Layer Change

Qi Yinming stood up with the help of Chen Zhaoxing, and upon hearing Yang Zhanbai's words, the two of them turned around simultaneously.

"Who died?!"

"Tu Shan?!"

Yang Zhanbai nodded, his expression grim.

"Yes. Tu Shan is dead. The news came from Zhu Ze Yu."

Qi Yinming felt a slight relief in his heart.

Oh, Zhu Ze Yu.

If the killing was done by Zhu Ze Yu, everything somehow became strangely reasonable.

He then noticed Yang Zhanbai's expression—

The man had his brows tightly furrowed, his facial muscles taut, showing not a trace of joy.

"What's wrong?" Qi Yinming grew tense as well. "Did something happen to Zhu Ze Yu?"

"He's injured."

Yang Zhanbai instinctively glanced toward the door, as if ready to rush out.

"At least Xu Tongguang was rescued. But we don't know how severe his injuries are."

Qi Yinming was much calmer than Yang Zhanbai.

He helped Chen Zhaoxing feed the cockroaches to the others and analyzed, "If he could still send a message, his injuries probably aren't too serious."

There were about a dozen people lying on the ground. Chen Zhaoxing had only pulled Yuan Chen and Qin Yang back up.

"These folks being alive is ridiculous too." He curled his lip. "Hell, who knows how much evil they've done."

"If it weren't for the lack of taste-testers, I really wouldn't want to feed them my new flavors..."

He cursed under his breath as he shoved a few greenish cockroaches into the mouths of the unconscious people, then quickly grabbed Qi Yinming.

"Hurry up, I need to get back to Room 303! It's late. I have to treat Zhu Ze Yu; I have to go to bed!"

Yang Zhanbai took one last look at the bodies scattered across the floor, then grabbed Yuan Chen and Qin Yang.

"Stay safe!"

He muttered quietly.

...

Zhu Yan sat in a chair, clutching his abdomen with a look of utter misery.

The next second, several loud bangs rang out in the middle of the dorm room.

Yang Zhanbai steadied himself against the bedframe, turned his head, and saw Zhu Yan sitting there. He let out a long sigh of relief.

"Damn, I was afraid you'd only be able to lie down!"

Zhu Yan wanted to curse.

But he had to play up his injury, so he just shot Yang Zhanbai a vicious glare and replied weakly.

"Can you not talk so much? Will it kill you?"

Chen Zhaoxing shoved two baijiu-and-chocolate-flavored cockroaches into his mouth.

"Recover first." He said cheerfully. "Zhu Ze Yu, what did you do? How did you end up in a direct confrontation with that Tu Shan character?"

Zhu Yan swallowed the two rich, thick cockroach candies with satisfaction, feeling a faint itch in the wounded area of his abdomen.

"There aren't just two Hunters outside; there's also some kind of weird horror creature."

After recovering a bit, Zhu Yan took two more cockroaches.

"This is an egg-millet flavor." Chen Zhaoxing happily introduced. "Even parrots love it!"

There was indeed a hint of egg fragrance.

Zhu Yan immediately stuffed them into his mouth, and only after his complexion regained some color did he begin to explain, glossing over the key points.

"Not long after I went out, a thick fog rose in the corridor."

"I couldn't see the way at all. No matter how I hit that fog, it wouldn't disperse."

Qi Yinming's expression grew serious.

He pointed at the mirror, and Zhu Yan saw that it had turned into a solid, gray-white surface.

"Like this?"

"Yes." Zhu Yan nodded. "Like a dark cloud. I couldn't find my way out no matter what. I walked for a long time before I ran into another player."

Zhu Yan started to feed them a fabricated version of events.

"He told me he could take me to a place where I'd find the Hunter. I followed him to a small room."

As Zhu Yan spoke, his lips trembled slightly, as though he had encountered something terrifying.

Xu Tongguang quickly added.

"That Hunter, for some reason, also took me to that room."

