Chapter 21: Mr. S’s Controller
On the way downstairs, A repeated his earlier trick. He activated the recorder and his bracelet’s projection function, forcing the liquid monsters to hide in the corners and melt into shapeless puddles, too frightened to approach them.
Su Qiong was also busy dodging left and right.
He followed closely behind A, maintaining the highest possible level of vigilance as he watched their surroundings, terrified that some viscous liquid might suddenly drip onto him and stain his body.
Deep in the night, the hospital was exceptionally lively.
Drip. Drip.
The sound echoed everywhere as the liquid monsters burst and leaked while moving. There were even more of them than on the previous nights.
Su Qiong asked fearfully, “Do you think they still count as ‘people’?”
“What I think doesn’t matter. The system is the one that decides.”
“All right.” Su Qiong worked hard to calm his mind, distracting himself through analysis. “The mandatory question probably isn’t asking you to count every single ‘person’ in the instance.”
“Mm.” A felt the same way. The number of people in the hospital changed every day, so there could not possibly be a fixed answer.
However, he lacked sufficient clues and had no more opportunities for trial and error.
“We’re here,” A reminded Su Qiong behind him.
Su Qiong floated down the final step and poked his head out from behind A, immediately sucking in a sharp breath.
He had thought the number of liquid monsters occupying the stairwell was already overwhelming.
Compared with the outpatient lobby, however, it was nothing.
Resthaven Psychiatric Hospital was relatively small, but the entire first floor had been opened into a single outpatient lobby, giving it an enormous amount of space.
During the day, it could accommodate at least several hundred patients seeking treatment simultaneously.
Now, however, the entire lobby was filled with liquid monsters. There was not even a place to set foot.
Some monsters dripped from the ceiling and fused with those on the floor.
Others hung halfway from the ceiling while the remainder of their bodies stretched to the ground, pulling them into nearly straight lines.
Even more liquid monsters were trapped between them, swept along with the current and compressed into various shapes.
Su Qiong remembered the elevator opening during the day.
The scene before him recreated the inside of that elevator on an even larger scale.
The liquid monsters had gathered and compressed themselves into one enormous, complete brick of human bodies.
A played the sound of explosions through the recorder. The liquid monsters instinctively felt fear.
Yet instead of moving aside, they tangled themselves together even more tightly, completely blocking the path ahead.
“We can’t get through, and we’re running out of time.” Even if Su Qiong unraveled himself into one long strip, he would never find a route through the tightly fused gaps between them.
One careless movement and his entire body would become coated in sticky liquid.
Dirty and disgusting.
A reached toward the chain around his waist, silently calculating how many monsters he could still kill with his remaining survival time.
“Right!” Su Qiong suddenly remembered something. “A, there’s still the secret passage!”
A turned back and waited for him to continue.
“We can go to Treatment Room No. 2 first and use the secret passage to reach the first floor. I remember its exit is inside the security room. One of the guards’ duties is managing medical records, so the archive room must be nearby!”
A replied helplessly, “But this hospital doesn’t have an archive room.”
“What?!” Su Qiong froze.
“Resthaven Psychiatric Hospital has a rule. The outpatient doctors keep the records of new patients, while old patient records are destroyed directly. Presumably, even they know those records can’t withstand scrutiny.”
Fine.
At least they were self-aware.
“If the old records were destroyed, then there’s no reason for us to go to the consultation rooms,” Su Qiong concluded.
A did not respond.
Aside from the outpatient consultation rooms, nowhere else in the hospital stored medical charts.
“We’ll search the security room directly! If my judgment is correct, the guards have the highest combat strength in the instance, so important documents must be kept under their supervision.” Su Qiong analyzed the situation with complete seriousness. “The hospital couldn’t possibly have destroyed every patient record. At the very least, they would preserve the files of certain special patients.”
“You’re that certain?”
Su Qiong replied confidently, “Of course. Humans love leaving evidence that can be used against them!”
A had nothing to say.
