Chapter 1 Suren Restrains His Thoughts

Suren tried his best to control his thoughts, not dwelling on the fact that the basement was a cursed space.

He feared being sucked in too early and encountering the blue-skinned undead. If he were instantly killed or forced to retreat prematurely, the ambush would be meaningless.

However, upon entering, he found the situation to be quite favorable.

The familiar scenery around him was unmistakably the third floor of the "Havier Hospital" inpatient department.

It was equally empty, without any people or monsters.

Suren breathed a sigh of relief, also grateful that his ambush plan had already succeeded in large part.

.......

This cursed space, after killing someone, could trap their soul here.

Then, the events after that person's death would repeatedly rewind.

Now that no blue-skinned undead appeared on the third floor, Suren guessed that the possible events had rewound again.

As long as he didn't trigger the safe in the Dean's office on the second floor, that undead shouldn't come up to the third floor.

If it weren't for that blue-skinned undead, Suren would have been curious if the "Blind Detective" Bill was still sitting on the second floor. After all, the last time he was "killed," only a part of his soul was stripped away. Perhaps it could be stripped away a few more times.

But he definitely couldn't go there now.

Then, Suren began to implement his "Plan B."

Without any delay, he formed a Warlock's seal with his hands, unlocked his bio-armor, and cold flames rose from his body.

This time, he didn't just want to leave "Plague Doctor" Sergei in this cursed space.

He wanted to kill him face-to-face and find a way to break the curse.

Because, generally speaking, the person who uses poison carries the antidote with them.

.......

Sure enough, before long, the space not far away twisted, and Sergei suddenly appeared in the corridor.

Looking at the changing scenery around him, the guy's eyes were full of doubt, obviously not understanding what had happened yet. But when he saw Suren with his menacing eight-armed spider spear not far away, he immediately realized he had been set up and looked wary.

Seeing the person arrive, Suren's lips curled into a smile, as if a host greeting a guest, warmly saying, "You've arrived, Mr. Sergei."

But as he spoke, he didn't give the enemy any chance to cast a curse. He immediately controlled his emotions and thought of an image in his mind: a ferocious Spider Queen appearing right in the center of the corridor, facing Sergei at close range!

As soon as this thought arose, a behemoth appeared in the corridor. A bloated spider abdomen, a menacing eight-armed spider spear, a beautiful upper body – this was the "Lord-level" Spider Queen that Suren had encountered in the catacombs.

.......

That's right, Suren's idea was to use this space's "terror manifestation" rule to kill the enemy!

If he only lured the person in, he could indeed kill them.

But there was also a problem: he couldn't get the enemy's loot.

Even if he came in again next time and the enemy was already dead, he would still encounter the enemy's "soul manifestation." Then, he would have to face not only the enemy but also the monster he had imagined, making it even more difficult.

But now that Suren was afflicted with the [Raven's Plague Curse], he had to get Sergei's storage ring and memory fragments.

Therefore, this guy had to die here.

He had to die in front of him.

And the most difficult part of this ambush plan was this.

The monsters manifested in this space attacked indiscriminately.

That meant Suren had to imagine a target that could kill the enemy but allow him to survive the monster.

The enemy he dared to lure in, at the risk of his own life, had to be a second-tier or higher profession.

A monster that could kill a second-tier could usually easily kill Suren, a first-tier.

But... there was an exception.

That was the mentally strong "Spider Queen"!

Suren had personally witnessed that monster easily kill a second-tier assassin in the catacombs, meaning that the Spider Queen's mental control was effective against most second-tier professionals.

Moreover, most importantly, Suren speculated that there was also a hidden rule in this space, which was that the more realistic the details of the "terror manifestation," the more controllable its abilities. (Imagining Cthulhu would most likely result in an ordinary octopus-headed monster because you simply don't know what that level of power means.)

So, it was best to manifest a monster that he had personally experienced and thoroughly understood its abilities.

Coincidentally, he knew almost all the detailed data of the Spider Queen, even the intensity of its mental shockwave.

Especially now that he had fused with the eight-armed spider spear, the monster had almost no secrets in Suren's eyes.

It was like playing a game; it's easy to wipe out when fighting a new boss, but the more you fight, the more you find the pattern, and the smaller the battle damage becomes.

This Spider Queen was strong; its mental control could affect people without even looking at them, and its skin could withstand alchemical bullets at point-blank range.

But Suren was very clear about one thing: the Spider Queen's gaze was like a light wave, and it could only attack targets it could see.

That was why the monster Suren imagined had its abdomen facing him and its face facing Sergei.

This narrow corridor might be spacious for humans, but for the bloated Spider Queen, turning around was difficult.

.......

The moment the monster appeared, Sergei sensed the crisis of death and instinctively prepared to cast spells to resist.

But the Spider Queen looked directly at the human in front of it, its eyes shining with red light, and a powerful mental force swept through the entire tunnel like a tide.

Even Suren behind it felt a daze.

And Sergei, who was being attacked head-on, instantly lost consciousness.

The Spider Queen didn't hesitate. It raised its spider spear and stabbed, piercing the guy from head to toe.

In one face-to-face encounter, it killed a second-tier professional.

Seeing this from afar, Suren was overjoyed: "Killed him!"

If he couldn't control Sergei, he would immediately recite the name of that resentful master and leave.

