Chapter 27: Pulling the Aggro

Suddenly, the words beneath the bodhisattva statue flashed through Zhou You’s mind.

“The living belong to the day; the dead belong to the night.”

Combined with how certain the Security Captain had been that he was already dead...

Could it be...

Zhou You raised his arm and pinched himself.

There was pain.

There was also the sensation of flesh and blood.

Only, compared to ordinary people, his body temperature felt somewhat cold.

So...

Zhou You shook his head, throwing aside that slight sense of unease, and inspected the security office once more.

First point: as expected, several more newspapers had appeared.

This time, however, there were only two pieces of information.

“City’s richest man... condition worsens, unlikely to survive more than a week.”

“Qinghe District... Sanhua Temple... scheduled for demolition.”

The emphasis remained on the wealthy man’s deteriorating condition. Judging from the news, he did not have long left to live.

As for Sanhua Temple, Zhou You had never heard of it before, and it was not marked on the patrol map either.

“It should be an important location. It may be related to future exploration.”

Zhou You silently noted it down before turning his attention to the second point.

Someone had tampered with the patrol log.

The thin notebook appeared to have been opened. The first page, containing the daytime patrol records, was still normal.

But on the second page, there was a blank space in the patrol schedule.

Only Zhou You’s name had been erased.

“Everything was normal yesterday, but today my identity has disappeared. So who exactly erased my name?”

Zhou You picked up a pen and was about to write his name back in.

But after thinking about it, he put the pen down again.

“No. No matter who erased it, not having my name there is probably a good thing. If someone breaks into the security office later, at least my information won’t be exposed. It’s just...”

But while Zhou You was considering the situation, a bell suddenly rang.

Damn it, it’s patrol time!

Instinctively, Zhou You grabbed the flashlight and prepared to rush outside.

But he immediately sensed something wrong.

Wait, the timing is off!

Although he had not checked the clock earlier, based on his sense of time, no more than twenty minutes had passed since entering the security office.

Yet the surroundings had already begun mutating.

And much faster than last time.

A flood of blood surged up through the floor.

One bloody handprint after another appeared across the white walls.

The unplugged television crackled noisily, and the twisted figure inside had become almost tangible, on the verge of crawling completely out of the screen.

Zhou You did not even have time to glance at the clock before charging out of the room.

Bang!

The security office door slammed shut behind him, sealing all the abnormalities inside.

But Zhou You quickly discovered that conditions outside were not much better.

The nighttime streets were no longer peaceful.

All the faces he had previously seen had crowded around the apartment entrances.

The faint rustling sounds had transformed into waves of sinister laughter.

Lights were shining from the residential buildings, but instead of the usual white or yellow glow, every window emitted a deep crimson color like fresh blood.

Occasionally, silhouettes could be seen standing at the windows.

Yet those distorted forms were clearly no longer human, but some deeper kind of monster.

The bell tied to his wrist was ringing almost frantically.

Combining that with yesterday’s experience, Zhou You needed only a moment to reach a conclusion.

This scenario is mutating every single day, and the situation is getting worse and worse!

Damn it, you bastard System, something this important and you didn’t bother mentioning it!

In the middle of his frantic escape, Zhou You raised a middle finger toward the System.

Then he pulled out the Bloodstained Dagger, which he had barely even warmed up yet, and viciously slashed his own hand.

Blood immediately poured out.

Before it could even hit the ground, however, the blade drank it all away.

The item’s effect activated at once.

Zhou You instantly felt his speed increase.

At last, before those ghostly faces could break through the apartment entrances, he reached the entrance of Mountain Locust Alley.

Fortunately, no mutations had occurred here yet.

Even so, Zhou You’s expression did not relax in the slightest.

Only after catching his breath and confirming that the game had automatically saved did he stand up and begin organizing his thoughts.

“First, the order of the mutations.”

“On the first day, everything was peaceful.”

“On the second day, mutations appeared inside the security office.”

“On the third day, the security office mutation occurred earlier, and mutations also appeared at Yuanshun Intersection.”

“If this pattern continues, then tomorrow it’ll be this alley, and the day after that it’ll be the crossroads and then Longsong Slope.”

“So.”

“This scenario never intended for me to clear it by following the rules step by step. In fact, if I hadn’t cleared both the street stall owner side quest and the alley game side quest yesterday, I’d probably already be trapped in a dead end by now.”

After sorting everything out, Zhou You spat forcefully onto the ground.

“Damn it. As expected of a low-to-medium corruption level scenario. The difficulty has skyrocketed compared to Building Four. If it’s already this ridiculous, then what kind of nightmare are the high-corruption ones?”

Yet despite his complaints, there was no trace of impatience on his face.

In stark contrast to his grumbling tone, his expression remained calm.

He was already revising his plans.

“It looks like my entire schedule needs to be rewritten. Originally, I wanted to dig a trap and see if I could swindle that old woman out of all her assets. But under the current circumstances, that’s impossible.”

“So...”

“How about I just gamble on it?”

Zhou You looked toward the distant fork in the road.

Taking a deep breath of icy air, he headed directly toward the route he had chosen long ago.

The streetlights swayed.

Whether it was merely an illusion or not, the lights seemed much dimmer than they had been in previous days.

The road, once barely visible, had become increasingly obscure.

From time to time, a shadow would suddenly appear at the edge of his vision.

But before he could examine it carefully, it would vanish again.

There was no way to tell whether it was a ghost or merely a trick of the eyes.

His Sanity was also steadily declining in this environment.

It was now approaching the seventy-point threshold.

Perhaps because of that, the lesion in his brain, which had not acted up for quite some time, began sending waves of stabbing pain through his head.

Yet regardless of what happened, Zhou You’s expression remained as heavy and calm as ever.

In fact, as mentioned before, he might usually be carefree and prone to slacking off.

But whenever circumstances changed, the closer he was pushed toward a desperate situation, the clearer his thinking became.

The five-minute journey passed quickly.

Soon, Zhou You spotted his target.

The woman in white standing at the fork in the road.

But this time, he did not go over to tap her shoulder.

Instead, he first removed the bell from his wrist.

Then he walked directly behind her, sliced open his arm with the Bloodstained Dagger, refreshed his speed buff, and finally...

He suddenly raised his leg and delivered a vicious kick straight into the female ghost’s back!

The frail figure immediately crashed to the ground.

At the very same moment, Zhou You spun around and sprinted away!