WTNL Chapter 603

Lucky Cruise Ship
Chapter 603: Same as last time

Floor B7.

A chilly atmosphere surged through this level, carrying the salty tang of seawater and the thick, putrid stench unique to corpses.

However, fortunately for them, with Carl Bell’s death, the main entrance to the auction was now accessible.

The group ran wildly, speeding through the hall, and soon, the tightly closed elevator appeared ahead.

Before they could be swallowed by the seawater and the corpses within it, they rushed into the elevator. Cold seawater slowly trickled in through the gap beneath the elevator doors, chasing their footsteps as if alive. Everyone instinctively backed away hurriedly to avoid it.

“Guests, which floor would you like to go to?”

The elevator operator, wearing Tong Yao’s face, revealed a perfect smile and asked.

“Floor B12,” Wen Jianyan said, his breathing unsteady.

That was the location of Ji Guan’s room and also the safest room their team possessed.

“Very well.”

“Tong Yao” smiled and pressed the button with a white-gloved finger.

“…” An Xin stared intently at that familiar face, his gaze complex. He slowly clenched his jaw, his cracked and bleeding fingers trembling slightly at his sides, drops of blood falling to the floor.

“Hey,” Wen Jianyan suddenly called out to him.

An Xin was startled, taking two seconds to come back to his senses.

“Don’t let yourself drown in it,” Wen Jianyan said, his tone slow and calm. “Although she has the same face, she is no longer the person you knew.”

“…Yeah, I know.” An Xin took a deep breath, forcing himself to look away. “Thanks.”

Companions dying in instances and being assimilated as part of them—for veteran anchors like them, this was by no means the first time, nor would it be the last.

They had to adjust their mindset immediately. Once dragged down by emotions, the price might be something no one could afford to pay.

Ding. The elevator slowly opened.

“We have arrived at Floor B12.” The elevator operator smiled sweetly. Only after receiving the tip she was due did she speak in a polite, monotone voice, “Please watch your step.”

Returning to the quiet accommodation floor, leaving behind the faceless shadows, the colossal mountain of flesh and blood, and the corpses submerged in seawater, only then did everyone dare to relax the tension in their shoulders, finally feeling the relief of surviving a catastrophe.

Opening the door, Ji Guan’s voice came from the inner compartment, the tension in his voice hard to hide:

“…President? Vice President? Is that you?”

“It is,” Chen Mo, who was walking at the front, spoke.

“Thank goodness.” Ji Guan clearly breathed a sigh of relief. “Luckily, it’s you guys. Otherwise, it would have been a bit too challenging for me.”

Although his anchor abilities and items were still intact, the loss of his limbs and eyes still greatly limited his strength, making him instinctively raise his guard.

“President, I’ll go in and check on him.” Blond turned his head, looking longingly at Wen Jianyan.

Wen Jianyan’s gaze lingered for a moment on his eyes, which remained blood-red with no sign of recovery even after he stopped using his talent, and nodded. “Yeah, go ahead.”

“Oh right,” Chen Cheng seemed to remember something. He reached into his pocket, pulled something out, and handed it to Wen Jianyan. “This thing appeared in my pocket after Carl Bell died.”

It was a heavy, dark coin.

It was identical to the coin Dan Zhu had examined carefully under the light after killing Eaton Ethan.

Since it was Qi Qian who killed Carl Bell, and Qi Qian’s paper figure after his “death” was on Chen Cheng, the coin appeared in his pocket.

“Thank you all for helping me complete my mission. Since everything is finished, I’ll be—”

Figaro sidled over, stealthily reaching out his hand.

Chen Cheng abruptly tightened his grip, raising an eyebrow at Figaro, the provocation in his eyes undisguised.

Figaro: “…” He narrowed his eyes slightly, the smile disappearing from his long, fox-like eyes.

Although Chen Cheng was already ranked in the top ten, for an old fox like him, Chen Cheng was still somewhat lacking.

Wen Jianyan looked up, giving him a faint smile. “Our agreement is over. We rescued Qi Qian, helped you complete your mission, and even killed Carl Bell. What more do you want? Our contract never stipulated who the token belongs to, from beginning to end, right?”

Figaro: “…”

Bro, seriously?

You’re doing this again!

