Chapter 321 Monster Hospital (Twenty)
I finally felt relieved after learning that the cause of my physical problems was the sequelae of entering Area A. This was better than the panic brought about by unexplained physical pain. And judging from the situation, I'm afraid that President Xuan's condition was the same as mine.
Ever since entering Area B and receiving the side quest, President Yan always had a feeling that she couldn't figure out what the system wanted to do. After all, during her search for Patient X in Area B, her progress was very smooth, and she didn't encounter any obstacles in the middle. She always felt that this was not like the system's style. Until now, the cold and painful feeling in her heart finally made her feel relieved.
Compared to the pain, President Yan was more concerned about the chilling feeling of something invading his body, because this feeling made people instinctively dislike it.
If there were any players from a guild alliance, or any players who had previously undergone preliminary examinations and wanted to become patients, and could empathize with Guild Master Yan at this moment, she would be able to feel this chill in her body, which was actually not unfamiliar to her, because that was how she felt when she approached the medical equipment for preliminary examinations just now.
After realizing that the mark on her body would not kill her, President Yan struggled to get up from the ground and leaned on the bed to calm her breathing. At the same time, she was a little concerned about the word used in the system's prompt just now - infection.
The system used "infection" to describe the condition of her body and the extra marks, rather than a punishment for entering Area A. Infection means there is an infection source. What President Yan is more concerned about is what exactly is the infection source, Area A? Or...
Compared to President Yan's calmness after figuring out the whole story, the three people on President Xuan's side, especially the President of Top Students and the President of Loan Sharks, did not seem so calm.
"This...what should we do?" The president of the top students felt the pain gradually dissipate, and couldn't help but curse, "It almost hurt me to death. In this case, should we help President Yan find someone? Otherwise, after waiting for half an hour, the infection will get worse and worse. Will we still have time to do our job? This system is a bit inhumane, isn't it? After all, we..."
"Okay," President Xuan interrupted the top student president before he finished speaking. "Don't talk nonsense. Have you forgotten? We have enough time. As long as we get rid of President Yi and the eldest lady within half an hour, we can go back to look for someone with President Yan. Now President Yan and we are in the same boat. Even if she doesn't want to share clues with us, we have to speed up because of the infection. This is a group task. As long as we find patient X, the task will be successful. It doesn't matter who finds it. Getting rid of President Yi and the eldest lady is our primary goal. After all, there may only be one chance to not abide by the staff rules."
President Xuan still has a clear sense of priorities. Now is the golden opportunity. Compared to completing a side quest, the rare chance to get rid of President Yi and the eldest lady is more important. Moreover, he thinks that President Yan will not allow the infection in his body to continue to spread. He believes that no matter whether President Yan is willing to help them or not, the other party certainly does not want to waste time here. In fact, the system has made plans for them.
It was just that the president of the top students and the president of the loan sharks were temporarily frightened by the consequences of failing to complete the task, so they did not think about the deeper problems. President Xuan did not give too much explanation, but just brought out President Yan to explain and temporarily ease the crisis in their hearts.
After all, if everything went well, they would only be delayed for half an hour at most, and the infection rate would be only 30%, which was not too serious. By then, they would just need to find patient X and everything would be fine.
"But President Xuan... will this method work? I have seen the abilities of these two people..." The loan shark president seemed a little scared, and coughed twice to spit out the blood foam in his mouth, "They are both very strong..."
Although he was very reluctant to admit it, the loan shark president still remembered how his companions died at the hands of the two men, and how they turned the situation around in such an emergency. He suddenly felt uneasy because of the big promises made by President Xuan and now because of the system's prompts.
President Xuan is usually not a talkative person, but now the situation forces him to use only these two people, so he has to explain, "You all know my skills. After using them, I can restrict the actions of two people for a short period of time. They will not be on guard against us giving them gifts. It's legitimate and this will go smoothly, so we just need to catch them for a few seconds when they can't resist. Don't you dare to do this?"
Chairman Xuan knew how to speak. He used threats and inducements at first, then changed the subject, "This is the only chance to take revenge. Now is our only chance. Don't forget the choice you made before."
After saying this, the two people on the other end of the communicator remained silent, as if they were considering what President Xuan had said. After a moment, they said, "We will cooperate with President Xuan."
"Hopefully, everything will go well for us later."
Finally, they reached a consensus. The three agreed to go to patient No. 151's room in three minutes to prepare for action, so they took advantage of these three minutes to adjust their status.
At the same time, Ward C.
