Volume 2 - CH 35.3

Meanwhile, as soon as Lin Qin agreed to help, Mu Jiashi then immediately turns to open the door to the dark bedroom, anxiously but still clearly telling them, “something’s wrong!”

Mu Jiashi quickly explains the current situation to four shocked pairs of eyes – about the crumbling Nightmare, the slaughter of the man in black in the service area, the limit of five minutes, and what they plan to do now.

He asks the four Missiontakers in the bedroom to continue numbering off, and to take the boy to the surface area after he leaves the wardrobe.

Laosan takes a deep breath. He didn’t expect this run… wait, no, the last run of the Nightmare to have undergone such an abrupt and frightening change.

And they’re even in the sixth run of the Nightmare already.

He nods firmly, and says, “understood.”

While the woman with the grue hair raises her head to say calmly, “we will get it done.”

Her gaze meets with Mu Jiashi’s for a split second before they separate.

Mu Jiashi knows clearly, though, that the ‘Billionaire’ already knew that he abandoned the four Missiontakers in the dark bedroom the last run of the Nightmare and headed straight for the service area.

This is something Mu Jiashi-like. He isn’t about to hide it either.

Besides, with how sharp Ding Yi is, she definitely would have figured it out. Even if their roles were switched, Mu Jiashi believes Ding Yi would have made the same choice.

Instead, Mu Jiashi is more curious about why Ding Yi has maintained that introverted stance and hid her abilities.

Would a billionaire of a Necessities Merchant really not be more arrogant or prideful in a Nightmare? Also, given Ding Yi’s possessions, she could certainly have hired Golddiggers.

Why did she try to pass through a Nightmare alone?

… Or is there someone she hired among these Missiontakers present?

These questions and curiosity pass in but a second. With hurried steps, he quickly heads for the service area with Lin Qin, Selfish and Scapegoat.

They take two cars, he and Lin Qin ride on one, Selfish and Scapegoat on the other.

On the way, Lin Qin reminds Mu Jiashi, “what you talked about before.”

Mu Jiashi was too preoccupied thinking about all the information in this Nightmare, so he had to pause for a moment when Lin Qin reminded him to remember what he was going to say.

“Sorry, sorry,” Mu Jiashi quickly apologises, “the bookstore owner, right. I once got into contact with him. I knew he never slept, liked drinks…”

Lin Qin says unhappily, “I knew all that.”

In other words, what Mu Jiashi just told him was useless to him.

Nor was he expecting to satisfy Lin Qin with trivia, but he had to tell him all of these so that he wouldn’t misunderstand and think he was still keeping some information to himself.

Not that Lin Qin would have cared to think that deeply.

So Mu Jiashi answers, “dalao, I was just setting up. I will tell you something that, besides myself, nobody would have known.”

In the stream, not just the viewers, but even Xü Beijin is curious what is coming. He still remembers clearly when he was acquainted with Mu Jiashi.

What about him could be something that nobody but Mu Jiashi knew?

The man answers, “I was trying to enter Xü Beijin’s Nightmare, but I found out he never slept. I wanted to find another way to break through, so, trying what I could, I asked the Tower resident who lived next to the bookstore then.

She was the one who told me that this bookstore owner drank drinks often. At the same time, she told me another thing.”

Mu Jiashi pauses for a moment here out of habit before continuing, “she told me that this bookstore owner has been living there since a very, very long time ago. He has never left the bottom floor of the Tower.”

Lin Qin then pauses for a moment before asking, “so what?”

Not just he is confused, but the viewers in the stream are also wondering.

“is it weird Beibei liked to shut-in at home?”

“actors… or rather, game NPCs being somewhere the whole time is normal, right?”

“or is there something special about the ‘bottom floor of the Tower’?”

Xü Beijin is pretty surprised himself.

He always thought that it was just coincidence that Mu Jiashi ended up giving him his drink. He didn’t expect there was a whole other layer to it.

His neighbour, huh…

The neighbour Mu Jiashi was referring to is not Wu Shen. He is referring to the neighbour before that.

