chapter8

 Zoey?

　　The moment she saw the flower-clad Pied Piper's true appearance through Gregorio's consciousness, Sylver, who had lazily collapsed on the bed, immediately sat up, his eyes full of astonishment that he couldn't hide.

　　How could he be here?

　　Only those who died in the Pure White World would be recycled and have their memories washed away to become an NPC of the box, it couldn't be that after he left, Zoey was ...

　　Sylver bit his lower lip, but soon his furrowed brow stretched and he lay back down.

　　No, it wasn't Zoey, just a fragment of his soul.

　　Zoey had lost his conscience, morality, and goodwill in the final battle eight years ago, and Piper was one of them.

　　Sylver, who had regained his composure, was quietly making his calculations, watching Gregorio's every performance with a critical eye, as if he were watching a movie.

　　Would this man be a competent enough helper?

　　The sound of the flute had been uninterrupted, the flower-clad pied piper playing an unknown tune to lead them down the trail through the forest. As they gradually advanced, spindle shapes hung from the bare, dead trees, cocoon-like for some kind of creature, and some hung down to the ground in long lengths, tugging out clumps of thin, white silk threads.

　　A huge, pure black spider crawled from the web of white silk threads woven overhead, checking out each cocoon. As they continued walking, they walked through the spider's territory and saw countless children's shoes, in a variety of colors and not of this world, scattered all over the place.

　　Piper's pace isn't fast, and it's quite boring to pretend to be controlled and follow in a stifled manner, Gregorio asks Sylver: [What is the box script of the Pure White World based on?]

　　Sylver is also idle and explains: [Myths, legends, or other fantasies, universal broken rules, an insignificant thought, in short, this is a world where anything can happen, and the rules of natural science sometimes change.

　　Gregorio: [The script for this box, then, is the Pied Piper in Flower, right?]

　　In Grimm's Fairy Tales, the flower-coated Pied Piper with high magical powers promises the residents of Hameln to help with a rat infestation, but when the residents don't pay him accordingly, the Piper, in a fit of pique, blows his flute and takes all of the town's children away.

　　A classic dark fairy tale.

　　Gregorio is presumably not under control because he's carrying the pendant recovered from the ranger, which was gifted to him by the Piper, but why is Aron okay too?

　　Sylver: [Well, but that's also because the box is categorized as a fairy tale and has a low level, which is what makes it so easy to see the blueprint. In the Pure White World, based on the type of script, all the boxes can roughly be categorized into Fairy Tale, Horror, Legend, Otherworldly, Survival, and Challenge, Fairy Tale is considered to be the easiest, and the scripts for the other types of boxes are all derived by Kether's real-time calculations, so the ghosts won't even be able to guess that they can be barely controlled by Administrator 03, I guess.]]

　　Kether, Administrator 03.

　　Gregorio silently memorized the two unfamiliar words that appeared in Sylver's mouth, from the teenager's few words, he felt that the Pure White World was not just as simple as it seemed and that what they needed to do was never a simple pilgrimage as the Joker had said.

　　Gregorio continued to walk forward, his sight opened up steeply, an ancient castle stood in the center of the black and white forest, surrounded by a deep moat, the only drawbridge that could lead to the castle was braided with hair of various colors. Those hairs taken from different people's heads were entangled, waiting for the return of the castle's owner.

　　The Piper led the group up the long bridge of hair, and below them, the river was filthy as if it were oil flowing from the ground, solidified into a dead silence without a ripple.

　　The gates of the old castle were open, and they stepped inside, stepping onto the crimson carpet, candles burning quietly in the wall-mounted candlesticks, and the lizard-headed butler, dressed in a gown, bowed toward his returning master.

　　The flute continued to play, the black-haired, black-eyed piper stopped in his tracks, and the crowd was controlled one by one into the dungeon guarded by two lizard guards. gregorio and Aron followed at the end of the line and watched as they entered the cells two at a time, mimicking the last one they entered.

　　The guards locked the cell doors one by one, the sound of the flute stopped, and the people under the spell all closed their eyes and collapsed onto the straw-covered floor, falling into a deep sleep.

　　In the blind spot of the guards, Gregorio found a relatively flat spot and quickly lay down, Aron lay face down and listened to the footsteps of the guards as they inspected the cell.

　　Gregorio opened one eye, just in time to see Aron sneakily lifting his head and looking out of the cell.

　　The ten of them were locked in a total of five cells, Marvin was in the same one as the middle-aged woman, and at the moment the teenager was lying on his side on a pile of straw, his eyes closed tightly.

　　"My god, it is the Pied Piper in Flower." Aron turned his head, moved quietly to the corner where the guards at the doorway couldn't see, and said to Gregorio in the lowest voice he could muster, "Do you know the story?"

　　"Know." Gregorio hadn't read a fairy tale in a decade or so, but the Pied Piper in Flower was so famous that he'd saved some impressions.

　　"To pass the box, you need to complete the final task, be recognized by the box, or find the door that allows you to get out to do so, and the first step is to leave the dungeon." Aron said, "It's a good thing there's two of us left unchecked or we'd be in trouble."

　　Gregorio pulled the soldier pieces out of his pocket, "I got a pendant at the ranger's house, I guess that's what's acting as protection, what about you?"

　　"After I separated from those two, I met a toad who traded me a hairpin for two gold beads in my hand." Aron held out the hairpin as well, crushed diamonds set in the shape of a tiny crown.

