August 22, 2023 by Wyrd
So, after they had been fighting for half an hour without being able to kill each other, the man proposed a temporary ceasefire, and the murderer agreed.
They wanted to try killing each other based on their own abilities, without rushing it at this moment.
After all, if they were really caught between a praying mantis and a cicada, giving the opportunity to someone else to reap the benefits, both of them would probably be so frustrated that they’d end up killing themselves directly.
They exchanged a displeased glance, then turned their gazes away with disgust on their faces.
The man looked at Ruan Qing and said softly, “Ah Qing, it’s getting late. You’ve worked hard today. Go rest first.”
It was already past 10 o’clock, and he knew that his beautiful neighbor usually went to sleep around this time.
Ruan Qing nodded. “You should get some rest too. You have to work tomorrow.”
After Ruan Qing finished speaking, he reached out to pick up the child on the sofa, preparing to carry the child to the bedroom to sleep.
“Ah Qing, let me do it.” Seeing this, the man directly took the child from the sofa, afraid that Ruan Qing might take the child to his own bedroom.
Ruan Qing didn’t object and went straight to the bedroom.
He wasn’t too worried about the child’s safety. Generally, it was safer when someone was present to watch over. The child shouldn’t encounter any issues.
Having two weirdos was much safer than having only one. Weirdos were usually so possessive that they wouldn’t share their loved ones with anyone.
Ruan Qing relaxed slightly and went to rest.
The game instance had just begun, and he needed to recharge his energy.
***
On the other side, nine players were gathering together to investigate who exactly ‘Xiao Xi’ was.
Their roles this time were that of foreign tourists who came to this province for tourism. They were currently resting in a hotel in the Xishan Residential Area. According to their role, they could stay here for 10 days.
To make the most of their time, the players split into pairs and conducted separate investigations, agreeing to gather in a corner of the hotel lobby after two hours.
The player with dyed yellow hair shared the clues he had found. “I found something. Xiao Xi doesn’t seem to be a real person. It appears that he’s a character in a role-playing game played by children in the Xishan Kindergarten.”
“What kind of role-playing game?” an advanced male player asked immediately, his expression changing.
The yellow-haired player shook his head. “I don’t know. The residents of Xishan Residential Area don’t seem to understand this much either. They only know it’s a role-playing game that children like, and the most important character is this ‘Xiao Xi’. The kids all fight to play as that character.”
Other players frowned upon hearing this. It was similar to what they had investigated. The residents of Xishan Residential Area didn’t seem to know much about the nature of this role-playing game.
This was quite abnormal.
However, it was already getting late, and nighttime in the instance was more dangerous than daytime. Also, it wasn’t safe for only two players to go investigate Xishan Kindergarten recklessly.
But now, the nine players had gathered together.
Wait a minute!!!
Nine players!?
The advanced male player looked around and counted twice to confirm that there were only nine people present.
Under normal circumstances, the number of days to survive was usually the same as the number of players in the game instance. If there’s more, then there would be a hidden rule.
That rule was that it was highly likely for one player to die each day in the instance. If they couldn’t find a way out, they would all die on the ninth or tenth day.
This meant that even on the first day of entering the game instance, safety wasn’t guaranteed.
And this rule had a very enticing aspect: triggering the death condition didn’t necessarily lead to death.
As long as a substitute was found to die in place of a player, that player could safely live until the second day.
The advanced male player lowered his gaze, concealing his expression. He didn’t speak, and the group of people started walking toward Xishan Kindergarten.
Xishan Kindergarten wasn’t far away, and the nine individuals arrived quickly.
The entrance to the kindergarten was already locked. The whole place was pitch-black, with only the light from the security office shining out, giving off a somewhat eerie feeling.
The nine exchanged glances and ultimately decided to go check it out.
It was clear that the nine of them going together would make too much noise and definitely attract attention. After discussing for a moment, they decided to send one person to go check the situation.
No one knew if it would be dangerous to check the situation recklessly. In the end, it was a newcomer player who went to check.
