Chapter 5
The moment she grabbed the Tang sword, An Rou severed the ropes that bound her to sudden wealth. Without looking back, she ran to the back door of the coal shop. As her high heels stepped out of the door, she suddenly stopped.
There was a sound flowing in the air behind me.
It was not a very real sound, but like a thin stream of invisible water, slow and subtle.
An Rou tried her best to suppress her frantic heartbeat, turned her head back, and vaguely felt that the sound came from the human-shaped carnivorous plant.
But what she saw in her eyes seemed to be different.
While the Piranha Plant looked like it was losing sanity, it wasn't nearly as gigantic and terrifying as the mutated ghoul in the game's poster. Instead, it resembled a child who hadn't yet learned to walk, relying on its own strength to pupate towards its master.
The head with sharp teeth was concentrating on fighting with the king.
Really... could this be it?
As a high-level bronze player, the King had faced far more ferocious ghouls than the one before him. He didn't even consider retreating a step unnecessary. With a swift swing of his spear, he chopped off all the fangs of the Piranha Plant in a few seconds.
It seems that he is just the weakest ghoul in C-class.
The spear spit out a red light, and it landed right in the middle of the Piranha Plant's head, nailing it into the ground. The two petals of its head expanded to the extreme, like a fish head on a skewer.
With a bang, gold coins exploded from the ghoul's body, and the ghoul's corpse instantly turned into a pool of liquid.
The king snorted in boredom, raised his eyes to look at Bao Fu, his expression solemn.
A meter away, there was a pale face, turned upside down, its mouth and eyes wide open to the extreme, as if in a state of terror, no longer handsome. The face was upside down because his body was completely turned over, chest up, back down -
No, it wasn't a body anymore, but a palm-thick expanse of white skin, devoid of any blood. Ribs, which should have been in his chest, protruded from beneath the skin, transforming into pairs of densely packed bony blades, long and sharp. Even longer than the blades were his limbs, their flesh shrunken and clinging to the deformed, elongated bones, each a dismal white.
The hands and feet were no longer hands and feet, the ends were shining with the cold light of bone blades.
Its flat body looks very much like a manta ray, but with its hands, feet and protruding head, it looks like an alien spider with only four legs.
——Get rich overnight, get rich overnight and be parasitized by a ghoul!
No, it wasn't so much parasitism as differentiation. In that brief encounter, the ghoul didn't have time to devour the entirety of Baofu's soul; perhaps it only took a bite. But without a Soul Card to replace the damaged soul, a single bite was enough for Baofu to transform into a brand new ghoul!
Even so, he shouldn't have transformed so drastically. Only when the host dies will a ghoul drastically transform into an inhuman form. And just now, the King saw clearly that the ghoul hadn't dealt a fatal wound to Baofu.
Could it be...
In a flash, a series of thoughts, guided by intuition, point to the truth.
But it's too late.
The steel-colored Tang sword pierced through the king's throat, forcing him to spit out blood in the next second.
The survival instinct made the king draw out his spear and sweep it backwards, but it missed.
An Rou had anticipated this, so she dropped her knife and walked away, appearing diagonally in front of him.
Her fair little face was covered in sweat, her hairband was loose, and a few strands of bangs broke free, sticking to her smooth forehead and coal-dust-covered cheeks.
She looked a little disheveled, but her beautiful almond-shaped eyes were unusually calm.
"Smelly bitch..."
Before the king could finish his curse, the wealthy man suddenly roared, the bone knife clanged on the ground, and he rushed forward.
Suddenly it stopped again.
Fortunately or unfortunately, the King died before it could devour the soul, and the fragrance of the soul suddenly disappeared from the air. The King's body collapsed to the ground, right under it, but its face swayed from side to side, and the pupils in its huge white eyeballs, as small as flies, drifted around, revealing a hint of doubt.
Suddenly, there was the crisp sound of coins falling to the ground.
Bao Fu roared, and his terrifying face suddenly leaned towards the source of the sound, and suddenly there was silence.
The sound was gone, and it stopped moving.
It has no vision, but its hearing is very sensitive - An Rou discovered this keenly.
She deliberately suppressed her breathing, took off her high heels, and was about to sneak away silently, but her eyes stopped at the golden ground.
It's all money.
She saw clearly that most of the gold coins came from the dead ghoul, and the rest appeared inexplicably from the king's body after his death.
In a monster-killing game, it's not difficult to understand that gold coins drop when monsters die, but can gold coins also drop when players die?
Perhaps "explode" isn't the right word. Looking at the scene just now, "leak" is a more accurate description. Those gold coins leaked out of the King's body.
*
Account Balance: 6330 (Gold Coins)
The 3,000 gold earned from playing mahjong has been handed over to An Younian, leaving only 50 gold in the account. In the morning, 20 gold was spent on hiring a three-wheeled vehicle.
I used the clues from the mission to get 1,000 gold from the king, and before that I also took 100 gold from... Gou Ming Chang, yes, that's the name, from the small gold mountain he gave me.
In other words, the total reward of the ghoul and the King's death leak was 5200 gold. Based on the visual observation at the time, it is estimated that the ghoul reward accounted for the majority, about 3,000 to 4,000.
Judging from the King's previous tone, the reward for a C-rank ghoul should be more than this.
——Could it be that the ghouls are dividing, their strength is weakening, and the rewards are also reduced accordingly?
In the narrow alley, An Rou's steps were relatively calm.
But her little finger hanging at her side kept shaking.
