Ch45 – [Announcement: Main Task – Failed]

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The mud house wasn’t big in the first place.
With thirty-some people squeezed inside, every person practically only had enough space to put their feet down.

After Anthony’s group came in, the other trainees in the mud house felt a trace of embarrassment. 

The main point was that they didn’t dare to return to the mud house behind the locust tree.
They trespassed the other’s nest like goldilocks and the three bears, comfortably settling themselves down here and even getting caught by the other in the act.

Zong Jiu was very uncaring in the face of the hostility in Anthony’s expression.

 

 

He soundlessly dropped his hand.
His expression was indolent, not leaking a single drop of his thoughts.

“We saw that you weren’t back yet so we borrowed it temporarily.
Since you’re back and we’re also about to leave, then we’ll just take our leave.” 

His eyes crinkled, and the white-haired young man waved his hand, everyone in Zong Jiu’s group following him out of the mud house.

 

[The newcomers behind the Magician are sure made up of some stuff.
They had just faced off a frightening assailant, it’s still dark as hell outside, and they dare to walk out just like that.]

[More importantly, no one has raised an objection yet.
Man, everyone really trusts the Magician.
I’m looking forward to their expressions when they find out that the Magician is the mole kekeke.]

[I’ve already closed off all the neighboring live broadcasts, just concentrating on this one, watching to see what the mole camp’s up to.]

 

“Wait.”

Just when the last member of Zong Jiu’s group stepped out of the mud house, Anthony suddenly spoke in a deep voice, “Where did Yi Ruisi go?”

There it was.

Zong Jiu slanted his face slightly, his pale pink eyes carrying an elusive, shimmering light. 

“He’s part of your group; what does he have to do with us?”

Seeming to realize that the atmosphere was a little off, the others gave wary expressions.

Xu Su muttered quietly, “Seriously? Their own man went missing and they still came over to ask us? Lunatics.”

Anthony stared, fixating on the white-haired young man, his expression treacherous, “Yi Ruisi was always trailing after you.” 

“Oh.” Zong Jiu lazily yawned.
“Did he trail after me out in the open? Why didn’t I see him? Could it be that just because someone’s tailing me, that I’m responsible for his personal safety as well? Do I look like such a good-hearted man?”

The two groups faced off through the door frame of the mud house, the animosity heavy in the air.

Just at this moment, another dark and blurry silhouette once again emerged from the rainy night.

The two groups looked over there in unison. 

Black-Robed Azan was walking in the rain.

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Icy rain pounded down from a high altitude, streaming over the Garuda tattoo on his head.
His black robes were drenched, hanging heavily on his frame, rainwater dripping down the wet fabric with every step he took.

 

He was holding his shoulder.
Crimson blood seeped from between his fingers, and his complexion looked unsightly.

Everyone watching audibly took in a sharp, chilly inhale, the sound rising and falling in succession. 

Even Zhuge An, who had stayed out of it all this while, showed some interest.

He was No.
3.
Black-Robed Azan was No.
4.
In a certain sense, by the demarcation of strength as judged by the system, they were very close in strength.

No.
4 getting injured went lengths to show the severity of this matter.

Let alone the trainees, even the bullet chat was busy flooding the screen. 

[Wtf how did a bigshot like Black-Robed Azan get injured.
Was he moving solo just now?]

[Yeah.
Camera time won’t be given to those who move solo in the second instance.
Very curious.]

[Something that can injure Black-Robed Azan?? Fuck me, this instance is horrifying, mama I’m scared.]

Under everyone’s unwavering attention, Black-Robed Azan released his hand, revealing the hideous black wound beneath. 

Oddly, despite how long he had held it, fresh blood continued to gush from the wound, mixing and rapidly diluting with the icy rainwater.

We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection.
If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.

The experienced veterans cried out in astonishment.

Qbecvr ilxf atlr, bcfr atja kfgf tjgv ab tfji, kfgf fjrlis gfmbuclhjyif jr kbecvr lcoilmafv ys j qbkfgoei Tlc fcalas.

Dijmx-Ebyfv Chjc ygbeuta akb qlfmfr bo lcobgwjalbc. 

“Ktf kbwjc lc atf kbbvrtfv lr vfjv.”

Po fnfc Ibcu Ale jcv atf gfra mbeiv atlcx bo atja kbwjc jr j ygfjxatgbeut qblca obg atf ajrx lc atlr lcrajcmf, kts kbeivc’a j nfafgjc glmt lc fzqfglfcmf?