President Barbie and Twelve began to search the wards from the beginning. As soon as they entered the ward, Twelve placed powerful electric lights in the four corners and the center of the room. The whole room was brightly lit, without any sign of shadows. It was not known whether the shadows were caused by the power outage and could not gather together in a short time, or because Nineteen's target was bigger and so they did not follow for the time being.
But Twelve still didn't dare to let his guard down. After all, there was the lesson of what happened on the island, and it was always better to be careful.
There were not many things in the ward. Apart from two beds and a table, everything was placed within sight of the naked eye, so there was no need to search much. However, President Barbie still explored it carefully. Even under the bed and table were searched. But even so, after searching several rooms in a row, she did not find anything strange.
"Is there something wrong with our thinking?" President Barbie had to pause her subordinates' actions and communicate with Twelve, "Maybe it was just a coincidence that the shadows were triggered, and there is nothing wrong with these rooms?"
The situation on the main force's side is still good, but once those black shadows all gather together, they can only continue to attack, but this is a battle without results. They have tried and found that those black shadows cannot be killed at all, so they can only be safe for the time being. If there is still no breakthrough, there will surely be no good results, so President Barbie has to doubt her current decision.
"It shouldn't be," Twelve had been thinking about this question along the way, but after hearing this, he gave President Barbie an unhesitating negative answer, "The system won't let us end up in a dead end. The shadow has been triggered, which means our direction is correct. There are only corridors and various wards here, and there aren't many places to hide information or trigger something. I still think our direction is not wrong, or maybe what we are looking for is not something hidden in the ward."
At the young age of twelve, she has become the vice president of a guild and is famous. Of course, it is not just because of her martial arts skills. In addition, she has been taken care of by the eldest lady and the president for a period of time, and has learned a lot. More importantly, she has a clear understanding of the system or the game, so President Barbie still agrees with her words.
"But if we are not asked to find something in the room, what does the system want us to discover?"
The two stood in a not-so-bright corridor. There was a bright base camp not far ahead, and the passage behind them was really dark. Perhaps the darkness was now filled with dense small shadows. Because they were afraid of the light source in Twelve's hand, they did not dare to move for the time being.
Listening to President Barbie's questions and looking at the darkness behind, Twelve always felt that she had a bad intuition in her heart. She knew that this intuition was not because there might be small shadows hidden in the darkness that could devour them, but another kind of premonition of danger.
President Barbie was originally standing side by side with Twelve. At first, she didn't quite understand why Twelve suddenly became interested in the darkness behind him. Then, somehow, she realized that the darkness seemed a little abnormal, because she found that the light from the powerful lighting lamp in Twelve's hand did not spread there at all. That area seemed to be covered by something more dangerous besides the black shadow.
While she was thinking of this, Twelve beside her had already taken action. She took out a small bomb and a powerful light from the control panel and threw them into the darkness one on the left and one on the right.
The passage that was imagined to be illuminated only illuminated a short distance. Soon, both the electric lights and the small bombs disappeared without a trace because they hit something.
What was even more strange was that the bomb did not explode after hitting the target. It was like a dud, swallowed silently into the darkness. With the last bit of light, President Barbie and Twelve saw that right in front of them, there seemed to be a large net woven with darkness. The moment the bomb hit the black net, it was covered by some sticky liquid, and in a moment, there was nothing left.
When they checked the ward before, they didn't want to be too far away from the main force in case something happened and they couldn't get there in time, so they didn't check from the beginning. They only looked at a few rooms in the middle. So it was not until now that they realized that this big black sticky net had corroded and digested all the wards and corridors in front, and was now about to spread to their side.
It seems that the system not only completed the task for them, but also set up an obstacle. Now there is this unknown black net outside, which is constantly shrinking the place where they exist. There are unknown black shadows inside, which are constantly approaching and testing, trying to swallow them all. No matter which one is touched, no one will survive.
When President Barbie saw the black net, she had already pulled Twelve back a distance and left a light bulb where they were standing. By observing the time it took for the light bulb to disappear, she could judge the speed of the black shadow's movement.
"There should be more than just this thing in front, there might be one on the other side as well, but it's blocked by the shadow now, so we can't be sure."
Twelve glanced at the direction of the main force and made a judgment. "I don't know when the black network appeared, but I think we have found the information given by the system. Now considering the task given to us by the system before, I think our understanding from the beginning has been deviated..."
Twelve's face rarely became serious. All the thoughts that he had felt something was wrong since he entered Area C now emerged one by one, and of course President Barbie also thought of them.
