WTNL Chapter 4.2

Decai Middle School
Chapter 4.2

The person responsible for serving food was an old, hunched hag. Her eyes were murky, and her fingers were wrinkled like tree bark. She tremblingly gripped the rice scoop, the galvanized iron scoop scraping against the bottom of the basin with a piercing sound.

Dinner was a kind of congee-like substance.

A layer of oil floated on the murky yellowish-white surface. In the viscous semi-liquid, glaringly white fatty meat, sparse rice grains, and mushy noodles were mixed at the bottom of the scoop, emitting an unappetizing odor.

She mechanically served the students scoop by scoop.

The moment each streamer saw the food in their bowls, indescribably complex expressions surfaced on their faces.

They carried their food bowls with sickly pale faces, one after another choosing a seat at the long tables and sitting down.

After all the students had gotten their food, the old woman tremblingly leaned over, preparing to pick up the large iron basin in front of her that only had scraps left at the bottom.

Wen Jianyan strode forward in one step, taking the basin from the other party’s hands without any explanation:

“Let me do it, you just rest.”

His posture was gentle and humble, looking at the old woman before him with great concern.

—Whether it was giving orders at the door or organizing everyone to line up to enter the cafeteria, Wen Jianyan was already preparing for this moment to strike up a conversation.

“Which direction should I carry it?” he asked.

The old woman raised a bark-like finger, pointing towards the back of the cafeteria.

Wen Jianyan slowed his pace, walking shoulder to shoulder with her in that direction.

The old woman raised her murky eyes, turned her head to look at the young man beside her, and asked in a wizened voice:

“Young man, you look unfamiliar. What’s your name?”

Wen Jianyan shyly pursed his lips: “I also just arrived today. You can just call me Xiao Zhao. I’m Director Shen’s distant nephew. I just graduated a while ago, so this time I wanted to come and ask my uncle to help me find a job.”

“Oh, oh…”

“My uncle told me to find Teacher Yang and ask her to show me around the school, but…”

“But?”

Wen Jianyan shook his head, quickly putting on a cover-up smile: “N-Nothing really, it’s just, Teacher Yang seemed to be busy with something, so… she asked me to stay and help organize discipline, and then left in a hurry.”

He hesitated for a moment, pursed his lips, and asked uneasily:

“Did I… do something wrong?”

[Inside live broadcast room 789326qwk]

[…]

[…The scent of green tea is overwhelming.]

[…The green tea flavor is overflowing.]

[Just a moment ago, he was an intern teacher; now he’s become Director Shen’s nephew. I’d like to see how many more identities he can make up.]

[…Keep it simple; the way of being a person should be simpler.]

This secretive and evasive way of answering obviously made the other party immediately understand something.

The old woman sighed, a hint of gloom passing over her face. She reached out and patted Wen Jianyan’s shoulder, saying amiably, “Don’t take it to heart too much. Teacher Yang… sigh, she’s always been like this. It’s not that she’s deliberately targeting you.”

“It’s alright. If you have any questions in the future, you can come ask me.”

“Eh, really? Thank you.”

Wen Jianyan revealed an overwhelmed, flattered smile.

A thread of a smile reached the depths of his eyes.

As expected, when dealing with elders like this, adding a beneficial background and appropriately showing weakness was the fastest way to extract information.

The two chatted as they walked.

Wen Jianyan quietly fished for information, firmly memorizing all the details that tumbled out of the other’s mouth.

Unknowingly, Wen Jianyan had arrived at the back kitchen.

Compared to the dining hall in front, the back kitchen was narrower and dirtier. The air mixed and fermented a sour, murky odor. The blue slop bucket placed on the side was half full, its inner and outer walls covered in thick layers of residue and filth, and garbage was everywhere on the floor.

Under the old woman’s command, Wen Jianyan poured the remaining soup and water from the food basin into the slop bucket, then placed the empty basin next to the cutting board.

Just as he was preparing to turn and say goodbye, his gaze suddenly paused slightly.

Not far from the cutting board was a sink.

A shallow layer of grayish-yellow water couldn’t drain away, pooling in the sink. In that murky water, several strands of shiny black hair drifted slowly. They were long, twisting around the drain opening like living creatures.

Wen Jianyan subconsciously threw a glance at the top of the old woman’s head.

Short hair, grayish-white and dry.

Right at this moment, a shrill scream came from the direction of the cafeteria, tearing through the night like a sharp blade, simply terrifying.

“!”

Wen Jianyan was startled.

The next second, he immediately reacted, hastily bade farewell to the other party, and then turned and strode in the direction the sound came from.

But before he could walk out a few steps, that tremulous old voice sounded behind him:

“Right… young man.”

Wen Jianyan’s footsteps paused, and he turned to look.

The old woman opened those murky eyes wide, her bark-like wrinkled face trembling slightly, and said in a very low voice:

“Stay away from the fourth floor of the dormitory.”

Wen Jianyan’s pupils shrank.

Before he could open his mouth to ask anything, the old woman turned around, taking slow, wobbly steps, and gradually disappeared into the depths of the cafeteria.

In the cafeteria, tables and chairs were messily knocked to the ground. Rushed footsteps and panicked screams mixed into a cacophony, chaos everywhere.

