Chapter 21
Chapter 21
Zhao Xiuming copied the way the biker had touched him earlier: he bent down and placed a hand beneath the anomaly doctor’s chin.
But he didn’t use his intact left hand. He used his ugly, mutated right one.
Slowly lifting the doctor’s face, he leaned close to his ear and whispered, “Heaven knows, earth knows, you know, and I know.”
“Even your so-called husband doesn’t know.”
He spoke innocently, full of reassurance. “My dear doctor, you wouldn’t want your other colleagues to know what’s happened to you, would you?”
The anomaly doctor opened his mouth to bite. But the feelers on Zhao Xiuming’s right hand had already spread across his face. The black strands drifted in curling patterns.
The once-disgusting filaments had an eerie beauty against that white, plastic-looking skin.
Unlike the wild feelers on the anomaly NPCs, these were docile and obedient. They carefully avoided the doctor’s own feelers, lashing Pu Yuanliang with something almost coy and provocative.
Pu Yuanliang didn’t know what Zhao Xiuming wanted. The anomaly NPCs had discovered the four players hiding in the morgue long ago.
They had deliberately surrounded the place, planning to act once night fell and the restrictions lifted.
Then Zhao Xiuming had suddenly appeared, bringing the masked biker they couldn’t afford to provoke.
Pu Yuanliang clamped his mouth shut. His lips began to fuse into his face, becoming one seamless whole.
He plainly refused to communicate, deliberately eliminating his own ability to speak.
Zhao Xiuming didn’t force him. Each time the feelers on his right hand struck, the System announced the points in a high-pitched voice.
His fresh, youthful voice turned soft when he pitched it up, despite the teasing tone.
[You’re really enjoying whipping him, Ge.]
[You’re rewarding him.]
[Each lash only earns a hundred points.]
[Interact with your nonhuman biker little girl, and a kiss is worth at least five hundred.]
[Teacher, what’s wrong with our Little Darling? He’s about to fall apart.]
[It was through a mask. You didn’t even really kiss.]
[Don’t tell me… you can’t handle it, Ge.]
Zhao Xiuming considered seriously and replied in his mind, [System, maybe you’re right. Why don’t I turn the anomaly doctors into little girls and kiss them one by one?]
The System said, […]
[The widow versions of the doctors are better, Ge.]
Afraid he might actually do it, the System tried hard to convey his disapproval through his clear voice. [Think about it, Ge.]
[A whole crowd of plastic male mannequins running toward you in skirts.]
[Trying to surround and kill you, they’ll separate their heads from their bodies.]
[Heads with spines dangling beneath them, floating like balls, coming at your face from every angle to kiss… bite you.]
This time, Zhao Xiuming fell silent. He pictured it, even imagining his points rising while the anomalies attacked him.
It wasn’t impossible. Just unnecessary for now.
Like a blood bag, the anomaly doctor Pu Yuanliang was wrapped in feelers Zhao Xiuming had extended and kept tethered at his side.
Of course, he wouldn’t submit without a fight. But every time he moved, the masked biker turned toward him, radiating menace.
Besides, Pu Yuanliang wanted to know Zhao Xiuming’s plan. He couldn’t hear the deranged conversation between Zhao Xiuming and the System.
All he saw was Zhao Xiuming smile, stand, and spread his hands. A Bible appeared on one side, a cross hovering on the other.
The two forms of [In the Name of God] were so “evil,” yet Zhao Xiuming wore a look of compassion, pretending to be a wonderfully good man. “Who else wants to enter a beautiful marriage?”
“Come, let Father officiate, physicians of God.”
Pu Yuanliang stared. “???”
All the surviving Horror Game players had gathered. After exchanging information, they remained doubtful of Zhao Xiuming’s claims.
But their companions’ missing bodies were currently the only lead. They could only begin searching while it was light.
Strangely, the Terror players had also spread out, looking everywhere for something.
The woman in red grew more certain the lead was real. Yet after a full day’s search, turning the entire hospital upside down, they found no trace of the players’ bodies.
The sun was sinking westward. Night would soon come again, and the NPCs would surely rampage once more.
The woman with shoulder-length hair was frantic. “We’ve searched this long without seeing a single NPC or a single player’s body.”
“The doctors are probably still in the morgue. Could Zhao Xiuming be lying? Maybe the bodies were there all along, never hidden anywhere else. Maybe he just wanted us out of the way.”
