Volume 2. Game Update in Progress
"One hundred and sixty-seven hours and twenty-five minutes, counting the time after leaving the Interdimensional Space, it should be almost forty minutes now, meaning... one hundred and sixty-eight hours, exactly one week?"
While walking down the stairs, I calculated the time.
Because of the soul's strength, my brain's computing speed had now increased beyond its normal limits.
So fast that even I was a bit surprised.
However, this little thing was just a fleeting surprise.
For me, surviving was the most important.
A stronger brain was beneficial for survival, so I was happy about it, but only to that extent.
From this countdown timer, it could be seen that unexpected incidents did not occur continuously but had a cooldown period.
Although it was only my first time experiencing an unexpected event, using this 'one week' period as a temporary cooldown time seemed reasonable.
The cooldown time was one week, and judging from the danger level of this unexpected event, it really was not very difficult.
Of course, it might also be that I was lucky and thus didn't encounter too much trouble during my first sudden mission.
One hundred and eighty-nine points seemed like a lot to spend, but most items were single-use consumables.
The cheapest reusable item was the World Watch, which was equivalent to one and a half Substitute Dolls.
And the price... was equivalent to twenty Substitute Dolls.
A Substitute Doll cost fifteen points, and the World Watch cost three hundred.
If thinking about long-term investment, the World Watch was indeed cost-effective.
But... who could guarantee that they would survive that long?
Therefore, it was normal that no one bought the World Watch.
Moreover... to recover the cost, one would need to survive through at least ten or more horror games.
So, for a newbie, it was almost impossible to save up three hundred points.
My current status was still a beginner player, but I might later become an intermediate or advanced player.
According to my guess, it would only get more dangerous from there.
In each game, there were two chances to use a Substitute Doll: one given during the mission, and one bought with points.
When I saw the World Watch until the time I bought it, several days had passed in between, but still, no one bought it.
This showed that players, whether high-level or beginner, basically had no savings.
In other words, these people... could only survive by using up all their points.
There were items like Substitute Dolls, Transformation Talismans, and Invincibility Talismans, but all of them were single-use.
With so many props, yet players still had no savings... this clearly indicated one thing.
As horror events progressed, the usage frequency of disposable props would increase.
The reason should be that the chances of survival would decrease.
What kind of horror could it be... that even dozens of seconds bought by paused time and Substitute Dolls were barely enough to survive?
It was hard to imagine.
But it was not completely unimaginable.
The World Watch allowed time to pause.
This should belong to player-exclusive item abilities.
Whereas the players themselves had no innate abilities.
I couldn't find any kind of physical enhancement items in the Points Mall.
Meanwhile, the monsters relied on their own abilities.
In other words... later-stage monsters might involve time and space powers.
My watch could pause time three times, but what if a monster's ability was to rewind time?
If that happened, even if I used the watch, it would be hard to survive!
What about space abilities?
If I paused for five seconds, and the moment time resumed, the monster instantly appeared beside me?
Then there would be no room for the World Watch to even work!
I dared not think too deeply about it.
But... if future monsters were weak, players should have accumulated a lot of unused points already.
In reality, however, this seemingly powerful World Watch had been hanging in the Points Mall for several days without anyone buying it.
Until finally, I, a rookie, with the points from my first entry into the game plus an S-grade mission, bought it.
There was only one possible explanation for this.
The later horror events forced players to use all their points to exchange for as many disposable items as possible.
Because they could not predict what kind of monsters they would encounter, and the more life-saving means they had, the better.
Moreover... every time, they might have barely survived only by exhausting all their life-saving means.
Thus, it made sense why such a strong item like the World Watch, even usable in the real world, remained unsold in the shop for so long.
Thinking about this, I walked out of the teaching building.
From the recent conversation between Zhang Yan and 'Brother Liu', I could basically confirm that they were waiting for me outside the school gate.
The former Liu Yunyan, whenever leaving school, would choose to return to that nearby house.
With the Liu family's financial power, buying several houses near the school district was very easy.
In fact, there were three neighborhoods next door, all built by Liu Wanqian.
Leaving a few for his children was not a problem at all.
The building Liu Yunyan lived in was only one street away from the school.
Normally, walking along the main road would not be an issue.
But Liu Yunyan usually preferred taking a shortcut through a narrow alley.
Except for Zhang Yan, who was familiar with Liu Yunyan’s route, perhaps only Liu Wanqian and Gong Lianyu knew about it.
"If I were that 'Brother Liu', I would choose to act here... hmm, as for the method, it would be much simpler."
To kidnap a person was too simple.
Temporarily block that alley, leave someone at the entrance to monitor me, and once I arrived, immediately open up the blockade, trapping me inside the narrow alley.