"Thinking about it now, it's strange. Why wouldn't he just kill me? Why bring me to that room?"

Xu Tongguang recalled the bizarre behavior of the senior Hunter and the erratic state of Tu Shan in that room, and he shuddered.

He tried hard to remember everything that had happened in the room, wanting to fill in the gaps for Zhu Ze Yu.

"Before I passed out, I heard them say something about needing a body, and they mentioned key fragments."

"But I don't know what that means. They knocked me out pretty quickly."

Zhu Yan nodded, a faint smirk tugging at his lips.

"That matches up, Xu Tongguang."

His tone was still weak, like a patient just recovering from a serious illness.

"You know what? Later, I found out that the player who took me to the room..."

He glanced at Yang Zhanbai, then at Qi Yinming, a flash of terror and disgust crossing his face.

Chen Zhaoxing quickly asked, "What happened to that player?"

Zhu Yan let out a dry heave.

After putting on this fake display of nausea, he said, "That player was a corpse that could move."

Yang Zhanbai's expression darkened further.

"That player had injuries—fatal ones."

"After he took me into the room, Tu Shan and the other Hunter discussed giving me to that fog outside."

Zhu Yan brazenly spun the story to tie everything together.

"That fog needs puppets. It must be some kind of special horror creature."

Yang Zhanbai stood up, walked to the mirror, and studied it carefully.

There was no sound or movement from outside the door, only a thick, oppressive gray-white stillness.

"This fog, besides being cold, doesn't seem to have any attack capabilities."

He turned around and briefly described to Zhu Yan what they had seen in Room 106.

"I think we should move to a safer floor, take turns washing up, and get to bed as soon as possible."

Yang Zhanbai leaned diagonally against the doorframe, observing for a moment, then rapped his knuckles on the door.

"This door is sturdy. There's not even a crack in it, so nothing to worry about."

"The guys in Room 106 were always up to no good, so we don't need to bother with them."

"What do you think, Zhu Ze Yu?"

Zhu Yan naturally agreed with Yang Zhanbai's suggestion.

"Let's head to the Xishan University cafeteria floor. It's safe there."

He couldn't wait to leave this bizarre fog, to avoid any further trouble.

Zhu Yan grabbed the red telephone on the table and pressed the callback button.

The call connected quickly.

Zhu Yan lowered his voice to explain his intentions to the pseudo-human on the other end, who seemed a bit taken aback.

"The Xishan University cafeteria floor? It's under renovation."

"Sir, would you mind going to the Boyang University cafeteria floor instead?"

The pseudo-human's tone rose in a lifelike simulation of surprise, and he even let out a little slurping sound.

"The night game is about to start. The Boyang University cafeteria floor has more people, and players can stay there for a particularly long time."

"Would that be acceptable, to go straight to that floor?"

Night game?

What was that—some kind of hunting activity that happens while players sleep?

Zhu Yan glanced back at the others. They exchanged wordless looks, all understanding each other's meaning.

Night game. Just from the name, it sounded unavoidable once it started.

In that case, the location didn't really matter.

"All right." Zhu Yan replied politely. "Please give me the floor-change command."

...

Inside Room 106.

An inexplicable cold was seeping into everyone's bones.

The cold wasn't freezing, but the dampness seeped into the very bones, forcing everyone to curl up on their beds, wrapping themselves in anything that could hold warmth.

Even so, some had faces turning blue and were shaking violently, clearly on the verge of mild hypothermia.

"W-what's going on?"

The man in glasses was on the verge of tears.

The cracks around the door were stuffed with tissues and clothes, but that clearly couldn't stop the cold mist.

It was as if the mist had a will of its own, surging into the room with almost frantic determination; the thin layers of fog rolled in at breakneck speed, pressing down on them with fierce intensity.

"W-where's the boss?" beside him, someone's voice was already choked with sobs.

"Damn it, what the hell is this stuff? I feel like it's angry or something."