Why is my journey to the world of anime a strange tale of rules?

What a coincidence!

"Speaking of which, putting aside the [Substitute Flesh and Blood], a special obsession object that directly parasitizes the player, the scalpel is a very clear obsession object originating from the hospital instance. In other words, the power of that thing was able to influence similar [hospital instances] very early on, and use that to set up plans on the player?"

Gao Hai's tone was very calm.

Even after confirming that at least twenty players had laid an ambush to attack him, his face showed no sign of surprise; in fact, he appeared quite relaxed.

"Whoa, what's going on?"

Ryo, who was pushed by Gao Hai, crashed to the ground and let out a cry of pain. She looked blankly at Gao Hai and the man standing not far in front of her, whose mere presence was inexplicably terrifying.

Something lunged at the two girls who were lying on the ground the next moment.

There was no time to react; he only realized he was about to be attacked when the thing was about to pounce on his face.

tread!

Then Gao Hai lightly stepped forward, crushing the thing directly into the ground, even leaving clear cracks in the concrete.

【Wow! W ...

Something was emitting a heart-wrenching scream, so terrible and piercing that Hongxia felt as if her eardrums were about to be torn apart.

"Ah."

But Gao Hai followed with a disdainful laugh, and the scream vanished in an instant. At the same time, the light bulbs along the entire highway exploded with a deafening roar, plunging darkness into the neighborhood.

Unable to make a sound.

At this moment, neither Hongxia nor Liang, who were sitting on the ground, could make a sound.

An intense sense of oppression and coldness assaulted their nerves and muscles from all directions, like a person without any protection being thrown in front of a hungry brown bear, making it impossible for the two girls to even get up and run away.

"Do you think that just because there are ordinary people around me, you can use all sorts of area-of-effect attacks to force me to submit, making me unable to fight you with my bare hands?"

Gao Hai's voice rang out again at this moment. Just like before, even though he was trapped in this suffocating and eerie darkness, his voice did not sound suppressed at all. Instead, it sounded as relaxed and carefree as if he were on vacation.

Click——click——

A roadside utility pole was twisted and broken without any external force, then flew into Gao Hai's hand and was twisted into a long stick.

Then Gao Hai walked to Hong Xia and Liang's side, drew a circle on the ground with the stick, and a flame appeared out of thin air, surrounding the two of them.

"You two stay here and don't move around. As long as you don't leave this circle, no one can hurt you."

With that, Gao Hai turned and left, disappearing into the darkness without a trace.

"Hey? Hey hey?"

At this point, Hongxia no longer knew whether she was dreaming or in reality.

Liang, who already had a vague premonition, pursed her lips and remained silent, simply observing the surrounding situation.

Beyond the burning flames, nothing could be heard or seen for a moment. In the deathly darkness, it seemed that nothing existed, and the only thing left in the world was the two girls hiding in the circle of fire.

What is going on here?

Until today, the two girls' memories consisted only of ordinary daily life.

But ever since they stopped Mr. Gao a few minutes ago, all common sense and rationality began to be torn apart little by little, and all sorts of surreal things began to emerge, starting to destroy Hongxia and Liang's worldview.

【Hey hey hey...】

Laughter suddenly erupted from the darkness.

"Whoa!"

Hongxia, already tense and terrified, trembled all over. When she saw the face of a woman who had been skinned alive and was floating in the darkness approaching from the darkness, she almost immediately screamed.

"..."

Liang, who was relatively more rational, reached out to protect her friend, but under the intense, numbing, and icy fear, she could only barely keep her composure and avoid losing her temper.

The rustling sounds then slowly approached from other directions.

This time, it was a dense swarm of tiny white spiders, each the size of a grain of rice. Each spider's abdomen bore a distorted human face, emitting silent howls, as if the face were a living person fused to the spider.

Come out quickly, come out quickly!

Someone whispered in the girls' ears.

