Chapter 1489: A Roundabout Way
The inn was as quiet as everywhere else, but its door stood wide open like the maw of a beast waiting to feed. The pitch-black doorway instinctively filled the player from Grindstone Water Shop with fear. At this point, he couldn't care less about anything else and simply wanted to flee into the station. However, when he went to retrieve his ticket, his personal panel wouldn't open!
"What's going on? How can this be!" His greatest reliance suddenly failing, the man was thrown into panic and confusion. After pacing anxiously on the spot twice, he suddenly realized: "This isn't real! This absolutely isn't real! Even in an instance dungeon, it's impossible to not be able to open your personal panel!"
But then he understood another problem: even knowing everything he saw was fake, he still couldn't escape the predicament. What's more, as time passed, even the items he was carrying became unusable!
Having been a player for so long had made him forget how difficult it was for ordinary people in the game world. Now, stripped of the game and items, that sudden fear of losing power swept over him from the deepest part of his heart, reaching its peak at once!
"Snap!" A small noise came from not far away, like someone kicking something over. The man immediately turned his head. "Who's there!"
A gaunt, hunched figure emerged from the darkness—an ordinary person from the slums. Their skin-and-bone bodies, sunken eye sockets, blackened faces, and yellowed teeth were their most distinctive features. Because most of them were so emaciated they were unrecognizable, players had gradually stopped treating them as human and certainly didn't bother remembering their faces.
"This isn't a place for you!" The man ordered him to leave. However, instead of leaving, the gaunt figure moved closer, his eyes bursting with a strange, greedy light visible even in the darkness as he said, "I'm so hungry... I'm so thirsty..."
The Grindstone Water Shop player's face turned ugly. "I'm warning you one last time. Leave now, or I won't be polite!"
But no sooner had he spoken than he suddenly noticed people emerging from all around. They were all like the gaunt man, their eyes gleaming as they stared at him as if he were food...
A bad feeling surged into his heart. The man immediately tried to jump to a higher place, but to his horror, the physical strength and leaping ability brought by evolution had vanished. Like an ordinary person, he pitifully and pathetically jumped two meters far and one meter high before crashing heavily to the ground, once again feeling the pull of gravity.
"Heh!" Those perpetually hungry people laughed and pointed at him. "He can't jump anymore!"
The player's face changed drastically. He scrambled with hands and feet to climb higher, but this seemed like a signal telling those surrounding him that he was out of options. The moment he took his first step, the people around him pounced. They grabbed his legs and dragged him back to the ground. Amid his terrified struggles and roars, they pinned him down. He couldn't tell whose hands were tearing at him. Some couldn't even wait to rip open his clothes before eagerly biting into him!
Long-term hunger hadn't sapped those people of their strength at all. When facing food, they burst forth with astonishing power. Ordinary teeth could tear through living human flesh like wild beasts. As the smell of blood surged out, the player quickly lost the ability to resist, gradually submerged by the crowd until there was no more sound.
Soon, the inn entrance returned to calm. Two support players came to the man's body and briefly examined it. "No obvious external injuries. Looks like... he was scared to death."
This was already the third person they'd encountered who had been scared to death along their way. The rest, whether the vanguard or those providing backup, had all vanished without a trace. Initially, they thought other water shop people had gotten ahead of them, but after coming in and seeing their frightened comrades, they gradually realized what was happening.
However, reason made them unwilling to believe it.
Because no matter how powerful Xu Huo was, he was only one person. He couldn't possibly handle so many players at once, especially in such a silent manner. Besides, what method did he use to scare players to death? In extreme danger, those people could have fled into the station. The station was dangerous, but it was still better than waiting to die here!
The two who came were cousins, both from Swift Water Shop. Although they hadn't seen their comrades' bodies along the way, the facts were right before them. Their best choice was to retreat and call for reinforcements.
The two exchanged glances, both regretting why they had come in to investigate. Getting back now might be difficult!
Sure enough, as soon as they turned around, they saw three people from Grindstone Water Shop approaching. The moment they saw the bodies on the ground, the newcomers attacked without waiting for an explanation.
"Calm down! Look at how he died!" The cousins retreated while explaining. "He was scared to death. Can't you see there's not a single external injury?"
"The opponent is deliberately killing people to make us fight among ourselves. Don't fall for his trick!"
It made perfect sense, but the other side wasn't listening at all. They attacked recklessly, as if they had lost their minds, completely intent on dying together with them!
The cousins came to their senses, realizing the problem might not be limited to one place. The older brother signaled his younger brother with his eyes to go report the situation while he stayed behind to hold off the Grindstone Water Shop people.
The younger brother successfully escaped and even luckily encountered two people from other water shops along the way. These people had all come to their senses from the bizarre events. After exchanging secret codes to confirm each other's identities, the group returned to the inn to find the other four.
But they were too late. The Swift Water Shop player had already been killed.
"Big brother!" The player who had gone for reinforcements threw himself before the body.
The others blocked the Grindstone Water Shop players and explained the situation. The three were half-convinced. "When we arrived, those two cousins were standing right in front of the body. There was no one else. Don't tell me you killed him and are using this opportunity to deal with us!"
The leader of the Clear Spring Water Shop was a middle-aged woman. She analyzed calmly, "Our water shops are roughly equal in strength. Even if someone wanted to take the opportunity to kill, there's no way there wouldn't be any sound."
"People from the water shops are either dead or missing. This is too strange," said a Grindstone Water Shop player.
"District 026 is backward, and we've been hiding in this small place, unaware of the outside situation. In fact, someone who has undergone super evolution in the mental aspect can achieve this level," the female player said. "Our current situation is like being under mental interference."
Everyone present had heard of super evolution, but they had never encountered it and didn't know exactly what mental interference was. A player from Golden Jade Water Shop asked doubtfully, "Since he's so powerful, why doesn't he just fight us directly? Why use such a roundabout method?"
(Chapter End)