Chapter 1 The Red-Clad Old Woman

Rotten, congealed blood and baleful aura spewed from the red-clad old woman's chest.

The flesh on her body writhed and churned, seemingly attempting to autonomously coalesce and heal the wound.

However, a substantial amount of frost-like, snowy white flames remained in the horrific wound.

One end connected to the nine-qiang sword in the hands of Wanli Fengdao behind her,

While the other end extended a large number of sword energies, locking down the red-clad old woman's torso and limbs.

Not only did it firmly seal the wound, preventing her from healing,

It also immobilized her limbs, pinning her firmly in place.

Using swords as locks, qi as pillars, creating a prison on the spot.

【Saint Spirit Swordplay·Sword Nine】

"Aaaaaaaah!"

The red-clad old woman, her limbs locked, roared in furious rage, violently jerking her arms.

Wanli Fengdao behind her was pulled by the drastic change in aura, vomiting a large pool of blood.

The scalp on his head had already been dissolved by the filthy blood, and his sizzling, melting hair mixed with a large amount of unknown substances, flowing down his cheeks.

The robes he wore, which were of fairly good quality, were also rapidly corroding and dissolving at a speed visible to the naked eye.

Tap tap tap tap.

Li Ang's feet rapidly struck the ground as he approached, carrying the Soul-Shepherding Bronze Scythe in his hand.

"All of you, die!!!"

The red-clad old woman's eyes were bloodshot.

The desire for life, the fear of death, the disgust for herself,

Caused her to suddenly erupt with even greater power than before.

Her arms and legs swelled again, her tattered red robes directly bursting apart.

The number of black ice crystals flying around her increased again,

Driven by the baleful aura hurricane,

They scoured and cut at the sword energy binding her neck, like whetstones.

Zheng!

The white-flame-like sword energy abruptly snapped.

The red-clad old woman twisted her neck, bringing her head close to her left arm.

Opening her bloody maw, she bit down hard on her left elbow, snapping it off with a crack.

Only half of her left arm remained, still hanging in the cage of sword energy flames.

Swish—

The sound of a sharp blade cutting through the air suddenly rang out.

Li Ang's original Strength and Agility attributes were already 11 points. After consuming divine power to remove muscle restrictions, they rose to as high as 14 points.

The Mastiff-style anti-theft tracking chip left by 13mArk required an Intelligence of 13 points or higher to equip.

Li Ang had three free attribute points that he hadn't added.

In addition to adding one point to Intelligence to meet the equipment conditions for the tracking chip,

He also invested the remaining two points into Strength and Agility.

Fifteen points in both attributes, plus the blessing of Ripple Breathing,

Li Ang streaked across the corridor like a phantom,

The scythe in his hand slashing down diagonally.

Clang!!!

A deafening, dull metallic clang echoed through the corridor,

The red-clad old woman, whose appearance was almost unrecognizable as human, used the wriggling, rotten flesh that had grown out of her half left arm to firmly grip the long-handled naginata, blocking it in front of the bronze scythe.

Blocked it...?

The red-clad old woman only felt an immense force transmitted along the naginata's shaft. Her massive body involuntarily retreated backward.

She instinctively used her rotting feet, which had burst out of her shoes, to grip the ground.

The red carpet was pulled up by her feet, creating ripples.

As the red-clad old woman barely managed to stop, two ten-meter-long traces of blood and flesh were left on the carpet.

She actually blocked it.

Wanli Fengdao narrowed his eyes slightly, his eyes full of unwillingness.

He first ignored the pain, tore off his tattered clothes,

And used the white cloth for wiping the blade to quickly wipe away the filthy blood from his head and body.

Before he could finish wiping, he took out a bottle of miniature life potion from his backpack and drank it down, barely stopping the bleeding.

【Saint Spirit Swordplay·Sword Nine】 had consumed too much of his energy.

If it couldn't kill Li Risheng with one strike,

Then he could only use that move...

After wiping away the filthy blood, the corrosive effect disappeared.

The miniature life potion allowed Wanli Fengdao's scalp to heal rapidly, but the dissolved hair did not grow back so quickly.

