The 22nd floor was eerily quiet, with everything looking almost identical to the hotel, except for some slight differences, like a few stubborn stains on the carpet that refused to come out.
The dim lighting, the winding corridors, and the oppressive feeling made it seem like there was nothing unusual at first glance. However, there was something lurking in this space, watching and waiting, hidden in the darkness, in the shadows, in the blind spots beyond one’s line of sight.
In the silence so profound that you could hear a pin drop, Xiao Qing suddenly clutched his ears in pain. He heard a piercing and cacophonous noise erupting in his ears as if there were countless people arguing and wild beasts roaring in a narrow space, and the noise was like needles stabbing into his eardrums, causing dizziness and pain. His consciousness received successive prompts for a sanity check.
The “ding” sound of the elevator’s arrival was like a wake-up call to some presence that had been dormant in this space. In the empty corridor, something was undoubtedly lurking. It was discussing the prey’s taste, debating who should eat the head and who should eat the hands, with voices at a frequency that humans couldn’t hear.
“There’s something…” Xiao Qing managed to utter a few words, despite his throbbing headache and the ear-piercing noise that made it hard to hear his own voice.
Old Wang, who was closest to Xiao Qing, immediately took charge. He lifted Xiao Qing, brought out a rope, and had Huahua and Tiantian help secure him to his back to free up his hands. He then looked at Xu Yintang and asked, “Where are we going?”
“2201,” When Xu Yintang saw Xiao Qing’s face, he immediately pressed Second Treasure on Xiao Qing’s face and began to brush his soul to soothe him. At the same time, he took out Little Darling and placed him just outside the elevator door. Little Darling extended all of its tentacles, cleaning the entire elevator hall.
Little Darling, who was about the size of a tissue in his pocket, had expanded to a radius of more than two meters. When looking at it, one could see countless tentacles, dozens of them, curling and swirling. At the center of the tentacles was a piece the size of a human head, resembling a distorted and twisted heart. It was black and blue, with thick veins crisscrossing its surface. At the top of the fleshy mass, there was a mouth with fine tendrils surrounding it, resembling a high-powered shredder capable of pulverizing even steel.
The fleshy mass and tentacles were adorned with bright red and vivid blue, creating a stark visual contrast, making this creature appear even more bizarre and out of place, as if it were something forcibly pasted into this world.
It was just lying there, all limbs extended, looking like a corner of a nightmare’s boundary hell. It was something that shouldn’t be closely examined, something that couldn’t be described.
The prompts for sanity checks and for using sanity recovery skills sounded almost simultaneously. However, this was not a comfortable and healing experience.
Crouching on top of Xiao Qing’s head was a grotesque creature, completely different from the tentacles and fleshy mass. It was terrifying in a way that was both similar and fundamentally different from humans. Its form gave people an inexplicable chill, as if it were an abnormally developed and distorted embryo, a hideous and malformed baby.
It was a sight that was both familiar and utterly alien, a form that made people involuntarily shudder.
Little Darling had no perception of anything abnormal in the corridor. There was no scent of food, no odor of decay, and the empty corridor appeared to be just as they saw it. It slowly extended its tentacles to explore the surroundings, attempting to touch farther areas, leaving behind dirty and sticky traces where it had just encountered the putrid secretions and ruptured pustules.
Xu Yintang followed Little Darling, leaving the elevator, and did the same as Xiao Qing had done before, holding back the elevator door for his teammates. Huahua took a step back and signaled for Old Wang, who was carrying Xiao Qing, to go first. She and Tiantian would cover the rear.
The two children exhibited great patience and meticulousness in the corridor, but they found no traces of food. Yet, Xiao Qing’s ears were filled with the increasingly loud noise, and a foul odor began to seep into his nostrils, gradually becoming thick and viscous, making it difficult to breathe.
We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.