　　[This is a fusion of two fairy tales.] Sylver snapped, [Henry has three iron bands on his chest imprisoning the heart, and in the most original Grimm's Fairy Tales, the story of the Frog Prince has another name, Henry the Iron Chest].

　　Gregorio didn't know that and made a secret note of it. He and Aron searched the cell through, careful not to alert the guards at the door, but found nothing.

　　"So what's to be done?" Aron picked at the broken diamonds in his hairpin, frowning in thought.

　　Probably too confident in the Piper's mana, or the box's intentionally lowered difficulty, the guards hadn't searched them for anything they had on them, and Gregorio was still armed with his shotgun. The idea of shooting the guards appeared in his head for a split second and was then dismissed.

　　The sound of gunfire would surely alert the others in the castle, and only a fool would use that method.

　　Just as the situation reached a stalemate, the sound of a guard talking to someone came, followed by whoever walked into the dungeon. gregorio and Aron hurriedly fell to the ground and pretended to be asleep, one of his eyes narrowed slightly as he secretly observed the situation.

　　In came the butler lizard, who made several repeated trips in front of the five cages, scrutinizing the people inside with a critical eye.

　　Finally, it stopped in front of the cell holding Marvin and pointed to the sleeping middle-aged woman, "That's her, fat-rich liver, the master will love it, bring it over there and let the chef take care of it."

　　Gregorio's heart all but stuttered, take it back and let the cook handle it, is it any wonder that the flower-clad Pied Piper set in this box is still a cannibal?

　　The cell door was opened and the servant who had followed the butler over dragged the middle-aged woman out, the butler surveyed the other human in the cell and suddenly added, "Take him with you as well, teenagers must taste delicious as well."

　　So another lizard servant tugged on Marvin's ankle and followed the butler out of the dungeon with the "ingredients".

　　They weren't very careful with the ingredients, and Marvin's head banged against the cell door as he was dragged, but no one noticed the muffled thud.

　　Two minutes later, quiet returns to the dungeon, but the two men in the cell diagonally opposite have been taken to the kitchen, and Gregorio immediately climbs to his feet and whispers, "Gotta get out of here fast."

　　Aron: "That's for sure, but don't worry too much, the box usually doesn't schedule absolute plot kills, and there's bound to be a way out of a seemingly desperate situation that can be resolved. Your brother may look a bit dull, but he's not stupid, he'll be fine."

　　"Hopefully." Gregorio searched the cell once more and suddenly saw something dark and still moving slightly from the corner and immediately copied the gun as a long stick in his hand, "What is it?"

　　"Don't kill me!" Sharp and thin voices rang from the ears of the two men, the thing burrowed out from the haystack, the mouse wearing a small vest covered its head with both hands and stared at Gregorio with two small black bean-like eyes. it was as big as a cat, but its fur all over its body was dry and shapeless, skinny and skinny, and its originally white vest was covered with stains.

　　With tears in his eyes, the mouse said pitifully, "I'm so hungry, can you give me something to eat? When I'm full, I'll help you guys as payment."

　　Plot?

　　Aron sniffed and touched Gregorio's bag, reaching inside to grab the bag of cookies, and asked, "Like what?"

　　"Surely you guys want to get out of here, and when I've had enough to eat and have the strength, I can dig a hole for you to get out." The mouse turned and pointed to a mouse hole in the corner that was only the size of a baby's fist, and said, "This hole leads to the larder, and I can widen it enough to let you all through."

　　In the story, the Pied Piper in Flower was brought in to exterminate the rats of Hameln, so is this just the survivor?

　　Gregorio put away his gun and Aron gave the rat two packages of cookies, which the white marmot immediately eagerly unwrapped against the package and munched on. Its two incisors are so big that when its mouth is closed, they can only be placed outside, and when it chews, constant clicks and cracker crumbs are splattering, with such a mouthful of teeth, it is thought to be a good digger of holes.

　　Gregorio would have liked to keep the white horse armor quiet, but under the effect of the plot, the guards at the dungeon door heard nothing and had become both deaf and blind.

　　In less than a minute the White Horse Armor winded up eating the cookies, it licked its nose with intent, patted the cookie crumbs on its clothes, and asked, "Got any water?"

　　Gregorio gave it the plastic water bottle he had left, it was a bit of a novelty to see a rat so big and humanoid for the first time. The white horse beetle ate and drank, finally satisfied, it pawed at the hole that let it in and said, "You guys wait a while, you'll be able to dig it soon."

　　After saying this, the White Horse Armor bit on the edge of the hole, tore down a large chunk of the hard cement that was glued to the wall, and with a swing of its claw brought out a sharp, cold light, and gouged down the entire piece of masonry.

　　Two people on the side were dumbfounded, even if there was a gun in hand, this rat wanted to do something they could not resist, look at their teeth, look at this claw, simply a moment will be able to tear people to pieces!

　　The rat's construction speed is very fast, in a few breaths it expands the hole to a scale that would allow a grown man to drill into it, and the whole body is plunged into it to excavate the wall inside.

　　Aron quietly poked Gregorio with his elbow and lowered his voice, "That's all it took just to eat two cookies, if it had eaten meat, it wouldn't have demolished the castle in minutes... I can kind of see why we need to get rid of the rat infestation."