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

"Miss Xiong, I'm here to help you!"

A loud shout was followed by a figure descending from the sky.

The pitch-black monster was pierced by a black and yellow pitchfork and flew backward in a sorry state. The next second, a tall neon man swiftly descended, dragging the chain that the lawyer had once again swung out, and kicked the monster, which was trying to lash out again, sending it flying dozens of meters away.

Ishido Masaaki.

Xiong Mi remembered the man's name.

The president of the 【Red Knot Society】 is known as one of the strongest Red Moon-level players in Japan, and is nicknamed 【Demon God Yaksha】.

Hmm... I guess it's a habit of the Japanese; they always like to give people weird nicknames. Even though he's just used to using his obsessive pitchfork as a weapon, other players have forced such a title upon him. As far as Xiongmi knows, the president of the Red Knot Society is actually quite bothered by his nickname. As for his character, in Xiongmi's impression, Ishido Masaaki has always been a very easygoing and kind person. Aside from his love of drinking and always rushing to the front lines in battle, he has no other problems.

Incidentally, like Xiong Mi, Ishido Masaaki was also defeated by Alice, and he too was turned into a toy doll by Alice in the Fujika Middle School instance. However, compared to Xiong Mi and Toyama Akira, Ishido Masaaki was even more unlucky. He only recovered after Takami broke through Yamato Middle School and the Baytos Research Institute and went to Takamagahara to retrieve the remaining dolls. Furthermore, because he lacked the ability to reset his own mind, Ishido Masaaki was basically in a state of mental collapse when he was first unsealed. The members of the Red Society had to spend a lot of resources and time treating their captain, and he only recently recovered.

“Waaaaaaaaaaa——”

At that moment, the tall man rushed forward, grabbed a pitchfork, and kicked the dark, eerie creature. He pulled out the pitchfork, then stabbed it in again, pulled it out again, and stabbed it in again. In just a few seconds, he launched more than ten attacks in succession. With each blow, blood flowed from the pitchfork, and the blood seeped into the creature's body, making its movements even slower.

"drink!"

Without hesitation, Xiong Mi pulled out a small knife and cut open the punitive mark. The blood that flowed out turned into flames, which immediately spread towards the dark, eerie creature. In an instant, the monster's body emitted a sizzling sound like roasting meat, and a series of shrill screams followed from its body, as if many people were trapped inside.

"Watch out, this thing can split!"

Akira Toyama, the vice-captain of the Red Knot Society, shouted from a distance.

At that moment, Xiong Mi suddenly sensed a sudden change in the aura of the black monster. Alarm bells rang in her mind, and she did not hesitate to withdraw her hand and dodge. Then she saw the thing explode in front of her, turning into pieces of black flesh that rushed out in all directions.

"Pfft-"

This was the closest person, Masaaki Ishido, who was hit hard and sent flying through the air. He was then hit several more times, his flesh and blood flying everywhere.

The players present didn't pay attention to the Red Knot Society leader's injuries. Everyone knew that this leader possessed a self-healing Dark Night-level blessing; unless his head was severed or his heart crushed, Ishido Masaaki was difficult to kill. This was why, despite being the society leader, he was always fighting on the front lines. For this reason, even when he was beaten to a bloody pulp, no one cared too much; they simply thought that given his style of doing things, this was perfectly normal.

Click click click——

Amidst the sound of shattering mirror, Xiong Mi, who had been struck by the black chunks of flesh, vanished without a trace. She reappeared unharmed, grabbing the chain thrown at her by the lawyer and being violently pulled away from the range of those bullet-like, incredibly powerful pieces of flesh.

However, the pieces of flesh seemed to possess a degree of self-tracking ability. Even though Xiong Mi had retreated to a considerable distance, the pieces of flesh relentlessly pursued him, actively changing direction and fiercely attacking. In the raging wind, Xiong Mi could even vaguely see fragmented human figures emerging from the black pieces of flesh, their arms outstretched towards him.

"Ow!!!"

A yellow flash cut off the path of the shredded flesh in the next instant, sending them all flying back.

The third member of the Red Society, and the last of the five members who participated in the defense of Tokyo, was a slender man named Hu Baoxiong with dyed light yellow hair, standing just over 1.7 meters tall. He leaped and bounded rapidly in the darkness, quickly knocking back the pieces of flesh one by one.

He was so fast that Xiong Mi could hardly see his movements.

"Ouch, ouch, ouch -"

Although it was hard to see clearly, it was easy to hear, as he was barking like a dog nonstop.

