Jiang Huaying hadn’t run far when she heard strange and intense noises from behind her.
She covered her head and looked back.
The forest, dark and chilling, had come alive!
Swelling blackened tree branches writhed like furious snakes, and in the blink of an eye, they coiled around a person’s torso.
That person only managed a cry of shock before being dragged beneath the roots.
During the chaos, the frenzied branches, whether intentionally or not, destroyed many of the tiny hovering cameras scattered around the two-legged sheep.
What was once a plentiful number of cameras was now reduced to just a few scattered ones.
The Nose Ring Man slashed a branch attacking him with a knife, and when he saw the reddish-brown “blood” oozing from the broken wood, his expression grew more and more deranged.
“Pffft! Hah!”
A thicker tree trunk suddenly slid through his chest from behind.
The Nose Ring Man froze for a few seconds, then lowered his head in disbelief.
The breaking wood still clung to his flesh.
Immediately afterward, he was thrown to the ground like trash, his limbs twisted and broken beyond recognition.
Jiang Huaying turned her head just in time to see this scene.
Terrified to the core, her face turned deathly pale, and a wave of nausea surged up her chest.
Her pain seemed to give Sinclair immense pleasure.
The god watched without blinking, the thrill of revenge burning hotter and hotter.
Jiang Huaying forced herself to suppress the nausea and kept running forward.
The two-legged sheep that had gathered dispersed into the forest once again.
Only the injured leg man still carried his weapon, blood of unknown origin oozing from his body, stubbornly trailing behind Jiang Huaying.
His already fragile sanity was completely shattered by the recent abnormal events.
Jiang Huaying’s pace slowed more and more; every breath felt like her chest was being ripped apart, agonizing beyond endurance.
Her previous escape had drained all her strength.
She fell to the ground again and tried several times to get up, but failed.
Her silver-white hair hung messily on both cheeks, losing its shine.
Behind them, more moving black thick branches than before surrounded them from all sides.
Just as they were about to coil around the injured leg man, they suddenly stopped simultaneously.
As if sensing something, they twisted and rolled on the ground a few times, then obediently retreated.
Sinclair would not allow anyone to spoil the show.
All this was what they deserved — the price of deceit and abandonment.
In just a few seconds, the injured leg man staggered to Jiang Huaying’s back.
He muttered incoherently, fully possessed: “Kill you… Why… why are you living so well… There must be something good… Kill… kill you…”
Jiang Huaying was no fool.
Supporting herself on one arm, she painfully crawled forward.
Her fair fingertips dug deeply into the black soil, the extreme contrast of colors striking an indescribable feeling of desolate beauty.
The glowing hunting pupils on the trees rotated slowly at the same pace.
Cat vision is six times more sensitive than a human’s, and Sinclair was no ordinary cat.
Her movements appeared slow and clumsy to the god.
Her desperate struggle for survival was futile; the god could have killed her countless times in this short span.
Sinclair’s gaze shifted upward, landing on Jiang Huaying’s face.
Dirty, tender cheeks were marked by two tear tracks, transparent pearls silently falling.
Sinclair felt the burning flame in her chest begin to surge like a tidal wave.
Damp, cold mold boiled up from underground, growing recklessly.
The sharp and exquisitely perfect brows and eyes were gradually shrouded in a layer of oppressive gloom.
The injured leg man raised his weapon, aiming for the back of Jiang Huaying’s neck.
The Energy Storage Slot hit 100%, the green light flickered on.
His frostbitten index finger curled forcefully!
…No response?
He looked down in confusion and saw a bloodline emerging from his wrist.
Just as he showed a puzzled expression, the sound of flesh sliding and falling reached his ears.
The hand holding the weapon was severed clean at the wrist.
“Ahhhhhh—”
The injured leg man let out a piercing scream, clutching his severed hand as he staggered backward, stepping on a protruding root and falling to the ground.
The next second, several tree branches burst from underground, ripping him to pieces and dragging them away.
When Jiang Huaying looked back again, the injured leg man was nowhere to be seen.
Only a faint blood mist floated in the forest.
She covered her pounding heart, her expression a mix of shock and bewilderment.
Before she could make sense of what had happened, darkness overtook her, and she lost consciousness.
In her final blurry sight before fainting, Jiang Huaying thought she saw a pair of ghostly yellow cat pupils emerging from the dense darkness.
Faintly, she also heard the familiar sound of metal cracking.
The girl’s body went limp and collapsed downward.
A thicker-than-the-others branch suddenly sprouted from somewhere, firmly supporting her back.
Other branches twitched, eager to coil around her ankles and wrists, pressing close to her skin, but restrained by some unknown fear, they didn’t advance, all staring sharply in one direction.
Sinclair stepped out from the shadows, silently treading on the dry leaves like a ghost.
Her eyes locked on the unconscious girl, no longer suppressing any emotion.
The cat pupils blazed brightly — wild and ferocious.
“I will kill you,” the weak voice rasped like gnawing on Jiang Huaying’s flesh.
“You must die by my hands.”
At her words, the surrounding branches twisted a few times.
First pointing at Jiang Huaying, then making a hugging gesture, shaking left and right a few times, their tips tapping symbolically.
Sinclair’s expression instantly turned cold.
“Even if it’s a corpse, it belongs to me.”
Rejected, the branches drooped pitifully.
When Jiang Huaying woke up again, she was somewhere else.
She knew the place had changed because the ground beneath her was flat and hard, like cement.
But she had no idea where she was.
Complete darkness surrounded her; she couldn’t see a thing.
Jiang Huaying didn’t have claustrophobia, but she was afraid of the dark.
