The man beside her suddenly spoke into her ear, and Jiang Yuer instinctively leaned away. Before she could get angry, the unfamiliar voice spoke familiar words.
Jiang Yuer was stunned. In the darkness, her round, sweet face burst into a look of surprise, and her tired eyes sparkled.
"Yuan, Yuanzi?" She tilted her head, staring intently at the young man's face, as if she couldn't believe it.
"It's me," Zhang Yuanqing whispered:
"I'm here to save you, but due to special circumstances, my body cannot enter here. I can only send my consciousness to possess this young man..."
Before he could finish speaking, Jiang Yuer cheered and threw herself at him.
"I knew you'd come to save me. You're a member of the Dragon Team, you'd definitely come to save me." She was as happy as a little girl.
Dragon Team member, the more he heard it, the more chuuni it sounded. He should have thought of a better-sounding name. Oh well, Aunt doesn't understand anyway... Zhang Yuanqing reached out and pressed her shoulders, preventing her from throwing herself into his arms.
"Calm down, I have some things to ask you."
Jiang Yuer hummed unhappily, then suddenly winced in pain, her eyes filled with tears of grievance:
"Yuanzi, why did you take so long? Aunt's leg is injured. Will it leave a scar?"
As she spoke, her eyes welled up with tears, looking ready to cry.
Where did your calmness and strength go? Zhang Yuanqing comforted in a low voice, "It's okay, I'll take you out and find a way to treat your injury. It definitely won't leave a scar."
This kind of injury would have already healed itself for a The Way of the Extraordinary, even a weak Swordsman. But for ordinary people, it was a very serious injury, and could even lead to tetanus.
"What are you two talking about? I can't understand a word," a rather robust woman asked tentatively.
The other four people beside her looked over.
Zhang Yuanqing first patted his aunt's hand, signaling her to be quiet, then looked at the five people and said in a deep voice:
"I'm a member of the Songhai Special Operations Team. I'm here to save you."
As he spoke, he raised his hand and wiped his face. Instantly, a golden lacquer mark lit up on his brow, rapidly spreading across his entire face, painting a mask with a golden lacquer base, and black and red colors around the eyes, forehead, and lips.
The mask was dignified and imposing, awe-inspiring.
He didn't have the time, energy, or patience to explain to these ordinary people. Using an item to intimidate them directly was the most cost-effective way.
In an instant, the ordinary people inside the wooden house felt an unspeakable fear welling up in their hearts. This person in front of them seemed like a god, a high and mighty monarch.
Submission was their only emotion at this moment. Any doubts, dissatisfaction, or fear vanished.
Zhang Yuanqing's majestic gaze swept over everyone. He saw them bowing their heads in submission, saw his aunt's stunned face, which also contained a hint of adoration.
He felt inexplicably good. It wasn't the sense of superiority that an extraordinary person felt toward ordinary people, but the fact that he was showing off in front of his aunt that made him feel good.
"Tell me everything that happened after you entered this place," Zhang Yuanqing said in a low, authoritative voice.
The people didn't dare to disobey. They immediately began to describe, in great detail, what they had experienced after entering this world.
After being drawn into this world, they were chased by a terrifying monster. The monster was shaped like a wolf, three or four meters tall, walked upright, and killed anyone it saw.
The old, the weak, and the young were all caught and killed.
The seven of them fled all the way until they saw a wooden house here and hid inside.
The monster chased them here, but couldn't break open the wooden door, so it left in frustration.
Only then were their lives spared.
"That monster comes back about once an hour. It imitates the cries of a baby to trick us into opening the door. When that fails, it starts ramming the door. The whole wooden house is about to fall apart from its ramming, but it just can't get in," a strong middle-aged man said, his face filled with terror.
A werewolf three or four meters tall couldn't break open a wooden door? Unless this wooden door was strange. That would fit the sealing characteristic of the Eternal Night profession, but the Eternal Night profession shouldn't involve werewolves... After listening, Zhang Yuanqing suddenly felt like something was missing.
After thinking about it, he suddenly remembered, what about the little girl in the red triangular hat?
