s steps faltered briefly before returning to normal. “You’ll be able to help me in this instance.”
Tongyu breathed a sigh of relief.
Yu Lingling had only given the others a rough map. The one in her mind was much more complete.
The perimeter of the Circus was marked off with several wooden posts and ropes, while the interior consisted of multiple tents.
Every tent flap was tightly closed, and not a single sound came from within. It was as if someone had pressed a mute button on the entire Circus.
There were plenty of animals in the Circus, so the complete lack of sound was strange in itself.
Tongyu suddenly asked, “Are those really animals?”
Were they really animals?
Yu Lingling harbored the same suspicion. “We’ll find out tonight exactly what kind of performance this Circus puts on.”
As the sky gradually darkened, the entire Circus seemed to come alive, suddenly filling with laughter and merriment.
The one leading the players this time was a dwarf with an aged face who stood less than a meter tall.
The dwarf didn’t care that one person and one animal were missing from Yu Lingling’s group. He didn’t even seem to care that Sun Jian’s animal had changed from an elephant to a goat. However, every player present noticed his gaze linger on Sun Jian for a few extra seconds.
Those few seconds alone were enough to make Sun Jian’s heart pound with terror.
Li Na breathed a sigh of relief. Her gamble had paid off.
In an instance, attracting special attention from these horrors was never a good thing.
As they followed behind the dwarf, Sun Jian cast a hateful, jealous glare at Yu Lingling and Tongyu, even though neither of them had anything to do with his predicament.
Li Na had clearly been the one to scheme against him, while Wang Hao and the others had physically attacked him. Yet Sun Jian didn’t dare resent anyone stronger than himself. Instead, he vented all his anger and frustration on those weaker than he was.
He might not have acted this way in the real world, but this was the Horror Game, a place that infinitely magnified the malice and desires buried deep within people’s hearts.
Tongyu sensed it. His fingers twitched, but instead of placing his Puppet Threads on Sun Jian, he sent them toward Sun Yao and Zhao Peng.
Just as one of the Puppet Threads was about to touch Zhao Peng, however, Tongyu was suddenly struck by a sense of danger. He immediately withdrew the Puppet Threads.
Zhao Peng, who had been mulling over Wu Bin’s words, frowned slightly and glanced around in confusion.
Withdrawing the Puppet Threads sent a sharp pain through Tongyu’s chest. He traced two words on Yu Lingling’s palm: “Peng. C-rank.”
Yu Lingling had noticed the moment Tongyu made his move and had even helped conceal it.
She had also noticed how his body tensed in that instant.
Since Zhao Peng wasn’t D-rank, he had to be C-rank. If his rank were any higher, his strength would have been suppressed upon entering the instance.
Tongyu’s Puppet Threads could only be placed on players up to two ranks above him, though that restriction did not exist in the outside world.
With two C-rank players entering this instance, its danger level could no longer be considered D-rank.
The Abyss Guild truly didn’t care whether the other players lived or died.
Yu Lingling lowered her voice. “Are you all right?”
Tongyu had intended to say he was fine, but then he remembered what Yu Lingling had told him before. “It feels like someone smashed me in the chest with a sledgehammer.”
Yu Lingling knew Tongyu had medicine on him, but he showed no intention of using it. Either the medicine wouldn’t help, or Tongyu had judged that he didn’t need it. She took a milk candy out of the Princess Dollhouse and popped it into his mouth.
As the rich, creamy flavor spread over his tongue, the nerves that had been taut ever since they entered finally began to relax.
The tent used for Circus performances was the largest and most lavishly decorated of them all. Yu Lingling’s group, however, wasn’t qualified to watch from the front. They were assigned a spot in a corner backstage.
The ticket-holding audience members had already entered and taken their seats in the front rows, but none of them carried flowers.
They came in all manner of bizarre forms. Some had human bodies and animal heads, while others had human bodies and heads but the limbs of animals.
Yu Lingling had studied books on human anatomy and dissection before. The audience area was too dark for her to make out their skin color, but even their human parts seemed to have been pieced together.
The proportions of their torsos, limbs, and heads were all wrong. One might have the head of a woman attached to the burly torso of a grown man.
What Yu Lingling and the others didn’t know was that the moment these strange audience members appeared, some of the people watching the livestream froze.
They couldn’t post anything related to the instance in the Livestream Room, but they could still communicate with one another.
Everyone gathered in that room had lost friends or family in the Happy Circus instance. They weren’t there to watch any particular player; they had been keeping their eyes on this instance all along.
“That’s my sister!”
A young man abruptly shot to his feet after spotting a bizarre creature with a human head and a snake’s body through the feed from Yu Lingling’s Livestream Room. Someone had once told him there was a chance that friends or family who died in Happy Circus might later be seen inside the instance, but he had never believed it.
Now that he had seen it with his own eyes, his eyes turned bloodshot and his entire body began to tremble. “How did she end up like this?”