Chapter 2 Safe House
The horror escape game copy [Hungry Mountain] is on the edge of the village.
The two players sneaked out of the village and hid in the bushes of dead trees.
Not far in front of them, a strange player was struggling and calling for help, but soon the screams gradually became smaller as the monster villagers gnawed on him, and were eventually replaced by chewing sounds.
The two men waited until the monster villagers had their fill and left before removing the hidden props above their heads.
Ding Hui and Ding Qi are brother and sister.
My sister Ding Qi was scratched in the abdomen by the monster, the wound became inflamed and ulcerated, and now she has a high fever.
In order to avoid being found by the villagers who had changed their minds at night by following the smell of blood, they had to leave the village and hide outside, but it was not safe outside either.
"Brother, you go back. I can hide here by myself."
"Shh...keep your voice down. It's dark now. If the monsters in the ground crack appear, the villagers won't chase them out."
Ding Hui tried to comfort his sister, but he himself was unsure.
The monsters in the cracks in the ground also eat people, and no one can tell whether they can hide safely until dawn.
Misfortunes never come singly.
The monster villagers moved back, and the footsteps were getting closer and closer.
The brother and sister looked at each other, their eyes full of panic.
Ding Qi pursed her dry lips. The high fever had made her gradually lose consciousness. She said in a daze, "Brother, go first. Don't worry about me."
Due to long-term hunger, blood loss, and high fever, her status bar was already showing a dying icon.
Ding Hui's face looked a little ugly.
This is the third time he and his sister have entered the game.
If it was a stranger teammate, he would have done his best, but this was his own sister, how could he just abandon her so easily! But his condition was not much better. He had been hiding with his sister for the past few days, with food shortages and hunger that left him with no strength.
Suddenly, Ding Qi rubbed his eyes and pointed in a direction.
"Brother, am I hallucinating? What do you see over there?"
Ding Hui looked in the direction of his sister's hand, and saw a cloud of black fog appearing on the originally dry and cracked land in the distance, and an old and eerie old house was looming.
The duplicate broadcasts appear at the same time.
[Refresh of safe house in the dungeon [Hungry Mountain]]
[The number of places to enter is limited, players in need please hurry up! ]
When they heard the system's voice, the brother and sister's eyes lit up.
Ding Hui carried his disabled sister on his back and ran towards the safe house, ignoring any monsters that crawled out of the cracks in the ground.
They really need a safe place to rest right now!
Thanks to the light hiding outside the village, the two men turned a disaster into a blessing and quickly arrived at the safe house in the thick fog.
The iron gate opened with a push. The yard was different from the dryness of Shih Mountain. The air was filled with dampness as if it had just rained. The LED lights around it emitted a faint light. Although it could not illuminate the entire space, it was possible to see roughly what was going on in the dim light.
There was a person sitting on the stone steps under the eaves, and he seemed to be a player who arrived earlier than them.
Ding Hui ignored the player who arrived first and hurriedly cleared a piece of ground for his sister to lie down comfortably.
Next, more players arrived.
When there were seven people in the yard, the iron fence closed, making a sound of iron clashing.
The safe house is closed to the public.
The rules appear on a panel in front of everyone.
【Welcome to the dungeon safe house. 】
[Human players are prohibited from killing each other in the safe house. 】
[Players are only allowed to move within the courtyard, and live streaming has been closed. ]
[Here, your panel data will be slowly restored. ]
[Based on the difficulty of the dungeon, the free stay time is 30 minutes. Players are requested to pay the stay fee as soon as possible. ]
[Points, props, souls... everything you have can be converted into exchange time. ]
After the players read the rules and made sure it was temporarily safe, they began to rest due to fatigue after the intense exercise.
Only Xu Zhiyan sat on the steps, indifferent.
Knowing yourself and your enemy means you can fight a hundred battles without danger. He thought that since he had to enter the dungeon anyway, he might as well take this opportunity to observe the status of other players in the game. Since they could find the safe house, they must be the stronger ones in the dungeon, right?
So he pretended to be the first player to arrive and observed others openly.
Two two-person teams and two loose players, a total of six people.
The strength of a team can be judged from its status.
Among them, the duo that arrived later was in the best condition. The two tall and strong men sat on the ground, took out some food and took a few bites, with a relaxed tone.
The worst group was the brother and sister group that arrived first.
Everything was peaceful for the first few minutes, but soon the two men finished their food and came over to the brother and sister, laughing and joking.
They probably knew each other, and a few words were enough for the onlookers to understand the whole story.
Ding Hui, the elder brother of the brother and sister duo, was a sports student before entering the game. He was the first to decipher the puzzle in the dungeon and obtained the side quest of Hunger Mountain. The other two lagged behind and missed out on this side quest. Now they want to share the side quest by trading antipyretic and anti-inflammatory drugs.
