Recap
Feng Shi and Jia Qing waited in Song Yang’s personal space for nearly three hours.
During these three hours, the two of them didn’t say a word, and the atmosphere was filled with anxiety and tension.
Three hours later, the red light of the private login room turned on, and the door opened.
Jia Qing and Feng Shi stood up abruptly.
“Song Yang!”
“Yang-ge!”
Song Yang was covered in shocking bloodstains, but his face was still okay, not too ugly.
But his expression was very subtle.
This wasn’t the first time Song Yang had entered a four-star instance.
Last time, he and two other players spent seven days in the instance, barely clearing it at the edge of the time limit.
He originally expected that it would be similar this time, but he didn’t expect to come out after only half the time.
Although the process was very tragic.
Jia Qing was frightened by the large bloodstains on Song Yang’s body, and his voice trembled, “Yang-ge, are you okay?!”
“I’m fine, the injuries suffered in the instance will automatically heal after leaving the instance, have you forgotten?” Song Yang patted Jia Qing’s head, “Don’t always panic.”
Jia Qing breathed a sigh of relief and wailed, “Yang-ge, you’ve made yourself look like this, it’s hard for me not to panic!”
“What about the other four players, how are they?” Feng Shi was much calmer than Jia Qing, and his question instantly made Song Yang’s smile disappear.
At this moment, the news that the four-star instance had been cleared must have exploded the entire forum.
The man walked to the dining table, picked up the water glass, took a sip of water, and said in a deep voice, “They’re all gone.”
Feng Shi and Jia Qing looked stunned.
…All gone?
Five people entered the instance, and in the end, only Song Yang came out alive?!
…
Song Yang fainted twice in the instance. When he woke up the second time, the young man had already disappeared.
For a while, Song Yang actually wondered if seeing Xia Jing was just a dream he had during his fake death.
However, after completely dealing with the monster and leaving the instance, Song Yang still felt that the experience should be real.
Xia Jing did appear in this four-star instance.
And how could an ordinary player intervene in an instance that was already full?
Perhaps because his mind was completely clear at that time, Song Yang was able to think about the whole thing more calmly.
He carefully listened to the system’s broadcast of the points results. Among the four dead players, there was no one named Xia Jing. Everyone’s name was consistent with their initial self-introduction.
So, could it be possible that Xia Jing was still one of them, and “Xia Jing” was naturally a fake name he made up, just like his human skin mask, all camouflage.
But this raised a new question—clothing.
Song Yang had a pretty good memory.
He clearly remembered the clothes each of the other four players was wearing when they first entered the instance.
It was completely different from the simple white T-shirt and jeans on that young man.
A person’s name could be made up on the spot, and a human skin mask could be put on temporarily, but what about clothes?
In such a tense and dangerous instance, would anyone have the leisure to change their entire appearance?
Was this possibility high?
Thinking of this, Song Yang looked back at this matter again…
When he met Xia Jing, besides him, there was only one player left in the instance who had been separated from him.
That player was a man about as tall as him, a little fat, with an honest personality and a friendly demeanor. If the two of them had been acting together, when they encountered the monster, the other party would definitely stand in front of Song Yang without hesitation.
This was almost completely different from “Xia Jing”.
Therefore, in the end, Song Yang completely rejected the possibility that “Xia Jing was one of the four players”.
The question returned to the starting point again—
How did that young man enter this instance?
At this moment, Song Yang put down the water glass and rubbed the corner of his eyes.
When he woke up from the effect of the fake death prop, his mental state wasn’t very stable, and then he was quickly knocked unconscious by that guy with a punch…
It only took about a minute before and after, and he didn’t have a chance to pay attention to more clues at all. Only when he woke up again did he find an empty awakening potion syringe, a small shield prop, and his spatial bag that was missing the Nightmare prop.
Thinking of this, Song Yang almost laughed in anger.
He still had to thank that guy for not leaving him there directly, otherwise, without the fake death prop, if he encountered the monster again, he would definitely die in his sleep.
