Changsheng Building
Chapter 653: Coincide?
Through the dusty mall entrance, deep in a corner where no one could see, stood a figure.
His form had almost completely merged into the infinitely silent darkness, seeming to have become a part of this world.
“People are coming in?”
Seemingly sensing something, Wen Jianyan tilted his head slightly and spoke softly.
As his voice fell, another figure emerged from the darkness, bending down behind Wen Jianyan. Black hair fell intimately onto both their shoulders, their shadows overlapping, indistinguishable from one another.
“Mm.”
“What next,” golden-red captivating eyes lowered, gazing at the young man in his arms, whispering by his ear, “what do you want to do?”
“Very simple. First, force him to take out items in this instance.”
When items were stored in a anchor’s backpack, ownership couldn’t be changed.
No matter how much resentment existed between Wen Jianyan and Gentleman, as a Nightmare anchor, the other party was far more successful. He was cold-hearted enough, shrewd enough, couldn’t be coerced, and certainly couldn’t be blackmailed. To force him to actively take out items from his backpack and hand them over while he still held all his cards was as difficult as ascending to heaven.
So, what Wen Jianyan had to do was consume his active strength, grind away his trump cards step by step, and force him to lose all choices.
“Then?”
“Then,”
Wen Jianyan narrowed his eyes, habitually playing with the ring on his finger, speaking nonchalantly.
“Grab it directly.”
He was indeed accustomed to deception and playing with people’s hearts, but that didn’t mean he was only good at that.
Lies were reserved for situations where there was a disparity in strength between the two sides.
Deception was a means for the weak to toy with the strong, but when he already held an overwhelming advantage, what need was there to feign civility?
Predator and prey had quietly switched positions long ago.
The Changsheng Building was his large web, and the Gentleman was the fly falling into it.
He turned his head, eyes smiling: “Ready?”
“…” Wu Zhu lowered his eyes, the depths of his golden pupils reflecting the young man’s face. Even though he had seen this look more than once, every time he was fascinated by this undisguised aggression and the vitality contained within it.
Wu Zhu’s Adam’s apple bobbed. He lowered his head to deeply inhale the scent in the other’s hair, his voice slightly hoarse:
“Always.”
“That’s good.”
Wen Jianyan raised his hand, jokingly pinching Wu Zhu’s chin, pushing his face away from his neck. He raised an eyebrow, a smile on his lips, eyes reflecting a sinful glimmer:
“Alright, move aside a bit.”
“We need to get to business.”
“Since parting at the hotel, have you been well?” the Gentleman smiled, his expression flawless. “Haven’t seen you for so long, I didn’t know you still entered instances.”
No one knew how Anise survived the death-certain position swap match.
But Gentleman was different.
After all, the so-called method that allowed Anise to survive came from his intelligence network.
“Just like that.” Anise’s stiff face twitched twice, revealing an expression resembling a smile. “No choice, one has to live. I was also entrusted by someone, forced into it.”
“What a coincidence.” Gentleman bowed slightly, fingers touching the brim of his hat.
“Ah, you also have a task?” Anise cackled twice, the laughter carrying a strange, hissing guttural sound. “In that case, I won’t disturb you.”
He waved his hand: “See you inside the instance.”
Watching Anise’s figure gradually disappear, the smile on Gentleman’s face also gradually faded.
He truly hadn’t expected to see Anise again in such a setting.
And… this was a instance with three Nightmare top ten anchors present.
Gentleman looked around. Although the instance hadn’t started yet and everything within sight was normal, he was inexplicably restless.
Sure enough, Dark Fire’s commission wasn’t that easy to fulfill.
Gentleman quickly withdrew his gaze, his expression returning to calm.
However, it wasn’t a big problem.
Although the number of people he brought this time was limited and they weren’t his most capable subordinates, if he really reached a dead end, he was confident he could retreat unscathed.
However, the viewers in the live room were clearly not as calm as him.
“Wait… why does all this look familiar?”
“Did I remember wrong? How do I recall this instance was already closed?”
“Yeah, I seem to have an impression too…”
The door of Changsheng Building was pushed open from the inside. The buzzing conversation in the entire square immediately disappeared. Everyone’s eyes fell on the security guard with pale skin.
“Come in.”
The security guard dropped a sentence and turned to walk into the dusty building.
The crowd followed closely, filing in.
The moment they walked into the building, even a anchor of Gentleman’s level couldn’t help but frown.
A cold aura attacked from beneath their feet, making the blood in one’s body seem to cool down with it. A certain unsettling substance settled in the surrounding air, making one immediately feel that the difficulty of this instance was by no means ordinary.
