Humans are all unique individuals. Even when facing the threat of death, everyone will have their own ideas.
In the second mirrored Instance, the number of surviving players barely scraped by. Most of them felt there was no need to do quests—even with Lin Hao's threats and enticements.
Zhou Hui and Ouyang Qiu actually agreed with doing quests. After all, completing the main quest sooner meant they could leave the Instance earlier.
However, seeing everyone else's reaction, they chose to go with the flow and remain silent.
“If you won't do them, then wait for death together. Either way, I'm confident I can make it back alive.”
In the end, he simply left them with these harsh words and chose to do the side quests alone.
...
In the third mirrored Instance, Jiang Chen—the backbone who had barely managed to keep their small three-and-a-half-person team together—was suddenly injured. After some discussion, Zhou Chang and Kang Xiaojia decided to enter the village anyway.
Although the paper car didn't need gasoline, humans were made of flesh and blood; they still needed to eat, drink, and relieve themselves.
...
...
In the first mirrored Instance.
The morning mist outside the mourning canopy had dissipated slightly, and pale sunlight filtered through the gaps in the drapes.
The inner room where the corpse was kept was actually just an old adobe house in the backyard of the Huang family home.
Unlike the grand and magnificent Huang family courtyard, the buildings in the backyard were visibly much more dilapidated. One could even tell they were made of yellow clay.
Despite his curiosity, Yang Hexuan didn't ask the Huang family why they had built a modern multi-story house yet kept this clay house in the backyard.
Lin Jianguo, on the other hand, felt that the Huang brothers' filial piety was likely mostly an act.
Who would hold their own mother's funeral in a dilapidated back room that could collapse at any moment instead of the new house?
The two of them exchanged a glance but remained silent.
The plaster on the back room's walls was peeling severely, exposing the yellow adobe underneath. The windows were tightly covered with black cloth, preventing even a sliver of daylight from entering.
A white cloth curtain hung at the doorway. As the wind blew, the curtain swayed back and forth, as if someone were hiding behind it.
Huang Facai watched from outside, refusing to let Su Ya and the others enter.
Yang Hexuan and Lin Jianguo could only exchange a glance before lowering their heads and walking into the room.
The moment they poked their heads in, a mixture of odors hit them square in the face.
Mustiness, the stale odor of the elderly, and the burnt smell of burning incense and paper money mingled together, wafting into their noses. It wasn't exactly foul, but it was certainly far from pleasant.
Yang Hexuan instinctively held his breath.
Lin Jianguo's footsteps also paused for half a second.
Behind the cloth curtain lay a dim room.
Two white candles were lit in the corner. The flames were tiny, and their eerie blue light cast a hazy glow over the room.
In the very center of the room sat an old elm-wood bed. There was a bulky lump on the bed, covered by a blackened white funeral quilt.
Kneeling by the bed were two children, one older and one younger, a boy and a girl. Draped in hemp mourning clothes, they wept with their heads lowered:
“Waaaah—”
“Waaaah, Old Lady...”
Although the two children didn't look up, their voices were already hoarse from crying. They kowtowed repeatedly, appearing far more filial than the Huang brothers.
Hearing footsteps, the two children didn't turn around. They remained in their posture of burning paper.
One of them spoke in a hoarse, shrill, and thin voice, “You must be the uncles from the camera crew. Sorry to trouble you... please help carry the Old Lady out. Once the shrouding is done, she can be placed in the coffin.”
The other followed in a low voice, “The soul-suppressing yellow paper... is pressed under the rice jar in the inner room. Seven sheets, don't take the wrong ones.”
Both spoke in flat, monotone voices, like robots reciting lines.
Yang Hexuan felt his skin crawl. He secretly tugged at the corner of Lin Jianguo's shirt and lowered his voice, “Uncle Lin, why aren't these two kids... turning around?”
Moreover, the Huang family was truly bizarre in every way.
They let outsiders handle their own mother's shrouding.
And they let two children preside over such a major event as mourning the dead.
“Don't ask too many questions,” Lin Jianguo said in a low, serious voice. “Get the yellow paper, carry the corpse, and leave as soon as we're done. Don't cause trouble.”
He also sensed that something was wrong, but he couldn't put his finger on it.
—Why did these two children refer to their own grandmother as "the Old Lady"?
“Understood.” Yang Hexuan clenched his fists and gathered his courage to walk toward the inner room.
...
The inner room was even darker and colder than the outer room, feeling practically like an ice cellar.
In the corner of the room stood a half-person-tall clay rice jar. A crack ran along its rim, and a broken wooden lid rested on top.
It looked quite old.
Yang Hexuan walked over to the rice jar and lifted the wooden lid.
A musty odor mixed with a sweet, metallic scent wafted over, nearly making him gag.
The rice jar was empty, with only a few scattered grains of rice at the bottom, covered in a layer of dust.
On top of the dust lay a fat, palm-sized rat.