Ding Hui touched his sister's hot forehead, his face full of confusion.
Once the copy is opened, the points redemption mall will be closed. The medicines they prepared before coming here have long been used up, and now they are helpless. Without the medicine, their sister will really die.
Compared to my sister's life, this branch line doesn't seem that important.
"Jiang Shen, do you keep your word?" Ding Hui asked.
Jiang Shen was the leader of the duo. He nodded with a smile and shook the small box in his hand. It was indeed the box of antipyretic medicine from the points mall!
"Of course! If you just share the branch line with me, I'll give you the medicine to save her life!"
As if he was afraid that Ding Hui would be unwilling, he emphasized: "Anyway, your team is like this, even if this branch line falls into your hands, you can't explore it! You might as well give it to me!"
Ding Hui didn't say anything more and chose to share the branch line.
He was at his wit's end, and the only thought left in his mind was to save his sister, and he had no time to think about anything else.
While several people were trading, two lone wolf players in the corner made disdainful sounds.
[Branch sharing completed]
Jiang Shen excitedly checked the branch line and fiddled with the panel for a long time, with no intention of handing over the medicine box.
The atmosphere was somewhat frozen. Ding Hui realized something and looked unnatural. He grabbed the other person and asked carefully, "Where are the things?"
"Something? What?"
Jiang Shen pretended to be enlightened: "Are you a fool? You didn't make any preparations for the transaction. Are you a newbie who has only entered the game a few times? That's right, this is just a one-star dungeon."
Seeing Ding Hui's transformation from stunned to furious, Jiang Shen slapped away the hand that was restraining him and warned loudly:
"Players are not allowed to kill each other in the safe house."
"If you want to take action, you'd better think carefully. I advise you not to break the rules." Jiang Shen's teammates also took the opportunity to add with a smile.
"You! Why are you like this!" This time, not only Ding Hui, but even Ding Qi clenched his fists and looked angry, but unfortunately, anger was of no use in the current situation.
The players who were sitting a little further away from them turned their heads towards the wall tacitly, looking as if they had no intention of getting involved.
Seeing how angry the two were, Jiang Shen shook the medicine box in his hand and said, "How about this? I won't make things difficult for you. Kneel down and bark like a dog, or give me all your food, and I'll give you the medicine."
In Hungry Mountain, it is unknown whether the NPC villagers are dead or alive. Every night they turn into hungry ghosts and eat everything.
There is very little food available to players.
Even drinking water requires careful calculation. In a sense, food is more important than props.
Jiang Shen doesn't want food, he wants the lives of the brother and sister!
However, no matter how stupid Ding Hui was, he knew that if he gave away the food he had accumulated in the past few days, it would be tantamount to suicide.
But without the medicine, my sister won’t survive!
"Bah! You wish! Brother, don't listen to them! I, I'm fine!" Ding Qi struggled to stand up.
Before she could do anything, Ding Hui had already made his choice.
The silent and responsible young man bent down and knelt down almost without hesitation in front of the player who had just deceived him.
The two arrogant people were stunned at first, probably because they didn't expect the other party to be so obedient.
Jiang Shen raised his foot and stepped on Ding Hui's head, saying in disdain, "Why don't you scream? Scream now!"
The weak girl with a high fever rushed over and tried to pull her brother up, and the scene was in chaos.
Xu Zhiyan was still sitting on the stairs under the eaves.
He was born into a merchant family. In terms of gaming experience or survival ability, he might not be as good as the other players in the academy, but he had seen a lot of ugly faces in the world, and it could even be said that he had seen more than the average person.
Abusers like Jiang Shen are the ones who bully the weak and fear the strong.
The less the victim resists, the more the abuser will enjoy bullying him, and in the end he will even mock the bullied person and say that he deserves it.
Xu Zhiyan didn’t understand the selection mechanism of this game. Why would honest people like the Ding brothers and sisters be selected into the game? Isn’t this bullying?
He sighed and spoke lightly.
"Trading fake goods is not what a businessman should have."
The two players not far from him turned around first and gave him wild looks, as if wanting him to stop talking.
Now that one is strong and the other is weak, even a fool would know to protect himself.
But his words, without lowering his voice, broke the chaos in the courtyard. Jiang Shen, who had just held his head high, immediately turned around and stared at the unfamiliar player.
He scolded fiercely: "I advise you not to meddle in other people's business."
Xu Zhiyan was still sitting there lazily, not even looking at Jiang Shen. He waved at Ding Hui, whose forehead was covered with dirt, signaling him not to continue doing stupid things and getting cheated.
"The box is empty," he explained.
It feels light when it is shaken, without any weight at all.
If Ding Hui hadn't been desperate to seek medical help, he probably wouldn't have been tricked into giving up the branch line.