As a human, he somehow understood humans less than an NPC did.
The two of them returned to the second floor and successfully found Treatment Room No. 2 hidden in a corner, along with the secret passage beside it.
Before entering the passage, Su Qiong had a sudden idea and asked A to help him open Treatment Room No. 2.
During the day, the room had been sinister and terrifying.
At night, however, it had become one of the safest places in the hospital. Not a single liquid monster was nearby.
Su Qiong switched on the lights. Along with the ceiling lamp, all the equipment inside the room activated simultaneously.
The devices had been modified into instruments of punishment, used to restrain patients who “refused to obey discipline.”
Now, as every machine began operating, the rushing sound of flowing water filled the air.
Su Qiong was deeply moved!
During his brief existence as a piece of code, it had been a very, very long time since he had heard such a clear and pleasant sound of running water!
After spending only one day inside the Resthaven Psychiatric Hospital instance, Su Qiong had already developed serious misconceptions and psychological trauma regarding water, supposedly the source of all life.
“The sound of water?” A carefully examined the entire treatment room.
Based on his knowledge of medical equipment, A was completely certain that none of these machines required water to operate.
Then where was the deafening sound of rushing water coming from?
“One,” Su Qiong suddenly said.
“What?”
“There’s a number inside that strange machine. One.” Su Qiong pointed it out, then gestured toward the device beside it. “Five.”
Numbers subsequently appeared inside several other machines as well, forming an eight-digit sequence in total.
“What does this number mean? Is it a year?” Su Qiong could not determine the answer immediately, and the system offered no hint.
He memorized the code first. After confirming that the treatment room contained no other clues, he followed A into the secret passage.
The passage ran vertically to the ground and was approximately three or four meters high.
Without using the climbing handles, A jumped straight down, completely disregarding the gravitational acceleration of this realistic instance.
“Wow!” Su Qiong clung to the entrance and looked downward, thinking A’s one-footed landing was unbelievably cool!
He imitated A and released the handle, jumping into the passage.
Then…
Because his body was far too light and weighed only twenty-one grams, gravity failed to pull him downward properly.
Instead, the draft flowing through the passage blew him up and down like a hydrogen balloon swaying in the wind.
Su Qiong felt terribly wronged.
It was bad enough that his character model had been created carelessly. Now even his right to look cool had been cruelly taken away.
Could the bastard system please behave like a human being for once?!
“Pfft—” A failed to hold it in and laughed softly.
“You’re laughing at me!” With no other option, Su Qiong clung to the handles and climbed down, nearly exploding with anger.
When he had first seen A last night, A had been such an aloof, powerful, and unapproachable elite player!
And now?
Ever since A was injured, not only had he lost his handsome face, but he had also lost the aloof dignity of an expert.
—How could you bring yourself to mock a marshmallow?!
“I wasn’t.” A restrained his smile and firmly denied it.
Su Qiong could not be bothered arguing. He extended one bandage to probe the situation outside the passage.
Fortunately, although liquid monsters still occupied the area outside, they were far less concentrated than those near the stairwell. At the very least, it was possible to force open a path.
Provided they did not mind touching the liquid monsters’ bodies.
After fully evolving, the monsters could not only fuse and stretch into sticky threads, but also move faster than before.
No matter how careful Su Qiong was, he could not guarantee he would avoid them completely.
The countdown above A’s head had already dropped below sixty minutes.
He could not wait until daytime.
Gathering his courage, Su Qiong prepared himself as though facing death.
Charge!
Strictly speaking, the bandages were not part of Su Qiong’s actual body. If they became dirty, he could simply wash them afterward.
Completing his work was more important.
The devoted guide NPC finished preparing himself mentally and was about to rush outside when a heavy suit of armor suddenly fell from above, nearly flattening him.
“You ambushed me!” Su Qiong struggled out from beneath it and discovered that A had thrown him a full suit of armor, complete with a metal mask covering the face.
The armor was exquisitely crafted and emitted a muted gleam in the darkness.
