Thrilling Delight

If he didn't need to eat human flesh often, Zhu Yan could barely accept it.

He turned his head to look at the tuxedo cat, which was looking up and acting cute, and gave its eyesight a negative review.

This was simply an insult to his looks.

"Change back to pure black." He glanced at the driver in the front seat and whispered a threat to the cat, "Or I'll kill you."

The cat's round eyes stared at him, completely ignoring the remark.

It ran onto Zhu Yan's body and rolled over to expose its soft belly.

"Furthermore, a [Cat] is the natural enemy of a [Plague Demon] and does not fear pestilence."

"Once a [Cat] acknowledges a master, its level will remain consistent with its master's."

At this point, the broadcast actually let out a crisp laugh.

"Finally, an explanation in passing."

"Your [Cat] refuses to change color because it believes you possess a crazy kind of caution. This is also why it chose you."

"Please pay attention to the [Player Personal Center]. We look forward to our next encounter."

Well, probably because he had merged with [Trembling Joy], his personal center had also undergone changes.

The broadcast completely ended.

There were only seven minutes left in the car ride.

Zhu Yan thought for a moment and still chose to stare at the palm of his left hand for three seconds, entering the [Player Personal Center].

Before the page popped up, a scarlet text box first occupied Zhu Yan's field of vision.

"Detected that you have merged with [Trembling Joy]."

"We will retain the [Player Personal Center] for you and plot the passages to [Carnival Paradise] on your map."

"Please pay attention to notifications and complete the thriller novice mission as soon as possible to unlock the [Hunter Personal Center]."

These words were easy to understand. That thriller novice mission was probably the same kind of thing as the initial player novice instance.

By analogy, after passing this mission, Zhu Yan would be able to enter the [Hunter Personal Center] by staring at the palm of his right hand.

The text box lingered in Zhu Yan's line of sight for quite some time before disappearing.

Zhu Yan clicked to check the [Thriller Map].

The familiar two-layered map spread out horizontally in his vision, penetrating the leather backrest of the driver's seat in front of him, glowing faintly in the cramped space.

Red dots representing the rhythm of the music danced on the monitor to the driver's right, echoing the red lines connecting the two layers of the map.

These red lines were shortening at an extremely slow pace visible to Zhu Yan's naked eye, pulling the lower layer's [Carnival Paradise] up bit by bit.

At this speed, in three months at the absolute latest, Anwu City would be completely covered in instances, right?

Zhu Yan observed for a moment, then shifted his gaze to look at a few locations he knew.

In just two or three days, the overlapping space between the [Hall of Mourning] and Wanxiang Square had visibly grown larger.

In addition, several houses on Meiyuan Street were also overlapping with small buildings from [Carnival Paradise].

Apart from the [Hall of Mourning], what attracted Zhu Yan's attention the most was a newly appeared clock.

This was a circular clock floating in mid-air over [Carnival Paradise] like a moon disk, its face painted with a heavy, exaggeratedly laughing human face.

Judging from the proportions, this clock was too enormous, a full half the size of that weeping head in the [Hall of Mourning].

In terms of location, this clock was right below Anwu North Station, which was the location of Zhu Yan's second instance, [Cat and Mouse Game].

At this rate of convergence, it wouldn't be long before it surfaced.

What was this?

Some instance, or something [Carnival Paradise] would use in the future to replace the sun and measure time?

Zhu Yan steadied his mind, concentrated, and continued to look at the map.

On the map, the layer belonging to Anwu City had gained some bright fluorescent green icons.

The icons were drawn in the shape of a bow and arrow, exactly the same as the one in the palm of Zhu Yan's hand, except for the color.

The words "Exclusive Passage" floated next to the arrows.

Zhu Yan counted them one by one. There were only ten icons in total, distributed extremely unevenly.

Near his future school, Xishan University, there were as many as five such icons.

Of the remaining icons, one was in the old town area where he was currently located, one was in the fallen Meiyuan Street, and the other three were distributed in places Zhu Yan neither recognized nor had ever visited.

It seemed these were the special passages that led to [Carnival Paradise].

Zhu Yan stared at the marker located in the old town area and zoomed in to check.

"Passage Location: Under the dining table, Room 401, Building 5, Shiqiao Alley."

Zhu Yan fell silent, and then a faint sense of joy welled up in his heart.

The passage closest to him was actually inside the guesthouse where he was currently staying.

What kind of luck was this!

Zhu Yan continued reading down and saw a line of small text.

"You now share the same goal as us. This passage is a special welfare gift granted to you."

No wonder.

After all, Zhu Yan could now be considered a chess piece of [Carnival Paradise].

"Activation Method: Please press the icon on the palm of your right hand tightly against the ground for one second."

The car ride was about to end.

Zhu Yan took a few last glances at the text and closed the player center.

He had finally returned to his own world.

The slight humming of the moving car, the background music, and the driver's humming filled his ears.

Zhu Yan looked at the gradually familiar old streets outside the window, and a faint drowsiness naturally flooded his mind.

This time, holding the cat, he still very cautiously bypassed the camera blind spots and walked into the old concrete stairwell.

Two hours later.

Zhu Yan lay contentedly on his bed; beside him was the cat he had washed clean and blow-dried.

He knew there were still many things to do—

For example, going to the [Recitative Platform] once, or dealing with that paper card from The Failed Art Student, which he had casually stuffed into his pocket.

The addresses on it were all in Anwu City, and there was even one inside his future university.

Zhu Yan had to go see what was there eventually.

But right now, in the cool air-conditioned room, under the soft covers, he was sleepy.

Zhu Yan ran through the things he needed to do in his mind like a revolving lantern and soon fell into a deep slumber.

...

Ten hours later.

The safe and warm darkness was broken by a few vague sirens.

Zhu Yan groggily opened his eyes and found that the sunlight had already pierced through the thick curtains.

As his consciousness gradually cleared, the sirens also became distinct. Zhu Yan recognized them as belonging to the police and emergency medical services.

Police and EMS?

Downstairs from his place?

Yesterday, Guan En had confirmed with him that during the [Plague Exemption Time], the virus could still be transmitted to other people.

To avoid the cameras, they had walked all over this small half of the urban village.

Even earlier, Zhu Yan had eaten soup dumplings and taken a bus to the supermarket.

Thinking about it this way, the virus...

Zhu Yan threw off the covers, jumped out of bed, pulled open the curtains, and looked down through the glass.

This small street seemed to have been cleared out. Zhu Yan saw staff in hazmat suits standing at the entrance of the apartment building, and the row of snack shops across the street were all closed.

Not far away, the door of the soup dumpling shop was wide open, and a large patch of highly abnormal dark red, mud-like substance was flowing down the stone steps in front of the door.

It seemed no one dared to approach the soup dumpling shop—even the police cordon was set up more than ten meters away from the main door.

Zhu Yan shifted his position, catching a faint glimpse of several ivory-white skeletons in the mud, still clinging with fascia and blackened flesh.

Even though he had already seen his share of death, witnessing such a scene still made Zhu Yan sick to his stomach.

Especially knowing that the woman's death was his doing.

In the future, even more people would die by his hands.

Nausea churned in Zhu Yan's stomach like a thick, sticky mire.

Unable to hold it back any longer, he rushed to the bathroom and threw up.