Duya never expected that a brief moment of distraction would allow Bubble Shadow to escape through the window.
He tried to give chase, only to find that the vines previously wrapped around Bubble Shadow were now bound tightly to his own body.
Something seemed to be moving in the darkness.
“Damn it!”
Duya had no choice but to untangle the vines before rushing off to pursue her.
“Big Brother, who was that older sister just now?”
Just as he took his first step, Bulanni’s voice rang out.
The young, innocent girl looked at Duya with wide, glittering eyes, asking out of curiosity.
“That sister was so pretty. Is she your girlfriend, Big Brother?”
Hearing Bulanni’s voice, Duya finally calmed down a little.
He looked up into the depths of the darkness; the old man had vanished, seemingly retreating into that bedroom along with the pot of mushroom soup on the floor.
But the possibility of him coming back out could not be ruled out, so for Bulanni’s safety, Duya spoke to the little one.
“You go back to your room and sleep first. I’m going to chase after that person.”
“Mm-hmm!”
Bulanni nodded.
She was naturally a very obedient and sensible child, and although she was curious about their relationship, she returned to the bedroom.
Watching the little girl’s retreating back, Duya looked at the room next door.
Regardless of whether the old man would attack Bulanni, for the sake of caution, he lit the lamp on the table again and placed it at the entrance of Bulanni’s bedroom.
Only after finishing all this did he pursue her.
However, once he climbed through the window and reached the outside world, he suddenly felt countless gazes land upon him.
This sensation of being stared at by the masses made a chill run down Duya’s spine.
The street was clearly empty, yet where were these gazes coming from?
He looked around, and at that moment, he finally saw the source of the stares.
In the windows of every house nearby, one could vaguely see pair after pair of crimson eyes.
At this time, Bubble Shadow’s playful, mocking voice echoed in the surroundings.
“I advise you, it would be best to go back~”
One had to admit, Bubble Shadow was far more cunning and insidious than he had imagined.
Capturing her was impossible with the tools he currently possessed.
He needed professional equipment capable of containing the grotesque.
Otherwise, even if he tied her up, the moment she was given even the slightest opportunity, she would turn into foam and escape.
So, should he continue the chase?
Looking at the empty street, Duya took a deep breath, and then took the step forward to pursue her anyway.
Regardless of everything, at least Bubble Shadow’s power was weak right now, but if he dragged this out, it would be very difficult to take her down once she recovered.
It was already the dead of night, and despite the moon above, Moon Crescent Town was exceptionally dark.
Duya followed Bubble Shadow’s scent and chased ahead.
His footsteps echoed endlessly through the empty street.
However, with every step he ran, the surrounding houses distorted, and the red eyes in the windows began to stir before disappearing completely.
Duya did not know where they had gone, but he was certain that the environment before him was becoming increasingly distorted and decayed.
The floor began to melt, and every time he lifted his boots, they trailed viscous, unidentifiable slime.
At this moment, Duya felt his brain pulsing with pain, as if something were forcibly pushing its way into his mind.
Countless grotesque bursts of laughter echoed from all directions, though he could not tell if these sounds were reality or auditory hallucinations.
But one thing was certain.
Ye Xiao’s information hadn’t lied to him; the nights in this town were indeed extremely dangerous.
If an ordinary person saw this situation, they would likely have instantly transformed into an irrational Berserker.
Perhaps due to consuming that mass of unknown flesh earlier, Duya only felt a slight headache for now.
“To hell with it.”
Even so, he stopped his footsteps.
What was worse, a large number of figures appeared in the street; these people were all walking step by step toward Duya like melting candles.
When they were close enough, dense, chaotic arrays of eyes opened on their melted faces.
They seemed to speak with a single voice, emitting an eerie murmur.
“Join us…”
“Join us…”
The scene in Duya’s eyes became even more broken; the buildings on the street seemed to begin writhing, bricks turning into rotting chunks of meat, doors and windows becoming fangs and teeth, as even more maddening whispers filled his ears.
The eerie voice drew closer and closer, as if roaring directly at Duya.
Amidst this maddening sound, Duya’s vision blurred bit by bit.
He realized the danger, but when he tried to back away, he found that a large number of shattered figures had suddenly appeared around him; they wailed incessantly, emitting shrill, agonizing cries.
Hand after hand grabbed his trouser legs, attempting to drag him down into hell with them.
The clamorous noise in his ears amplified, shouting and screaming; in this increasingly distorted world, which felt like a hallucination, the strength in his limbs faded away.
At this moment, Duya felt as if he were being trampled beneath a crowd.
Unable to move…
Unable to breathe…
Unable to think…
His consciousness was being destroyed…
His body was shattering bit by bit…
He seemed destined to join them, becoming one of the “people” here who could never escape.
….
On the other side, after fleeing far enough, Bubble Shadow pulled up her dress and retied the cord.
The girl, feeling both embarrassed and annoyed, patted her own face, forcing herself to calm down.
Although her panties had been seen, as long as she treated the other person like a pet dog, it wouldn’t matter.
Who would care about the gaze of a pet dog?
Bubble Shadow relaxed, pushed open her own door, and changed back into her Fuyeli form.
She was certainly not a roaming grotesque; in fact, she had been disguising herself quite well in this game world.
She even had her own independent identity.
No one knew her true appearance, and no one knew of her status as a grotesque.
In this terrifying town, everyone assumed she was just a minor spirit without much power.
But precisely because she had lived in this place for a while, she knew very well what happened at night.
That was exactly why she had advised Duya not to follow her.
Once deep night arrived, this eerie little town truly would eat people.
“That guy shouldn’t be stupid enough to chase after me, right? He’s an investigator, after all, he couldn’t be that reckless…”
Thinking this, Fuyeli looked out the window, and then she saw Duya half-kneeling on the ground, still attempting to crawl forward…
At that moment, she really wanted to curse.
“How did an S-class investigator like you even manage to survive this long?!”