Chapter 53 Swan Castle (Second Update)
Although the Ghost Wizard and the Werewolf Knight had completely different motives, they shared a common goal at this moment—to find Yu Naixin again as soon as possible.
Yu Naixin herself has already resorted to her old tricks from the last simulation, using the priest's folding fan to hide in all sorts of nooks and crannies throughout the Swan Castle.
This time, however, Yu Naixin's actions were not simply aimed at stalling for time.
While stalling for time, she also dug out the things she had stolen from the ghost wizard and took out a notebook containing the ghost wizard's experience and techniques in making potions.
[What?! My goodness, is the female guest genuinely preparing to learn how to make potions?!]
[I was completely baffled. Could she even understand it? A ghost's private notes couldn't possibly be kind enough to explain basic potion knowledge; it would definitely start with all sorts of advanced technical terms. What on earth was she, someone with absolutely no background knowledge, trying to read?!]
[Let's not even talk about whether she can understand it or not. Just look at how frequently she's moving around, up and down, left and right, while trying to avoid the four male guests' thorough search. Can she really concentrate?!]
Yu Naixin really can concentrate and understand the contents of her notes.
Multitasking is commonplace for Yu Naixin. She recently finished controlling both the werewolf knight and the ghost wizard simultaneously.
It's just reading while running around, which is quite easy and leisurely.
Yu Naixin's reading and information extraction abilities are already exceptional. When she was first brought into "Heartbeat 1000%", even in such an unprepared and tense situation, she was able to capture the key points from so many densely packed clauses in a flash. Now, she is even more capable.
Yu Naixin's mindset has been completely transformed by this dating reality show, and the improvement of her physical functions by spiritual power is also amazing. Her reading speed, memory, and thinking ability have all been greatly enhanced.
Although there are many words in the notebook that she cannot understand yet, Yu Naixin can choose to memorize them directly and imprint them in her mind.
As a college student who has been on campus for less than two months and whose academic momentum from high school has not yet completely disappeared, Yu Naixin is quite professional in this regard.
She could barely understand the notebook, but the prescriptions were something she had to memorize entirely. There were many things that Yu Naixin had never even heard of before, and the materials and samples provided by the ghost wizard were limited, so she couldn't find the corresponding items.
However, Yu Naixin felt that she had already gained a lot.
Completely unfamiliar knowledge, as if from another world, poured into her mind. The more Yu Naixin learned about it, the more she felt how well-suited she was to learn these things.
The process of making potions, in essence, is also a microscopic construction of spiritual energy.
The maker needs to have a thorough understanding of the spiritual properties contained in each material, know what effects the interaction between different spiritual properties will bring, and then use appropriate tools and techniques to fuse several materials together, so that their spiritual power can be connected where it should be connected, blocked where it should be blocked, diverted where it should be diverted, and removed where it should be removed, so that the spiritual power contained in all the materials can be used to construct a complete multidimensional aggregate.
This requires the operator to have a strong ability to construct multi-dimensional space, but this ability is nothing special for Yu Naixin.
Whether it was Cocoon Village in the previous episode or Swan Castle in this episode, Yu Naixin only needed to wander around to create an accurate 3D map in her mind and made no mistakes.
Making magic potions is simply extending the original three-dimensional space into a higher dimension. Yu Naixin actually did this when she used the Jade Bone Mahjong set to control the male guest.
While Yu Naixin was focused on learning, it wasn't good news for the viewers in the live stream.
Although Yu Naixin kept moving around to keep the live stream from freezing, the content was very simplistic.
Even when the audience switched to the perspective of the four male guests, all they could see was the monotonous scene of the male guests searching everywhere but finding nothing.
How long are we going to keep watching the female guests...? This is so boring...
[I can't take it anymore, I'm going to find some fun in other live streams.]
[She was able to maintain such a focused reading state for so long... I don't know how much she actually understood, but I know her dedication is truly admirable...]
[I'm increasingly doubting whether the little witch can actually figure something out. Even if she can't understand everything, just learning a little bit is already amazing!]
Most of the viewers in the live stream had left, and time was ticking away. An hour later, at 6:39 PM, the Ghost Wizard finally found Yu Naixin's trail.