In the “Integrity First” livestream room chat:

“LMAO, dying of laughter!”

“Competing in backstabbing? This is Wen Jianyan’s domain!”

Figaro gave Wen Jianyan a deep look.

If it were just Chen Cheng, he might have had a chance of winning. But with Wen Jianyan on the opposing side, the situation was vastly different—especially given the presence of an unidentified, powerfully ambiguous non-human entity with them.

And Figaro was very pragmatic.

He stepped back and sighed. “Sigh, fine, fine.”

“Since matters have been mostly settled, all I can do now is bid my farewells—regardless, you are welcome to contact me anytime. You have my contact information.” Figaro raised his hand, placed a top hat he produced from somewhere onto his head, and bowed elegantly. “However, before I leave, out of obligation as a partner, I must warn you—the token is not what I wanted. I was commissioned by someone from the very beginning.”

He waved his hand, speaking in an aria-like tone, “Farewell, my friends.”

With that, Figaro turned and left gracefully.

“Here.” Chen Cheng flicked his finger. The pitch-black coin spun in the air with a ding and landed in Wen Jianyan’s hand.

Wen Jianyan examined the coin. Its surface was ancient and rough, cold to the touch, emitting a lingering faint scent of blood. He ran his fingertips over the indentations on the coin’s surface. There seemed to be text engraved on it, but due to severe wear, it was illegible.

So this is… the management token.

“Hey, what that guy said just now…” Chen Cheng turned his head, looking in the direction Figaro had disappeared. “You heard it, right? What do you think?”

Figaro’s implication was very clear.

The reason he sought the token was that he had accepted Dan Zhu’s commission. Now that the mission had failed and he was returning empty-handed, he would naturally inform Dan Zhu of the reason for the failure. When that time came… they would become Dan Zhu’s problem.

And Dan Zhu had always hated trouble.

“Perhaps Dan Zhu is still troubled by the aftermath of killing Eaton Ethan, so much so that she couldn’t deal with Carl Bell personally,” Chen Cheng looked at Wen Jianyan, his expression unusually serious. “But even so, that witch is not someone to be trifled with.”

In the Nightmare Top Ten, the higher the rank, the more unfathomable the strength.

Among them, the Nightmare Top Three were especially so.

As guild masters ranked in the top three of the Nightmare leaderboards, no one knew how long they had lived here or to what extent they had become alienated. In a sense, they had almost become part of the Nightmare’s rules, entangled with each other like vines, jointly forming this terrifying creation presented before them.

“To be honest, I don’t want to see that happen either,” Wen Jianyan took a deep breath and pocketed the coin.

He didn’t know why Dan Zhu needed three tokens or why she wanted to become the Captain, but… there was one thing Wen Jianyan could be sure of.

All clues pointed to the same conclusion.

“First, the core of this instance should be on Floor B6.”

The Lucky Cruise had a total of eighteen floors.

Floors B1 to B6 were the “Casino Area” managed by Mesvis.

Floor B7 was the “Auction Area” managed by Carl Bell.

Floors B8 to B18 were the “Accommodation Area” managed by Eaton Ethan.

Among these, the area managed by Eaton Ethan evidently had the lowest threshold. Although Wen Jianyan hadn’t entered every floor, he had been to the deepest, Floor B18. The cabins there held “Tenants.” Although it was terrifying and Wen Jianyan had nearly failed to escape, information revealed from various aspects indicated that it was clearly not where the core of the instance lay.

However, the idea that “Floor B6 is the core” was just Wen Jianyan’s guess; there was no evidence.

But after Su Cheng took the unique pass and went down alone, he confirmed the truth of this matter.

“And the core of the Lucky Cruise must be closely related to the ‘Captain’.”

That mysterious Captain who had never shown their face—Nightmare Rank 1, the Guild Master of Oracle.

“Su Cheng took the only pass, effectively cutting off the only channel for others to enter Floor B6,” Wen Jianyan raised his eyes and said softly. “However, if we obtain three tokens and become the Captain’s ‘Successor,’ we can enter Floor B6 as challengers to face the Captain directly—which is equivalent to reaching the core of the instance.”

However, there was one thing Wen Jianyan didn’t mention.

That golden heart placed on one end of the scale.

