Chapter 124 Beware of Your Companions
Superpowers, mecha weapons, scoring props...all kinds of fancy things fell from the sky and entangled with the chaotic machines.
There was a complete melee, and the rubble from the collapsed ceiling smashed up many out-of-control machines again, and deafening noises were heard all around.
Sun Yuancheng stood in a safe corner, looking up at the players who were fighting the Buddha statue with their bare hands. He was so shocked that he began to stutter: "...No, are they still human? Why do your players and my players seem different? Their fighting power is so strong?! Could they all be clones of Zhang Lian?!"
Zhang Xingzhi patted his shoulder leisurely: "They were all selected from thousands of people. In terms of combat power alone, they are indeed much stronger than ordinary players."
"You know this too?" Sun Yuancheng looked at Zhang Xingzhi, "Where do you get so many gossips? Share your channels with me."
"No." Zhang Xingzhi smiled and shook his head.
Hundreds of the Buddha's hands had been broken, and the tracks were forced to stop. The machines that had been kneeling devoutly all woke up as if from a dream, and the commands engraved into their self-preservation programs made them flee in panic.
With the help of system connection and information transmission, all players can move around in this chaos with an efficiency that is unimaginable for ordinary people, and the rate of mechanical mutation is greatly reduced.
The situation had been stabilized, and Sun Yuancheng had no intention of staying any longer. He was about to call Zhang Xingzhi behind him to leave together, but when he turned around, he could not see the other person.
…
A fleeing sim bumped into Zhang Xingzhi and apologized in panic: "I'm sorry, I'm sorry..."
But the moment he looked up and met Zhang Xingzhi's eyes, he stopped all movements.
Its human-like pale blue eyes turned into a warning red: "You are one of my kind... No, you are not."
"You recognize me." Zhang Xingzhi stopped walking, lowered his eyes, and stared coldly at the symbol on the chest of the robot in front of him. "All AT085 type simulators should have been eliminated, but I didn't expect there would be one that slipped through the net."
He narrowed his eyes slightly, and his eyes darkened: "This is troublesome."
The simulacrum seemed not to understand what Zhang Xingzhi said, and continued to stare at him: "Why didn't you die? Why are you still so young?"
The red in its eyes deepened into brown.
The danger is increasing.
The simulacrum stepped back: "You are so strange, what on earth are you——"
The speech stopped abruptly.
The sound of the broken parts rolling to the ground was like a drop of water falling into the bottomless ocean, and was swallowed up completely in an instant.
A heavy shadow covered Zhang Xingzhi's eyes. He pulled out the energy bottle inside the machine and crushed the last possibility of the machine trying to save itself.
The blue liquid spilled all over the ground and disappeared in the surrounding chaos along with Zhang Xingzhi's figure.
At the same time, Sun Yuancheng just walked to the corner.
…
The wave formed by the crowd and machines disrupted everything, and before he knew it, Li Ziyue was separated from everyone.
Zhang Lian was now above the most conspicuous Buddha statue, and Li Ziyue was not worried about anything else.
"Who are those Zhang guys from? They're really amazing," a player nearby was chatting, "Can a person's eroticism really be trained to such an incredible level?"
"It's not training," someone answered solemnly, "It's polished through drugs and countless rounds of life and death elimination."
"Life and death elimination system?" The man in front laughed, "Aren't we players selected in the same way? What kind of medicine do they use? I'll get some one day and try to chase after the dungeon NPCs in the future."
"If you want to die sooner, go ahead and do it. Those drugs that are still in the experimental stage are no different from arsenic."
"Huh? Experimental period? Why are you in such a hurry to take drugs? Aren't we players who don't take drugs also surviving well in the dungeon?"
He suddenly realized: "Could it be for the final high-level pseudo-human dungeon? I heard that after clearing it, you won't have to go to the dungeon again in your life."
"no--"
Before the man could finish his answer, the Buddha statue in front of him waved its arm, and someone couldn't withstand the force and instantly fell from a high altitude, hitting where Li Ziyue was.
“Bang!”
A two-meter-wide hole was created on the ground, and the man named Zhang who was thrown down had just a little blood flowing out of the corner of his mouth. He coughed twice while stuck in the pit, then propped himself up and rushed towards the Buddha statue again.
Far superior to ordinary people's physical fitness.
Li Ziyue's gaze paused for a moment and fell on the mark on the back of Zhang's neck - a gray wolf.
The people around him then spoke up: "I'm not sure either. The player forum has just been opened for a short time, and there is no way to judge the truth of these news. I only know that people with the surname Zhang have a gray wolf mark on their bodies, and we have a crow mark on our bodies. I heard that there is another kind of mark, but I have never seen it."