This sentence took away the carrot that was hanging on the Ding brothers and sisters.
Jiang Shen rushed to Xu Zhiyan with a sullen face, wanting to punch this ungrateful player in front of him, but thinking of the safe house rules, he hesitated and said something harsh:
"You're lucky. Once you get out of the safe house, you'd better be careful."
Xu Zhiyan shrugged, ignoring the furious guy in front of him, stood up, walked around Ding Hui, and looked at the brother and sister slumped on the ground.
"It's really hard to live." He sighed, not knowing who he was talking to.
Although it sounded stupid to be deceived for his sister, he didn't hate the other party.
"Bang!"
Some medicine and water were thrown into Ding Hui's arms.
The man who had just been desperate was filled with astonishment. He picked up the medicine box and took a look. It was not the medicine exchanged in the mall, but the modern antibiotic hydrogen peroxide could also improve his sister's condition.
The eyes of the man who lost the side quest and knelt down before the liar instantly turned red.
"I...thank you."
He lowered his head and sincerely thanked the young man standing in front of him.
But before Xu Zhiyan could answer, Jiang Shen interrupted their conversation and said in a sarcastic tone: "Oh, I didn't realize that you, a pretty boy, have so many things."
As he spoke, he looked sourly at the young man in front of him, but unfortunately the light in the yard was too dim, and apart from the other person's bright eyes, everything else was not very clear.
Jiang Shen cracked his knuckles and raised his chin, saying, "You love to show off so much. When we get out, I'll make you kowtow a hundred times and then dig out your two beautiful eyes!"
Xu Zhiyan turned his head lazily, squinted his eyes and looked at Jiang Shen, with a smile on his lips.
"Oh? That's amazing!"
"Are you scared now? If you kneel down and beg me now, maybe I will show mercy." Jiang Shen thought that the other party was scared, and his expression became increasingly ferocious.
There was a rustling sound in the old house, and Xu Zhiyan checked the time.
"Yeah, I know I'm scared now."
After giving a perfunctory answer, he said no more and walked straight into the gate of the old house. Suddenly, the originally dim hall was lit up, illuminating the yard as well.
Ding Hui, who wanted to stop him, still kept his hand outstretched, with an expression of disbelief on his face.
The lights are bright, allowing the players to see the situation clearly.
The young man who gave out the medicine was completely different from them. He was dressed neatly and cleanly, wearing a black leather glove on his right hand, with a light teardrop mole under his left eye, and traces of blood vessels visible on his cold white skin. He had a perfect warm smile on his face, which made people like him even more.
Not only was he not as embarrassed as them, he also ignored the rules of the safe house and walked in...
Thinking of a certain possibility, Jiang Shen, who had just mocked Xu Zhiyan, felt his legs go weak and he knelt on the ground, cold sweat instantly soaking his back.
The lights in the hall flickered, and in front of the shrine, several "hands" slowly climbed onto the table.
The players were attracted by the movement in the room and stared at the monster that appeared under the long table with bated breath.
It was a mass of irregularly shaped red substance, about one meter tall, barely in human form, except that it had five long arms growing out of its body, each holding up a white porcelain plate.
Xu Zhiyan raised his eyebrows and glanced at the monster that was crawling towards him. His smile froze, his face became solemn, and his disgust was evident in his words.
What is this?
It’s too ugly!
However, thinking about the protection fee he would have to collect... ahem, the reward he would have to collect, he cleared his throat and spoke to the players.
“Free time is about to end.”
"I hope you all have a good rest."
The red monster reluctantly left the door and held the porcelain plate in front of every player.
Every time someone placed an item on the tray, a golden stopwatch would appear out of thin air in Xu Zhiyan's hand.
【Name: Safe House Timer】
【Level: ???】
[Type: Special Item]
[Introduction: A delicate pocket watch made of unknown material, which records the time you exchanged.]
[Notes: The countdown starts when the player enters the safe house. Please be sure to leave before the time reaches zero, otherwise terrible things will happen.]
The process of collecting props and distributing stopwatches went very smoothly.
Xu Zhiyan held the last stopwatch, bent down with a smile, and looked down at Jiang Shen who was lying limp on the ground.
"Knock your head a hundred times? Dig out your eyes?"
When the other party heard this, his voice began to tremble. He quickly knelt up and began to kowtow, with only apologies left on his lips: "I'm sorry, sorry, sorry, I'm a slut, I'm sick, I'm an idiot, I'm sorry, sorry... bang bang bang..."
Jiang Shen, who was so arrogant ten minutes ago, kept kowtowing, leaving a shallow pit on the ground of the deserted yard, which was soon stained with blood.
Xu Zhiyan looked at it for a while and suddenly felt bored.
