1, 2, 3, 4…
The elevator floors kept rising.
Eventually, it stopped at the 13th floor.
Li Ran frowned slightly. After a moment’s hesitation, he pressed the elevator’s up button.
Ding!
Another elevator arrived on the ground floor.
Li Ran quickly stepped in and pressed 13.
“It’s Zhou Miaomiao.”
Before entering this eerie world, he had memorized all twenty-five participants’ info at a glance—especially the good-looking girls, who left a deep impression.
Though Li Ran was a bottom-tier student, he still kept up with some gossip from Azure Isle Academy. Plenty of guys had a crush on Zhou Miaomiao.
Ding!
The elevator arrived at the 13th floor.
Just as he stepped out and was about to sneak toward the stairwell to observe the situation from the shadows—
“Ahhhh… AAAAH!!”
A piercing, blood-curdling scream suddenly erupted from Room 1304.
The scream stopped abruptly. Then, the door was yanked open with a bang—a burly man stood in the doorway, his face drenched in blood.
“Kid, are you following me?” The brute glared at Li Ran with murderous hostility.
Li Ran froze like he’d been struck by lightning. What the hell? He got spotted that easily?
A string of text prompts appeared above the burly man’s head:
[Name: Wang Qian]
[Class A Spirit-Infected Entity]
[Eerie Energy: 500]
[Info: A fugitive criminal wanted for five murders. A savage maniac. He can crush your chest with one hand.]
[Warning: He’s extremely paranoid with strong persecution delusions. Anyone who enters his field of view will immediately be marked as suspicious. You’re close to crossing his warning threshold.]
[Tip: He visits the back alley twice a week to look for girls. He only brings them home after personal verification.]
[Tip: If you’re being targeted by him, get to a spot with surveillance or find the community’s security guards.]
[Hint: Wander the neighborhood and accept other missions. You must raise your power level ASAP.]
Li Ran was stunned.
A fugitive? A murderer?
All the brute did was glance at him in the elevator—
And he got suspicious?
This monster had a Eerie Energy level of 500 and was a Class A threat!
Meaning: even if Li Ran reached 500, he’d still need top-tier gear to stand a chance against this guy.
Zhou Miaomiao?
No way she could survive him.
She must’ve been assigned the role of an escort, which is why Wang Qian targeted her.
Li Ran had only glanced into the room, but that one glance made his heart nearly leap out of his throat.
Behind the living room couch, half of Zhou Miaomiao’s head was sticking out. Crimson blood poured out from under the sofa like a stream, spreading across the floor—a shockingly gruesome sight.
So much blood… her chances of survival were almost zero.
Li Ran jerked his gaze away and looked up at the brute in horror.
Danger!!
This guy was extremely dangerous!
Li Ran’s brain blared with alarm bells.
He could see the blood on Wang Qian’s face. And that gaze… like he wanted to eat someone alive.
[Hint: Back up to the elevator. He’s wary of the camera inside.]
Seeing the hint, Li Ran took several steps back.
He pointed to the floor and snapped, “You got issues? Me? Following you? I live downstairs! You should check your bathroom—it's leaking and flooding my apartment. It’s been going on for days! I’ve tolerated this long enough!”
Wang Qian glared at him furiously.
He was furious. He wanted to kill someone!
That woman inside had disappointed him terribly. Couldn’t do anything, yet dared to sell herself? And then she threatened to call the cops? He snapped and killed her.
Now this guy—from the first floor all the way up here? Very suspicious.
If this punk didn’t give a damn good explanation...
He’d rip out his heart and eat it in front of him—bite by bite—then tell him how it tasted.
“I’m telling you, leaking water is a big deal. If it goes on too long, it could cause serious damage…”
Li Ran kept scolding the crazed murderer while backing up.
“I know a waterproofing guy—his work’s so good your place won’t leak for thirty years.”
Li Ran retreated all the way to the elevator. The doors were slowly closing.
Wang Qian was radiating killing intent, like a bloodthirsty monster.
“Oh, right. This elevator camera? That same guy installed it. Super advanced tech—facial recognition as soon as you’re in frame. Even fugitives get instantly ID’d.” Li Ran pointed to the camera.
