Volume 3 - CH 54.3

Jiang Shuangmei has left her apartment unit and is now running for the stairs to head for Room 807. When she’s on the eighth floor, she’s about to knock and pauses when she spies something out of the corner of her eye.

She sees an elevator with its entrance open. While on the ground, are what appears to be… several utility cards?

A few minutes later, Jiang Shuangmei has reunited with her older sister, telling her excitedly, “sis! Look what I picked up?”

Three utility cards. An Infocard, an Attack card, and a rare, useful Trick card, named ‘The Devil’s Mask.’

Jiang Shuangjie is shocked, not even asking how Jiang Shuangmei left her apartment unit so early, and quickly asks, “where did you pick them up from?”

Jiang Shuangmei replies, “from the elevator outside.”

Jiang Shuangjie is confused for a bit before suddenly recalling the fact that the Nightmare restarted out of the blue the last run…

A wet blanket has suddenly smothered her all over.

Jiang Shuangmei seems slightly confused by Jiang Shuangjie’s nonreaction, asking, “sis, what is it?” Then she looks at the cards in her hand, asking, “is the card no good?”

Jiang Shuangjie sighs and asks her hapless younger sister, “Shuangshuang, think about it for a second. Why would there be some utility cards on the floor out of nowhere?”

“I picked it up though,” Jiang Shuangmei blinks and says, “I don’t plan on giving it back either.”

Jiang Shuangjie “…”

She’s looking at her younger sister with a rather exasperated expression. She’s not sure how she can explain it to her.

This is such an eerie thing too, but her younger sister is unwilling to think… She knows that it’s because she is used to relying on her.

In Nightmares, she is always the one doing the thinking and her the ‘actioning’; it’s such a natural instinct now, that obviously, Jiang Shuangjie could mull over where the utility cards come from, but Jiang Shuangmei can just pick them up and be done with it.

Besides that, Jiang Shuangjie is also aware of why Jiang Shuangmei is so glad.

This is their first attempt at going through the floors of the Tower after so many years outside of Nightmares. They have experience from before, and a stash of utility cards from back then, but it is still difficult for them.

Therefore, picking up valuable utility cards must mean a lot for Jiang Shuangmei as she happily picks them up for herself.

The older sister understands what she is thinking, but she is not sure how to convey her worries.

The sisters fall silent.

In the stream, meanwhile, the audience is practically yelling out typing,

“oh shit! did the dead guy drop those?!”

“? its like a chance to drop your items after death? super unfriendly to us unluckies, oi!”

“we never saw dead people drop items though… I’m scratching my head here”

“what’s even going on?”

Xü Beijin doesn’t say anything even though the viewers clearly seem curious. While normally Missiontakers do not drop utility cards when they die, but in this Nightmare, Missiontakers dying is clearly treated abnormally.

In the third run, after Muscular has been killed by the elevator, and the Nightmare restarted, he’s gone.

His item being dropped is probably because he has succumbed to a Collapsed Nightmare… No, rather, he has been made to succumb.

He has been turned from a Missiontaker into an Actor, an Actor who is specifically tied to this Nightmare forever, acting as the specific furniture here.

Actors, obviously, cannot hold or use utility cards themselves.

In the Tower, a Missiontaker succumbing or not can be verified by checking if their residence is still locked up.

There are, in fact, seasoned thieves who would go after doors that haven’t seen anyone enter for a while; they might be holding all the valuables of a succumbed Missiontaker.

Some Missiontakers did manage to strike it rich this way.

They’re nicknamed Vultures, because they live with corpses. And strangely, while these Vultures are equally the lowest of the rungs among Missiontakers, their reputation isn’t as abysmal as the Carddealer’s. They’re also more rarely seen and well hidden.

Perhaps Muscular wouldn’t have ever expected that, one day, that prey in his eyes would end up a temporary Vulture who grabbed everything he brought.

No matter what, though, his entire disappearance must mean that the Nightmare has already crumbled by the third run. Even if it were someone else that ended up dying in the third one, that Missiontaker would have been gone.

Therefore, in fact, Missiontakers must not let themselves die anymore since the third run.

… How arbitrary. No wonder the teenage girl heard about how some Missiontakers would be gone forever even after a Normal End was achieved.

This Nightmare begins with the Missiontakers having been separated into different apartment units. The scene is so large that the Missiontakers cannot discover that one of them is gone in a timely manner.

It must be after a long exploration, investigation and information-gathering that they might be able to tell what’s gone wrong; more likely, however, is that they wouldn’t even be able to definitively state how many Missiontakers are present in this Nightmare.

Xü Beijin himself only knew there were seven Missiontakers present via the streaming system.

These Missiontakers are unable to track everyone else in real-time. In fact, it is completely possible they would never be able to find every last person in the Nightmare before one of them disappeared entirely and they wouldn’t be any the wiser.

… In a Nightmare, information really is immensely valuable.

For example, Jiang Shuangjie, right now. Her instincts have convinced her that something must be behind these utility cards popping up nowhere, but she does not know what, or why. Unlike Xü Beijin, she lacks information.

She would even prefer Jiang Shuangmei just putting those cards back where she found them. She doesn’t want to take any more risks in this unconventional Nightmare. Also, what they should do right now is to look for Thin and the others, to try and shut the electricity off to leave this Nightmare for good.

However, Jiang Shuangmei is unwilling to do as her older sister says.

Who knows which Missiontaker could have had these cards? Who cares why it is in the elevator? Nobody!

She is even stating, “maybe it’s a surprise package from the Server?”

Jiang Shuangjie “…”

She is completely looking at her younger sister anew. How did she not know before that her younger sister actually had such a positively naïve side?

Her head is throbbing.

Did she really overprotect her younger sister?

Jiang Shuangmei is stubborn in refusing to put the cards back, even saying, disappointed, “sis, we really need utility cards; did you forget we want to head for a higher floor…?”

“Of course I do!” Jiang Shuangjie says frustratedly, “but Shuangshuang, don’t you think that there’s something wrong with the utility cards just lying there for no reason?!”

“Not really,” Jiang Shuangmei firmly replies, “I’m keeping them even if they’re suspicious. After we leave this Nightmare, who would care or know where we got them from?”

Jiang Shuangjie opens her mouth, but no words come out.

She doesn’t want to fight with her here. She is really genuinely questioning if she has spoiled her younger sister to the point of uselessness. She is even lacking in basic judgement in a Nightmare.

The point isn’t in who even owned these utility cards, but w・h・y they ended up in the elevator.

Kindness from the Server, even?

Impossible!