The copy has 0 error tolerance, and the last words on the ground are all wrong for me.

Chapter 564 The Chaotic Battle on the Day of the Anomaly

Wu Chang, sitting in the back row, was pretending to study the blueprints from the Central Research Institute. Hearing Xianyu's reminder, he looked up and said:

"I understand. Once we enter the Central Research Institute, we'll need your help to retrieve what Mr. Mason wants safely."

Strings said:

"Mr. Sean, please rest assured that we will ensure your safety and retrieve your belongings successfully."

Compared to Mason, who was arrogant and looked down on everyone, Sean seemed much more approachable and friendly.

For this reason, Jason and Strings both valued Sean highly, regarding him as an important medium for them to infiltrate the Civil Rights Party camp.

They are all veteran players who have traversed hundreds of planes and witnessed countless instances of human nature's coldness and warmth; they are not just mercenaries with muscles but no brains.

The moment they saw Mason, they could see through his true nature and knew that this path was a dead end.

Their original plan was to use their own strength as leverage to make a deal with the high-ranking members of the Civil Rights Party who wanted to replace Mason.

Such transactions are highly risky, and there is a possibility of being used as a tool to kill someone else; they must be used with extreme caution.

But Sean's appearance helped them solve this problem.

As an outsider with no strong background, Sean, even with Mason's favor, was nothing more than a marginal figure in the Civil Rights Party, doing the dirty work and hard labor.

To gain a foothold, he needs a power that is unique to him.

If they can be paired with Sean, and if this mission is completed successfully enough to bring Sean into the core of the Civil Rights Party, then they can gain a voice within the Party.

With Sean as their mascot, if the time is right, it wouldn't be impossible for them to kill Mason and the others and seize power.

At 11:40, the convoy arrived at the edge of the Central Research Institute. Jason got out of the lead car, which was serving as the vanguard, and went to Wu Chang's window to ask for instructions:
“Mr. Sean, there are a lot of people gathered ahead, all of them here for the Central Research Institute. Many of them are like us, hired by the military.”

"What do you think we should do now?"

Wu Chang thought for a moment, then said:

"Don't rush. Before I came here, Mr. Mason told me that the Central Research Institute is fraught with danger and retrieving the items will not be easy."

"Since they're in such a hurry, let them go and scout ahead first."

Upon hearing Wu Chang's statement, Jason nodded and instructed the other players to assume a defensive stance, guarding around Wu Chang's car.

Wu Chang said to Jason:
“I’ve heard that the mercenary circle isn’t very big. While the special energy field of the research institute hasn’t dissipated, see if you know anyone among these people and try to win them over.”

"The situation in Jacques City is not optimistic. It's always better to have one more friend than one more enemy."

Jason nodded after hearing this. Although they were not mercenaries, the circle of players in the Realm of Reason was not very large.

After spending a long time in the Realm of Reason, players of similar strength will inevitably end up being grouped together.

As Jason selects players, the players are also scrutinizing them.

It has only been 24 hours since we entered the instance, and most players are focused on how to get through the first day of the instance, and haven't had time to look for other factions yet.

Compared to ordinary players who are scattered and rely on scavenging for equipment, Jason and his group acted in unison, and their convoy was well-organized, clearly indicating that they had joined a larger faction.

When fighting in dungeons, it's not shameful to team up; faction slots are limited, and it's shameful not to team up.

Not only was Jason choosing his teammates, but many players who considered themselves quite skilled also took the initiative to approach him and try to get in touch with him.

The two-way rush turned the area outside the Academia Sinica into an open-air job market.

Wu Chang sat in the car, looking at the fifth floor of the research institute.

Twenty minutes are enough for him to break through the above-ground part of the research institute.

Inside the Central Research Institute, Wu Changzhen had just led Jianxing and the others to the fifth floor via elevator.

The fifth floor wasn't so winding; there was only one path on the entire floor, and a fleshy monster floated in the air above the hall.

The flesh-and-blood monster was wearing a security tactical vest with the words "Central Research Institute" printed on it.