“We have to go back and check! There were only four of us then. We couldn’t take the doctors on. Now we’ve gathered everyone, let’s stay together and test things before the rampage starts.”
“Maybe we can’t kill anomalies at night, but we can during the day.”
They had already wasted an entire day because of Zhao Xiuming’s words. It was difficult not to suspect that he’d deliberately stalled them.
The teammate with the backpack tried to calm her. “Sis, don’t rush into anything.”
“The search wasn’t entirely fruitless. At least we know the hospital is completely safe during the day.”
“I also took the chance to hack its surveillance system. We know Terror Game’s mission is to find someone, too. Maybe there’s a place in this hospital we players don’t know about.”
The beautiful player in red pressed her lips into a smile. “Then Zhao Xiuming’s lead is real! Li Zhehan and his fiancée really exist.”
“I told you. With the lie-detecting rabbit and my skill, how could he lie?”
“He wasn’t deceiving us or trying to get us away from the morgue.”
“Do we keep looking now? For that secret place in the hospital the NPCs have hidden from us?”
After some thought, the leader offered a new suggestion. “If our mission doesn’t conflict with Terror Game’s, perhaps we could try making contact.”
“We can gather information on them. They can do the same to us.”
“This hospital isn’t small, but it isn’t enormous. The only reason we haven’t run into each other is that both sides are deliberately avoiding it.”
Horror Game’s mission was survival. Terror Game’s was to find someone. The only reason to fight was that killing the other game’s group would raise their own rewards.
“Maybe Terror Game’s players aren’t killing us because they think we can find Li Zhehan and the others. Then they’ll kill us afterward.”
Another player objected with an even darker theory. “Maybe they think they don’t need to kill us themselves. We’re too weak. They can just wait for the NPCs to wipe us out.”
“I’m not working with Terror players. I’d rather we pool our points and hold out together for the remaining time.”
The Horror Game players only had to survive. There was no need to risk searching for clues or confronting the anomaly doctors. They simply had to stay alive by any means necessary.
Their livestream comments split into two camps, too. One favored action and thought the short-haired leader had a good idea.
The other favored caution, believing that keeping their heads down and building strength was the right approach.
“At this difficulty, how many points will it cost to tank the attacks without knowing the NPCs’ weaknesses? Even if they survive, they’ll lose everything. Waiting passively is a dead end. Better to fight for a way out.”
“They just need to make it through the time left. Why cooperate with Terror players or look for some clue-related character? Aren’t they making trouble for themselves? Staying alive matters most. Who cares about points? First, they have to live.”
“They won’t live without taking risks, either. They’re already under attack from NPCs. What if the Terror Game group takes the chance to attack, too? Get hit from both sides and hand the enemy easy kills? Cooperate with Terror Game first and keep them onside. Finding Li Zhehan isn’t the important part. Survival is. Use cooperation to borrow their firepower, and they can coast to victory.”
“Terror Game’s players aren’t idiots. What if they’re the ones doing the using? They might die even more horribly.”
With a strict objective-based mission, perhaps the players could have cooperated.
But with a survival mission, some always clung to wishful thinking and hesitated.
The commenters on both sides stood their ground. The players couldn’t reach a consensus, either. None of them considered that they had walked into a trap.
Finding NPC weaknesses. Working with Terror players.
The fact was, even finding this Li Zhehan and his fiancée, Zhang Xueya, wouldn’t change anything.
Because the supposed instance storyline didn’t come from the instance at all. It was a story brought in by cannon fodder from a romance novel.
Unknown changes were taking place here. They were both a loophole and an opportunity. Realizing the instance had no backstory, Zhao Xiuming had no objection to grafting one onto it and taking advantage.
The leader with shoulder-length hair had guessed the most unlikely truth. But even Zhao Xiuming didn’t know why Terror Game’s players were looking for Li Zhehan.
Probably because of Assistant Li?
“We really are on the same wavelength.” Reading the message Zhou Qingyan had sent, Zhao Xiuming’s smile widened.
It said the Terror Game players had concluded from Assistant Li’s “confession” that Zhang Xueya was the cause of the hospital’s changes.
But soon Zhou Qingyan sent another message. “Zhao Xiuming, do you know where Zhang Xueya is? We saw the biker with you.”
Of course he knew. He stared at the phone, its glow lighting the area around him.
Around him were anomaly doctors, captured and bound by feelers.
Packed together. Who knew how many… widows.