Chapter 157

"Thank you for your hard work?" Lin Tu chewed over those words the entire way back, unable to make sense of them. But the immediate priority was to get back to the dorm and have Kou Lin check who had sabotaged the water supply.

Along the way, Lin Tu noticed that the previously dry wooden ceiling and walls of the ship had begun to seep water, just like the damp, muggy days of March. Except this water was somewhat dirty, like stale water that had soaked in rusted iron pipes for a long time.

The yellowish water gradually flowed across the floor, making the entire ship look like it had been pickled, leaving behind an indescribable yellow stain.

As she turned a corner, Lin Tu vaguely caught sight of a rotting hand reaching out from the water. When she looked again, it was gone. She hurried back to the dorm, where the players were gathered around Kou Lin's tablet watching the surveillance feed.

"There's nothing on the surveillance!" Kou Lin's face was slightly panicked.

As she said, the footage on the monitors was perfectly normal—even their dorm room appeared clean, with no water stains and no inexplicable corpses. But the moment they looked away from the screen, they could see that all six walls of the room were soaked through, like a rotten sunken ship pulled from the sea.

"What about the red-name who sabotaged the water supply?"

"Just saw him on the lowest deck! That idiot!"

"Send me his location." Lin Tu glanced at Guan Suiyue and mouthed "No. 51." Guan Suiyue immediately understood. She hesitated briefly, looking at her younger sister, then gave Lin Tu a slight nod.

"You two be careful. We'll go see if we can catch him and grab another red-name ID card." Guan Suiyue instructed.

Luo Yongzhi and the others also wanted to follow and help. Lin Tu quietly pulled Yi Ying aside and handed her a [Cupid's Incense], then asked her to punch her.

"If something happens to me, use this to find me. I'm entrusting this to you," Lin Tu hesitated for a moment before continuing, "And if something happens to me—but Guan Suiyue comes back safely—be wary of her! Don't believe a word she says. Of course, don't tell Guan Suixing any of this unless absolutely necessary."

Yi Ying instantly thought back to the tense atmosphere between Lin Tu and Guan Suiyue from a few days ago, and a thousand thoughts raced through her mind.

But she solemnly accepted the Cupid's Incense and assured Lin Tu, "I will."

After leaving the dorm, neither of them spoke. It wasn't until they entered a restroom with no surveillance that Guan Suiyue produced a dried flower—a prop from the Temple that could precisely locate players who had used [Divine Descent].

They obviously weren't going to find the red-name who sabotaged the facilities. They were going to use the chaos to find No. 51 and settle the score.

The two waited silently, biding their time for the disaster to begin and the moment to strike.

"You know? Both my parents were players, but they died early. Suixing and I depended on each other to survive. To stay alive, I joined the Temple willingly and was raised there from a young age." After a long silence, Guan Suiyue suddenly spoke.

Lin Tu exhaled. "Don't care."

"The Temple is absolutely no place for children. We practiced swords and physical training every day, rolling around in the mud. If that was meant to increase our survival odds in calamity worlds, then why did they also make us use our bodies to please foul-smelling adults and fill the void in their spirits? I've known since I was little that I was a slave, an object, a tool. But I endured it because I promised Mom and Dad I'd take care of my little sister."

Lin Tu stayed silent, noticing that Guan Suiyue's hand was trembling involuntarily. She couldn't help but feel a flash of impatience. "Why are you telling me all this? Does your tragic story mean I have to forgive you for trying to kill me? I told you, I don't care."

"That's not what I mean. I'm not asking for your forgiveness." Guan Suiyue gave a faint smile. "I just want you to know that whatever I do, it's because I've been backed into a corner. I swear I will never deliberately hurt you—or anyone."

For the first time, Lin Tu felt that Guan Suiyue's golden hair wasn't golden at all—it seemed dull, more like yellow, or withered weeds. Did Guan Suiyue really think she could hurt someone and still play the victim? Lin Tu grew even more impatient, yet she couldn't bring herself to refuse.

Fortunately, Guan Suiyue didn't speak again afterward.

About five minutes before the event began, Lin Tu received a message from the NPC—

[Return of the Dead Event Initiated]

[Duration: 24h (varies by person; minimum 24h per person; during this period, each additional 100ml of water from the ship's water system consumed adds 1h; during the added time, only the affected individual can see the dead; if the water system isn't repaired within 24h, the event duration increases by another 24h)]

[The water system has been sabotaged. As a crew member, you have been poisoned by drinking the water, causing severe hallucinations. But is it really just a hallucination? All those who ever died on this ship will return! They were your friends, your superiors, your partners—now they only want to drag you into an endless hell. Attacks from the dead will inflict the negative status "Hallucination Deepening," which stacks continuously. The worse the status, the more powerful the dead you face!]

