Arc 2: Luxury Cruise
Chapter 32
Xu Ziyue said goodbye to the three players and ran over to the chess room.
The chess room and casino were both located on the second floor of the cruise ship and is ten floors away from where Xu Ziyue was.
Along the way, he recalled the information the three players revealed.
The sea monsters would not only target the players, it would also target all the NPCs on the cruise ship regardless of whether they"re a crew member or tourist……….. Although Xu Ziyue didn"t think that the sea monsters would only hunt players, he subconsciously thought it would prefer players more.
But right now, that didn"t seem to be the case.
To the sea monsters, everyone was the same. Whether they"re a player or an NPC, everyone had an equal chance of being targeted.
The sea monsters made it seem as if the loss of the NPCs had nothing to do with the players but in fact, it meant that it was likely that none of the players would be able to survive.
Just like what the three players earlier said, if the NPCs responsible for giving them stamps were parasitised and died, where could they go to get their stamp?
Xu Ziyue boarded the elevator. At the eleventh floor, two more players entered.
Xu Ziyue didn"t pay too much attention. He had too much on his mind, so he didn"t start any small talk. Standing in the elevator, he examined his card over and over again but couldn"t see anything special.
It was just the places that had already been stamped………..It intrigued him.
He didn"t look carefully before and didn"t pay attention to whether they were the same or slightly different.
Now that he was looking more closely, he saw that these stamps were all round and the pattern at the bottom should be the same. The pattern……
Before Xu Ziyue was able to make it out, the elevator suddenly shook.
Xu Ziyue pressed himself against the corner of the elevator and stabilised himself.
He looked over at the surveillance camera and shouted: "Anyone there? The elevator malfunctioned!"
Xu Ziyue was extremely fl.u.s.tered when the elevator shook. He instantly a.s.sociated it with the word "death".
Despite already being dead and having already died once, he still hated the thought of it.
The elevator didn"t continue falling but for Xu Ziyue who was still inside the elevator, it wasn"t any better.
At this moment, it was as if the elevator was suspended in the air by a single rope and the other end was held by someone. A small shake of the rope would result in the elevator moving left, right, up or down. Although it wasn"t possible for the elevator to do that as it could only move up or down, for a moment Xu Ziyue truly believed it was like that.
Xu Ziyue stabilised himself and slowly spread his legs and sat down while sticking to the corner of the elevator. He looked at the two players on the other side. Their current situation made a chill run down Xu Ziyue"s spine
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Xi Ziyue asked: "Are……Are you okay?"
Of the two players, one was a man and the other was a woman. The man"s reaction was no different from normal people. The fright caused him to release cold sweat and his face was one shade paler than before. The woman however was different. She remained expressionless and didn"t seem to be concerned. As the elevator swayed about, she wasn"t scared and would stand up again and again. Sometimes when she was able to stabilise herself for a while, she would repeatedly press the b.u.t.ton of the floor she was going to. The times when she couldn"t maintain balance, she would fall back down heavily. Even with her knees bleeding and bruised, she didn"t seem to notice it.
The male player swallowed. He slowly moved away from the female player and shuffled over to Xu Ziyue.
But in an elevator, no matter how far you tried to move, it was still very close to the other side.
"What"s going on?" Xu Ziyue quietly whispered to the male player.
The male player"s expression didn"t look very good. He didn"t expect the target who seemed normal yesterday become like this, but he also had some guesses.
He pointed at the female player, "Probably, was parasitised………"
This sudden predicament left Xu Ziyue helpless. Even if he wanted to do anything, it was difficult to just stand up in this shaky elevator so that was out of the question.
"Was this elevator also an activity we needed to experience? Why did something like this happen?" Xu Ziyue had gone up and down on this elevator many times and, apart from this one time, he didn"t have any problems.
The male player"s face turned pale. He clearly remembered something.
Xu Ziyue asked him, but he hesitated and refused to speak. It was only when a child"s laughter rang from all directions inside the elevator that he couldn"t hold it in any longer.
"At the children"s playground…….I made a promise with a child playing there that once I finished playing all the games safely, I would take the child out."
Xu Ziyue"s pupils constricted. A child?
He remembered that there were also children when he went in, but they always played by themselves and didn"t come to talk to him. At that time, Xu Ziyue couldn"t help but be wary, so he didn"t take the initiative to talk to them either.
But now it seems that they were probably something special.
