Chapter 3 Nina Circus (Revised)

Chapter 3 Nina Circus (Revised)

After walking for more than ten minutes, they finally arrived in front of the copy. The three of them looked at each other and reached out their hands to touch it.

The restless black mist instantly wrapped around the wrist like a vine, and in the blink of an eye it had enveloped the entire arm, continuing to devour at an incredible speed until it devoured the entire body.

Soon, the abandoned city returned to its dead silence, leaving only the well-fed black fog that happily expanded a few inches further outwards.

After a brief dizziness, he landed safely.

"I still feel sick, as if I were being swallowed."

Ye Yunhe patted his clothes in disgust, feeling uncomfortable all over. A familiar feeling of nausea came over him. He took the mint candy handed to him by Lin Muyu and ate two of them.

There were many tourist NPCs around, and they were also mixed in. Not far away stood a red and white shed with extremely bright colors. It was a very typical circus shed, but it was several times larger than an ordinary one.

It's not opening time yet, so the curtains are closed.

The time in the copy is not interoperable with the real time, and can only be judged by the weather. Lin Muyu quietly told them that it was probably sunset now, and based on the time on the tickets in their hands, they would probably have to wait for a while.

There was a sudden "ding" sound in my ears, followed by an electronic sound -

"Players are detected to be in place, welcome to the A-level copy - Nina Circus."

"The broken Miss Heart, the burned Mr. Diamond, the inseparable Spades and Clubs, and the most popular Joker, send you their greetings."

"The condition for clearing the game is: Kill the guilty person."

"Have a nice trip."

——

Follow the crowd and officially enter the circus.

Si Yuan looked around like an ordinary tourist, curiously examining the internal structure. In the center is a stage, decorated with ribbons and circus logos, surrounded by lights and sound systems, with special equipment needed for the performance hanging high in the air, and neatly arranged red velvet chairs fixed in the outer circle.

In addition, there are some rooms with closed doors and pieces of paper stuck on them. Tourists who come to watch naturally don’t need to pay attention to what is written on it, but players can’t.

Si Yuan had very good eyesight. He squinted and distinguished the three rooms labeled "Dressing Room", "Magic Room" and "Acrobatics Room".

While they were waiting outside, the captain had already assigned them tasks. At the beginning of the copy, they would not be killed immediately. Before the performance officially started, they would divide the troops into three groups to search.

He made a gesture to his teammates, and swam around in the crowd like a fish, and soon no one knew where he was.

Lin Muyu was about to explore the left side, but when he was halfway there, a weak pulling force made him stop and look down.

The owner of the rally is a little girl about ten years old, wearing a cute red-wrapped dress, small leather shoes, and a pair of pigtails hanging softly on both sides of her shoulders. She gently grabbed the corner of the young man's clothes with her right hand, held a magic hat in her left hand, and looked up at him with her pale little face.

"What's up, kid?"

Lin Muyu took her aside to prevent her from being bumped by the crowd, then squatted down and asked softly.

The little girl looked very thin and her voice was thin:

"Hello, sir, can you help me find someone?"

This must be the special plot NPC, Lin Muyu thought.

Generally speaking, low-level copies will not have detailed plots and complex puzzles, and you can even just rush out to pass them. But advanced copies are different. They may randomly generate several special NPCs to provide clues or hinder decryption, but players need to actively find them.

Clues like the ones that come to your doorstep now indicate that this copy contains a hidden route.

Hidden Route - It's hard to crack, but as the saying goes: the greater the risk, the greater the reward.

If successful, then after the copy is over, the player will get a further "perfect clearance", more supernatural potions will be dropped, and weapon materials and supernatural items will definitely be dropped.

Since they are all hidden, they are naturally not that easy to encounter. It's good to have one in ten copies, not to mention that it is destined to be encountered only in high-level copies. Some teams cannot come out alive even if they encounter it, so there are very few reports about it.

Lin Muyu didn't have the mentality of having to achieve a perfect clearance, he just took things as they came.

He withdrew his thoughts and keenly noticed that the little girl was a little uneasy, so he gave a reassuring smile.

"Don't be impatient, take your time and tell me, who are you looking for?"

"Looking for the magician in the circus..." The little girl pinched her sleeves and said a little embarrassedly: "I saw his hat in the dressing room. I don't know if it was dropped. I wanted to give it to him, but now the official performance is about to start, and I still can't find him."

She raised the hat in her hand and held it in her arms to show it to Lin Muyu.

"So I would like to trouble you to help me find someone. You are tall and can see far, so you will definitely be able to find someone faster than I can myself."

The hat was handed to her. Lin Muyu did not refuse. He took it and patted the little girl's back gently. She was so thin that the bones on her back were obviously protruding, giving people the illusion that she would be crushed if she exerted a little force.

"Of course I can help you with this little favor. What's your name, little boy? Do you live here?"

"Thank you, sir." The little girl was obviously happy. She bowed slightly to express her gratitude. "My name is Nina. Yes, I live here. My father is the director of the circus."

——

Ye Yunhe sneaked into the dressing room. The official performance was about to begin, and the room was empty at the moment.

Being careful not to disturb the items and keeping an eye on the outside, she touched something hard and cold at the corner of the table and the clothes hanger and gently pinched it out.