I could only force myself to calculate the balance to distract myself from the palpitations of surviving the disaster and... the trembling of killing someone for the first time.
The situation was too urgent, too complicated. She was an NPC, but she was more than just an NPC. She didn't want to turn into a pile of death data and dissipate in this damned soul world.
So he took a risk and grabbed the knife to save himself.
She succeeded, and at the moment of escaping, she was pulled over by that strange voice that seemed to come from a ghoul.
For some unknown reason, she killed the injured Baofu... No, Baofu began to change rapidly afterwards. He was no longer a human being. He had been contacted and his soul was devoured by a ghoul, and a brand new ghoul had differentiated from his body.
The "person" she actually killed was the king.
An Rou didn't know why she did this. Maybe she instinctively felt that these players were less likely to let her go than the virtual ghouls.
The king is the biggest threat to her.
Passersby glanced over.
An Rou turned her gaze and saw two NPCs secretly pointing at her in the corner of the alley.
Her face was caked with sweat and soot, and her off-white cheongsam was stained with black and white spots. An Rou lowered her eyes, and the small white leather shoes on her feet were also in a mess.
She couldn't go back like this.
An Rou calmed her breath, quickly walked out of the alley, and turned into a cloth shop on Zhongsu Street.
In the era set in the game, most women wore cheongsams, which usually needed to be custom-made. Fortunately, the cloth shop had some ready-made clothes for display, and An Rou picked out a similar white cotton cheongsam.
She was tall and slender, with a thin waist, and the dress fit her perfectly, no worse than a custom-made one.
When paying, her eyes stopped and looked at another cheongsam on the wall.
Purple lace, silk base, embellished with lace flowers all over, in the same color balance, noble yet charming.
How could such exquisite lace craftsmanship exist in such a backward era?
After all, it's a virtual game, so why bother taking it so seriously? An Rou asked about the price.
1000 gold, stolen money.
But it's silk.
An Rou gritted her teeth and bought it. If she couldn't afford it in the real world, why couldn't she enjoy it in the game world? Besides, this outfit would come in handy soon.
The white high-heeled leather shoes had not been replaced. Seeing that An Rou was generous, the shopkeeper was very attentive and helped her polish the shoes.
Next, only the facade remains.
An Rou simply washed her face, went out, called a rickshaw, and returned to Wuyan Lane. She got off at the alley entrance and walked in gracefully.
The smooth and soft touch of silk completely soothed the palpitations she had been trying so hard to suppress. She felt like she was wearing a suit of armor.
An Rou didn't go back to the bun shop. Instead, she twisted her waist and went into the hair salon.
A middle-aged woman in a smoky blue cheongsam came forward. Without even looking at the screen above her head, An Rou recognized her from memory—Qiao Jie, a helper in the hair salon who specialized in washing customers' hair.
Qiaojie didn't recognize her until Anrou called out, "Qiaojie."
"Xiao Rou?" Qiaojie covered her mouth and looked at An Rou's clothes again in disbelief.
An Rou didn't wait for her to ask more questions. After all, making up lies was a waste of time and effort, so there was no need for that. She glanced around the store and asked, "Where's Sister Hong?"
Qiaojie hesitated to speak, but finally answered her first: "She was frightened yesterday and is resting at home. Xiaorou, are you looking for her?"
An Rou shook her head: "Come and wash your hair."
Qiaojie confirmed it twice. After all, shampooing in the shop costs money, 50 gold per session, which is quite expensive. And Anrou had also been forced to have her hair washed in the shop for a while, under the guise of Hongjie's help "looking after her."
It was not until An Rou took out 50 gold coins and placed them on the counter that Qiaojie smiled awkwardly and led her in.
"Hey, Xiaorou, why are there so many dusts in your hair?"
When you flush with hot water, all it turns out is black water.
"That's why I came here to wash my hair. I can't wash it clean myself."
An Rou's tone was a little amused. She remembered that when she was forced to work odd jobs at the hair salon, Qiao Jie had secretly helped her quite a bit. This person was a good person, said to be Hong Jie's distant cousin. Living under someone else's roof, she was inevitably a bit timid.
The hair dryer is in line with the technology of this era. It makes a loud noise and is useless except for producing heat.
Qiaojie blew her hair and praised, "Your hair is so good! You don't even oil it or take care of it, but it's still black and shiny, and there aren't even any split ends at the ends. —Xiaorou, do you want a perm?"
An Rou glanced at her in the mirror.
She's a good person, but she's also obsessed with money. Admittedly, it's not her fault. As the King said, this is a pay-to-win game, and it's a given that NPCs are obsessed with money.
An Rou couldn't help but laugh at herself. Even if she changed her heart, she still loved money.
"No need, just put your hair in a bun, a more mature style." An Rou said, "I see you sell hairpins, I want the one with pearls."
As she was speaking, the sound of the beaded curtain rustling against each other was heard at the door. An Rou glanced at it and raised the corners of her lips.
Sister Hong is here.
Even heavy makeup couldn't hide her tiredness and distracted look.
Since the other party didn't notice her, An Rou didn't say anything. But Qiao Jie stopped talking and her hands obviously quickened their movements.
When everything was done, Qiaojie leaned in and whispered, "The hairpin is 100 gold. Just put it on the counter. Don't..."
An Rou didn't wait for her to finish, she stood up slowly and turned to the woman who was smoking in a trance on the mahogany sofa.
"Sister Hong, long time no see."
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