Chapter 33: BS01
“Truly insane!”
A single comment from an onlooker in Yong Ye City perfectly summed up what Jin Cheng and Tang Cuo did over the next hour or so. These two rode the tram all the way from the edge of Zone F back to East Cross Street, changing routes halfway to turn it into a Zone F concert tour, broadcasting the song Evening Primrose to every corner.
Everyone in Zone F had never found this song so brainwashing.
During the tour, the tram’s original “ding-ding” turned into a “clatter-clank”, but no matter how battered it became, looking as if it would fall apart the next second, it remained steadfast on the road, speeding like lightning.
Tang Cuo gradually forgave its exorbitant fare.
Amidst the “clatter-clank”, the tram finally headed to its final destination—East Cross Street.
Jin Cheng still hadn’t figured out where the Puppet Master was. He might be completely unremarkable in appearance, perhaps just any person standing by the side of the street; the only distinguishing feature would be the threads wrapped around his fingers.
But Yong Ye City was, after all, a city shrouded in eternal night. No matter how bright the streetlights were, visibility was hindered.
Most of the attackers this time were long-range fighters and crowd-control types. Coupled with various items thrown into the mix, very few actually rushed up to fight in close combat. Who knew how many people were hiding in the dark alleys, behind windows, and on rooftops. Countless people harbored ulterior motives, but none managed to deal a devastating blow to Jin Cheng and Tang Cuo.
Mr. Crow was continuously jumping up and down in anger.
Yong Ye City had an automatic repair function; it could be smashed to bits today, but upon waking up tomorrow, it would be exactly the same as before. In the past, Mr. Crow never minded the players destroying the city; he would even relish watching the show from the sidelines. The fiercer they fought, the happier he was watching.
But today was different.
Two Blacklisted individuals were parading through the streets and had even smashed his bronze statue. Unfortunately, since this wasn’t inside an instance, he couldn’t do anything to them, so he could only jump from one roof to another, attempting to curse them to death.
As he cursed, he couldn’t help but feel a bit of pity.
Look at 79081, such sharp skills, such an annoying yet endearing personality. He used to like him so much in the past, but he just had to be disobedient.
And look at 27216, see that righteous yet expressionless little face, setting fires and drawing blades without batting an eye—truly making Mr. Crow both love and hate him.
Truly infuriating for a crow.
Pissing this crow off to death.
None of these players in sheep’s clothing were any good, hmph.
“Just you wait! One day, the great and kind Mr. Crow will peck you all to death, one by one!” Mr. Crow flapped his wings, thought about it, felt it wasn’t right, and immediately corrected himself: “No, I’m going to skewer you on a tree! As my exhibits! That’s right!”
“I’m going to turn you into statues and erect them in every street and alley of Yong Ye City, so everyone will know my greatness! Hahahahaha!”
The more Mr. Crow spoke, the happier he got. His mood improved, and he stopped losing feathers.
Tang Cuo looked up at him in the distance and asked Jin Cheng, “Has he lost his mind?”
Before Jin Cheng could answer, Mr. Crow snapped his head back. “What did you say?! 27216! I heard that! Did you think I couldn’t hear you? I heard you!”
Tang Cuo shut his mouth.
Mr. Crow itched to give him a good peck.
At this time, the tram finally drove into East Cross Street. Tang Cuo could clearly feel the hidden killing intent around them fade significantly, and the prying eyes lessened as well.
That prickly tension of having eyes on their backs was slowly receding.
The conductor dropped them off at the bus stop closest to Tang Cuo’s residence, waved, and left. He hadn’t gotten tired of that song yet. In the battered carriage, only the gramophone remained completely intact. The time-steeped vocals drifted through the night of Yong Ye City, carrying an indescribable charm.
East Cross Street was chilly and quiet.
Under Chi Yan’s warning, the players had all turtled up inside their rooms. Only the bold ones dared to step into the corridors or lean out their windows to check the situation, though their hearts were still filled with unease. They had all heard the commotion outside just now. East Cross Street was like an isolated island in a raging storm—it looked safe, but who knew if the next wave would crash over them.
The safety right now felt more like the calm before the storm.