His use of the bio-network was similar to Dylan's, both controlling firearms. However, compared to Dylan, whose bio-network dissolution was so severe that he could only fuse with a rifle, the flesh-and-blood monster before him was armed to the teeth.

His hands are combined with a shotgun and a rifle respectively, his lower body with a flamethrower and an energy jammer, and his back with a special tactical backpack, allowing him to float in the air and fight in the air.

In addition to himself, his scattered bio-network also took over the entire floor's automated defense system.

The moment Wu Chang stepped into the hall, at least four machine guns and more than twenty armed drones were pointed at him.

The armed monster floated in the air, its face radiating invincibility, its expression telling everyone: get lost or die.

The number of resentful spirits on this floor has rebounded, reaching the level of the second floor. Most of the players who were able to get through the monster attacks on the first two floors died on this floor.

The players' complaints reveal that the armed monster's abilities are simple and brutal. Once it discovers an intruder, it will challenge the intruder to a duel, just like a cowboy in the West.

If an intruder refuses, their attributes will be greatly reduced, and they will be shot and killed by the disdainful armed monster.

If the intruders agree, the fifth floor will become a battle space. Whether it is an intruder or an armed monster, their attacks will have a tracking effect, cannot be dodged, and the only way to win is to fight head-on.

Controlling the building's automated defense system, coupled with heavily armed monsters, the firepower is clearly unmatched by ordinary players.

In just one second, the bullet he fires can turn a player into a pile of minced meat.

Agreeing means death, disagreeing also means death.

Unless your gun is faster and has more firepower.

This kind of monster, which has no mechanics and is all about numbers, is exactly the type Wu Chang likes best. If he wanted, he could easily take down the armed monster.

But he has no intention of doing so.

The special energy field was about to disappear, and there were so many players surrounding him. He needed to leave something behind to attract their attention and divert their firepower from his main body.

He cleared all the way through the surface area, and when other players realized there were no more benefits on the surface, they would gather underground. At that point, the main body would encounter many obstacles when it tried to take action.

If you are discovered by armed monsters while passing through the fifth level, you will be caught in a battle, which is unavoidable.

However, amidst the players' resentment, he never saw anyone attempt to sneak through, only to be discovered, captured, and killed by the armed monsters.

One reason is that stealth cannot hide from the Pain Monster and the Elevator Monster. If you try to stealth and are discovered, you will lose the initiative and be at a disadvantage in the battle.

Another reason is that players are influenced by the size of the fifth level area, which makes them confident and unwilling to escape.

Is it possible to sneak up before being spotted by the armed monster and avoid being detected?
Wu Chang waved his hand to summon Shadow, instructing Shadow to use its stealth ability to envelop him and attempt to bypass the armed monsters to reach the safe passage on the other side.

Just as he expected, the two successfully bypassed the armed monster's line of sight and were not detected.

After verifying his guess, he immediately had Shadow expand the skill's range, bringing everyone to the other side of the fifth floor.

After passing through the fifth floor right under the noses of the armed monsters and re-entering the stairwell, the group breathed a sigh of relief and then looked at Heping with strange eyes.

When passing through the second and fourth levels, Peace dealt with the monsters blocking her way on her own, without attempting to have Shadow use her abilities to bypass them.

Was this something that wasn't considered before peace was established, but suddenly came to mind?

Obviously not. If it were them, this problem might arise, but peace would be impossible.

There is only one possibility for making such an arrangement: that Peace has seen through the armed monsters and knows that stealth is effective against them.

But a new question arose: how did he see through it? They had gone up to the fifth floor together in the elevator, and they had both seen what Heping saw.

Not only did they fail to notice the armed monster's weakness, they also failed to notice Peace's probing of the armed monster. In their eyes, the armed monster was simply posing in the air without moving, yet Peace saw right through it.

While Peace has made many outrageous moves while tackling dungeons, many things that have happened in the past can be explained by details and reasoning. But what is happening in front of them today has gone beyond reasoning and is more like fortune-telling.

If you're going to play the dungeons like that, how can anyone else play with you besides them?