As the male guest who relies most on his brainpower, the Ghost Wizard frantically searches under the influence of intense hatred. Even though Yu Naixin's ability to hide is definitely not weak, she was eventually caught by the Ghost Wizard.
At that time, Yu Naixin was sitting on top of a cabinet in the corner of the third floor of Swan Castle, with her legs dangling in the air in a blind spot.
Suddenly sensing a burning gaze, Yu Naixin looked up from her notebook and met the eyes of the ghostly wizard on the ground ten meters away.
The moment the ghost wizard saw Yu Naixin, he exploded like a time bomb, unleashing a torrent of fury: "Princess! I've found you—!"
The ghost wizard spoke the last four words as if each one had been fiercely rejected on the tip of his tongue, uttering them through gritted teeth.
"Heh..." The ghostly wizard laughed in fury, his sinister voice like a venomous snake flicking its tongue. He conjured a strange magic wand in his hand with spiritual power. "You can't escape!"
The ghost wizard's current low-pressure aura is quite terrifying.
The spiritual power within his body leaked out due to extreme hatred, forming an extremely unstable energy fluctuation on the surface of his body.
Even the scenery around the ghost wizard was distorted by this energy.
[Holy crap, is this the strength of a guest character from a dungeon below the Domain Lord level? Seeing it with my own eyes is so shocking! Just the tiny bit of spiritual energy overflowing from their body can cause such a direct impact!]
I feel like if anything gets close to a ghost now, it'll be instantly blown to bits the moment it touches it!
[Does the female guest still have mahjong tiles? It seems she doesn't? What will she do then?!]
The ghost wizard chanted obscure incantations, and a dark green mist began to appear at the tip of his wand, clearly indicating that it contained a deadly poison.
At such a thrilling moment, Yu Naixin rather inappropriately burst out laughing.
"Hahahahahahaha!" Yu Naixin laughed so hard that her legs swung in the air several times. "Mr. Ghost Wizard, so you have a fetish for cross-dressing?"
"It's fine, it's fine, I respect that, it's freedom to dress as you please. It's just that your sense of style, hahaha, still needs a lot of improvement, hahaha!"
The ghost wizard was still wearing the clothes he had taken from the maids he had killed.
Although the ghost wizard didn't wear the whole outfit, and the maids' clothes weren't that big, he simply pieced together the fabric of several maid dresses and draped them over himself, mainly to cover his transparent body.
However, the maid dress still had elements such as lace, bows, ruffles, and frills, and the ghost wizard's hasty work didn't have time to remove all of these things.
So overall, he was indeed wearing a messy women's dress.
[What?! The female guest's focus at a time like this is actually on the clothes?!]
All I can say is that she's truly unique; her thought process is so bizarre, she clearly doesn't even know the word "fear"...
[Wow, the female guest's laughter is so infectious, I couldn't help but laugh along!]
[I got influenced by the little witch; upon closer inspection, the ghost's outfit is actually quite funny, hahaha.]
Ghost Wizard: "...?!"
The ghost wizard felt like he was about to sneeze but was forcibly pushed back down.
Amidst intense displeasure and anger, there was also a hint of grievance and bewilderment.
Are the female guests that the "Heartbeat 1000%" program team arranged for this time out of their minds?!
Yu Naixin even kindly offered the ghost wizard a suggestion: "Hey, I have a professional tailor here, do you need any help?"
Yu Naixin waved the notebook in her hand and called out, "The service fee isn't expensive. There are two parts in your writing that I don't quite understand. Just explain them to me!"
Ghost Wizard: "...??!!"
Following the werewolf knight's pigeon-toed wink and peace sign, the ghost wizard was once again driven to a mental breakdown by Yu Naixin.
...What the hell is this female guest talking about?!
He could understand every single word she said, so why couldn't he grasp what she meant at all?!
[I'm dying of laughter. The female guest was like a street vendor, enthusiastically and actively promoting her products.]
[Isn't the ghost's expression the funniest? Even with such blurry features, you can still see a deep sense of existential doubt, hahaha!]
So she's actually studying seriously?! After watching for so long, there are only two parts she doesn't quite understand?!