So, after Black-Robed Azan finished scouting for the necessary information and verifying the hypothesis in his mind, he went straight to the woodshed at the northern side of the village.

By the time he reached the woodshed, the sky had already turned dark. 

There were several villagers guarding the woodshed previously.
But by night, these villagers had disappeared.

Intuitively feeling suspicious, Black-Robed Azan summoned a small ghost to eavesdrop in the village head’s mud house for news.

 

Then, he heard a conversation.

“Dad, what should we do about that stinky wife? The traffickers will be here tomorrow!” 

Wang Shou anxiously paced inside the mud house.
He sounded extremely agitated and restless.

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“I warned you not to go too far.”

The village head fiercely struck the bed with his tobacco pipe.
“A whole twenty yuan!”

In the days of famine, twenty yuan was a fortune. 

The young girl Wang Shou had previously sold fetched him six yuan.
Six yuan could cover the family’s expenses for half a year, not to mention twenty yuan.

Wang Shou also regretted it.
“I only wanted to have some fun with the boys, how could I have known that that wench would have such a hot temper.”

“Forget it, what’s done is done.
We still have business to take care of tonight.
Make the proper preparations tomorrow, then bring the meat to the market at the west entrance to sell the following day.
If we’re lucky it can sell for at least a yuan or two.”

The village head wasn’t through.
“Leave half for ourselves.
Store it in the water tank in the back, then we won’t have to worry about lasting the winter.” 

…

The information contained in this conversation was shocking, not only verifying but also adding to his previous speculation.

Black-Robed Azan instructed the small ghost to keep an eye on the two people in the mud house, then went straight to the woodshed.

If he wasn’t mistaken, the woman should be dead. 

If a person was only recently deceased, their soul wouldn’t immediately go down to the nether world.
As long as the corpse was still intact, Black-Robed Azan could try to draw out the soul with his Spirit Summoning Streamer, getting clues from the mouth of the dead.

The woodshed reeked of the strong stench of blood.

The woman was collapsed on the ground, her hands bound together.
Her body had stiffened, covered with specks of semen and dark-purplish bruises, not a single part unmarred.

There was a gaping, bloody hole in her forehead.
Her eyes had rolled upwards into white. 

A bloodstained woodcutting knife rested on a woodpile to one side.

Perhaps it was that her own daughter had been sold off, and that she herself was captured to suffer abject humiliation here, thus developing a death wish.

 

Black-Robed Azan silently recited a few incantations.
After making sure that there was nothing unusual in the surroundings, he squatted down with the Soul Summoning Streamer, getting ready to start summoning the spirit.

And it was right at this moment that a change suddenly occurred! 

The corpse’s eyes suddenly rolled over, turning from hollow white to limpid black.

Her bloodied fingernails lengthened ferociously, clawing at Black-Robed Azan who wasn’t able to dodge in time within a moment, leaving behind a corrosive wound festering with Yin energy.

“I was careless.”

It wasn’t anything too major, nor too minor. 

In actuality, Black-Robed Azan could have completely avoided it.
This was because before getting ready to summon the spirit, he had even purposefully sensed for whether this woman carried any resentment in her heart, preventing the other from sinking into madness to become a malevolent demon.

However, there wasn’t.
He didn’t sense the slightest demonic aura from her.

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When it came to dealing with ghosts, Black-Robed Azan could claim to be the best of the best amongst all the trainees.
Even Yin-Yang Master only raised shikigami, not ghosts.

It was a serious problem if even he hadn’t sensed any resentment from demonic transformation. 

This meant that the supernatural beings in this village were not regular ghosts that had turned into malevolent demons.

“Oh, I know this.”

Zong Jiu cut in.
“It’s that the human heart had turned demonic.
Grandma Yin from the temple said so.”

Black-Robed Azan frowned.
“It’s not that easy for a human heart to turn demonic, unless the extreme temporal, geographical, and social conditions… nevermind that.” 

“There’s one more piece of information.”

His expression was austere.
“The people of this village have the proclivity for cannibalism.”

As expected.

Zong Jiu wasn’t surprised. 

Even before mentioning his strange task to “find a perfect corpse”, anyone who had an inkling of the dark side of history would know that in times of famine throughout the ages, eating human flesh wasn’t any kind of uncommon phenomenon.