Come and join us, come and share our joy, let our blood and souls be one, and let us enjoy happiness forever!

The cement pavement seemed to be melting away little by little, revealing the festering, bloody flesh inside.

Something that looked like a human hand, or a bloody, fleshy growth like some kind of tumor, gradually approached, from which eyeballs and a mouth grew, making soft, rustling sounds.

Hongxia, who was already timid, felt like she was going crazy.

But then Liang reached out and pinched her thigh, the pain jolting the girl awake.

"Don't be afraid, they can't get in. If we're not afraid, they can't harm us."

Then, listening to her friend's voice, which was barely maintaining its composure, Hongxia was finally able to calm down a little. However, her whole body was still trembling uncontrollably, and tears were streaming down her face. She was clearly nearing her limit.

【Nijika...Nijika...Where are you...】

Then, she heard the voice of her older sister, Ijichi Seika.

"Sister? Is sister in danger?"

Only then did Hongxia realize that she was right next to the entrance to the starry sky, and her sister was not far away. Her eyes widened, and she almost immediately got up from the ground and rushed towards the direction from which the sound came.

But Liang pressed down hard on Hongxia's shoulder, forcing her back to sit on the ground.

"What a coincidence! We just failed to intimidate you and then we heard your sister's voice saying, 'Don't go out, we have to stay here.'"

As she spoke, Liang's body trembled slightly. Unlike Hongxia, the girl, who had been more deeply affected by the blessing and had received some kind of enhancement, felt an even stronger chill when she heard "Xingge's" voice, as if the one who made the voice was not a living person, but something extremely terrifying.

[Nijika... Nijika ahhhhh... Nijika, come save me... save me...]

Almost the instant the cold words fell, the sound from the darkness turned into a shrill scream, with a terrifying sound like something tearing flesh and eating it.

Under the continuous stimulation, Hongxia was already somewhat dazed. She wanted to get up and rush towards her sister's voice, but then she remembered her friend's words and the strange things around her. For a moment, she felt a dizzy feeling that her mind was about to lose its ability to think, and she swayed and almost fainted.

However, just as Ryo said, nothing ever got close to them.

No matter how terrifying the monsters, how horrific the sights, or how distorted and eerie the sounds, none of them ever came near them even once.

Enveloped by that inexplicably persistent ring of fire, these evil spirits could only try their best to lure, deceive, or force them away from the ring's range, but they couldn't truly inflict violence on them. Just like this ring of fire that Gao Hai had casually drawn, it was far more terrifying than all of them combined.

tread!

The sound of hurried running suddenly rang in the ears of the two girls.

They turned around and saw a girl rushing out of the darkness.

The other person reached out and threw off their hat and mask, then suddenly stopped in front of the ring of fire, their sunglasses also flying off, and their hood falling down, causing their long pink hair to fly wildly. A blood-red guitar then appeared in their hand.

"Pochi-chan?!"

The face of the newcomer was undoubtedly that of Goto Ichiri, who had left the band and was always timid, socially awkward, and prone to making all sorts of strange moves.

This time, however, neither Hongxia nor Liang could sense any clumsy or silly aura from Ichiri. Instead, they felt a sense of oppression, as if they were looking up at someone.

when--

The next second, as the girl forcefully played the strings, a shockwave tore through the surrounding area.

The darkness that enveloped their vision returned to normal in an instant.

Under the bright lights, there was an empty street, Hongxia's house covered by a larger ring of fire, and several corpses lying on the ground not far away, their bodies twisted into different shapes, and their faces with only horrifying hollowed-out holes, as if there was nothing left in their heads.

No, it's not just these things; there's something else lurking around us.

Something emanating a chilling aura and a terrifying, twisted power is still spying on this place, wanting to launch an attack.

Dangdangdang——

The sound of continuous plucking reached their ears in the next moment.

It was completely different from the music that Ichiri usually played; it was a noisy, manic, and violent melody, as if it were roaring in fury, overflowing with murderous intent.