Su Qiong scanned it with his bracelet and discovered that it provided five thousand defense points.
Based on the offensive strength of mimicry NPCs, at least five thousand of them would need to attack simultaneously to break through its defense.
“I just exchanged for it. Put it on first.” A looked outside. “There are too many monsters. You won’t be able to avoid them.”
“What about you?”
“They can’t do anything to me,” A replied indifferently.
“You’re already injured. Assuming the liquid humans contain the same substances as the slime monster, touching them directly will make your condition even worse.”
The piece of code was extremely worried about the human before him.
A was clearly about to die, yet he still treated his own life as though it meant nothing.
“It doesn’t matter.” With the countdown floating above his head, A calmly said, “You’ll take me out of this instance before it reaches zero.”
He had been acknowledged!
A human trusted him without reservation!
Su Qiong’s voice was sweet and adorable, but his tone was utterly serious. “Don’t worry. I’ll guide you properly.”
“All right. Let’s go.”
There were still countless liquid monsters outside the passage—enough to make one’s scalp crawl.
Individually, they possessed relatively low combat strength and moved slowly. They posed no threat to A whatsoever.
But when dozens or hundreds gathered and fused into one enormous mass before lunging at him, A was forced to draw his weapon and expend his remaining life force to attack.
The distance between the passage exit and the security room was only three meters.
Protected inside the armor, Su Qiong remained completely unharmed. A, however, was forced to attack several times, reducing his countdown by a full twenty-five minutes.
“Hold on a little longer. We only need one final clue. I’ll definitely find the answer that clears the instance!”
“All right.”
A actually wanted to tell Su Qiong that injuries of this degree were nothing.
During his previous training, A had endured countless impossible extreme environments, surviving by the narrowest margin every time.
However, A glanced at Su Qiong and ultimately said nothing.
Having someone comfort him in a hopeless situation felt strangely reassuring.
Even if the one comforting him was a marshmallow.
“We’ve reached the security room. You go inside first.” Su Qiong pushed open its half-closed door with all his strength and allowed A to enter.
Then, using the armored body, he blocked most of the liquid monsters outside.
The monsters attempted to continue attacking A and Su Qiong, but the armor prevented them from advancing.
Su Qiong left the suit outside and secretly slipped through a gap into the security room before slamming the door shut.
“Is Resthaven Psychiatric Hospital truly a beginner-zone instance?” Su Qiong began questioning his existence as code.
The system, which had been offline for some time, suddenly answered:
[The Resthaven Psychiatric Hospital instance is a realistic instance located within the beginner zone.]
“Where is there a beginner instance this difficult? It’s at least comparable to a Second-Circle instance.”
After players passed the beginner-zone trial and successfully entered the Circle, they would begin challenging instances within it.
The Circle also had different levels. Su Qiong habitually called the first Circle “Circle One” and the second “Circle Two.”
Circle One was the easiest to clear. The higher the Circle’s number, the greater its difficulty.
Beyond that, Su Qiong’s level was too low to obtain more information.
He knew only that the world of IF had a limited number of Circles, though he did not know exactly how many.
The system shamelessly replied:
[Reevaluated according to its current clearing difficulty, the instance has indeed reached the level of Circle Two.]
Su Qiong: “…How could you possibly have the nerve to throw a new player into it?”
[Instance difficulty is adjusted according to the player’s abilities. The system has determined that Player [Blank ID] possesses strength exceeding that of ordinary players and has already reached the level required to clear Circle One.]
“???”
Three question marks slowly appeared in Su Qiong’s mind.
Because the system believed A could clear Circle One, it had thrown him directly into a Circle Two instance before he even understood the game’s rules or mechanics.
Its logic was equivalent to parents believing their newborn baby would eventually be admitted to university and immediately sending him to sit a postgraduate entrance examination.
Completely absurd.
The system added:
[Furthermore, the clearing condition for Resthaven Psychiatric Hospital is extremely simple. The player only needs to answer the mandatory question correctly.]