As each team stepped forward to draw shop keys, the bullet comments in each live room became doubly active.
[Ahhh absolutely right, it’s the instance in my memory! All processes are exactly the same!]
[Yes, I remember too. This instance ranked quite high on the online viewer list back then! I went in to watch too!]
[That’s not right… wasn’t this instance platinum-cleared by Pinocchio? Why is it open again?]
[Is it a bug?]
[But this doesn’t seem like the scope for a bug!]
No matter how intensely the audience discussed, these contents related to the instance were unilaterally blocked for violating live room confidentiality regulations. Thus, except for viewers outside the instance, no anchor saw such discussions.
The instance process continued to advance according to memory, and anchors successively received their number plates.
In this instance, every team operated as a multi-person group; only one person acted alone.
Even in a specialized team instance, Hugo still didn’t team up.
He stood alone in the hall, hands in pockets, eyes lowered. Even though he did nothing, a vacuum zone was left around him; no one dared to approach.
He obviously had no teammates.
Thus, some teams began to stir. Some people exchanged glances, intending to step forward, trying to extend an invitation and cling to a powerful ally. Unfortunately, before they could approach, Hugo had already begun to move.
He walked straight to the blood-red wooden box ahead and drew a shop doorplate from it.
Then, without waiting for anyone to come talk to him, he walked away without any lingering.
Watching Hugo’s retreating figure, everyone left behind showed astonishment.
Although they had heard of Hugo’s lone wolf title, they really hadn’t expected the other party to be so independent even in a instance with rigid team requirements.
The Gentleman glanced over, calmly withdrew his gaze, not surprised by this.
Although he and Hugo were by no means on good terms, as fellow Nightmare top ten anchors, he naturally knew the other’s temperament long ago and naturally wasn’t prepared to provoke him.
Although he didn’t know how the other entered such a team instance as a single person, according to his intelligence network, it wasn’t the first time the other had done this.
He looked around and quickly located Anise’s figure.
The other was surrounded by another team. Those people’s levels were obviously far inferior to Anise, gathering around him like stars around the moon.
It seemed the other party hadn’t lied in the square earlier; he was indeed hired.
Just didn’t know what kind of stakes they paid to actually hire Anise who had been secluded for so long.
“Vice President, I’m going too.”
Someone in the team whispered.
However, having just taken a step, he was stopped by the Gentleman:
“Wait a moment.”
“?” The person stopped and turned to look. “Vice President, what’s wrong?”
The Gentleman raised his hand and handed him a blood-red bracelet that looked like it was woven from human hair. That thing emitted a strange cold aura, looking very evil.
“Wear this before drawing the key.”
“Yes.”
Watching the retreating figure of the team member, Gentleman frowned tightly.
Generally speaking, he rarely used such level items so early in a instance. However, for some reason, this instance gave him such a terrible feeling that he’d rather take insurance in advance—of course, as for how much backlash this luck-turning item would have and how much price the user would have to bear, he didn’t care that much.
After all, they always had replacements.
Useful ones would be kept, useless ones screened out, or made into reusable “products,” maximizing their value.
Soon, the team member walked back from the front of the line.
Even though everything went smoothly, his face looked very ugly. While handing the key back to Gentleman, he stammered: “Vice President, this item you gave me…”
Gentleman lowered his eyes, gaze falling on the team member’s palm, pupils contracting involuntarily.
That bracelet woven from human hair had turned from red to black at some point and broken into two pieces.
Item… failed?
His gaze fell on the team member’s wrist where a blood-red bruise in the shape of a hand had appeared, and immediately rejected his guess.
No, it didn’t fail.
It was destroyed by another, more powerful curse.
“V-very sorry…” The team member looked at Gentleman with obvious fear in his eyes. “I don’t know how…”
Gentleman gave him a cold look: “You are truly useless.”
Unfortunately, things having come to this, he had no other way.
“Alright,” Gentleman took a deep breath, took the key, voice sounding squeezed through his teeth, “let’s go.”
The group turned and walked toward the shop represented by the number plate.
The shop door was tightly closed. A small brass plate was chiseled into the wall, with a small number on it;
No. 04.
In the live room, viewers who had watched previous broadcasts were all stunned.
“…Shop No. 04?”
“Isn’t this the shop Pinocchio was assigned to when this instance opened last time!”
“I just went back to check the replay, it really is…!”
“Huh? What’s going on?”
“Is it a coincidence?”
But… would there really be such a coincidence in the world?
