Chapter 7: The Returner on a Snowy Night (1)
After a six-hour rest, Tang Cuo’s HP recovered to 30% and stopped increasing. A glaring “-8” hung there, silently mocking him. It seemed that as long as he had a negative score, he wouldn’t be able to recover to a full state, and he would forever look like he was on the verge of death.
The young man in the mirror still had a pale complexion.
Tang Cuo rummaged through a plastic supermarket bag, found some chocolate beans, and tossed two into his mouth. He then pocketed the box, walked to the window to observe his surroundings once more, and realized—
Yong Ye City had no daytime.
The reason he phrased it this way, instead of saying Yong Ye City had no sun, was because there had been no moon in the sky last night either.
Yong Ye City at this moment looked exactly the same as it had last night, but perhaps because the new players had all gone to rest, the streets were much quieter. Tang Cuo planned to go for a stroll in the Mission Hall, take on a mission to practice his skills, and clear his negative score while he was at it.
Although he was lazy and prone to courting death, he didn’t actually want to die. Most of the time, he just couldn’t be bothered or didn’t care enough.
He pushed the door open to leave, and the door next door opened almost simultaneously.
“Morning.” Today, Mr. Clown wasn’t wearing his fringed leather jacket; he had changed into an army green utility jumpsuit paired with military boots. His messy hair was still casually gathered into a small bun, making him look tall and handsome. However, there was a new silver mask on his face, covering the upper half from the nose up.
Tang Cuo nodded. He didn’t dislike him, but he didn’t have any particular fondness for him either.
The two went downstairs together.
Jin Cheng casually followed behind Tang Cuo with his hands in his pockets. Perhaps because he hadn’t slept well, he was still yawning. Tang Cuo paid him no mind, but when he reached East Cross Street and had walked a fair distance, he noticed Jin Cheng was still following him.
“Are you going the same way?” Tang Cuo glanced at him sideways.
“Have you forgotten what happened last night?” Jin Cheng kindly reminded him, “You made me drop from Zone A to Zone F. Not only do I have to climb my way back up level by level, but I also wasted a potion saving your life last night. If I don’t latch onto you, who else should I latch onto?”
Nonsense from start to finish.
Tang Cuo didn’t believe a single hair on his head. Judging by Zhang Xing’s tone when mentioning the Zone A elites, they stood at the absolute top of the combat power pyramid in all of Yong Ye City. Even if he dropped from Zone A to Zone F, Tang Cuo believed he could easily return.
Latching onto an inexperienced newcomer like Tang Cuo offered no benefits other than looking for trouble. Tang Cuo also didn’t believe the other party could tell how capable he was after just two brief encounters and wanted to be friends.
As for waiting for a chance to seek revenge? That was even more absurd.
But if he wanted to follow, let him. The road was wide, and Tang Cuo couldn’t dictate where he walked. It was about 10:00 AM. Although Yong Ye City had no daytime, the breakfast stalls were still open, located right at the corner of East Cross Street.
The boss was a middle-aged woman blind in one eye. Her expression was cold and not very welcoming, but the steamed buns she made smelled incredibly delicious. The blackboard at the entrance read: Vegetable buns 800 points each, meat buns 1000 points each.
“Boss, can I buy on credit?” Tang Cuo was broke again.
“Get lost.” The boss’s reply was very direct.
Jin Cheng laughed from behind and then, under Tang Cuo’s gaze, bought six steamed buns—three meat, three vegetable—but didn’t share a single one with Tang Cuo.
Tang Cuo turned and left.
With his long legs, Jin Cheng walked fast and caught up in a few steps. While eating a fragrant steamed bun, he teased, “Do you have any special skills? If you have a specific expertise, perhaps you could take Yong Ye City’s special recruitment exam and open a shop like that boss earlier, so you wouldn’t have to do missions.”
Tang Cuo: “You can go do it yourself.”
If things were that simple, everyone would be doing it; why struggle between life and death?
