What malicious intent could NPCs possibly have? C15.1

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Chp15. part1

What kind of hellish place is this?

Owen lowered his voice, “We need to find an anchor point quickly. What if we turn into old men here and still end up old men when we get out?”

“It shouldn’t,” Pei Han said. “The dungeons are all data-driven, they’re essentially virtual worlds. They won’t change our physical state in the real world.”

Ning Ge: “…”

They all have real bodies, so of course they’re fine. But Ning Ge is an NPC, essentially a set of data, a piece of code. What if she really gets old here?

Originally, she wanted to find a place to hide and retire, but here, she doesn’t need to retire, she just ages and dies instantly, clean and efficient, without having to worry about anything.

Encountering a dungeon like this, not only can’t she stay, but she also needs to hurry and find a way to get out before she gets too old.

The young aunt stood beside the corpse, glancing at the children around her, seemingly hesitating about something.

She said, “I’ll go get someone to take her somewhere else…”

Before she could finish, the man weighing her interrupted, “Take her where? Isn’t that troublesome? Just here.”

He walked over. “You lift her foot, I’ll lift her head.”

The young woman was a little afraid of him and didn’t dare say much. She could only silently lift the deceased woman’s foot, and the two of them lifted the body together, moving it to a small metal door about half a person’s height against the wall.

The man opened the door. It was dark inside, and they couldn’t see what was there.

They pushed the body inside.

With a loud bang, a flash of white light seemed to appear inside.

Ning Ge thought, What kind of place is this? Anyway, wherever it is, a place that handles corpses can’t be a good place.

Given the rate at which the population here grows, people die every day. Having a place to dispose of corpses right there is both hygienic and convenient.

“What’s in there?” Pei Han suddenly asked.

The man glanced back at him. “That’s connected to the Mother Body. Go in, and you’ll be with the Mother Body.”

Mother Body?

That’s strange. What is it? Does it mean Mother Earth?

Since Pei Han was being so nosy, the man pointed at him. “Come and weigh yourself.”

Pei Han wasn’t worried. He stepped onto the scale, and sure enough, it beeped—he passed.

As he stepped off, he asked again, “If I fail, I won’t have to ‘be with the Mother Body,’ will I?”

The bracelet didn’t list the punishment for failing the mission, and he wanted to know what it was.

This time, the man didn’t answer. He gave Pei Han a disgruntled look, but it was clear that once the scale showed he had passed, he had passed, his displeasure was useless.

He then pointed at Jing Yao, who was watching the commotion. “You.”

“I weighed myself as soon as I came in,” Jing Yao reminded him.

The man, disbelieving, scanned the boy with a barcode scanner and, finding he had indeed been weighed, reluctantly moved on to grab the next child.

Jing Yao, half-smiling, suddenly shoved a chubby boy next to him forward. “He hasn’t been weighed yet.”

Ning Ge had just noticed this chubby boy, he was also a player, wearing a black bracelet on his wrist, looking very nervous, his eyes filled with terror.

Ning Ge saw the number on his wrist: KW7373, resembling an aeroplane, easy to remember.

The chubby boy was clearly tall and heavy enough, but the scale wouldn’t register a passing weight.

“I’m already this tall, and it’s still not enough?” the chubby boy asked in a panic.

The man glanced at him coldly. “Overweight.”

The chubby boy panicked. “Not enough is bad, being overweight is bad too?”

The man didn’t waste any words. Suddenly, he reached out, scooped the boy up by the waist, and casually opened the small metal door beside him, shoving the boy headfirst inside.

The movements were practised and swift, executed in one fluid motion, so fast that no one could react.

A scream, a flash of white light.

Having just witnessed them throw a corpse down, and now suddenly a living person was shoved in, the children in the room, though bewildered, were terrified and cried.

“What are you crying for?” the man snapped.

Now no one dared to cry anymore.

The man said, “If it doesn’t pass the inspection, it’s scrap. Why keep scrap if you don’t deal with it?”

The young woman looked at them with pity, gently comforting the children, “It’s okay, don’t be afraid, you’ll all pass.”

The man, his face stern, continued calling people to the scale, “Next.” He pulled the trembling child onto the scale.

Jing Yao’s lips curled into a satisfied smile, and he stepped back.

Ning Ge suddenly realised that he had done it on purpose. Like Pei Han, he wanted to know what would happen if someone failed.

This man was ruthless, killing someone silently, completely unconcerned.

Ning Ge continued to try to hide further back.

Step by step, she retreated, almost stepping on the feet of the person behind her.

Ning Ge suddenly understood the second half of the words the older aunt had said to her before she passed away.

The older aunt held her shoulders, leaned down, and whispered, “Silly child, back…”

The second half was “back.”

Backing away was the only way to survive.

A day here was equivalent to ten normal years, so an hour was equivalent to five normal months.

They looked seven or eight years old, the age when they grow rapidly. In a year, which is a little over two hours here, growing five or six centimetres wouldn’t be a problem.

Ning Ge remembered when she was little, her brother had pasted a height chart on the door, the scale shaped like a giraffe’s neck, with measurements marked one by one.

Ning Ge’s record was growing ten centimetres in a year. Although this memory might be unreliable, it at least made sense.

This meant that as long as she could stall for time, she could very well grow the missing centimetre.

There were dozens of children here. Weighing each child for one minute would take half an hour.

Half an hour was enough.

“Step back, wait until everyone is weighed before going up,” was the last piece of advice and kindness the older aunt had given Ning Ge before she died.

The man looked up, seemingly noticing Ning Ge quietly hiding in the crowd.

“You!” the man pointed at Ning Ge, “the one with the bangs…”

Before he could finish, the man was suddenly bumped into and stumbled.

It was Jing Yao, who had been punched and sent flying, crashing into the man.

Pei Han followed closely, throwing another punch, and the two immediately began fighting.

Pei Han and Jing Yao rolled around on the ground like two fish. The man and the aunt tried to help, but the two boys were quick and skilled fighters, even the two adults couldn’t separate them.

Everyone else pushed forward to see what was going on, but Ning Ge silently squeezed to the back.

Time was of the essence.

Pei Han had clearly figured out the key to the situation and was trying to buy her as much time as possible.

However, he wasn’t holding back, as if he’d been disliking Jing Yao for a long time.

After a while, the fighting between Pei Han and Jing Yao finally ended. The man was furious, “What happened? Why did you hit him for no reason?”

Pei Han coldly retorted with three words, “He deserves a beating.”

The man was puzzled, “Why does he deserve a beating?”

Pei Han replied: “He was looking at me.”

Jing Yao chuckled, “So what if I was looking at you?”

Pei Han didn’t speak, but silently raised his hand and beckoned to him with his index finger. Jing Yao wasn’t intimidated at all and immediately moved closer.

They fell into the usual routine of “What are you looking at?”, “What’s it to you if I’m looking?”, “Let’s talk.” Neither of them was the type to talk the talk, so they immediately started fighting again.

The adults finally managed to separate them with great effort.

This commotion not only bought them time, but also made the man completely forget about Ning Ge, glaring angrily at the two of them.

Although very annoyed, he showed no intention of throwing them into the small door.