Now, seeing this, the plan was going smoothly.

But suddenly, Suren's gaze fixed on Sergei's corpse, which didn't show any signs of gray mist, and his pupils shrank: "No, he's not dead yet!"

The spider spear had pierced Sergei's skull, but at this moment, the corpse actually turned into a raven corpse the size of a human.

And the back of the corpse tore open like a cicada shedding its skin, and a pale-faced middle-aged man staggered out from behind the husk.

"Is this his legendary ability to avoid physical damage?"

Suren also understood that this guy seemed to have a raven substitute with a similar effect to a "substitute puppet."

It was fortunate that he hadn't chosen to use the scythe earlier, otherwise, if this strike hadn't killed him, things would have gone wrong.

And at this moment, Sergei temporarily regained consciousness because of his rebirth.

Unfortunately, he was still at point-blank range from the monster.

The Spider Queen wasn't surprised. It glared and gave the human in front of it another mental shockwave.

Then, after controlling him, it directly stabbed his chest with another spear.

Seeing the "gray mist" floating from the corpse, Suren finally confirmed that the guy was really dead this time.

Facing this kind of mental monster at point-blank range, there was nowhere to escape. Even if this [Plague Doctor] had countless strange and unpredictable spells, he didn't get to use them and was directly killed twice in a row.

As soon as Sergei died, the Spider Queen naturally discovered the other human behind it.

Just as the bloated spider body showed signs of turning around, Suren's two puppets suddenly appeared, spewing a mouthful of black oil and phosphorus fire at the queen.

The flames instantly ignited the spider body and the corridor.

And Suren didn't continue to attack. He quickly manipulated the eight-armed spider spear and charged towards the Spider Queen.

Just as the monster had just turned one hundred and eighty degrees, Suren happened to reach its back. He pulled the steel wire in his mechanical gauntlet, and his whole body was pulled past the monster's burning back.

This time, unlike last time in the catacombs, he couldn't kill it, and he didn't need to kill this monster at all.

He just brushed past it, taking advantage of this close proximity to leap over, allowing Suren to perfectly avoid the mental shockwave from the Spider Queen's face.

In the air, he instantly retracted his bio-armor, then rolled and landed, peeled off the storage ring from the corpse, devoured the ball of gray mist, and completely recited the syllables in his mouth: "Tielmido..."

Hmm... suitable for some venomous women to torment their rivals in love.

But suddenly, an inspiration flashed in his mind.

"Huh, if the damage increases the closer you are... if I solidify this curse spell into a cursed puppet doll, and it absorbs the enemy's blood in battle, wouldn't the enemy hurt themselves if they attacked the doll? This curse spell seems pretty good?"

Suren only had a book of beginner's cursed puppet making, which explained the basic making methods and theories of various cursed puppets, but there weren't many finished design drawings.

But it did write a sentence with unlimited possibilities: "Creativity and imagination are the most valuable qualities of a cursed puppet master. A qualified cursed puppet master needs to create cursed puppets that suit them."

Suren thought that this idea of "curse spell + doll" was a good one.

The thought flashed through his mind, thinking that he could try it out in the future.

After digesting the harvested memories, he picked up the raven beak mask he had grabbed from Sergei's corpse.

After identifying it, it was also a powerful cursed object.

[Plague Doctor's Raven Beak Mask]

Quality: Silver

Description: Plague doctor, is it the god of death who spreads the plague, or the doctor who saves lives and heals the sick?

Cursed characteristics: A gas mask with cursed characteristics. Wearing it, you can filter out more than 99% of the toxins in the air; wearing the mask for a long time will slowly increase your toxin resistance, and your plague resistance will be greatly improved; but occasionally, you will be inexplicably poisoned or infected with the plague due to the residual old toxins in the mask;

Details: 1,800 years ago, when the plague was rampant in a certain city, a kind doctor wore it to solve the terrible plague; after he died, the reputation of the plague doctor spread.

The properties of this mask were very good, almost 100% toxin filtration, which was a big step ahead of the top gas masks on the market.

Moreover, long-term wearing could slowly increase the body's toxin resistance. This was also a very good growth attribute; the higher the toxin resistance, the better.

"The thing is good, but the recognition is too high. Wearing this, I'm afraid the entire Old Lingdun will know that I killed Sergei..."

Suren raised his eyebrows slightly. For him, it was a rather tasteless thing.

He wasn't a professional doctor, and the cursed characteristic of occasional poisoning was very "lucky." Taking a breath, the toxins might not be filtered out, and he might even be infected with ancient toxins.

He couldn't guarantee that he would be able to detoxify it if he was poisoned.

Moreover, he dared to say that if he wore this mask, those Raven Gang guys would definitely never let it go.

........

It was a bit of a pity that due to time constraints, he didn't take out the job-change materials and bio-armor on Sergei's corpse.

But it was still good.

Killing was the goal, and escaping and harvesting was just a bonus.

Suren also felt quite satisfied.

He thought that by triggering the cursed space, Mr. Black would appear.

Suren wanted to apologize to him.

But after waiting for a while, he didn't come, and Suren didn't stay in the apartment for long.

He had wasted a lot of time killing Sergei, and the vanguard of the Umbrella organization in the inner city had probably arrived in the South City.

What he had to do now was to immediately return to Green Street and take his belongings out of the city.