Volume 3: High School Arc - Mirror Game
The players’ gathering time was scheduled for midnight tomorrow, and today, I was only here to explore the situation—at the very least, I couldn’t show up to meet the other players completely unprepared.
I didn’t know why, but the deeper I walked in, the colder it felt around me.
Even though my clothes were warm enough, the chill still made me shiver uncontrollably.
Wait!
The people who tested this before said the reason they felt cold was due to the approach of an Evil Spirit Form, so could it be...
A sudden jolt ran through me!
At this moment, I was less than ten meters away from the main gate, and now I could actually feel the chill!
I quickly closed my eyes, and the Evil Spirit Form rapidly emerged behind me.
Just then, a surprised voice rang out from afar.
“Huh?”
Immediately afterward, the perception around the Evil Spirit Form suddenly intensified.
A strong wave of icy coldness enveloped my back.
Within that coldness was a gaze filled with resentment and malice.
I suddenly turned my head!
A shadow darted into the nearby bushes in an instant and vanished from sight.
Almost instinctively, I extended the Evil Spirit Form’s arm.
After some practice, I had become proficient at extending parts of the Evil Spirit Form’s body.
The joints of the arm instantly stretched out.
The Evil Spirit Form’s hand reached straight into the bushes.
But the moment I touched the bushes, I felt as if I had grabbed something, and I couldn’t help but twist the hand hard!
“Gyaaah!!!!”
A sharp cry echoed through the surroundings.
The scream was so miserable it sent chills down the spine!
What did I catch!?
I froze for a second and then pulled back my hand, only to find a strand of long hair in my palm.
The hair emitted an enticing fragrance.
This was… the thick scent of soul energy.
The aroma instantly ignited my hunger.
The whites of the Evil Spirit Form’s eyes began turning blood-red at a speed visible to the naked eye.
Just as I was about to lose control and strike again, suddenly, a voice called out.
“Don’t use your hand!!! I give up!”
A person?
It was actually a person?
Monsters couldn’t communicate with humans.
This was something I had confirmed in multiple games.
Though they had emotions, they were nothing but intense negative ones.
They absolutely couldn’t speak human language.
But this voice… it was clearly human!!
While I was still stunned, a figure crawled out of the bushes.
As they walked out, they complained.
“Ai… I didn’t expect it to be a parasitic type. I thought it was a newbie player and wanted to scare them.”
It really was a person?
While I was still trying to process it, another figure crawled out of the bushes.
Judging by the silhouette, it was a short-haired girl.
“I told you not to underestimate others! Got caught, didn’t you? That move just now cost you at least one-third of your item’s strength. Serves you right!!”
While I was still in disbelief, the two of them stepped out from the darkness.
A man and a woman.
“Hello… sorry, this guy scared you, didn’t he? We mean no harm. Could you… please withdraw your parasite?”
That girl wasn’t looking at my body, but at the Evil Spirit Form floating above it!?
She could see me?
I immediately locked eyes with her.
Even though she was wearing glasses, I still saw it in an instant—her pupils clearly reflected the silhouette of the Evil Spirit Form!
“You’re a newbie, so maybe you don’t understand the damage a parasitic-type monster can do to you. Please withdraw it first. We really mean no harm. This guy just thought he could scare a newbie. Sorry…”
The girl looked gentle and well-mannered.
She spoke clearly and calmly.
I looked at the guy, then at the bespectacled girl, and after a brief silence, I slowly withdrew the Evil Spirit Form.
It looked like… I had encountered some high-level players.
And these two could clearly see the Evil Spirit Form, so they were likely players.
Then… what did I just grab?
Instinctively, I glanced at the strand of hair in the Evil Spirit Form’s right hand.
The girl seemed to misunderstand something and quickly said,
“Don’t move. How about this—you give us that part of the monster, and we’ll give you an appropriate reward. Don’t be nervous…”
Reward?
Part of a monster?
I paused for a moment.
I pulled the Evil Spirit Form back into my body, forcing myself to suppress the strong desire to devour the strand of hair.