"You saw a little girl in a red hat in the tunnel, and then you inexplicably entered this place. But from beginning to end, the little girl in the red hat hasn't appeared," Zhang Yuanqing asked:
"Has anyone seen her since entering this place?"
Jiang Yuer shook her head, "We've only seen the monster, Yuanzi. Is there a problem?"
The others shook their heads, indicating that they hadn't seen her.
Strange, could that little girl have turned into a werewolf? While Zhang Yuanqing was thinking, he looked around the wooden house.
The wooden house wasn't small. On the left were a fireplace, a wooden dining table, a water tank, and other items, which was where they were. On the right was a simple wooden bed, and a small desk by the window.
The fireplace was connected to a chimney, and on top was a large iron pot. Zhang Yuanqing lifted the lid, and a sour, rancid smell wafted out.
The pot was filled with rotten beans.
The tableware on the dining table consisted of wooden bowls, wooden spoons, and half a piece of blackened, hard bread.
The many details in the wooden house told him that the owner here was a foreigner, and a foreigner from the Middle Ages.
Zhang Yuanqing walked around the fireplace and the dining table, but didn't find anything of value. Then, he walked towards the wooden bed.
Jiang Yuer followed closely behind her nephew.
Zhang Yuanqing had no choice but to support her, carefully avoiding obstacles to prevent her from bumping into the wound and making it worse.
"Yuanzi, tell me secretly, which evil villain is causing trouble this time? Dr. Octopus or the skateboarding mad scientist?"
With her nephew by her side, Jiang Yuer wasn't afraid at all, and showed a strong curiosity about supernatural events.
"This is a sudden incident. I don't understand what the enemy is yet," Zhang Yuanqing replied, half-truthfully.
"Is this mask your superpower? Isn't your superpower invisibility? Can you put it away? I'm a little scared," she said, both curiously and weakly.
"No," Zhang Yuanqing refused.
"Why not?"
Because putting away the mask is the same as stopping its use, then I have to pay the price of a drastic change in temperament. You don't want to see me saying 'Auntie, muah muah' one second, and then slapping you across the face the next, cold and ruthless... Zhang Yuanqing couldn't explain it, so he didn't answer.
He and his aunt walked around the wooden bed, but didn't find anything. However, on the desktop by the window, they found a piece of parchment.
The paper had a few lines of writing in a foreign language. By the moonlight, the nephew and aunt lowered their heads to read.
"That little bitch will definitely come to take revenge on me, she will... She is a bastard, the bastard child of her mother and a monster, so she is also a monster."
"Those foolish people only burned her mother, but didn't burn her. Now she's grown up, she'll come back to kill me and take revenge... The priest set up a barrier in my house, she can't get in, but I always have to leave the wooden house, I need help... There is an old hunter in this forest, he used to like me when he was young."
"Damn it, that old bastard agreed to protect me, but he demands to sleep in the wooden house every night. I hate the stench on him, he never bathes... But I can only submit, because his shotgun can kill that little bitch."
"I told him that if he knocks on the door four times every night outside the house, the barrier will disappear and he can come in. Oh, I really hate him, because he never bathes..."
The content ended there.
Something's not right, I have a feeling I've entered a dungeon... Zhang Yuanqing silently complained in his heart. According to the contents of the parchment, the owner of the wooden house had an enemy.
She was sure that her enemy would come to take revenge, which meant that the burning of the "little bitch's" mother had a great relationship with the owner of the wooden house.
"So the wooden house has a barrier, no wonder the monster can't get in, Yuanzi. So, does that mean the werewolf is the little girl in the red hat?" Aunt said quietly.
Their heads were very close together. When she spoke, her breath was like orchids, and her body gave off a faint fragrance.
"What makes you say that?" Zhang Yuanqing asked in return.
"Didn't it say above that the little bitch was born from her mother and a monster? And after we came here, we only saw the monster, not the little girl in the red hat," Jiang Yuer's thinking was very clear.
"No, I think the monster is the hunter," Zhang Yuanqing said.