Jin Cheng smiled and stopped talking, eating his buns slowly. Halfway through, he stopped again to buy two cups of soy milk and a few fried dough sticks. Tang Cuo didn’t wait for him. Seeing a bus stop by the road, he went over to take a look, but realized he needed to pay to ride the bus too, so he gave up.
Just then, Jin Cheng caught up again, dangling the remaining two buns in his hand, and asked with a smile, “Want some?”
Tang Cuo took them casually, without the slightest hesitation.
Jin Cheng: “Not angry?”
Tang Cuo asked in return, “Why should I be angry?”
Jin Cheng: “Because I didn’t give you any earlier, and these are my leftovers.”
“Oh.” Tang Cuo only stared intently at the bag in Jin Cheng’s hand: “Then are you going to eat your leftover fried dough sticks and soy milk?”
This was a point about Tang Cuo that outsiders often couldn’t understand. He never followed universal principles in how he did things; his temper was eccentric, and he had his own unique style.
Jin Cheng handed him all the remaining breakfast and even conveniently stuck the straw into the soy milk for him. He seemed increasingly curious about Tang Cuo, his gaze never leaving his face.
Tang Cuo was eating, so why would he care? Besides, if he wanted to look, let him look; he wouldn’t lose a piece of flesh.
With two buns, one fried dough stick, and a bag of soy milk, Tang Cuo was eighty percent full. About half an hour later, the two entered the Central Zone from Zone F and could see the silhouette of the Mission Hall in the distance.
Jin Cheng also guessed his destination and asked, “There are specialized equipment and potion shops here, with discounts for newcomers. Don’t you want to take a look first?”
“No, I’m poor.” Tang Cuo spoke with justified confidence and walked away without looking back. He had already spent all the money he extorted from Zhang Xing, and buying with points was even more unrealistic. The most regrettable thing was that the meat cleaver couldn’t be placed in his inventory slot. Fortunately, he still had a Tarot card. Tarot cards could be placed in the inventory slot and might come in handy at a crucial moment.
However, he didn’t plan on telling Jin Cheng for now.
Jin Cheng stopped talking nonsense, and the two arrived in front of the Mission Hall. Tang Cuo stopped, turned to glance at him, and they exchanged names with a tacit understanding.
“Cheng Jin.”
“Tang Cuo.”
Who knew where this bullshit tacit understanding came from.
Before entering, Tang Cuo asked one final question: “Why are you covering your face?”
Jin Cheng crossed his arms and pondered for a few seconds, as if contemplating a monumentally important question. He tilted his head slightly and answered, “Perhaps because I have a scar on my face?”
He then laughed, speaking in an unconcerned tone, “I have many enemies, and this face is too recognizable. If people found out I dropped back to Zone F, it wouldn’t be very good. Although I don’t mind getting my hands dirty, peace has always been my pursuit.”
Tang Cuo wanted to roll his eyes, but he held back.
Inside the Mission Hall, it was as bustling as ever.
Jin Cheng skillfully led Tang Cuo past various amusement facilities without explaining much, summing it up in one sentence—”These games are all pretty boring. Do you want to play the claw machine? There are many easter eggs hidden inside, but also some rather nasty debuffs, the lethal kind.”
Naturally, Tang Cuo declined. And it was at this moment that he saw the three virtual electronic screens hanging in the center of the hall. The one directly facing him was “Mr. Crow’s Blacklist,” with K27216 gloriously bringing up the rear.
“Quite impressive.” Jin Cheng saw it too.
“Since you could incur the Crow’s wrath, it proves you have the capital to be targeted. So—which one are you?” Tang Cuo asked.
“Guess?” Jin Cheng neither denied nor confirmed it, a smile on his lips. He really hoped Tang Cuo would take a bold guess, but Tang Cuo didn’t oblige, showing a lack of interest.
He turned to look at the missions.
The walls of the Mission Hall were also known as the Mission Wall. The surface seemed to be made of some kind of black crystal, with tens of thousands of missions scrolling across it. From a distance, it looked like the data stream generated when a hacker attacks a computer. People came and went throughout the entire hall. Occasionally, someone would walk up to the wall, pause briefly, their expression grave, numb, or slightly relaxed, chatting in twos and threes before walking into the Mission Wall.