"Why didn"t you honour your promise?" He could tell that there must be a reason for it as most people wouldn"t willingly break their promise with a child who has helped them. Furthermore, the children in this world are special.
Special to the point that no one was willing to anger them.
"I also wanted to b-but the NPC outside didn"t allow it. He said that children should stay inside. Those NPC parents may look normal at first but in fact each and every one of them are strange."
Xu Ziyue had nothing to say. Because he had wanted to leave the children"s playground safely, he had agreed to the "child"s" request, but he couldn"t fulfil it due to the other NPCs. In the end, even Xu Ziyue was dragged in.
The male player looked nervously at his companion on the elevator, "W-what now?" If not for this, he wouldn"t have been able to tell that his companion had been parasitised.
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Xu Ziyue shook his head, "Seeing that it can"t do much, I can"t do much either."
Besides parasitising humans, he still didn"t know what other abilities the sea monsters possessed but at this point in time, it seems that the sea monster inside the human body was no different to players. They were similarly stuck inside the elevator, unable to get out.
The female player"s hands and knees had sustained a lot of cuts. Blood oozed out from the wounds. Under normal circ.u.mstances, someone would hurry over and treat her.
But she was parasitised by the sea monster……Neither Xu Ziyue nor the male player moved.
What if the sea monster no longer wanted to stay in this body, and wanted to change?
"Bang!"
Suddenly, the elevator stopped. Xu Ziyue"s straightened body again became crooked.
As if it was held stable by two hands, the shaking suddenly stopped.
The shaking earlier travelled through the elevator through to Xu Ziyue. Even now, he could hear some ringing in his ears.
The elevator door opened, but the elevator was located at a somewhat awkward position. Only the lower half of the elevator was met with the opening to the floor.
Xu Ziyue lowered his head and looked out. Amongst the group of workers, he saw Austin in his wheelchair.
"Austin!" Xu Ziyue sprawled on the elevator floor in surprise. If he was an animal, at this moment one would see a tail wagging incessantly behind him.
Soon afterwards, Xu Ziyue"s tail sagged and drooped down.
He remembered what he was preparing to do.
"Come out. I"ll catch you." Austin opened his arms and looked gently at Xu Ziyue from below.
Xu Ziyue glanced at the female player who had already climbed out at some unknown point in time and then he looked at the male player.
The male player shook his head, "You first. You first." The scene that had appeared in his mind was the elevator suddenly moving again while one was in the middle of climbing out. If that were the case, the body would end up cut in half…….If they could let the one being parasitised…He internally shook his head and threw away those thoughts. Safety first. Once he"s safe, he could worry about their current predicament later.
But he didn"t dare go out first.
The first to get out was naturally the abnormal female player.
Xu Ziyue shrugged at the male player and turned around to look at Austin.
Austin nodded resolutely and said: "It"s okay. Trust me."
Xu Ziyue"s ears turned red. He lowered his head and crawled out.
Several workers outside helped catch Xu Ziyue and helped him stand upright without falling to the ground.
Xu Ziyue patted off his dusty clothes and quickly thanked them one by one.
The male player inside who saw Xu Ziyue get out safely breathed a sigh of relief.
The parasitised female player had also returned to normal. She no longer pressed on the elevator b.u.t.ton persistently like a madman. She limped over to another elevator and headed back up.
Xu Ziyue thought for a moment but eventually didn"t call out to her.
Even if he did, he didn"t know what to say.
"Let"s go. You should change your clothes." Austin didn"t ask Xu Ziyue anything but it was also because of this that Xu Ziyue couldn"t tell what he was thinking.
"Then I"ll head off first?" Xu Ziyue said to the male player who was sprawled on the elevator floor.
The male player glumly let out a sound of acknowledgement.
Xu Ziyue then thought of the children in the children"s playground. He was a little uneasy……..
Austin asked: "What"s wrong? Not going?"
Xu Ziyue shook his head and got ready to leave.
But after taking two steps, Xu Ziyue saw a young girl standing in front of them.
The young girl smiled sweetly at the male player and let out a laugh resembling the laughter they heard inside the elevator.
Xu Ziyue instantly looked back, "……..!"
Before words could leave his mouth, Austin"s hand pressed down onto Xu Ziyue"s hand that was on the handle of his wheelchair, "Why did you stop?"
Xu Ziyue looked at the male player who managed to come out from the elevator safely. Cold sweat formed across his back.
When he looked back again, that young girl was gone.
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Haunted children scares me the most ?