Twelve chapters - "Come and play games with me
[——HP-350! (Weakness Strike, Full Force Strike!)]
"Bang!" Su Ming'an knocked out a zombie hiding in the corner with a steel pipe, splattering brain matter and dark blood everywhere.
He followed the route in his mind and proceeded to head from the fourth floor down to the archives in the basement.
[Exp+50]
As he killed the zombie, he saw his experience bar increase slightly, estimating that killing about ten more would level him up.
"Help, help..." A player trapped in a ward, too scared to come out, spotted the two daringly advancing and quietly cracked open the door a sliver wanting to follow them.
Su Ming'an didn't mind, he continued down the stairs, passing by several corpses mangled beyond recognition and wandering zombies.
Suddenly, from a blind spot in his vision, a zombie plunged from above, clawing straight towards Su Ming'an's head—
A silver longsword, with extreme precision, pierced through its eye socket.
[——HP-600! (Precision Strike, Full Force Strike, Sharpness, Darkness Suppression!)]
The girl wearing a cat-ear hat produced a very pretty rapier in her hand, her wrist flicked, and the zombie dropped to the ground powerlessly, hardly spilling much blood.
In her left hand, she held the remains of a chocolate bar from the morning, her eyelids drooping as she nibbled delicately on the wrapper, her right wrist moving leisurely.
"Swoosh—" Suddenly, a snowy white arc flashed, and the other zombies following suit were pierced through the forehead by the sword.
The longsword swung, flinging a beautiful crescent of black blood onto the ground as the girl holding the chocolate bar advanced with the sword in one hand, her scattered black hair dancing lightly behind her.
Just then, the combat power displayed on the team panel for the girl seemed to be suddenly activated, surging upward.
[(Yuanyuan)(Teammate) Combat Power: 120~230 (Fluctuating)]
She hadn't added any attribute points.
Her prediction dreams stemmed from innate sensitivity, and her points were invested in the sword in her hand.
...
[Caoine's Snow (Blue Level, Capable of Growth): The Illusion and Reality, the Futile Dream of Shattering
Attack Power: 10~20
Durability: 18/20
Equipment Requirement: One-Handed Weapon, Strength Requirement 2 and above
Special Attributes: The snow that cuts down all nefarious arrogance, any being tainted by her frost shall never reincarnate. Comes with Ice Attribute, Darkness Suppression Attribute.]
...
While Su Ming'an was slaying zombies left and right, the silver sword always managed to be at the most needed spot with the utmost precision, leaving no gaps for defense.
The two coordinated perfectly, quickly overpowering the zombies on the crowded first and second floors, reaching the archives below.
Some people wanted to follow them, but seeing that the zombies on the stairwell had been mostly eliminated, they opted not to follow and instead turned to flee toward the main entrance.
Yuanyuan arrived at the archives, glanced at the iron lock hanging on the door.
"Clang—" with a swipe of Su Ming'an's finger over it, the lock fell automatically to the ground, and the iron bars creaked open.
A multitude of bookshelves and countless books came into view.
The girl, seemingly moved, walked towards a bookshelf, searching among the numerous file folders.
While the slaughter continued outside the door, daylight gradually advanced towards noon.
Yuanyuan stared entranced at a file.
"Found anything?" Su Ming'an asked, turning his head.
Following his gaze, he saw a photo of a little girl on the file, beaming brightly.
Dark eyes, sparkling gaze, she looked exactly like that stiff and strange little girl.
[Duoduo]
Her name filled the information bar.
[Registered in City X, daughter of the couple Han Yanyan and Chen Limin.
Died from domestic violence on August 1, 2019]
Yuanyuan's fingers gradually clenched tighter.
Su Ming'an silently glanced at the information and looked away.
He knew Yuanyuan had once gone through such experiences... If he hadn't been living next to her home, hadn't turned off his phone at midnight, hadn't received her call for help... he might never have seen her again.
Faced with such information, perhaps she was also feeling some sorrow deep inside.
...
[Clue Five: Duoduo's File]
[Received: 10*1 Exploration Points]
[Clue recorded in the Clues Bar, available for review at any time.]
[Perfect Completion Progress: 50%]
...