“He searched for five whole days without finding the clues necessary to answer it. You call that simple?”
After Su Qiong questioned the system, he heard A call him.
“Su Qiong, I found it.”
Su Qiong immediately abandoned his attempt to communicate with the system and turned toward A.
A was remarkably skilled at dismantling buildings. After smashing the security room to pieces, he finally uncovered a metal box wrapped in several layers of clay beneath the floor tiles in one corner.
A split apart the clay coating, triggering a new hint.
[System: This is the hardest box within the instance. It cannot be opened through brute force.]
A’s expression remained cold.
Trashy system. If it had nothing useful to say, it could simply remain silent.
“A, there are two combination locks on the box.” Seeing one on each side, Su Qiong immediately remembered the digits from earlier. “Try one, five…”
A entered the sequence Su Qiong had memorized into the lock one digit at a time.
The locks opened with a click.
It went so smoothly that it seemed unbelievable.
Even Su Qiong was stunned.
The stairwell had “coincidentally” been blocked by liquid monsters, forcing them to descend through the secret passage.
The passage happened to be beside Treatment Room No. 2. On a whim, Su Qiong had checked the room and “coincidentally” obtained the code.
There were far too many coincidences to avoid suspecting deliberate system intervention.
On closer consideration, however, it was reasonably logical.
The system assigned hell-level instances to top players primarily to increase the challenge, not because it genuinely wanted to kill them.
A had very little time remaining. Instead of continuing to obstruct him, the system had added certain conveniences to the setting to help him clear the instance.
—Only after A successfully entered the Circle and challenged even more difficult instances would the system have further opportunities to torment him.
The metal box contained only a little over a dozen medical charts.
A removed all of them and discovered that the young S alone accounted for seven volumes.
Seven full years had passed between his admission and the “accident” that erupted at Resthaven Psychiatric Hospital, killing everyone inside and leaving only S in the Critical Care Ward with a final trace of life.
A first opened the other patients’ medical charts. Every piece of data was normal, and none of their test results displayed any symptoms of illness.
Yet the conclusion written in each chart diagnosed them as severely mentally ill patients incapable of taking responsibility for their actions.
“In my opinion, they really were seriously ill,” A commented.
Su Qiong picked up the young S’s medical chart and carefully smoothed out the creases at the corners before opening it solemnly.
In the year S entered the hospital, psychological testing indicated mild depression, but the condition was not severe. The doctor’s treatment plan was to keep him hospitalized for observation.
In the second year, S’s depression worsened to the point that therapeutic intervention had become necessary. The doctor’s treatment plan stated:
His condition has improved. Continue inpatient observation to consolidate the results of treatment.
Over the following years, S’s condition became increasingly severe. By the fifth year, after being confined to a hospital room for so long, he finally began showing signs of losing control and developing schizophrenia.
The doctor took no meaningful action and symbolically gave him a small quantity of medication that had been replaced with yeast tablets.
This continued until the sixth year.
S miraculously returned to normal. Every indicator returned to its standard range, and he displayed no psychological problems whatsoever.
“Strange.”
A and Su Qiong expressed their confusion simultaneously.
“Did he recover on his own?”
[System Notification: Congratulations to Player [Blank ID] and NPC Su Qiong for collecting all clues. Would you like to reconstruct the story?]
“Yes,” A answered.
[System Notification: Reconstruction of the Resthaven Psychiatric Hospital instance will now begin. Friendly reminder: Time will not pass during the reconstruction.]
After the system issued the notification, the scene before them transformed.
The destroyed security room returned to its original appearance.
The world became bright once again.
Su Qiong looked outside. Every liquid monster had disappeared. Only members of the media and reporters moved back and forth outside, setting up cameras and “interviewing” the corpses lying on the ground.
To seize the advantage, some media organizations broadcast their reports live. Facing the cameras, they vividly described the scene.
“A large-scale water poisoning incident has occurred at Resthaven Psychiatric Hospital. At present, all medical personnel and long-term inpatients inside the hospital have died under mysterious circumstances.”