Unlike the members of the Arcane Knights, it was the Tank Trio who were more composed this time. After all, in their eyes, everything Peace did was outrageous, and they had been stimulated too much to remain numb for the time being.

On the fifth floor, going up again, the path is reduced to stairs.

This time it went very smoothly; they walked up three floors before the stairs were blocked again.

Without Wu Chang's instruction, everyone automatically stepped aside to make way for the entrance to the eighth floor.

The first few floors of the research institute were chaotic, but the layout of the rooms still maintained a certain order. However, once you entered the eighth floor, it no longer resembled a research institute; it was more like a ruin.

All the lights on the eighth floor went out, plunging the entire floor into darkness. The still-flashing red alarm lights were the only source of light in the building.

It looked like a place where a fierce war had taken place. Bullet holes and traces of explosions could be seen on the walls, and fragments of instruments and equipment were scattered everywhere. Almost not a single piece of glass in the building was intact.

On the messy ground, corpses lay scattered everywhere. Some were wearing white coats, some security uniforms, some special tactical vests, and others were just ordinary people dressed as usual.

The bodies of these people were intertwined and piled up together, as if the corpses from the previous floors had been moved here.

As soon as Wu Chang entered the eighth level of space, he could feel a sharp mental impact. If the mental attack from the painful monsters on the second level was like a T-shirt label, then the mental attack from the eighth level was more like a mouth ulcer.

For a flesh-and-blood monster, this level of achievement is already quite impressive.

The air was thick with despair, and if one could not resist it, this atmosphere would lead to a strong urge to destroy and a tendency toward self-destruction.

He followed the scent deeper into the eighth floor. A touch of blood appeared in the red light, and the corpses lying on the ground floated up, as if floating on water, moving slowly in the air.

Many of the corpses carried resentment, but the resentment on their bodies was so fragmented and torn that one could only see what happened in the last few minutes of their lives, without being able to see the cause and effect.

More than 90% of the victims' resentment was related to a chaotic battle in which people distinguished themselves by their clothing and indiscriminately attacked living people other than their own side. This was likely related to the occurrence of the Light of Collapse.

The remaining less than 10% of the dead were players with exceptional strength who managed to break through the blockade of armed monsters and reach the eighth floor.

Those who have reached this point are all domain-level experts without exception, but there are differences between domains.

Among the resentments, one deep red one stood out the most, and its owner also held out the longest on the eighth floor.

The master of the resentment is a blonde woman dressed in business attire and wearing frameless glasses, exuding the air of a social elite. She possesses a realm of light, and her bloodline or job change is related to angels. When she opens her realm, a faint halo gathers above her head.

If given more time to acquire divinity, perhaps she could truly become a demigod-level low-ranking angel.

The Light Realm, with its inherent purification and protection properties, allowed her to sustain herself on the eighth floor longer than others.

But simply enduring for a long time wasn't enough. The eighth level seemed to have no boundaries. She moved quickly along a straight line for a minute, but still couldn't see the other side of the eighth level.

The darkness was endless, with no visible boundaries. She could only try her best to expand her domain and resist the increasingly intense atmosphere of despair while maintaining high-speed movement.

Unfortunately, the angel candidate failed to realize that she was not only facing the eighth-level research institute, but that from the moment they entered the ground space, they were in a vast domain.

The effects of the Pain Monster, the Elevator Monster, and the Armed Monster on her had accumulated within her, and now, stirred by the atmosphere of despair, they all erupted together.

She recalled being chosen by the Abyss Game and inexplicably becoming a player in it. On Earth, she was a high-ranking executive in a large corporation, but in the Abyss Game, she was at the very bottom, struggling even to survive.

As she persevered and survived the first few dungeons, her talent began to shine. As soon as she reached level ten, she gained the favor of the dungeon's native inhabitants and obtained a hidden job change. From then on, she made great strides forward.

She not only successfully joined the White Tower, but also became a ranked player in the Wasteland. After entering the Realm of Reason, she completed her second job change. With the support of the organization and her strong judgment, she went all in on all her resources and successfully unlocked the hidden quest to activate the Angel Bloodline at level 49.