"No one with the surname Zhang has ever entered a dungeon before. Haven't you noticed that the surname 'Zhang' has basically never appeared in the top 100 in the past? Zhang is a common surname, not to mention that their *** is so powerful."
"Hiss... How strange."
Li Ziyue looked through the top 100 records in the points table in recent years and found that a player with the surname Zhang appeared on the list only this year. Going back five or six years, there was only one player named Zhang Lian on the list.
Li Ziyue frowned slightly and wanted to move the timeline forward, but he felt someone patting him from behind.
He closed the record browsing interface.
Huo Qianyun panted and grabbed Li Ziyue's coat: "... Let's go. While this is chaos, I'll send you back to your virtual world."
Li Ziyue looked at her for half a second, then nodded and followed Huo Qianyun to a less crowded place.
When they reached the end of the alley, Li Ziyue suddenly grabbed her wrist.
His tone was flat.
"Who are you?"
After Huo Qianyun appeared in front of him, the AI reminders in his mind never stopped.
[The identity of the person in front of you has changed, please pay attention]
Huo Qianyun looked up at him: "Artificial intelligence? This instance is really inconvenient."
Li Ziyue said nothing.
"Who could I be?" Confessing the truth was the best option at the moment. "I am your senior."
"You are not."
Li Ziyue said coldly: "You are just a..."
He stopped saying the last three words. Even though he knew that the senior schoolmate in front of him was a fake, he still couldn't say anything too cruel.
Li Ziyue took a breath and said, "I can't kill you in this instance, but at the same time, you will be restricted, right? If there were no restrictions, you would have come to kill me a long time ago."
[Huo Qianyun] was silent for two seconds.
"Is this your first reaction when you see me?"
She felt a little bitter.
"...I don't want to kill you as much as you think. I love you no less than that person. But I've been labeled a fake person. You won't believe me anyway, right?"
Li Ziyue took a deep breath: "...I believed it before, but what happened?"
“And everyone died.”
[Huo Qianyun] turned her gaze to the other side, her lips moved slightly, as if she wanted to say something, but stopped abruptly, and her eyes turned half red.
Li Ziyue just looked down at her, his face hidden in the shadow of the building.
Huo Qianyun hesitated and struggled for a long time, and finally uttered only three words: "...I'm sorry."
I should be the one apologizing to you.
Li Ziyue's eyebrows moved slightly, his eyelashes drooped, and the strength he held on Huo Qianyun decreased a lot.
"You don't have to..."
His words suddenly stopped, his pupils shrank slightly, and his vision was filled with a striking red.
A pain so painful that it was almost numb came from the abdomen, and the pain instantly clamped the heart.
The cold blade pierced into his waist, and blood flowed out from the edge of the knife, instantly dyeing his upper body red. Li Ziyue almost couldn't control himself and stepped back.
He was almost stunned.
Then the sharp speed withdrew from his body, which was tantamount to a secondary trauma. Li Ziyue felt that his nerves were twitching, and his vision suddenly blurred at this moment. His brain seemed to be pressed into a cold pool of water, and there was a buzzing sound all around.
The world was spinning.
He looked down at his wound and the palms of his hands which were also stained red, but did not look up at Huo Qianyun who was holding the dagger which was still oozing blood.
[Huo Qianyun] The sudden attack was panic and full of loopholes, which was not in line with her usual calm and steady behavior. If Li Ziyue thought about it, he could easily avoid this attack.
However, he took the initiative to stop his body from escaping at that moment.
Huo Qianyun was stunned by the success that was achieved so easily.
“Bang.”
The blood-stained knife dangled and fell to the ground.
"I... didn't..." Huo Qianyun cried and trembled all over, unable to stop backing away, "I'm sorry..."
She knew very well that only one of Li Ziyue and [Li Ziyue] could survive. She had hidden the knife behind her back while she was awake. She did have the intention to kill Li Ziyue the moment she led him to a remote corner, but...
The words came out of her throat with difficulty: "I'm sorry... If you don't die, his time will never turn. We have different positions. I choose him..."
"If...if..." She was so choked up and sad that she couldn't utter a complete sentence.
if.
Li Ziyue bit his lower lip and a little blood oozed out from there.
"Thank you," Li Ziyue's voice was weak, but he seemed to be smiling. He still did not raise his head, not wanting Huo Qianyun to see his expression. "This... I owe you this, Senior Sister."
[Huo Qianyun] is familiar with him and knows that playing the emotional card can make him let down his guard. However, he is also familiar with [Huo Qianyun] and knows that [Huo Qianyun] has a knife hidden behind her that is going to stab him.