Only the Evil Spirit Form’s right hand remained outside.
The rest returned inside me.
Feeling the sensation slowly returning to my upper body, I raised my head and looked at the man and woman.
The boy was about 1.75 meters tall, a fairly standard height.
He seemed a bit thin, but his arms weren’t small.
Clearly someone who trained regularly.
As for the girl… she looked prim and proper.
There were some freckles on her face.
She wore large, square-framed glasses and had short hair.
She gave off a bit of a silly vibe, but…
The intense resentment and malice radiating from her told me this woman was far stronger than the boy.
“Who are you? Game players? You're in this game too? Why did you ambush me? How many games have you played? Do you know other players? What clues do you have for this game? Tell me everything… and I’ll trade you this hair.”
“Uh…”
The two of them were stunned by my barrage of questions.
They looked at each other.
In the end, the girl stepped forward.
“We’re game players, part of the Survivor Alliance. We only ambushed you because this idiot was fooling around. If we scared you, we apologize. Of course we know other players, and we do have some clues about this game—but this isn’t the place to talk.”
Saying that, the girl glanced around.
Then she added, “That hair… we’d appreciate it if you could return it soon. If it stays in the Surface World, the resentment inside will gradually dissipate.”
Resentment?
Could it really be as I suspected?
That some monsters attach themselves to solid objects, forming something like ‘resentment’?
I looked at the two of them.
After a moment of hesitation, I handed over the strand of hair.
Of course, I did so by extending the Evil Spirit Form’s right hand.
I didn’t intend to make close contact with these two.
At least not before I figured things out.
“Thank you for your generosity.”
The girl formally thanked me, then turned and gave the guy a solid smack on the back of the head.
“What are you standing there for! Say thank you! If this sister hadn’t returned it, you wouldn’t have been able to say a word even if she took it!”
The guy stumbled from the smack and rubbed the back of his head with a wronged expression.
He bowed and apologized to me.
“I’m sorry. I acted recklessly.”
I didn’t respond.
I calmly watched their expressions.
Meanwhile, the Evil Spirit Form’s right hand remained outside my body.
If they tried anything shady, I wouldn’t hesitate to go all out.
Perhaps noticing my caution, the girl smiled.
“No need to be so tense. We really mean no harm. But of course, you probably won’t believe us just because we say that. So how about this… let’s go back to the city. With more people around, you won’t have to worry we’ll hurt you.”
More people means less risk of harm?
“Why?”
“What do you mean why?”
The girl was momentarily stunned by my “Why” and subconsciously asked back.
“Why wouldn’t we be able to hurt you if there were more people? Monsters… ordinary people can’t see them, right?”
“Heh… you’re overthinking it, little sister. It’s not about whether the Evil Spirit Form can be seen—it’s that we… need to hide ourselves. Think about it: if we harmed you and it affected tomorrow night’s gathering, what kind of punishment would the System impose?”
“……”
That was true… it was hard to say what kind of punishment the System would hand down.
“How did you get here, little sister? Judging from your outfit… did you come by motorcycle? Perfect, we’re on motorcycles too—let’s ride back together.”
“No… I took a cab.”
“A cab!?”
“A cab!!”
The two of them exclaimed in near unison, then exchanged glances.
In that glance, I caught a hint of surprise.
“What’s wrong?”
“No… actually, it’s nothing… it’s just that you took a cab…”
The girl with glasses looked at me with a scrutinizing gaze, as if she were seeing some sort of national treasure or rare species.
The guy had the same look.
“Let’s introduce ourselves first—makes it easier to talk. I’m Jiang Yulong, currently a junior manager in a department at Tianding Everything Co., Ltd. You look young, so feel free to call me Brother Yulong, or Brother Jiang!”
Jiang Yulong looked at me with a relaxed smile.
“I’m Xu Han, this guy’s guardian!”
The girl with the large square-framed glasses declared she was his guardian so matter-of-factly that I was startled, and Jiang Yulong was too.
