Chapter 29 Horrifying Crimes 9: The Isolated Island Prison
Upon discovering the blood, Ling Yuanshan immediately pulled Wu Wangwang backward, making a loud banging on the floor. If it weren't for the fireworks outside providing cover, they would have been discovered long ago.
Now that something that didn't quite look like a monster had appeared behind the floor, Ling Yuanshan's suspicions deepened. What exactly was locked up upstairs? Were they different on each floor?
After a moment's hesitation, the head forced itself out of the narrow hole, its entire scalp was ripped off, revealing blood-red flesh and pale bones, with only the skin of the face still clinging precariously to the facial bones.
"What should we do?" Wu Wangwang asked, tilting her head. She hadn't expected there to be such things behind the floor, and there seemed to be quite a few of them.
Ling Yuanshan didn't hesitate for long: "Never mind, keep smashing. Be careful not to get hit by them. We still don't know how they differ from the monsters outside."
Wu Wangwang noticed the difference. She felt that the one that appeared on the twenty-first floor was more like a ghost, a ghost formed from the lingering resentment of someone who had been murdered.
These ghosts are filled with resentment after death and no longer care about morality or ethics. They will try to drag anyone they meet down with them, making them even more vicious than Du Luo Chu Ping and the others.
For Ling Yuanshan's safety, after he returned to his previous position and continued smashing the floor that was gradually cracking, Wu Wangwang stood a little behind him, raised her hand and sent a wisp of ghostly energy onto Ling Yuanshan. With her protecting him, no matter how many ghosts crawled out, their evil thoughts and curses would not affect Ling Yuanshan.
I just don't know if this will lead to Ling Yuanshan making a mistake in judgment.
Wu Wangwang decided to give up. She figured things would work themselves out, so she moved to another spot and joined Ling Yuanshan in prying up the floorboards.
Not only were they working hard on the twentieth floor, but the ghosts inside were also squeezing the hole that had appeared. With force applied from both sides, they managed to pry open the entire floorboard in just a few minutes. Heavy steel and concrete slabs came crashing down, almost breaking the staircase.
Countless ghosts swarmed out from the twenty-first floor. They ignored Wu Wangwang and Ling Yuanshan, who had huddled in a corner to avoid the concrete floor, and instead climbed out directly down the stairs and through the corridor exit.
Immediately afterwards, screams came from outside, probably because building employees had discovered a continuous stream of ghosts crawling out.
There were also a lot of ghosts, like the shadows on the 46th floor, constantly crawling out, blocking Wu Wangwang and Ling Yuanshan. They couldn't squeeze in and couldn't get to the 21st floor.
"We're stuck in traffic. Should we try something else?" Wu Wangwang asked Ling Yuanshan in a low voice, keeping track of the time.
Ling Yuanshan was somewhat troubled. He rarely encountered dungeons with an explosive number of monsters. Even if he did, they were usually survival-type dungeons where he could just hack and slash. This dungeon had unclear settings and deeply hidden rules, so he didn't dare to make any rash moves.
Seeing that the fireworks were about to end, and not wanting to wait for all the ghosts to leave, he thought for a moment, then reached out and grabbed an exposed steel bar. Luckily, he was tall, otherwise, they wouldn't have been able to touch the ceiling from their position.
The surrounding blood had smeared Ling Yuanshan all over, but the ghosts did not intend to attack him and Wu Wangwang. Instead, they ran frantically outwards, barely managing to squeeze open an opening.
Ling Yuanshan breathed a sigh of relief and reached out to pull Wu Wangwang upstairs. Their clothes were soaked in blood and they were all sticky, but at least they made it upstairs.
There was no light upstairs, and ghosts were crawling all around them. They were knocked around and staggered, running in a random direction to avoid being pushed aside by the large number of ghosts. But the two of them were almost covered in blood.
Having gained a breather, Wu Wangwang wiped her face: "There are no lights in the building. They say get up, but there are no lights on the forty-sixth floor either. Could they be phototropic?"
Ling Yuanshan shook his head: "Not necessarily. There are many lights and residents in the city center, but the shadowy figures did not rush in. Even if there was a riot, it was only outside the city center. Perhaps there is some special setting in the city center."
“That makes sense. By the way, have you noticed that these ghosts have clothes, but the monsters on the street don’t?” Wu Wangwang said, pointing to a crawling ghost.
The monsters on the street were indeed naked, but some of them didn't look very human. They certainly couldn't wear human clothes, but they were still somewhat acceptable to the senses. However, all around them were ghosts wearing clothes, even if the clothes were tattered, which still made them different.