Wanli Fengdao, with a few messy tufts of hair on his head, had a determined expression.

He held two longswords in his hand, the tips crossed and pointing diagonally at the ground, slowly gesturing a sword stance.

The red-clad old woman only felt a chill behind her neck, as if needles were pricking her skin, and her hair stood on end.

But she couldn't spare any time to deal with Wanli Fengdao, who was accumulating power—accompanied by cracking sounds,

The naginata and scythe, which were colliding and fighting against each other, both showed cracks.

The latter's blade shattered first, breaking into countless pieces.

The Soul-Shepherding Bronze Scythe was, after all, only a rare-level weapon.

In terms of toughness, it couldn't compare to the Naginata of the Invisible Ghoul.

"Kill him quickly!"

Hei Shengzi urged sharply from above.

His figure shook, and he split into ten avatars.

Each avatar held a dim, golden magic item.

Short swords, daggers, pentagram badges, skulls, withered arms, miniature embryos, etc.

These magic items all came from the private collection of the Other Shore Organization.

Each one had undergone a large number of rituals and had been worshiped with incense by countless believers. They were not inferior to the high-level equipment produced in the Killing Game Mall at all.

If Mule and Liu Wunao were rich,

Then Hei Shengzi and the Other Shore Organization behind him not only possessed a large amount of wealth,

But also had influence,

And people.

The ten avatars, along with Bai Haozheng's Nen energy, the mechanical golem's light cannons, Liu Wunao's arrows, and Yu Yixinzhong's Thunder Sword, were in a stalemate,

Hei Shengzi's main body turned into black smoke, shuttling back and forth between the ten avatars,

While chanting all kinds of insidious and treacherous incantations,

Creating acid rain, blood rivers, and weapons out of thin air,

Holding back Mule and the others, forcing them to stalemate with him, unable to support Li Ang in the distance.

Just as Yu Yixinzhong and the others had guessed,

Hei Shengzi did cooperate with the red-clad old woman. The Invisible Ghoul was involved,

But more than that, it was purely for profit.

Hei Shengzi knew that the red-clad old woman was Dan Fei reincarnated through possession.

He knew that as long as the red-clad old woman existed, the lack of people would inevitably prevent the players from meeting the requirement of "someone must live on each floor."

If the players broke the rules, the Tall Thin Hat would begin the culling.

At this time, there were two options in front of Hei Shengzi.

1. Tell the other players the truth, and everyone would search for the red-clad old woman in the hotel together and find a way to bring her to the eleventh floor to kill her.

2. Do not tell the other players the truth, conceal the truth, and cooperate with the red-clad old woman,

Let the red-clad old woman continue to pretend to be a pure aberration, killing one player every night.

If he chose the former,

The rules would not be broken, and everyone would continue to rely on their own abilities to survive and make a living until the end.

However, Hei Shengzi could not guarantee that

Someone would not be like 13mArk, thinking that living on a floor where someone had died could make them safer,

And enter the 10th or 11th floor where someone had died at night, safely spending the night,

And transfer the risk of the Tall Thin Hat's culling to others.

Hei Shengzi put himself in their shoes and felt that it was very likely that someone among the remaining players would do this.

If he obeyed the rules and stayed in his room, he might be harmed by others.

If he went to the 10th or 11th floor himself, he would be executed by his companions for being selfish once he was discovered.

If he chose to cooperate with the red-clad old woman, the risk would be much smaller.

First of all, the red-clad old woman was half an aberration. She knew the hotel's secrets, could move freely in the hotel, and would not be attacked by other aberrations.

She could help him solve the notes that appeared in his room, greatly reducing the risk of death.

Secondly, the red-clad old woman would continue to grow stronger by devouring, constantly increasing his advantage over his other teammates.

Thirdly, the existence of the red-clad old woman could also help him find out if anyone would try to transfer the risk like 13mArk—just as Bai Haozheng had guessed, the hotel's agitation was increasing level by level.

The more floors that were left empty, the more agitated the hotel would become, and the higher the intensity of the aberration attacks would be.