The newcomer player didn’t want to go, but offending the veteran players might lead to an even quicker death. He could only tremble as he approached the security room.
The security room had windows, allowing a view of the interior.
After the newcomer player arrived beneath the window of the security room, he cautiously peeked his head in, eyes filled with fear as he looked inside.
His expression was as if he was afraid of seeing a monster.
However, the newcomer player didn’t see any monsters, not even a person.
The security room was empty, with only the lights on, as if the security had forgotten to turn them off after work.
Since no one was inside, the players decided to enter and search for clues.
Yet, even after thoroughly searching the security room, they found no clues. There was nothing in the security room except for a visitor’s log and the surveillance footage of the entrance of the kindergarten.
Luckily, they had avoided the cameras and weren’t caught on surveillance.
The log and surveillance footage were nothing special, just records of parents picking up their kids.
Just as everyone was preparing to leave, the surveillance video played the footage from this afternoon.
The people were momentarily stunned by the image of the young man on the screen. The surveillance footage was in black and white, but it didn’t diminish the young man’s stunning appearance.
Innocence and allure came together perfectly on the young man, devoid of any vulgarity. Instead, his beauty was beyond description, making it impossible to look away.
Even in black and white, one could imagine how extraordinary the young man looked.
Li Shuyang saw the familiar figure of the young man on the screen. He paused his card-shuffling hand and a faint enigmatic smile formed on his lips.
After the card that could bind NPCs became unusable, he used the card that bound teammates. The system still displayed “Cannot Bind”. Then Li Shuyang used his only tracking card.
This time, it succeeded.
Indeed, he was a non-bindable special NPC.
Reaching the level of a player like him, one could already faintly touch upon certain secrets of the game.
Due to the uniqueness of certain instances, there existed a special NPC within the instances.
The game system erased this special NPC’s memory, and the game system would then implant pre-set memories, circulating in various major instances, to complete specific tasks assigned to this special NPC.
It’s highly possible that Su Qing from the previous instance was this kind of special NPC.
Li Shuyang looked at the figure of the young man with delight in his eyes. He wondered if the game system would chase after him if he was to abduct the special NPC of the game system.
That’s quite intriguing.
However, the next second, Li Shuyang’s expression changed.
Husband?
Father?
Li Shuyang saw the child on the screen call out “Dad” to the young man and immediately crushed the card in his hand.
Although Li Shuyang wasn’t livestreaming, most of the fellow players were.
Lu Rufeng was famously known as a ‘Magician’ within the instances. Basically, in instances where he was present, other players could forget about completing it alive.
Lu Rufeng treated players crazily, and he treated himself just as crazily. The audience basically referred to him as “Crazy Lu”.
Lu Rufeng’s previous act of disguising as a newbie in the instance had long been spread to the forum of the audience. When someone discovered that Lu Rufeng continued to use alternate accounts to enter the instance, they immediately posted about it on the forum.
Many viewers caught on to this.
As a result, when the instance had just started for less than half a day, they saw Li Shuyang crush the card, causing an explosion of comments in the livestream room.
[Damn it!!! Crazy Lu is truly Crazy Lu. He destroys S-rank items just like that! Who else could pull this off!?]
[Help! He didn’t even give it a second thought before crushing it. I’m so shocked that I even dropped and shattered the glass in my hand!]
[It’s over, it’s over. The Magician has gone even crazier. Can the streamer survive this? No, this is one of my favorite streamers!]
[Did I just notice that God Lu only crushed the playing card after watching the surveillance video? Let’s be honest, that young man is really exceptionally good-looking. Could it be that God Lu saw him and felt attracted? But the NPC already has a husband and child.]
[I don’t think that’s possible, but during the last instance with God Lu, I was there too. He suppressed the ghost because he wanted an NPC’s body, and he ended up losing a lot in return. Well, that NPC looks just as attractive as this one, so I’ll observe for now.]
The sound of crushing the card wasn’t exactly quiet; many players turned their attention and saw Li Shuyang walking away.