[Map changes: Due to the water system failure, the ship has developed additional structures, and hidden rooms have been opened for you. During the "Return of the Dead" event, hidden rooms will randomly generate throughout the ship. Three portions of food can unlock a hidden room. Each room contains one portion of food and water, and one dose of hallucination-curing medicine. Each room can shelter up to seven people for 1h; each additional hour of shelter costs one portion of food.]

[Note: Since the dead are our common enemy, both good and bad players can damage them; when the collective hallucination ends but an individual's hasn't, that individual will risk becoming lost—except for those inside hidden rooms.]

After reading the NPC's message, Lin Tu immediately checked her food balance first.

Food could be stored in the communicator as a string of numbers and retrieved when needed. As a hardened foodie, Lin Tu would never touch the ship's prepackaged bento meals. All the food she'd received was stored in her communicator, untouched.

Counting the three portions she'd collected each day, plus the food the [Cannibal] skill had earned her daily from human flesh, her current balance was 42 portions. She hadn't used today's [Cannibal] skill yet—adding six more portions would bring it to 48—enough to sustain 47 hours in a hidden room. If she counted the one portion stored in each room, that pushed it to 48 hours—two full days.

At that thought, Lin Tu instantly felt at ease. In two days, the water system would definitely be repaired.

"Shall we start?" Guan Suiyue asked.

"Hold on." Lin Tu took out her broken blade, pointing at the innermost toilet stall. A hand was reaching out from the water, desperately clawing upward.

She tried to chop at the rotting hand with her broken blade, but to her surprise, the blade cleanly severed the arm—the decayed flesh couldn't withstand the blade's weight at all.

This didn't match her impression of a near-S-rank monster at all; it was worlds apart from the cannibals from before. Just as Lin Tu thought this, she noticed the severed arm on the ground had somehow vanished, and a new arm had regrown from the shoulder.

Except this arm had a metallic glint, completely different from before.

"Hallucinations, regeneration, enhancement..."

Guan Suiyue murmured as she watched Lin Tu raise the blade again. She wanted to stop her, but the blade had already come down.

"Sizz!" A metallic clash rang out as the arm was severed again.

Lin Tu carefully examined the cross-section of the severed arm. Its flesh was now half-metal, half-decayed meat, with a metallic sheen identical to her broken blade.

Whether it was the same metal as her blade, Lin Tu couldn't tell—and she didn't have time to look.

Because the severed arm disappeared again within seconds, and yet another arm grew from the shoulder. This time, even without Lin Tu cutting it, it was obvious the metal content was far higher than before.

"A growth-type S-rank monster." Guan Suiyue said grimly. "We have to get the water system fixed ASAP. If we let them keep growing, every player on this ship is dead."

Lin Tu knew the stakes too. She was about to message the Captain, but recalling that eerie smile, she hesitated for a moment, then chose to message Kou Lin instead, asking her to use the surveillance to send a warning to everyone.

Guan Suiyue used the dried flower, and the two headed out of the restroom.

But the moment they stepped out, Lin Tu sensed something wrong.

What had been a cramped, medieval ship hull was now towering and spacious, like a modern department store. Looking up, the ceiling was a good twenty or thirty meters high.

Meanwhile, what had been a narrow two-deck layout had somehow split into three or four levels. Each level was a different zone, yet somehow felt familiar.

For instance, the area Lin Tu was in now was the lowest deck—a massive public restroom. Men's and women's restrooms were crammed together in overlapping layers, like a maze. This was still the men's restroom entrance; turn a corner, and there was another men's restroom entrance.

"So this is what 'becoming lost' means?" Lin Tu recalled the note in the message and gained some understanding. All the other restrooms were hallucinations—only the one they'd just come out of was real.

She casually tossed a marker into the restroom: "I, Lin Hantian, shall return!"

The dried flower was already drifting outward. Lin Tu followed Guan Suiyue, weaving through the "maze" as they headed upstairs.

Several dead crawled out of the restrooms, trying to block their path. Fortunately, these were newborn monsters with no deaths to their name yet. Lin Tu did her best to avoid them; when she couldn't, she severed their legs so they couldn't use their enhanced hands to hurt anyone.

During this time, she also received a message from Kou Lin—the warnings were thorough enough that even the most careless person could avoid these monsters.

They passed through the dormitory zone and the storage zone. Notably, these areas were all maze-like, making it impossible to tell directions. And as time passed, the dead they encountered grew stronger and stronger.

—Even though no one wanted to kill them and make them stronger. But like Lin Tu's earlier forced leg-severing, they were tireless and immortal, clinging on relentlessly with no end in sight. There was simply no way around it.