Ripples formed on the black wall, and people walked in without any hindrance, vanishing from sight in the blink of an eye.
“The missions here are all random—variable numbers of people, variable content, variable difficulty. But if you enter at the same time, there’s a very high probability you’ll be assigned to the same instance. In Yong Ye City, almost everyone eventually forms a fixed team; going solo makes it very easy to die,” Jin Cheng explained.
“Were those your teammates yesterday?” Tang Cuo said, then had a flash of inspiration and asked, “Can people from different zones do missions together?”
Jin Cheng crossed his arms and smiled: “Yes, sir. Right now, I can only team up with a newcomer like you. If I can’t climb back to Zone A, then we’ll just have to die together in the game, mutual destruction.”
Tang Cuo raised an eyebrow: “Are you sure the missions will be easier to pass with two blacklisters grouped together?”
“Depends on luck.”
“My luck is very bad.”
“Do you think saying that will make me let you off?”
“Tsk.”
Tang Cuo was actually kindly warning him, because his luck really was very bad. But since the other party insisted on courting death and couldn’t be stopped, then it was none of his business. Besides, to be honest, he was quite curious to experience the effect of this blacklist.
“Let’s go.” Without further ado, Tang Cuo walked straight into the wall. He was met with absolute darkness, unable to see his fingers in front of his face; even Jin Cheng next to him had disappeared.
About five minutes later, a familiar bell chimed.
“Ding—”
“New player detected. Triggering priority. Commencing serial mission: Blizzard Villa – ‘The Returner on a Snowy Night’. There are a total of 8 players in this round. Objective—Kill Yingjun.”
“Wishing you a happy survival!”
With a flash, Tang Cuo found himself standing in the first-floor lobby of a hotel.
It was a youth hostel; behind the counter hung the hostel’s green pine tree logo. Looking around, the entire hostel was exquisitely and warmly decorated. Small wall sconces were everywhere, casting a warm yellow light onto the white walls, which were adorned with many collages and landscape photos. And of course, there was a wish wall, a staple in any such hostel.
A dumpling-making activity was being organized in the hostel. Including Tang Cuo, there were four people here.
The clock pointed to 6:00 PM.
“Dear guest, would you like to come help?” The staff member was a girl with a round face, smiling as she spoke, looking very endearing.
“I don’t know how.” Tang Cuo was calm and composed, his gaze sweeping over the remaining two. They were a man and a woman in their twenties, both wearing different styles of windbreakers, sitting very close together.
The moment Tang Cuo’s gaze met theirs, the two almost jumped up.
Players, without a doubt.
But these two clearly knew each other and quickly lowered their heads to whisper. Tang Cuo had no intention of talking to them anyway. He walked straight to the hostel entrance, lifted the windproof curtain, and looked out.
The hostel door was an old-fashioned red wooden door. Through the glass on the door, one could see the situation outside. The glass was already covered in ice and snow, and the howling wind slapped through the cracks of the door, chilling to the bone.
Blizzard Villa—a common isolated island trope in detective fiction. The moment Tang Cuo heard the system announcement, he understood the mission’s context—he was the new player, so his priority was triggered—this was likely content generated based on his profession, aimed at taking care of new players.
Tang Cuo was a private detective, but in his short two-year career, he had rarely encountered murder cases.
Instead, every few days, he would be tasked with finding cats and dogs carelessly lost in the city.
There were also many cases of infidelity and affairs, but Tang Cuo always ended up taking photos that burned his eyes, so over time, he focused solely on finding cats and dogs. Besides finding cats and dogs, he also handled anti-fraud cases.
Nowadays, old men and women didn’t trust their children; they trusted the fraudsters outside. But compared to the fraudsters, they trusted Tang Cuo more. Not because Tang Cuo was eloquent, but because he looked good. His features were heroic and upright, commonly referred to as “the top student,” “the child from another family,” “whatever he says must be right,” and “grandpa and grandma’s darling.”