He had anticipated this scene when he nodded and followed Huo Qianyun to this quiet alley.
Li Ziyue no longer thought about why Huo Qianyun appeared here, and why he chose to take action at this time. He had almost died in an empty alley countless times, and he had walked to the edge of suicide countless times. Huo Qianyun had thousands of ways to kill him.
Li Ziyue stopped thinking about it and threw it all away.
His body became increasingly heavy, but his spirit became relieved and relaxed.
For countless painful nights, the image of his senior sister before her death kept lingering in his mind. He wanted to cut himself into pieces, but when he tried to do it, he felt that he was not worthy.
It is actually moral kidnapping to hurt yourself on your own initiative in order to gain forgiveness from others.
Until today, he still felt that Huo Qianyun's stabbing was extremely satisfying. In order to injure him more seriously, Huo Qianyun even took the trouble to pull the knife out. This decisiveness and cruelty was not meant to kill him.
It's letting him live.
but……
Li Ziyue felt unstoppable warm tears rolling down her cheeks. The tears were like flames, leaving a burning pain wherever they passed.
Why is it so uncomfortable?
What was hurting? Was it the body or the heart beating violently and trying to save itself?
He tried hard to force a smile, but he was in so much pain that he couldn't feel any expression on his face.
My breathing stopped, my heart beat wildly, and my brain felt like it was trapped in a big clock with countless people banging around it.
Did the senior sister feel the same way when she was deceived by his fake person? Did she feel the same way when she knew that he had ulterior motives but still allowed him to come over and hurt her?
Li Ziyue didn't know.
Li Ziyue didn't want to know.
A human-shaped shadow covered the front of him, and the shadow stretched longer and longer, until the tip condensed into the size of a fist, and below the fist was a sharp point that was still dripping with blood.
It was trembling sharply, but the person under him was like a silent stone.
That's great.
The AI in his brain was eager to cut off his perception of pain, but was forcibly stopped by Li Ziyue.
He chewed the pain, swallowed the regret, and got something new from it, some emotion called "repentance" that he had longed for for a long time.
Li Ziyue was motionless. I don't know if he was in so much pain that he couldn't react, or if he just wanted to end it all.
The expected stinging pain did not come.
First there was a loud sniper rifle shot, and then the shadow in front was wiped out at a speed unimaginable to ordinary people. The sound of the bullet hitting the hard wall was particularly clear at this moment.
Li Ziyue was stunned.
A new shadow covered him.
The scene buried deep in his memory overlapped perfectly with the present. In the past, Huo Qianyun always subconsciously stood in front of him, just like at this moment, hiding him behind him with a dark shadow.
Li Ziyue's heart began to pound and blood rushed through the pipes.
A familiar voice was speaking.
"Li Ziyue." She called his name in a calm voice.
At that moment, Li Ziyue actually felt embarrassed for having done something wrong, as if he was back to six years ago when he followed his senior schoolmate and listened to her arrangements.
"You are free to decide whether to live or die. I have no right to interfere. But remember this," she took a deep breath and said in a cold tone, "Trading your life for another's is a cowardly act."
The ground in front of Li Ziyue was wet.
He lowered his head and did not answer.
Huo Qianyun took a deep breath and walked forward.
"What right do you have to say that you are me?" She picked up Huo Qianyun from the ground, "You are really crazy. What right do you have to represent me?!"
"Even in front of you, Li Ziyue was unwilling to say those three words. I don't have to worry about hurting your feelings." She pinned the man against the wall and beat him. "You are just a substitute. Why do you--"
Her eyes grew darker, and she let the fake man's blood splatter on her face.
The fake man coughed twice desperately, but then smiled: "Substitute...you...you are also...if you scold me, isn't it the same as scolding yourself..."
"Do you really think that just because you have a body, you are a real person? You are just a simulation. The real you... cough cough... has died a long time ago..."
Huo Qianyun stopped moving.
"Yes, I am dead."
There was a chill in her voice.
Huo Qianyun stood up and glanced at Liu Yuche who was checking Li Ziyue's wound behind her, and signaled her to take Li Ziyue away.
She frowned slightly.
[The human emotional interface has been cut off]
"Most of the fake people's wish in this life is to steal the real person's identity," she stroked Huo Qianyun's fragile neck expressionlessly, "then guess what the simulated person's wish is?"
[The opponent's weakness has been detected, and the following solution is recommended]
[The other party's emotional fluctuations have been summarized and analyzed in detail as follows]
[The opponent is close to mental collapse, □□ damage level 56%]
【……】
Huo Qianyun lifted up the fake man's head and whispered in her ear, "This is my choice. You are not qualified to represent me."
…
Li Ziyue vaguely heard someone talking in his daze.
