44 - Nineteenth

Translated by rabbitrisu

Prior to this, the man posing Cheng Yun described Su Zimo as ‘the Flower of Gaoling.’ ¹

The young Su family head isn’t the type of person that can seduce people with words or actions, but seemed to be a light glowing in the distance. People couldn’t help but pay attention and get close, but because they worried the light was too hot, they couldn’t help but back away.

Qi Xiaomin used to have some affection for Su Zimo, but she soon discovered that Su Zimo was like a book character. Although he was desirable, he was hard to reach.

Du Xin tried to touch. He kept trying, kept trying, kept trying, but still found himself standing far away from Su Zimo, as if all he had done before was just standing still.

Of course, there were also the madman and Liu Xu who hadn’t had Su Zimo’s appearance in mind from the start. It seemed more practical for them to consider how to survive the twentieth nightmare world.

The person who pretended to be Cheng Yun may have been the same at first, but when he saw Su Zimo walking toward his step by step, he narrowed his eyes seriously, considering the possibility of branding Su Zimo with a slave mark.

If so, he might one day see this high mountain flower lying there, his eyes pleading behind his glasses, black hair and silver chain intertwined, a trampled ‘slave’…

The man swallowed down his throat. He looked at Su Zimo playing with the pen while approaching him, finally walking around the long table to him and Bai Man. He leaned his body down, showing the silver chain across his collarbone, then reached out and picked up the slave mark on the table.

After standing upright again, Su Zimo raised his right hand that was holding the pen, deliberately letting the sleeves slide down, exposing the unblemished arms. He glances at the man, asking, “Is the puncture mark made here?”

‘Cheng Yun’s’ gaze couldn’t help but fall on Su Zimo’s arm. He subconsciously wanted to nod, wanting to see the spikes on the badge pierce the pure skin, bringing forth bright red drops of blood!

The moment when he was dazed, Su Zimo’s eyes suddenly became fierce. His right hand that was raised high suddenly swung violently, causing the baton hidden in the metal pen to appear in the sky with a crack. When his opponent didn’t respond at all, he directly hit his upper body!

Su Zimo didn’t need to aim at a certain point as long as he still wore the ‘Li Gui Shroud’ on his body!

“Aaaah!”

Strangely enough, originally Su Zimo had just hoped that the baton in his hand would push away the man holding Bai Man. He didn’t expect that when the baton touched the other person’s body, ‘Cheng Yun’ would scream in pain!

“Remember not to stare at people with those kind of disgusting eyes next time.” Su Zimo breathed a sigh of relief, and after rolling his sleeves back, he photographed the stunned Bai Man and gestured to Dr. Jin.

At that time, ‘Cheng Yun’ couldn’t care less about Bai Man. Even the scalpel held in his hand was directly tossed away, and he protected his neck very painfully.

Su Zimo and the others even saw ‘Cheng Yun’ change back to the appearance of a female ghost wearing a strange white robe. And this time, the white robe’s neckline began to ooze red stains. The red color spread more and more, and the other party’s screaming became more pained!

Before… ‘Cheng Yun’s’ appearance as he female ghost didn’t seem to be a coincidence, nor was it deliberately done. In Su Zimo’s view, it was more like the ‘Li Gui Shroud’ on him has begun to bite back!

It’s just that because not all the trainers were aware of ‘ghost tools’ or the existence of ‘retribution,’ so they didn’t realize how terrible it was to possess certain tools.

Even more terrifying… Su Zimo looked at the metal baton in his hand, and felt that this thing had some other uses besides fighting malicious spirits. Retribution comes faster…

When ‘Cheng Yun’ began to scream inexplicable, Jin Lei and Bai Man had already pulled Su Zimo away from where Cheng Yun was, and didn’t forget to pick up their respective weapons.

When Jin Lei and Bai Man fled to catch their breaths, they passed by the madman and Liu Xu who had rushed over.

Su Zimo turned around and saw Liu Xu take out handcuffs from his pocket – it looked like ordinary handcuffs with no special text boxes – then skillfully handcuffed the hands of the guy who looked like a female ghost.

