Ashes of the Dead

Is it real or fake?

Zhu Yan didn't believe a single word.

Although "Everyone Has Their Own Destiny" didn't give him any prompts, to be fair, this Li Daochang - no, this thing hiding inside Li Daochang, was really taking him for a fool.

What did it mean by saying "He is the master here"?

The name of the copy was "Where Is Mother", and the task of the "Hunter" was to spread Mother's contamination.

When told that Li Daochang was the master here, Zhu Yan only had one thought in his mind.

It was not sincere at all. It showed no real intention.

It seemed that he had to play the game on his own.

Expecting a terrifying creature to expose itself willingly was just too naive.

"What should I offer?" Zhu Yan asked in a compliant manner, then changed the subject and, imitating Jin Rongxu, mercilessly betrayed his teammates.

"This offering doesn't necessarily have to be something from myself, right?"

"Can I offer other people's lives?"

Except for Zhu Zeyu's and Jin Rongxu's.

"That's not enough," Li Daochang said. It simply didn't understand Zhu Yan's sense of humor and its face drooped.

Meanwhile, out of its sight, a wisp of "Fog" separated from under Zhu Yan's feet and quickly scurried up the stairs.

Zhu Yan couldn't just keep chatting with Li Daochang and passively continue the game.

Since this house belonged to Li Daochang, there must be other clues hidden inside.

Anyway, it couldn't be wrong to take a look around first.

"What do you want?" Zhu Yan asked Li Daochang on the first floor.

Strange. Everything was so strange.

Originally, Zhu Yan even thought that he might face an unsolvable boss in the game like Kayako when dealing with Li Daochang.

A boss with no sanity, unable to communicate, only knowing to deceive and kill them.

But Li Daochang actually didn't attack for a long time. Instead, it used such a gentle way to persuade Zhu Yan to offer something.

Did this thing need certain conditions to attack?

Or was the thing it wanted to get something special that it couldn't take by force?

...

In the field of vision of the "Fog", there were only two rooms and a storage room on the second floor. One of the room doors was locked.

The place looked dirty. The open - door room seemed to have not been cleaned for a long time. Zhu Yan even smelled the stench of excrement and the smell of old rust.

The stench of excrement was floating out from behind one of the closed doors.

Holding back his nausea, Zhu Yan manipulated the "Fog" to separate a small wisp and squeeze through the crack of the door.

"I can let you participate in the deal," Li Daochang sneered. "Of course, all those people you brought here have to participate in the deal too. This is a necessary step."

Zhu Yan didn't say a word for the moment because the situation inside the room on the second floor scared him.

In the form of "Fog", floating on the ceiling, he saw at a glance a gaunt person in the middle of the bed!

It seemed to be a woman. Her hair obviously hadn't been washed for many days. It was tangled messily and hung down long, covering her face.

"Also," Li Daochang continued. "Since your behavior has been extremely offensive, you have to pay double the price to buy."

Zhu Yan forced himself to focus on Li Daochang first.

Li Daochang's lifeless eyes showed no light, and Zhu Yan couldn't see its pupils clearly.

"You know," Li Daochang said. "Human flesh is very precious..."

"How much do you sell a portion of human flesh for?" Zhu Yan suddenly asked.

He already knew the answer to this question, but earlier, "Everyone Has Their Own Destiny" had also prompted that what this ghostly Li Daochang was selling might not be human flesh at all.

He had to use this kind of meaningless chitchat to buy some time and try to gather more useful information upstairs.

...

On the second floor, the other part of the "Fog" that wasn't in the woman's room gently floated into another bedroom.

This was obviously Li Daochang's own bedroom. There was a very old wedding photo on the head of the double - bed, showing what the corpse downstairs looked like when it was young.

At the end of the bed, there was a very simple wooden table. There was a can of milk powder and a bucket of lime on the table.

Next to the lime, there was also a simple - looking wooden box, which also contained some gray - white powder.

For some unknown reason, the things in this box made Zhu Yan a little scared.

When he got a little closer, the terrible coldness directly penetrated him.

Even his body on the first floor was frozen so that his bones ached.

...

"Damn it!" Zhu Yan on the first floor couldn't hold it in anymore.

Li Daochang's face suddenly darkened. "Do you think it's too expensive?"

Hearing this question, Zhu Yan actually felt a strange sense of relief.

He had already seen clearly what was upstairs.

The gray - white powder should be ashes because there were also unburned bone fragments in it. There was also a name pasted on the side of the wooden box.

It was Li Daochang's deceased wife!

"You're asking for 500,000. Why don't you just rob people?" Zhu Yan quickly put on a bargaining pose.

He wasn't that afraid of Li Daochang now.

The name of the copy was "Where Is Mother", and the task was "Expand Mother's contamination".

And a part of "Mother" was upstairs.

If it was "Mother" that was controlling Li Daochang, and "Mother" was of a very high level, and everything was normal...

Then when Zhu Yan used his level - 0 "Fog" to investigate, "Mother" couldn't be as indifferent as if she didn't see it. Li Daochang, being controlled by "Mother", would definitely show some reaction.

But Li Daochang didn't.

Li Daochang seemed not to notice the abnormality upstairs at all. It just asked Zhu Yan if the price was too high.

Could it be that the ashes and the "Fog" had some special attributes and were restricted by the controlled terrifying creature?

Or was there some other mystery...

"500,000," Li Daochang smiled again.

"I know the world has changed. Your 500,000 can be converted into 5,000 bone gold coins. I know each of you can afford it.

"You said that the one outside is your puppet, so you're actually the leader of them. You can make them pay.

"This first deal isn't a bad one, right? You pay the money first, and we'll have a second deal."

Zhu Yan was a bit shocked.

Was this terrifying creature out of its mind?

After going around in such a big circle, all it wanted was money?

However, now everything was full of doubts, and Zhu Yan didn't want to pay the money without knowing what was going on.

...

In the yellow small building, Zhu Zeyu looked at the second - level "Walking Corpse" and suddenly asked an out - of - the - blue question.

"What exactly are you trading? If we buy human flesh, can we really eat human flesh?"

It wasn't that he was just guessing randomly.

There was only a small half left of the box of ashes in Li Daochang's house. The milk powder and lime next to it seemed to be things used to mix with the ashes to make fakes.

It really seemed like they were being sold in portions!

Was it possible that what these people had been selling before was ashes?