Players, Please Board the Train

“I’m not sick.” The Scar Player tried to stay calm, but his eyes were already twitching uncontrollably, constantly wandering over his own wounds. Every time he spotted a bleeding cut, the fear in his eyes deepened by another degree.

Inside this dungeon, things players imagined often became visible to the naked eye. So Xu Huo could also see the hallucination details that appeared after the Scar Player was affected by the ”Murmuring Sphere,” which meant he could also hear the continuous dripping sound of blood.

To make the effect more realistic, he had added two buckets and a grandfather clock nearby. The clock sat on the desk directly facing the Scar Player, and the buckets were placed under his wrists to catch the blood. There was water in the buckets, so the dripping sound would be amplified.

The Scar Player clenched his teeth, glancing at the second hand ticking on the clock one moment, then staring at the water in the buckets turning red the next. His mental state grew increasingly unstable.

Xu Huo stood up and walked over to the desk. ”Rumor has it that a very famous medical doctor overseas once conducted an experiment.”

”He selected a death row inmate, blindfolded him, simulated the motion of a blade cutting across his wrist, then placed a bucket nearby with water dripping, telling him he was bleeding. He also slowed the water flow over time to create the illusion that the bleeding was slowing due to excessive blood loss.”

”After a while, the inmate’s breathing and heartbeat gradually slowed down, and finally stopped.”

”When the doctor went to check, he found that the inmate had actually died—allegedly from a stress response.”

Leaning against the desk, he reached out and turned the minute hand of the clock back a bit, then added, ”There’s no way to verify the truth of this experiment, but medicine is all about pushing limits. I’ve always been very interested in this experiment, wanting to know if people really can be scared to death.”

A fruit knife slid out of his sleeve, and he cut the Scar Player’s wrist right in front of him.Feeling the pain and seeing the blood flow out, the Scar Player’s eyes bulged. ”What are you trying to do?!”

Xu Huo casually dropped the knife, grabbed a long towel from the drawer, moved behind him, and blindfolded him. He said, ”Do you remember where I turned the minute hand to just now?”

”Nine...” the Scar Player answered involuntarily.

”Listen carefully to the sound in the bucket. I’ll be back in fifteen minutes.”

After blindfolding him, Xu Huo turned and left the room.

Hearing the footsteps and the door close, the Scar Player began struggling in his chair. He roared curses, desperately trying to break free, but as the blood drained away, his movements grew smaller and smaller, his breathing grew weaker and weaker, and before long, he slumped motionless in the chair.

”What is he doing?” Wen Xuelin stood outside the door, staring through the glass window as the Scar Player thrashed in his chair. Her eyes widened in shock. ”Is he trapped by an item?”

No one was holding him down or tying him up—why was he just flailing around in his chair with his eyes closed?

”It’s obvious he fell for the trick.” Zheng Liang, who hadn’t managed to grab a room, glanced over indifferently. ”Someone like him deserves to die.”

There were other players lingering in the corridor. Two of them heard the conversation and immediately came over. When they saw the Scar Player inside, they shoved the others aside and tried to go in to rescue him.

Zheng Liang raised a hand to block them. ”Two of you, the treatment isn’t over yet.”

Those two were also Player-Eaters. To assert their dominance after everyone lost their personal panels, they deliberately revealed the player numbers on their backs. One of them knocked Zheng Liang’s hand away, patted him on the shoulder, and said, ”Kid, mind your own damn business.”

Zheng Liang let out a cold laugh and didn’t bother wasting words. He swung his fist and punched, sending that average-sized Player-Eater crashing to the ground.

”Stop acting tough, you bastard! Do you think everyone else is stupid? Showing off your arms in the dead of winter—aren’t you cold?!”

The man wiped the blood from his nose, got up, and threw a punch back.

If they were both ordinary players, Zheng Liang might not have had the upper hand. But since everyone was just an ordinary person now, and he’d learned two years of martial arts, he wasn’t afraid of a one-on-one fight relying on technique!

The two started brawling. The other Player-Eater stared at Wen Xuelin and lunged at her, actually trying to bite her. Wen Xuelin screamed, dodged, and in one move stuffed her phone into his mouth while delivering a kick to his groin. Then she quickly hid behind Zheng Liang.

A one-against-two fight was impossible. There were plenty of other players in the corridor. If the Player-Eaters banded together, the other ordinary players would naturally join forces too. Just as the tension escalated, threatening to turn from a brawl into a full-on melee, the door to a nearby office opened. A doctor wearing glasses snapped at them, ”Do you all want to be locked up on the seventh floor?”

Players with ”severe conditions” had already been sent to the seventh floor. The players who had turned into ordinary people didn’t dare risk it and had to temporarily call a truce.

”Next.” The doctor’s expression was blank as he pointed to someone.

Zheng Liang darted in ahead of a Player-Eater, rushing inside, then smugly closed the door behind him. The players outside had no choice but to flip him off.

Zheng Liang voluntarily walked over and sat across from the desk. After looking around the office, he said, ”Doctor, you’ve got good taste. Hanging a landscape painting in your office, huh?”

Xu Huo, whose appearance had changed, flipped through the medical record. ”Your condition clearly improved after the last treatment.”

”Oh yeah?” Zheng Liang quickly asked, ”So, can I be discharged today?”

”After you pass this test, you can be discharged.” Xu Huo handed him a form. ”Answer every question carefully. If the results are up to standard, your family can pick you up today.”

”No problem!” Zheng Liang slapped his thigh and gladly took the form. He scribbled down his answers, handed it back, and then looked at Xu Huo with full anticipation.

Unfortunately, Xu Huo couldn’t let him leave that easily. He frowned as he stared at the form for a moment, then said, ”Do you still remember your good friend Xu Zhi?”

A flicker of surprise crossed Zheng Liang’s face before he quickly suppressed his expression. ”I remember. What about him?”

”Is he really your best friend?” Xu Huo tapped the form. ”He comes to see you once a month, but on this form, you clearly wrote that your best friend has already passed away.”

”How is that possible?” Zheng Liang blurted out. ”Xu Zhi died ten years ago!”

Xu Huo pulled out a phone from the drawer. ”This is the phone you handed in when you were admitted. Open it and take a look.”

Zheng Liang snatched it up. He unlocked it with his own phone password and opened the gallery. What he saw were photos of himself and Xu Zhi taken at various times. Over the course of ten years, Xu Zhi showed subtle changes in the pictures, aging gradually. There were even a few photos of them together in the hospital, the earliest one taken at the Seventeenth Hospital about a year ago.

The more he scrolled, the darker his face got. Finally, he just threw the phone back. ”I’ll only say what I remember. Treat me like a psycho if you want. I’m not getting discharged today!”

He turned to leave, but Xu Huo called out from behind him. ”You have a meeting this afternoon. Your parents and Xu Zhi are both coming.”