Chapter 46 Divine Justice_1

Huai Shi was momentarily stunned, then sniffed the hand-rolled cigarette which didn't even have a filter. It seemed to contain some spices, and it smelled refreshingly clear and sharp.

"Metallic reinforced shell, incense nourishes the soul," Raven said calmly, "You'll get used to it, but be careful not to use it to get high when it's not necessary. Addiction can cause a lot of trouble.

Apart from a very few kinds of Thousand-Year Incense, most incense works by stimulating the Source Substance to achieve a stimulating effect — like an upgraded version of Red Bull and cigarettes. Overuse makes it very easy to turn into an idiot."

Huai Shi nodded without saying anything more.

Moments later, he watched the Source of fire dissipate from his fingertips and twisted his neck, "Let's go again."

Then darkness struck.

Soon, he opened his eyes again and sighed, "Continue."

Raven nodded.

The long afternoon passed in continuous repetition until the last time he opened his eyes, the sky had already turned pitch black, utterly silent.

"Do you want to rest for a bit?" Raven asked. "After all, you've reached your limit."

"One more time."

Huai Shi finally understood the troubles of hardcore gamers, rubbing his temples and yawning, "I'm close to cracking it."

"Okay, so, the last round?"

"The last round."

Huai Shi nodded.

So, with a bout of vertigo, he opened his eyes from within the train carriage, silently listening to the commands coming from up ahead, not uttering a word.

Even taking advantage of the last bit of time, he closed his eyes and slept for a while.

"Call me when we get there."

He patted the shoulder of the teammate beside him, very affectionately.

Before long, the car stopped outside the village.

He was rudely kicked awake.

Huai Shi smiled nonchalantly and clumsily got up, following his teammate into the field. It was during a brief moment of lurking in the bushes that he suddenly patted the shoulder of the person ahead of him.

The teammate turned around unhappily.

Then saw him extend his hand expressionlessly, holding a dagger, thrusting into his own throat, and then sweeping it across.

"Goodbye."

Huai Shi whispered softly.

The hue of blood soaked the parched land and wild grasses.

Above the barren ground, he crawled, swiftly making his way towards another teammate, his movements quick. He moved on all fours while crawling.

Like a spider that had crawled through the brambles.

One after another, according to the radio information, he enjoyed the sensation of striking down his teammates.

The experience of backstabbing as a Second fifth was truly pleasurable; Huai Shi felt he was getting quite proficient at it.

These beautiful moments continued until the sounds of Team A engaging in combat reached him.

He sighed, hearing the alert from the radio. Someone had noticed something was off since four or five people hadn't responded in over five minutes.

It seemed he could no longer blend in.

He shook his head, sat down on the ground, and pulled the pins from several small grenades, weighing them in his hand before throwing them with all his might.

The booming of explosions came from the distance.

Gunshots rang out, and the shrubs around him were trembling, peppered with bullets like wild grass in a downpour.

Huai Shi sighed, rolled up his sleeve to wipe the blood off his face, and stood up from the bodies of his teammates. His uniform was now stained crimson with the blood of his comrades.

His backside was covered in a large red patch.

"What's this? Looks like a monkey with hemorrhoids."

Huai Shi complained to himself, picked up his rifle, and headed toward the direction of the gunfire, yelling out, "Don't shoot, friendly!"

Then he pulled the trigger towards those stunned faces.

He emptied one magazine without resistance, then another, and felt a bullet hit his shoulder, as if a chisel had gouged out a large hole, and amidst the intense pain, he seemed to no longer feel his left hand.

"Going overboard, aren't you, Old Pal? My hand is broken again?"

Huai Shi sighed in resignation, "I haven't learned how to reload with one hand yet."

Discarding the automatic rifle he was holding, he drew his pistol and walked toward the village.

"7794! What are you doing?" roared a voice from the radio.

"Of course, I'm striking down my teammates, friend. Didn't you know? I chose Black Lily, you chose Hanzo, and together we can rebuild the Empire."

But there was no response from the radio, only brooding silence until the instructor's indifferent voice sounded, "Mission changed, eliminate 7794."

He was being targeted.

"Don't make decisions so quickly."

Huai Shi sighed. Before the channel was cut off, he lifted the radio and tentatively said, "I think I could still be saved."

Crack!

Huai Shi instinctively tilted his head, seeing the radio in his hand burst open into a mess in mid-air.

A sniper's bullet.

Under the strong sense of Death Perception, he sprawled and quickly crawled into the complex alleys of the village, hearing footsteps from all directions.

He silently counted in his mind.

In the original carriage, there were seven from Team B on the left, and six from Team A on the right. Including himself, there were thirteen people.

Now under the mole's betrayal, six from Team B were gone, completely annihilated. Logically, after the B-side of the tape finishes playing, it should be the A-side, but now it looked like he was going to be played by the A-side.

Luckily, the location wasn't far off.