“Liu Xu, I didn’t expect you to…” The madman looked at Liu Xu with a surprised expression, then sighed. “…have this particular hobby?”

“…” Liu Xu looked at the madman silently, perhaps because he had to explain and it was rare for him to say more. “This was from when the other party fell when I met some comrades in the past. I thought it may be useful and I always have it with me. I have no special hobbies or related occupations. I just retired from the military.”

“What should we do now?” Maybe it was because Liu Xu and the madman were in front, but Dr. Jin and Bai Man no longer thought about taking the lead and backed away without hesitation.

Su Zimo didn’t continue backing away, but stood on the other side of the long table. He was opposite ‘Cheng Yun,’ who was just handcuffed and pushed into a chair, and was ready to use the baton in his hand again at any time.

Not long after ‘Cheng Yun’ was pushed down, he changed back into Cheng Yun’s appearance again. This made the surrounding trainers feel a little admiration. After all, that guy looked very pained before. They thought he couldn’t take any more, and didn’t expect he would reveal his true appearance.

On the other hand, the ‘venomous snake’ with such high willpower seemed even more terrifying.

“Do you still need my lighter?” Because Su Zimo had gestured for the lighter’s activation behind his back, Xiao Huo couldn’t wait to ask with a very jittery expression.

“Sorry, I don’t need it for the time being.” Su Zimo shook his head. He had recalled that Xiao Huo’s lighter could attract ghosts and he could help contain the ‘venomous snake.’ He didn’t expect the metal pen to be so powerful, but just one blow disrupted all of the guy’s movements.

“To be honest, don’t you think that the one surnamed Su is more suspicious than me?” The one posing as Cheng Yun raised his eyebrows. “He really doesn’t look like a newcomer who has only experienced three nightmare worlds.”

“Who the hell are you? Show your true face!” Bai Man didn’t listen to his nonsense. She just stood on his side and loudly questioned him.

“Hehe. If Mr. Su asks me, I can say.” The man raised his head and smiled at Su Zimo. Even though he was imitating Cheng Yun’s gentle smile, his expression was full of fraud.

“As you said.” Su Zimo didn’t think he would have less meat. ²

“You can call me… venomous snake.” The man smiled and said, “I just got the name, do you like it? Anyway, I like it very much. After all, it is the Flower of Gaoling, the great beauty Su. Is this bond more vivid than ‘Shoushan No. 1 Secondary School?’”

“….”

“Hand over Cheng Yun’s things!” Bai Man looked like a lunatic. “We will verify the other things ourselves, and will not ask you, you bastard!”

“Anyway, I’m also a companion who fought side by side. Such an indifferent tone is really heartbreaking. The snake’s hands were unable to move, and he could only look at Bai Man provocatively. “Those things are in my coat pocket. You can take them yourself.”

“Wait a moment.” Su Zimo heard the snake saying this, and immediately stopped the madman who wanted to do it. “Don’t touch his clothes!”

He always thought that only one person knew the peculiarity of his clothes, and looked at Su Zimo with more interested eyes.

“Mr. Liu.” Su Zimo didn’t care about the other’s eyes. He turned to Liu Xu on the other side. “Put on the red gloves, then try to touch his pocket. If there’s no problem, take out the contents. Madman, check his backpack again.”

Although he didn’t know why Su Zimo said so, Liu Xu put on the gloves without hesitation and touched the pocket as Su Zimo said and found there nothing unusual except for some red blood on the edge of the pocket, before reaching his hand in.

“I even suspect that you’re a veteran who has cleared the twentieth nightmare world.” The venomous snake looked Su Zimo up and down, as is trying to see through the skin and bones under his clothes.

The snake’s pockets looked very ordinary, but Liu Xu hadn’t finished after so long. Seven things had been put on the table next to him, and all of those things seemed to be ghost tools!

In addition to the small bottle of holy water, the thieves’ keys he saw before, and an ordinary dagger, Su Zimo also saw four tools he had never seen before.