Unlike Masaaki Ishido and Akira Toyama, this player named Koyoyuki did not die at the hands of Alice from Fujika Middle School, but rather at Hayate Elementary School. Furthermore, he was defeated by the dog-turning mechanic of the Butcher's Hut, trapped inside which led to mental instability, and then attacked and killed by other monsters.

Although the player has now been successfully rescued, the psychological damage he suffered is even more difficult to recover from. After all, the corrupting power of Hayate Elementary School can truly affect people from the bottom of their cognition. Moreover, Kobo was trapped for even longer than Hayasaka Ai, who still often plays master-servant games with Takami. Therefore, after a long and difficult period of treatment, although Kobo can now cooperate with his teammates in battle and has basically regained his communication ability, there are still some habits that are difficult to change that he needs to overcome.

In other words, even now he still can't help but ask other people about their urine, and he drools and wants to peek at it when he sees Oli. As one of the few players who survived the torment, Xiong Mi knew more or less about Hu Baoxiong's situation, but she had always regarded this player as a tragic example. She didn't expect that the dog-transformation mechanism, besides its side effects, seemed to have brought some kind of benefit to this player. At least the super-fast movement that he was currently using was something that Xiong Mi herself could never do.

“Attacking this thing can only temporarily repel it; it will catch up soon. Every time it is attacked to a certain extent, it will split apart. After splitting and then merging again, the effects of the previous obsession and blessing will disappear, and everything will return to the starting point. We have tried many ways to seal this thing, but the results have been far from ideal, and we can never get rid of it.”

At this moment, Akira Toyama approached and began to explain the situation to Xiong Mi and the lawyer.

Our cause will surely triumph!

A roar suddenly came from above.

That sound... are the rescue team members coming down?

Xiong Mi felt a little tense after hearing the familiar voice, but then she noticed that Yuanshan Ming had a similar expression on his face, which made her realize something.

"You have a rescue team member on your side too?"

"Oh? So there was more than one?!"

After a few words of conversation, both of them understood.

At that moment, the chilling aura and roars coming from above also began to draw closer.

[For the great God of Gold! For the Lord of Humanity whom I adore!]

[To save all elementary school students! To save all mothers!]

Two powerful voices accompanied two identical figures, each holding a submachine gun and with blurred faces, as they fell to the ground.

"What the hell is this about saving elementary school students?"

Xiong Mi couldn't help but complain.

"Don't ask me, I don't know why the strange creatures summoned by Mr. Gao would say these strange lines."

Yuanshan Ming looked on with disbelief, and it wasn't hard to tell that Lao Guo on his side had probably said a lot of strange things.

However, this is not what we need to worry about right now. What is really important is that with the arrival of the two rescue team members, some kind of force resonated and summoned more power from somewhere else.

As the five players continued to fall, they witnessed golden light emerge from the two figures and condense into a giant golden palm in mid-air.

Then the palm slammed down, sending the black monster that had just coalesced and returned to its original form flying away. In the blink of an eye, it flew beyond the players' field of vision.

After expelling the monsters, the golden hand did not disappear immediately. Instead, it turned around and slapped each of the two rescue team members hard, causing the two summoned creatures to stagger for a while before finally dissipating.

It seems that these two strangely behaving rescue team members have brought some negative publicity to Gao Hai himself.

Chapter Sixteen: The Abstract Rescue Team Members and the Entrance to the Touching Abyss of the Soul.

To be honest, Gao Hai had absolutely no idea what Lao Guo had become.

Despite being the first summonable member of the rescue team badge, a summoning artifact, Lao Guo contributed significantly to Gao Hai's dungeon raid. Although he was mostly just there to fill a spot, his role was undeniable. However, Lao Guo was essentially only at the level of an ordinary person in terms of soul strength. While he had a negligible Twilight-level buff, it was nothing compared to the other team members the badge later housed.

With each enhancement of the rescue team's badge, Lao Guo, the weakest member of the team, experienced a significant improvement, soaring from a Twilight-level grunt to the level of a Night-level normal monster, even gaining the ability to create clones. However, while these enhancements increased Lao Guo's strength, they also diluted his true nature in a sense, gradually transforming him into something else entirely.

To put it bluntly, the real Lao Guo only had so little power, which couldn't compare to the power infused into him after the badge was upgraded. In addition, after Lao Guo became a summoned creature, he lost the ability to independently enhance and absorb power. After these several infusions of power, what belonged to him was basically gone and no longer existed.

So the question now is, what exactly should this rescue team member, who is now divided into five, be considered?

