Welcome to the Bizarre Games

Chapter 634 Robbers
—Dead silence, emptiness.

This is the first impression an apartment building gives.

This place is considered a dangerous area, but because it is so remote and unlike other places where it is easy to find bargains, ordinary scavengers are unwilling to come here except for the exploration team sent by the mayor.

But today is an exception.

As soon as he arrived, Zhou You saw a group of people making a fuss not far from the apartment building.

This is quite a rare scene. To avoid being discovered by strange entities, scavengers usually operate stealthily, like in this case. Perhaps they think the owner of this place is a recluse, or maybe they're so enraged they can't care about anything else?
"Now that our escape route is cut off, what should we do? We can't go back. Are we really going to have to sneak away into the unknown in the dark?"

"Unknown area? Aren't you afraid of being teleported to that hellhole, the City Hall? You might be able to find a way out elsewhere, but the City Hall is where you'll suffer for eternity."

"Who the hell said there was good stuff here? We've all been screwed over!"

"Why are you looking at me? You all agreed to this in the first place, and besides, my men are still trapped in the supermarket, their fate unknown."

"Who told you to bring people along at this time? I already told you to split up!"

"Don't talk to me, what do we do now?"

"."

Seeing this infighting among the group, even a child like Wang Xiaoer thought they were acting strangely silly.

He shook his head and made a gesture to Zhou You.

The meaning is simple—just go around them and ignore them.

However, for some reason, after thinking for a while, Zhou You suddenly moved that leg and stepped out of the shadows where he was hiding.

The group of people were still in a state of disarray, but their nerves were on edge. Upon hearing footsteps, they immediately realized that uninvited guests had arrived.

"who!"

Several weapons were raised, mostly machetes, but there was also a homemade gun—however, facing the dark muzzle of the gun, Zhou You simply smiled and raised his hand.

"Don't shoot, sir. It's me. Oh no, I misspoke—I'm not a weirdo, I'm just a scavenger."

"Scavengers?"

Upon hearing this, several people lowered their guard, but two of the smarter ones did not lower their guns. Instead, they pointed them at Zhou You and said sternly.

"If you're a scavenger, why are you hiding? Show us your face!"

Strangely enough, Zhou You, who usually doesn't listen to anyone, was surprisingly obedient at this moment, raising his hands and openly exposing his body.

Seeing this, those people finally breathed a sigh of relief.

Soon after, several others noticed his slightly inconvenient legs, and their smiles became even more mysterious.

This is, after all, a desolate area, a place beyond the reach of rules and laws. If someone is rich enough, it wouldn't be difficult for them to disappear without a trace.

Almost instinctively, one of the people who was trying to get information asked.

"Who are you, and where did you come from?"

Zhou You spoke in the tone of a man in a suit.

"My name is Zhou You, a scavenger. I wanted to take a look at the apartment building for some reason. As for where I came from..."

He gestured behind him.

"Of course it's that supermarket. Is there some other road leading here?"

Upon hearing this, everyone froze, like statues.

As if they couldn't believe it, those people didn't even say a word, they just kept looking at Zhou You with their eyes - as if they wanted to see something special about him.

After a while, an excited voice rang out.

"—That place is open?!"

Unfortunately, Zhou You shattered his illusions without hesitation.

"How could that be? It's completely blocked."

"Then how did you get out?"

Zhou You shrugged.

"I escaped before the lockdown, but I wasn't in a hurry to come this way—I was slightly injured and found a place to rest for a while."

In an instant, the morale that had been raised was lost again.

The group looked at each other, and they all saw a hint of despair in each other's eyes.

Of course, most of the time people won't blame themselves, but will try to shift the blame onto others when they make a mistake—they've already argued once, and neither of them wants to take the blame.

And now, isn't there a ready-made punching bag for venting?

One of the more reckless members of the group reached out, grinning maliciously, and tried to grab Zhou You.

"It's strange that this cripple is even here. Maybe he's been following us all along. Let's grab him and interrogate him to find out what happened."

This argument is completely untenable, but no one stopped them—they've been stuck here for quite a while, unable to move forward or backward, so finding someone to vent their frustrations on, or letting him go in to scout things out, wouldn't be a problem.

but.