The rat was covered in sleek, glossy black fur. Its belly was bloated and round, and it lay on its back with its feet in the air, completely motionless.
It looked completely dead, its body already stiff.
“Dead rat... must have eaten the Old Lady's rice to get itself this fat.”
Yang Hexuan frowned and muttered in a low voice.
He suppressed his disgust, reached his hand down to the bottom of the jar, and tried to search for the yellow paper.
But the moment his fingers brushed against the yellow paper, the "dead rat" suddenly twitched.
First, its tiny claws twitched, and then it slowly rolled over.
Yang Hexuan's movements froze instantly.
It felt as though all the blood in his body rushed to his head before turning ice-cold.
He had never seen such a sickening sight in his entire life.
Its body was that of a rat—black fur, sharp claws, and a long, thin tail—but its head was a human head.
It was a thumb-sized woman's head with an oval face, short hair, and the corners of her mouth slightly curled, as if she were smiling.
“Hiss—!”
Yang Hexuan gasped, his hair instantly standing on end as goosebumps erupted from the back of his neck all the way down to his heels.
He yanked his hand back violently, but he was still a step too late.
The human-headed rat let out a sharp squeak—
The sound was shrill and thin, resembling both a baby's cry and an old lady's laugh. The rat scrambled straight up his wrist.
Its cold, slimy claws gripped his skin, feeling slick and greasy, like a piece of bloody meat sticking to him.
“What the fuck!!!!”
Scared out of his wits, Yang Hexuan desperately shook his arm, trying to fling the thing off:
“What is this thing?! It's so disgusting!!”
But the human-headed rat climbed incredibly fast. It scurried up his arm, reaching his shoulder in the blink of an eye.
The tiny human head turned, its oval face staring straight at him, letting out a faint, crackling giggle as if laughing.
“Fuck!”
Yang Hexuan's legs went weak with fear. He stumbled back a couple of steps, his back slamming against the wall with a thud.
In his desperation, he grabbed a broken clay bowl nearby and smashed it against his shoulder.
The broken bowl shattered on the ground with a clatter. Only then did the human-headed rat squeak, jump down, and slip into a rat hole at the base of the wall.
Right before it disappeared, the woman's face on the rat's head turned back with a look of deep sorrow, tears welling in her eyes as if she were begging for help.
Did I see things?
How could a human-headed rat be asking for help?
Yang Hexuan shook his head violently, banishing the terrifying thought from his mind.
...
Quiet returned to the room.
Only the candle flames flickered, causing the shadows to sway wildly.
Yang Hexuan relied on the wall, panting heavily.
“What happened?” Hearing the commotion, Lin Jianguo quickly walked in from the outer room, a tense expression on his face. “Did something happen?”
“A r-rat... a rat...” Yang Hexuan's voice trembled as he lifted his arm to show Lin Jianguo. A few faint claw marks were visible on his skin.
“The rat had a human head... It looked j-just like a human...”
He could swear that if that thing had spoken just now, he would have danced the breakdance all the way out of the village.
Lin Jianguo's brow furrowed even deeper. Looking at the tiny rat hole at the base of the wall, he also felt a wave of disgust.
A human-headed rat.
Were they cursed to keep running into rats?
“Are you alright?”
“I-I'm fine...” Yang Hexuan wiped the sweat from his face and bent down to fish out a stack of yellow paper from the bottom of the rice jar. He counted them. There were ten in total. “I got the yellow paper. Wait, why are there three extra sheets?”
【Yellow Talisman Paper (Quest Item): A yellow talisman drawn by a Feng Shui master using cinnabar, watermarks, tiger urine, and peach wood ash. It possesses a wondrous effect.】
“A quest item?”
He instinctively looked at Lin Jianguo, who fell into deep thought before whispering a quiet instruction:
“Shh. The quest only requires seven yellow talismans. As for the remaining three... nobody knows when they might come in handy. Since you found them, keep them hidden. I won't tell anyone else.”
“That... that doesn't feel right.”
Yang Hexuan's fingers were still trembling. With some reluctance, he pulled out one sheet and handed it to Lin Jianguo:
“Uncle, let me share one with you. I've seen in movies that ghosts are afraid of yellow talismans.”
A trace of expected cunning flashed deep in Lin Jianguo's eyes, but he merely grunted in agreement and accepted the yellow talisman.
“It's good that you're fine.”
He patted Yang Hexuan on the shoulder, his tone turning heavier:
“When we carry the corpse next, focus. Don't look around, don't let your mind wander, and carry it steadily. Don't drop the Old Lady.”
The quest prompt was still hanging in their field of vision.
【Carrying the Corpse (Two-Person Quest): Move Old Lady Huang's remains from the inner room's temporary resting place to the old wooden door-plank bed in the mourning hall. You must first find seven sheets of soul-suppressing yellow paper to place beneath the bed.】
Lin Jianguo wasn't sure if dropping the corpse would trigger some sort of taboo.
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