Pa’r ufaalcu mibrfg… Vbwfatlcu lr ufaalcu mibrfg…
Pc jc lcrajca, Wljb Hlcu’r ybvs mbcneirfv jcv agfwyifv, jcv yibbv yfujc ab aglmxif ogbw tlr cbrf jcv fjgr. Lf kjr ujrqlcu tfjnlis, tlr ojmf aegclcu yielrt. Lf wjcjufv ab ajxf bea j qlii ogbw tlr yjmxqjmx jcv obgmfv la lcab tlr wbeat, vfrqfgjafis agslcu ab wjxf rfcrf bo jcs mief tf mbeiv ecvfgrajcv.
Believe in your teammates, he had to believe in his teammates…
“Shadow… women… leaving blood, blood, blood… cannot… no… save, save, save… Knife Money… that deal… no, no… killed… killed…”
There were too many voices and too many scents flooding into his mind at once, tearing his thoughts to shreds and binding his tongue, turning all his words into incomprehensible gibberish.
Xiao Qing could only desperately move his one remaining, obedient eye up and down, repeatedly doing so. He looked towards Xu Yintang, hoping that Xu Yintang could understand his signals. Their cooperation since entering the instance had proven that their thought process was generally in sync, but the other teammates were already giving their all just to stay awake, and even if they saw something, they had no ability to defend or fight back.
Believe, he had to believe in his teammates… he had to believe…
Xu Yintang saw Xiao Qing’s shifting eye, and he followed the gaze upwards and then back towards himself. In the dimly intertwining light, his shadow multiplied and spread out on the ground like unfurling petals. As he focused on his own shadow, every one of his shadows looked up at him.
Shadows, numerous and swaying.
They resembled wide-open mouths, as if they were about to swallow him whole.
Shadow… light…
A flash of insight crossed Xu Yintang’s mind!
“Stand together!” he shouted loudly and swiftly retreated to press against Old Wang’s body. At the same time, Little Darling’s tentacles suddenly shot up towards the light above their heads, finding it!
The light bulb shattered into pieces, and within a moment of darkness, Little Darling’s mouth apparatus clamped down on something. Second Treasure also raised his head as if he sensed it, greedily opening his mouth, as if he were savoring honey from the air.
As one light went out, all the lights in the corridor started to flicker, as if there were electrical issues. The shadows on the ground became disordered, losing their human form. At a certain moment, Xu Yintang saw a flower petal-shaped giant mouth filled with sharp teeth at the boundary where light and shadow met.
Huahua and Tiantian had already hurriedly run to Old Wang’s side during this interval. They held Xu Yintang’s outstretched hand as he encircled Old Wang and Xiao Qing. The five of them huddled together, with the shadows under their feet overlapping and forming a huge, blooming flower. As the light contracted and expanded, it seemed temporarily impossible to close.
In the meantime, Little Darling smashed one light bulb after another, biting down on the prey that roamed within the darkness. The corridor’s lights, one by one, extinguished. From this corridor to that corner, in the blink of an eye, Little Darling’s tentacles disappeared into the depths of the corridor.
“Ahhhhhh! Die! Die, die, die, die, die, die, die, die, die, die!!!” Xiao Qing’s eyeball swirled, and his features contorted. At this moment, all the voices in his mind were screaming in unison, and he simultaneously experienced the excruciating pain of being crushed and bitten by the mouth apparatus. He screamed uncontrollably.
Xu Yintang had seen and experienced too many states of mental breakdown caused by electric shocks. He knew that Xiao Qing was now in a state of delirium, unable to perceive the outside world. Second Treasure also transmitted his own helplessness at dealing with Xiao Qing’s current mental state.
Its mental soothing skill could restore a maximum of 3 sanity points at a time. It was like pouring a bucket of water into a swimming pool at a time. At the same time, Xiao Qing’s swimming pool was draining at a faster rate, emptying three buckets for every one that was filled, until it was completely depleted.
If this continued, Xiao Qing would go completely insane. Xu Yintang didn’t say a word and raised Xiao Qing’s iron rod. According to his experience, physical disturbance was the best way to combat madness.