The place where Carl Bell performed the “Appraisal” didn’t exist in reality but was more akin to some constructed alternate dimension. Since the heart didn’t appear with Carl Bell’s disappearance—like he and Wu Zhu did—it was highly probable that it still remained in its original storage location.

And Wen Jianyan boldly predicted that location was on Floor B6.

In the “Integrity First” livestream room chat:

[Holy sh*t… he actually found a backdoor way to enter Floor B6!]

[Okay, okay, I knew you wouldn’t let us down! It’s just a missing pass, not a problem for you at all!!]

[Uh, there are still some problems. The anchor only has one token right now. The other two are with Mesvis and Dan Zhu. No matter how you look at it, this is Hell difficulty!]

[Speaking of which, what exactly is going on on Floor B6? Didn’t Su Cheng go down? Has anyone checked his livestream?]

[Duh, of course we did, but he turned off the stream in the elevator and hasn’t turned it back on… I’m seriously anxious as hell!]

“If you don’t want to come into direct conflict with your Guild Master—” Wen Jianyan looked at Chen Cheng.

Chen Cheng: “I definitely don’t want to. But I’m afraid there’s no other choice now.”

The moment he didn’t hand over the item just now, there was no turning back. Dan Zhu wasn’t a magnanimous person who would allow her guild members to make such decisions without paying any price.

“But it doesn’t matter,” Chen Cheng shrugged, his attitude as nonchalant and punchable as ever. “I never liked her anyway. That woman smells like a corpse. I’ve wanted to get as far away from her as possible for a long time.”

In the “Integrity First” livestream room chat:

[…Although it’s not the first time I’ve wanted to say this, I still have to sigh. Bro, your mouth is really foul.]

[Damn it, take that back! Dan Zhu is my goddess!! My goddess farts rose scents!!!]

[LMAO, I guarantee if Dan Zhu actually heard this, he’d die more miserably than anyone else on this ship.]

Just then, the livestream system released today’s mission—all anchors were to gather on the first floor of the cruise ship again.

“…How unfortunate.”

Wen Jianyan took a deep breath and said.

“It seems all situations will have to be discussed tomorrow.”

At this moment, Wen Ya and the others also walked out from the inner compartment. Clearly, they had received today’s livestream mission as well.

“Ji Guan stays here,” Wen Jianyan said calmly. “I’ll pay the points needed for the deduction.”

Failing to complete the reality show mission would result in a forced shutdown of the livestream. A forced shutdown would lead to failure to complete the livestream mission duration, resulting in a deduction of corresponding points—due to the difficulty of the instance, this number was enormous.

But, well, Wen Jianyan was rich.

Although a series of previous events had caused him to lose a considerable amount of points, even so, with the added wealth from auctioning his property, he was still filthy rich.

“As for you,” Wen Jianyan looked at An Xin and proposed, “If you don’t mind, you can temporarily act with us.”

Tong Yao was dead. Qi Qian was asleep.

Although according to An Xin, four members of the Dark Fire squad had survived on Floor B7, given the current situation on Floor B7, the remaining member likely faced a grim fate and had probably been swallowed by the icy seawater.

“However, I must warn you in advance,” Wen Jianyan said, “Our upcoming situation will be dangerous… very dangerous.”

They were now completely on the opposing side of Dan Zhu, and the next target to kill was the Casino Manager, Mesvis—the process of killing Carl Bell had been difficult enough, and killing another Manager probably wouldn’t be any easier.

“I understand,” An Xin smiled frankly. “But for us anchors, who aren’t living with their head tied to their belt? Since we’re going to die sooner or later anyway, I’d rather stay with people I like… or at least cooperate well with.”

Wen Jianyan paused, seeming to want to subconsciously glance to his side, but feeling his action might be too obvious, he forcibly stopped halfway.

“Let’s go, we’ll talk more upstairs.”

He fell back a few steps, and after watching the others leave the room, he turned to look at Wu Zhu.

“Same as last time.”

Wen Jianyan tilted his head, his gaze landing on the other, his eyes flickering slightly.

His voice was very soft, but he ensured the other could hear clearly.

“…Come find me tonight.”

---

The group entered the elevator again. The seawater that had seeped into the elevator on Floor B7 earlier had vanished, cleaned up without a trace, making it almost impossible to imagine what had happened here.

