Volume 2. Game Update in Progress
I slowly opened my eyes, hearing faint breathing by my ear, and before me was complete darkness.
"What time is it..."
My mind felt groggy.
Although I had been able to sense the outside world over the past month, the immense stream of memories constantly impacted my consciousness, leaving me with no time to care about the passage of time outside—I could only barely remember a few key places.
I raised my hand and pulled out the oxygen tube inserted in my nostrils.
Having a plastic tube stuck in my nose felt extremely uncomfortable.
Even though the oxygen was soothing, the thing was ultimately foreign to the body.
While unconscious, my sense of the body wasn’t very sensitive, but now that I was awake, the discomfort immediately returned.
After a month of barely moving, my body had atrophied to some degree.
My arms didn’t move as smoothly as before.
Fortunately, I could already feel the Evil Spirit Form continuously feeding back into my body, replenishing strength and restoring the atrophied muscles.
I looked down at myself and recalled that a month ago, I had staggered and stumbled out of the forest and returned to the villa.
After climbing over the wall and sneaking back into my room, I completely lost control of my body.
But I still remembered the condition I was in back then.
Honestly, it was hard not to be suspicious in that state.
My whole body was covered in dead branches and rotten leaves, my shoes were filled with melted snow, and my hair was in tangled clumps.
No matter how you looked at it, I resembled a mountaineering accident victim.
But looking at myself now, I was much cleaner.
The filthy clothes were gone, replaced by a clean, loose white set of pajamas.
I didn’t feel anything on my shoulders, so I probably wasn’t wearing any undergarments.
The breathing beside me sounded familiar.
Judging from the rhythm, it was likely Aunt Zhao’s.
She seemed to be in a deep sleep.
Right!
The World Watch?
Instinctively, I reached for my wrist, only to find the watch missing.
I quickly glanced around and, fortunately, it hadn’t been thrown away. It had been placed in the watch box on the dressing table.
The box also contained several other watches I’d never seen before.
Maybe Gong Lianyu brought them back from Europe?
Or perhaps Liu Wanqian bought them.
In any case, the watch box was now full.
I casually glanced over—Richard Mille full-diamond 18K gold, Queen of Naples full-diamond 18K gold series...
Are full-diamond watches really that pretty?
Why do I find them so gaudy?
Hmm...
That Richard Mille full-diamond 18K gold one was about twenty million yuan, right?
If I remember correctly... it was Gong Lianyu’s personal watch.
Why was it now in my watch box?
The rest were all worth several hundred thousand yuan, mostly encrusted with diamonds...
Sigh, I really don’t understand rich people.
Watches that cost hundreds of thousands to millions—even tens of millions—aren’t as practical as a 10,000-yuan Casio radio-controlled watch!
200-meter water resistance + automatic time calibration via radio signal + solar-powered charging—if used with care, it’ll last a decade without any problems.
As for ten years later... who knows if I’ll even still be alive?
Why worry about something that far away?
Still, I could tell how much these parents cared for Liu Yunyan.
Even with two younger children, their love for her hadn’t diminished in the slightest.
Honestly, it’s rare these days to see parents care so much for a spoiled kid like that.
As the saying goes, all parents love their children.
"Hoo..."
I shook my head and stopped thinking about it.
Supporting my weak body, I walked over to the dressing table, picked up the World Watch, checked it for any problems, and put it back on my wrist.
The watch box must’ve been added after I fell into a coma.
I wasn’t sure whether Gong Lianyu or Liu Wanqian bought it.
Anyway, I didn’t buy a watch box when I furnished the room.
I only needed one World Watch, and the others were completely unnecessary.
"Tss... hoo!"
I let out a long breath.
I had to admit, the phrase "life lies in movement" wasn’t a lie.
After lying down for a month, my body was so weak that even walking this short distance made me break out in cold sweat.
No way…
I needed to take a bath.
The more I got used to this body, the stronger my obsessive cleanliness became.
I honestly worried that one day I’d scrub myself raw because of it.
I didn’t wake up Aunt Zhao.
Her breathing told me she was utterly exhausted and in a deep sleep.
She seemed physically unwell—probably from worrying about me lately?
I went to the bathroom and checked my body.
Despite lying in bed for a month, my muscles had only slightly atrophied, and my height had noticeably increased.
I used to be 160 cm tall, but now I was probably around 162 or 163.
I entered the washroom and turned on the light.
Over the past month, I had basically relied on sweating to excrete waste and IV fluids to barely sustain my body’s nutrition.
So now, I badly needed to use the toilet...
Yeah, it wasn’t glamorous, but the body's needs had to be met.
Never heard of anyone who didn’t need the bathroom.