"——Ah, Big Brother, Big Sister~"
A sudden, bell-like laughter rang out nearby.
A little girl in a blood-red dress, barefooted, revealing arms full of scars, still bore the imprint of an adult's slap on her face, yet her smile was as brilliant as the blazing sun.
...As if she had never been hurt.
"So, you found out about me after all." Bandages peeled off her body bit by bit, but the dark blotches had vanished, replaced by numerous scratches and bruise marks, prominently appearing at every corner of her frail body.
She flashed a smile, her gaze purely innocent:
"Come play a game with me, Big Brother, Big Sister, it's been so long… no one has wanted to play with Duoduo for a while."
Meanwhile, even though there was no broadcast here, an eerie, off-key singing voice came from all around:
[The little girl picking mushrooms~]
[Carrying a basket of bones~]
"Walking barefoot at night~
Across cemeteries and hills~"
Duoduo herself hummed along, swaying her bare feet, perched on a bookshelf.
From the other end of the shelf, rustling noises came through.
Only then did Su Ming'an see that several players lying unconscious were there.
The moment the singing started, their eyes, which had turned completely black, suddenly opened.
Their bodies began to swell like balloons, their skin quickly darkening, their nails elongating, and turning pitch black, saliva mixed with blood starting to drip from their mouths, carrying a suffocating stench.
"Run!" Su Ming'an was not accustomed to waiting for others to complete their transformation before fighting, so he grabbed Yuanyuan and ran out—clearly, this was not something that could be resolved by force at the current stage.
Yuanyuan, clutching the file paper, followed Su Ming'an and dashed out.
Mutated zombies roared deeply behind them as Su Ming'an charged through an area littered with corpses and black blood, when suddenly Yuanyuan grabbed his arm from behind and pulled him into a room nearby.
"Bang!" The glass door slammed shut, followed by the rolling shutter being slowly pulled down, emitting a grating friction noise.
"Click, click, click——"
The following mutated zombies were now forcefully scratching at the glass door.
Those clawed fingers scraped against the door, blood oozing out from the inflicted scrapes as if insensitive to pain, their faces desperately pressed against the glass, squeezing their pale white eyeballs.
There was no consciousness, only an instinctual frenzy for human blood and flesh.
— The Apocalypse had descended, Day One.
"Bang—!"
The rolling shutter finally slammed down.
Just in the nick of time.
Noises still came from outside, 'creak, creak,' but Su Ming'an first turned his attention to the interior, discovering that it was a laboratory. Other than him and Yuanyuan, there were two... two zombies.
Those two zombies stood back to them in the corner, as if they hadn't seen them or heard anything, their bodies bent, engaging in some unknown activity.
"Bang!"
Su Ming'an kicked out, flipping over the middle-aged zombie on the left. It lay on the ground, emitting a 'gurgle gurgle gurgle' from its throat.
On the right, Yuanyuan had grabbed a camping shovel from somewhere and smashed another zombie's brain to pieces, the stench of dark blood splattering everywhere.
The clang of the camping shovel hitting the ground echoed, leaving behind silence in the room.
— Su Ming'an saw.
The two fallen zombies were in fact the former Dean and his wife.
Their victim was a little girl's body, lying on the ground.
She was dressed in a blood-red outfit, with large black spots on her body. Around the empty eye sockets flowed a beautifully hued, purple blood.
Above her body, pretty, umbrella-like mushrooms were blooming.
Outside, the doomsday-like roaring and the screaming and crying of people created a piercing concerto, as if heralding the arrival of the apocalypse.
Yuanyuan clenched a file paper on domestic violence tightly in her hand.
"La~ La~ La~"
Suddenly, a girl's singing voice gradually arose.
The girl in the blood-stained dress had crossed the closed gate, abruptly appearing behind the two of them. Her eyeballs turned, looking somewhat stiff and stagnant.
"Wow, big brother and big sister, you did really great!" She suddenly saw the corpses of the Dean and his wife lying on the ground and her face showed genuine joy.
"Those are your parents," Su Ming'an said.
"It's okay~" Duoduo laughed and spun around, walking up to Su Ming'an with a smile:
"When Daddy was still the Deputy Dean... he used uncles and aunties who died in the White House to cultivate a very tasty kind of mushroom.