Chi Yan didn’t dare make a loud noise. He poked his head out of Tang Cuo’s broken window, waved at them, and nodded to signal that “everything is fine”.
Jin Cheng stowed his bow and walked side-by-side with Tang Cuo into the stairwell.
There was no one in the corridor either. Occasionally, a few peered through the cracks of their doors, their eyes tinged with fear, but they didn’t speak. It wasn’t until the second floor that someone finally walked out, asking cautiously from a distance, “Is that Meng Yufei really dead?”
Jin Cheng looked over and smiled. “Yeah.”
The person’s eyes immediately turned red. Choking back sobs, they said, “The person who came with me was killed by him, and I… I didn’t dare get revenge for them. Thank you, thank you…”
At that moment, Chi Yan heard the voices and poked his head out from the corner of the third-floor stairs, catching sight of them. “Ge!”
Tang Cuo and Jin Cheng looked up simultaneously. Right at that very moment, the player who had been saying “thank you” suddenly threw a card directly at them.
Chi Yan saw it clearly. Eyes wide, he cried out in alarm, “Behind you!”
Before his voice even faded, the card flipped in the air, a flash of light passing over its surface.
Jin Cheng, however, seemed to have anticipated this. The instant he turned, he threw a flying knife with a flick of his wrist. Ding! It hit the card dead center.
But the expected attack didn’t occur. Pungent, thick smoke billowed out from where the knife pierced the card, filling more than half the stairwell in just a few breaths.
“Hold your breath!” Jin Cheng’s expression abruptly changed, and he swiftly retreated to the third floor.
The pungent smoke chased right on their heels, creeping upwards. Tang Cuo only inhaled a single breath before he felt his head spin—his condition was wrong. He immediately held his breath. Seeing Chi Yan was a beat too slow, he clamped a hand over his mouth and dragged him away.
Stepping onto the last stair of the third floor, Jin Cheng spun around sharply. A small red fire extinguisher abruptly appeared in his hand. The moment he turned, he aimed it at the stairwell and activated it. An endless stream of foam sprayed out, completely sealing off the staircase opening in the blink of an eye.
“The smoke can’t come up for now. You guard this spot.” Jin Cheng tossed the extinguisher into Tang Cuo’s arms, then shifted his gaze to Chi Yan. “Use the megaphone. Tell everyone downstairs to jump out the window.”
Without another word, Jin Cheng turned and dashed into Tang Cuo’s room, leaping straight out the broken window.
Seeing this, Chi Yan’s heart nearly leaped out of his throat. Before he could even catch his breath, Tang Cuo slapped a hand onto his shoulder.
“Snap out of it,” Tang Cuo said.
With his thoughts back in place, Chi Yan wiped away his cold sweat and hurriedly pulled out the megaphone to shout. He had merely been startled just now; once he recovered, his mind was as sharp as ever. He opened his mouth and yelled, “There’s a poison gas bomb in the building! Everyone on the first and second floors, jump out the windows immediately! Do not use the doors, jump out the windows directly! Hurry!”
At the same time, Jin Cheng quickly darted to the first-floor stairwell, bumping right into the card-throwing player who was fleeing in panic.
“Didn’t they tell you to jump out the window? Why are you taking the stairs?” A smile hung on Jin Cheng’s lips, but his eyes were extraordinarily cold. He lunged forward and delivered a vicious kick.
Bang! The player crashed into the stairs, the iron handrail instantly buckling.
He spat out a mouthful of blood and collapsed in agony. However, Jin Cheng was already right in front of him. Pressing his knee into the man’s chest, Jin Cheng snapped his mechanical bow into two pieces with a click, crossing the two curved blades against the man’s throat.
“Who sent you?” he asked.
In this instant, against the unchanging, deep night of Yong Ye City, Jin Cheng was as sinister and chilling as a demon.
The card player trembled in terror, which only worsened his pain, making him stutter incoherently, “N-No, I wasn’t…”
The curved blade cut into his skin.
“I-I-I-I’ll tell! I’ll tell! It was a guy, a man in a jacket, m-maybe in his twenties. He said as long as I used that card on you, he’d give me gear and take me out of Zone F. I didn’t mean to, I really didn’t mean to! Spare me, big bro! I’ve been on East Cross Street for a long time; if this continues, I’ll never make it to Zone E. Have pity on me, have pity on me! I really don’t know his name…”
The man babbled incessantly, as if that was the only way to alleviate his fear. By this time, the pervasive smoke finally drifted down from the second floor. Smoke naturally travels upwards; its descent was much slower than its ascent.