Ling Yuanshan noted the difference and patted Wu Wangwang on the shoulder: "Let's go, let's see if there are any clues here. The fireworks should be over soon, and this place will soon be under control again. Perhaps, we are very close to the truth."
The ghost ran out of the twenty-first floor, leaving the space open. Wu Wangwang and Ling Yuanshan quickly went through it, but they were very disappointed. Not only did they not find any information, but they also did not find a passage to the twenty-second floor.
The fireworks outside had completely stopped. From the 21st floor, they could see through the window that the prison guards had finally entered the City of Innocence and would probably take over the city center soon, but they had not found any useful information so far.
Wu Wangwang, holding the scissors, asked, "Should we keep smashing it upwards?"
Ling Yuanshan hesitated: "It's very difficult. If the building is to be tall, it needs support. We don't understand construction and we don't know where the important steel bars are. If we dig the wrong ones, the whole building will break in half and we will be crushed to death."
Moreover, this building is very strange. The twenty-first floor is like a mezzanine, with no passages going up or down. It's as if the twenty-first floor was sealed off from the moment the building was completed, as if so many ghosts were captured and imprisoned in the building back then.
The problem was indeed very serious. Wu Wangwang didn't understand either. She looked up and realized that she could find out what was upstairs, but even if she did, she would have difficulty in telling Ling Yuanshan.
The best way is to go up there.
Wu Wangwang looked around but couldn't see any windows. However, there were glass walls all around. She came up with an idea: "How about we break the glass and climb up?"
Ling Yuanshan looked up and estimated the height of the twenty-first floor, then said, "I'm fine, but what about you?"
“I don’t think you can climb faster than me. When I was climbing mountains to catch wild boars, you were probably still playing on your rocking horse at home,” Wu Wangwang said bluntly. She knew from the original owner’s memories that if the original owner hadn’t had such a strong ability to escape, he wouldn’t have survived until he met the Ghost Mother and chose to stay in the instance.
Even if Wu Wangwang said that, Ling Yuanshan was still not entirely at ease. After all, Wu Wangwang was too thin and frail. He had seen poor girls before. Although they were thin, you could still see the muscles and the physique of someone who had done heavy work for many years. You couldn't see that at all in Wu Wangwang. Most of the time, she looked like a quiet girl who loved to look at flowers and plants.
Since Wu Wangwang insisted, Ling Yuanshan said nothing. He randomly picked a piece of glass, told Wu Wangwang to step back, and smashed it himself. Then he stuck the knife in the middle of the floor. His long knife, including the handle, was 1.8 meters long. Because he was tall, he could reach the glass on the 22nd floor by climbing after inserting the knife.
Wu Wangwang watched worriedly from below. If Ling Yuanshan's hand slipped and fell, she would have to catch him. Humans were too fragile; otherwise, she wouldn't have been able to enter this instance with him.
Ling Yuanshan, as expected of someone who honed his skills in the game, successfully climbed up and took out an arrow, stabbing it hard into an even higher place. He then freed his longsword, gripping the arrow tightly with his right hand and using the longsword in his left to shatter the glass on the 22nd floor.
At this moment, Ling Yuanshan was completely hanging in mid-air, but the instant he broke the glass, a pile of broken flesh and bones suddenly fell out and hit Ling Yuanshan all over, scaring him so much that he almost let go.
Fortunately, those weren't living creatures and couldn't move. Once they survived the initial fall, they wouldn't fall out on their own anymore.
Wu Wangwang could see everything clearly from below. She even reached out and caught a heart. She gently squeezed it, and judging from the feel, the heart must have been dug out recently. Apart from not being very warm, it was still soft.
Ling Yuanshan took a deep breath, and with the support of the arrow and his long sword wedged into the floor, he used both hands to do a pull-up, lifting himself up to the twenty-second floor. After climbing up, he was stunned.
Wu Wangwang, who was waiting below, poked his head out and asked, "Young Master, are you alright? Help me up!"
Ling Yuanshan had been carrying the repairman's bag that he had stolen earlier. It contained a rope, which, although not long, was enough to pull Wu Wangwang up.
Ling Yuanshan remained silent for a while before lowering the rope. Wu Wangwang, being lighter, had an easier time climbing up than Ling Yuanshan.
Upon reaching the twenty-second floor, Wu Wangwang was also stunned—the entire twenty-second floor was filled with wreckage and some bloodstained, broken objects, the purpose of which was unknown.
Calling it remains isn't entirely accurate, because there were still many fresh organs, similar to the one Wu Wangwang caught earlier, as if it had just been dug out, but that's clearly impossible.