Gao Hai didn't know the answer. In fact, he had never considered this question before. It wasn't until now, after sending out rescue team members to lead the Red Moon level players and injecting more power to ensure the survival of the rescue team members, that he noticed that, at some point, these rescue team members, created based on Lao Guo, seemed to have become abstract.

People die when they are killed, but justice cannot be killed! Hmph!

For the sake of humanity, there is no need for pity, no need for regret, and no fear whatsoever!!!

Inside the pitch-black, enormous cavity with no bottom in sight, the two rescue team members were still shouting loudly.

Summoned remotely by their power, Gao Haiguang felt an overwhelming embarrassment at the roars of these two creatures, a feeling he felt compelled to carve a three-bedroom apartment into the floor. He simply couldn't imagine how the old Guo had become something like this. What on earth was going on with these things?

[Isn't this the teacher's problem? Is it because the teacher often watches some inexplicable and abstract things that these low-level summoned creatures, which already lack self-awareness, are changing and exhibiting this reaction, as if they've been brainwashed by strange videos?]

Alice's voice echoed in his mind, and from the slight suppressed laughter in her voice, it was easy to tell that the little brat was thoroughly enjoying the spectacle.

[Shut up and be quiet, don't interfere with my operations. Tsk, the Dark Night-level rescue team is still not up to par; they're completely useless in direct combat. I need to consider deploying a higher-level force. But now is definitely not a good time; I can only wait...]

After saying a few unpleasant words to Alice, Gao Hai turned his attention back to the instance space.

He could sense that several players from the Fishing Gang and the Red Knot Society had joined together, and now there were five of them active in the same area. That area was a place with an unusual spatial structure, seemingly possessing some kind of special property.

what is that?

With his eyes closed, Gao Hai extended his senses, trying to feel the place more deeply, and shared the information he gained with the players present as much as possible.

It was a hole.

A bottomless pit, with no end in sight, a never-ending downward plunge.

But... no, it shouldn't be like this, it's not like this.

This hole is wrong; they shouldn't have entered this way. They shouldn't have come here; there's no way to get to the right place this way.

Because this is not a hole in the real sense; it exists in the spiritual world, a hole in the mind of others.

Gao Hai can already see it.

See things that are deep inside, things that are in the past.

It was an old doctor, a doctor sitting in the corridor of a mental hospital, and behind him, the heavy ward doors vibrating continuously.

I can now confirm, I can confirm with absolute certainty... that my patients have indeed connected to another world, a world that doesn't exist in the real world, a world beyond our comprehension...

The doctor's lips trembled as he slowly uttered words, his voice sounding muffled and grating, as if it were coming from a videotape.

These patients... these patients who underwent brain surgery, I don't know why they've changed like this...

[According to normal surgical procedures, they should have become like everyone else... They should have become quiet and calm, but they didn't...]

They seem to have become able to see something unusual; they've become able to see another world, a world that we normal people cannot understand or access...

I thought they were just crazy, like most doctors and nurses... but they showed me, they showed us all, and those who didn't believe them are now dead...

I still think this is very abnormal. I feel that world must not be a good place...

Regardless, I must fulfill my duty as a doctor. I need to treat them, I need to try to heal them… They are patients, they are my patients. If even I abandon them, who else will care about the lives of these mentally ill people…?

Now, I need to find the right caves... I must enter those caves first before I can truly understand them...

[You can't just jump straight into the hole. Everyone has their own hole, and you won't be welcome to barge into someone else's. Those who are impolite will only fall deeper and deeper... There must be a medium, a token that can be accepted...]

It might be a favorite food, a piece of jewelry, or a toy. The appearance isn't important; what matters is the emotion the item carries… Only by obtaining the corresponding token can you enter the corresponding cave and journey to deeper places…

I'm ready, and I hope everything I've done won't be in vain...

Perhaps these things should never have happened in the first place. That surgery, that cruel surgery, should never have been promoted in the first place...

[This is really something, what have we done...]

Things have progressed to this point now, and I think I have no other choice...

Remember, the patient's cave I'm going to is not my own... I absolutely must not enter my own cave, because once I do, I can't get out, and I can't get out on my own...

I don't know if anyone will hear these messages...

In short, I will set off after the recording is finished... I hope I can end all of this, I hope so...

The doctor stood up.

The heavy doors also stopped trembling at the same time.

It was as if the patients hiding inside heard the doctor's words, knew what was going to happen next, and so they prepared themselves, quieted down, and silently waited for the other party to come to them.