And that guy broke into that dangerous instance, just to get the Nightmare prop back from him?
Song Yang narrowed his eyes, turned around and sat down on the sofa, replaying the entire game in his mind.
…After a while, he let out a soft breath.
No, throughout the instance clearance process, he couldn’t recall any other signs of the sixth person’s intervention. All clues pointed to the fact that the young man appeared in that instance and only took the Nightmare prop.
The more he thought about it, the more absurd it became.
Song Yang almost used the Nightmare prop to exchange for the fake death prop.
It was because he recalled the longing in the young man’s eyes when he stared at the prop that he changed the trading conditions on a whim.
He was also thinking that if he had the chance to meet him again in an instance in the future, and the two of them didn’t become opponents, it wouldn’t be impossible to tease that guy and give him this prop.
As a result, good guy, he came to take it himself.
…After Jia Qing and Feng Shi digested the news just now, they saw Song Yang lost in thought, his expression very strange, just like when he first stepped out of the login room.
Feng Shi realized that Song Yang must have encountered other things in the instance. Just as he was about to ask, Song Yang laughed strangely and raised his head.
He said, “Let’s put out a bounty.”
Feng Shi and Jia Qing were stunned, “A bounty? What’s the content of the bounty?”
Song Yang said with a half-smile, “To find a cunning thief.”
*
Xia Jing received several waves of “guests” in the Safe House and drifted aimlessly for many days.
During this boring process, he found a strange bounty announcement in the “Player Announcement Board” of the holographic mini-screen, which was synchronized with the game hall’s big screen.
The bounty was posted anonymously.
The bounty issuer only gave a contact method. The reward was two monster props, a 200-point spending quota, and three chances to be carried through instances—one-star to three-star instances were optional.
As soon as this announcement came out, the entire forum was in an uproar.
This reward was quite generous.
First of all, monster props weren’t something ordinary people could easily get. Whether they were useful or not, two monster props could be exchanged for 200,000 chips in the real world.
Secondly, there was the 200-point spending quota. This was an amount of points that countless ordinary players couldn’t get even after challenging twenty one-star instances. This was enough to directly buy two houses in Smiley City, what a concept!
Finally, there were three chances to be carried through instances, and the star rating was optional up to three stars—you know, among so many players in Smiley City, 70% of them currently didn’t even dare to set foot in two-star instances!
When they saw the third condition, many people wondered if this was some lunatic coming out to fool people. After all, the bounty issuer promised to carry people through three-star instances, but didn’t guarantee that they would definitely clear them!
But on second thought, which of the first two rewards wasn’t something that only someone with some ability could offer?
So soon someone started a post on the forum, and all the online players poured in, discussing heatedly.
To get the reward, they first had to see the content of the bounty.
This bounty was to find someone, which was very common in Smiley City.
Spending a lot of money to find someone, either it was for revenge, or to chase someone, and this bounty issuer was looking for a…
“…A young man who always wears a human skin mask, the mask craftsmanship is quite unique, the level of skill is very stable [not a compliment] [he should change the mask after seeing the bounty, but with his craftsmanship, he may not be able to change it, even if he can, the level is still there (laughs)], slender figure, estimated to be 1.8 meters tall, the face under the mask may be good-looking, unpredictable personality, looks very upright [not a compliment X2], likes monster props, very persistent and insistent on the things he wants [not a compliment X3], in short, a very absurd young man.
Anyone with any clues can contact me, Smiley City contact information 001XXXXXX309.”
“Good guy, good guy, this is the first time I’ve seen such a unique bounty!”
“I don’t know how to comment for a while, dumbfounded.”
“The four words ‘very absurd’ are full of personal emotions! [dog head]”
“The brackets are full of sarcasm [laughing crying]”
“So this is to find an enemy, right? Is it a dispute caused by monster props?”