The elevator started slowly, beginning to ascend.

Suddenly, Wen Jianyan seemed to think of something and asked, “Can we still go to Floor B7 now?”

The elevator operator smiled and replied with the same professional attitude as always, “Apologies, Floor B7 has temporarily ceased operations.”

“What about Floor B5?” Wen Jianyan asked.

“It is currently under maintenance and will reopen soon,” the elevator operator replied with a smile. “Please wait patiently.”

“Okay, thank you.” Wen Jianyan nodded thoughtfully.

The rupture of the hull caused by Carl Bell’s death was a major event sufficient to cause an instance to collapse, but… the different sectors of the Lucky Cruise existed in parallel spaces.

So, even if the hull of Floor B7 ruptured and seawater invaded, the other areas remained unaffected.

Just like all other accommodation floors invaded by seawater, Floor B7 had been sealed by the Nightmare again, becoming part of the “outside of the instance”—from this perspective, the structure of this instance was far more robust than he had imagined.

In a sense, this was a good thing. At least they wouldn’t die from falling into the water in a shipwreck—that would simply be one of the most frustrating ways to die.

Soon, they arrived at the first floor of the cruise ship.

It was still the familiar decor, the familiar scene.

Even though the Captain’s Dinner had just been held here yesterday, Wen Jianyan still felt like a lifetime had passed—too many things had happened today, too densely packed, so that recalling yesterday felt like thinking about the last century.

In the center of the hall, not far awa,y stood the familiar glass box.

Clearly, there were no extra activities tonight. As long as they purchased and drew their accommodation room number for tonight, they could leave.

Wen Jianyan noticed that there were far fewer people alive now than he had imagined.

And Dan Zhu, as always, did not show her face.

Just as he walked into the hall, a gaze with an incredibly strong presence, almost cutting into his flesh and bone, came from a distance, locking dead onto Wen Jianyan.

Wen Jianyan shivered and turned to look in the direction the gaze came from.

At the end of his line of sight was Gentleman and his Oracle squad.

It seemed that although they ultimately failed to find the pass to Floor B6, they had successfully escaped from Floor B5 in the end.

The Gentleman’s face was deathly pale, a rare absence of a smile on his face. He simply stared at him coldly from afar, saying nothing.

Wen Jianyan, unafraid of death, smiled back at him, looking punchable no matter how you looked at it.

After all, this floor was very special.

Even if the Gentleman hated him to the bone and wanted to eat his flesh raw, he was still restricted everywhere and had to consider the potential price of making a move.

Just then, Alex, who had taken over management of the accommodation area from Eaton Ethan, stepped forward with a smile on his face.

“Due to certain special reasons, the areas from Floor B13 to Floor B16 will all be open to everyone tonight.”

The price for Floor B13 was 70 million, and the price for Floor B16 ballooned directly to 200 million!

Instantly, the crowd was in an uproar.

Those who had lost everything had long been dragged away to become racehorses. All those who survived had their own capabilities—whether surviving deadly gambling games or looting others’ property in crueler ways—the vast majority of people who made it here had accumulated considerable wealth.

But that didn’t mean they could afford such astronomical figures!!

A buzzing of shock, anger, and resentment arose. The air instantly tightened. Countless resentful eyes stared fixedly at Alex above, as if a mutiny would erupt in the next second.

Even though he had anticipated this, the terrifying number still made Wen Jianyan’s heart constrict for a moment. He quickly did the math in his head… Among all the squads, his was the most intact with the highest retention rate, so naturally, they needed to buy more rooms.

Even with his massive assets, faced with such astronomical room fees, he was almost unable to bear it.

However…

Before today, they usually only opened one floor deeper than the previous time. This was the only time the Lucky Cruise had opened four accommodation floors at once.

It seemed that although the fall of Floor B7 didn’t lead to the destruction and sinking of the ship, it still had an impact on the instance…

Precisely because the safety of more cabin floors could not be guaranteed, the cruise ship was forced to open deeper accommodation floors.

Wen Jianyan gritted his teeth. “Buy Floor B16.”

Chen Mo was stunned, instinctively turning to look at him. “…How many rooms?”

Wen Jianyan took a deep breath and slowly said:

“For everyone.”

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