Leaving aside the days of antiquity, the Qing dynasty had the North China Famine of 1876-1879, the Republican Era had a three-year crop failure in its 17-19th year, and even the recent history of 1959-1961 saw three years of widespread famine due to the policies of the Great Leap Forward and people’s communes.

 

But in all famines, the scenery remained unchanging.

How bitter and desperate was the landscape of famine? 

Digging up tree bark and roots, eating raw vegetables, eating Guanyin soil… as long as it was edible, it would be used to satiate their hunger and fill their stomachs.

Entrenched in an abominable situation, cannibalism had similarly become a matter of course.

For mankind, food was necessary for survival.
If the most basic necessities of survival couldn’t be guaranteed, then morality and law would be reduced to meaningless sheets of empty writing.

In all famines, ultimately, even corpses would turn into a lavish feast. 

“A Record of the Northern Disaster” and “Lamenting the Northern Disaster” had documented and depicted the horrific atrocities of the Northern Chinese Famine.
As long as someone died of starvation, countless would flock over to the area, even digging up the decaying bodies from the ground and cooking them in pots.
Some parents couldn’t bear to eat their own children, so they would swap them with the children of others.
Eventually, the situation devolved into murder for flesh to eat.

The late Ming poet Qu Dajun wrote a poem called “Elegy of the Human Offal”, describing the way people never had enough to eat during times of great famine.
In order to allow the survival of her husband, a woman had willingly gone to the market to be “human offal”.

Human offal were, as the name suggested, naturally humans who went to the market to sell themselves as food.
With human flesh openly sold in the market, one could well imagine the living purgatory of those days.

“Wait, something doesn’t quite line up.” 

Just when everyone was still reeling from the information Black-Robed Azan brought, Zhuge An suddenly furrowed his brows.

“The market opens in the morning.
If Wang Shou wanted to sell human flesh, he would minimally have to arrange for the butcher to wash and cut it overnight.
So why are they waiting for the following day to sell it instead of tomorrow?”

Black-Robed Azan gave a start.
“I didn’t notice this either.
I think they said they were going to the temple tonight.”

At this, many people’s faces paled. 

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Black-Robed Azan had not moved with Zong Jiu’s group, so there was information that he was still unaware of.

For example, when they left the temple, Grandma Yin had specifically warned them that the temple didn’t open at night and that they could only find her in the day.

Combining it with the cold look the village head had when he came out of the temple and that those villagers were taking advantage of the night to head over, it was abundantly clear what evil intentions they harbored.

Zong Jiu’s expression turned stern.
“Let’s go.
Something might have happened.” 

In the end, just as his words fell, at the very moment that everyone rushed into the pouring rain, the cold mechanical voice of the system resounded.

[Mole identity card.
Main task: find a perfect corpse – Failed.]

 

It wasn’t only Zong Jiu.
The others also received a notification.

[Normal identity card.
Main task: protect the villagers – Failed.] 

At once, everyone was dumbfounded.

[The main tasks of both camps have failed.
Evaluation is unable to proceed.
Famine Mountain Village is now restarting…]

In the blink of an eye, the heavy downpour halted.

The surrounding scenery streamed, changing around them, and returning to stillness. 

Not far away, the human traffickers were pulling their small cart, unhurriedly walking towards the village entrance of Tongbai village.

Nearby, Wang Shou and the villagers were pooling their efforts to bind the girl tighter.

Whereas the trainees were standing in an empty square, unable to move their feet, only able to watch the plot introduction unfold once again.

The same look of startlement was splashed across each and every of their faces. 

No one knew why the tasks of both camps would fail at the exact same moment.
Much less did anyone know why the task, despite being dictated as a seven-day task, was only on its third day when it was directly terminated across the board.

They were completely lost; the bullet chat even more so.
Everyone was trying to get a word in at once, closely monitoring the live broadcast for new developments.

[Famine Mountain Village has been successfully restarted.]

[This is the final restart of this instance.
If the task isn’t successfully completed, the whole team will be immediately eliminated.] 

[Extracting the instance’s punishment mode…]

[Punishment mode extraction complete.]

All the trainees suddenly felt a long-lost hunger burning like fire in the pits of their stomachs.

[“Hunger” value has been forcibly opened.] 

[The maximum hunger value is 60.
If the value drops to 0, you will instantly die.
Please make sure to satiate your hunger.]

[Mole protection is switched off.
Please note that mole props can no longer be kept in the system backpack.]