That one sentence made Wang Qian freeze.
Especially the part about fugitives and cameras—his face changed dramatically as he stared at Li Ran in disbelief.
“Does he know who I am?”
But the guy didn’t look like a cop at all.
“No… he must be bluffing. I’ve been in and out of here dozens of times. How could the camera do facial recognition?”
In the few seconds he hesitated, Li Ran slipped into the elevator and slammed the button for the first floor.
He furiously mashed the door-close button!
“Fuck! No one lives downstairs!!”
Wang Qian suddenly realized he’d been tricked and bolted toward the elevator—
Too late. The doors shut.
BANG!
With a deafening thud, the elevator door bulged outward—like it had been punched with a sandbag-sized fist. The panel caved in.
“Kid, I’ll tear you to pieces!!”
“You can’t run!!”
Wang Qian’s terrifying voice roared from outside the doors.
As the elevator descended and that oppressive sense of danger faded, Li Ran’s back was soaked in cold sweat.
The elevator reached the ground floor.
Li Ran bolted straight for the exit.
Anywhere with cameras!
He looked back up at the 13th floor.
And nearly had a heart attack.
In the center window of Room 1304, a towering figure stood by the glass.
His head had morphed into a grotesque blade made of flesh and tentacles. From his gaping maw, a massive, blood-soaked tongue slithered out, licking the window—leaving streaks of gore that spelled out one single, bone-chilling character:
"Death."
Seeing that, Li Ran gasped sharply.
Shit. He’s got his eyes on me!
[Mission Triggered: Eliminate the Murderer (14-Day Limit)]
[Reward: +100 Eerie Energy, +1000 Points, 1 Special Item, 1 Special Equipment]
Li Ran didn’t expect to trigger a new quest like this.
Seeing the rewards, he instantly understood the difficulty.
Wang Qian—this serial killer—was clearly a major boss.
With his current power, it was impossible.
To take him down, you’d need overwhelming strength, trump cards, hidden weapons—
Li Ran had none of those. What could he even use?
He wandered through the community park.
After a while, he saw a pile of torn chip bags strewn across the grass.
Even though the area felt creepy, it had been pretty clean overall. So the snack trash really stood out.
[A 700g bag of Leshi Chips with 3,000 calories. Eating it equals ten bowls of rice.]
A golden-finger prompt appeared above the chip bag.
Li Ran was stunned. No wonder they say chips are a deadly trap for couch potatoes.
He walked farther and saw more snack wrappers on the ground.
Spicy sticks, shrimp crackers, potato chips, rice crisps, instant noodles, sandwiches, burgers—he counted over a dozen bags. All junk food favorites.
[A 16-inch durian pizza box. No real durian inside.]
[Fried chicken bones. Tough texture. Made from eight-legged hormone chickens.]
[Milk tea with no actual milk. Even your pee smells like it.]
“…”
Whenever Li Ran felt confused, the prompts would automatically pop up.
“All high-tech abominations…”
Further ahead, he frowned deeply at what he saw under the pavilion.
There was… a spherical person.
“Player?” Li Ran wondered. If it were an NPC from this eerie world, the golden finger should’ve shown a danger alert.
Like "Class X Spirit-Infected Entity." But the fat guy had no such tag.
Which meant… he was most likely another player!
Only now, he’d turned into a massively obese man.
His limbs were bloated, his gut round and oversized, his distended lower belly nearly dragging on the ground. He looked like a melting sphere of fat wax.
He sat on a stone bench, with the table in front of him piled high with snacks and drinks like a mountain. Empty wrappers covered the lawn like a dense carpet—layer after layer, packed so tight there was no room to step.
He was cramming food into his mouth with both hands, stuffing it in non-stop.
Li Ran couldn’t believe he’d eaten all of that.
The guy didn’t even chew. Food just slid down his swollen throat and into his gut, which visibly squirmed with every swallow.
It wasn’t even a belly anymore—it was a grotesquely swollen sphere, stretched to its limit, ready to explode.
“God… how much did he eat?!”
The fat man continued devouring food like a maniac. His belly swelled again—another dimension larger, like someone had inflated it.
Li Ran had a really bad feeling.
(End of Chapter)