“According to our station’s investigation, the water poisoning is connected to a scientific research experiment. Experts state that the victims’ symptoms closely resemble those caused by nuclear wastewater, and that tritium levels within the deceased greatly exceed acceptable limits.”
“Relevant authorities will conduct further investigations into whether this incident is connected to the discharge of nuclear wastewater by a certain nation.”
“Correction! Correction!”
“After conducting a detailed search of the hospital, reporters discovered one surviving patient. He is currently unconscious from dehydration and has been transferred to a nearby hospital for emergency treatment.”
“A large quantity of experimental equipment was discovered inside the patient’s room, connected to several hospital departments, including the water room, treatment department, and power supply room. The patient also left behind a map and a sequence of numbers.”
“Using the map, reporters located a specially constructed metal box. After opening it, we discovered several unusual medical charts.”
“My God! Resthaven Psychiatric Hospital was hiding an earth-shattering secret!”
“Wait! What gives you the right to order me to end the broadcast? I’m a properly accredited professional reporter! I must reveal the truth to the public today!”
The commotion outside continued, but Su Qiong no longer had the attention to listen.
He had already guessed what happened afterward.
Su Qiong lowered his head and discovered that the medical chart in his hands had undergone a subtle change.
The final blank pages of the seventh volume were now filled with neat handwriting.
In my seventh year here, a complete world exists inside my mind, identical to the world outside.
Among the people created by splitting my mind, I found one long-term inpatient. As expected, his psychiatric evaluation was completely normal.
He wasn’t ill, but I was.
After pressing the button, I finally understood what illness I had.
On the final page of the medical chart, two enormous words appeared before them.
“A,” Su Qiong called.
“I know the answers to both questions.”
“Mm. I know them too.” A had reached the same conclusion.
“Are you leaving the instance now?” Su Qiong asked.
Instead of answering, A asked for Su Qiong’s opinion. “What do you want to do?”
“I want to take the medical chart to S. I promised I would tell him what illness he had. But…”
A had been tormented by the instance for so long. He surely wanted to leave immediately.
Once the player disappeared, the instance would close as well.
A glanced briefly at Su Qiong, then stood and dusted the dirt from his hands. “Let’s go. I still have twenty minutes.”
Su Qiong instantly became happy and floated upward. “We’ve already obtained the clearing clues, so we can request system protection. I promised you that I would get you out before your countdown ended.”
“Do you fulfill every promise you make?”
“Of course.” Su Qiong’s voice was exceptionally serious. “Pieces of code strictly execute every line of instruction.”
A said nothing further. He accompanied Su Qiong back to the inpatient ward on the third floor and entered the space where the young S remained.
The boy was still sitting there in silence.
Holding his medical chart, Su Qiong did not immediately hand it over. Instead, he made a request.
“Would you be willing to be my friend for twenty minutes?”
“A friend?” The two syllables were completely unfamiliar to S.
“Yes, a friend. Let’s make it fair. For the first ten minutes, you’ll share your world with me. For the next twenty minutes, I’ll share mine with you.”
“…All right.” S hesitantly agreed and slowly began describing his world.
Su Qiong had originally believed that a code’s world was tedious.
He had never expected S’s world to be even emptier.
At least code had commands and error reports.
S’s world contained only blankness.
No one understood him. No one could comprehend his words. No one responded to his pleas for help.
Day after day, year after year, there was only loneliness.
Eventually, S himself became his entire world.
“Have you ever played a game?” Su Qiong asked. “Should I tell you about IN OFF?”
Su Qiong had experienced only two instances. He told S about both of them, focusing particularly on the Resthaven Psychiatric Hospital instance.
After finishing, Su Qiong asked, “S, suppose you entered the game and became an instance NPC. Now that the instance has ended, would you want to leave this place?”
S thought seriously for a long time before shaking his head. “No. I don’t like that world.”
Su Qiong was not surprised.