Tower residents come and go, so, in the Missiontakers’ eyes, these mad people just don’t have a fixed home.

Sometimes, when a Missiontaker has decided to target a certain resident, and scouted and researched their way so that they could enter the resident’s Nightmare, they may end up discovering that the residence has disappeared out of nowhere.

That is actually because the Actor has successfully played a significant enough role in helping Missiontakers resolve their Nightmare and headed to a higher floor to be assigned a new script.

So obviously, Xü Beijin has had more neighbours than Wu Shen. In fact, that neighbour might not be assigned the doll store owner’s role either. After Wu Shen has headed up to a higher floor, Xü Beijin was wondering whether a new Actor or even Missiontaker – an outsider – might move in next to him.

Missiontakers and Actors living opposite sides of the same street is rare, but not unheard of. It all comes down to luck.

Though Xü Beijin is surprised that Mu Jiashi has once interacted with his neighbour.

He digs through his memories to figure out who the neighbour was when Mu Jiashi was at his bookstore… Then, he recalls a face.

It’s a woman. A pretty smooth-talking Actor, which was why she knew about his preference for drinks.

Though, close neighbours as they were, that was it. Xü Beijin never even ended up Acting in her Nightmare once. That Actor went to a higher floor really quickly too.

She was the one that told Mu Jiashi the information, huh.

Xü Beijin isn’t really angry; it has to be said that conversations between Actors and Missiontakers, especially when it comes to Nightmares, even if it’s the Nightmare of someone else, is still under the management of the Server.

Therefore, this was the equivalent of an unavoidable, scripted event. In fact, perhaps the Actor didn’t even want to tell him, but the Server ordered her to tell Mu Jiashi when he came to her.

So Xü Beijin doesn’t really care about that conversation he didn’t know about.

He just felt that this was really satisfying his curiosity that he could find out about the truth of something that happened way back even after so long.

Really, after spending so long in the Tower, Xü Beijin’s emotions have really been ground to almost nothing. He just blanks out in his bookstore in the Tower, or does some reading, and then the day passes. When he doesn’t have to Act, his life is as dead and unchanging as stillwater.

Yet the arrival of the streaming system has changed his life and also punched right through the calm layer settled on his life. It is even revealing new secrets he never knew before.

How exciting.

He was never really interested in Missiontakers——A natural result because of the different circumstances facing the Actors and the Missiontakers, especially when the latter never figured out who the former, the Tower residents, really were.

Therefore, Xü Beijin was never someone interested in Nightmares or Missiontakers throughout the whole Tower.

Yet, thanks to the screen of the stream feeding all these events and information and clues right into his eyes, nobody can resist thinking about them besides those who are truly dead inside.

Mu Jiashi has no idea the person he is talking about is actually observing him quietly through a hidden stream camera.

He continues to explain, “there is a high mobility to Tower residents on the bottom floor. As far as I am aware, this is the only resident who I’ve been told has never left the bottom floor.”

Mu Jiashi really is humbling himself when he explains. In fact, given his prior standing among Golddiggers and in his own team, he practically knew most residents on the bottom floor of the Tower.

Therefore, ‘as far as I’m aware’ basically means the information was true, at least at that time.

He did leave the bottom floor for a long time, so he doesn’t know about if anything has changed and what the current situation is, so he is using words that are more conservative. Even though he didn’t really need to for what he just said.

The two pieces of information he got when he asked Xü Beijin’s neighbour about him, was that one, Xü Beijin never slept and liked drinks, and two, Xü Beijin has never left the bottom floor of the Tower.

So, Lin Qin, who isn’t as dumb as some Missiontakers always say he is, is able to ask, “so what you’re trying to say, is that his Nightmare is related to the fact that he has never left the bottom floor?”

Mu Jiashi nods confidently, answering, “I believe so.”

Xü Beijin, who hears that in the stream, looks like he has something to say, but stays quiet.

In the stream, the detective dalao is quick to type, “Bei! My Bei! Don’t be a spoil sport, please! I want to be able to work out what Nightmare the game gave you!”

The Nightmare the game gave him?

