CH 17.1

While the players were arguing, a man quietly came up to Bai Lixin’s side.

“You’re Bai Lixin, right?”

Under the noisy background, the man’s voice was only audible to Bai Lixin.

Bai Lixin looked at the man. He looked around 25 or 26 years old and had a shrewd face. His hair was meticulously combed behind his head and he wore a casual suit. He raised his hand to reveal the flashy watch on his wrist, which was worth a lot of money at first glance.

“Oh, let me introduce myself. My name is Huo Yunjun. I used to be a businessman in the real world.”

Bai Lixin pulled a detached yet polite smile, “Hello.”

“I didn’t join the group tonight either. I chose to explore on my own and made a little discovery. I also saw you go out to investigate as well. Would you be interested in working with me?”

Bai Lixin was silent for some seconds and didn’t answer right away.

The watch man continued, “Oh, I forgot to mention. I’ve been in this world for a while, and I’ve already broken through five copies. I now live on the 8th floor, so you can trust my abilities.”

Bai Lixin spoke up, “Why me?”

Watch man, “I saw your last game live and you were fantastic! With you, we can definitely make it out of here!”

The watch man looked around and lowered his voice, “This castle is quite big. I walked around the corridors for a long time, and when I came to the end of one of them, I saw a very suspicious room. I was about to go in to investigate when I heard the news of the players’ deaths, and I rushed back.”

“With my years of experience in passing copies, that room can not be some kind of decoration. There must be some kind of clue inside. However, my abilities are limited and I may not be able to find any clues in there, so I had to find someone to work with.”

The noise around them grew thicker and thicker, and Bai Lixin looked toward Wen Ziqing and found that Wen Ziqing was also looking at him.

Wen Ziqing found his gaze and even smiled at him.

Bai Lixin withdrew his gaze and said, “You can look for Wen Ziqing. He has great leadership skills and is familiar with this game. He is more suitable to be your teammate than me.”

“Oh, come on, him?” Huo Yunjun frowned all of a sudden, “With my years of experience in reading people in business, he runs in deep water. He’s definitely not as selfless and generous as he appears.”

Bai Lixin, “Okay, I’ll think about it and give you an answer tomorrow.”

Huo Yunjun then left quietly. Bai Lixin’s eyes followed his figure and found that he had cleverly hidden in a very inconspicuous little corner.

Perhaps it was because they had left the trial copy; this copy no longer had a player protection mechanism and players could attack each other. As the argument intensified, the players who were gripped by panic looked ready to exchange blows.

Bai Lixin called out to the system in his mind: [System.]

System: [Hello player, the assistance system is at your service.]

Bai Lixin: [Is there a place to go to the toilet or wash up here?]

System: [Yes, look ahead; there is a small door there. It leads to a toilet and a shower.]

Bai Lixin looked around the hall and found the small door.

He slowly got up.

Dijia, “What are you going to do there?”

Bai Lixin, “I’m going to shower and then sleep.”

Bai Lixin avoided the bickering crowd and pushed the side door close to the edge and walked in.

Once inside, there was a long, narrow corridor that could only fit one person through. Beyond the wall on one side of the corridor was the hall where they slept, while the other had two small doors and a switch.

Bai Lixin switched the lights on and opened the two doors one by one. The first led to a bathroom with a sink attached to the outside and a huge mirror embedded in front of the counter, while the second was a bathroom.

The bathroom has separate small compartments, each with clean towels inside.

He didn’t know who put the towels in, but who cares! Weren’t they put here for them to use?

Bai Lixin was used to bathing every day, and he didn’t feel any discomfort when Dijia used water to secretly clean his body every day in the Trial game.

But this copy didn’t have Dijia and his water body.

Thinking of this, the hand at the door to the compartment paused slightly.

The bat hidden in his pocket came out with its two paws pulling at the top of the pocket, revealing a small head.

Bai Lixin, “True Ancestor, have you heard of River God Village?”

The little bat lifted its head and in its red eyes was great confusion; “No, should I have heard of it?”

Bai Lixin, “No, it’s nothing.”

It seems that the memories of the copies are not interchangeable, so this Dijia is also a soul fragment?

He closed the compartment door and undid the buttons one by one.

Just as he was undoing the last one, his hand suddenly stopped and his eyes looked slightly threateningly at Dijia in his pocket.

Bai Lixin, “I’m going to take a shower. Shouldn’t you go out?”

Dijia, “…Fine.”

Dijia flapped his wings and flew off through the gap above the cubicle without looking back.

The shower turned on and the cold water rolled down Bai Lixin’s entire body in moments, causing him to shiver a little.

Unseen by Bai Lixin, Dijia quietly doubled back. He hung upside down by his feet from the overhanging beams of the roof, staring unblinkingly at Bai Lixin below.

