Chapter 44: Hungry Hell
At the gates of the Hunger Hell flea market, a crowd of freelancers gathered densely, pointing and whispering toward three people hanging above the entrance.
The three looked withered and skeletal—barely breathing, as if they’d been strung up there for days. Their eyes, bloodshot and feral, stared down at the crowd below, teetering on the brink of losing control to hunger.
Tang Mobai recognized their faces. They were people who had entered Hunger Hell with Jing Su, once hoping to join the Fuguang Guild. Jing Su himself was among them, tied in the middle. On the surface, he didn’t appear to have been tortured—after all, Hunger Hell didn’t allow players to physically harm one another—but his condition was terrible. On his clothes, someone had scrawled the word “Fuguang” in blood, crossed out with a big red X.
This was a blatant provocation. Clearly, their plan was working—if Yan Wuzhen hadn’t been beside him keeping watch, Tang Mobai might already have rushed forward to save them.
“Calm down,” Yan Wuzhen whispered in his ear, pressing down hard on his shoulders. “If you expose yourself, you’ll walk straight into their trap. That’s exactly what they want. See those people under the gate? They’re all members of the Jade Society.”
“I know.” Tang Mobai took a deep breath. Beneath the hanging captives, several people lounged casually by the gate. They looked relaxed, but their eyes kept scanning the crowd. If Tang Mobai hadn’t put on his disguise mask, his emotions might already have betrayed him.
“So boring. Why hasn’t anyone shown up yet?” yawned a young man—the same one who’d stormed the Jade Society’s meeting room before. He looked up at the hanging trio. “You’re from the Fuguang Guild, right? Why hasn’t anyone come to save you yet? Maybe they’ve abandoned you?”
“Go to hell!”
“Lapdogs of the Jade Society!”
“Your whole family’s dead, you son of a—!”
The moment he opened his mouth, the hanging trio erupted in a flurry of curses so vicious that, if words could kill, the youth’s entire bloodline would’ve been wiped out a dozen times.
The young man dug a finger in his ear, looking irritated. “So noisy. Shut up.”
As soon as he spoke, the ropes binding them automatically coiled around their mouths, gagging them. The three struggled, trying to bite through, only to nearly break their teeth on the hardened material.
A stir rippled through the crowd of freelancers. Then a red-haired man from the Jade Society stepped forward and said, “Everyone, this has nothing to do with you. This is a personal matter between our guild and Fuguang. Please, stay out of it.”
The freelancers began murmuring among themselves. Everyone knew Fuguang was the guild selling Fasting Pills, a secret that had already spread widely among independents. Seeing Fuguang members strung up like this, most had already guessed the cause—Fuguang had angered someone powerful by selling those pills.
But the Jade Society wasn’t like Spirit Music, that small group from before. To offend a major guild like them made everyone nervous.
Someone muttered, “What ‘personal matter’? They’re just pissed about the Fasting Pills—”
Before he could finish, the red-haired youth moved. With the help of a golden rope tool, he pinpointed the speaker in the crowd and lashed out like a snake, binding the man in seconds. “What? You want to hang up there too?”
The man froze. “T-The Jade Society’s Red Duke is going to kill me!”
Apparently, this “Red Duke” had some fame in Hunger Hell. His presence alone had kept the crowd from rioting earlier. But now that he’d stepped into the mob and was threatening to act violently, someone finally snapped, grabbing his shoulder. “Hey, man, that’s too much.”
Red Duke turned his head slowly, scanning the crowd. “I’m just trying to stop you all from being manipulated. Can’t you see? This guy’s deliberately riling you up. Maybe he’s one of Fuguang’s people too.”
“They won’t even save their own members, yet you think they’ll save you? Think carefully—who’s really being used here?”
“Besides,” Red Duke continued, voice loud and clear, “our issue with Fuguang is a private guild dispute. Their leader, Tang Mobai, stole an alchemy formula from us—the same one you call the Fasting Pill. It was supposed to be our product.”
The crowd fell silent for a moment, then broke into a wave of shocked chatter.
Yan Wuzhen and Tang Mobai’s faces darkened immediately. They’d expected lies—but not ones this shameless.
Stole your formula? Tang Mobai seethed inwardly. Why not say you invented alchemy itself next? What are you, the Lost Paradise version of a stolen nation?
The claim was so absurd that even the bystanders twitched at the corners of their mouths. “You guys were going to sell Fasting Pills?” someone asked skeptically.
“Of course,” Red Duke said smoothly. “That was the original plan—until someone sabotaged it. But I’ll swear on the Jade Society’s name: once Fuguang is gone, anyone here can buy the pills directly from us.”
That last statement hit hard. Swearing on a guild’s name in Lost Paradise was serious—breaking such a vow would ruin their credibility across the network. And saying it in front of this many witnesses gave it weight.
Yan Wuzhen frowned. “So that’s their play…”
He spoke in a low, cold voice. “The Fasting Pill is essentially an alchemical product. The Jade Society has several high-level alchemists—they can reverse-engineer the formula. That’s how they’re pulling this off.”
Seth blinked. “But wouldn’t that conflict with the Merchant Alliance’s interests? How can they allow this?”
“Simple,” Yan Wuzhen said. “Divide the profits and gain new allies. Like I said—the Merchant Alliance isn’t a united front. Now that they see how the Fasting Pills have rallied the freelancers, they’re getting nervous. By letting the Jade Society sell pills too, they can weaken us, pacify the crowd, and keep control of the market. First they destroy Fuguang—then they set the prices themselves.”