And the reason why he had previously agreed to Li Ang's suggestion of "everyone gathering together"

On the one hand, it was to get rid of the suspicion that he was a mole.

On the other hand, it was also because Hei Shengzi had full confidence in the red-clad old woman's strength and "loyalty."

"Shut! Up!"

The red-clad old woman only felt that Hei Shengzi's urging was so noisy and jarring.

Her eyes were blood red,

Under the tattered red robes, a large amount of rotten flesh uncontrollably grew and spread.

Her hands, which could barely be recognized, gripped the naginata's shaft (her left hand, which she had bitten off herself, had grown back), and slashed forward.

"Die!!"

Accompanied by the roar was a wave of stench.

Li Ang faced the stench without changing his expression.

Releasing the shattered haft of the scythe, he dodged the slash while simultaneously

Kicking the blade of the slashing naginata, sending it crashing heavily against the wall.

"Die!"

The bloated red-clad old woman simply released her grip on the shaft. Her chest and abdomen suddenly split open,

And a large number of human arms grew out of the wounds, intertwining with each other.

They surged toward Li Ang like thousands of blossoms, trying to pull him into the crevice in her waist and abdomen.

"Don't love me, there's no future unless you dance for me."

Li Ang praised, and a huge amount of vines extended from under his white coat, shooting out like spears, nailing the outstretched arms to the wall.

As for himself, he advanced instead of retreating, closing the distance,

And threw a punch.

An ordinary, unadorned straight punch, without any special effects, slammed into the red-clad old woman's chest.

Bang!

The red-clad old woman had originally wanted to counterattack, but the movement of her hand suddenly stalled.

She was hit by Li Ang's punch,

And her tall, burly body arched its back like a boiled arthropod in the subphylum Crustacea, order Decapoda, suborder Pleocyemata.

Beneath the blue-black skin, a fist-shaped outline faintly appeared.

———

A sinister, obscure, low, and distant chanting of scriptures echoed in the corridor.

Boom!

The mechanical golem's crimson beam of light aimed at the avatar that was chanting the scriptures and shot out rapidly.

Hei Shengzi, in his black smoke state, relied on a skill that allowed him to foresee death to react in advance.

He manipulated the avatar he was residing in to urgently adjust its position, barely avoiding a vital hit.

The cannon grazed his torso.

The avatar's right arm couldn't even last for a second before it instantly evaporated.

The pale skull in its right hand also disintegrated under the pure energy bombardment,

Turning into a few wisps of white smoke that scattered and disappeared.

Hei Shengzi's heart sank.

The souls of twenty people, twins who had suffered several days of torment and ultimately died unjustly, were wasted just like that.

Pity, hateful.

Malice surged from the bottom of his heart.

Hei Shengzi, in his black smoke form, ordered the avatar that had lost its magic item to dive down toward the plague doctor, forcing Yu Yixinzhong, who was rushing toward him, to turn back to save him.

He then detached himself

And bounced into another avatar,

Continuing to chant the scriptures without stopping for a moment.

These avatar puppets of Hei Shengzi were also precious treasures created by the Other Shore Organization.

Their material was neither gold nor wood, neither iron nor stone. They were exceptionally tough, not inferior to special alloys.

They were extremely light, flexible, and precise to control—all the puppets had a fragment of Hei Shengzi's soul built into them, which could be considered his incarnation outside his body.

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Moreover, each puppet needed Hei Shengzi to nourish it with his blood every day in order to be able to communicate with him and be as responsive as his own limbs.

Under his control,

The avatars cooperated tacitly, driving the magic items at all costs and consuming the soul energy accumulated by the Other Shore Organization for a long time.

They wove a seamless encirclement,

Preventing Bai Haozheng and the others from breaking free for a long time, and maintaining a stalemate.

This was not to say that Hei Shengzi's strength was far stronger than that of Mule and the others combined.

It was just that the Other Shore Organization's moral bottom line was on par with the Ephemeral Flower Cult.

They could kidnap homeless people who no one cared about, detain stowaways who had crossed the ocean in small boats, and set up fictitious names in chaotic and disorderly Africa. In the name of NGOs and NPOs, they set up hospitals, secretly faked deaths, and detained patients.