Even if S left the instance, he would not necessarily feel any freer.
The players who entered the game might not understand him either.
Loneliness amid a crowd was the most profound form of loneliness.
“But…” S looked at Su Qiong, tiny sparks of light appearing in his eyes. “I like you. You’re my first friend. I want you to stay here, inside my world.”
“That…” Su Qiong hesitated.
Personally, he did not mind. To Su Qiong, remaining within the game or staying inside an instance made little difference.
But he was a guide NPC. There were still so many players outside waiting to be guided.
“The twenty minutes are over.”
There was no clock inside the room, yet S could measure time with perfect accuracy.
“Now you’re no longer my friend.” S curled back onto the hospital bed and said softly, “Goodbye.”
“Actually, I…”
“Thank you for sharing your world with me. It was very joyful. From now on, I’ll make my own world a little more interesting as well.” S repeated, “Goodbye.”
“All right.” Su Qiong said farewell, then made another promise. “When we have a chance to meet again, you have to share your happy world with me.”
S neither agreed nor refused.
When Su Qiong left the young S’s room, only thirty seconds remained on A’s countdown.
Only after seeing Su Qiong return did A take out the examination paper and calmly begin writing his answers.
A answered the optional question first.
The theme of this instance is: _____.
A had initially believed it was connected to water. After uncovering the hospital’s story, however, he arrived at a completely different answer.
Loneliness.
A wrote the word, and the system judged it correct.
Su Qiong analyzed the mandatory question with great seriousness. “It asks the player to accurately state the exact number of people in the hospital. But ‘people’ doesn’t include the patients and doctors. They were all split from the world inside S’s mind. The only people who truly exist are you and S.”
“Mm.” A agreed with Su Qiong’s analysis. Then he raised his pen…
And wrote the number three.
“Three?!” Su Qiong was bewildered.
Had A not understood him?
There were clearly only two people in the instance!
“There’s also you,” A explained.
“Me?” Su Qiong hurriedly said, “I’m not a player, and I’m only a string of code. No matter which standard you use—”
[System: Correct answer.]
Su Qiong stopped halfway through his sentence.
What was going on?
Did he truly count as a “person”?
[System: Congratulations to Player [Blank ID] for completing the Resthaven Psychiatric Hospital instance. Reward: 10,000 points.]
[System: Congratulations to Su Qiong for completing the Resthaven Psychiatric Hospital instance. Reward: 5,000 points. Note: Half the points were deducted for entering the instance midway.]
Su Qiong was speechless.
Since the system already had a deduction mechanism, why not simply deduct all these useless points?
[System: Congratulations to Player Su Qiong for obtaining the instance item: Mr. S’s Controller.]
[Item Description: Mr. S’s Controller is an annihilation-type item. Pressing the red button will kill every player and NPC within an instance. Pressing the green button has a chance of killing a Lord of the Circle Realm.]
[Note: This item may be used only once. The person who presses either button will die. Please use it cautiously.]
“What a dangerous item!” Su Qiong held it out toward A. “Do you want it?”
“For me?”
“Of course. Items dropped inside an instance are supposed to be given to players.” Su Qiong nodded, then added, “But it’s extremely dangerous. You’d better not use it.”
A accepted the item and solemnly thanked Su Qiong. “Thank you for helping me. If we encounter each other in another instance…”
“That probably won’t happen,” Su Qiong told him. “You passed the instance’s trial, and your level and points are ranked second on the entire server. You’ll definitely enter the Circle. I’m only a beginner-zone guide NPC, and my level is too low to enter the Circle and guide any of you.”
“I see.” A frowned slightly and fell into thought.
When Su Qiong entered the instance, A had already been worn down by it for four days and was nowhere near his full strength.
He had then suffered further injuries and had been unable to protect Su Qiong properly.
A had originally planned to repay Su Qiong’s kindness if they met again in a future instance.
—But there would be no future meeting.
Su Qiong could roughly guess his thoughts and casually said, “Why don’t you tell me your name?”