There was an even darker layer to this plan—one Yan Wuzhen didn’t voice aloud. The reason the three weren’t killed, but displayed here in the busiest market, was psychological warfare.
If Tang Mobai came out to save them, he’d fall right into their trap. But if he didn’t show up—well, that was even better.
Fuguang had won the freelancers’ loyalty through righteousness—by selling Fasting Pills fairly. But if they didn’t even save their own members, that moral high ground would crumble instantly.
Why fight for someone who won’t even rescue his own?
Once the freelancers’ faith scattered, Fuguang would be nothing more than a six-person upstart guild—ripe for crushing.
The scheme was disgusting—but effective. The three captives had probably been hanging there for a day already. According to Hunger Hell’s rules, they could only survive another 24 hours. Beyond that, even if they lived, they’d be useless.
Yan Wuzhen sensed Tang Mobai stir beside him and quickly grabbed his hand—but Tang Mobai didn’t move again. His fury had cooled into something far more dangerous. He just stared at the Jade Society members below, his gaze locking on Red Duke’s face, burning it into memory.
Finally, he turned away. “Let’s go,” he rasped.
Yan Wuzhen blinked. He’d expected a fight to hold him back…
But when Tang Mobai turned, there was something in his eyes—something cold and alien—that made even Yan Wuzhen uneasy. For the first time, the bright, naïve smile seemed like a mask—and beneath it was something dark, focused, and terrifyingly calm.
“Ah Zhen, Seth,” Tang Mobai said quietly. “I’ve decided. I’m going to turn Hunger Hell upside down. Will you help me?”
[Passive Skill: Wrath I]
Rage boosts reflexes and critical rate up to +30%.
[Wrath II]
Anger fuels resolve. Mental debuffs reduced by 40%.
For the first time, his desire—once hazy and restrained—was crystal clear.
Seth nodded. “Yeah.”
Yan Wuzhen snorted. “At this point? I’m already on your damned ship.”
They returned quickly to their hideout. Tang Mobai didn’t waste words—he wrote out the mission options that the real-world team had provided and pointed to one.
“Originally, I wanted to discuss which world we’d tackle next. But after today, I’ve made up my mind. This one.”
Yan Wuzhen glanced at it and raised an eyebrow. “A B-rank tech-side dungeon world? You want to hit them through their project?”
“Yes. I’ll rescue our people—and I’ll make the Jade Society pay in full,” Tang Mobai said.
Seth looked confused, so Yan Wuzhen explained, “That world is currently the major guilds’ top raid target—especially the Jade Society’s. They need a stable resource chain to conquer it, and our Fasting Pills have disrupted their supply lines.”
From a business perspective, every guild operated like a corporation. Raiding dungeon worlds was equivalent to running a high-investment, high-return project. The Jade Society’s alchemy tech had originally come from such a dungeon.
But high risk came with high stakes—entire guilds could be wiped out. That’s why the Merchant Alliance existed: to share risk. In low-tier dungeons, individuals couldn’t compete with organized guilds. That was why the “guild demons” looked down on independent freelancers.
Higher hells, though, were another story.
Tang Mobai’s voice was calm. “They wanted to drag us out? Fine. We’ll oblige. But they’ll bear the consequences.”
Seth nodded. “I don’t object.”
“I do,” Yan Wuzhen said sharply. “I get your anger—but think. That dungeon’s crawling with guild players. We’ll be hunted constantly. How do you plan to strike them effectively when you can’t even find their base?”
“I already have.”
Yan Wuzhen blinked. “Wait—what?”
“Their base,” Tang Mobai said simply. “Their stronghold in that world.”
Yan Wuzhen stared, stunned, as if trying to decide whether Tang Mobai had lost his mind. “Impossible. No guild would expose its own stronghold. They may flaunt their strength, but they’re not idiots.”
A guild base was like a fortress—safe zone, supply depot, respawn hub. No sane guild would let that location slip.
But Tang Mobai only smiled. “It’s possible. That B-rank tech world already has plenty of streamers. By tracking when and where guild players turned their streams off and on, comparing their chatter, and mapping their movement data—I’ve pieced together enough to pinpoint their base.”
Of course, Tang Mobai hadn’t done this himself—it was the real-world team’s work, tirelessly analyzing stream data while he was trapped here.
“And as for striking their base…” Tang Mobai’s lips curled faintly. “Trust me—when it comes to firepower, we’re the ones they should be afraid of.”
That was why the experts in the real world had insisted he study alchemical physics and chemistry—not just for survival, but because some weapons simply couldn’t be made without that knowledge.
With enough understanding—and alchemy as his cheat—Tang Mobai could turn knowledge itself into a weapon.
“And there’s a saying from my hometown that makes a lot of sense,” Tang Mobai said calmly. “If you strike hard once, you’ll save yourself from a hundred blows later. We can run this time, but what about next time—or the time after that?”
Yan Wuzhen and Seth fell silent. They hadn’t heard that proverb before, but its meaning was easy enough to grasp.
Yan Wuzhen closed his eyes briefly, then opened them again. “Alright. What do we need to prepare?”
“Use our points to buy supplies—arm ourselves as much as possible. We’ll rescue the hostages, then head straight into the instance. I bought a fixed-location descent card earlier at the market. If I’m right, we’ll be thrown straight into a tough fight the moment we land. This will be a blitz battle,” Tang Mobai said.
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