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Bonus chapter! Thank you to --- for the donation! ^^
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After noting down the time and location of the offline meetup, Ruan Qing exited the group chat and returned to the player forum.
This time, instead of searching for information about veteran players, he typed "Miao Village" into the search bar.
The results weren’t extensive, but they provided enough to understand the basics of Miao Village—this time, entirely from a player’s perspective.
After entering the dungeon, players would arrive in Miao Village as either tourists or potential marriage candidates, then gradually investigate the situation surrounding the village chief and her son.
The village chief had concealed her actual time of death, causing the parasitic gu worms inside her to leave her body long ago. When the black dog came to investigate, she deliberately lured it away.
The black dog always appeared after a villager’s death, clearly checking whether the gu worms had left the body—or whether the villager had turned into a vengeful ghost.
But because the village chief diverted it, no one realized the gu worms had escaped, nor did anyone discover she had become a ghost.
The gu worm outbreak in Miao Village was now inevitable.
However, hardly anyone survived until the fifth day. Most players died within the first three days after being parasitized by the gu worms.
Even with medicinal herbs suppressing them, Miao Village wasn’t completely safe. Occasionally, gu worms from the forest would enter the village, or some would crawl out of the farmland.
Nowhere was free of gu worms—except the northern part of Miao Village.
But going there was practically suicide.
Ruan Qing wasn’t particularly interested in the players. He fast-forwarded past their investigation segments, only slowing down when Miao Ciyu appeared in the footage.
Unfortunately, Miao Ciyu’s figure flashed by only once in the entire dungeon. Miao Linyuan and Li Tianyi didn’t appear at all.
There was no way to decipher the meaning behind the final conversation between the System and Li Tianyi.
In the past, there had been times when the System didn’t extract him from the dungeon immediately—but those were passive delays. This time, it was clearly the System’s own doing.
It almost seemed like the System had been threatened by Li Tianyi.
A faint suspicion lingered in Ruan Qing’s mind. He rewatched the footage several times but found no useful clues, eventually giving up.
Having slept for nearly a full day and night, he no longer felt tired. He picked up a hat and sunglasses, then draped himself in a loose black cloak, covering every inch of his body before leaving the room.
The game’s central district was as lively as ever, bustling with players of all kinds—almost like an ordinary city.
The aura around the players was the only thing that betrayed the underlying tension in this place.
Although the game's main city prohibited killing and the use of any force, that didn’t mean players couldn’t make enemies. There were even cases of players being hunted down inside dungeons.
Because of this, many players concealed their identities, so Ruan Qing’s outfit didn’t stand out too much. He walked with clear purpose toward his destination.
The main city had an area dedicated to viewing dungeons and live streams.
Ruan Qing soon arrived at the live-streaming hall. A massive screen dominated the center, densely packed with the names of dungeons—all currently being played by participants.
Before paying points to enter a stream, players could only see the dungeon’s name, difficulty level, and its clearance rate, displayed beside the title.
The hall wasn’t empty, but it wasn’t crowded either.
In this infinite horror game, unless a player had certain special items, they couldn’t choose their next dungeon. Watching a live stream cost three times the points earned from clearing that dungeon—most would rather spend those points on equipment.
Besides, there was no guarantee how strong or how long a streamed player would survive. It was easy to waste a fortune on a stream only to get nothing in return.
Ruan Qing’s gaze swept quickly across the screen before settling on one dungeon with a zero percent clearance rate.
Out of the thousands of dungeons listed, this was the only one no one had ever cleared.
Dungeons with zero clearance rates offered much higher rewards, and Ruan Qing was tempted to check it out. But he only had 460 points—nowhere near enough.
After a moment’s thought, he took out his phone, snapped a picture of the screen, circled the dungeon, and sent it to the veteran players’ group chat.
[Does anyone know this dungeon? What kind is it? [Pic.JPG]]
[Is it a strength-based dungeon or an intelligence-based one?]
He hesitated briefly before adding the question he really wanted to ask:
[...Are there ghosts in this one?]
The three messages appeared in the chat, but no one responded. No one even showed up—as if none of the group members were in the main city.
But if a player wasn’t in the main city, their avatar would gray out, showing them as offline.