A streamer sat clumsily by the sink in a sorry state. By his feet was an overturned food basin; yellowish-white soup spilled all over the floor. Long, pitch-black hair mixed with saliva was pulled out, lying on the floor in a large, sticky glob.

However, he was still frantically vomiting, digging his trembling fingers into his throat, as if there was still something firmly stuck in his windpipe.

“Blargh—”

The streamer arched his back in a spasm, letting out terrifying dry-heaving sounds.

“What happened?”

“This… what is going on here?”

A few streamers gathered together, asking in a state of panic.

“Violated the rules, duh.”

A cool voice came from not far away.

The newbie streamers froze, turning to look in the direction the voice came from.

They remembered that the man who spoke was a veteran streamer named Kong Shixing.

There were two other veteran streamers who seemed to be on a team with him; the three of them stayed together all the time.

Kong Shixing stood aside with his arms crossed, his expression indifferent: “This kind of D-rank instance is generally not too difficult. The key is to be obedient. As long as you act under the premise of obeying the rules, stream your broadcast, and do the main and side quests issued by the system, you can generally scrape together enough necessary survival time—of course, the premise is that you don’t violate the rules.”

Those newbie streamers felt a chill down their spines:

“V-Violate the rules?”

“Rather than huddling here letting your imagination run wild, you might as well go around and ask, see exactly how this unlucky bastard broke the rules, so you can avoid the risk later.”

Su Cheng, who was standing to the side, heard their entire conversation.

He swallowed his saliva, composed himself, and spoke with some difficulty: “I, I think I know.”

Hearing this, the gazes of the others all turned to him.

“He was just saying who knows if there’s a problem with the food here, and whether eating it would cause an accident. So he wanted to take advantage of the NPC’s absence to secretly pour the stuff in his bowl down the sink…”

This explanation did sound somewhat reasonable.

Moreover, the soup and rice here looked truly awful, almost like slop. Even if it was poured away, it wouldn’t be a pity. So, it also received the approval of several streamers, who brought their bowls to the sink with him.

However, the moment the leading man poured the soup away, a pained expression suddenly appeared on his face.

His bowl clattered to the floor, and the untouched soup spilled everywhere.

The other streamers were frightened and couldn’t help but retreat one after another. No one dared to approach the sink anymore.

Then, pitch-black long hair began to gush out of the streamer’s mouth.

Su Cheng described in a low voice. His voice gradually became somewhat unsteady, and cold sweat started to seep out on the tip of his nose.

The few people listening carefully all froze.

They instantly realized something and abruptly turned their heads to look to the side—

They saw eight large, mottled and faded characters written on one wall of the cafeteria:

“Economy is honorable, waste is shameful.”

Kong Shixing narrowed his eyes and said, “So that’s how it is. Then this is one of the rules.”

“…”

After his voice fell, the other streamers looked at the almost completely untouched food in their basins, and their expressions couldn’t help but change several times.

It seemed… they absolutely had to eat this meal.

Not only did they have to eat it, but they also had to eat it cleanly, not leaving a single grain of rice behind.

Outside the door, Wen Jianyan stood with his arms crossed, a thoughtful expression on his face.

—”Rules.”

It seemed this was the keyword.

The overall game didn’t deviate much from his guess, which allowed Wen Jianyan to let out a long breath of relief.

After all, compared to ghosts and monsters that killed indiscriminately, having rules was much easier to handle.

As long as there were rules, loopholes could definitely be found.

As long as loopholes were found, one could exploit the rules in reverse.

Moreover, perhaps because the instance level wasn’t high, the judgment of the rules here was clearly not considered strict. Otherwise, Wen Jianyan wouldn’t have been able to exploit a loophole and successfully sneak into the teaching team.

Just then, that vomiting streamer abruptly bent over, finally letting out a heart-wrenching, violent dry heave—

“Blargh!”

“Clatter.”

A crisp sound of something hitting the floor rang out.

Several white molars mixed with blood and saliva fell to the ground. The small, fingernail-sized teeth rolled on the floor, clattering, until one of them rolled all the way to Wen Jianyan’s feet before slowly coming to a stop.

That pale, bloodstained tooth staying at the edge of his vision appeared exceptionally eerie.

Wen Jianyan stared at it, feeling a chill rise up his back.

The small red cloth pouch forgotten in his pocket suddenly seemed to grow heavy, weighing heavily in his pants pocket. Pressed against his thigh, it made that patch of skin inexplicably hot, almost somewhat unbearable.

…A molar?

Could this be related to the “hidden item” he had found earlier?

Right at this moment, a familiar mechanical voice suddenly sounded in Wen Jianyan’s ears:

[Ding! Condition met detected, hidden side quest opening—]

Wait, hold on?

Wen Jianyan panicked.

Before he could react, he saw strands of pitch-black hair spread over without warning, tightly wrapping around his wrists and ankles. Cold and clammy, they constricted like living creatures.

[Hidden side quest opening complete!]

The moment the voice fell, Wen Jianyan instantly felt his vision go dark.

This feeling, how familiar it was.

It was simply… exactly the same…

…as the moment he entered the instance.

Before Wen Jianyan lost consciousness, only one last sentence remained in his mind—

Trash live broadcast room, go fuck yourself!

__

Author’s note:

This tells us that being too ‘green tea’ will bring karma (just kidding)

Xiao Wen: ???

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