It's one organ that's been dug out, but this whole floor is full of them. Even if you dug out all the humanoid creatures and humans who were standing and walking in the City of Innocence yesterday, it wouldn't be enough.
"How come there are so many? And they're so...fresh." Wu Wangwang picked up a piece of intestine from the side and said that this intestine was even fresher than the Nine-Turned Intestines made by the Ling family chef.
Prison guards had already gathered downstairs. They had divided the entire City of Innocence into sections for control, and everyone, whether native residents or shadowy figures, was handcuffed and treated without discrimination.
Ling Yuanshan glanced back. The prison guards were almost in the city center and probably had seen him and Wu Wangwang climbing up.
There was no point in worrying about what was hidden on the 22nd floor at this moment. Ling Yuanshan made a quick decision, throwing his long sword and smashing the glass on the upper floor. The long sword would disappear quickly after it left his hand, and the game would retrieve it.
Unlike the twenty-second floor, when the glass shattered on the twenty-third floor, some tools, or weapons, fell out. Wu Wangwang and Ling Yuanshan each caught one: a bloodstained hammer and a scalpel.
Wu Wangwang examined the bloodstains on it and touched them: "They're wet, like someone was just hit by them."
Ling Yuanshan frowned: "Don't you think these three floors can be connected?"
"Connect them?" Wu Wangwang looked up in confusion.
“The 21st floor contains the victims’ bodies, so they are all in terrible condition and have tattered clothes. The 22nd floor contains the remains that fell out when the victims died. These organs and such may have been removed by the murderer for his own fetish. Normally, it would just be some limbs that have been cut off. And the 23rd floor contains the murder weapon,” Ling Yuanshan analyzed in a heavy tone.
Wu Wangwang had already discerned the reason from the blood. She knew Ling Yuanshan had guessed correctly: "That makes sense, but why separate them and lock them up? Normally, where should these things be stored?"
Ling Yuanshan didn't quite understand either. He shook his head and said, "I don't know. I don't usually pay attention to things like murder cases, but it's strange that they're all here and don't seem to have gotten old."
At their pace, it was too late to get to the top floor. The prison guards started walking into the building. If they caught him, he didn't know if he would ever have a chance to get out of prison again. The answer was so close, yet he had no way of knowing. Ling Yuanshan felt a deep sense of regret.
If only flying items were included as rewards in the past, there would be no need for all this trouble.
What Ling Yuanshan discovered, Wu Wangwang also saw. Those prison guards were not NPCs restricted by rules in the City of Innocence. They were fully capable of controlling the player's actions. Once caught and taken back, the hope of passing the game would be slim.
With things having come to this point, Wu Wangwang offered a solution: "Young Master, do you have any other tools? The only way to hold off the prison guards now is to make everything in the building come out. I don't think the only accident in this building is the shadow on the 46th floor."
There must be some price to pay for killing an entire floor, right?
Ling Yuanshan was stunned: "They're going to bomb again? I should have saved some fireworks for this building."
At the time, he and Wu Wangwang both thought there was important information in the building, so they didn't put the fireworks on it. If they had known that the building contained indestructible things, they would have left one firework.
Wu Wangwang shook her head: "It's not about bombing, it's about releasing everything upstairs. The prison guards should be searching the entire building for things on the 21st floor. The 22nd and 23rd floors are inanimate and won't move, so they definitely can't stop them. But the other floors might not be inanimate."
Since the prison guards treated the shadowy figures equally and didn't eliminate them, they certainly wouldn't touch anything on other floors. It would be better to let those things that couldn't provide any clues slow them down, giving them a chance to climb higher.
Moreover, each floor was packed with people, so breaking the glass in advance would make room for them to climb up.
Ling Yuanshan immediately agreed. He stood on the edge of the 22nd floor, took a deep breath, and with all his might, swung the long sword in his hand at the glass above his head. After charging up, the distance the long sword could fly was greatly extended. The spinning long sword cut all the way up to the 32nd floor before disappearing.
After the glass shattered, monsters and various daily necessities began falling from the 24th to the 32nd floors. It was so strange that no one knew what the purpose of those floors was to hide these things.
"The furthest I can throw is the 32nd floor. To maintain the uniqueness of items for players, the game will take them back after a certain period of time unless the player actively gives them away. They can only be summoned again by the owner. Let's climb up first, and I'll continue throwing when we get to the 32nd floor." After Ling Yuanshan finished speaking, he summoned his longsword again to climb.
Wu Wangwang continued to provide support from below, while also observing the development of events around him.
After the new monster appeared, the prison guards downstairs were indeed thrown into chaos for a moment. No matter how strong they were, they couldn't defy the dungeon's rules and fly up, especially since this was over twenty floors, and it would take time to fly up.
