Players, Please Board the Train

”Ah!!!” After nightfall, screams began to come from different directions throughout the hospital—the upper floors of Building One, the laboratory of Building Two. Sometimes the screams were so distorted that players couldn’t even distinguish between male and female voices, and they involuntarily projected someone’s voice into their minds, sending chills down their spines in the dead of night.

Moreover, the situation inside the hospital had become even worse than the day before. Black spots had grown on the corridor floors, and a strange, pungent odor drifted everywhere, keeping even the players who had planned to sneak out and steal samples at night from daring to leave their rooms.

With the environment deteriorating, players were forced to cooperate. Gu Yu, Zheng Liang, and their group gathered together with some other Black Players to discuss countermeasures.

They had attempted the first task during the day, but not a single player had cleared it. Instead, the players who had undergone psychological therapy all developed some kind of problem.

”I paid special attention to that Scar-Armed guy,” said a Short-Haired Black Player. ”He didn’t come back out after his treatment during the day. During the hospital disinfection just now, I saw two Security Guards carrying a body bag out of that treatment room. Word is he was scared to death.”

”Scared to death?” This was salt in the wound for the already beleaguered players. ”What the hell could scare someone to death? There weren’t any random ghosts or monsters running around the hospital during the day!”

”I don’t know the specifics,” the Short-Haired Black Player said. ”But I’ve figured one thing out—this hospital is definitely experimenting on patients. Scar-Arms probably died because of that.”

”I counted heads. Aside from the ones taken to the seventh floor, there are fewer than forty left from the third to the sixth floor. Some went missing last night,” Gu Yu said. ”I’m afraid even more will disappear tonight.”

”And there are new patients coming into the hospital,” Wen Xuelin added. ”But they were sent straight to Building Three for quarantine.”

”They’re definitely players who showed up later. Tough luck for them. The quarantine ward is probably full of infected people. Whether that infectious disease is real or fake, stepping into that place is hell-mode difficulty,” another Female Player said. ”I’ve studied the three tasks thoroughly. The first one is a dead end. The second one has clearly increased in difficulty. We might as well try the third one.”Everyone exchanged glances. The Short-Haired Black Player said, ”Someone already tried the third task and didn’t clear it.”

”Maybe they didn’t clear it either because we were looking at the wrong time, or because we used the wrong cleaning method,” the Female Player said. ”But think about it—what’s there to clean at the main gate? Now it’s different. There’s a pathogen infection spreading in the hospital. Maybe this is the opportunity.”

”That’s possible,” Brother Liang said, rubbing his chin. ”Let’s try using the cleaning solution first.”

”I stole this from the janitor,” the Female Player said, pulling out a glass bottle.

”Trying it is fine, but we need someone to lure away those freaky things outside the door,” the Short-Haired Player said. ”No one can open their panels right now. Whoever goes will be in serious danger. The fairest way is to draw lots.”

He took out paper and a pen he’d swiped from the nurse’s station. ”We’ll split into odds and evens. Odds are the decoys, evens go to the main gate.”

No one objected. Everyone folded their slips of paper and drew in turn. There were twelve people total. Gu Yu, Wen Xuelin, the Short-Haired Player, the Female Player who had made the suggestion, plus two others, would go to the main gate. The rest were responsible for luring away the monsters on the floors.

”Hope more people stay lucid tonight,” Brother Liang said as he picked up a fire extinguisher and quietly pulled the door open a crack. But what he saw outside stunned him. The hallway no longer looked like it had when they had first come out. Aside from the pathogens, massive piles of meaty, writhing masses clogged both sides of the corridor—the walls, the ceiling, everywhere. Flesh and mucus constantly dripped from above, hitting the ground with a hissing, corrosive sound.

”Is this real or fake?” Zheng Liang couldn’t help asking.

”Of course it’s fake! Did you see anything like this in the hospital during the day? There’s no way this much stuff could grow in such a short time. It has to be coming from some player’s imagination!” Brother Liang gritted his teeth. ”These idiots! The dungeon already warned us not to imagine things, and they’re over here opening up their brain holes!”

”Roar! Roar!” The sound of beast-like howls echoed from not too far away. Everyone had a faint sense of dread. The Short-Haired Player said, ”Please tell me no one imagined a zombie...”

Before he could finish, the door of the room next to them was slammed open with tremendous force. A person tumbled to the ground along with the door panel, then twisted grotesquely as he climbed back up, his head craned backward as he stared at their doorway!

Brother Liang immediately slammed the door shut. The person outside collided with it at the same time. If there hadn’t been two or three people bracing the door from inside, that door would have been knocked down as well.

”That’s not a zombie from someone’s imagination. That’s a player,” Brother Liang said. ”It was the patient in the next room. He’s turned into a zombie!”

”What the hell is in this hospital?!” Wen Xuelin’s face turned pale. ”Can those pathogens actually infect people and turn them into zombies?”

”What zombie? If anything, they’d turn into Mutants!” the Short-Haired Player said. ”Didn’t you notice how strong he was?”

Everyone’s minds were in a fog. They couldn’t immediately figure out whether that person outside had truly turned into a Mutant, or had just imagined himself into one. The former meant the infectious disease was extremely severe, capable of causing Mutant transformation. The latter meant the danger in the hospital still came from their own imagination, and the dungeon had not actually restrained their true physical abilities. In other words, their stamina was still there—they just thought it wasn’t.

”Only one way to find out,” Gu Yu said quickly as she pulled the sheets off the beds in the room and tied them together into a rope. She then threw it out the window. ”This is the third floor. You guys lower me down. The outside of the main gate and the inside are the same anyway!”

”I’ll go!” Zheng Liang tried to stop her, but Gu Yu didn’t agree. She pushed him away. ”It’s easier for someone lighter to go down and climb back up.”

With that, she sat on the windowsill. Hearing all sorts of sounds coming from the room’s window, she nodded at Zheng Liang and slid down.

The second floor had also become a place of monster activity. The moment she lowered herself to the window, several hands reached out from inside. Gu Yu dodged their grabbing, but the rope tied around her waist was caught. Seeing that those hands were unbelievably strong and nearly pulling Zheng Liang and the others above down with her, she decisively slashed through the bedsheet with her knife!

”Sister Gu Yu!” Wen Xuelin screamed.

The floor wasn’t high. After landing, Gu Yu ran toward the main gate. But unexpectedly, a bunch of ”zombies” rushed out from both sides, and one even jumped down from the upper floor to block her path!

She recognized him as a Player-Eater. Seeing the blood around his mouth, she grabbed a potted plant beside her and hurled it at him, trying to go around. But he was too fast—he grabbed her arm and sank his teeth into her shoulder!

Zheng Liang and the others had jumped down behind her. Gu Yu didn’t look back. With all her strength, she smashed the glass bottle against the gate. The bottle shattered, and the cleaning solution spilled across half of the massive doors. In an instant, she vanished from the spot!