Xie Chun Ye seemed completely cut off from the world around him. He noticed nothing of what had happened behind him.
He quickly pulled open the restroom door and stepped inside.
At first glance, the restroom was spotless and brightly lit, as neat as though no one had ever used it.
Frowning, he pushed his glasses higher on his nose and told Song Zang to stay outside and keep watch.
Song Zang quietly agreed. Pretending to wait in line outside the restroom, he stood guard with only half his attention on the task.
He had something far more urgent to deal with.
—That troublesome thing was changing shape again.
After burning the pursuing flight attendant down to a sheet of skin, it did not return to Song Zang immediately. The pale blue flame writhed and compressed into a small ball, then unfolded again as though shedding a layer of skin…
It transformed into a tiny snake as white as snow. Its scales were cool to the touch, and its long, slender tongue flicked in and out as it leisurely wound itself around Song Zang’s wrist, looking extremely pleased with itself.
Song Zang’s expression darkened. Lowering his gaze toward the cold-blooded creature around his wrist, he muttered as though speaking to himself, “I already had a white pet.”
Perhaps sensing the inexplicable dislike in Song Zang’s tone, the snake abruptly raised its head. Its scarlet, vertical pupils were intimidating.
After staring at Song Zang in warning, it slowly exposed two venomous fangs and deliberately rubbed them against his delicate skin. Clear venom quietly seeped from the tips.
What a nasty thing.
Still, the instant the venom emerged from its fangs, the bloody stench of decay lingering around Song Zang vanished as though a mouse had spotted a cat.
It was clearly helping him, yet insisted on acting vicious. Song Zang could not understand its attitude at all.
“…You can even turn into an albino cobra,” Song Zang muttered in frustration. “What exactly are you?”
The beautiful snow-white snake ignored him completely. It curled itself into a neat little circle around Song Zang’s wrist and slowly closed its menacing eyes.
It was apparently going to take a nap.
Song Zang sighed helplessly and looked at the horrifying pile of thin skin lying on the carpet.
The abnormality had happened right before his eyes, so he would have to continue playing dumb and fool Xie Chun Ye later.
But…
Shifting his attention from the snake to the unnaturally quiet restroom, Song Zang suddenly realized something strange.
—Xie Chun Ye had not noticed any of the commotion outside.
It was almost as though the two spaces had been completely sealed off from one another.
His puzzled gaze passed through the gap in the doorway and landed on Xie Chun Ye, who was carefully inspecting the restroom. After hesitating briefly, Song Zang pulled the door open a little wider and stepped inside.
The instant his foot touched the restroom floor, the roar of the aircraft engines disappeared from his ears.
It was like stepping from a noisy world into a vacuum. The surroundings became deathly silent, and no matter how loud a sound might be, it could no longer reach him.
Xie Chun Ye remained completely unaware. He turned toward Song Zang and asked, “No NPCs coming to use the restroom?”
“No.” Song Zang brought his acting skills fully into play. His face was frightened, his hand trembled faintly around the door handle, and a trace of panic choked his voice. “But Brother Xie… that flight attendant was fake. She rotted away…”
“Rotted away?”
Song Zang’s explanation made little sense, but Xie Chun Ye had no time to question him. He immediately strode out of the restroom and frowned down at the collapsed sheet of human skin on the floor.
Taking advantage of the opportunity, Song Zang turned around, gently pulled the door nearly closed, and quickly began inspecting the restroom.
It looked far too normal, which made it suspicious in itself.
The only obvious clue was the space itself.
It was like a balloon whose opening had been tightly tied shut. The interior felt isolated from the rest of the world—silent, suffocating, and completely sealed.
How had Xie Chun Ye failed to notice?
Song Zang swept his gaze across the toilet and water tank. He did not linger on them for long before looking directly at his reflection.
A pitiful figure stared back at him, pale with fright. Soft black hair fell messily over his forehead, long raven lashes concealed dark eyes, his shapely lips bore repeated bite marks, and his face was sickly white.
Song Zang stared at himself for several seconds. Then his entire body stiffened, and he looked at the mirror in disbelief.
In the space of only a few seconds, a pair of curved ram horns had slowly grown from the top of his head. They flickered faintly within the reflection, pouring out a dense, ominous aura.
Song Zang trembled violently and raised a hand to touch them, only to feel nothing.
His shaking fingers landed on his soft black hair. His face grew paler and paler because the frail, ghostly white young man in the mirror had quietly begun to smile.
It was as though someone were tugging upward on the surface of the reflection’s skin, stretching the corners of its mouth higher one fraction at a time.
Yet Song Zang himself was clearly not smiling.
Thump, thump—
His heartbeat thundered in his ears. It felt as though an invisible force had seized his heart and was pulling it outward, nearly ripping it straight from his chest.
He tried to calm himself, but faint chanting and distant Buddhist intonations suddenly drifted into his ears. The sound made his limbs feel as comfortable as though they had been lowered into warm water. Without him noticing, the vigilance that had kept his back rigid slowly began to loosen.
If he surrendered to the sensation, collapsed where he stood, and fell asleep inside the restroom, it seemed entirely possible.
Was this the mental attack Xie Chun Ye had warned them about? Honestly, the chanting was getting on his nerves.
Song Zang’s gaze shifted toward the doorway.
Xie Chun Ye had not returned yet. Excellent.
He stroked the sleeping snake around his wrist, then suddenly raised his left hand without expression and punched the mirror to pieces.