He gestured the direction, lifted his handgun, and picked out the rash fool who peeped out in front. After the target fell, he shot twice more in succession, ejected the magazine to check, and found six bullets left, just one for each person... Yeah right, he wasn't any kind of sharpshooter. In this kind of melee, being able to hit even one person with six shots would already be damn good luck.

Maybe he could try a wild spray with five shots. If those five didn't just so happen to kill all six people across the way (with one bullet miraculously going through two), then the last bullet could provide a swift end for himself.

A heroic death, free from disgrace, sounded almost too romantic...

The approaching footsteps were getting closer. He kicked the ground twice and leaped over the wall, exiting the alley. After so many cycles of death, he had begun to grasp some patterns.

Compared to the malevolent level design in current VR games, a setting where simply memorizing the layout could make things easier seemed almost too kind.

Then, in the yard behind the wall, he saw that same pair of terrified eyes again.

The stooped woman was still gazing at the sky.

With a vacant look.

She was vainly trying to hide two frail children behind herself.

But they were all already dead, lying on the ground, riddled with bullet holes and blood. Dust fell from the wind, covering those vacant eyes.

"Why is it always you guys?"

Huai Shi paused for a second, scratched his head, wanted to say something, but just didn't know what to say. Even though he knew this was a recording, even though he knew these were all fake NPCs, he still felt an indescribable sense of shame.

This wasn't a game.

"I'm sorry."

Huai Shi hung his head, no longer daring to look into those dust-covered eyes.

He said, "I'll be out right away."

He burst through the door, charging into the road, and shoved his gun barrel into an opponent's eye socket: "Die—"

Blam!

A mass of plasma burst from the back of the man's head. He didn't have time to look around; he fled for his life, staggering as he tried to get away from that yard.

But he just couldn't forget those eyes.

When he started to treat all this as just a game, the many deaths from the records awoke him from his fond dreams. This was not a game; it was a record, a history that had once happened.

A history that had once taken place in some corner of the world.

A trifling massacre and trifling deaths.

They were all already dead.

Those lusterless eyes were gradually covered by dust, buried, forgotten, not even deemed worthy of being remembered...

Huai Shi staggered on, running desperately through the narrow spaces, weary but pressing forward. After kicking open a door, he finally reached his destination.

In the room, the old man curled up in the corner seemed to be frightened, instinctively clutching the object in his arms.

"Let go."

Huai Shi leaned against the door frame, panting, raised his handgun: "Give that to me."

The man muttered something, hesitated momentarily, and let go, suppressed by Huai Shi, crawling on the ground.

"Thanks."

With labored breath, Huai Shi hoisted the object, staggered back two steps, turned around to leave, but after a couple of steps, couldn't help but look back and shouted, "Don't worry, I'll save you."

No one responded.

The villagers were probably all long dead.

He couldn't save a single one.

Damn...

Huai Shi rubbed his eyes with his forearm and cursed in a low voice, "Damn…"

Next, he heard the roaring sound of the courtyard gate shattering, as the noise of automatic rifles started up like a torrential downpour, sweeping through every inch of the space.

Huai Shi huddled behind a millstone, listening to the sound of debris flying overhead.

He took a deep breath, trying to calm himself amidst the odor of gunpowder, then Huai Shi got up, shouldering the RPG, and strived to show his comrades the brightest smile he could muster:

Hey, how are you guys?

Then, he pulled the trigger.

"—Justice, rains from above!!!"

Boom!

Amidst the violent shaking and shock, flames and thick smoke soared into the sky. Boiling blood mist spread out, dancing with the dust, eventually turning into fine rain, settling on the walls, the ground,

And on Huai Shi himself.

Silence returned.

Huai Shi dropped the launcher, crossed through the wrecked courtyard and streets, and walked toward the center of the village.

Closer to the man who was waiting there.

Shocked by the outcome, the instructor standing there with his hands behind his back froze for a moment, but soon he raised his hand, took off the sunglasses on his face, and tossed them away.

"Even though they are mere prototypes, for them to be utterly annihilated here... I didn't expect you to be so tough, 7794."

Those cold gray eyes stared at Huai Shi's face. Then, the instructor gestured to the young man with a curl of his finger, "It seems I need to give you another lesson."

"The feeling is mutual."

Huai Shi twisted his neck, discarded his gun holster and the Quick Reaction Vest that was getting in his way, and drew his military knife with one hand, assuming a stance utterly different from his opponent's.

Different from the Rome Military's combat techniques, it was a classic posture from Dongxia, so classic that even the instructor almost failed to recognize the beginner's form.

"Come."

Huai Shi grinned: "I'll use military boxing to smash you to pieces."

"Good."

The instructor seemed to understand something, his complexion gradually darkening as his bones rubbed together, creating a deep sound: "Good, 7794.

I promise, before you die, you'll understand—what Hell is like!"