At this moment, apart from the group owner, the other members' icons were lit up—clearly, they were all currently in the game's main city.
Either they hadn’t seen the message, or they simply couldn’t be bothered to respond.
After waiting a few minutes without getting an answer, Ruan Qing put the group chat out of his mind and turned his attention to another dungeon name.
Advanced Dungeon: Horror Amusement Park – Clear Rate: 3.29%
This dungeon had the lowest clear rate aside from the one with a 0% success rate. Without much hesitation, Ruan Qing paid the required points and entered its livestream.
Choosing a livestream required going to the broadcast hall, but once the points were paid, players could choose whether to watch it there or on their own phones.
Ruan Qing didn’t stay in the broadcast hall. Instead, he found a random café, sat down, and pulled out his phone to watch.
Players watching a livestream couldn’t send comments or see audience chat, but they could see the number of other players currently viewing the stream.
Horror Amusement Park – Viewers: 2
Ruan Qing’s gaze lingered on the number "2" for a second before shifting to the dungeon’s live feed.
What greeted him was a dreamlike, colorful amusement park. A merry tune played from the carousel, and staff in mascot costumes wandered around, holding bundles of balloons. They would kindly hand one to any visitor they encountered.
That is, if the balloons didn’t bear the visitors’ faces.
At first, the balloons weren’t very big, but as time passed, they grew—swelling larger and larger until, finally, they burst with a loud pop.
And when they did, the visitor with the same face as the balloon exploded too.
The reason for the balloons’ expansion was unknown. The speed at which they grew was unknown. Even the final limit before bursting was unknown—each visitor’s case was different.
The "visitors" were, of course, the players who had entered the dungeon. Clearly, they had to clear the dungeon before the balloon bearing their face exploded.
The dungeon’s clear conditions were simple: experience every ride in the Horror Amusement Park or obtain an item from the amusement park’s owner.
Ruan Qing had joined the livestream a bit late. The balloon of the player he’d selected to watch had already swollen to a terrifying size, looking as though it could burst at any second. Just seeing it was enough to make one’s heart pound in dread.
This player wasn’t weak by any means. Though every challenge in the game was deadly, he had managed to survive them all—barely. Yet his balloon continued to expand in an eerily unnatural way.
At this rate of growth, there was no way he would survive long enough to complete all the amusement park attractions.
If he didn’t make some kind of change soon, death would be waiting for him.
While Ruan Qing was focused on the screen, he didn’t notice that someone had finally spoken in the five-person group chat—not in response to his message, but by posting a picture.
[Who is this? [Image.JPG]]
The photo was slightly blurry, but the boy in it was still clearly visible.
The boy was completely wrapped in a large black cloak, with a hood pulled over his head, concealing his entire figure. His build and face were hidden, but his slender frame was unmistakable beneath the oversized fabric, giving off a delicate, almost fragile impression—like a caged canary.
At the moment, the boy was tilting his head up to look at the massive screen ahead, revealing a glimpse of his pale, jade-like chin—enough to make it hard to look away.
If Ruan Qing had glanced at his phone, he would have realized that the boy in the photo was none other than himself, taken just moments ago in the live broadcast hall.
Unlike his own message, which had gone unanswered, this one drew the attention of the other players.
One of the men, hearing the group chat notification, frowned in annoyance and picked up his phone to mute it. But when he saw the blurry image, his fingers froze—then quickly typed a reply.
[Can’t make out his face, hard to tell. Is this the live broadcast hall?]
Another member also appeared, more observant than the first. After examining the photo, he scrolled up through the chat history, his gaze settling on the image Ruan Qing had sent earlier.
[The angle of your photo lines up with the one posted above. If the timing’s close, the person you’re photographing is probably the same player who sent that picture.]
[A group member has recalled a message.]
[A group member has recalled a message.]
[A group member has recalled a message.]
The recall notifications kept popping up—even the original question about the boy’s identity was deleted. Soon, the chat interface reverted to its previous state, with only Ruan Qing’s message remaining.
And Ruan Qing, still oblivious, noticed none of it.
Hehehe
ReplyDeleteHaaaa... I really miss our himbo ML from the Casino Arc.
ReplyDeleteHe should be the endgame fr.