Chapter 148
Chapter 148
Wei Sen did not particularly care which Instance she entered. However…
“You can’t open this door, maybe because the Instance inside is connected to you. If I enter a designated Instance like this, will I still run into clues related to Ether Group?”
At that, Lin Ze said, “Things inside an Instance World aren’t set in stone. If the Ether Group clues appeared the previous times because of you, then no matter which Instance you enter, the relevant clues will appear in some other form.”
“Is that so? How do you know?”
“A guess. Just like different Contamination Sources produce different Eerie Shadows, and different Order Keepers encounter different clues. It makes sense. Otherwise, how do you explain the fact that no one else has ever encountered clues about Ether Group, yet you keep running into them?”
Wei Sen felt Lin Ze’s words did make some sense.
If she chose this Instance and clues related to Ether Group still appeared, then it would not only prove that Ether Group was closely connected to her, but also prove Lin Ze’s reasoning just now.
But…
Wei Sen looked at Lin Ze suspiciously. “Why me? If you want to know the truth behind the Perfect Clearance of this Instance, you don’t necessarily have to come to me, do you?”
Lin Ze smiled faintly. He knew she was not that easy to fool.
“If I said it’s because I believe you’re capable of achieving Perfect Clearance while no one else can, would you believe me?”
The two looked at each other. Wei Sen could not see through the man before her. After all, he was someone who had survived in the Eerie World for fifty years. His thoughts were indeed difficult to grasp.
Saying that only she could do it and no one else could was definitely an excuse. It was only an A-Rank Instance. The Hero Ranking was full of experts; surely someone would be able to achieve Perfect Clearance.
Although she did not know what Lin Ze’s purpose was in having her enter this Instance, at the very least, he would not harm her for the time being.
Besides, this Instance was only A-Rank. It would be somewhat difficult, but for her, achieving a Normal Clearance and coming out alive should not be too hard.
After thinking it over, Wei Sen said, “Fine. I’ll go.”
“Wait. Let me first tell you what I found out from others about the situation beyond the door,” Lin Ze said.
“All right.”
“There are currently three known methods for Normal Clearance.
“Method one: slay the Evil Dragon raised by the Red Queen, and the Mad Hatter will take you out of this world.
“Method two: kill the Mad Hatter and offer his head to the Red Queen. The Red Queen will guide you out of this world.
“Method three: find a way to earn the White Queen’s trust. She knows the way out of this world.
“If you can’t achieve Perfect Clearance, or if you encounter some other danger, you can choose one of these Clearance Conditions and leave the Instance World.
“The world inside this Instance is exactly what the name on the door says: Alice in Wonderland. It’s identical to the world in that story, but much more sinister, filled everywhere with deadly dangers and rules.
“The specific rules each person receives are not quite the same. You’ll only know once you go in.”
After Lin Ze finished in a grave tone, he operated his Watch for a moment and took out a pair of black glasses. “Take these. The sunglasses you wore earlier didn’t look very good. These suit you better.”
This was…
Wei Sen looked at the familiar item. It was the Anomalous Artifact, Eye of Chaos.
She took the glasses, and the System prompt instantly sounded in her mind.
///Ding~ Congratulations, Host, you have obtained the B-Rank Anomalous Artifact: Eye of Chaos.
Usage: Can distinguish everything affected by Contamination. Single use only. Duration: 1 minute.///
“How many Anomalous Artifacts do you have, exactly?” Wei Sen asked.
“Not sure. I’ve never counted.”
If a person’s wealth was judged by how many Anomalous Artifacts and Merit Points they had, then the man before her was basically a billionaire CEO of the Eerie World.
Wei Sen shook her head and prepared to enter the door, but then another question suddenly occurred to her.
“Oh, right. During these fifty years, when you weren’t in an Instance, were you always in the Origin Land?”
Lin Ze had not expected her to suddenly ask him such a question, but he answered seriously. “Most of the time, I stayed inside Instances.”
“Like a vacation?”