Just as the hand was about to grab Zhou You's shoulder, a crisp 'crack' sound was heard.

What the hell is going on?

The group looked closely and saw that the person who had made the move was now limply hanging by his side—it was clearly broken!

The man was also taken aback, staring blankly at his hand for a few seconds until the excruciating pain flooded his mind, finally making him realize that this was reality—

Then, a piercing howl echoed throughout the night sky.

Zhou You frowned and kicked the idiot unconscious again—after shouting like that, even if the skinny figure was a homebody, he should have come out to check things out—and at the same time, the others also came to their senses.

"Something's not right with this guy!"

"It's not weird, but it's definitely not benevolent!"

"Let's take him out first!"

The gun barrel was immediately aimed at Zhou You, while those who were more impatient had already swung their cleavers down towards his head.

The person sighed helplessly.

"Personally, I really dislike the storyline of the Crooked-Mouthed Dragon King, but there's nothing I can do, there are always some guys who have to cause trouble for no reason. Never mind, I still have some questions to ask, let's make an example of him first."

The moment he uttered that sigh, the blade was already inches from his forehead.

But Zhou You only glanced at it.

Then, the brass knuckles materialized, and he actually used his arm to block the cleaver!

Can the human body stop steel?

No, at least theoretically not.

However, Zhou You was no longer part of this theory at this moment.

To the man's disbelief, the blade made contact with Zhou You's fist but could not advance an inch—and the force of the feedback was as if he had not struck a human body, but a block of cast steel!
The next moment, his hand had already grasped the blade, and then he gently pried it to the side.

The machete was bent and reshaped as easily as a cotton candy, eventually turning into the shape of a measuring tape.

At that moment, the two guns finally got their sights on Zhou You.

But the man with the gun also saw this scene, and cold sweat poured down his back.

"This is a successor. Damn it, how could there be one here? Don't move, or I'll shoot!"

Zhou You just smiled. A nonchalant smile.

“Go ahead and drive—but let me warn you first, with that homemade gun of yours, even if I have mobility issues, I could easily cut off your arm holding the gun before the bullet hits me.”

The words were plain and ordinary, as if they were describing a fairly common thing.

But the man with the gun didn't dare gamble.

His finger was on the trigger, but he couldn't bring himself to press it—but in that moment of hesitation, Zhou You had already darted forward and was right in front of him—

what happened?
The thought had barely crossed his mind when the gun in his hand was taken away.

Meanwhile, someone was fiddling with the object and laughing at those around them.

"Alright, your only hope is gone. Did you really think you could stand up to me with just a few daggers? Put yourselves down for now. I don't want to kill you, I just want to ask you a few questions."

The group looked at each other.

These guys glanced at their companions who had fainted from the pain on the ground, and then at the gunman who was less than half a foot away from Zhou You, sweating profusely. They all put down their weapons, and it's unclear who started it.

Zhou You finally breathed a sigh of relief.

Given his current physical condition, he really didn't want to waste his precious energy in a place like this, especially since it wasn't far from the apartment building, and he might accidentally alert that tall, thin figure.
Wouldn't all my plans be wasted?

Fortunately, the pretentious tactic came in handy here, and these guys were clearly intimidated—Zhou You didn't waste any words, first kicking the guy next to him back, and then directly asking.

"What are you doing here?"

Those people didn't know how to answer, and after a while, they stepped forward as if they were the leader and said cautiously.

"Replying to you, brother—no, I mean, sir—we heard there are valuable things here, so we wanted to come in and see if we could find anything worthwhile on the outskirts."

With his explanation, Zhou You roughly understood what was going on.

—These guys are practically local bullies in this area. They don't scaveng, but instead make a living by robbing others. —But a few days ago, they got some news that the mayor's reward was for something in the apartment building. Unfortunately, nobody usually wants to come here, and they didn't want to make the secret public. So, after discussing it, they decided to take matters into their own hands.

The result.

It would have been better if we hadn't gone ahead; now that we have, we're in this situation where we can neither advance nor retreat.

"So, robbers should just stick to being robbers and not do things they're not familiar with—look what happened, they messed things up right away."

"Um, sir, what are you saying?"

