Buddhist player

"Name?"

"...Luo Dali".

"age."

"twenty one……?"

"truth."

"...I look older than my age."

"gender?"

"...Just give me a quick death."

Looking up at the ceiling at a 45-degree angle, Luo Dali had a look of utter despair on his face, and faintly visible glistening tears were sliding down his cheeks.

"I've made myself perfectly clear. I don't know that little girl next to you at all. My background is simple and innocent. I came to this town from the city just to find a way to survive. I'm really not some kind of player as you claim..."

What has happened in the past two days has been nothing short of a nightmare for him.

At first, things were alright, since he was rescued by an adult when he was in dire straits on the bus. But the nightmare began after he got off the bus and arrived in this small town.

I don't know what's wrong with this town. Everyone seems to be seriously ill. Before I could even put down my luggage and rest at my temporary lodging, I was kidnapped by a fat man weighing several hundred pounds.

That fat guy is a complete psychopath. After gagging him and tying him to a pillar, he kept beating him while praising him for being so stubborn and holding back... Why the hell didn't he just ask?!

Later, strange events broke out in the town, and blood mist filled the air. The fat man decisively abandoned him and ran away. He could only watch helplessly as the monsters that emerged from the mist grinned and surrounded him...

After that, his memory was fragmented, and when he regained consciousness, it was already evening.

Before he could even react, the fireworks raining down from all over the town terrified him. After barely getting through the night, he witnessed firsthand how the townspeople were dissolved in the black fog.

With nowhere else to turn, he could only take advantage of that opportunity to hide in an unusually luxurious building... and then he was kidnapped by another pervert.

And then, we have now.

He was initially overjoyed to see his savior, but the black-haired loli beside him plunged him back into despair with just a few words.

In an effort to restore his memory, he endured a series of treatments, including electric shocks, waterboarding, cannon fire, and sky lanterns, in just one hour... To be honest, he felt that it would have been better to just give himself a quick death.

"What should we do? This guy seems to be a native NPC."

Turning his head, Quantum Self-Binding whispered a question to the person sitting next to him.

"Oh, then let's retry it."

Bai Chen kept looking down at the map drawn by Hua Yuzhi without raising his head.

The appearance of Luo Dali, and especially Xiao Qi's identification, forced him to start all over again from the beginning of his previous deductions.

According to his reasoning, if players stay here for too long, they will be completely swallowed up by this town. Regardless of the final outcome, they should be unable to maintain a physical form, such as turning into the fog monsters in the blood mist.

Logically, his deduction is correct, but Luo Dali's appearance provides another direction for this deduction.

—nibbling away.

He hadn't quite understood why the people on the bus were acting like they wanted to devour Luo Dali, but considering their identities as players... it didn't seem so incomprehensible after all.

Bai Chen lit an incense stick for himself and glanced at Luo Dali, who was tied up in a chair.

The identity of the other player should be beyond doubt. Not to mention the identification from Xiao Qi, so far, apart from Xiao Qi, only these players can retain the memories of the loop.

Now that the other party has been rescued, will there be a knife-cut noodle who has replaced Luo Dali's identity and also forgotten his past on the bus tomorrow?

That's easy to verify; we can just stop the buses again tomorrow. But the question is, if the ultimate goal is just to devour them, what's the point of going through all this trouble... some kind of special sacrificial ritual?

Unconsciously, Bai Chen's heart stirred slightly.

Upon closer examination, the lord's actions were extremely suspicious. Before Dawntown became Fogtown, everything the lord did seemed like a deliberate attempt to let things spiral out of control.

……wrong.

Bai Chen frowned.

If the other party simply wanted to make a sacrifice, there was no need to deliberately delay and let the situation escalate to that point. The old man said that during that period, due to the lord's inaction, more than half of the town's residents had left.

If you're going to stage some kind of cult ritual with sacrifices, the more people the better... Is it because the conditions haven't been met?

Because a certain requirement was not met, the ceremony never began; it was all preparation beforehand. Only after everything was ready did the giant foot descend from the sky, bringing this unknown sacrifice to a close.

If you're asking for something... players?

Both the changes in the town and the lord's attitude began after the player group arrived in this town.

From that point on, the initial setup was completed, and then for the next ten years, players were continuously hunted...

Bai Chen pressed his temples hard.

To be honest, he was startled by his own sudden idea.

Regardless of the world, the definition of a player has always been quite lofty: the chosen one, the chosen one, the savior, the one who saves the world... and so on.

The logic of those dungeons is also the same: to go to a certain place to help complete a task, to help some being get rid of their obsession, or to help a region be free from disaster. Although the process may be slightly different, the core is the same.

If... This is just a hypothetical situation.

Once some unspeakable entity figured out the underlying logic of the system issuing missions and dispatching players, it deliberately created the environment and conditions to attract players, thereby completing the overall hunt of this group of players...

This possibility does exist, doesn't it?

If this logic is applied to the current situation in this instance, everything seems to become easy to understand; otherwise, he simply cannot comprehend the lord's actions.

"Alright, no need to investigate further."

Exhaling, Bai Chen glanced at Luo Dali, who looked utterly dejected, and stood up from the sofa.

To be honest, he wasn't sure what state the other party was in, but their identity was definitely correct. If Quantum Self-Binding hadn't found them by chance, who knows how long they would have been hiding there.

"Then what about him?"

He stretched out his hand and pointed at Luo Dali in front of him.

"I don't know why, but I always have a feeling that this guy is a dangerous person."

"Tie him up and gag him."

After thinking for a moment, Bai Chen gave his answer.

"And then... tomorrow will come."