Chapter 88 A Heart Burning with Desire "Grandma, I want to be a bad person just once..."
The drop tower landed smoothly without any bumps or abnormalities, so smoothly that everyone found it hard to believe.
A sense of security begins to build the moment one's feet touch the ground. Everyone raises the safety bar in front of them overhead and hurriedly scrambles out of their seats.
Their heart rates were still skyrocketing, but they didn't have time to calm their hearts down. Instead, they turned and ran towards Shao Feng.
High in the air, his naturally dangling legs were right at the source of the flames. Neither Jiang Zhiling nor Luo Chuange beside him were injured; only Shao Feng himself suffered the consequences.
Moreover, his injuries were quite serious.
Although the flames didn't directly scorch my knees, the skin was completely red, as if freshly cooked rice noodles had been poured onto my legs, with cherry-red marks resembling blood seeping out.
The injuries to other parts of the body were not so fortunate.
Shao Feng's right calf had turned black, and the fabric of his pants was completely burned, clinging tightly to his skin. The skin tissue showed varying degrees of ulceration, sticky and gooey, like a lump of slime riddled with holes.
His left calf was more severely injured, the boundary between flesh and clothing indistinguishable, completely charred black by the flames. The black scales burning on his leg were a horrifying sight, as if they would crackle if thrown into the wind.
The effects of adrenaline last for about this long, and that's when it's almost over.
Unable to stand upright, Shao Feng was in excruciating pain from the burning sensation in his lower body, making him feel like he was dying in his seat.
"Take a deep breath, don't be too nervous, your leg will be fine."
Wang Jianping squeezed to the front of the crowd, squatted down in front of Shao Feng, gently lifted Shao Feng's calf with both hands, and examined it carefully.
He looked troubled, his mouth opening and closing, but he didn't know how to say it for a moment. He could only turn around and look at Qi Zhixia who was standing behind him.
"Qi Zhixia, we might need to lend him the wheelchair for a while."
Shao Feng's condition, with his lower body almost completely ruined, was far more severe than Qi Zhixia's.
Without hesitation, she slowly rose, supporting herself on the handles on both sides of the wheelchair, and carefully stepped out of the wheelchair area with the help of Liang Jun and Gu Keke.
Before entering the instance, she had already recovered to the point where she could barely take a step or two. Compared to Shao Feng's current state, Qi Zhixia's injury was nothing.
Wang Jianping pushed the empty wheelchair to Shao Feng and instructed Lao Ren and Tang Cailei, who were not far away, "Help me move him into the wheelchair. Be careful not to touch his legs."
When Lao Ren and Tang Cailei's names were called, they exchanged a glance. Although they both disliked each other, they didn't say anything more and prepared to move the patient.
But the moment they touched Shao Feng, he began to writhe violently.
"It hurts—it hurts—"
Shao Feng was pale, his lips bloodless. His fingers were spread wide apart, as if he was in excruciating pain, and he was teetering on the brink of shock.
Wang Jianping is a doctor, and based on his professional knowledge, this situation was already extremely critical.
Shao Feng is very likely to lose consciousness in a short period of time.
The others are all helplessly gathered here, which is not a solution either.
Just as Wang Jianping was about to call on more people to lend a hand, Jiang Zhiling, who had been waiting beside Shao Feng, suddenly noticed something unusual.
"The drop tower is running!"
It seemed that the automatic operation had worked again, as the machine detected that there were still players in the seats and restarted the next round of the game on its own.
In a semi-conscious state, Shao Feng was still slumped in his seat. If he were allowed to go through another round alone in his current state, it would be no different from playing with his life.
Luo Chuange realized the danger of the situation and shouted, "Quickly, find a way to move him down!"
When it comes to "saving one's life," "saving one's legs" seems less important.
Everyone swarmed forward, offering help wherever possible, ignoring Shao Feng's pig-like screams, and tried to transfer him to Qi Zhixia's wheelchair. But whether the wheelchair activated its self-protection mechanism or Shao Feng's legs were too stiff to sit down again—
No matter what methods everyone used, it was as if there was an invisible and intangible barrier that kept Shao Feng out of his wheelchair.
"What's going on...?"
Jiang Zhiling was a little anxious. She freed one hand and patted the seat of the wheelchair, and even sat down to try it herself, but there was nothing wrong. "Why can't Shao Feng sit down?"
This wasn't mentioned in the prop description, and even Wang Jianping was unaware of it.
With no other option, they dragged Shao Feng to the edge of the fence and sat down temporarily to consider their next plan.
They hadn't even left the airport area where they jumped off the building. In the only game area without staff, expecting NPCs to come in and give them souvenirs was simply wishful thinking.
In other words, everything will only truly end once they figure out how to get out of this broken gate.
Jiang Zhiling cried uncontrollably. She knelt beside the unconscious Shao Feng, wiping away the cold sweat that kept seeping from his forehead.
Just as she found a clean cloth and was about to continue wiping his sweat, her wrist was suddenly grabbed.
It was none other than Shao Feng.
His previously furrowed brows had now completely relaxed. Shao Feng's innocent puppy eyes were bright and sparkling, unlike the way they had been filled with tears; they seemed to be his natural, unchanging gaze.
Each element seemed normal, but for some reason, when Jiang Zhiling put them together, she had a strange feeling.
She sensed something was wrong and used a lot of strength to pull her wrist out of Shao Feng's grasp.
