Blue Mountain Psychiatric Hospital 7

After entering, Xie Fangcheng looked around.

This was an operating room. It looked as though the previous operation had ended only moments ago. Fresh arterial spray spattered the area beside the operating table, and suspicious blood clots lay on the floor.

"Hm?"

Xie Fangcheng walked over and lowered his head to examine the blood on the floor.

The color had barely changed. It looked like someone had been operating here just minutes before he broke down the door.

Xie Fangcheng sighed.

If he'd known, he would have come up to the third floor sooner. He might have caught them red-handed.

Drip. Drop.

The back of Xie Fangcheng's hand went cold.

He looked down and found a drop of red liquid on it.

Xie Fangcheng raised his head and met the gazes of five or six pairs of eyes on the ceiling.

An "octopus" that covered nearly the entire ceiling was staring at him.

Calling it an octopus wasn't quite accurate. It had octopus tentacles, but its tentacles were covered in eyes, teeth, and mouths from who knew what species. Its octopus head was flat, as if half of it had been sliced away and a bizarre fish head sewn in its place.

Fresh chunks of meat still hung from the fish mouth. Its fish eyes stared down at Xie Fangcheng, while a suspicious liquid mixed with blood dripped from its mouth again, splattering onto the floor in front of him.

"An octopus..." Xie Fangcheng scratched his head.

He had no idea how to communicate with something like this. There was no way he could ask where Dr. Han was.

Xie Fangcheng was generous about it. "Forget it. I'll run into someone humanoid sooner or later, right?"

He closed the door.

A minute or two later, the door opened again.

In his right hand, Xie Fangcheng held a bent steel pipe. He had pried it off a prep table in the cafeteria kitchen when he passed through the first floor.

There had only been four of them to begin with. He hadn't conserved them early on, and this was the last one that still barely resembled a stick.

He needed to find somewhere to pry off another one.

In his left hand was the only clean piece of cloth he could find in the room: a white lab coat from the cabinet. Clever Manager Xie had deliberately avoided hitting the cabinet earlier, so it was now the only intact thing in the room. It also held quite a few documents.

Xie Fangcheng flipped through a few. They were all about some kind of experiment. He couldn't understand them, so he decisively folded them up, stuffed them into his pocket, and planned to give them to Qi Chanyang.

This sort of mental work was obviously not his strong suit!

Xie Fangcheng carefully used the white lab coat to wipe down the steel pipe, quickly restoring its shine.

Being a particular sort of man, he didn't forget to close the door on his way out. The lock was completely broken, though, and it made a creaking sound in the deathly silent third floor.

The red lights in the corridor flickered faintly.

Xie Fangcheng stepped out of the room. Manager Xie was a civic-minded man and didn't litter. He found a trash can on the third floor, ignored the strange writhing thing inside it, and stuffed the white lab coat in.

There wasn't a soul around. Not even someone he could chat with.

Even an NPC to talk to would do.

Xie Fangcheng slung the steel pipe back over his shoulder and hummed a song out of boredom.

His footsteps and singing drifted through the third floor.

"I'm a little painter, a painter hmm-hmm fine. I'll paint the hmm-hmm-hmm-hmm, till it's hmm-hmm-hmm... Knock, knock, knock. Hello? Anyone there?"

......

Second floor.

Qi Chanyang brought Gu Shanshan to Room One.

The No. 1 NPC was lying on the floor. His hair and arms had returned to the length they had been at mealtime, and his wounds were slowly healing. He looked as though he would recover before dawn.

There was no helping it. The door to No. 9's room was broken, and the whole place was strewn with trash, as if it were under renovation. Ge Juan, carrying her plastic bucket, might come knocking again at any time.

The two NPCs in Room Four had both collapsed on the floor. It was impossible to tell whether they had taken each other down or what had happened. That room was a complete mess as well.

Only Room One was suitable. Qi Chanyang had been careful when fighting the NPC, and the other party had clearly been careful too. One man and one monster had both tried their best not to damage the room's furnishings, and the floor was still fairly clean.

After they arrived in the room, Qi Chanyang moved Patient No. 1 onto the bed and did a little cleaning.

Then Qi Chanyang looked at Gu Shanshan apologetically.

"I need to go look for Xie Fangcheng, then see if I can find any clues."

He had promised that kid he would find him as soon as possible. He didn't know what condition he was in now, but if he was still alive and waiting for him, Qi Chanyang didn't want him to die disappointed.

There was also the unmarked room beside the cafeteria on the first floor. There had to be something inside.

Based on what they knew so far, every day the doctor NPCs made the players take medicine. If a player didn't take it, the patient NPC in the same room wouldn't take it either.

Taking the pills for three days was almost certainly a death sentence.

Veteran players like Qi Chanyang could naturally avoid taking the medicine and survive in the instance for three days.

But even a calm and capable new player like Gu Shanshan had nearly died in her room.

They had to find another way.

There had clearly been few clues on the first floor, where they had been active that day, and the doctors had kept watching them.

Only at night, when the doctors and patients were gone, was it best to search for clues.

They would have to face other unknown NPCs, but at least there probably wouldn't be more of them than during the day.

They couldn't delay any longer. The NPCs in this instance were even more formidable than Qi Chanyang had expected.

Today was only the first day, the safest day in an instance. As the number of players dwindled after this, the NPCs' range of activity would grow, and the killing rules would become more brutal.

Gu Shanshan was afraid too, but she knew she was currently a burden, so she nodded. "Be careful, Brother Qi."

Qi Chanyang sorted through the items in his System Inventory and took out several to hand to Gu Shanshan.

"Unless something else holds me up, I'll come down once every fifteen minutes. If there's danger, these should hold out for a while."

Gu Shanshan did not refuse.

"Don't worry, Brother Qi. If I really use these up, I'll pay you back later."

Qi Chanyang didn't mention the ninety percent mortality rate for new players. He smiled too. "All right."

With that, Qi Chanyang gripped Gift of the Whale Fall tightly once more, took a deep breath, and opened the door.

The pitch-black corridor was like a man-eating beast, waiting for its prey to fall into its trap again.

Something upstairs was roaring. It also seemed to be slamming against the walls, sending out huge bangs.

Qi Chanyang planned to wait until the third floor quieted down before taking a look. He needed to check the first floor first.

When people were afraid, they tended to hide in familiar surroundings. Clearly, if Xie Fangcheng was still alive, there was a good chance he would be hiding in the reading room or the badminton court on the first floor.

When he reached the stairs leading to the first floor, Qi Chanyang had just taken out the master key when he looked down.

The lock on the iron door... was gone?

He hurriedly searched carefully and soon saw the lock lying on the stairs. Something had torn it apart by force.

Qi Chanyang's eyelid twitched.

His body had already been strengthened by the System six times, but these locks were clearly System-made: sturdy and secure, difficult to remove with brute force.

What kind of terrifyingly powerful NPC would it take to rip a lock apart?

Faced with an NPC like that, Qi Chanyang doubted he would even have a chance to run.

Was it the Director?

Qi Chanyang looked toward the first floor.

He gritted his teeth. In the end, he still pushed open the door and headed down to the first floor.