It was a piece of broken porcelain. It was probably smashed when it was intact, and then flew to this place with the impact force and got stuck.

Ye Yunhe carefully looked at the patterns on the porcelain tile.

This was supposed to be a... character? This fragment looks a bit like the hem of a skirt, but the fragment is too small and it is currently impossible to tell what type of skirt it is.

She carefully put away the porcelain fragments and continued to search.

There is a dressing room in the room, and a cabinet for clothes is placed on the side. It is designed with rows of drawers with each person's name on them.

Ye Yunhe opened the drawers one by one and found the only locked drawer. The space where the name was written was blacked out with a black pen. The skills she learned during training came in handy at this moment. She skillfully picked the lock and carefully opened it.

Inside was a neatly folded tutu and a pair of scuffed dancing shoes. This almost explicit clue reminded her of the porcelain pieces in the bag. The owner of this porcelain should also be the owner of this dance dress.

The Broken Miss Heart has been found.

Music and the host's voice came from outside the door, and the performance was about to begin.

She searched for a while, made sure nothing was left behind, closed the drawer and left quickly.

——

At the same time on the other side.

"What's going on? Porcelain pieces are hard to find."

Shi Xu, who almost searched the entire circus, threw the items in his hands in annoyance. The light ball was a little worried that his hand would be cut by the sharp object, but since it was the culprit, it didn't dare to say anything.

"Alas, who would have thought that a mastermind would spend most of his time looking for something? His B-grade rating was instantly cut in half."

Shi Xu pulled out the cloth from his waist, put the porcelain piece in it, wrapped it up and stuffed it into his pocket. He didn't want to look at this unlucky thing that disrupted his plans.

The protagonists acted quite quickly, which was worthy of his hint of driving out the special NPC. The thought of "working" with such smart people made him feel less stressed.

As a smart person, his imagination must be excellent.

Thinking of this, his mood improved again. Shi Xu glanced helplessly at the ball of light that was pretending to be dead: "Don't shrink there, I don't blame you. It would be strange if this kind of detailed information also existed in the world line. This is not a popular science book."

"That's good. I was afraid you would think I was unreliable. I thought I could find it out."

The light ball breathed a sigh of relief. For some reason, he was afraid that Shi Xu would get angry. Maybe I was influenced by the comics I read before. Although this person always smiles with his narrowed eyes, we can’t just give him a stereotype. We need to change it!

"Then let's go, next we are going to..."

The two walked away.

——

In order to avoid missing clues, the official performance needs to be watched here alone. After Ye Yunhe and Lin Muyu met, he learned that he was going to look for the magician and took the initiative to stay.

She sat on the red velvet chair, first praising its comfort and softness, then turned her head away with some doubt, muttering:

“Where are Si and An?

Si and An are waiting for an opportunity.

He hid in a secluded place, bent down, and watched the movements over there almost without blinking, waiting patiently for the staff guarding the room to leave. He immediately exerted force with his legs and rushed towards the door that was not yet closed, entered the door and locked it in one go.

The first place Si and An explored was the animals' resting room. The beasts in the cages stared at him quietly. They didn't seem to have been abused or whipped. The room was very empty and one could see the inside and outside at a glance. There seemed to be nothing worth spending time on. But he still felt something was wrong, and his intuition told him that there must be clues here.

So he avoided the staff all the way and finally found the animal training arena. However, he took a quick peek through the crack in the door and saw a staff member inside who was recording something, writing quickly with a pen.

Fortunately, after some effort, I successfully broke in! Stealth success!

Si and An turned their heads, looked around, and walked towards the training platform. Protective iron nets are installed on the four sides of the training platform to prevent animals from attacking the audience and running away.

There are several large circles scattered on the ground, as well as high chairs, steel ropes, bicycles...all of which are training props needed for animal performances.

There was also a whip covered in blood, coiled on the ground like a snake.

It is indeed so.

There was a sudden sound behind them, and Si Yu'an's pupils shrank suddenly. They turned around instantly and jumped up to create distance. They used their special powers to improve their physical fitness and jumped five meters away. They drew the greatsword behind them and took a defensive posture.

…

It is a soul lion.

He was sitting upright and looking at the human who suddenly jumped out in front of him.

Si and An were silent.

"...Brother, you scared me."

He silently cancelled his supernatural power, exhaled deeply the breath that was stuck in his chest, and looked at the lion in front of him.

The lion's body was covered with criss-crossing whip marks and burn wounds. Since they had not healed before death, the wounds still existed even after it became a soul. Its majestic beard was burned to a short piece, its hair was messy and uneven, and the hair around its mouth was stained with blood. It was very thin and looked malnourished.

Its lungs and chest were shot several times, and one could even see the flesh and blood and organs inside. These were fatal injuries.

Human malice and greed are fully reflected in this lion.

Si Yu'an thought that even if the scene before them was extremely real, it was just an NPC in the dungeon. In reality, there must be countless animals that were abused and kept in captivity like this, unable to resist, and finally used as a venting bucket and shot to death.

Not to mention, he loves animals.

A spontaneous rage rose from his chest. He closed his eyes tightly, and when he opened them again, he had calmed down.

The clue mentioned by the electronic voice - Mr. Burnt Cube, has been found.

When the copy is over, he will burn this place down and then spread the fire to reality.

Now, there are more important things to do.

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