If this continued, everything would go as Guan Suiyue said: every player on the ship would be wiped out!

The "Captain's" message arrived just in time: "Repairing the water system requires fixing the pipes at ten nodes across the player ship! Our Mechanic's surveillance feed is hallucination-free—everything looks normal. We can guide everyone! Repair the pipes!"

Seeing that the Captain said dozens of people had volunteered, claiming to be near the pipes and willing to try, Lin Tu breathed a sigh of relief.

She opened Kang Lina's chat window. If they delayed any longer, the dead would only get stronger. She needed to rally people quickly, find No. 51, and kill him.

With the promise of help killing the Ace of Diamonds, Kang Lina readily agreed to Lin Tu's request. Shortly after, guided by Kou Lin, she found Lin Tu and Guan Suiyue.

The three converged, and their pace immediately quickened. About ten minutes later, they reached the stairwell zone. It was a tangle of crisscrossing stairs, front and back, left and right. Fortunately, the dried flower's guidance led them to four or five people in a corner of the stairs.

Seeing the dried flower drift toward that group, Lin Tu's eyes narrowed as she fixed on the twenty-something woman in the middle, and said with certainty, "It's her!"

Though the face had changed and the voice had likely changed too, habits were hard to break. Lin Tu clearly remembered how that damn No. 51 always liked to tilt his head up when looking at people.

"You two flank from the sides; I'll circle around to their front!" Lin Tu was the fastest of the three. She quickly activated [Lighthouse] and vanished like a beam of light.

The remaining two, who couldn't stand each other, found themselves in eerie sync, splitting off in two directions to close in on No. 51.

"Who are you!" The leader of the five sensed something wrong and shouted. "Red-names?! Don't think you can do whatever you want! We're on pipe-repair duty—there's a Mechanic watching us the whole time!"

"There's a Shapeshifter among you!" Lin Tu cut her off, showing her face openly so the woman could see her.

"It's you..." Sure enough, a face that had caught two red-names in the courtroom still carried weight. The woman didn't immediately deny it and ran through the situation in her head before realizing that someone by her side really had been acting off recently.

"What's the name of your cat that died in the disaster?" She immediately turned and demanded of her "teammate." "Say it, and I'll believe you!"

Her teammate—correction, No. 51—didn't answer. The moment he'd seen the dried flower, he knew he'd been locked on.

He quickly retreated, but Guan Suiyue and Kang Lina had already moved into position behind him.

"What the hell! A Shapeshifter! Where's my friend!" The former "teammate" instantly turned hostile. On the wooden stairs, the group fanned out, pulling out props and glaring at No. 51.

"Careful, he's a red-name!" Lin Tu warned.

"I don't give a damn if he's a red-name! Where's our friend!" The woman lunged, attacking No. 51.

A streak of fire shot toward No. 51. The blast was formidable—even from a distance, Lin Tu could feel the wave of heat. Meanwhile, her other three teammates also attacked from their directions.

Lin Tu had never been one for fair play when she had a grudge. Seeing this, she drew her broken blade and slapped a "Blade Light, Sharp Edge, Thousand Shadows" on No. 51, plus an "Armor Break."

[Armor Break: Your attacks cause the target's defense to decrease.]

Guan Suiyue didn't move. She knew full well that such attacks couldn't kill a White Glove.

Sure enough, a faint light rose from No. 51's body. He pulled a handful of sand from his pack and tossed it into the air, and a dreamlike, rainbow-hued glow bathed the maze-like, topsy-turvy stairwell.

The barrier of sand effortlessly blocked the group's attacks. Then it fell to the ground, solidifying into sand soldiers two meters tall.

"Praying for the gods' blessing: an immortal pats my head, and I bind my hair to gain eternal life." No. 51 pressed his palms together. As he prayed, the light around him grew brighter and more holy. When it fell upon the sand soldiers surrounding him, Lin Tu could clearly feel them becoming more animated.

"Post-apocalypse base diplomatic protocol: No cultivation after the founding of the nation!" Guan Suiyue finally raised her sword to her chest and activated her skill. "Feudal superstition is unacceptable; facts speak louder than words. All that I survey is my territory. Within my territory, if those opposing feudal superstition outnumber those supporting it, all feudal superstition is prohibited!"

"Opponents, raise your left hand. Supporters, raise your right hand."

As Lin Tu raised her left hand, she couldn't help but recall Guan Suiyue's earlier explanation.

The Temple's skills all came from [God's Emissary], a rule-type skill evolved with many evolution points.