"Whether it was the shadow dragging Xiaodao in, the corrosive burning sensation Xiaodao felt, or the black net's ability to corrode and digest, these were all the system's reminders to us that in this mission, we are not the ones delivering dinner, but someone or some people's dinner. This is a process of being digested, and we are the food that is restricted here by someone or some people..."
Those seemingly strange places became clear because of this explanation.
For example, there are so many players who entered Ward C as staff members, but there is nothing here, because this is not the real Ward C. After all, when they entered here, not to mention the medical staff, even the nurses' station was empty, and those patients who turned into black shadows were all fake.
Therefore, they entered some kind of false space without realizing it, and the tasks issued by the system were just a disguise.
【bite--
Congratulations, you finally discovered that this is not Ward C in the real space. 】
President Barbie and Twelve both heard the system's timely prompt sound. It seemed that they had finally found the core of the problem.
Then all the players in Ward C heard the true meaning of their mission.
【bite--
Congratulations to the player for discovering the secret of the side quest - Dinner in a Dream.
The dinner in your dream is a real dinner, but you are not the one eating the dinner, but someone else’s dinner. 】
The system made a strange sound, with an indescribable cunningness that made the players shudder.
【Task Description:
As the digestion time goes on, the fake C Ward you are in will gradually shrink. When the Ward completely disappears or the shadows are completely connected, the digestion will be completely over. Only when you wake up the person who is having dinner in his sleep in some way can you enter the real C Ward. 】
Although the real mission was revealed, the players did not feel relieved, because everyone had personally experienced the power of this 3S-level ultimate copy. They had entered the ward for some time, and if it were not for the appearance of the shadow and the black web, they would not have found out what the real mission was until now.
But once this real mission was announced, everyone was faced with their current crisis. It was not an exaggeration to describe the current situation as "wolves in front and tigers behind". After all, in this short period of time, they had clearly realized that neither the black shadow in front of them nor the black net behind them seemed to have any weaknesses.
Moreover, the mission description states that only if they wake up the people who are having dinner in their sleep can they enter the real C ward. In other words, it is not advisable to start from the black shadow and the black net.
They need to find the person who is having dinner in his sleep under this life-threatening situation, and also find a way to wake him up. This is extremely difficult, especially since they now know that they are not in the real Ward C, but just in an illusory space. That is to say, they and the person who is having dinner in his sleep are not in the same time and space. So how can they find him and how can they wake him up?
President Barbie and Twelve have returned to the main force. They left a light at regular intervals along the way to observe the distance the black net had advanced. Because of Nineteen's well-organized layout, those black shadows attacked several times but were dispersed by the main force. Now they are hiding in the dark and observing, with no intention of taking further action.
"There is something strange about this real mission," Nineteen spoke first. Her thinking was much faster than other players, and she quickly grasped the key point. "It has been made clear that the environment we are in now is not the real C area, but the fake C area. This means that there are no real humans or patients here except for those of us who are treated as dinner. According to the system's description, the environment we are in is a simulation of someone's stomach. Theoretically, he and we should not exist in the same space. In other words, we need to wake up the person who is dreaming of dinner, and it is impossible for him to be here. Then how can we, who are restricted here, contact him and wake him up?"
Many players didn’t think of this at first, but after Nineteen’s explanation, everyone’s faces darkened, because they finally understood the strangest part of the task description.
"The mission is definitely not a dead end," President Barbie knew everyone's mentality, so she had to stand up and say a few words, "The system didn't say that this kind of awakening needs to be face to face, and the mission description said that it is through some form, maybe it is a clue for us. Twelve and I have just checked the room in the middle section, there is no problem, there must be no clues in the corroded space in front, and the shadow has been blocking here from the beginning..."
Twelve already understood what she wanted to say. "So the information about the awakening method is very likely hidden in the ward at the back that we haven't entered yet. We have to find a way to avoid the shadows and enter as quickly as possible. After all, there may also be black nets at the back. Once those rooms are also corroded, we will never be able to find the possible information."
I don't know if it was due to the atmosphere, but the dark shadows surrounding the large group seemed to have finally sensed the players' eagerness to make a move. They no longer hid in the encirclement like turtles, and some even wanted to get closer to them. Or maybe the scattered shadows finally recovered after a short rest. Those dark shadows showed a momentum of being ready for battle, and it seemed as if they would all merge together in the next second and engulf all the players.
At this moment, Twelve took the initiative and threw out a small bomb.
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