"Are you feeling any better...?"
She asked Shao Feng about his condition in a kind and gentle voice, but to her surprise, he braced himself with his hands on the ground and struggled to stand up.
This left not only Jiang Zhiling speechless, but everyone else as well.
His two thin legs, almost burned by the fire, trembled as they barely supported the entire weight of his body.
Shao Feng's pale fingertips gripped the wooden fence tightly. His eyes seemed unfocused, staring blankly ahead, a hint of confusion on his face.
Jiang Zhiling sat there, stunned, tilting her head back blankly. "Shao Feng?"
Only Jiang Chunhua reacted first, rushing forward, grabbing Jiang Zhiling's slender arm, and pulling her mentally challenged sister up from the ground.
"His name is Shao Feng!" Jiang Chunhua stared fiercely at the skeleton-like body. "He's been possessed!"
Shao Feng seemed not to hear Jiang Chunhua's whispers—
Or perhaps he has lost all his hearing.
In a completely silent world, Shao Feng struggled to take his first steps, moving towards the drop tower.
Liang Xun's gaze lingered on his swaying figure for only a brief moment before quickly shifting to the other side.
The automation is somewhat problematic; even though there are no players on the seats, the drop tower still starts running for the second time.
The seat is currently just beginning to rise slowly and shows no signs of falling.
Shao Feng staggered forward, and Gu Keke tried to stop him, but Luo Chuange stopped her first.
Like Jiang Chunhua, Luo Chuange said with a serious expression, "This is no longer the person we knew."
Shao Feng's eyes were already covered with a layer of gray. He blinked blankly and rhythmically, his mouth making small murmurs as if he wanted to say something.
Liang Xun patted Gu Keke on the shoulder, silently gesturing to her, before stepping forward to listen to what Shao Feng was saying without disturbing him.
"Was it my fault for saving him...?"
"But Grandma said that we should learn to be good people, because only good people will be rewarded..."
"Then why did I die...why was I the only one who died..."
"I saved everyone, why am I the only one who died..."
Shao Feng's voice sounded a bit more immature, like that of a naive teenager.
Liang Jun's slow steps stopped in place.
She probably understands what happened here.
The one controlling Shao Feng's body now is none other than the little ghost that was floating in mid-air earlier.
Perhaps many years ago, before this place was abandoned, this young boy, in the prime of his life, came to the amusement park with his grandmother.
Because of her age, the grandmother could only watch her grandson play freely from outside the fence, experiencing the first fully automated drop tower.
But the equipment malfunctioned during operation, and the parts burst into flames. When the fire was about to engulf everyone, the boy, who was only a teenager, chose to push everyone else out, but he himself was left there forever.
The elderly woman, who witnessed everything from the sidelines, went berserk and, without saying a word, tried to rush in to save her grandson—
The withered burn marks on the old woman's arm may just be proof of this.
While Liang Jun was thinking, Shao Feng had already walked to the bottom of the drop tower.
His legs seemed to be fine, and Shao Feng squatted down slowly without any effect, then sat down on the scorched earth with his back against the main support of the drop tower.
He picked up a charred booklet from the ground and flipped through it aimlessly, his empty gaze having no fixed point.
Jiang Zhiling, who was being pulled by Jiang Chunhua, covered her mouth in shock, and her body began to tremble uncontrollably.
"It's that employee manual... Why is it there?!"
Shao Feng secretly threw it in—
This was Liang Jun's subconscious thought.
If this hypothesis holds true, then all the strange things that happened to Shao Feng can also be explained.
This is the punishment imposed by the system on players who violate the rules.
Shao Feng seemed to be muttering something.
They were a little too far apart, and Liang Xun, wanting to get more clues about the dungeon, unconsciously moved closer.
Shao Feng seemed to have lost all five senses. Even when Liang Xun approached him right in front of him, he did not react at all. He continued to flip through the charred manual without a care in the world, like a carefree child.
"I don't want to save anyone anymore..."
"But when I see people still being burned to death, I always remember what my grandmother said..."
"But will good people always be rewarded...?"
Shao Feng abruptly stopped turning the pages of the book. His pupils regained a momentary clarity, but what followed was a flash of extreme panic in his eyes.
He frantically clawed at the ground with both hands, as if using his last bit of strength to escape this burial ground that was about to become his grave.
These fragmented movements were truly unexpected. Liang Jun's brain couldn't process these fleeting clues in time, and she could only react by looking at Shao Feng's twitching facial muscles.
His large eyes were filled with tears of pain, and his face was divided in two.
The upper half of his face showed the infinite despair of someone on the verge of death, with tears streaming down his face as if he wanted to escape from his decaying body.
The lower half of his face, with the corners of his mouth turned up in a triumphant smile, was filled with mockery and contempt.
His facial muscles seemed to be twitching, and his mouth was opening and closing, perhaps because his body was trying its best to control his soul.
But in the end, the main body was defeated.
The voice was light and airy—
"Grandma, I want to be a bad person just once."
Liang Jun felt a chill in her heart and was about to take a step away when a huge shadow loomed over her head.
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Author's Note: Why do burns remind me of scalding hot rice noodles?
Because I myself once spilled a bowl of freshly cooked rice noodles...
It has to be extra spicy, extra numbing, and extra vinegar...
In the end, I was pleasantly surprised to receive a light second-degree burn (bitter smile).
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