For example, No. 51's [Divine Descent] skill worked because [God's Emissary] stipulated that gods must heed their followers' prayers, so as a follower, he could borrow divine power. No wonder Kang Lina called the Temple people thieves—stealing divine power under the guise of righteous excuses.

Guan Suiyue's [Post-Apocalyptic Base Diplomat] was different. Though also from [God's Emissary], it didn't borrow divine power, so it was ultimately weaker than [Divine Descent].

Sure enough, everyone present except No. 51 raised their left hands. Just as victory seemed at hand and No. 51 was about to be suppressed, beams of light shot down from the ceiling, striking the sand soldiers and shrinking them into half-person-tall dwarves.

Then these dwarves all raised their right hands high—their votes outnumbered the combined total of everyone present by more than two to one.

The situation instantly reversed.

Having failed to activate her skill, Guan Suiyue was struck as if by a heavy blow, coughing and stumbling back two steps before spitting blood from her mouth.

But she swallowed the blood, clenched her teeth, and said, "For at least the next 24 hours... no, 12 hours, the number of voters shouldn't change. Otherwise, this vote's result will be reversed."

The dwarves, who had been about to re-form into sand soldiers, froze in place.

No. 51 sneered. "Guan Suiyue, I think you've lost your mind! After all the precedent you've seen, you really dare to defect from the Temple?"

Before Guan Suiyue could answer, No. 51 kept going. "Running off to a calamity world is one thing, but bringing backup? Come back with me now, return what you stole, and the Temple might kill you—but I guarantee your sister survives."

Lin Tu, who'd been listening the whole time: "???" So No. 51 had chased Guan Suiyue into the calamity because she'd stolen something from the Temple?

"Enough with the chatter! Where's our friend!" The squad leader demanded angrily. Temple internal affairs were none of their concern, but if it involved their organization, they weren't to be trifled with.

"I knocked her out, she's under the stairs. You'd better take your Mechanic and go find her, or else—"

"Or else I'll kill you!" The hot-tempered woman shot another fireball at No. 51. When it was blocked by a sand soldier, she nodded apologetically to Lin Tu. "We'll go find our teammate first. If you need help, we can call people...?" Though she doubted anyone would want to get involved in Temple affairs.

"Go ahead." Lin Tu shook her head. After the group left, she turned to No. 51. "What about me then? Why did you try to harm me?"

No. 51 looked somewhat surprised. He glanced at Lin Tu, then at the furious Guan Suiyue, and couldn't help but laugh, his voice hoarse and sharp. "So your relationship isn't that solid after all. Sorry to disappoint you, but it wasn't me who tried to harm you. It was—"

"Lin Tu!" Guan Suiyue shouted. "Are you going to believe him?! Huh?!"

Lin Tu's gaze swept over Guan Suiyue, then over No. 51. Anger and hatred burned hot in her chest, but she quickly calmed down. "I only trust my own judgment. No. 51, answer first: how do you know me?"

"I don't know you—"

"Liar!" Lin Tu snapped, drawing her blade and pointing it at No. 51. "I'll only give you one chance. Otherwise, I don't care who you are—I'll help Guan Suiyue kill you first! Kang Lina, do you have a lie detector?"

Lin Tu looked at Kang Lina, who was also a bit dazed. She quickly produced a disposable lie detector and set it on the ground.

"Fine, fine! Black Factory people are here too, and you all love your lie detectors," No. 51 raised his hands. "I know you. But the one who wants to harm you really isn't me—it's someone else. I was just following orders. The one who knows you is him. He suspects you are—"

"What?"

"Fine—his suspicion was correct." No. 51 smiled at Lin Tu. "But are you sure you want me to say it now? Will your two friends keep your secret? If not, you're in trouble... Joining forces with Guan Suiyue isn't as good as joining me."

"In this world, no one but me knows your secret. Even the one who gave the order thinks you're already dead. Telling your secret to others does me no good. I promise I won't spread it around. We could even split the reward for catching Guan Suiyue—"

"Lin Tu!" Guan Suiyue shrieked again. "Attack already! What are you waiting for!"

Kang Lina stood with her arms crossed, thoroughly in "none of my business" mode—she'd just follow whichever side Lin Tu chose. Seeing that, No. 51 raised his voice further—

"Don't you want to know who really wants you dead? Don't you want to know your secret? I'll treat you as my ally! I'll tell you everything!"

"Really?" Lin Tu stepped forward two paces, cutting him off.

Seeing Lin Tu suddenly advance, the sensation of his arm being severed and his back feeling cold surged back. No. 51 instinctively stepped back, but Lin Tu's curious, sincere gaze made him stop. "Of course it's true."

Guan Suiyue gripped her sword tightly, watching the two draw close. At about three meters, Lin Tu was blocked by the sand soldiers.