They locked up those who had been kidnapped and deceived into dungeons,

And through all sorts of unspeakable and horrific means, they tortured them, causing them to burst out with soul energy far beyond that of ordinary people, full of resentment and despair before their deaths.

They then injected the energy into containers,

As "batteries" that could be used by the players under the Other Shore Organization.

Compared to the Other Shore Organization, some of the members of the Devil Scientist Alliance could only be considered harmless tech nerds.

Each of Hei Shengzi's avatars contained at least a hundred portions of soul energy—this energy was not only far beyond that of ordinary intelligent beings in terms of quantity,

But also far superior to the Nen power used by Bai Haozheng in terms of "quality."

Moreover, the consumption and waste of negative soul energy also came with a corrosive effect,

Which could easily break through the imprisonment skills of other players.

Therefore, ten puppets that were not flexible and adaptable enough to defeat any of the players present in a one-on-one fight (except for the plague doctor) were able to maintain the situation,

And buy enough time for Hei Shengzi before they were inevitably defeated.

In the war between transcendents, the side that broke through the moral bottom line and used every means possible,

Might not be able to ultimately win,

But they would definitely be able to gain an advantage in some aspects.

Bai Haozheng and the others were not fighting against Hei Shengzi alone, but against the resource bank of a large organization.

"Wen Na Ta Ba La Mi Sa Ah Xi Heng Wu Wa——"

Hei Shengzi's chanting grew louder and louder, and the lights in the maze corridor suddenly dimmed. A dark cloud slowly condensed in the air,

Crowds of heads stirred in the clouds, and despairing faces appeared and disappeared.

No one can escape from my Ten Severing Torment Formation.

The dark cloud was constantly drawing energy from the ten avatars.

Hei Shengzi's heart gradually settled down. He resided behind one of the avatars and continued to chant,

Manipulating the avatar to say aloud, "In fact, we don't have to fight to the death.

We're all just strangers on this mission, not relatives or friends.

Cafe, Dan Fei, and Bob belong to the Voodoo Black Magic Group.

13mArk and Ω are both gang masterminds and members of the Devil Scientist Alliance. None of them are good men or women.

They all have a lot of blood on their hands.

I killed them, which can be considered a contribution to the present world.

Why should you fight desperately for a few scumbags?

Why not put down our disputes and live peacefully together?

Relying on Mr. Bai's corridor maze, we can completely survive tonight and tomorrow."

Yu Yixinzhong stepped on invisible bricks in the air, chasing Hei Shengzi's true body.

She slashed out with her sword, manipulating lightning to shatter a magic item in the hands of an avatar, forcing Hei Shengzi to transfer again,

And said coldly, "I don't care about their lives at all, I just care that

You can kill other people's lives for a small possibility.

If no one dies tonight, the Tall Thin Hat will inevitably appear and begin the culling.

The corridor maze can block the strange things outside, but it may not be able to block the Tall Thin Hat.

And you, you would never sacrifice yourself to atone for your sins for the sake of others, would you?"

"Since that's the case,"

The avatar in which Hei Shengzi resided had a cold expression and a calm tone, "Then go..."

Bai Haozheng's pupils suddenly shrank, and his ten fingers formed a hand seal.

Causing Hei Shengzi to feel dizzy, unable to say the word "die."

Yu Yixinzhong, who was beside him, also waved her Thunder Blade, sending down lightning to strike Hei Shengzi, causing his figure to stall.

Bang!

A bamboo spear flew in out of nowhere, dragging a high-speed afterimage, piercing through this avatar.

The puppet was heavily knocked away,

The strange things that made up the corridor maze also had special properties. Everything in the maze was as difficult to destroy as the corridor.

Therefore, the moment the bamboo spear pierced through the avatar and came into contact with the wall,

The tip exploded on its own, sticking firmly to the wall and fixing the puppet in place.

Hei Shengzi in black mist form suddenly felt startled and looked down.

He saw that the red-clad old woman below had disappeared, replaced by a large ball woven from vines and ropes. Wanli Fengdao was standing beside it, responsible for guarding it.