Countless tiny shards rained down, reflecting countless versions of Song Zang’s face.
Only one shard still reflected the horns, nearly impossible to pick out with the naked eye.
Song Zang’s entire fist had sunk through the shattered mirror. His slim, pale wrist could not follow because the white snake coiled around it held him back.
Startled awake, the snake jerked its head upright and looked from side to side. It then glared viciously at Song Zang before slithering down across the shattered mirror.
It raised its supple, beautiful white body and rummaged through the debris covering the floor. At last, it crunched down on an ordinary-looking shard of glass. Its thin belly immediately swelled as though it had eaten an enormous meal.
In the next instant, the sealed, suffocating sense of vacuum vanished. The roar of the aircraft engines finally returned to Song Zang’s ears.
Danger truly lurked everywhere in this place.
Song Zang withdrew his hand, brushed the glass fragments from his sleeve, and scooped up the snake.
Holding it by its cold tail, he secretly rubbed its round little belly and rolled the little snake between his fingers several times before realizing what he was doing.
Song Zang forced himself to let go. He picked up a suitably sized piece of broken glass and slipped it into his pocket for later use.
Then he turned toward the door and cried out, “Brother Xie! The mirror suddenly shattered!”
Hearing him, Xie Chun Ye quickly returned and pushed the door open. In the next instant, he pulled Song Zang behind him. “What happened?”
“I was looking in the mirror, and then I saw a pair of ram horns growing from my head in the reflection…” Song Zang said anxiously. “But I clearly don’t have any horns. I thought something was wrong, so I tried to touch the mirror, and then it shattered on its own.”
His tone was sincere and frightened. His entire body trembled, and tiny pieces of glass clung to his shirt.
Xie Chun Ye nodded. He pulled out two tissues, used them to pick up a shard, and examined it for a moment before looking toward the place where the mirror had hung.
Behind it was a storage cabinet containing tissues, hand soap, and several spare travel-sized toiletries.
Song Zang’s punch had not damaged the cabinet at all, almost as though the mirror had never belonged there in the first place.
Xie Chun Ye had clearly noticed the same thing. Narrowing his eyes, he brushed away the remaining shards from the mirror’s frame and reached inside. After confirming there was no danger, he opened the cabinet directly.
It was an ordinary storage cupboard stocked with spare rolls of toilet paper, boxes of tissues, wet wipes, and disinfectant.
Calmly, Xie Chun Ye took two boxes of tissues and tossed them to Song Zang. “This instance is filthy. Take more paper.”
“All right.” Song Zang fumbled to catch them, then asked softly, “Brother Xie, do you know what just happened?”
Xie Chun Ye did not answer directly. Instead, he looked at him meaningfully. “What’s your name? How old are you?”
“…Song Zang. Twenty-two.” Song Zang looked confused.
“What’s your greatest wish?”
Song Zang blinked blankly. “To bring my dog back to life.”
“How?” Xie Chun Ye folded his arms and watched him.
“With… with game points…”
“Good. You resisted a wave of mental contamination.” Xie Chun Ye looked satisfied and, unusually, offered a lengthy explanation. “If you hadn’t, you’d already be a Ram Emissary beneath the Earth Mother Goddess, shouting, ‘Long live the Earth Mother Goddess.’”
“Huh? What Ram Emissary?” Song Zang still looked completely lost.
“Tianhai City has a religious organization, and the Earth Mother Goddess is the local deity. Two emissaries serve beneath Her—the Ox Emissary and the Ram Emissary. They walk among humans and communicate with believers,” Xie Chun Ye explained as he wrapped his hand in tissue and searched through the trash bin. “I looked it up on the subway. There are two ways they communicate. First, believers may perform a sacrifice, mixing cow, sheep, and human blood in a ritual that allows the emissaries to descend into the mortal world. Second, the Ox and Ram Emissaries may actively possess human bodies, making it easier to deliver the Earth Mother Goddess’s instructions.”
Song Zang’s face went pale. “So I was almost possessed?”
Were the repeated chants and Buddhist intonations in his ears some kind of godly anesthetic designed to make people stop resisting?
“Exactly. If the possession succeeded, you would become a hollow shell drained of flesh and blood. The reason our appetites suddenly increased was that the emissary’s descent required a flesh-and-blood sacrifice while it searched for a suitable vessel. The more we ate, the more flesh it could consume.” Xie Chun Ye closed the lid of the trash bin.
He then opened the restroom door and walked out at an unhurried pace. Pointing toward the sheet of human skin on the carpet, he continued explaining quietly, “That flight attendant is what remained after one of the emissaries possessed her… It chose you as its new vessel, but your Resistance is absurdly high. The possession failed, the backlash struck it, and it fled.”
“So I really am that impressive.” Song Zang suddenly understood.
All of his physical stats were 9999, so it was hardly surprising that the Ram Emissary had chosen him immediately. However, it probably had not fled at all. The troublesome thing had swallowed it whole. After all, the little snake sleeping around his wrist seemed to exist on an entirely different level from everything else here.
“You are. The ghosts and monsters in low-level instances have very little effect on you,” Xie Chun Ye said, stepping over the human skin without looking down again. “But your physical fitness is terrible. Train more in the future, or even Qiu Shuang could kill you with one punch.”
“…All right. I’ll work hard.”
Song Zang bit his lip, sounding ashamed.
He did feel a tiny bit guilty about constantly fooling such a decent man.
Only a tiny bit.
【Optional Mission: Uncover the truth concealed behind Tianhai City. (68%)】
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