"That's too bad." The next second, the yellow earth Lin Tu had somehow grabbed in her hand was hurled straight at No. 51's face.

It was a dirty trick. He instinctively dodged but still caught some of it.

—Ten seconds of control.

"Because the thing I hate most is people threatening me with secrets!"

Lin Tu raised her blade and swung, but the sand soldiers blocked her path. Fortunately, Kang Lina acted in time—a toy gun appeared in her palm, and with two "bang bang" shots, she froze the sand soldiers in front of Lin Tu. A third shot she fired at No. 51, but the freeze effect was blocked by a faint glow, leaving his status unaffected.

—5 seconds.

Lin Tu was long practiced at this. She swung at No. 51, and sure enough, the blade was stopped by a faint light barrier. Not discouraged, she used "Armor Break" and struck three more times in quick succession.

Her damage had been saved up all along, and combined with the daily curse-like negative stack she'd been piling on No. 51, her attacks had a quadruple critical effect. Those three strikes, as expected, shattered No. 51's protective light barrier.

—1 second.

Without lingering, Lin Tu quickly retreated while shouting "Cornfield Effect!" and tossing a pile of corn cobs.

It all happened in a flash. By the time Guan Suiyue realized her heart was racing wildly and began to calm, Lin Tu had already retreated to a safe position.

"Damn it!" Freed, No. 51 roared. He traced unseen light with his fingers and effortlessly cut through the cornfield illusion. "Let the gods hear my prayer—I long devoutly for the descent of Heaven!"

In an instant, Lin Tu felt like her eyes were nearly blinded.

Light poured down from the ceiling in torrents, like a divine miracle. Countless guiding beams lifted No. 51, Lin Tu, Kang Lina, and Guan Suiyue, carrying them involuntarily upward.

The light brought them to the very top of the ship—the snowfield zone.

A vast snowfield hung high in midair, surrounded by bottomless cliffs of pure darkness.

Holy light bathed the snowfield, making every snowflake seem to glow. The descent of the divine kingdom made the snowfield feel like No. 51's stage. His body began to grow—two meters, three, five... fifteen meters.

Black chains bound his body, but he wielded them freely. He was the sovereign of this snowfield, while at his feet, Lin Tu and the others were barely visible—like ants that could be crushed with a single step.

"[Heavenly Descent]!" Guan Suiyue downed a large bottle of medicine and shouted to warn Lin Tu and the others.

Meanwhile, below the snowfield at the ship's highest deck.

Beams of holy light pierced through the snowfield, illuminating every corner of the ship like a grand, beautiful performance—if one ignored the countless dead and the people fleeing from them.

Dozens of players on quests split up, following the Mechanic's directions toward different destinations. Kou Lin stayed to help with the surveillance, partly because Lin Tu didn't trust the Captain.

Yi Ying stood silently with her back to the others, staring at the incense in her hand, feeling her heart pound. Luo Yongzhi and Liu Sheng, whom Yi Ying had secretly tipped off, also sat huddled together, staring blankly at the incense.

"What's happening..." Among the crowd, only Guan Suixing paced back and forth.

Though her sister had forbidden her from joining the Temple, Guan Suixing, who had dreamed of becoming a Temple member since childhood, knew the Temple's skill effects all too well. This light could only come from a high-level Temple skill. She'd only seen it once in her life, which was why it was so memorable.

She looked left and right, and no matter how she looked at it, this was definitely light from a Temple skill.

What the hell is Guan Suiyue doing... Guan Suixing couldn't stop worrying. What an idiot! She couldn't even hold onto the positions of the bishop's foster daughter or church saint—honestly, she might as well hand them to Guan Suixing instead. She could learn the sword too. What 'eldest daughter is like a mother'—as the younger sister, she could be a mother too. Look at Guan Suiyue coming home every day exhausted like a dead pig; why should she get to enjoy the good life? She could work like an ox too and let Guan Suiyue enjoy it...

Chaotic thoughts churned in her head. Just as she focused all her attention on the holy light, someone quietly pushed the door open and walked in.

"A lot of people went to fix the pipes—I heard six have already succeeded, right?" The person first walked behind Kou Lin, glanced at her surveillance feed, and seeing it was true, leisurely strolled over to Guan Suixing's side.

"Four more to go. Why aren't you helping?" The person sat down beside Guan Suixing, grabbing the restless girl and pulling her firmly to their side.

Guan Suixing turned her head—it was No. 42's smiling face.

But for some reason, a chill ran down her spine. That smile was... indescribably strange. As if she had no idea how to smile and was only doing the motion.