Zhou You spoke very softly, so much so that the leader didn't hear him at all—and he didn't offer any explanation, but instead looked up and asked again.

Why do you call me "sir"?

The leader looked at Zhou You blankly, as if he had asked a very strange question—but he suppressed his emotions and explained in a low voice.

"Sir, you are a successor, and judging from your skills just now, you should at least be from the core area. Naturally, we should call you 'Sir'."

It seems this identity is quite useful? It actually managed to make this guy's attitude do a 180-degree turn.
Zhou You naturally wouldn't expose him, but instead continued to ask questions.

"Alright then, sir it is, I'm used to being called sir anyway—as I just said, I have a few questions for you."

"Sir, please speak."

"You said you've been trapped here for a long time, did you try to get into that apartment building before?"

A bitter expression immediately appeared on the leader's face.

"To be honest, sir, when we discovered the anomaly in the mall, we planned to go through the apartment building. But we didn't expect this place to be so difficult—we originally had about twenty people, but after going around in there, well, only these people are left."

Zhou You raised an eyebrow.

"You mean...you went in and took a walk around?"

"Uh, that's right."

"Which floor have we reached?"

"Three is not right, it should be two, right?"

"Did you encounter that tall, thin figure?"

The leader scratched his head.

"What thin, elongated figure?"

Well, these guys didn't even get to see the main character before they were completely routed.

Zhou You thought for a moment, then asked another question.

"What did the apartment building look like when you went inside?"

This time, the other party answered cleanly and decisively.

"What a sight. It's like a place that's been abandoned for years, full of sewage, garbage, and all sorts of rotten things. Oh right, there should be people inside, or rather, people imprisoned by some strange entity. The toilets are full of excrement and urine, and they're all blocked up."

This is good news.

Zhou You nodded—the scenery hadn't changed much since he fled, which proved that the apartment building wasn't a shopping mall and had undergone a more complex transformation.

"If it's all ordinary scenery, how did you manage to lose so many people?"

The leader made a face that looked like he was about to cry.

"Well, we don't know why either—even though there were no enemy attacks, people would mysteriously disappear after every corner—and after several people disappeared in a row, we realized something was wrong, so we withdrew immediately, and then... that's how we ran into you, sir."

This was an event I hadn't seen before, but it was also quite normal. When I ran away, I followed the safe passage that the fat man mentioned, so naturally I didn't encounter any enemies along the way.

Unfortunately, after what happened to me, that road was probably already blocked by the tall, thin figure, so I probably can't go back.

After clarifying what he wanted to ask, Zhou You turned around decisively and, surprisingly, kept his promise and let the group of robbers go.

Before leaving, he even threw the homemade gun back.

The leader watched Zhou You walk into the alleyway until the figure was completely out of sight before collapsing to the ground.

"What's the big deal? It's just that the city and those few gang leaders keep a few inheritors, and you never even see them normally. How come one of them suddenly appeared today?"

Those who had argued with him earlier also gathered around and whispered among themselves.

"Um, boss, Ma San seems to have completely lost consciousness. Should we try to risk a retreat after this?"

—Now you remember I'm the boss? Why didn't you think of that when you rebelled and used me as a target?

The leader snorted coldly, but for the sake of the overall situation, he ultimately did not lose his temper. Instead, he said fiercely.

"Just leave Ma San here—he's a simple-minded, muscle-bound guy anyway. If it weren't for him wasting so much time at the mall for his henchmen, we wouldn't be in this mess. As for retreating..."

He scoffed.

"What retreat? Let's keep going back to the apartment building!"

Those people looked at him in disbelief upon hearing this.

"Boss, we've already lost so many men, are we still going in?"

The leader said coldly.

"It's precisely because of the huge losses that we need to go in—otherwise, wouldn't it be a waste of resources? Besides..."

He stared intently at the spot where Zhou You had left, a greedy smile spreading across his face.

"Even an inheritor went inside, doesn't that prove the rumor that there are real treasures inside? Yes, that's right, we can't beat that guy, but we have the numbers. If we can really snag a bargain, that's our ticket to paradise!"

"You really don't want to take a gamble?"

No one answered, but a series of swallowing sounds could be heard.

(End of this chapter)