Xü Beijin has a terribly grim expression as he lowers his head to look at his own hand. He is trembling slightly.

Slowly, but firmly, he grips his fist tight, so tight his fingernails are digging into the flesh in his palm. It is a bit painful; in this game, even pain is unbelievably realistic. He is trying to suppress his trembling with the pain.

Calmly, he thinks——You wouldn’t want to know.

It isn’t the first time he has thought so either.

When once, Missiontakers were all headed for him, all endlessly curious about his Nightmare, Xü Beijin has thought so countless times.

In fact, after that wave of enthusiasm passed, Xü Beijin has never thought like this for a long time.

Though right now, it feels almost like he has time travelled back to that time.

Not even he is able to put a finger on what he is thinking about in this very moment; his thoughts feel like they have descended into a cold, bottomless, empty abyss. Tangled, frozen.

Yet, the next second, he hears something.

“But I’m not interested in his Nightmare,” says Lin Qin.

Xü Beijin cocks his head right up to watch the stream.

Unlike the shock of Mu Jiashi and the ruckus in the comment barrage, Lin Qin just flatly states, “I just want to fight him. I don’t want to go into his Nightmare.”

Xü Beijin gives a deep, hard look at Lin Qin, who just said that.

Mu Jiashi begins smiling bitterly, saying, “oh… I see. Dalao, that’s all I knew, so…”

Lin Qin is pretty forgiving, though, saying, “that’s alright. I promised, so I won’t go back on it.”

He promised to deal with the man in black with Mu Jiashi, for the price of what he knew about Xü Beijin. Mu Jiashi upheld his end of the deal, so Lin Qin will comply, of course.

Just like Ding Yi, who asked Lin Qin for help using drinks. Despite her invasion of his privacy displeasing him somewhat, but he still completes the deal regardless.

By the same vein, despite it being pretty much useless, that is irrelevant to the proposal Mu Jiashi made.

The man in question sighs in relief before asking curiously, “dalao, can I ask why you want to fight with the bookstore owner?”

He’s asking indirectly, but honestly, he doesn’t think Xü Beijin can win against Lin Qin.

Lin Qin nods to answer, “I feel like he might be able to win in a fight with me,” then he emphasises, “possibly, but I’m not sure.”

Mu Jiashi is shocked enough just with that answer, though.

Lin Qin also rubs his chin, meanwhile, muttering, “hmm, you said he has never left the bottom floor… Then maybe I can just keep an eye on the bookstore entrance forever? If he doesn’t move…”

Mu Jiashi’s mouth twitches.

Dalao, even if you’re a dalao with an ungodly fighting strength, you don’t have to act like such a stalker against a poor little NPC, do you?

Xü Beijin “…”

He is once again questioning his decision to invite Lin Qin over.

Really? Really really?

This is definitely a clingywart who will never let go once attached!

But unfortunately… He has already leaked his address to him earlier!

He woefully taps his forehead onto the counter. All hope is lost. He is picturing how, in the future, there will always be a little apple lying outside of his door…

Ptoo, little apple, his arse.

He’s been totally led astray by those naughty viewers in the stream!

While Lin Qin is thinking, Mu Jiashi is speechlessing, and Xü Beijin is despairing, they finally reach the service area, where, the slaughter of the man in black is still ongoing.

They made it in time. Nobody has died yet from his big machete.

In the stream, the viewers begin working through everything Mu Jiashi has done since the fifth run began, and they are all expressing their impression at how decisive and influential the man has been once he started to act.

Up to this point, Laosan was the most brilliant one among them. He didn’t make many decisions, but his process of analysis and thought was paramount to their progress.

They didn’t expect how Mu Jiashi basically took over after the unexpected change occurred.

Meanwhile, the corridor group has left their two cars behind. Lin Qin is walking straight for the central plaza flowerbed, so quickly that the rest of the Missiontakers are having trouble keeping up with his steps.

When they finally arrive at the plaza, running, among the bloody scene, they spot Lin Qin, already holding the big machete, bored, while locking the man in black in place with a foot planted on his chest.

It seems, the man in black would not be able to get back up for a while.