This was someone Guan Suixing herself had rescued. She still remembered the dazed expression on her face when she'd first woken up. But now... the more she looked, the more unfamiliar she seemed.

Pretending to casually look down to scratch her ankle, Guan Suixing glanced at No. 42. Face, hair, neck, clothes, wrists, ankles—everything seemed normal. Guan Suixing grew more confused. Was her instinct just off?

She forced a smile at Yi Ying. "Should we go help?"

"No." Yi Ying didn't turn around, just stared at the incense in her hand.

Damn... Guan Suixing wanted to shake her awake.

"Let's go!" No. 42 said cheerfully. "Four more pipes, and we can end this disaster."

"I'd rather not." Guan Suixing shook her head.

"Fine." No. 42 shrugged and continued wandering around the room. "But I don't think we're that lucky. No way all ten pipes get fixed at once. Hehe..."

Back at the top of the ship, Lin Tu had found a hidden room. She paid the fastest price in her life to enter, collapsing onto the simple sofa like a fish out of water, breathing heavily.

As for No. 51's skill [Heavenly Descent], it magnified him over tenfold, multiplying his physique and strength. An ordinary person couldn't hope to resist. The good news was that the skill made him extremely clumsy, and over the next twenty-four hours, if he didn't cancel it, his size, abilities, and strength would gradually diminish back to normal.

So Lin Tu and Guan Suiyue's original plan was to avoid a direct confrontation and instead lead him around in circles, like walking a dog.

Interestingly, this disaster featured [hidden rooms]. Though [hidden rooms] could only block the dead, not players, their advantage lay in their secrecy and concealment. People of ordinary size could easily hide, but No. 51, over twenty meters tall, searching for them was like looking for a needle in a haystack.

"Good luck finding us."

Lin Tu lounged in the hidden room for a full three hours before a single leaf slowly drifted toward the door of her room, and No. 51 finally found her.

"You're a damn rat! He was right to kill you! You deserve to be hacked to pieces!" No. 51 roared.

Lin Tu dodged the leaf, used [Lighthouse] to circle around No. 51, found another hidden room, led him on two laps, then slipped inside.

From outside the room came No. 51's furious shouts.

And so, another needle-in-a-haystack search began.

Probably realizing he was running out of time, No. 51 abandoned his old methods and used a skill directly.

Several leaves found Lin Tu's hiding spot in succession, forcing all three—Lin Tu, Guan Suiyue, and Kang Lina—out. They faced off against No. 51 in a triangular formation.

Only three or four hours had passed, and No. 51 was still formidable.

"I have a prop that can bind him—S-rank, perfect for this. You in?" Kang Lina didn't want a head-on fight with No. 51 and shouted to Guan Suiyue.

"I'll trade you an S-rank!" With that promise, Kang Lina pulled three guns from her pack.

She tossed them to Lin Tu and Guan Suiyue from afar. "We position at the three points of an equilateral triangle and shoot at him."

Taking the gun, Lin Tu saw a circular pattern with a 20-meter radius appear on the ground, centered on No. 51.

Kang Lina was first to the circle's edge, fixing herself at one point and firing a shot at No. 51. Then Lin Tu spotted a bright focal point on the snowfield. Using [Lighthouse], she dashed over, raised her gun, and fired.

With her bullet, a rope of light shot out, wrapping around No. 51 and binding him tight.

"Damn it! Damn it!" Having his enemies discuss strategy right in front of him, No. 51 charged furiously at Kang Lina, planning to tear the prop apart with brute force.

"Hurry!" Kang Lina urged, her feet planted firmly, steady as a mountain.

At the final point, Guan Suiyue finally reached position.

The moment she fired, another rope of light bound No. 51's body.

A powerful force yanked him back to the center of the circle. The ropes from the triangle's three points held him secure with perfect stability, binding him fast at the very heart of the ring.

No matter how No. 51 struggled, he couldn't escape the prop's control.

"Now we just take turns shooting in that order." Kang Lina sighed in relief. "As long as we hold out until his [Heavenly Descent] runs out, we win."

That still meant nearly twenty hours. But for Lin Tu, this was already far better than her and Guan Suiyue's original plan.

"Thanks." Lin Tu said to Kang Lina.

"Don't mention it." Kang Lina smiled. "Your friend paid up, and I need your help too."

Time ticked by, minute by minute.

At the top of the ship, the snowfield was no different from an outdoor one—prolonged exposure inflicted the "Partial Freeze" negative status. Fortunately, Lin Tu had discovered a bug-abuse method earlier, so all three were in good shape. No. 51, for some reason, also seemed unaffected by the status, which disappointed Lin Tu slightly.

About ten hours passed—a full night.