He put away his smile, threw Jiang Shen's stopwatch in front of him, stopped making things difficult for him, and returned to the old house.
People die in the game every day. The strong ones can decide the life and death of the weak without any reason. It's nothing more than the law of the jungle.
Thinking of this, Xu Zhiyan felt a bit of a headache.
He should worry more about himself than others.
The next day, the weather was fine.
The thunderstorm and heavy rain washed away the haze in the sky.
A lot of things happened last night. Xu Zhiyan stayed up until dawn before going to sleep. When he opened his eyes again, it was already afternoon and the sunset was crimson.
I don’t know if it’s because I slept from dusk to dusk, but a huge feeling of loss came over me.
"It feels like I've been abandoned by the whole world." He murmured to himself.
[Ding! Host, you are the agent of ghosts and gods!]
[You are the only one who abandons others! You still have us!]
The safe house system, which had been silent due to pressure from ghosts and gods since it was bound, finally emerged from its corner and refuted its host.
Perhaps in response to the system's words, Xu Zhiyan saw a hand made of blood mist suddenly stretch out from under his bed, and the swollen and sticky bodies of the monsters appeared from the crack in the door.
Thinking of the unappetizing appearance of these guys, he felt dizzy and thought it would be better to be abandoned by the world.
"I know what everyone meant. You don't have to come out next time."
Except for Mr. Ghost, the rest of the guys in this house are hard to describe.
He seemed to remember something and called up his own panel.
[Name: Xu Zhiyan]
[Status: Weak]
[Mental Threshold: 0-59]
[Current Spirit: 59]
[Features: None]
[Skills: None]
[Title: Ghost Agent]
[Ghost Agent: Rare title, comes with 15 minutes of absolute safety time when entering a new dungeon, and can communicate with the safe house system within the safe time. ]
What the hell is this mental threshold limit of 59! Among the props received yesterday, there is a B-level prop that requires a mental limit of 80. He can't even trick himself into reaching the upper limit of 60.
Suddenly I understood why the ghost emphasized yesterday that "the better the props, the higher the requirements for the user"!
As for the fifteen minutes of absolute safety time?
The system explained before that the game currently has no opening kill.
This title is really rare and useless.
Turning over, Xu Zhiyan wrapped himself like a cocoon, thinking of the instructions of ghosts and gods in his mind.
The safe houses hidden in the copies are sealed. They are located in the most dangerous places in each copy. What the heirs need to do after entering the copy is to find these safe houses and become the owners of these safe houses.
Only in this way can you upgrade the safe house and unlock more rooms.
...59 mental strength.
In this kind of horror escape copy, you can’t even use the better props, so how can you find a safe house in the most dangerous place? Isn’t that just a waste of time?
Glancing at his right hand wrapped in a black glove, Xu Zhiyan pinched his nose and told himself to stay calm, thinking that at least he still had the protection of ghosts and gods.
I originally wanted to observe for a while longer, but from what happened yesterday, unless I enter more copies and complete the task to upgrade the safe house, I can only watch the noobs fight each other.
It’s not like he hasn’t thought about watching the live broadcast.
But if you don’t clear higher-star dungeons as soon as possible, you can only watch the lowest-level live broadcasts!
God knows what kind of mood he was in when he was checking the live broadcast room before going to bed. He cleared all the dungeons with half stars, even yesterday's Hunger Mountain had only one star.
"Open the copy that requires me to enter as soon as possible." Xu Zhiyan said to the system.
[Okay, I'll arrange it for you right away.]
[Since this is the first time the host enters the game, he will take a special channel.]
[After you complete the instance, a new entry and exit anchor point will be established at the player gathering place [Shell].]
[Everything in the safe house is kept secret. Some of the memories of the players who saw your true face yesterday have been modified. Please feel free to enter the game.]
Six hours later, the sky went dark and not a single star could be seen.
One of the doors standing in the hall opened, revealing endless darkness that seemed to swallow people up.
Xu Zhiyan saw ghosts again.
The other party was still trapped in the shrine with chains. He looked like the lord of ghosts, but he made people feel inexplicably sacred and inviolable.
Thinking that he and the ghosts and gods were now in a relationship of Party A and Party B, Xu Zhiyan felt that he should say something to reassure the other party... Forget it, with 59 mental strength, with this level of professional ability, he might not be able to get out of there for long after he goes in, so he decided not to talk about it.
His slender fingers rested on the door handle, and just as he was about to push the door open to enter the dungeon, a faint ghostly voice came from behind him.
"Go find me."
Xu Zhiyan was stunned. When he wanted to turn around and ask for details, a strong suction force suddenly appeared in the door and sucked him in.
He felt himself falling in darkness.
My consciousness began to blur and I eventually fell into a deep sleep.
…
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