Chapter 18
Chapter 18
The System scoffed. His tone was far from gentle, yet somehow carried a sense of helpless concern. [Dirty.]
Zhao Xiuming obediently lowered his hand. Putting on a false smile, he complained to the players, “Oh dear. Those monsters outside have trapped me here, too. I’m so scared.”
The four players exchanged inscrutable looks. They didn’t believe a word of it.
When this fellow lied, he practically wanted to write “fake” across his face.
The male player opposite him was about to act when the leader stopped him in time.
She shook her head at her teammate, then quietly asked Zhao Xiuming, “What do you want?”
He liked talking to straightforward people. Before he could open his mouth, though, she took out a lie-detecting item: a palm-sized porcelain rabbit.
The four players thought this would keep them from being deceived or used. But Zhao Xiuming had never intended to lie in the first place.
“I’m sure you’ve noticed something wrong with the hospital. Don’t you want to know why?”
“Those unkillable doctors are a real headache. Don’t you want to find a way to kill them?”
Every sentence he offered was deeply tempting to the players.
To clear the instance, they had to survive. And hiding alone couldn’t keep them alive.
Ideally, they needed to know how to kill the anomalies. Otherwise, once found, they would have no power to resist and would certainly die.
As soon as Zhao Xiuming finished, the four players’ expressions shifted. The item in the leader’s hand hadn’t reacted at all. It hadn’t even begun a judgment.
“He’s asking questions, so it can’t judge them.” The male teammate was a little baffled, unsure whether Zhao Xiuming was deliberately exploiting a bug in the item.
Convinced that he was a cunning NPC, the man couldn’t help challenging him. “What do you mean? You want to work with us? Aren’t you a doctor here?”
The female teammate also noticed the leading nature of his words. “Why should we trust you?”
Just when they thought he would keep dodging their questions, he answered with painstaking seriousness. “I want to work with you.”
“I’m not a doctor.”
“Why should you trust me…? How would I know why you’d trust me?”
“Don’t, then. You’ll do what I say anyway.”
At last, the porcelain rabbit reacted. Its eyes glowed green. [Truthful.]
The leader quickly assembled the information. “You say you’re not a doctor. Then what was going on in the ward?”
Zhao Xiuming began evading the question again. “It was…”
He spread his hands, his eyes teasing. “Exactly what you’re thinking.”
The rabbit didn’t react. The leader realized something and recalled her earlier suspicions.
Her expression darkened. “You really were posing as a doctor to make us deal with that monster. How did you know we could?”
Zhao Xiuming looked surprised. “The only people entering the hospital then were you and us. Didn’t you see?”
“If the monster could eat us, why couldn’t it eat you?”
“You and a stranger run into a bear. You have a gun. What do you do?”
“Shoot the stranger, of course. Buy yourself time to escape.”
He answered his own question. The rabbit’s eyes shone green. [Truthful.]
Before the players could react, Zhao Xiuming said earnestly, “I don’t want to hurt you at all.”
“I’m a wonderfully good person: kind, accepting, compassionate, and full of pity for the world.”
Green light blazed from the rabbit’s eyes as it affirmed over and over, [Truthful! Truthful! Truthful! A saint!]
Its three uses exhausted, the porcelain rabbit shattered and vanished.
The players looked shocked. They looked bewildered.
Once their brains started working again, their first instinct was disbelief. But an item produced by Horror Game couldn’t be faulty.
This anomaly NPC was a wonderfully good person, didn’t want to hurt players, and sincerely wanted to cooperate.
Had a windfall simply dropped into their laps? Free help, delivered to their door?
Even the comments in all four players’ livestreams found it incredible and began analyzing it.
“He doesn’t look like a good guy. No, wait, he does look like one. I just don’t know why I keep feeling he isn’t. No, he really doesn’t look evil. Huh, but he feels kind of evil. But he’s pretty cute… Oh no. He must have a special ability. He’s controlling me now!”
“He didn’t lie? Could even the Honest Porcelain Rabbit fail to detect it? We’ve never encountered an NPC who could block items before.”
“It’s not the item. He’s playing word games.”
“The only direct answers he gave were ‘wants to cooperate’ and ‘not a doctor.’ You can’t trust the rest: ‘doesn’t want to hurt players’ and ‘a good person.'”
“‘Doesn’t want to hurt’ doesn’t mean ‘can’t hurt.’ ‘A good person’ doesn’t mean good to players. Maybe the recipients of his kindness are NPCs.”
“Don’t tell me these players are getting completely taken in.”
“Probably not. This team is fairly well-known. One member’s enhancement path is seriously strange…”
Inside the game, the players realized Zhao Xiuming was difficult to deal with. Continuing to use lie-detecting items would waste a lot of points.
With the instance becoming more dangerous, they needed to save those points for more important life-saving items.
They exchanged several looks and understood one another’s intentions. Three quietly used protective items.
Zhao Xiuming keenly sensed that something had changed. The female teammate who had been silent and easy to overlook suddenly stepped forward.
There were two men and two women in the group. The woman using the lie-detecting item was their leader, with shoulder-length hair.
Both men beside her were tall. One wore a mask covering his eyes; the other held the detector and carried a backpack.
The woman who stepped forward had wavy curls. Compared with the other three, she seemed more concerned with her appearance.
Not only did she look perfectly composed, she had carefully maintained her makeup and kept her clothes immaculate.
The other players wore trousers for ease of movement. Only she wore a dress.
A striking, sexy red dress, with a slit at the chest and an open back.
Zhao Xiuming’s expression grew strange. He didn’t place much importance on human appearances.
He noticed people’s faces and the details of their clothing, but he didn’t dwell on them or savor them.
Only when he needed the information did he recall it, analyzing what their appearance and clothes could tell him.
It was like being unable to grasp what others called an “atmosphere,” or understanding that someone was trying to create one without feeling any emotional response.
But now… he realized he was analyzing all four players’ appearances with extraordinary clarity. He had even reached a conclusion: the woman in red was beautiful and very captivating.
Strange.
That strangeness interested him. He couldn’t help staring at her closely.
Noticing his gaze, the woman in red looked satisfied.
Players could enhance their bodies in ways related to their talents.
Her enhancement focused on charm: what people commonly called being “universally irresistible.”
Players and NPCs alike would be drawn to her and develop feelings for her.
Players might protect themselves with items, but NPCs without items had no way to resist.
Soon, the two NPCs before her would become her infatuated lapdogs, obeying her every word.
She played with her hair and smiled at Zhao Xiuming, successfully drawing a look of wonder from him.
She laughed softly. “Do you like me?”
He paused. “Yes.”
As he spoke, he tried to approach. But the moment he took a step, the masked man behind him wrapped an arm around his waist and held him immobile.
The biker not only restrained him but also caught his chin between gloved fingers.
Zhao Xiuming could only lean back against him, forced to lift his head, his eyes bewildered and pitiful.
The biker took a deep breath, released his chin, and instead covered Zhao Xiuming’s face completely with his palm.