Ling Yuanshan had become much more skilled. It was much easier for him to climb alone than with Wu Wangwang. This time, he climbed three floors in one go, only lowering the rope down to retrieve Wu Wangwang when it reached its limit.
As the two continued upwards, the number of monsters released along the way increased. Some of these monsters were similar to those of the usual ones, while others were extremely aggressive, wreaking havoc as soon as they appeared. If Wu Wangwang hadn't left a wisp of ghostly energy on Ling Yuanshan beforehand, and if they hadn't dared to attack the Ghost Mother, they probably would have killed Wu Wangwang and Ling Yuanshan first.
After the appearance of the ferocious, murderous monster, the prison guards finally panicked. It wasn't just chaos; the warden hadn't appeared yet, and the guards were growing increasingly frantic as the monster indiscriminately killed and devoured residents.
Ling Yuanshan led Wu Wangwang to climb to the sixty-seventh floor. Among so many floors where monsters and items would fall, only the sixty-seventh floor was very quiet. After they went upstairs, they noticed that this floor was filled with computers and bookshelves.
Moreover, as they moved forward, Ling Yuanshan revealed a strange expression: "This place..."
Wu Wangwang looked around and said, "What's wrong with this place? Let's quickly look up some information; we should be able to find a solution."
To everyone's surprise, Ling Yuanshan suddenly stopped and stared blankly at the door in front of him: "I've seen this door before, it's the warden's office!"
"Huh? Isn't it in the mountains?" Wu Wangwang asked subconsciously, then remembered that Ling Yuanshan had said that the office was strange and felt like it was no longer in the mountains.
If Ling Yuanshan went into the mountains and ended up on the 67th floor of the Municipal Building in the City of Innocence, it wouldn't be surprising if he felt it wasn't the same place.
Ling Yuanshan didn't say anything. He walked quickly to the door and pushed it open. Sure enough, there was a simple office. The warden was sitting behind the red desk. He didn't know when she had arrived. No wonder she hadn't appeared downstairs.
Wu Wangwang followed Ling Yuanshan into the room. She stood to the side and behind Ling Yuanshan, avoiding direct confrontation with the warden. She was quite cautious in front of the judge.
The warden waved his hand: "Don't worry about me. The dungeon requires supervision of key plot points. Investigate whatever you want."
Both Ling Yuanshan and Wu Wangwang were already used to this situation. Every time they were about to pass the level, the referee would appear from an unknown place. At other times, no matter how the player died, the referee never appeared.
Ling Yuanshan unceremoniously pulled Wu Wangwang to the bookshelf and began searching for the documents stored there.
The warden may not need to worry about it, but the prison guards downstairs can come up at any time.
From the twenty-first floor upwards, every floor of this building is sealed off, and they have no normal way to get up. However, they might use other means, such as flying a plane from the port to the top of the building and then coming down. Therefore, Ling Yuanshan dared not delay at all.
Among the documents on the 67th floor, along with the computers and bookshelves outside, even though Ling Yuanshan and Wu Wangwang couldn't read all the information, the truth was clear from the directory of all the files—a death row inmate is a death row inmate, and even if he spends a hundred years in prison, he won't become a good person just because he's released.
After reviewing the prisoners' records, Ling Yuanshan stormed into the warden's office and demanded, "This dungeon has absolutely no conditions for completion! All that talk about mitigating punishment is a lie!"
Hearing the noise, Wu Wangwang put down the documents in her hand and went over, just in time to hear the warden's reply: "No dungeon will completely block the player's way out. Even if you enter a killer horror movie dungeon, there will still be a glimmer of hope, as long as you run fast enough. If you didn't find any clues, that's your problem."
Wu Wangwang walked up to Ling Yuanshan and asked, "What did you see?"
Ling Yuanshan glared angrily at Wu Wangwang and led her to a computer outside.
Computers are so convenient; you can directly search for key information. The first thing Ling Yuanshan looked up was the establishment document of the City of Innocence. It clearly stated that initially, there was no City of Innocence on the island; this area was a labor camp.
Many prisons have similar areas, mainly designated for prisoners to work in. Long hours and repetitive tasks can wear down a person's will and energy.
Apart from some prisoners, most criminals who go to prison are naturally energetic and have no limits in their thinking. If the prison doesn't want them to cause trouble all day, it will exhaust them to the point that they can't even lift their hands to fight. This kind of life is okay for ten or eight years, but if it lasts more than twenty years and those who are sincere in repenting gradually can't live without this kind of life.