A small knife out, a cloth stuffed in, a sack over my head, a rope tied, thrown into the car waiting across the street, and then driven away directly.
There were plenty of methods to block the road, such as "sewer maintenance" or "garbage cleaning".
In short, uniforms were cheap.
Pretending to be city management or certain workers made blocking the road no problem at all.
With two more people guarding the alley entrances, blocking others, the plan would be foolproof.
Hmm... it seemed I had quite a potential for crime?
Tsk tsk, no wonder they say "every detective has the potential for perfect crime."
I didn’t consider myself a detective, just someone who enjoyed deduction a bit more.
At least, from my self-perception, I felt closer to a detective's vibe.
From Liu Yunyan’s memories, I learned that there were no surveillance cameras on either side of the alley.
It seemed that 'Brother Liu' also had quite a brain.
The chosen location was very suitable.
Presumably, the vehicle used was also either a stolen plate or a missing car.
As for personnel... they should limit it to fewer than five people, including the one monitoring me.
If it exceeded five people, it would be easy to expose.
Kidnapping was dangerous.
Group crimes would result in heavier penalties.
Thus, 'Brother Liu' likely wouldn't arrange for more than five people.
After all, the loot had to be split.
Too many people meant less money each, making it not worthwhile.
With this reasoning, the whole situation became fairly clear in my mind.
And I... had also prepared a counterattack plan mentally.
I had... an advantage almost no one else had, and that was... Evil Spirit Form!
Thinking of this, I picked up the phone and dialed out.
"Young Miss."
As soon as the call connected, Shao He’s cold voice came from the other end.
This woman was just like this, with a personality almost like a stone girl, having that kind of two-dimensional cool goddess vibe.
Unfortunately, she was just a security guard... hmm, a bodyguard.
"Shao He, go buy me two servings of spicy boiled fish, I want the ones from Chuan Shu’s place, yes... the one in front of the station."
"Both portions must be extra large... no, make that three."
"How much do you think you can eat? Hmm... fine, then three extra-large portions."
"Hmm? You can’t eat that much?"
"Then two large portions and one small portion."
"Also, buy some other food you like."
"It’s not just for you. I’ll eat too."
"Preferably more meat... the price? Does this even need to be considered!?"
Maybe no one would ever know, but when I said that last sentence, the joy in my heart almost made me soar.
Damn!
Never thought I'd ever get to say something so rich and arrogant!
"Take the money from the trunk, it's in the box inside."
"There should be two hundred thousand there."
"The password is 999."
After receiving Shao He’s confirmation, I hung up.
However, before hanging up, I still heard someone on the other end shout, "Damn! So much money!"
Uh... well, putting cash in the trunk was something many rich people liked to do.
Actually, a lot of wealthy people liked doing this.
First, it could be used to show off when necessary.
Second, money could work wonders.
Even if an actual robbery happened, just pulling out tens of thousands and handing it over would solve it.
The richer a person was, the less likely they were to fight to the death, because... they had more money, and once their life was gone, the money was useless.
Back when I was still "Zhang Yiwei," I worked at a restaurant.
The boss there was fairly wealthy, owning tens of millions.
Once, when he and his wife went for a walk in a park, they got robbed within ten minutes.
The boss, without a word, handed over his thick gold chain, cash, and phone without hesitation.
The whole transaction took less than three minutes.
Then the robber walked away contentedly.
Hmm... just that simple.
Although the boss called the police, it was almost impossible to catch the robber.
This was the real behavior of rich people.
Only the poor would risk their lives during a robbery because... their money was also their lifeline.
Thus, to avoid such a situation, Liu Wanqian stuffed fifty thousand yuan into the front drawer of my "Don’t Touch Me" car.
The trunk even had a full two hundred thousand in cash, all fresh bills, to prevent robbers from becoming desperate.
Sacrificing wealth to avert disaster.
However... my purpose wasn't to show off to Shao He how rich I was.
Nor was it purely out of appetite.
It was simply to... get Shao He away.
Because what I was about to do would be troublesome if she saw.
After hanging up the phone, I continued walking toward the school gate.
It was already past four in the afternoon.
Although the sunlight was still warm and pleasant, the school entrance had become much quieter.
I had deliberately delayed a bit.
And just as I had guessed, after walking a few steps out of the school gate, a wave of malice came from my side.
In an instant, I directly separated the head of my Evil Spirit Form from my physical body.
Thus, from an outsider’s perspective, it looked like I was walking with my head lowered.
But in reality, my physical head was in deep sleep mode while my body continued moving.
Using the head of my Evil Spirit Form, I looked in that direction.
'Found you...'