A girl who bore a striking resemblance to Ichiri Goto appeared out of thin air beside her.

The second, the third... finally, a total of five girls appeared next to Goto Ichiri, and the moment they appeared, they rushed out with some kind of weapon in hand, heading towards one of the twisted things that was spying on Nijika and Ryo.

Meanwhile, Ichiri himself continued to play rapidly. Each sharp, explosive sound from the guitar created a substantial sound wave that shattered the windows of all the buildings within a hundred meters and sent the branches and leaves of the surrounding trees and shrubs flying and dancing in the air.

Hongxia stared wide-eyed at Goto Ichiri, who was displaying incredible power and beating up all the twisted creatures that were attacking her. She thought she might be seeing an alien.

Just when she thought she was witnessing the most shocking scene of her life, accompanied by the violent tremors of a building collapsing from its center, Gao Hai's figure flew out of the building, stepping on a mangled, bloody figure as he landed on the ground, creating a spiderweb-like crack in the ground within a ten-meter radius with a deafening roar.

"You've prepared so many methods to ambush me, and this is all the strength you can muster? If this is all you're capable of, you'd better not embarrass yourselves."

As Gao Hai casually remarked this, he looked down at the player whose face was completely distorted, his voice filled with disappointment.

"God's judgment...will surely descend...on you..."

The player, his expression one of fanaticism, let out a distorted roar. His already severely distorted face began to reveal mechanical structures such as gears and wires, as if these things had grown out of his flesh out of thin air.

Of course, before the thing actually grew out, Gao Hai stepped on it and crushed its head on the spot.

"Up there!"

Having already eliminated all the monsters that had attacked his friend, Ichiri called out to Takami at that moment. Takami looked up and saw one figure after another standing in front of the windows, appearing from the surrounding buildings.

Was the complex array constructed using the surrounding skyscrapers as a ritual venue? Did they think they could exploit the complexity of the surrounding environment to prevent me from quickly deciphering it and causing harm?

"The idea is not bad, but at this level, it's far from enough."

Gao Hai then smiled and waved his hand.

As Hongxia watched this scene unfold, she witnessed how, with Gao Hai's actions, every tall building within a radius of several hundred meters was instantly severed, turning into fragmented structures of varying sizes suspended in the air.

Interlude 4-42: The Calculation Behind the Attack and the Night Belonging to Ichiri Goto

For the two girls, Hongxia and Liang, tonight was truly a spectacular display of extraordinary beings battling each other.

For Goto Ichiri, tonight was a rather thrilling date. Especially the part where she had just escaped and then learned of the incident from Takami, rushing back to fight using the power of her guitar—to be honest, Ichiri was quite frightened at the time, constantly worrying about whether Nijika and Ryo were in danger. Only after confirming that Takami had protected them well did she finally relax, and together with Takami, they gave the players who dared to attack them a good beating.

As for Gao Hai, well, he didn't really feel much of a lingering effect; it wasn't even as strong as the band performance Yi Li had taken him to. Compared to the modified person in the abandoned hospital, these players, who were clearly also modified by the [Hospital]'s power, were far too weak. Even though they used some kind of mystical ritual array and brought out various obsession objects, none of these things were of any use against Gao Hai, whose strength now far surpassed that of the players. They were easily crushed by him.

Unfortunately, Gao Hai failed to capture the mastermind this time. The person claiming to be the mastermind behind the "Female Face Gang" didn't arrive in their true form. Instead, they brainwashed a player, instilling in that player the false belief that they were the mastermind, and then had them lead a modified player squad to attack Gao Hai. Therefore, even after capturing the player and conducting a mental search, Gao Hai couldn't pinpoint the real enemy. In fact, Gao Hai only knew what was going on because he saw information deliberately left in the brainwashed player's memories; otherwise, he wouldn't have been able to accurately assess the enemy's true situation.