Just as the ghost wizard was unable to think for a moment, Yu Naixin showed a somewhat disgusted expression: "Tsk."
"Why do you look like you're not smart at all?"
Yu Naixin shook her head: "Forget it."
Before she could finish speaking, Yu Naixin deftly flew away on the priest's folding fan.
【What?! Why so suddenly?!】
[So the female guest's whole charade was just a ploy to distract the ghost and create an opportunity to escape?! She's done this before!]
[I have a feeling she's genuinely disappointed with Ghost's poor performance?]
[I remember the Ghost was really sharp during the Moonlight Town dungeon episode, so why is he acting like a silly deer in this dungeon episode?]
In the end, all Yu Naixin left for the ghost wizard was a fleeting, blurry silhouette.
Regardless of how furious and annoyed the ghost wizard behind her was after he realized what was happening, Yu Naixin continued to read her notes carefully.
The time quietly arrived at 6:55.
[It's almost 7 PM, why isn't the female guest in a hurry at all? The banquet starts at 7 PM, how can this princess possibly escape? It's clearly the deadline!]
[Her relaxed demeanor doesn't seem like she's going to give up; has she already figured out how to deal with it?]
But what else can she do? No guest on the show can survive the deadline!
【What nonsense are you spouting? If we could survive, would it be called a death date...?】
Yu Naixin finally took action.
She put away what she was holding and stopped trying to hide. Instead, she flew directly to the end of the right-hand corridor of the castle via the shortest route.
Aside from the Elf Prince still not being in good condition, the other three male guests were already red-eyed from searching for someone. Yu Naixin was almost immediately noticed by the Vampire Duke as soon as she appeared.
Using the speed of the priest's folding fan, Yu Naixin barely managed to avoid the vampire duke's blood mist attack. The ghost wizard and the werewolf knight also heard the commotion and rushed over.
Despite being relentlessly pursued by the three male guests, Yu Naixin's spiritual energy level was severely insufficient for sustained pursuit.
All the Qi-nourishing medicines were used up during the previous hiding process. Yu Naixin had specifically checked during the last simulation that neither Qi-nourishing medicines nor healing medicines had been refreshed. The description of these two special medicines, "limited to 1 per day," means that the program guests need to stay in the instance for a full 24 hours to count as one day.
The Swan Castle instance only lasts four hours from entry to the deadline, so there's definitely no way to wait for a new batch of potions to be available.
Yu Naixin can only rely on the few remaining spiritual energies in her body to move forward at full speed.
Just as she was a few meters away from the entrance to the hidden passage, the black bat swarm of the Vampire Duke and the black-green poisonous mist emitted from the Ghost Wizard's wand finally wrapped around Yu Naixin's ankle.
The vampire duke's blood-red eyes lit up.
The ghost wizard couldn't contain his excitement either.
【?! They really caught up?!】
[Is the female guest heading to the fourth safe zone? Why didn't she leave sooner?! Wouldn't it have been much safer to conceal herself and slowly approach the entrance?!]
[If she's going to do that, she'll have to consciously choose her route. It's easier to just randomly avoid the other players in the instance and find a hiding place nearby. I feel like she wants to focus more of her energy and attention on reviewing her notes, and only rush to the safe zone when the deadline is almost here.]
[I'm actually quite curious to see what's in Ghost's notes. How can the female guests be so eager to see them? It's a pity that such extraordinary things can't be clearly seen in the live stream.]
[...Should I say she's genuinely diligent and eager to learn, or just truly confident in herself? What's the difference between this method and walking a tightrope!]
Is this female guest finally going to die? Let's see if she can still laugh so wildly when she dies!
However, the next second, the vampire duke and the ghost wizard discovered that what they had captured was not Yu Naixin herself.
Instead... it's an invisible mask.
In that brief moment, Yu Naixin successfully flew to the end of the corridor, used the golden key to open the entrance to the hidden passage, flew inside, and quickly closed the door.
She just spent 500 Sweet Coins to buy an "Advanced Illusion" item in the system's special shop, and with the invisible mask tainted with her own scent, she successfully fooled the two male guests.
Wow! That was an incredible maneuver!
[The female guest has quite a few Sweet Coins in stock; she's been buying one high-end special item after another!]