A’s eyes revealed faint resistance.
He had not spoken his real name in many years.
Su Qiong muttered, “We’ll never meet again. Whenever I think of you in the future, I’ll only have a simple codename.”
After listening to him complain for several sentences, A finally surrendered.
“An’an.”
“Huh?”
“An’an. That’s my name.”
“It’s a reduplicated name!” Su Qiong praised happily. “Adorable.”
“…Shut up.”
A blinding light appeared before them once more, and the surrounding sounds shifted from silence to noise.
When Su Qiong restored his vision, he discovered that they had already left the instance and arrived at the player survival base.
The base was extraordinarily lively. The public noticeboard was covered in recruitment advertisements from major guilds.
Only five and a half days had passed since the players entered IF, yet they had already established a forum, created guilds, shared intelligence, and exchanged information, making the survival base remarkably organized.
On the main guild list, Su Qiong even saw Yu Qimiao’s name.
The guild he had founded bore an extremely familiar name:
The Orphan Alliance
—He really used that ridiculous name?
Were players who were not orphans allowed to join?
“Su Qiong, it really is you!” Yu Qimiao happened to be conducting business nearby. The instant he spotted Su Qiong from a distance, he stopped his transaction and hurried over to greet him.
“Where’s your cloak?” Yu Qimiao asked.
Su Qiong had been about to greet him, but the moment Yu Qimiao mentioned the cloak, he nervously retreated half a step.
What should he do?
Yu Qimiao had spent all his points purchasing that cloak for him, yet Su Qiong had “dismembered” it inside the instance.
For the first time as a piece of code, Su Qiong experienced guilt.
“I’m sorry…” the piece of code apologized weakly.
Yu Qimiao understood immediately. “You destroyed it again?”
“…Mm.” Su Qiong lowered his head and obediently admitted his mistake.
He had assumed Yu Qimiao would definitely become angry. Instead of scolding him, however, Yu Qimiao smiled.
“That’s perfect. Only after leaving the instance did I realize that cloak’s level was too low and provided no bonuses for you. Here.”
Yu Qimiao opened his item inventory and removed a pale-gray cloak trimmed with soft fur.
“I traded with someone for this.” Yu Qimiao skipped over the blackhearted process involving forced buying and selling. He draped the small cloak over Su Qiong and expertly tied it with a bow. “It provides some defense and a speed bonus. It’s a life-saving item, so you’ll be safer wearing it.”
“Why are you giving it to me?” Su Qiong was deeply confused. “I can’t guide you anymore.”
“I didn’t give you an item because I wanted you to guide me.” Yu Qimiao looked at Su Qiong with pure concern, without the slightest hint of calculation.
Had the players Yu Qimiao had cheated over the past two days witnessed this scene, they would have thought they were seeing a ghost.
Since when had this blackhearted capitalist become so eager to help others?
“Su Qiong, who is this…?” Yu Qimiao finally noticed the tall man beside him.
After leaving the instance, A’s injuries had completely healed.
His handsome face was exceptionally striking, while his obsidian-black eyes carried a sense of distance that made it obvious he was not someone to provoke.
And that was before anyone scanned him with a bracelet and saw his completely blank ID and arrogantly conspicuous LV. 25.
Within the entire beginner zone, reaching a double-digit level already made someone a king among kings.
This outrageously powerful man was Level 25!
The moment A appeared in the survival base, scouts from several nearby guilds immediately sent reports back and summoned their senior members, each trying to find some method of recruiting A into their organization.
Su Qiong knew nothing about any of this. He introduced him to Yu Qimiao.
“His codename is A. His real name is too adorable, so I can’t tell you.”
Yu Qimiao became curious. “How adorable?”
“Extremely, extremely adorable. But I promised to keep it secret, so I can only reveal a tiny bit of information.” Su Qiong leaned toward his ear and whispered.
“It’s a reduplicated name? Then it really is adorable.”
A: “…”
Is that how you keep a secret?
