Chapter 1086: Treatment Effect
You Xuewen's disappearance was too sudden, and completely without a trace. Not only were there no signs of other players moving about, but even You Xuewen himself had made no sound or movement. Even if he had been remotely moved by a prop, there would have been a process, not this complete lack of any clue to grasp.
Lin Qiao and Zhou Yuanzhu both looked grim and puzzled.
"He was standing right here?" Xu Huo gestured to his own position.
"A bit to the right," Zhou Yuanzhu said.
Xu Huo moved a step to the right, releasing his Spiritual Power to search between the two floors, but still found nothing unusual there.
"Let's go back first," he said after a moment's thought.
Back in the second-floor room, Zhou Yuanzhu immediately recounted the incident to Uncle Guan and asked, "Uncle Guan, is there a prop that can make someone disappear like that? Like long-distance teleportation or something."
Uncle Guan's expression was somber. "Hard to say. But since you didn't find anyone nearby, generally long-distance teleportation props require the player to wear them. To take Xuewen away, the other party would have had to act personally..."
"I swear I didn't see anyone, and Uncle You didn't make a sound either," Zhou Yuanzhu quickly said.
"Did you notice anything else when You Xuewen disappeared?" Xu Huo asked. "A B-rank player should be more perceptive."
Uncle Guan shook his head. "Even a high-rank player's hearing has its limits, especially with so many rooms and layers here. If a player deliberately conceals their sound, it's hard to know exactly what happened through the floor."
Lin Qiao and Zhou Yuanzhu, who were right there, hadn't realized what had happened, let alone him downstairs.
"If it was Xiaohe City's people who did it, then our situation is even worse," Ruan Qiyan said.
"It might not be a prop," Xu Huo said, then told them what he had learned from Miss Ma and the others. Even Uncle Guan found it unbelievable. "So even Xiaohe City's people don't know how those people disappeared?"
"No wonder they warned us not to move around at night," Ruan Qiyan said. "They were probably trying to provoke us into going out."
Compared to the players of Xiaohe City, the unknown danger from the Instance made them even more passive. They didn't know how the danger occurred, its pattern, or when it would end, making their actions even more constrained.
"But looking at it the other way, there's some benefit," Chi Minghong said. "At least Xiaohe City's people are wary of the Instance attack and won't dare to strike at us for now. We can stall for a few days and figure out the Instance danger first. Otherwise, even if we leave Xiaohe City, we don't know when we'll encounter it again. There are still twelve days left."
"What about Uncle You?" Zhou Yuanzhu looked at everyone.
The others fell silent. Not only was You Xuewen's disappearance strange, but even if he had been taken by Xiaohe City's players, they didn't have the strength to confront them head-on now.
"We really shouldn't have come here," Zhou Yuanzhu said regretfully.
This was just an angry remark. According to Miss Ma and the others, Xiaohe City's players already knew the conditions for the mysterious disappearances. Once people started disappearing, they would definitely conduct a large-scale search. Being able to draw a simple map meant they had a way to avoid the mutant swarms. Otherwise, with that kind of attack from the small woods, this dilapidated city wouldn't have lasted long.
Within ten-plus days, finding them was inevitable—sooner or later.
Losing a companion weighed heavily on the Holy Sword Society members, but going outside carried risks, so they could only stay in their rooms.
"You're going out again?" Zhou Yuanzhu asked, seeing that Xu Huo didn't seem to be resting.
Xu Huo nodded. "There's still something I need to finish."
He didn't intend to explain to them and simply pulled open the portal that appeared in the center of the room, stepping through.
Arriving once again at Miss Ma's room, Xu Huo walked to the table and sat down, pulling out a form for her. "Fill this out, and you can be discharged."
Miss Ma glared at him hatefully, snatched the form, filled it out quickly, and slapped it hard on the table.
Xu Huo picked up the form, glanced at it, then smiled at her. "Congratulations. You can be discharged. Nurse Teacher has already packed your clothes and belongings."
Qian Zi appeared at the door holding a leather suitcase, smiling as she congratulated her, and said, "Your parents are already at the entrance."
Miss Ma's expression stiffened. She pointed at the handkerchief Xu Huo had given her earlier, which was tied to the suitcase. "This isn't mine."
"Consider it a recovery gift," Xu Huo said.
Under Qian Zi's guidance, Miss Ma went downstairs, passing through the familiar-faced "patients" and "medical staff" to the first floor. After completing the discharge procedures, she was led to the entrance, where an elderly couple stood outside, tears streaming as they reached out to her.
Miss Ma abruptly stopped. "No... impossible! My parents died long ago!"
The elderly couple's expressions immediately changed, and they looked at the nurse beside them, who then looked at Miss Ma.
Miss Ma instinctively suppressed her doubts and disbelief, forcing a stiff expression as she called out, "Mom, Dad."
Her parents took her suitcase and her hand respectively, pulling her outside while chattering, "The room is cleaned spotless, and we bought lots of your favorite dishes and fruits..."
Miss Ma stiffly followed them into the car, left the hospital, passed through bustling streets, and returned to the house she once knew.
Watching her busy parents, she picked up the fruit knife from the coffee table and charged at her mother's back. "I don't believe you're real!"
A large amount of blood spilled onto her hands. Amid her mother's cries of pain and her father's furious shouts, Miss Ma revealed a hint of a gratified smile. Then she was forcibly sent back to the mental hospital, where she once again met "Doctor Xu."
"You think fabricating fake parents will make me believe you?" Miss Ma looked at him defiantly. "You don't know, do you? I killed my parents myself and flushed them down the drain!"
"Doctor Xu" looked at her with pity. "It seems ordinary treatment won't work on you. Your condition has worsened. I'll transfer you to Dean Kang next."
Miss Ma didn't understand what that meant until she experienced what "rough treatment" was over the next "two weeks": restraints, electroshock, needles to the head, drugs replacing food and drink... The mental hospital life she had once felt like a cage now seemed so wonderful!
After she learned to be docile and not resist, "Mr. Kang" finally nodded to let her go to the general ward. Before leaving, he even gave her a half-hour hypnosis treatment to make her forget the physical pain.
Those suffering experiences became like insignificant, sealed-away things.
Back in the general ward, Miss Ma saw Xu Huo again. This time, she took the initiative to ask, "Are you real?"
Xu Huo's pen was still writing on the paper, but Miss Ma no longer had the urge to lash out. She said expressionlessly, "That Kang guy is a Cannibal Player. His two most trusted people are one named Jiang Wenzhang, a White Player, and another named Gong Jiaji, also a Cannibal Player."
(Chapter End)