Almost the instant Yu Naixin closed the door, the last bit of spiritual energy in her body was exhausted.
The priest's folding fan could no longer carry her forward, so Yu Naixin jumped off in time and ran quickly forward on her own two feet through the hidden passage.
At 6:59, Yu Naixin finally arrived at the fourth floor of the central round tower of the castle.
Yu Naixin had already sent out the paper puppy and the priest's folding fan. These two special magical artifacts were faster than her. Yu Naixin had them work together to bring out the dress that symbolized the princess's status and the matching crown from the bedroom, and then move towards the indoor garden from both sides to save time.
The priest's folding fan has no spiritual power and limited load-bearing capacity, but with the addition of a paper dog, it can still carry a dress and a crown without much trouble.
The princess dress had been cut from paper puppies beforehand, and it fit Yu Naixin perfectly, allowing her to put it on with ease.
If it weren't for the fact that she had tried and found that the princess dress and crown couldn't fit into her inventory, and that there wasn't a cloak with a pocket provided by the Ghost Wizard at that time, making it inconvenient to carry such a gorgeous long dress and such a heavy headdress, Yu Naixin would have actually wanted to carry them with her at all times.
Later, they could only put the things in a safe area and wait for her to return.
The moment Yu Naixin tied the ribbon at the back of the princess dress, she could clearly feel that the privileges belonging to a "princess" had finally been activated.
[I knew this dress would suit the female guest perfectly! It's so beautiful, like a lovely little princess~]
[Wow! Does this dress even have a built-in makeup remover? The female guest's dark makeup is finally gone!]
[Wow! The female guest is so beautiful?! Now I finally understand why I saw so many comments lamenting that she didn't use her own face!]
The entire Swan Castle was no longer just a three-dimensional map constructed in Yu Naixin's mind, but... it was truly all under her control.
If Yu Naixin wanted to, she wouldn't even need to lift a finger; she could teleport any item in Swan Castle to any location with just her thoughts.
All the servants in the castle, whether maids, female or male, or housekeepers and stewards, were at Yu Naixin's mercy, her life and death entirely dependent on her whim.
It's seven o'clock, time to go.
Just like in the previous simulation, the four male guests broke through the original restrictions of the show after the deadline and gained the right to move freely throughout the entire Swan Castle.
This time, however, neither the Vampire Duke and the Ghost Wizard, who had already caught up to the entrance of the hidden passage, nor the Werewolf Knight, who arrived shortly after, wasted any more time and energy on the NPCs in the Slaughter Castle.
With a clear objective in mind, the three male guests exchanged glances and, with perfect understanding, began to violently break through the closed entrance.
What was impossible before the deadline becomes effortless after the deadline.
Even the elf prince, who had been daydreaming for a while, sprang into action. The four male guests worked together to forcefully break open the entrance to the passage, revealing the deep, winding passage inside.
It must be said that this passage was indeed built with great care.
Given its size, Yu Naixin could move around freely inside, and the head maid, Luo Siluna, could just walk normally inside. However, for the four male guests, they had to bend over and lower their heads, and even then, they might not be able to get in.
The ghost wizard was the one with the biggest advantage. He gritted his teeth and finally decided to go all out. He threw off his tattered dress and slid in.
His transparent body was incredibly flexible, moving through the narrow passage like a stream of water without any hindrance.
The Vampire Duke was the second to go in. He temporarily transformed his body into a swarm of black bats, which crowded and jostled their way in.
Even with his back bent, the Elf Prince could barely walk inside.
Only the werewolf knight, who was only two meters tall, could squeeze in no matter how hard he tried.
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Author's Note: Werewolf Knight: ...Feeling wronged.jpg
Two chapters combined into one today!
I need to update at least 6,000 words a day. I'll try to fix the update time every day.
Thank you to all the little angels who voted for me or watered my plants with nutrient solution between 23:48:53 on August 4, 2024 and 23:55:33 on August 5, 2024!
Thank you to the little angels who watered the nutrient solution: A+ 15 bottles; Cheese Little Sunflower 8 bottles; Nini Nini 3 bottles; Benben and Gray Feather Joy 1 bottle each;
Thank you so much for your support! I will continue to work hard!
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