The sweet smell of blood was even stronger without the barrier of his clothes. The scent wrapped itself in the vapor around him and went upwards, enveloping Dijia’s entire body.

Dijia ground his back teeth, his blood-red eyes filled with greed.

He wanted to bite him.

If he wasn’t bound by the contract, he would have swooped down right now, sunk his sharp fangs into his opponent’s veins and feasted on him!

The young man looked very slender with his clothes on, and he was surprised by what he saw when the clothes were off.

The young man’s seemingly thin waist had a deep waistline and small, shallow abs.

His thighs were straight and his calves were long and slender.

The already beautiful features of the young man’s face were even more heavily sculpted by the cold water, and his short, soft black hair was now dripping wet in his ears, giving him an indefinable allure.

Dijia stared in awe at the young man below, other inexplicable stirrings and desires suddenly welling up in his chest.

Those desires, mixed with the appetite for blood, intertwined and opposed each other.

Countless voices flooded his mind.

Get him!

I want him!

The youth below tilted his head slightly, the beautiful ends of his eyes fluttering in the air in an arc.

It was only then that Dijia noticed that the young man’s eyes, which were originally brilliant and fiery, had become hazy and dense, like laurel flowers hanging on the banks of a river in May, swaying their branches and reaching towards him. He was also like a siren hiding in the deep sea, seducing him and making him fall deeper into it.

He was pure and lustful.

Just when Dijia was about to continue spying on Bai Lixin, the lights overhead blinked several times and suddenly went out.

Only the dim wall lamp in the corridor was still emitting a faint glow, which was barely enough for Bai Lixin to see what was in front of him.

The shower overhead was still pouring water. The cold water fell to the floor, hitting the cramped, dark bathroom heavily.

Bai Lixin took a cautious step back and quickly wrapped a towel around his body once he was out of the shower’s reach. In the dim light, the water in the shower was gradually stained with the color of blood.

The thick, bloody water smelt fishy, and it fell unchecked onto the floor, spreading over the entire bathroom.

Bai Lixin tried to turn off the shower, but the bloody water did not stop falling.

Everywhere the blood water went, thick hair scrambled out of the cracks, spreading over the entire bathroom in just a few moments.

Bai Lixin tried to push the door, but it was locked tightly and could not be opened at all.

The hair seemed to be alive, and it started spreading in Bai Lixin’s direction as soon as it appeared.

When the hair was about to wrap around Bai Lixin’s leg, his quick eyes and hands grabbed it with force, and something suddenly wailed. The hair fell to the ground, the blood vanished, and the lamp above reverted to its original position.

The cold water was still falling downwards, as if everything that had just happened had been an illusion.

Bai Lixin looked down at his hand, and in his palm were a few long, broken black hairs.

He calmly put on his clothes, and only then did Dijia drop to his shoulders.

Dijia, “Be careful, you’re cursed.”

Bai Lixin, “A curse? When was I cursed?”

Dijia, “If I am correct, it would be when you saw the bandaged man outside in Lady Rose’s room.”

Bai Lixin didn’t react for two seconds before suddenly coming to his senses and saying, “You mean seeing the Bandaged Man gets you cursed?”

Dijia, “To be precise, it would be when you lock eyes with it.”

“I just told you about Blood’s Domination Gaze ability, right? This curse is similar to that; it’s a forbidden technique that the third generation of Bloods researched.”

“A person is continuously tormented during their lifetime, causing them to die in extreme pain, at which point their soul takes on resentment. Then the curser transfers his dominion into that dead person’s eyeball and then projects the curse through it. So any person who sees it gets cursed.”

Dijia, “The curse was supposed to be on Lady Rose, and judging by the nailed down boards, Lady Rose or Mr. Mo knew of the existence of the curse. I just didn’t expect it to come on you.”

Bai Lixin dried his hair and fastened the last button of his shirt and walked out, “How do you lift the curse?”

Dijia, “Either you find the curser and kill him, or the cursed dies. Once the curse is on, it is immortal.”

Bai Lixin lowered his eyes slightly, his long, thick black lashes covering his eyes that were lost in contemplation.

This copy was even more bizarre and dangerous than he had imagined. If Dijia hadn’t told him about it, he wouldn’t have known about the curse at all, nor would he have known about the so-called “Domination Gaze”.

The system had thrown them into this copy of [The Blood Clan] without telling them anything about the habits and abilities of the Bloods, just letting them explore on their own.

But the combat power of the players and the combat power of these Bloods were not of the same magnitude from the start. As humans, the players became props for the Bloods to satisfy their appetites from the moment they entered this world.

They could at least get clues in the trial copies by talking to NPCs, but in this copy, a bloody mouth was waiting for them once they tried to talk to an NPC.

Bai Lixin froze for a moment.

So it wasn’t that they couldn’t communicate, it was just that they had to pay a price every time they did?