“More or less. If the Eerie Entity doesn’t cause trouble for me, I won’t cause trouble for them.”
Wei Sen smiled faintly. “I see.”
Only after saying it did Wei Sen realize that the question she had asked had nothing to do with what they were about to do. She had asked purely because she was curious.
But… she was actually curious about him.
“I’m leaving!” Wei Sen said coldly. She turned around without the slightest hesitation, opened the Gate of Xuanpin, and stepped inside.
Watching Wei Sen disappear through the doorway, Lin Ze still tried to follow her in. But an invisible force rejected him, keeping him outside. In the next second, the Gate of Xuanpin slammed shut, giving him no chance at all.
Lin Ze frowned at the door and murmured to himself, “I hope my judgment… is right.”
…
Inside the gate, the moment Wei Sen stepped in, her feet met empty air. She spun around, trying to grab onto something, but the already-closed Gate of Xuanpin was rapidly receding into the distance. There was nothing for her to hold on to.
The next second, her body plunged downward at high speed. All around her was pitch-black silence, as though she had fallen into the depths of the universe.
She couldn’t possibly fall to her death the moment she entered, could she?
If that were really the case, there was no way Lin Ze wouldn’t have warned her.
With that thought, Wei Sen didn’t panic. She worked to steady herself, spreading her body flat as she continued to fall. This way, she could better observe her surroundings.
And yet she fell for a very long time, while everything around her remained pitch-black.
[System, I want to do a Card Draw!]
She couldn’t keep waiting like this. What if she hit the bottom and splattered into a pile of mush? She had to think of something.
///Ding~ Very well. One Card Draw chance has been consumed. Current remaining chances: 0. The next Card Draw requires accumulating 15,000 Merit Points. The Host has currently accumulated 12,600 Merit Points. Another 2,400 Merit Points are needed to unlock the next Card Draw!
Ding~ Drawing card!
Ding~ Congratulations, Host. You have drawn Protagonist Halo Privilege *1!
From now on, if the Host encounters death, you may resurrect once!///
Excellent!
At that moment, Wei Sen was grateful she had drawn a System-granted privilege rather than an Anomalous Artifact.
Resurrection! In the Eerie World, no Anomalous Artifact obtainable there could do something like that, not even an S-Rank one!
As she thought this, specks of light began appearing before Wei Sen’s eyes.
Colorful beams of light stretched and twisted, racing upward past her on both sides.
Then a vintage writing desk appeared around her, along with a metallic desk lamp, rows upon rows of bookshelves, and countless books flying through the air.
She was still falling. As she descended, the scenery around her kept shifting, as though she were passing through a bizarre and dazzling dream.
She remembered now. In the story of Alice in Wonderland, Alice had fallen down the rabbit hole and gone through a scene like this too.
So now… was she experiencing everything Alice had experienced?
After falling, she would arrive in the underground “Wonderland.”
Just as that thought crossed her mind, a cold flash of light swept across her face.
Wei Sen instantly went on alert and hurriedly looked around. To her right, in the endlessly elongated study, a blade larger than her entire body was stabbing straight toward her.
It was so fast that it was clearly aiming for her life.
Seeing this, Wei Sen kicked over a nearby bookshelf with all her strength. More books flew upward, while she used the momentum to accelerate her fall, narrowly dodging the massive blade coming straight at her.
Wei Sen could already see candlelight glowing below. It looked like she was about to land. But in the next second, the giant blade suddenly stabbed out again from another direction.
This time, it was even faster, and the angle was viciously tricky. Wei Sen had nowhere to dodge. She glanced sideways and watched as cold metal easily pierced through the right side of her abdomen.
Wei Sen lowered her head in shock. Her torn internal organs were still hanging from the blade.
The world abruptly spun around her. Her upper body and lower body separated in a rain of blood.
In her whirling vision, her own legs were still twitching mechanically. Blood gushing from the severed bones drew eerie arcs through the air, like a twisted ballet of death.
She could barely feel any pain. Her consciousness gradually blurred, and after darkness swallowed her vision, her breathing stopped completely.