Chapter 2351: Piranha Mask
The middleman looked him up and down, a hint of disdain in his expression. "What risks could there be? Even if there are, I'm the one taking them. With a face like yours, trying to get in for free would just be an eyesore to others... but your sister, she can go in for free."
The Painting Woman quickly interjected, "We're going together."
The middleman was much more amiable toward her. "Beauty is also a weapon. A sister this beautiful, bringing along one extra person is no problem at all."
A player came over to wash her hands, and only then did the middleman stand up. Clapping her hands, she opened the cloakroom on one side of the office. It was filled with a dazzling array of clothes, accessories, shoes, and jewelry, all of which looked extremely expensive.
"A sister this pretty, how could she wear such ugly clothes? Come, come, let big sister doll you up."
The Painting Woman pretended to be at a loss and looked toward Xu Huo. Only after he nodded did she follow the middleman.
The middleman had her change into several outfits before finally settling on a black dress. She also picked out a string of gemstone necklace and put it on her, circling her twice before nodding in satisfaction. "The icing on the cake. This way, your beauty will be showcased even better."
"Alright," the middleman then clapped her hands. "Leave your contact information and go back for now. When the time comes, I'll find you."
After saying that, she winked at the Painting Woman. "You absolutely must come, little sister."
Xu Huo and the Painting Woman left. Only then did the middleman, beaming, wave everyone else out of the office and contact someone. "A mermaid showed up today, no invitation. When the time comes, arrange for someone to bring her in... Oh, and there's a dead weight with her. Find an opportunity to get rid of him... Once the door opens, I'll head over... The mermaid isn't enough... Alright, I'll figure something out..."
Listening to her words, Xu Huo understood that the so-called "other channel" was still the entrance to the Fish Feast. It was just that people without invitations needed someone to bring them in.
That made things much simpler. But while it was simple, it also indicated that the Fish Feast's management was very strict, at least with no loopholes at the entrance.
"Are we staying here?" The Painting Woman was very dissatisfied with the sudden change of environment.
"We're very poor right now." Xu Huo was in the middle of forging an invitation. "Put your invitation inside your clothes. Don't let anyone see it."
"I feel like that person is a scammer." She leaned in behind him. "Like a human trafficker."
Xu Huo could naturally see that. The so-called "mermaid" was probably just a bit of entertainment within the game.
"She wants to sell us. Can we kill her?" the Painting Woman asked again.
"It depends on the situation," Xu Huo said.
"Then we'll kill her after we get out," the Painting Woman decided.
Perhaps the Fish Feast invitation itself was a special item. A forgery certainly wouldn't be identical to the original, but considering their personas, producing a fake invitation was perfectly normal.
After waiting two days in a small inn, the middleman finally contacted them, giving them an address to wait at, saying someone would pick them up.
Xu Huo went as instructed, but he didn't expect the car that came to pick them up to have a city government license plate.
"The Fish Feast—is it run by city government people?" Xu Huo asked an inappropriate question.
The driver's face turned ugly, and he said impatiently, "Ask fewer questions!"
Seeing that Xu Huo indeed stopped asking, the other man seemed a bit unsatisfied and continued, "It's because of people like you, who have a good life but go looking for death, that this mess never ends!"
Even the Painting Woman could tell that the man didn't want to be doing this job.
"If you don't want to do it, you could just not come," she said to him.
That finally hit a nerve. The driving player yanked the steering wheel hard, throwing both of them against the window on one side, then swung them to the other side.
The car swerved on the road like it was drunk.
"Don't mind him," Xu Huo continued his previous persona. "My sister didn't say that to mock you. She genuinely thinks that if you're unhappy, you could change jobs. After all, you're a player and a healthy person—you have more choices than ordinary people."
"We're going to the Fish Feast to get some money to treat her throat. She can't speak, and she can't even use some items."
Hearing this, the other man slowed down, glanced at them with a hint of pity in his eyes, but said nothing.
The Painting Woman, fully immersed in her role, turned back to ask Xu Huo, "Brother, can my throat really be cured?"
"It can," Xu Huo went along with it. "You can't just follow me around forever."
"Don't die," she immediately performed even more intensely. "First, get the money to treat your degeneration."
Xu Huo patted her on the head and said nothing more.
The player in front seemed somewhat moved. After a long silence, he said, "If it's so dangerous, why bring your sister along?"
"Leaving her alone outside wouldn't put my mind at ease either," Xu Huo said with a smile.
The other man said nothing more. Halfway there, they rendezvoused with a white car and followed behind it.
The two cars drove around the city for quite a while, as if waiting for something. Then, at a certain turn, the white car entered a nearly empty street and stopped under an ancient tree.
Xu Huo and the others also stopped. As they got out, the player in front pretended to open the door and turned back to whisper to them, "Don't go! Get out of here!"
But just as he finished speaking, a player from the middleman's side flashed over to the car, grabbed his shoulder, and said expressionlessly, "You can leave now."
The man gave them a deep look and had no choice but to drive away.
Xu Huo and the other two were brought under the tree. Looking up, they saw a very small fish-shaped sign hanging on the ancient tree. Was this the entrance?
"Give me the invitation," the middleman said to Xu Huo.
Xu Huo handed over the fake invitation.
The middleman glanced at it, let out a sneer, casually tossed it aside, and then knocked on the sign.
In fact, the moment they approached the fish sign, Xu Huo felt the invitation in his clothes grow slightly warm. Then a passage appeared in the tree. On two steps stood a man wearing a jellyfish mask. He immediately spotted the Painting Woman, nodded at the middleman, reported "two people" through his micro-terminal, and said, "Come in."
Xu Huo and the Painting Woman stepped onto the stairs one after another. The door behind them disappeared. The jellyfish mask handed them two masks. "Put them on."
The masks only covered half the face. The one the Painting Woman received had a mermaid pattern, while Xu Huo's was a clownfish.
"The rule of the Fish Feast: you can only move freely while wearing the mask. The mask cannot be removed casually..." Before the jellyfish mask could finish speaking, he saw the masks on their heads change. The mermaid on the Painting Woman's head turned into a clownfish, while the clownfish on Xu Huo's head transformed into a sharp-toothed, fanged piranha.
"Piranha... you have an invitation!" The jellyfish mask turned to run while reaching for the micro-terminal on his arm.
Xu Huo naturally wouldn't give him that chance. He directly immobilized the man on the spot. But just as he was about to question him, the other man suddenly convulsed as if in a stress reaction, then fell to the ground with blood flowing from his mouth and nose.