The sky began to lighten. Having gone the whole night without sleep, they ate a meal and continued the standoff with No. 51.

During this time, the snowfield beneath their feet flickered as if about to vanish. According to the Captain's messages, the water system had been successfully repaired, and the extra ship structures would soon be deleted.

But things rarely went as planned. Someone deliberately sabotaged the water system again, and the hallucination, which had just begun to fade, solidified once more.

Unfortunately, the Captain didn't catch the saboteur, and Kou Lin found no clues either.

Another five hours passed.

Having gone nearly 24 hours without sleep, Lin Tu was starting to feel dizzy. But No. 51 hadn't slept either, and the curses he'd been spewing all night had grown quieter. Lin Tu focused her mind and kept shooting at him.

Just then, her communicator buzzed.

Lin Tu had few friends added—besides the Captain, only Kang Lina and her own teammates. As she picked up her communicator, she saw Guan Suiyue to her front-left doing the same—

From "Guan Suixing": "It's No. 42! No. 42 sabotaged the pipes! Where are you guys! She's not right, she's a monster pretending to be a player... I don't know what she is, but she knows I'm a doctor and she wants to kill me! Help!"

The words flashed through Lin Tu's mind—

Ace of Diamonds... likes to disguise as an ordinary person... usually among the first to stir up trouble...

"Where are you! Calm down!" Looking up, Guan Suiyue was already frantically sending messages into her communicator.

"What's wrong?" Kang Lina asked, puzzled. She checked the time. "A few more hours and this ends. Just hold on a little longer."

"I think I found the Ace of Diamonds," Lin Tu said.

Kang Lina, who had worn a "I want to die" expression all night, suddenly brightened. Her eyes blazed with fierce hatred. She took a step forward, then paused as if remembering something. "I know what you're getting at. I'll hold back."

Lin Tu nodded, then turned to Guan Suiyue.

She was already clutching her communicator, looking at Lin Tu with pleading eyes.

"She knows a scientist. Even if Guan Suixing dies, she can be revived," Lin Tu said. "And I know where the other doctor card is."

Kang Lina didn't understand but didn't care either, only nodding. "As long as you pay enough, the scientist will help."

"No, no way..." Guan Suiyue shook her head fiercely, brows furrowed. "What if the scientist dies? What if the profession card gets stolen? My sister can't die. She can't!"

Lin Tu: "..." She didn't want to argue with Guan Suiyue. She opened her communicator and typed—

"We have something urgent. Can you hold on by yourself?"

From "Guan Suixing": "I'm hiding in the restroom now. I can hold on a bit longer. Message Yi Ying and the others to come help me! If not, help me find the scientist! I don't want to die!"

Lin Tu read it out word by word. "She's not a child anymore. She can't hide behind you forever. She knows what she's risking."

She looked at Guan Suiyue's face, on the verge of collapse, and continued, "Do you know what you're risking? This is our one chance. If we don't kill him, he'll turn around and kill us."

On the silent snowfield, only Guan Suiyue's soundless breakdown remained.

No. 51 watched the drama unfold quietly. His divine kingdom would expire in four hours, but he suddenly felt the skill hadn't been wasted. "Hey, you know what?" He said to Lin Tu with a grin. "From what I know of Guan Suiyue, you're going to die at my hands today."

"I'm sorry!" Guan Suiyue dropped to her knees. The next second, she activated a skill.

"What the hell!" Kang Lina recognized it before Lin Tu did—[Blood Ties Bind Us Tight: No matter when, no matter where, as long as you long for it, you will always arrive at your loved one's side in time. (Can only be used once)]

"Get back here, you stupid bitch! This stupid prop needs three people to work! Fuck you, Guan Suiyue! Are you even human?! You're leaving us here! Damn Temple people—trust none of them! I was a fool to trust you!"

Unfortunately, Kang Lina's curses simply faded into the snowfield.

On the silent snowfield, of the triangle's three stable points, only two remained.

Lin Tu, to Kang Lina's diagonal front, stared silently at the spot where Guan Suiyue had vanished. Two betrayals in a row had left her speechless. Kang Lina was right—she really had been a fool.

No. 51 had never imagined things would go so smoothly. The person he most wanted to kill had ended up saving his life.

He laughed uproariously, nearly doubling over.

"The Temple trained her from the age of three, and in the end? She betrayed the organization. And someone like that was worth the trust of the two of you?"

He didn't waste more words. The prop that needed three people now had less than a tenth of its original power. If he hadn't been held down all night, he could easily break free even at seven or eight meters tall.

"Hey! What do we do now!" Kang Lina shouted at Lin Tu. "Your bad judgment better not drag me down too!"