He said it was a 'vaccine' for the 'virus'."
But daddy's 'vaccine' seems to have failed..."
Duoduo's voice became a bit melancholic: "He always talked about stock prices or something, but Duoduo didn't understand, when I asked about it he would hit me and force me to eat mushrooms... the kind that really isn't tasty..."
Her body gradually started to show more black spots.
"Later, later..." Duoduo spun in place: "It seemed like everyone around had eaten those tasty mushrooms, only Duoduo had the untasty ones... Duoduo really hates mommy and daddy, really really hates them... and then, then..."
Her normally smiling mouth gaped even wider, resembling the greedy old man driven by money, but unlike him, her eyes were filled with a longing for love:
"Mommy and Daddy, they...they killed Duoduo."
The surrounding music became louder.
The lighthearted nursery rhyme melody gradually twisted into something eerie. The clean, tidy walls seemed to also start showing streak after streak of bloodstains; bloodied handprints pressed onto the walls, the trails of blood slowly dripping down.
"My story is over," Duoduo shook her head, her eyes innocent as she looked at Su Ming'an and Yuanyuan: "Big brother and big sister, do you know who the mushroom picking girl really is?"
...
[You have reached the ultimate truth of the world and entered the "Perfect Pass" storyline· Intelligence path]
[Please select your answer]
[Note: If inferences cannot be made further, you can issue the conjectures from the clue column at any time, to extend thought processes.]
...
Su Ming'an faintly had a suspicion, but he suddenly realized something was wrong with the girl next to him, and hurriedly looked over, only to find Yuanyuan had already turned her body away.
He suddenly remembered the hericium cookies Yuanyuan had eaten earlier.
All who had eaten the mushroom-based food had already transformed into zombies; could it be she…
"Clang—!"
The silver sword fell to the ground, emitting a dazzling burst of light from its snow-white blade.
"Come here." He saw large patches of black on her body.
Black blood oozed from the corners of the girl's mouth, her eyes brimming with tears as she looked at him.
"It's a bit... uncomfortable." Her voice trembled uncontrollably as she looked at Su Ming'an, slowly pulling up her cat-eared hat, as if retreating into a safe haven.
Su Ming'an's hand touched her skin, which was nearly desiccated.
Yuanyuan leaned harder toward him, as if she could no longer support her own body, her eyes filled with a blood-red light like the setting sun.
"—As long as Big Brother gives the correct answer, I'll let this cute big sister go~" The little girl happily jumped in place, humming a tune, her expression filled with anticipation.
...She was anticipating the death of everyone.
Time ticked by, and the eerie singing continued around them.
Su Ming'an's thoughts raced, and at the last moment of the countdown, he announced his long-deliberated answer:
"The little girl picking mushrooms, the mushrooms she wanted to pick are all the people who have turned into zombies in X City, she is the only one who ate the bad-tasting mushrooms, she has been, from the start, a petri dish cultivated by the superintendent for virus research."
He saw the little girl's joyous smile.
...Did he get it right?
He hurriedly looked to the side.
The next moment, his vision was filled with blood red.
The comforting look in the girl's eyes still rested on him, but the light within them had scattered into the oblivion of the night.
Blood burst forth.
In the next instant, the headless body of the girl plummeted down, blood spraying from the severed neck, drenching his face and head.
"Congratulations, Big Brother!" Duoduo opened her hands, smiling mischievously at him: "—Guessed, wrong, oh—!"
Su Ming'an's eyes stayed open.
Hot, dark red blood slid down from his slightly parted lips, carrying a warmth.
He caught Yuanyuan's gradually chilling body, his thoughts plunging into a profound and eerie silence.
...
[Teammate (Yuanyuan) has died, the squad automatically dissolves.]
...
[Perfect Pass·Intelligence (Peace) route failed, automatically entering the Force route, starting boss battle mode]
[boss·Duoduo(Normal Combat Power):800 (strongly recommended for multiplayer challenge)]
[Player (Su Ming'an) current Combat Power:206]
[Odds of Winning: 0%]
...
[World Game·Remaining Players: 451248658]