He swung the rod forcefully, smashing it on Xiao Qing’s head. Xiao Qing’s face was covered in blood, and his eyes rolled back as he slumped, completely motionless.
Several teammates were startled by Xu Yintang’s actions. The muffled sound of the rod hitting the head made Tiantian cringe and pull her neck back instinctively.
The dark corridor had already left her feeling uneasy, and even before she could inquire about the situation, she suddenly felt a numbness on her back. She instinctively grabbed Huahua next to her and rolled forward. Huahua was about to take out a small flashlight to ask if Xu Yintang needed it when the swaying beam of her flashlight fell on a face with a sinister grin behind her.
“Hehe… hehe…”
Suddenly, a man covered in blood appeared, emitting a hoarse, chilling laughter. His murky, yellowish eyes were fixed on the two girls, and his gaze exuded a nauseating and uncomfortable meaning.
“Laura… my Laura…” He approached the two girls step by step, raising a hand covered in fresh blood and wielding a knife. In his view, the appearance of these two women gradually overlapped with that of his former wife, who he insulted, leaving him increasingly excited and agitated. He could already imagine them dying in fear and screaming in a gruesome manner, his lips splitting open to reveal a fiendish, frenzied smile.
Although no one had seen pictures of Gerald, this repulsive and hideous apparition was undoubtedly him.
“Don’t run—”
“Who the hell’s running?” Huahua grabbed a bottle of alcohol and sprayed it forcefully towards the eyes that were glued to her chest. “Disinfect yourself, you stinking idiot!”
Before she finished speaking, Old Wang had already raised a sledgehammer and smashed it onto the head of the malevolent spirit.
Old Wang was an expert in drywall construction, and tools like hammers, pickaxes, and power saws were all part of his daily life, especially the sledgehammer, which he wielded with the precision and strength of a thousand pounds. With one swing, he smashed Gerald’s face into a shape that was no longer recognizable as human.
“Ahhhhh!”
Gerald clutched his face and let out a painful scream, staggering a few steps backward and collapsing on the ground, unable to move for a while.
“Go to the back,” Xu Yintang instructed the two girls and Old Wang to guard against attacks from the other side of the corridor. He removed Second Treasure from Xiao Qing’s head, tucked him away, and raised the iron rod to strike Gerald once again. He continued to pummel Gerald until he was reduced to a shape on the ground that could no longer maintain a human form. Then he tossed Second Treasure to him, saying, “Eat up.”
After he had his fill, Second Treasure worked diligently to rescue Xiao Qing. He still had to stay in this instance for six days, and this team couldn’t afford to be without Xiao Qing.
After all, you couldn’t rely on Xu Yintang to boost morale, rally the team, or spin lies from NPCs to gather clues.
Author’s Note –
Mother Xu Yintang beats his teammates once again!
Thanks to the laundry detergent tutorial, the teammates are all quite reliable, except for Mother Xu Yintang.
Xiao Qing’s intuition was a great success at the beginning!
There are three sanity checks here: the first two times are a success -3, failure -1d6. The final check, if successful, is -1d6, and if it fails, it’s -1d10.
To be honest, without Second Treasure, he would have been in real trouble. Better thank Second Treasure!
And Mother Xu Yintang finally had a successful intuition once, moving heaven and earth!
I don’t know why, but when Old Wang raised his hammer, my mind was filled with 80! 80! 80!
Thank you for the chapters!!
Treasure and Darling saving the day.
It’s really cool how the Author is writing the missions with dice rolls for character interaction with the game world.
honestly i thought it was just a joke, but omg that’s actually be cool if that’s what the author did!
Thank you for the chapters! <3 <3
I really like this group of players! I hope the whole team survives!!!
I like how the author includes the dice in their writing! It’s really cool
Thank you for the update ❤️💯
The babies are the best haha💚💜💚
Thank you for your translation 💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