Once she completes this task, she will awaken her divinity, become a demigod, and have the potential to reach the true pinnacle of the Realm of Reason.

Unfortunately, her good fortune ended there. The hidden quest related to demigods was unlocked at level 49, proving that her talent and luck were indeed good enough. But it was precisely because of her talent and luck that she was too impatient.

To complete the hidden quest of the Angel Bloodline, she needs to solo queue, break through the Gamma-level near-out-of-control dungeon, and complete the bloodline activation ceremony.

Having gambled away all her resources, she was unable to make any further preparations. In addition, the difficulty of the Gamma-level, near-out-of-control dungeon far exceeded her expectations, making her journey to complete the mission exceptionally difficult.

She had three chances to complete the hidden mission. The first two attempts were not smooth. Although she managed to clear them, her exploration progress was still far from breaking the deadlock. Moreover, she encountered two consecutive Gamma-level missions that were on the verge of going out of control without any buffer, which caused her to accumulate some hidden injuries and not recover to her best condition.

The sleepless night dungeon was her last chance. If she failed, not only would the hidden quest she had unlocked disappear, but all the resources she had invested would also be lost.

Divinity was so close, yet she could never reach it.

This is likely her only chance in her life. She cannot accept missing out on divinity, nor can she accept the loss of failing the mission. Giving it up is more unacceptable than killing her.

She was unwilling to accept it, but she was powerless against the boundless darkness of the eighth level.

At this moment, it felt as if she was facing not the eighth level, but the entire abyss. The immense pressure made it hard for her to breathe, and she felt despair.

Click.

A crisp cracking sound rang out in the realm of light, and fine cracks appeared above the pale white space.

The next moment, the area above the field of light shattered, and a faceless doll with a damaged surface, as if it had been thrown from the tenth floor and run over by a truck several times, crawled into her field.

From every crack on the faceless doll's body grew dense, slender white tentacles, which, like spider legs, supported its body.

It used all four limbs and white tentacles to rush towards her quickly, arriving in front of her in the blink of an eye, their faces almost touching, with a distance of no more than ten centimeters.

Although the doll has no facial features, there are two holes smashed in the area of ​​the eyes.

Through the hole, the angel candidate saw a tangled mass of energy that she couldn't comprehend. She didn't know what it was, but Wu Chang, who was experiencing everything from her perspective, felt very familiar with it.

The contents inside the doll are fragments of the shattered resentment of the plane's original inhabitants. These fragments, mixed with the doll monster's mental world and domain core, combine with countless small characters to form a different kind of energy.

If nothing unexpected happens, that thing contains the light of collapse that appeared on the day it appeared.

The angel candidate couldn't understand what it was, but her soul could feel the impact of that thing. The moment she saw the doll's core, her eyes went blank, and she could no longer resist.

The white tentacles on the doll wrapped around her, then the doll shattered into pieces, the fragments swirling around her before closing up again and swallowing her whole.

The next moment, the screen went black, the resentment ended, leaving only a deep red, blood-red last message.

[Breaking the deadlock in a sleepless night dungeon.]

Looking at the blood-red last words, Wu Chang couldn't help but sigh. Miss Angel was not only generous in appearance, but also in personality. She not only left him with information, but also left him such a lighthearted blood-red last word.

rustling.

Just as he was recalling the resentment of the candidate angel, a faint sound came from the darkness, as if a large swarm of insects were moving rapidly.

Under the dim red warning lights, a cracked doll flashed by and disappeared back into the darkness.

It was obvious that the puppet monster had its eye on him.

He was afraid the puppet monster wouldn't see him, so he even took out his phone and turned on the flash.

The moment the white light appeared, a shadow darted out of the darkness and pounced straight at Wu Chang.

The puppet monster exuded a deep sense of despair, and other players avoided it like the plague. However, Wu Chang took the initiative to approach it, grabbed the puppet, and slammed it to the ground.

He pressed himself against the doll, turned its head to look at the hole in its face, and exclaimed excitedly:
"Be good, don't move, let me in."

(End of this chapter)