Upon hearing Chi Yan’s urgent broadcast, the players on the first and second floors scrambled out the windows to escape. For a moment, the entirety of East Cross Street looked like dumplings being dumped into a boiling pot—there were players jumping out of windows everywhere.
It wasn’t even just East Cross Street, nor was it limited to the first and second floors.
Hearing about a poison gas bomb, the players on the third floor and above panicked, so they followed suit and jumped as well. It was only when Chi Yan leaned out the window and beheld this spectacular scene of mass defenestration that he suddenly remembered—this fucking megaphone was a zone-wide broadcast.
Which meant that all of Zone F had heard his warning.
No one knew exactly which building was hit by the poison gas bomb, so everyone assumed it was their own.
A zone-wide broadcast.
Listen to how urgent and utterly sincere that voice was. No need to ask questions—just jump immediately.
Because Zone F players were relatively weak, they were always the most desperate to stay alive. It was only after they jumped that they realized something was off—Eh, why are the people in the next building jumping too?!
Streets full of players who had just jumped out of buildings, streets full of dumbfounded faces.
The shockwaves of this event rippled all the way to the Central District. Because the Evening Primrose concert tour had been such a massive success, everyone was keeping an eye on Zone F. The very second this spectacular scene occurred, someone was already screaming and broadcasting it outward.
One person told ten, ten told a hundred. By the time it reached the Game Hall, it morphed into:
“Jin Cheng forced all the players in Zone F to commit mass suicide by jumping off their buildings!!!”
In the corner, Wen Xiaoming looked up in astonishment, blinking rapidly, thinking he had misheard. The next second, he sprang up from the ground. After pricking his ears to catch a few more sentences, he immediately rushed toward Zone F like his pants were on fire.
It wasn’t that he lacked faith in his boss, but rather that he genuinely believed his boss was entirely capable of doing such a thing!
Zone F, East Cross Street.
Jin Cheng eventually tied up the card player and blocked the first-floor stairwell as well. Since the players had all jumped out their windows, their respective doors were closed, temporarily sealing the smoke inside the building. Tang Cuo and Chi Yan were the last to emerge from the building, and they brought Jin Cheng some rather unpleasant news.
“A few people passed out inside.”
“?”
“Acrophobia. They didn’t jump, took the door.”
“…”
Jin Cheng smiled and asked, “Do I look fine right now?”
Tang Cuo answered honestly, “Not really.”
Jin Cheng took back the fire extinguisher, feeling like his lungs were about to explode from sheer anger. As the only person present with a gas mask, he had no choice but to re-enter the building, carry out the unconscious players one by one, and conveniently use the foam to plug all possible ventilation vents.
Six people had fainted in total. When carried out, their faces were tinged with green; they did not look good at all.
Chi Yan didn’t dare touch them directly, asking worriedly, “What kind of poison is this potent? Will they be okay?”
“This isn’t an ordinary poison, it’s a virus.” Jin Cheng said in a low voice, “Ordinary poison isn’t contagious, but a virus is.”
Tang Cuo finally understood why Jin Cheng had been so furious. This tactic was far too malicious. Had Jin Cheng not reacted swiftly, the casualties would likely have exceeded just these few.
The people on the long black stone street couldn’t hear their conversation, but panic was brewing. They knew Jin Cheng, Tang Cuo, and the rest were very powerful. Whatever could make them wear such grave expressions was definitely not a trivial matter.
Someone bolstered their courage and approached to ask, but Chi Yan jolted and subconsciously stepped in front of Jin Cheng and Tang Cuo to block the person. With his face tight, he said, “If you need something, tell me.”
The person just wanted to ask about the situation. Since Chi Yan had been the one communicating with them previously, they spoke to him. But right at this moment, Jin Cheng’s body suddenly swayed. He draped an arm over Tang Cuo’s shoulder, his brows tightly furrowed, looking unwell.
