Chapter 126: Have You Found Peace? (2)
Chapter 126: Have You Found Peace? (2)
Roll—
A grenade fell in front of Ah Jian.
"Damn, what the hell?"
Ah Jian immediately ran as fast as he could, rolling on the ground and covering his head.
Boom!
The grenade exploded.
Even though Ah Jian had promptly thrown himself to the ground, he was still injured. He had at least ten shrapnel scratches on his body, and his ears had temporarily lost their hearing.
From a distance in the streets, a fierce gunfight could be heard, intermingled with blood-curdling screams.
"The reinforcement from the strategy group is here."
"Weird creatures are already descending from above. This should hold them off for a while."
"Let's get that little evil spirit out of here."
Two fanatics put on black gloves, which allowed them to touch intangible evil spirits.
They carried the unconscious Zhang Qian and ran out of the school's back door.
A van was parked at the back entrance. They got on, and the van immediately left the school.
The driver glanced at Zhang Qian, whose face was intermittently flickering, and said with a frown, "What's wrong with this child? Is she still in the state of an earthbound spirit?"
"Probably not."
"She just got sprinkled with salt by the agents that's why she is like this," said one of the fanatics. "Don't worry. Today marks the fourth year since her death. The resentment she's accumulated is enough for her to become an evil spirit. She'll recover soon."
"I hope so."
The driver pulled up the handbrake and stepped on the accelerator.
Bang!
The roof of the van suddenly sank, and everyone immediately looked up.
"There's something on the roof."
"Shit, look ahead!"
The driver turned and saw Ah Jian, his face covered in blood, glaring menacingly through the window.
"You bastard!"
The driver cursed, stepping on the accelerator and then swiftly turning the steering wheel. Caught off-guard, Ah Jian's grip loosened, and inertia threw him off.
The van continued to drive forward.
As it was about to cross an intersection, the phosphorous bomb Ah Jian had installed on the roof exploded. The entire car was instantly engulfed in flames.
Phosphorous bombs, banned worldwide decades ago, had made a comeback. After the weird resurgence, these bombs became the secret weapon of agents around the world in their fight against these weird creatures.
The main component in phosphorous bombs is white phosphorus, capable of generating temperatures of up to 1000°C. Once white phosphorus touches the skin, it's incredibly hard to remove. The intense heat can burn a person down to their bones in seconds.
The fanatics in the car managed to jump out but didn't get far before collapsing and turning into charred corpses. Even after their death, their bodies continued to burn.
Ah Jian leaned against a corner of a wall, squinting towards the flames.
Zhang Qian's ghostly figure slowly dissipated in the fire, and Ah Jian once again saw the sweet smile she used to wear when she was alive.
Have you— finally found peace?
…
"Ah Jian, you damn fool, using a phosphorous bomb in the city? Are you trying to get yourself killed?"
Qu Kangping hurried to Ah Jian's side and berated him, looking at Ah Jian's bloody face.
Ah Jian pointed to his ears and grinned, "Captain, I think I've gone deaf?"
"You damn idiot!"
"You seem to be scolding me…"
"First, let's get this idiot to the hospital. If those fanatics got away, so be it. Saving him is the priority now!"
Qu Kangping lifted the injured Ah Jian into a car.
At the hospital, doctors urgently operated on Ah Jian.
Unable to curb his nicotine cravings, Qu Kangping stood in the hospital's front plaza, smoking.
Ah Jian's impulsiveness this time wasn’t entirely detrimental.
A month ago, the fanatics had set their sights on the earthbound spirit, Zhang Qian. They performed a transformation ritual on her, gradually turning her into an evil spirit.
Leveraging Zhang Qian's weird powers, they created "Barrage bots" operable in the weird world.
Today was meant to be the final day of Zhang Qian's transformation. By dawn, the fanatics had planned to take her away.
Ah Jian used his exceptional stealth skills to bypass the fanatics' surveillance and successfully found Zhang Qian.
The strategy team never expected Ah Jian to single-handedly infiltrate the school to eliminate the evil spirit, and the fanatics were equally taken aback that Ah Jian would venture into the lion's den alone.
Ah Jian inadvertently exposed the fanatics who had been in hiding for years.
Beep, beep, beep—
Qu Kangping's phone rang.
"What is it?"
"Captain, Ah Jian has been moved out of the operating room."
"How is he?"
"The doctor said he's out of immediate danger for now, but he still needs to stay in the hospital for observation for a few days."
"You've had a long night. Stay with Ah Jian for the evening, and take a day off tomorrow."
"Yes, Captain."
Qu Kangping took a last drag from his cigarette, tossed the butt into the trash bin, and left.
...
The Weird World.
The next day, Gu Yi was awakened by his roommate's nudging.
For some reason, when Gu Yi woke up that morning, he no longer saw those bullet comments attacking people. He speculated that the strategy team must have found and apprehended all the keyboard warriors in the real world.
Prepared, Gu Yi joined the group of students and went down to the first floor.
The dormitory's supervisor stood at the entrance, as she had for the past few days, beckoning everyone over, "Today is the second exam, and you still need to give up one item."
Gu Yi nodded, choosing to part with his beloved sneakers.
The students lined up, heading to the exam hall. Gu Yi paused beside the supervisor, tentatively asking, "Will it be the same tomorrow?"
"We'll talk about tomorrow when it comes."
She replied, unwilling to reveal more.
Not daring to probe further, Gu Yi moved ahead.
By now, all essential items had been relinquished. If anything else was required, he'd have no choice but to sacrifice a person.
Given the current scenario, there was no chance for him to complete the dungeon exploration in three days. Only by acing the exam and scoring high could he obtain the rare "Dream Fragments" — the most vital consumable in the entire dungeon.
Gu Yi could only hope that the Dragon Country's strategy team was competent enough to help protect his family.
Having experienced an exam before, Gu Yi confidently took his seat, awaiting the question paper.
The blank sheet was placed before him, and the exam bell rang on time.
Everything went black before Gu Yi's eyes. When he opened them again, he found himself sitting in a bedroom. The voice of the invigilator echoed in his ear, repeating the exam instructions.
Most of the content was similar to the last time, except for the following instructions.
"3. This exam adopts a dream simulation format. The test duration is three days and the flow of time is not synchronized with reality. Please allocate your time wisely. Whatever happens in the dream will not affect reality."
"4. Examinees must uphold morality during the exam."
Gu Yi didn't rush to start. He looked down at his body and realized he was in the form of a child, probably no older than five.
The room's decoration was quite rudimentary, resembling an old house from the 70s or 80s.
"Begin the exam."
As soon as the voice ended, Gu Yi's body automatically jumped off the bed. He still couldn't move freely.
It seemed the system wanted him to experience the storyline firsthand.
He walked out of the bedroom.
In the yard, a woman was being beaten by two men. Even though she looked unfamiliar, the system informed him that this woman was his mother.
Gu Yi hid behind the door, watching in horror as his mother was beaten to death.
His stepfather stood aside, indifferent, even handing a club to the assailants. It wasn't until noon that the village head and police arrived in the yard.
However, by that time, the stepfather had already destroyed all evidence.
The sole eyewitness, Gu Yi, had been sent to his grandmother's house even before the police arrived.
The police investigated for a long time but couldn't pinpoint the real culprit.
The other two men involved in the beating were the stepfather's brothers. They had colluded in their testimony, deceiving both the police and the village chief during the investigation.
In the end, the stepfather shifted the blame for the murder onto his two brothers. They were sentenced to twenty years in prison, while the real instigator, the stepfather, remained free.