Originally, only the port area of the island was a prison. Later, through the work of the prisoners, separate sections were gradually built, separating prisoners of different types and sentences, but the work content remained unchanged.
After most of the area was completed, there were not many empty spaces left. The warden began to consider whether to set aside a separate area for the prisoners to train. After several votes and discussions, it was finally decided to retain the central area of the island and not to build anything else.
Thus, the prototype of the City of Innocence was born.
At first, the prisoners entered the area to clean and plant crops; everything was normal. Then one day, a prisoner died in the field, and no one knew how he died.
The prison guards were clearly nearby, yet the prisoner still died, and the surveillance footage did not capture the cause of death.
The forensic doctor came up and performed an autopsy, which determined that the prisoner died from an allergic reaction. However, allergens were tested when the prisoner arrived on the island. The prison guards would not have assigned the prisoner to the vicinity of allergens. Moreover, the allergic reaction does not occur that quickly. The nearby prison guards had plenty of time to save the prisoner. How could he have died so quickly?
Everyone was baffled, and the prisoners gradually became less obedient.
As serious criminals, being sent to this island is itself a heinous crime. If it weren't for the fact that some of them are truly lacking in ability, they would never be alive now.
The prisoners are making a huge fuss, insisting on a thorough investigation into whether there is any collusion between the prison guards and the prisoners. They are indeed vicious, but they have also offended many people. If the prison guards are colluding with outside bosses, who knows how many days they will live?
They were already a group of difficult criminals to deal with. If we don't give them an explanation, who knows what other trouble they'll cause.
After some thought, the warden said that from now on, there would be no more surveillance cameras in the central area of the island, and the prison guards would not be allowed to enter. However, every morning, the prisoners would still have to go to work. The work would no longer be assigned, and they would have to figure it out themselves. But if they could find the murderer, it would be considered a meritorious act of surrender, and they could get a reduced sentence.
This is the origin of the morning work setting for the copy.
Those terrifying prisoners were incredibly cunning; they solved the problem in just three mornings. One of them was a highly intelligent criminal chemistry expert who used plants from the botanical garden, getting a little bit of them every day, and with the help of his friends, he killed someone who dared to make lewd jokes at her.
I was arrested because of betrayal by a friend.
Later, the warden transferred the murderer, the prisoners who caught the murderer, and the related prisoners to different prisons and dealt with them separately, indicating that the matter was over and everyone knew the reason, so why make a life-or-death struggle in prison?
But less than five days later, the chemical expert also died in the center of the island; this time, he fell to his death.
The warden realized that these prisoners, who had at least dozens of lives on their hands, could kill someone with far too much ease; their intelligence seemed to be born for murder.
So the rules changed again. Prisoners who had killed or wanted to kill were exiled to the center of the island. They would no longer be able to enjoy anything the prison provided. Meanwhile, the other well-behaved prisoners would enter the center of the island every day to catch the prisoners left there. If they caught one, their sentence could be reduced.
However, prisoners who are caught will be returned to the center of the island, forming a sustainable development. If a prisoner accidentally kills the prisoner being hunted during the pursuit, he will be treated as a murderer and will continue to be imprisoned in the center of the island, unable to leave.
Moreover, they will transform from hunters into prey.
In less than a year, a particularly vicious group of prisoners gathered in the center of the island, and the entire island suddenly became a battleground of power. The prisoners in the prisons regarded the prisoners in the center of the island as prey, while the prisoners in the center of the island regarded the prisoners outside as usable resources. Their confrontation actually made things much easier for the warden.
If things ended here, everything would be normal. But one day, moving corpses began to appear on the island. They crawled around, fearless and attacking anyone they saw. They could also infect people, and the island was completely overrun, just like the apocalypse in a novel.
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Author's Note: [End of Chapter]
Wu Wangwang: I've heard of them, they're called zombies! But they probably don't taste good. Ghosts with brains are much tastier. [starry-eyed]
Ling Yuanshan: A human quietly died after hearing this [fear]
——
I suddenly had a craving for dumplings yesterday, so after staying up all night to finish writing an update, I went out to buy the ingredients. But I didn't have a meat grinder, so I chopped three pounds of filling by hand and also made two hundred dumplings.
After I finished wrapping it up, I went to sleep. But when I woke up around 9 p.m., I found that I couldn't lift either of my arms, and it still hasn't gotten better today.
Today's update was typed with bandages on both my arms and hands, and I only just finished writing it now. I hope my hands won't hurt tomorrow so I can write more and update more consistently. [Please!]
A meat grinder is a must-have; you can't skimp on this kind of money, it's too expensive! [crying emoji]
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