Because the pattern on the card was concealed, players didn’t recognize it as Magician Lu Rufeng’s card. They just looked at him with a sense of confusion as he walked away.
Being alone right now wasn’t wise, but they wouldn’t stop someone who was seeking trouble.
Players continued searching for clues. Since the security room didn’t yield any clues, they decided to check inside the kindergarten.
The interior of the kindergarten was pitch-black, without a trace of light. Occasionally, a gentle breeze would rustle the leaves, creating a slight movement. Under the cover of darkness, it felt as if there were monsters lurking inside, giving an intense feeling of danger and unease.
Many players hesitated.
In the end, players decided to come back for investigation during the daylight tomorrow. For tonight, they would investigate the residential building in the Xishan Residential Area.
Given that the instance was named ‘Xishan Residential Area’, the entire community should be part of the instance core.
After all, if only the Xishan Kindergarten had a problem, the instance might have been directly named Xishan Kindergarten.
However, players investigated the plaza and entertainment facilities in the community, but no one knew the specific details about Xiao Xi’s role in the game.
Opinions were varied, and there were all sorts of claims.
This left players feeling helpless. Without even knowing what ‘Xiao Xi’ was, let alone investigating who killed ‘Xiao Xi’, it seemed they would have to visit Xishan Kindergarten tomorrow.
***
“Ding dong! Ding dong! Ding dong!“ The doorbell unexpectedly rang, carrying a sense of urgency, sounding unusually piercing in the quiet night.
In the master bedroom, two men were emitting cold hostility, as if they wanted to draw a knife and kill each other the next second. Upon hearing the doorbell, both of them impatiently furrowed their brows.
Both of them really didn’t want to bother.
However, if the doorbell continued ringing, it might wake up the wife resting in the adjacent bedroom.
They had no choice but to attend to it.
Both of them found masks and put them on, then stepped out of the master bedroom.
One of them took down the photo from the living room wall, as if throwing away trash, and tossed them onto the balcony outside the kitchen. The other walked towards the door.
August 22, 2023 by Wyrd
So, after they had been fighting for half an hour without being able to kill each other, the man proposed a temporary ceasefire, and the murderer agreed.
They wanted to try killing each other based on their own abilities, without rushing it at this moment.
After all, if they were really caught between a praying mantis and a cicada, giving the opportunity to someone else to reap the benefits, both of them would probably be so frustrated that they’d end up killing themselves directly.
They exchanged a displeased glance, then turned their gazes away with disgust on their faces.
The man looked at Ruan Qing and said softly, “Ah Qing, it’s getting late. You’ve worked hard today. Go rest first.”
It was already past 10 o’clock, and he knew that his beautiful neighbor usually went to sleep around this time.
Ruan Qing nodded. “You should get some rest too. You have to work tomorrow.”
After Ruan Qing finished speaking, he reached out to pick up the child on the sofa, preparing to carry the child to the bedroom to sleep.
“Ah Qing, let me do it.” Seeing this, the man directly took the child from the sofa, afraid that Ruan Qing might take the child to his own bedroom.
Ruan Qing didn’t object and went straight to the bedroom.
He wasn’t too worried about the child’s safety. Generally, it was safer when someone was present to watch over. The child shouldn’t encounter any issues.
Having two weirdos was much safer than having only one. Weirdos were usually so possessive that they wouldn’t share their loved ones with anyone.
Ruan Qing relaxed slightly and went to rest.
The game instance had just begun, and he needed to recharge his energy.
***
On the other side, nine players were gathering together to investigate who exactly ‘Xiao Xi’ was.
Their roles this time were that of foreign tourists who came to this province for tourism. They were currently resting in a hotel in the Xishan Residential Area. According to their role, they could stay here for 10 days.
To make the most of their time, the players split into pairs and conducted separate investigations, agreeing to gather in a corner of the hotel lobby after two hours.
The player with dyed yellow hair shared the clues he had found. “I found something. Xiao Xi doesn’t seem to be a real person. It appears that he’s a character in a role-playing game played by children in the Xishan Kindergarten.”