And Li Ang...

He was still holding the posture of throwing the spear.

Was the red-clad old woman resolved?

No, impossible.

Not to mention that her vitality was tenacious and extremely difficult to kill,

Even if she could be killed, Li Risheng would not do so—this was not the real eleventh-floor corridor. Killing the red-clad old woman in the maze would not prevent the Tall Thin Hat from appearing.

Hei Shengzi's mind raced, maintaining the chanting of the incantation.

While dispatching several avatars, sacrificing the magic items to desperately hold back Yu Yixinzhong, who wanted to launch a surprise attack,

He muttered the incantation, trying to jump again.

He had already tested before that the corridor maze could also absorb energy from a certain distance—this was also why he would have at least one puppet avatar guard below the dark cloud.

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Although there were some traces of divine power left on this bamboo spear with great force,

It was not enough to bind Hei Shengzi in black smoke form and prevent him from escaping.

Um?

Wait a minute,

What is this shiny thing?

Hei Shengzi suddenly noticed that there seemed to be a shiny object embedded at the end of the bamboo spear.

Was that...a glass mirror?

In the next moment, Li Ang suddenly crossed hundreds of meters and appeared in front of the puppet in which Hei Shengzi resided.

【Name: Abyss Magic Mirror】

【Type: Magic Item】

【Quality: Perfect】

【Effect 3: Mirror World Travel. Active trigger, the user can touch the mirror frame of the magic mirror and randomly teleport to a mirror object within a radius of one kilometer around it】

The Abyss Magic Mirror, which had always been used as an auxiliary logistics item,

Finally had its use in this vast, infinitely repeating corridor maze.

There were no mirrors installed in the corridors of the Dolphin Hotel.

And the length, width, and height of the corridor maze all exceeded the range of one kilometer, so it would not teleport Li Ang to other locations.

Therefore, the mirror shard (made with alchemy) that he had installed at the end of the spear before throwing it became the only designated teleportation location.

Clang.

Li Ang's palm gripped the end of the bamboo spear.

Within a radius of ten meters, divine power leaked out.

The bamboo spear blossomed, bore fruit, and grew vines and threads.

Like a bamboo cage, it firmly bound Hei Shengzi's main body in smoke.

Li Ang used divine power as a barrier, cutting off the connection between Hei Shengzi and his avatars,

And also cutting off his connection with the dark cloud above—most of the energy was in the dark cloud, and Hei Shengzi himself had become the biggest flaw in the so-called Ten Severing Torment Formation.

———

It's over.

Li Ang, holding the constantly shaking bamboo cage, fell downwards and nodded to Bai Haozheng and the others.

If Bai Haozheng and Yu Yixinzhong had not released control skills just now, the spear probably would not have hit Hei Shengzi.

"The cloud has dispersed."

Liu Wunao retracted his gaze from the drifting and dissipating dark cloud and looked at Li Ang, who was carrying the bamboo cage in his hand, and said calmly, "How do we deal with them?"

"Of course, we'll cut the weeds and eliminate the roots."

Li Ang shrugged, "Those who kill people will be killed.

It's not 3:30 yet.

We'll take Hei Shengzi and Dan Fei to the 13th floor and the real 11th floor to resolve them. The remaining people will return to their respective floors to calm the hotel's agitation.

At the same time, we'll meet the requirements of someone living or dying on each floor, so that the Tall Thin Hat won't appear.

By the way, where's your bottle?"

Liu Wunao took out the glass bottle covered with talismans. Li Ang stepped forward, wrapped the mouth of the bottle with the bamboo cage, slowly poured Hei Shengzi in black smoke form into the bottle, and closed the lid.

It was unknown what material this bottle was made of, but it could perfectly adapt to the size of the creatures that were put into it.

The black smoke that was cowering at the bottom of the bottle condensed into Hei Shengzi's face. The latter looked at the people outside the bottle with a pale and venomous expression, constantly opening and closing his mouth, making gestures.

It seemed like he was threatening and begging everyone.

"Phew, finally sealed him up."

Li Ang exhaled a breath of turbid air.

