Chapter 13
Chapter 13
"J-J-Jue Ge... just now... just now..." Wang Tan Zhi stammered, his Terror Value spiking again. Due to accumulated fear, even after calming himself seconds later, his Terror Value didn't drop back to the minimum level but hovered around 15%.
Feng Bu Jue's expression remained blank as he interrupted in a steady tone: "Based on my deduction, we now have two options."
"W-what?" Wang Tan Zhi now stretched two syllables into four.
"First", Feng Bu Jue replied, "you take this knife, charge forward, and once you turn the corner, just hack wildly at whatever you encounter. I'll cover you from behind."
"I choose the second option." Wang Tan Zhi's response suddenly became fluent—even before hearing what the second choice was.
"Actually, I prefer the second option too." Feng Bu Jue walked ahead of Wang Tan Zhi and stood calmly in front of the first door on the right, turning the handle.
Everyone knows that in horror games, doors are always a source of terror. No one could predict what awaited beyond—especially with classic malicious designs like "door surprise attacks." The danger of opening the door was equal to charging around the corner.
An ordinary person would cautiously extend their arm to push the door open, crouch low, keep their body as far from the doorway as possible, and prepare to flee at any moment. But Feng Bu Jue's action was like someone sprinting to a toilet stall driven by urgent bodily needs. He strode forward, leaned his upper body forward, and pushed the door open.
The room had no lights. Corridor illumination spilled through the doorway, revealing a horrifying scene inside.
It was a ten-square-meter ward. A cabinet in the corner had toppled over, as had the trash can near the wall. The floor was littered with debris—mostly useless trash like rags, crumpled paper balls, broken flowerpots, stained disinfectant cotton, shattered glass medicine bottles, and so on. The hospital bed's sheets were torn, and the entire room reeked of blood. Nearly every surface caught in the light bore visible bloodstains.
"Training Mode becomes an invisible option once players reach level five. Obviously, this mode is designed for newcomers, allowing them to safely level up to five", Feng Bu Jue explained while approaching the cabinet, rotating it upright, and rummaging through its contents. "High-level players probably only play Training Mode once after finishing the Newbie Tutorial—or skip it entirely to enter the Common Singleplayer Survival Mode directly. Those players likely read the game manual beforehand. They know the rewards from a mode that only grants experience points will definitely be inferior to the formal survival mode."
Feng Bu Jue retrieved an unopened syringe from the cabinet, glanced at its attributes, and placed it directly into his satchel. "Judging from the rewards, Training Mode is even worse than the Newbie Tutorial. So I believe its difficulty is similar to the tutorial—players can clear it just by not getting scared offline, even without solving puzzles."
He actually crouched down, sniffed the broken medicine bottle, and continued, "Frankly, we could skip exploring these rooms entirely and just chase that shadow. I estimate we'd spend about twenty minutes fighting several battles that might cost us Vitality Value to complete this scenario."
"Then why did you come in?" Wang Tan Zhi asked.
"I said there were two choices, but you picked the second without listening", Feng Bu Jue replied, unfolding crumpled paper balls one by one under the light. "The second option is solving puzzles."
"Hey... didn't you just say—"
"I said you could clear it without puzzles, not that there were no puzzles to solve", Feng Bu Jue interrupted, continuing to examine the papers without changing expression. "However, solving puzzles won't grant us Skill Points either. But there's one advantage: it reduces the difficulty of clearing the scenario. Simply put... using intelligence to handle part of what would require physical effort." He selected a paper and handed it to Wang Tan Zhi. "Check what this is."
"This is..." Wang Tan Zhi took the paper, scanning it before asking, "a medical record?"
[Item Name: Unidentified Patient's Medical Record]
[Type: Plot-Related]
[Quality: Common]
[Function: Unknown]
[Can Be Taken Out of Scenario: No]
[Note: Multiple sections of this paper are obscured by bloodstains.]
"This is your specialty", Feng Bu Jue said, waving the remaining stack in his hand. "I'll check these."
Wang Tan Zhi glimpsed the top paper and felt his scalp prickle—its surface bore a grotesque human face.
They moved to the brighter corridor, spending about three to four minutes examining the documents. Wang Tan Zhi scrutinized the medical record, carefully deciphering blood-obscured sections. Feng Bu Jue, however, flipped through his stack rapidly. With his Reading Compulsion trait, he processed information efficiently—his memory, comprehension, and reasoning abilities allowed him to treat these disturbing images like illustrations in a common magazine.
"Finished yet?" Feng Bu Jue asked first.
Wang Tan Zhi kept his eyes on the record, thinking before replying, "It's a twelve-year-old male... still a child."
Feng Bu Jue rubbed his chin. "Oh... a Young Pioneer." No one could follow his train of thought...
"Right... leukemia, hospitalized for a long time, but..." Wang Tan Zhi lowered the record, lifting his gaze to the corridor's end. "Judging from the medical notes, he didn't have much time left..." His voice dropped. "He's probably a ghost now..."
"Not necessarily", Feng Bu Jue countered. "There are three doors here. We only know the first room might be this boy's ward, but we can't confirm if the shadow we saw was his." He handed his stack to Wang Tan Zhi. "You don't need to read details—just check the attributes." Pausing a second, he added, "These papers have six different faces. Each has a number in one corner."
[Item Name: Six Human Face Sketches]
[Type: Plot-Related]
[Quality: Common]
[Function: Unknown]
[Can Be Taken Out of Scenario: No]
[Note: These drawings are clearly by the same hand. The item can be split or stacked, with stacked items considered a single entity.]
"I'm getting more confused..." Wang Tan Zhi muttered.
Feng Bu Jue nodded. "Normal. The puzzle clues are clearly insufficient." He strode toward the second room. "Also, I have another hypothesis—this is why I wanted to solve puzzles before clearing the scenario." Pushing open the second door, he added, "I believe among these three wards, we'll find at least one proper piece of equipment."
(End of Chapter)
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