“No, if it’s to find an enemy… it feels like the style is a bit wrong…”
“But this doesn’t look like they want to chase someone either, wouldn’t the other party want to hit someone after seeing this bounty? [laughing crying]”
“The big shot’s bounty is also full of the big shot’s flavor (not a compliment X4) [dog head]”
“Is this really a bounty? The style feels so strange! [dazed]”
“Asking, is the point about the mask craftsmanship being quite unique saying that the other party is ugly? [dog head]”
“Upstairs, I think that’s what it means! [dog head]”
……
When Xia Jing saw this announcement, he raised his eyebrows high.
He let out a chuckle from his chest, his eyes circling the short lines of text several times, and then a hint of provocative amusement appeared in his eyes.
Turning off the holographic mini-screen, Xia Jing got up and walked into the small supermarket, taking down two human skin masks.
When he sat down on the sofa again, Tuanzi curiously approached its owner’s feet and looked closely—
Its owner was carefully drawing faces with his extremely clumsy technique, faces with completely different shapes, but equally ugly, no, even uglier…
Tuanzi: Why do you have to be so competitive about this kind of thing!!
Little doggy’s pain mask.jpg
*
Soon, the outside world ushered in another ordinary Monday.
In the corner of the game hall, a young man walked out of the narrow corridor.
The young man was wearing a white T-shirt and jeans. Although his attire was simple, he had long limbs, a slender and tall figure, and a gentle temperament.
The passersby only needed to take a glance at him to involuntarily move their eyes upwards to look at the young man’s face…
Then they were dumbfounded.
The young man’s face was in the shape of a gourd under some funny filter of a certain app, narrow at the top and wide at the bottom, the proportions quite exaggerated.
The front of that face was also quite uneven. The places that should be full and bulging were sunken, the places that should be sunken were bulging, and the places that should be smooth had small waves. It was a look that couldn’t be imagined even with all the human imagination in the world.
A pair of small round eyes were embedded on this distorted face, particularly spirited, and the two lips were so thick that it was as if he had been injected with a dozen lip fillers.
The passerby’s first reaction to seeing this face was to be stunned, thinking that he was hallucinating. After rubbing his eyes and looking carefully again—
That face was still that face, a face that a real human simply couldn’t grow!
No, let’s not mention the uneven front of the face, the design was simply anti-human. Just the upper part of the face being so narrow, could it really hold an adult’s brain?!
This must be a human skin mask, right, it must be!
Was making his face look like this deliberately done to get back at society?!
The corners of the passerby’s mouth twitched violently!
Xia Jing, with this face, calmly walked through the game hall and entered an empty login room.
On days when he could play games, Xia Jing was always in a good mood.
He was very lucky today. There were a total of twenty updated instances, nine of which were three-star instances, and none of them were full yet.
Xia Jing quickly scanned them, ruled out five instances that currently only had one or two people logged in, and then removed three options with elements similar to the instances he had entered before. Finally, his eyes settled on the last three-star instance.
“The Ringing of Death”, 8/11.
The cover of the instance was a train track under the night sky, the track leading into the distance, stars twinkling in the night sky.
There was little information on the cover, and it didn’t look scary. Compared to other instance covers, it even looked a bit ordinary.
But fortunately, it was still three people short of being full, so it should be able to start successfully.
Xia Jing quickly made his decision.
He smiled, gently tapped the screen, and his vision fell into darkness.
…
When Xia Jing regained consciousness, he was already standing in the aisle of a brightly lit train carriage.
Among the players who had entered the instance earlier and were waiting, some were attracted by his appearance and looked at him strangely.
Some were vigilantly observing the inside of the carriage and the outside.
Some were communicating loudly to relieve their tension.
Xia Jing calmly counted, there were already five people in his sight.
He turned around again.
In the other half of the carriage behind him, two girls were sitting by the window, and one of them, facing him, was looking at him.
Diagonally opposite them, a handsome man with fair skin was standing by the window, looking out.
Noticing his gaze, the man turned his eyes and paused.
Song Yang: “…………”
The style of this face was somewhat familiar.
___
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Update: Monday, Wednesday, Friday
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