This mission was really a pain in the neck. The divine power that he had managed to accumulate was bottoming out again.

He didn't know how long he would have to wait to replenish it.

"..."

Bai Haozheng rubbed his sore shoulders and glanced at the giant plant vine ball that Wanli Fengdao had dragged over. The one locked in this ball should be the red-clad old woman.

Even the red-clad old woman who had devoured so many players was defeated by Li Risheng...

It seemed that the bureau's assessment of him might still be too low.

"Hei Shengzi might not be so easy to kill."

Bai Haozheng said calmly, "The Other Shore Organization might not be good at anything else, but they have never lacked sinister and poisonous magic.

Hei Shengzi is their young master. If we kill him,

We might suffer a blood feud curse. Even if we return to the real world, there is a certain probability that we will be locked onto and hunted down by the Other Shore Organization."

"Oh?"

Li Ang raised an eyebrow, his peripheral vision glancing at Mule. The latter nodded almost imperceptibly.

"That's troublesome."

Li Ang frowned slightly. He didn't mind being hunted down by the Other Shore Organization.

In fact, after knowing that he could be ranked fifty-sixth on the individual combat power ranking,

Li Ang's confidence had increased a lot.

However, he still cared about Li Ang's identity. Attracting the hatred of a medium-sized organization for no reason... wouldn't be a good thing.

He still wanted to finish high school and go to college.

"If you don't mind,"

Bai Haozheng looked around at the companions present and said with a faint smile, "I will lift the corridor maze later. We will go to the thirteenth floor together through the elevator shaft.

I will be responsible for killing Hei Shengzi."

Yu Yixinzhong glanced at him, "Aren't you afraid of the blood feud curse?"

"A blood feud curse is just a curse, not an instant-kill spell."

Bai Haozheng said indifferently, "If they have the ability, let the Other Shore Organization cross the ocean and come to the Special Affairs Bureau headquarters to seek revenge on me.

The Pacific Ocean isn't covered.

My colleagues and I in the Mobile Task Force will fully cooperate."

Bai Haozheng's rogue attitude, which was not afraid of boiling water, subverted his refined and gentlemanly image and won him the admiration of the other players.

As Bai Haozheng snapped his fingers, the maze corridor shrank again. The group went to the thirteenth floor through the elevator shaft.

Bai Haozheng killed Hei Shengzi, who had been threatening and begging for mercy all the time—to prove that he had indeed killed Hei Shengzi, Bai Haozheng generously showed his player information completely,

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Letting the others see that his experience bar and currency bar suddenly increased by 500 points (these points cannot be used in the script mission, they are just a reminder. They will be calculated with the evaluation coefficient after the mission is completed, and the final settlement will be made)

After confirming Hei Shengzi's death, the group came to the eleventh floor through the elevator shaft, ready to kill the red-clad old woman who was bound by the plant vine ball.

During this process, the group found that there were not many aberrations left wandering in the corridor.

They didn't know if it was because the elevator safety time had arrived and they were avoiding danger,

Or if it was because the hotel's agitation had calmed down a lot after Hei Shengzi was killed.

In the mission reward, every kill of any form of life would grant 500 experience points and game coins.

500 game coins were nothing.

But 500 experience points, with the blessing of a high reward coefficient, were still very considerable.

The right to harvest the red-clad old woman naturally fell into Li Ang's hands.

"Well, no one wants this kind of thing to happen. The most important thing in life is to be happy. I hope that after you die, you will seek revenge for grievances and hatred. Don't look for me.

I hope you can be born into a good family in your next life and grow up healthy and happy..."

Li Ang muttered, putting the vine ball into the eleventh-floor corridor and driving the few remaining swamp divine powers, causing a large number of spears to grow in the ball, piercing through the limbs of the red-clad old woman who was unconscious and had lost her senses.

Ding.

Five hundred arrived in his account. Li Ang listened to the prompt that sounded in his ear and nodded with satisfaction.

He was just about to use the vines to break the red-clad old woman into pieces and use alchemy to refine them into basic elements to eliminate future troubles when he heard a low human voice coming from the vine ball.

"Wait, don't do it yet."