A wave of suffocating frustration surged in Lin Tu. Her eyes stung, and all she wanted was to drag Guan Suiyue back and pry open her skull to see what was inside!

"Run!" With the prop failing, standing there like a scarecrow was useless. She downed a cup of [Strength Milk], shoved a handful of Night Blueberries into her mouth, and drew her broken blade. "The Ace of Diamonds is No. 42. If I survive this, I'll help you. If I don't, find someone else!"

Kang Lina, momentarily stunned by the shout, then grew angry too. "Are you kidding me?! She's the one who betrayed you, not me! Why would I run?! I'm Kang Lina—I'd sooner change my name than my ways! Student of Kang Aolei's daughter Kang Yuxin, best employee of Black Factory's 36th class, current Black Factory squadron leader Kang Li! I'd never cut and run!"

Lin Tu, hearing a resume-like preamble that sounded like gibberish, was momentarily at a loss for words. But strangely, that suffocating frustration eased somewhat at such a proud declaration...

"The problem is, I can't beat him!" Lin Tu downed a bunch of items, safely left a Moonlight in place, then used [Lighthouse] to circle to No. 51's side-rear.

She'd always been good at exploiting advantages. No. 51's [Heavenly Descent] made him huge, so she used her speed and agility to try landing a hit.

The broken blade was coated with [Deadly Poison]. If she could just break No. 51's skin, she'd have a chance to drag him down. But things didn't go her way. [Heavenly Descent] didn't just make No. 51 bigger—it enhanced his speed and reflexes too.

Lin Tu barely got within a meter of him before he dodged sharply and knocked her to the ground with a single punch. If not for the remnants of Kang Lina's prop still tangled around him, she couldn't have gotten within three meters at all.

Cold snow pressed against her cheek. Pain flared in her abdomen. She had absorbed the Ace of Diamonds' energy twice before, but that had only partially enhanced her physique—it clearly hadn't made her as iron-bodied as the Ace of Diamonds. The gap between her and No. 51 was still enormous; she hadn't even managed to use Moonlight.

"Hey! You alive?!" Kang Lina's voice came from afar.

Lin Tu looked up to see Kang Lina charging ahead to draw No. 51 away so he couldn't attack her.

Lin Tu took a deep breath. She could feel her ribs about to crack again. She raised a hand and waved weakly to signal she was still alive.

"I have an idea! Keep him busy for me!" Kang Lina shouted.

"You have an idea?" No. 51 maliciously hurled his chains at Kang Lina, a hunk of metal taller than her whistling through the air, nearly flattening her into a pancake.

Kang Lina used a skill to leap forward two steps and quickly pleaded, "No, I don't! I don't! Aren't you and Lin Tu the ones with the blood feud? Why are you chasing me, a Black Factory girl? I just came to deliver a prop! I didn't even know you before!"

"Who told you to be so loyal?"

No. 51 raised his chains, about to smash Kang Lina again, when he suddenly felt an itch behind him.

He turned to find a mass of dark, barbed wire crashing toward him like a tidal wave.

The wire was low-level and couldn't hold him, but it crawled up his body like mosquitoes—irritating beyond belief.

After the wire came more corn cobs. Hallucinations sprouted from every corner of his body. They didn't do much, but just like before, they were mosquitoes—annoying as hell.

Seeing No. 51 truly distracted, Kang Lina quickly shouted to Lin Tu in the distance, "I know the scientist! You know that! I'll definitely revive you for free!"

Lin Tu, who was frantically hurling her stockpile at No. 51: "..." What did "I know the scientist" mean? Was Kang Lina already prepared to collect her corpse? Well, she supposed she should thank her.

"Ahhhh! I can't take you anymore!" No. 51 furiously slammed into the snow. From earlier, when Lin Tu had sneakily stolen his holy water, to now, when she'd repeatedly blocked him from killing people—this manufactured thing, this waste, this thief—he was going to tear her apart! He'd crush her into a meat patty and feed her to the dogs!

Meanwhile.

Guan Suiyue reached Guan Suixing's side.

"Are you okay! Xingxing!" She hugged her sister, nearly crying. "Where's No. 42?"

"Sis?" Guan Suixing's trembling body stopped shaking at Guan Suiyue's sudden appearance. She looked at her sister in confusion. "How did you get here? A prop? You secretly planted another prop on me?"

"I was worried about you." Guan Suiyue turned her sister's head straight and said seriously, "You're about to be free, you know? You can go anywhere in the world you want, even leave the game. So now, you absolutely cannot die."

"What are you talking about, sis?" Guan Suixing frowned. "You've lost it! Lin Tu just said you had an emergency over there—did you really abandon her and run?!"

"I'll go right back! It's not too late. Don't worry."