In this pitch-black place that seemed to swallow even one’s sense of self, every extra second was enough to drive a person mad.
She even felt her breathing growing difficult.
“Is anyone there?” Her panicked voice echoed out.
It didn’t carry far before being compressed and muffled, finally swallowed by the darkness.
Even more terrifying!
Jiang Huaying curled up in fear, never having missed the Butcher this much before.
Whether it was the strong arms or the slums she came from, she longed for them all.
She hoped the Butcher would find her quickly but knew clearly that at this moment, she could only rely on herself.
Jiang Huaying slowly moved, trying to figure out her surroundings by touch.
The unknown is the scariest.
Every inch forward was a tremendous challenge.
She bit her lower lip hard but still let out broken sobs through the gap, sounding like a kitten’s weak cry for help.
Suddenly, the thick blackness flickered.
Two faint yellow lights brightened!
Starting as tiny dots, they gradually enlarged and approached.
Jiang Huaying stiffened like prey targeted by a predator, unable to move: “Don’t… don’t kill me… please.”
Her choked voice was like a sharp blade, tearing back and forth through the softest flesh.
The darkness roiled violently for a moment, then a sharp cat’s meow pierced the air!
Shrill and piercing, full of resentment, violence, obsession, bitterness, and loss.
All conflicted emotions clashed inside, nowhere to vent.
The darkness vanished, and the scene before her shifted suddenly.
Jiang Huaying was standing on a deserted commercial street.
For a moment, she thought she had returned to the real world.
Everything on the street was too similar to reality; a wave of familiarity washed over her.
But she was still inside the game, maybe even still trapped in that eerie forest.
This place felt like a mirage, or rather, a Dream Core.
The street looked as if it was extracted from her memories, familiar yet eerily strange.
For example, the colors here were bright and vivid, like highly saturated illustrations.
There were many signs of human activity on the street, but not a single person to be seen; the entire street radiated a strange emptiness.
There were also some chaotic physical rules, twisted object details…
But it was still better than the completely black world just now.
Jiang Huaying stood still, calming herself for quite a while.
Until the fear of being trapped in the dark gradually subsided and the numbness in her limbs disappeared, she cautiously took a step forward.
Most shops on the street were inaccessible; either the doors were closed or cluttered with messy junk.
Only one dilapidated pet hospital had its doors wide open, as if waiting for her to enter.
Jiang Huaying took a deep breath and stepped inside.
The hospital’s name was Nido Pet Hospital.
Judging from the interior facilities and decor, it was once a high-end chain pet hospital.
She didn’t know how to get out, so she resorted to her previous escape room tactics, searching around.
At the front desk was a record book listing medical consultations.
Many of the handwriting entries were blurred, but a few readable treatment records included: X-rays of limbs, Debridement, Internal Fixation for Fractures, Tail Amputation, Intensive Care Inpatient Ward.
After these treatments, the same little fellow’s name appeared repeatedly, indicating it had suffered a lot.
But the little fellow’s name was also smudged; she could only vaguely make out “Sin…air.”
Jiang Huaying went to the back of the hospital, which seemed to be the Inpatient Ward.
She saw many things belonging to S little friends.
There were cages with name tags, leashes, water cups, feeding bowls, toys…
She even spotted a small room with a window and air conditioning, the door also labeled with the name of a third little friend.
As she turned, a file folder suddenly fell from a shelf.
Jiang Huaying stopped and bent down to pick it up.
Opening to the first page.
The file recorded annual data after five little friends recovered.
She flipped to the second page.
The five little friends were actually a group of kittens.
Continuing to flip.
The kittens’ initial physical stats were poor, looking very weak.
In the game, the kittens’ level was the lowest, E.
But soon, their stats began to skyrocket.
Within a year, they soared directly to 553!
Sinclair, merged with the shadows, was closely watching Jiang Huaying’s every move.
The god decided not to kill her just yet.
That would be too cheap.
The god wanted her to regret her past foolishness!
But she would never be forgiven.
Even if she knelt on the ground begging, repenting a hundred times a day, using every trick to please Sinclair, the god would never forgive her!
Focused on the file, Jiang Huaying didn’t notice the dense evil aura constantly emanating from the shadow behind her.
Her flipping sped up.
The kitten’s form changed.
From a small bundle, it kept growing, its color darkening.
By the last page, the huge dark shadow was indescribable, transformed into a nameless black monster.
Beside the image, a crooked line of words read — “Devourer’s Eye.”
“Throat! Hah!”
Jiang Huaying slammed the folder shut.
The words of the curly-haired youth echoed again in her ear: “The boss-level monster in the Swamp Light Forest — Devourer’s Eye.”
Run!
Run fast!
Only one thought remained in Jiang Huaying’s mind.
The moment she ran out the hospital’s door, the entire building shook violently.
Spiderweb-like cracks spread at a grotesque speed across all the walls.
Flickering light bulbs exploded one after another!
The concentrated shadow rapidly expanded, finally turning into a black monster as tall as a hill, with two huge, bulbous, bright yellow eyes embedded in the center.
An incredible roar of hatred thundered through the sky.
Hypocritical humans! Fickle humans!
The god wanted to crush every one of her bones!
At the same moment, a frantic system prompt rang in Jiang Huaying’s mind.
【Suggested: Host stop running and face the challenge directly.】
“Get lost!” Jiang Huaying screamed inside her head.
She would never go back!
Because the alert tone kept ringing madly in her ears.
【Black Fog Density +1】
【Black Fog Density +1】
【Black Fog Density +1】
【Black Fog Density +1】
【Black Fog Density +1】
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