"The hunter?" Jiang Yuer widened her eyes in surprise, "Isn't the hunter supposed to protect the owner of the wooden house? How could he become a monster?"
"I don't know, but I just heard those people say that the monster knocks on the door once every hour. You've been missing for about three hours, so it knocked three times, right? The monster only needs one more time, and it can come in," Zhang Yuanqing said:
"The monster knows the way to enter the wooden house... Why are you avoiding me?"
Jiang Yuer had a look of disgust on her face, "You have bad breath, have you forgotten to brush your teeth?"
...Zhang Yuanqing said angrily, "Your life is almost gone, and you're still worried about bad breath? Besides, this isn't even my body. Do you believe I'll just leave?"
Jiang Yuer was able to be flexible:
"Yuanzi still smells good, but your analysis is too arbitrary. Couldn't it be that the little bitch captured the hunter and threatened him to tell her how to enter the wooden house?"
"That possibility can't be ruled out," Zhang Yuanqing nodded.
Jiang Yuer tilted her head, thinking seriously for a moment, and said:
"Yuanzi, I feel like it's a little familiar. The little girl in the red hat, the owner of the wooden house, and what's written above... It's very familiar, but I can't quite put my finger on it."
Familiar? Zhang Yuanqing thought, you're just a mortal, how could you be familiar with a The Way of the Extraordinary item?
But after hearing his aunt say that, Zhang Yuanqing thought about it carefully and realized that he did have a strong sense of deja vu.
"Ah, I remember," Aunt clapped her little hand, "Little Red Riding Hood!"
Little Red Riding Hood!!
Zhang Yuanqing had a sudden epiphany. That's right, Little Red Riding Hood.
Putting aside the bizarre and terrifying reality, if you only look at the keywords, little girl in a red hat, forest, hunter, wooden house, werewolf... These elements combined, aren't they the story of Little Red Riding Hood?
"So the owner of the wooden house is Little Red Riding Hood's grandmother? The grandmother who was eaten by the wolf?" Zhang Yuanqing read the parchment again, and slowly pieced together the entire plot in his mind.
Little Red Riding Hood's mother had her with a monster. After the grandmother found out, she gathered the people and burned her mother to death, but the young Little Red Riding Hood escaped.
The grandmother knew that Little Red Riding Hood was a hybrid monster, and worried that she would take revenge when she grew up, so she hid in the wooden house that had been blessed by the priest.
But that still wasn't safe, so the grandmother made a deal with the hunter in the forest. The hunter could come to sleep in the wooden house every night, on the condition that he helped her kill Little Red Riding Hood.
What kind of dark story is this?
Also, why would an item contain such a space, such a story?
This could already become a dungeon.
It's also possible that these were originally part of a dungeon? The foreign The Way of the Extraordinary cleared this dungeon, subdued a certain item, and then stripped it from the main dungeon?
The space they entered was not only a space formed by the Eternal Night profession's item, but also once part of a dungeon?
That's why he had such a strong sense of entering a dungeon.
There's no point in thinking about this now. Once he gets that item, the truth will come out... Zhang Yuanqing muttered in his heart.
"Aunt, when did the monster knock last time?"
"A long time ago," Jiang Yuer said.
"How long ago is 'a long time ago'?"
"Let me ask..." Jiang Yuer said softly to her companions who were huddled by the fireplace:
"Sister Li, what time is it now?"
The middle-aged woman with a rather robust figure took out her phone, looked at it, and whispered back:
"It's ten thirty."
A phone? Uh, I almost forgot, this isn't a dungeon. You can bring your phone in. No wonder they can clearly calculate that the monster knocks once every hour... Zhang Yuanqing was stunned when he saw the phone, and then remembered that this was an item space.
"Yuanzi, it's exactly four hours," Jiang Yuer's face became flustered.
She entered this place at 6:30 in the afternoon, and now it was 10:30 at night, exactly four hours.
The monster knocks once every hour, the fourth time is coming soon.
Just then, heavy footsteps sounded outside the wooden house. In the darkness, some huge monster was coming over.