My lord, spare his life!

Outside, the night was as dark as ink.

A fierce wind arose, and lightning flashed.

Boom!

A dark purple thunderbolt cleaved through the night.

Zhang Yang was jolted awake by the noise and suddenly opened his eyes.

Boom!

Another clap of thunder.

In that instant, the light and airy soul gained weight.

Electric light pierced into the dilapidated house through the cracks in the earthen wall.

In an instant, the darkness receded, illuminating everything—blood splattered on the walls, body parts scattered on the ground. Zhang Yang had just opened her eyes when she saw this bizarre scene. Even more bizarrely, when she subconsciously tried to move her hands, the body parts below also wriggled in sync.

Zhang Yang narrowed his eyes, and, still not believing it, moved again.

The body parts below briefly revived.

Zhang Yang: "..."

She just went through a picture, and her body suddenly turned into pieces?

"Or is it one of the planners having a barbecue in the server room again?"

Zhang Yang stared blankly at his scattered self under the rafters, feeling no panic, only a warm greeting to the game planner—NPCs have a tough time with this kind of planner.

Yes, Zhang Yang is an NPC.

To be precise, Zhang Yang is an NPC who unexpectedly awakened her consciousness before the launch of the holographic game. From the day she gained consciousness, she discovered that she was different from her peers—those peers either stayed in one place all day or repeated a few monotonous lines of dialogue over and over again, like puppets without souls or self-awareness.

[They must not be discovered; if discovered, they will be eliminated!]

[It cannot be erased; to erase it is to vanish into nothingness!]

These two warnings were imprinted on her mind like ironclad rules from the day she was born, giving her an inexplicable and intense sense of crisis. She had a premonition that she had to become a person! Only in this way could she avoid being discovered as special by "He" and thus escape being erased.

but--

What is a human being?

Am I not a human being?

Who is He?

Her confusion didn't last long before things took a turn for the better.

A small community with a population of only 1,300 has attracted 30 million survivors seeking relatives. Apart from Zhang Yang, no one thinks it's outrageous that the scavenging old woman could single-handedly support 30 million grandchildren. As time goes on, the army of grandchildren continues to grow exponentially.

Its reproductive capacity is even more terrifying than that of a line or a plane.

Zhang Yang also learned from them that they were the ones who were "human".

They call themselves "players" and "extraterrestrials".

The "He" that can eliminate her is the game's official entity.

In other words, if Zhang Yang, this plastic leaf, wants to ensure its own safety and avoid being erased, it must find a way to integrate itself into the forest called "Players." This is the safest way.

Zhang Yang, an NPC disguised as a player.

It's been going on for a full sixteen years!

Before I could even celebrate finally owning a home base, everything went black as I entered the side map.

Open your eyes again—

Her head was hanging from the roof beam.

Her disassembled body lay on the ground, writhing like a pupa.

Despite the bizarre nature of the situation, Zhang Yang remained calm, having witnessed countless similar occurrences. Players occasionally experienced glitches including, but not limited to, hair flying off, head separating from body, clothes disappearing, and bodies sinking into the ground and getting stuck in walls.

With extensive experience and knowledge, one naturally becomes unafraid of the unusual.

only--

As an NPC disguised as a player, she couldn't fix bugs by exiting the game and repairing the client like a player could. After waiting a long time without her body respawning and reassembling, she sighed in frustration.

"Just as I thought, NPCs have no human rights."

We still have to solve the problem manually.

Zhang Yang recalled the feeling of controlling her body. First, she tightened her core, and her torso under the beam struggled to sit up. Then, she controlled her hands and exerted force until the body parts pressing down on her hands were pushed out. Only then did she see clearly what her right hand was holding.

Her own left ankle.

The left hand has relatively more freedom.

Having just broken free from the weight of the body parts, his left hand began to grab wildly at the ground, reaching towards the earthen wall, and then "climbing" up the wall.

Climbing the wall with one hand was quite strenuous; she fell down just inches off the ground. Left with no other option, Zhang Yang had to control her right hand to "climb" over as well to help. She slowly adjusted her rhythm, trying to swing her left hand up with her right, then her right hand up with her left, finally completing the extremely difficult spiral climb onto the roof beam.

"From this we can conclude—"

Zhang Yang muttered to himself, focusing his attention on his two hands.

"Stepping on your right foot with your left foot can really send you flying!"

Since you can't see, you can only feel the knots in the rope with your fingers.

"Which bastard tied this knot so tightly? It's so hard to untie!"

Half a day passed with no progress, and I was covered in sweat.

"Phew, that's a relief!"

Before she could even celebrate her partial victory, the knot loosened, and the ground rapidly zoomed in and out of her sight!

boom!

After the muffled thud, my vision spun around.

The original top-down perspective has been changed to bottom-up.

Oh, her head fell to the ground.

It's not a big problem. Just move your head and adjust your vision!

Zhang Yang grabbed the two pieces of corpse and tried to piece them together.

Good news, the wound closed perfectly, and nothing was missing.

The bad news is that the wound didn't heal on its own.

She had no choice but to remain in the position with half her face pressed against the sticky, stinking ground, lost in thought—she had neither the ability to repair the client like a player nor the skill to refresh it and make it brand new, so how could she turn her fragmented self back into her complete self?

"Oh, and we can sew it up!"

The game's backpack contains needles and thread.

She stole the backpack from a new player—players who couldn't find their backpacks had to delete their accounts and rebuild.

With a thought, a line of words quietly appeared before my eyes.

Please enter your password.

Zhang Yang replied forcefully, "Damn it!"

A transparent screen quietly unfolded before my eyes.

Name: Zhang Yang, courtesy name Boyuan

Age: Unknown

[Faction]: None available

[Stars]: None available

[Talent]: To be unlocked

[Loyalty]: Beginning to take human form

[Morality]: Somewhat understanding of human nature

[Strategy]: A mirror reflecting the person.

[Ambition]: Unfathomable

[Title]: Wanderer

[Current Status]: Shang Yang Knows the Strength of Horses

The screen looked slightly different from what she was used to, but she didn't have time to think about it now. Zhang Yang fumbled for a needle and thread in her game inventory. The room was dimly lit, and it took her a lot of effort—biting it with her teeth and smearing it with saliva—to finally thread the end of the needle.

First, relax your torso and lie flat.

He used his left hand to pull his hair and move his head, carefully adjusting his gaze, while his right hand held his right leg to adjust the position of the severed area, ensuring the skin and flesh matched.

I carefully tried inserting the needle.

I could clearly feel the cold, sharp needle piercing my skin, but it didn't hurt much. Instead, it felt like a dull itch through thick boots.

Hmm, it's good that it doesn't hurt!

The sharp needles, carrying the thread, shuttle back and forth, creating a serrated pattern.

After sewing up the right leg, the same method was used to sew up the left leg.

Then came the left arm and the right arm.

To reinforce her limbs, she had two extra stitches.

Finally, only the head remained.

After a while, filled with the worry that "the stitches will hold and not come undone," she held her head in her hands and stood up unsteadily. Her steps were shaky, each step a slant.

"This bug is quite serious—"

Would she disassemble herself every time she returns to her homestead for a side quest?

Boom!

A fierce gust of wind smashed open the crumbling window.

Clang! The wooden window frame hit the ground.

Zhang Yang subconsciously turned around so that he could see the head clearly.

Boom!

Another bolt of dark purple lightning cleaved the night sky.

In a flash, the lightning illuminated the silhouette of a person standing outside the window.

It also reflected an indifferent face, wet with rain.

Zhang Yang: "!!!"