Even celebrities do—unless that celebrity is a Pixiu (a mythical Chinese creature. In folklore, a Pixiu is said to have a huge appetite for gold and treasures but no anus, meaning it never expels what it consumes).
But... what really broke me was that I never expected it to stink this badly.
I almost passed out from the stench.
Apparently, a month’s worth of toxins had built up inside me.
After finishing in the bathroom, I immediately turned on the exhaust fan, took off my pajamas, and turned on the bathtub faucet.
While waiting for the tub to fill, I stepped under the shower and turned it on.
‘Shhhhhh~’
Clear water poured down onto my face with a rhythmic splattering sound.
Hmm... If your mind went to a dirty place, you’re beyond saving.
"Hoo..."
I let out a long sigh, feeling the clean water seep into my skin, quickly replenishing the moisture lost over the past month.
My skin, once dry and rough, slowly regained a trace of vitality.
Supporting myself against the wall with one hand, I lowered my head and let the warm water wash over my hair, streaming down both sides of my cheeks and dripping onto the white porcelain floor.
Completely different from my former self—gone were the prominent chest and the two attendants.
What remained was a flat stomach and a hairless... hmm.
As for the two in front... well, they still looked great, not deformed despite lying in bed for a month.
Seems like having a youthful body has its perks.
Although I didn’t think I’d be looking for a boyfriend or anything in the future, I still hoped to be beautiful.
Even if this was Liu Yunyan’s body, it was mine now... and only I could keep this body moving.
And I was human.
Anyone human would love beautiful things, and I was no exception.
Even if I used to look at others, now I look at myself...
Though strictly speaking, I probably wasn’t really human anymore, right?
When it came to that... I wasn’t too sure either.
Lowering my head, I watched the droplets patter against the white porcelain floor, bouncing back and hitting my calves and the tops of my feet.
Feeling the beads of water slide down my fair skin, I couldn’t help but recall the slaughter... from that day.
Even though I had fully prepared, from the very beginning, I was at a disadvantage.
I tried to escape, but... before I could, everything around me had already turned pitch black.
I knew what that meant.
Aside from that mountain, everything else had been swapped between the Surface World and the Inner World!
That was... the Inner World!!
I had no choice but to face the Goat-headed Monster head-on, within a 500-meter radius centered around me.
And from the start, it was nothing like I had imagined.
Almost immediately, one of my arms was bitten off.
That Goat-headed Monster launched a frenzied assault on my Evil Spirit Form.
My Evil Spirit Form barely had any power to fight back.
That feeling—having my soul torn apart, being refused and devoured—nearly drove me insane.
No matter how hard I resisted, I lost a leg too.
And all of that happened in less than two minutes.
The Goat-headed Monster seemed to thoroughly enjoy the act of hunting prey.
Even though my body had no defenses, it never attacked my physical body, only my Evil Spirit Form.
At that moment... I was almost in despair.
Although I didn’t need legs to fly, my speed was clearly slower than the Goat-headed Monster.
For a split second, I even considered recklessly diving into the Inner World.
But... the moment my remaining leg stepped into that darkness, I experienced what it truly meant to feel soul-crushing terror.
I couldn’t describe that sensation—that kind of fear...
It was worse than death.
Then, at the cost of a leg, I clawed it off myself, tore it apart, and escaped from the darkness.
Only to come face to face with the Goat-headed Monster again.
At that moment... I gave up hope.
I truly felt... despair.
Watching that Goat-headed Monster approach me step by step, savoring my fear with each inch, as if enjoying a feast.
In that instant, I gave up.
And then... the unexpected happened.
The Evil Spirit Form... went berserk.
At the brink of life and death, my Evil Spirit Form completely broke free from my control.
It was overtaken by a powerful survival and devouring instinct.
What happened next... was an unbelievable, one-sided slaughter.
The Evil Spirit Form brutally killed the Goat-headed Monster.
With just one arm, it tore off the Goat-headed Monster’s head and stuffed it into its mouth.
Before it could even chew, it reached out again, completely ignoring the creature’s defenses, and ripped off another arm, cramming that in too.
The entire process lasted less than thirty seconds.
The Goat-headed Monster was torn into dozens of pieces, one by one stuffed into its mouth.
I could clearly feel what it was like to chew the monster inside my mouth.
I could clearly hear the Goat-headed Monster’s screams coming from inside me.
Thinking about that feeling still made me nauseous even now.
Throughout the entire process, I had no control over the Evil Spirit Form.
I could only stand by as a spectator, watching my Evil Spirit Form go berserk and tear apart the Goat-headed Monster.
In the end, after devouring the Goat-headed Monster, it still wasn’t satisfied.
It even turned its attention toward the Inner World.
However... the Evil Spirit Form didn’t succeed.