Tang Cuo was slightly taken aback, but immediately caught on. His gaze turned cold and sharp as it swept toward the player: “Grab him!”
Chi Yan was about to explode.
Why was there another one after the first? Would it ever end?! He quickly rallied the other players to subdue the man together. The person was extremely panicked and was captured alive with barely any resistance, constantly crying out that he was falsely accused.
Jin Cheng raised his head again at this moment, seemingly having caught his breath, though his complexion remained poor. Chi Yan nervously asked if he was okay, but Jin Cheng pressed a hand down to stop him and issued orders one by one—swiftly and decisively.
“Lock him up, we’ll talk after interrogating him.”
“Isolate everyone who was infected. Do not touch them with your bare hands, wear protective suits. The rest of you, pay attention to any changes in yourselves; report any abnormalities immediately.”
“East Cross Street is on full lockdown. No one enters or leaves without my permission.”
With that, he pulled a hazmat suit from his inventory and threw it to Chi Yan. Naturally, Chi Yan would handle the arrangements. The players had never seen a setup like this before. They fell completely silent, momentarily forgetting about being forced to jump off the buildings just earlier.
East Cross Street descended into a state of high alert and paranoia.
Chi Yan went off to handle his tasks, while Tang Cuo and Jin Cheng entered the adjacent building, temporarily borrowing a player’s room. Yet the moment the door closed, the grave expression on Tang Cuo’s face vanished without a trace. He crossed his arms and looked at Jin Cheng. “Keep acting.”
Jin Cheng shrugged, turning to sit in a chair. “Didn’t you play along perfectly?”
Tang Cuo sometimes felt that Jin Cheng was a genius. It was the only way to explain how he managed to formulate such a comprehensive plan in the mere two to three minutes it took for the card to take effect.
Having Chi Yan do a zone-wide broadcast with the megaphone was step one. It simultaneously evacuated the innocent players and publicized the incident, sending a message to the mastermind behind the scenes: Your man made his move, and he might have succeeded.
Faking being infected in front of everyone, even treating an innocent player as another assassin, was a clear signal to the enemy: I’ve fallen into your trap.
The ensuing string of commands made the situation seem increasingly severe, raising the probability that the other side would believe it. And now, all they had to do was make full preparations and wait for them to come knocking.
“You paraded yourself around on the tram, and now you pull this stunt. Are you trying to lure as many of them as possible to East Cross Street and catch them all in one net?” Tang Cuo asked.
“Everything you said is correct.” Looking at Tang Cuo’s clear gaze, Jin Cheng suddenly wasn’t angry anymore. Compared to a black-hearted enemy, a partner with tacit understanding was much more important.
“You have the Twelve Movements in your hands. If it’s truly that powerful, would those people actually dare to come? Given what they know about you, wouldn’t they suspect it’s a trap?”
“If I wasn’t infected, they wouldn’t dare, nor would they need to risk it. They would just keep using other methods to chip away at my strength until they finally kill me in one fell swoop. But I am infected, and the debuff from this virus is very severe. Under the temptation of the Twelve Movements, someone will inevitably fail to hold back and make a move.”
Catching one was good; two wasn’t too many, and one wasn’t too few.
After a pause, Jin Cheng added, “The most crucial point is this—the people who would come to kill me for the Twelve Movements would never believe that I’d recklessly use the Movement on a dumping ground like East Cross Street, nor would they believe I’d give up my rights just to do a good deed. As for the people who do believe in me, or those with actual bottom lines, they wouldn’t come to kill me in the first place.”
Tang Cuo was convinced. This logic was undeniably solid.
Jin Cheng shifted into a more relaxed posture and continued, “However, the virus is a bit troublesome. When this kind of debuff is applied to a person, ordinary healing and antidote potions are useless. We need to confirm exactly which one it is first. It’s not convenient for me to show myself right now. Pass a message to Chi Yan and have him find Wen Xiaoming.”
Hearing this, Tang Cuo opened his character panel, took a glance, and directly told him, “It’s called ‘BS101’. The clinical manifestation is that the maximum health cap drops by 1% every minute. The three attribute columns—Force, Intelligence, and Charm—along with the skill slots, are completely locked. It’s likely highly contagious.”
Jin Cheng: “???”
What did you do to your max health again?