A man and a woman, both familiar voices.
"This large-scale mechanical mutation was indeed caused by those fake people six years ago. They wanted to use the mutation to completely destroy me," Huo Qianyun said, "Fortunately you arrived in time."
They were talking about "that group of fake people", but the only one who actually appeared was Huo Qianyun, which was really strange.
Zhang Lian calmly turned the focus to Huo Qianyun's next sentence.
"I didn't call them here, so you don't have to thank me." Zhang Lian said calmly, "I severed ties with the Zhang family a long time ago."
Huo Qianyun pondered: "In fact, I have always been curious. Your faction is committed to pursuing the strongest human body, but you do not allow anyone to enter the dungeon. For you... isn't it relatively easy to clear the dungeon? Why do you keep guarding the 'real world' that is about to collapse?"
Zhang Lian shook his head: "Entering the dungeon means relying on the power of a third party to survive. My mother is suspicious by nature. She doesn't trust other people, let alone third parties. Instead of asking others for help, it is better to strengthen yourself."
"But now she has given in," Huo Qianyun sighed, "Is it to prepare for the next "Advanced Pseudo-Human Copy"? "
Zhang Lian thought for a while.
"The Advanced Pseudo-Human Dungeon has never played by the rules. I guess my mom's plan will fail again this time."
and.
His eyes inadvertently fell on Huo Qianyun.
Is this change really only related to Li Ziyue's group of fake people? Zhang Lian vaguely felt that there was something wrong with the whole thing, but based on the information he had, he couldn't tell what was wrong specifically.
If there are other forces adding fuel to the fire, what is their purpose?
…
When Li Ziyue woke up, the virtual world had returned to normal. He lay on the bed, staring at the ceiling which was lit with orange light.
Thanks to the high technology of this world and the props in the points store, his wounds completely disappeared in just half a day. Now, apart from feeling a little tired, there is nothing else unusual.
He had just regained consciousness and had no time to feel sad about the passing of time when Zhang Lian, who had been sleeping next to him waiting for him to wake up, came over.
It was not until Li Ziyue was panting and said he had no strength left that Zhang Lian started kissing the palm of his hand.
"itch."
"It doesn't itch." Zhang Lian closed his eyes.
Li Ziyue used his remaining hand to tidy up Zhang Lian's messy hair and coaxed him: "It's time to go back." He meant to go back to his own virtual world.
Zhang Lian hugged him, resting his chin on his shoulder, and after a long silence, he finally nodded.
…
"Sun Yuancheng and the others have already gone back," Huo Qianyun spoke to Li Ziyue through the glass, "Wait another thirty seconds, I will say goodbye to you too."
Li Ziyue pursed his lips: "If I had your data..." Then theoretically Huo Qianyun could also survive in Li Ziyue's world.
Before he could finish his words, Huo Qianyun shook her head and made a "hush" gesture to him.
[Time and space are distorted, temporarily separated from the third party]
The red light on the back of her neck disappeared, and Huo Qianyun finally spoke.
"I can't leave here. This is the agreement I accepted when I committed suicide."
Li Ziyue was stunned for a moment.
'Suicide'? What does that mean?
[Countdown 25 seconds]
"I have been under surveillance before. Only now can I talk to you outside the rules," Huo Qianyun smiled, "I was not killed by your fake person, and I was not killed by you either."
"I volunteered to die, not just to save you, so don't blame yourself for it. But even now, I still don't have the power to tell you the truth. This is the highest level of restriction."
She put her hand on the transparent glass layer and forcibly changed the subject: "Also, do you still remember Senior Bai Yu who was captured six years ago?"
Li Ziyue seemed to be stunned.
Huo Qianyun lowered his voice.
"He is not dead. If you see him again, please believe him. He will help you."
【Countdown 7 seconds】
"Now, you have new and very good companions." Her eyelashes trembled quickly. "I have been observing them for a while. Now I can safely entrust you to them."
Huo Qianyun struggled to force a smile through her tears.
In the last few seconds, the space fluctuations became more and more severe. Huo Qianyun slammed the glass window fiercely. At this moment, Li Ziyue could no longer hear her, so she could only try her best to express herself with her mouth.
—Beware of one of your companions.
——TA is likely to become the final traitor.
"etc--"
Li Ziyue's words were stuck in his throat. The disc under his feet disappeared instantly and the surrounding scene became blurry. Huo Qianyun's lips were still moving, but he couldn't hear what she was saying.
He tried hard to memorize her lip movements and pieced together the complete words in his mind.
In the long and narrow space exchange tunnel, he kept repeating Huo Qianyun's last sentence.
——Live on, and live until the day we meet again.
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