“What kind of role-playing game?” an advanced male player asked immediately, his expression changing.
The yellow-haired player shook his head. “I don’t know. The residents of Xishan Residential Area don’t seem to understand this much either. They only know it’s a role-playing game that children like, and the most important character is this ‘Xiao Xi’. The kids all fight to play as that character.”
Other players frowned upon hearing this. It was similar to what they had investigated. The residents of Xishan Residential Area didn’t seem to know much about the nature of this role-playing game.
This was quite abnormal.
However, it was already getting late, and nighttime in the instance was more dangerous than daytime. Also, it wasn’t safe for only two players to go investigate Xishan Kindergarten recklessly.
But now, the nine players had gathered together.
Wait a minute!!!
Nine players!?
The advanced male player looked around and counted twice to confirm that there were only nine people present.
Under normal circumstances, the number of days to survive was usually the same as the number of players in the game instance. If there’s more, then there would be a hidden rule.
That rule was that it was highly likely for one player to die each day in the instance. If they couldn’t find a way out, they would all die on the ninth or tenth day.
This meant that even on the first day of entering the game instance, safety wasn’t guaranteed.
And this rule had a very enticing aspect: triggering the death condition didn’t necessarily lead to death.
As long as a substitute was found to die in place of a player, that player could safely live until the second day.
The advanced male player lowered his gaze, concealing his expression. He didn’t speak, and the group of people started walking toward Xishan Kindergarten.
Xishan Kindergarten wasn’t far away, and the nine individuals arrived quickly.
The entrance to the kindergarten was already locked. The whole place was pitch-black, with only the light from the security office shining out, giving off a somewhat eerie feeling.
The nine exchanged glances and ultimately decided to go check it out.
It was clear that the nine of them going together would make too much noise and definitely attract attention. After discussing for a moment, they decided to send one person to go check the situation.
No one knew if it would be dangerous to check the situation recklessly. In the end, it was a newcomer player who went to check.
The newcomer player didn’t want to go, but offending the veteran players might lead to an even quicker death. He could only tremble as he approached the security room.
The security room had windows, allowing a view of the interior.
After the newcomer player arrived beneath the window of the security room, he cautiously peeked his head in, eyes filled with fear as he looked inside.
His expression was as if he was afraid of seeing a monster.
However, the newcomer player didn’t see any monsters, not even a person.
The security room was empty, with only the lights on, as if the security had forgotten to turn them off after work.
Since no one was inside, the players decided to enter and search for clues.
Yet, even after thoroughly searching the security room, they found no clues. There was nothing in the security room except for a visitor’s log and the surveillance footage of the entrance of the kindergarten.
Luckily, they had avoided the cameras and weren’t caught on surveillance.
The log and surveillance footage were nothing special, just records of parents picking up their kids.
Just as everyone was preparing to leave, the surveillance video played the footage from this afternoon.
The people were momentarily stunned by the image of the young man on the screen. The surveillance footage was in black and white, but it didn’t diminish the young man’s stunning appearance.
Innocence and allure came together perfectly on the young man, devoid of any vulgarity. Instead, his beauty was beyond description, making it impossible to look away.
Even in black and white, one could imagine how extraordinary the young man looked.
Li Shuyang saw the familiar figure of the young man on the screen. He paused his card-shuffling hand and a faint enigmatic smile formed on his lips.
After the card that could bind NPCs became unusable, he used the card that bound teammates. The system still displayed “Cannot Bind”. Then Li Shuyang used his only tracking card.
This time, it succeeded.
Indeed, he was a non-bindable special NPC.
Reaching the level of a player like him, one could already faintly touch upon certain secrets of the game.
Due to the uniqueness of certain instances, there existed a special NPC within the instances.
The game system erased this special NPC’s memory, and the game system would then implant pre-set memories, circulating in various major instances, to complete specific tasks assigned to this special NPC.
It’s highly possible that Su Qing from the previous instance was this kind of special NPC.