[Ordinary Exorcism Seal (One Star)]

[Quantity: 5]

[Sale Price: 10 yuan]

[Description: Single use items. Attach to doors and windows to prevent ghosts from approaching for a period of time. Length varies depending on the intensity of the ghost.]

[Diexian (Two Stars)] ³

[Sale Price: 50 yuan]

[Description: Diexian can only answer yes/no questions. When you have very important things to consult Diexian about, please be careful. The answer given by Diexian is only correct 20% of the time.]

[Nightmare Brand Sleeping Pills (Two Stars)]

[Quantity: 3]

[Sale Price: 50 yuan]

[Description: Disposable medication that can make people sleep instantly. It sounds like an ordinary sleeping medication, but when you take it while being threatened by a ghost, you can not only sleep comfortably, but also don’t have to worry about possession or proximity to ghosts. The duration is determined by the willpower and strength of the ghosts. It’s a wonderful medication for travel. The only thing to note is that taking this pill will bring you endless nightmares, and you will not be free of them until the effects of the medication disappear.]

[Temple Sachet (Two Stars)]

[Sale Price: 50 yuan]

[Description: It exudes a flavour that malicious spirits hate, so some spirits will subconsciously bypass the wearer’s surroundings until the fragrance of the sachet is completely gone.] ⁴

“Seals don’t even matter, and why would he carry perfume sachets. a dish, and sleeping pills with him?” Even veterans like the madman couldn’t see the special abilities of these things after a while.

“The key, exorcism seal, dish, and sachet are all Cheng Yun’s. They’re all the props he brought from nightmare worlds!” Bai Man recognized Cheng Yun’s belongings at a glance.

“Since you call yourself a venomous snake, you must think you’re very powerful. Why do you collect so few things after doing this for such a long time? Most of these things still belong to Cheng Yun?” The madman to the side also found Cheng Yun’s cell phone and wallet in the snake’s backpack, so he directly stuffed Cheng Yun’s things from the table back into his backpack and walked over to Bai Man.

Bai Man stroked the backpack, which may have belonged to Cheng Yun, with her hand. She looked at the wallet and cell phone he should have carried with him and suddenly felt the urge to cry.

“His purpose was to die in a nightmare world, so he shouldn’t need to bring any powerful props.” Su Zimo also didn’t believe that they were the snake’s possessions. “I’m afraid he wanted to hide his weapons to use in the twentieth nightmare world.”

“That day will never arrive.” The snake smiled. It seemed that people could see the snake tongue flick out of his mouth. “You kill me now, so you’ll be free, right?”

“I have a better idea.” Su Zimo also smiled, then walked around to Liu Xu and took a white capsule from the small glass bottle of ‘Nightmare Brand Sleeping Pills.’ “Mr. Liu, I will trouble you to please let him eat this, and we may clear the task before he wakes up.”

“No… no… no… you can’t do this!!!” The snake that was very calm suddenly collapsed. The veins on his forehead burst up, and he said with a furious tone, “Kill me! You can’t do this! You can’t do this!! That bastard Cheng Yun has ruined me one. If you do this, I’ll die next time!!! Stop it! Kill me! You kill me!”

“It turns out that this is why you hate Mr. Cheng so much. He carried you through the eighteenth nightmare world?” Su Zimo’s beautiful face was probably more terrifying than a ghost in the snake’s eyes just then. The smile was more like a devil’s from hell. “And now, is this your nineteenth nightmare world?”

If he said so himself, Su Zimo thought he was smiling prettily.

Footnotes

<ol>Flower of Gaoling: Something beautiful that can only be viewed from a distance, not touched. (Sometimes referred to as the flower of the high mountain.) Won’t have less meat: It won’t hurt to do/try something. Diexian: A ghost/fairy that lives in a dish. It’s used like a Ouija board for contacting the ghost and having it answer questions. It’s more commonly known as the pen fairy in English, since most kids use pens or chopsticks instead of a dish. It says flavour because spirits eat things based on their scents, and once they ‘eat’ it the flavour goes away.</ol>