The Blood Identity card that Xia Chi had drawn allowed him to eliminate such a cost, but there was a price to pay in exchange. Xia Chi had to endure hunger.

Wait, Xia Chi?

Bai Lixin jerked to a halt.

He remembered that he wasn’t the only one who looked into those eyes…

As if to validate Bai Lixin’s thoughts, the private chat box started jumping like crazy.

Bai Lixin opened the private chat box, and a dozen messages from Xia Chi popped up immediately.

Xia Chi: [Brother!!!]

Xia Chi: [QvQ, help, I’ve seen a ghost!]

Xia Chi: [Ghosts, how can there be ghosts in this bullshit Blood Clan copy! *Senior Sister in Red, I just saw the Senior Sister in Red!]

Bai Lixin: [How about now?]

Xia Chi: [I screamed in fear, attracting the other Blood guards, and the Senior Sister in Red disappeared.]

Bai Lixin: [Who exactly is the “Senior Sister in Red”?]

Xia Chi: [It’s a character from a school horror movie I used to watch. It was the first scary movie I watched in junior high school. It scared me to death, and she’s been my psychological shadow ever since.]

Bai Lixin paused: [You mean you’re most afraid of this sister in red in your heart.]

Xia Chi: [Wuwu, yes.]

So the curse came in the form of a situation that the cursed person feared the most?

But I am not afraid of blood and hair, so why did those things appear?

Is it because I have nothing to fear, so the curse chose to try something that everyone was afraid of?

Bai Lixin told Xia Chi about the curse, then said: [Don’t remain alone in the future. Stay with those Blood guards, try to get more information. But don’t act alone yet, wait until you catch the cursed one].

Xia Chi: [Wuwu, okay. I’ll listen to you, brother.]

—

Live broadcast room.

[Hahaha, I’m laughing to death! Xia Chi’s A meets Bai Lixin’s F- and it’s too funny. Such a disgusting curse was unfortunate to meet two men with two extremes of luck. ]

[I can’t believe you can still laugh. Isn’t the curse scary?]

[Uh, it’s quite scary, but when I think of Bai Lixin’s encounter, I don’t know why, but suddenly I don’t feel scared….]

[The one upstairs… I feel the same way too!]

[You’re crying and you’re making a fuss, but I just hate the live room blocking. Damn, the officials blocked God Xin’s shower scene again.]

[You cry and you make trouble, but I only hate that the live broadcast room is blocked. The officials blocked the scene when God Xin was taking a bath again. ]

[Did the True Ancestor remain in the bathroom when Beauty Bai was taking a bath?]

[Ah ah ah, let me become the True Ancestor’s eyes!]

—

Bai Lixin returned to the hall where they slept, and the argument in the room was still on.

Wen Ziqing, who had been silent, clapped his hands and his usual gentle voice rang out in the room, “Everyone take it easy. One fewer person is one fewer fighter. Now is not the time for infighting. It’s only the first day, and everyone’s stress should have been relieved after all the bickering. Let’s rest early.”

A player was surprised, “You deliberately let us quarrel?”

Wen Ziqing, “Yes, although I watched the live stream earlier, the information seemed to not only fail to help everyone, but it made everyone’s spirits tighten. I can tell you guys are under a lot of pressure, but there are still four days ahead of us. If we don’t let it out as soon as possible to keep our strength up, it will be hard to get through later.”

“Don’t panic, everyone. Even if we really can’t get through, let us make these last few days go peacefully. We are all here because we are destined to be here. Maybe the last moments of our lives will be us keeping each other company. Making a friend is better than making an enemy.”

“No one enters this damn game of their own accord, and it’s a human instinct to fear death. We can’t change that, but the most important thing now is for everyone to keep a good mindset. Don’t you think so?”

“Yes, yes, yes, that’s right!”

“So that’s it! Not to mention, I feel much more comfortable after cursing.”

“Me too, I suddenly feel so tired and just want to sleep.”

“Me too, I’m tired, sleepy, and hungry after the sudden stress relief.”

“Thank you, Wen Ziqing. Get some rest early, good night.”

The bickering was so easily diffused by Wen Ziqing’s words. Bai Lixin looked around and noticed that the players who had been tense moments before were now stretching out, and some even had a smile on their faces.

They smiled and greeted those around them, shuffled off to wash up and went to bed.

It seemed that, for just a moment, everything was different.

Half an hour later, the lights in the room were slowly turned off, and Bai Lixin fell into a deep sleep with his clothes on.

In the silent darkness, a slight sound came from under Bai Lixin’s bed.

It was a skeleton bursting out of thin air from the ground. It had just crawled halfway up, showing only the upper half of its head and arms on the ground, with the part below its waist still submerged in the ground.

The skeleton had some bloody bandages wrapped around its body and was planning to crawl out from under the bed to attack Bai Lixin.

But just when it was about to continue crawling outwards, a head suddenly appeared under the bed.