“What the hell! Aren’t you my girlfriend? When did you become my guardian!?”
“If I didn’t keep an eye on you, who knows what kind of mess you’d cause!”
“Hey hey hey! You make it sound like I’m a walking trouble generator!”
“What do you think you are? If I hadn’t worked so hard to apologize just now, do you think she would’ve handed back the cursed item’s resentment so easily? Do you even know how rare cursed items are!!”
“I… I didn’t mean for this to happen…”
“Then what did you mean!! And when did I ever agree to be your girlfriend? Just because you’ve got no shame doesn’t mean I don’t!!”
“I… damn it!”
Hearing Xu Han’s words, Jiang Yulong collapsed to the ground, completely dejected.
“After all I’ve done… and now you want to abandon me? Sob sob sob sob…”
“Get up! Don’t embarrass me!!”
Xu Han shouted while kicking him twice.
“Uh… you two, are you a couple?”
Watching them bicker, I couldn’t help but ask, but the responses I got were polar opposites!
“Of course she’s my girlfriend!”
“I’m not his girlfriend!”
“……”
Should I just turn around and leave now?
What do these two weirdos have to do with me anyway?
But before I could make up my mind to leave, the two of them returned to normal.
“Sorry you had to see that… Anyway, let’s talk in the city. As for the mirror factory… it doesn’t really matter whether you check it or not. We’ve already investigated it, including Workshop No. 7. We even took photos. If you want, we can send them to you. That way, you won’t have to take unnecessary risks, right?”
Looking at Xu Han’s relatively sincere expression, I hesitated for a moment and nodded.
There wasn’t really anything to hesitate about.
Even though these two didn’t seem dangerous, that so-called cursed item just now still surprised me.
When I returned the resentment-filled hair, Jiang Yulong had pulled out a pouch from his pocket.
Yes, the kind of old Chinese-style pouch that looked like its colors had long faded—clearly something old.
Inside the pouch, I saw a strand of hair and a pair of eyes filled with resentment.
Then, the resentment within the hair was reabsorbed into the pouch.
Throughout the entire process, Jiang Yulong had acted very cautiously.
Which meant… he feared what was in the pouch too.
So, he couldn’t fully control it?
I didn’t know, but in that regard, I was quite curious.
Xu Han had just said that my Evil Spirit Form was a parasitic type—so what category did Jiang Yulong’s pouch fall under?
I still couldn’t figure it out, but it was just as I suspected.
While the in-game points wouldn’t directly grant players items that could resist monsters, these people had found another way to acquire items for self-defense.
Like Jiang Yulong’s pouch.
And the “parasitic type” Xu Han mentioned.
The specifics were still unclear, but since these two were willing to talk, I should listen.
As long as I didn’t reveal my identity as a newbie, they probably wouldn’t realize I was new.
That way, they might share something I was interested in.
“If that’s the case… fine. You ride your motorcycle, I’ll get back in the cab. Where should we meet?”
“Do you like barbecue?”
Instead of answering my question, Xu Han asked me something else.
“…It’s fine.”
Barbecue?
Xu Han smiled.
“Then let’s meet at Central Garden. There’s a place nearby that serves pretty good barbecue. We’ll talk there.”
“Store name? Address?”
I took out my phone, ready to ask.
Suddenly, in the reflection of the screen, I saw that malicious grin on my face again.
At first, I didn’t think much of it.
I’d been seeing that expression almost daily over the past four days.
Sometimes it scared me, but I’d gotten used to it.
But… when I lit up the screen, I realized—
That malicious smile, which normally disappeared the moment the screen turned on, didn’t vanish.
On the contrary, it became even clearer!!
Sensing that something was wrong, I instinctively looked up.
The previously dilapidated mirror factory suddenly started to crack.
The smell of decay spread in an instant.
A moldy stench filled the air.
The once mottled walls slowly began to turn a deep crimson.
“What’s wrong?”
While I was still in a daze, Xu Han looked at me with confusion and asked.
“Didn’t you see it?!”