Li Shuyang looked at the figure of the young man with delight in his eyes. He wondered if the game system would chase after him if he was to abduct the special NPC of the game system.
That’s quite intriguing.
However, the next second, Li Shuyang’s expression changed.
Husband?
Father?
Li Shuyang saw the child on the screen call out “Dad” to the young man and immediately crushed the card in his hand.
Although Li Shuyang wasn’t livestreaming, most of the fellow players were.
Lu Rufeng was famously known as a ‘Magician’ within the instances. Basically, in instances where he was present, other players could forget about completing it alive.
Lu Rufeng treated players crazily, and he treated himself just as crazily. The audience basically referred to him as “Crazy Lu”.
Lu Rufeng’s previous act of disguising as a newbie in the instance had long been spread to the forum of the audience. When someone discovered that Lu Rufeng continued to use alternate accounts to enter the instance, they immediately posted about it on the forum.
Many viewers caught on to this.
As a result, when the instance had just started for less than half a day, they saw Li Shuyang crush the card, causing an explosion of comments in the livestream room.
[Damn it!!! Crazy Lu is truly Crazy Lu. He destroys S-rank items just like that! Who else could pull this off!?]
[Help! He didn’t even give it a second thought before crushing it. I’m so shocked that I even dropped and shattered the glass in my hand!]
[It’s over, it’s over. The Magician has gone even crazier. Can the streamer survive this? No, this is one of my favorite streamers!]
[Did I just notice that God Lu only crushed the playing card after watching the surveillance video? Let’s be honest, that young man is really exceptionally good-looking. Could it be that God Lu saw him and felt attracted? But the NPC already has a husband and child.]
[I don’t think that’s possible, but during the last instance with God Lu, I was there too. He suppressed the ghost because he wanted an NPC’s body, and he ended up losing a lot in return. Well, that NPC looks just as attractive as this one, so I’ll observe for now.]
The sound of crushing the card wasn’t exactly quiet; many players turned their attention and saw Li Shuyang walking away.
Because the pattern on the card was concealed, players didn’t recognize it as Magician Lu Rufeng’s card. They just looked at him with a sense of confusion as he walked away.
Being alone right now wasn’t wise, but they wouldn’t stop someone who was seeking trouble.
Players continued searching for clues. Since the security room didn’t yield any clues, they decided to check inside the kindergarten.
The interior of the kindergarten was pitch-black, without a trace of light. Occasionally, a gentle breeze would rustle the leaves, creating a slight movement. Under the cover of darkness, it felt as if there were monsters lurking inside, giving an intense feeling of danger and unease.
Many players hesitated.
In the end, players decided to come back for investigation during the daylight tomorrow. For tonight, they would investigate the residential building in the Xishan Residential Area.
Given that the instance was named ‘Xishan Residential Area’, the entire community should be part of the instance core.
After all, if only the Xishan Kindergarten had a problem, the instance might have been directly named Xishan Kindergarten.
However, players investigated the plaza and entertainment facilities in the community, but no one knew the specific details about Xiao Xi’s role in the game.
Opinions were varied, and there were all sorts of claims.
This left players feeling helpless. Without even knowing what ‘Xiao Xi’ was, let alone investigating who killed ‘Xiao Xi’, it seemed they would have to visit Xishan Kindergarten tomorrow.
***
“Ding dong! Ding dong! Ding dong!“ The doorbell unexpectedly rang, carrying a sense of urgency, sounding unusually piercing in the quiet night.
In the master bedroom, two men were emitting cold hostility, as if they wanted to draw a knife and kill each other the next second. Upon hearing the doorbell, both of them impatiently furrowed their brows.
Both of them really didn’t want to bother.
However, if the doorbell continued ringing, it might wake up the wife resting in the adjacent bedroom.
They had no choice but to attend to it.
Both of them found masks and put them on, then stepped out of the master bedroom.
One of them took down the photo from the living room wall, as if throwing away trash, and tossed them onto the balcony outside the kitchen. The other walked towards the door.