Otherwise, he wouldn’t have been able to scam Zhang Xing.
The staff member’s smiling voice sounded from behind: “The broadcast said it’ll be seven days. Only when the blizzard stops can the road repair crew come. My contract expired, and I was originally going to resign and go down the mountain. I was just waiting for the new employee to come for the handover, and now I’m trapped here and can’t leave. But don’t worry, heavy snow often blocks the mountain here, so our hostel not only has its own generator but also stocked up on a lot of food. Even if we stay for ten days or half a month, there’s absolutely no problem. Oh, and hot water, there’s plenty of hot water!”
Tang Cuo didn’t speak.
Right at this moment, a sudden exclamation came from upstairs.
The windbreaker couple looked up alertly, only to see a blur as the young man who had just been standing by the door ran up the stairs. The two hurriedly followed. Reaching the second floor, they found everyone gathered in a room at the end of the corridor.
It was a public bathhouse. Upon entering, there were two sinks and a row of lockers. Further in were four shower stalls separated by plywood. It was unisex.
At this moment, everyone was gathered around the lockers, staring at the second locker from the left in shock or solemnity. Tang Cuo stepped forward and discovered a corpse hidden inside the locker.
Male, around thirty years old, with short hair and stubble, wearing a black fur-collared leather jacket. Sturdily built, cause of death unknown.
Scanning the surrounding people, plus the windbreaker couple from earlier and Tang Cuo himself, there were eight people in total. The broadcast just now said there were a total of eight players in this round, and they were all here, so where was Cheng Jin?
Did he not enter?
While Tang Cuo frowned, a middle-aged man wearing a jacket with a steady temperament pulled an ID card out of the corpse’s pocket. The lighting in the bathhouse was dim, but it didn’t stop him from accurately reading the name on the ID card—
“Li Yingjun.”
“Yingjun?!” A student-looking boy with a buzz cut hurriedly leaned in to look, then froze: “W-Wasn’t this mission to kill Yingjun? Why is the person already dead?”
He couldn’t help but look at the boy wearing thick-framed glasses next to him. The boy pushed his glasses up and said, “Blizzard Villa. It’s definitely not as simple as murder.”
The two looked like they knew each other.
“Exactly.” The middle-aged man scanned the room and said, “May I ask who among us is a newcomer? Everyone should have heard the broadcast. There’s a newcomer among us, which triggered the priority. This instance should be their area of expertise.”
Hearing this, everyone looked at each other in dismay, but no one admitted it.
Tang Cuo was initially very certain, but he unexpectedly discovered that besides him, there was actually another newcomer here—the lady in the red dress he had met in the square last night.
She was leaning against the doorframe with her arms crossed, turning a blind eye to Tang Cuo’s gaze, but she didn’t expose him either.
When no one answered, the middle-aged man frowned slightly.
The boy with thick-framed glasses, however, showed no special reaction and immediately inspected the corpse: “There’s blood on the back of his head; he should have been injured by a blunt object. No other wounds have been found so far. The corpse is stiff, and the temperature here is low, so he might have been dead for several hours. Who was the first to discover the corpse?”
“That person isn’t here.” A pretty girl with short hair raised her hand and pointed to the window left slightly ajar: “He jumped out the window.”
“There’s another person?” The buzz-cut boy blinked, then pointed at everyone one by one like a fool counting heads, and asked: “Aren’t there already eight people here?”
The girl shrugged: “You’re asking me, who should I ask?”
The buzz-cut boy was about to ask more, but just then, a gust of cold wind blew in from the back of his collar, making him shiver. He abruptly turned around, coming face-to-face with a silver-masked visage.
It was right at the window. The newcomer had pushed the window open and entered, wearing black military boots and utility pants, moving with the agility of a cheetah. When he looked up, there were still a few snowflakes on the silver mask. With a flick of his right hand, a trophy-sized bronze statue stained with blood rolled to the side of the corpse.
“You looking for me?” he asked.
