Two hours earlier.
When Xiao Gui'an finished creating the [Writer], the sky outside, which had been gloomy but could still barely be considered daytime, had completely darkened.
Unlike the brightly lit, all-night-illuminated metropolises of the real world, the horror game world was dead silent and desolate. It was essentially a ghost city, a world created and bound by rules, and when the game hadn't started, there wasn't a trace of life's breath.
He stretched his somewhat sore shoulders.
This was because Xiao Gui'an hadn't fully merged with the [Writer]'s corpse yet.
Seeing that the clock on the wall had already pointed to 9:30, and thinking about his mission, Xiao Gui'an fell silent for a moment. He still didn't know if he'd have time for information gathering after setting up the [Student] later.
Whatever, since I'm here, I'll make the best of it. I'll rest a bit more before going out.
Feeling like his brain was oxygen-deprived from thinking.
Xiao Gui'an went to the balcony to breathe some fresh air and adjust his mood.
Outside Sunshine Residential Area was also an unknown region. In some distant, immeasurable place, it seemed like some eerie and terrifying enormous creature was slowly writhing, accompanied by fleeting bloody red flashes, standing tall within the entire world.
But none of this concerned Xiao Gui'an. His cozy little home isolated him from everything.
He leisurely filled the watering can with water, then watered those extremely well-maintained potted plants of his, one pot after another.
A distorted black shadow hidden in another building secretly gripped the balcony railing, revealing half of its small head, watching Xiao Gui'an's direction with hollow eyes, but couldn't see clearly.
Xiao Gui'an didn't notice this watching gaze. Because he was in a good mood, he hummed a few unknown tunes, carrying a slight aura that didn't belong to this era.
Completely unaware that the softly hummed songs traveled further and further, so conspicuous in this silent world.
The slowly writhing enormous creature in the distance slightly halted its forward movement. Countless tentacles resembling snail eyes turned slightly toward Xiao Gui'an's direction, the protruding large blood-red eyeballs gently rotating as if detecting something.
Then—
It changed direction, heading toward where Xiao Gui'an was.
The distance seemed very far, and its movement speed appeared slow, but given its massive size, it could instantly stretch across wide roads, with half a city crawling beneath its feet.
In just a few moments, it was very close to Xiao Gui'an's direction.
"Damn it, why did that 'Scavenger' change direction? What idiot is actually humming during Quiet Moment?!"
On a hidden tall tower to the west, a person dressed entirely in specialized clothing was holding up two round, vertically-pupiled eyeballs, constantly observing the movement direction of that enormous creature.
Within these masses of deadly black mist, the eyeballs held by this seemingly lively baby-faced young man, Chang Mingrui, were actually a mid-level ghost object, 'Peeping Eyes,' capable of briefly seeing through the black mist during the night's Quiet Moment.
After being modified by the bureau and processed with some special methods, they became similar to telescopes in the real world.
"That direction, aside from that special point school, based on previously gathered information, is unlikely to contain anything that could attract a 'Scavenger'."
"Of course, that's also beyond our speculation..."
A seemingly meticulous black-haired youth adjusted his glasses, holding a large notebook where he wrote and read.
When something different from usual occurred, facing a species that made one unable to muster even a shred of courage to resist, how could people not feel anxious and fearful.
Even though they were extremely far away now and in a place without game trigger points, their hands still trembled...
The high-ponytailed woman in the team with a long knife at her waist tightened her grip on the hilt, her body slightly tense.
In this world, taking one wrong step meant falling into an abyss. Not a single detail could be overlooked.
That they could stand here now was only after experiencing countless life-and-death moments, requiring courage and abilities ordinary people didn't possess.
The observation squad had always been the one with the highest mortality rate in the [Tianji] bureau.
The middle-aged man standing furthest back had a calm expression, an unlit cigarette dangling from his mouth. His face seemed to still have unhealed wounds, his gaze heavy as he also tried to penetrate the layers of black mist to see something.
He was clearly the central figure of this squad, the captain of the ninth investigation squad, Liu Feng.
No matter what this squad thought, countless ghosts and monsters detected something unusual this night.
Even ghosts could feel fear and terror.
Killing those weaker than themselves, submitting to those stronger—even in this distorted horror world, this remained an absolute truth.
The air seemed to become heavier with moisture, and the area outside the balcony felt darker than before, as if something was blocking it.
The black shadow in the other building had long disappeared without a trace due to the 'Scavenger's' approach, trembling as it hid inside the building.
Everything around was quiet, so quiet he could clearly hear his own breathing, sticky and heavy.
Wait—
Such loud breathing?
He realized that wasn't his own sound.
Xiao Gui'an looked up and saw the open space outside the balcony filled densely with things—numerous large red eyeballs staring unblinkingly at him, accompanied by a putrid, bloody smell.
What is this?!!!
Damn!
His pupils contracted violently. Facing the behemoth before him, Xiao Gui'an was momentarily speechless.
Those tentacle eyes slowly retracted. The 'Scavenger' slowly lowered its body, hiding its true eyes behind thick, dirty fur, but this didn't prevent it from seeing Xiao Gui'an.
It gently sniffed, perceiving Xiao Gui'an.
No intense despair or hatred, just some fear—not even enough to fill the gaps between its teeth.
But it was already half-full now, not particularly hungry.
Was it this little thing? Making strange sounds...
[It's really huge...]
Actually, the 'Scavenger' near Xiao Gui'an had shrunk countless times to see him clearly with its narrow eyes.
Now it was only about the height of a 10-story building.
When the 'Scavenger' retracted those extended tentacles back into its thick fur, Xiao Gui'an finally saw its full appearance.
Hmm—
How to put it? Although it smelled quite foul, the behemoth before him looked like a large brown-furred dog with overly long hair! Even its eyes were covered.
Although he felt his legs were too weak to walk, Xiao Gui'an still tried to remain calm.
At least superficially maintaining an unperturbed appearance.
Now that we're all ghosts, we can't die again, so why be afraid?
Ignorance is bliss.
[System, System, are you there? What's this before me?]
[Ding—]
['Stupefied, foolish, slow-moving, ugly-looking, brutal and terrifying world garbage cleaner—Scavenger'
Cities cleaned by them become cleaner!
No remains, no bloodstains.
They aren't picky eaters—they consume everything: despair, hatred, fear... all malice, all negative emotions can become their food.
They usually emerge during Quiet Moment in the night to clean cities. Their bodies are incredibly massive, existing between illusion and reality, able to freely change shape and size...']
[Level: Unknown]
[Power: Unknown]
[Current Status: Unknown]
[Not recommended for extensive contact with performer's current abilities—]
Of course, the System didn't say everything.
For example, a starving 'Scavenger' would eat anything. Even in the horror world, ghosts and monsters didn't want to provoke this thing unnecessarily.
Heaven knows it just went for a stroll and returned to find Xiao Gui'an had attracted such filthy thing. Its data was about to go haywire!
It hoped its adjectives would make Xiao Gui'an immediately retreat upon recognizing the difficulty and return to his room.
[Oh—so it's a hardworking city-cleaning big dog!]
Zero System:??!!
Were all those adjectives I just added wasted?
Did you not listen to a single word?
The System felt extremely puzzled.
"Really, look at it. Although it doesn't look particularly clean, it seems quite gentle, doesn't it?"
Xiao Gui'an's thought process was still quite peculiar.
With this explanation, he relaxed slightly again.
"OK, let me see who's daddy's good doggie~"
Directly touching it with his hand wasn't really possible.
Returning to the room to get a pair of gloves, Xiao Gui'an then gently opened the balcony safety lock, sat swinging his legs on the balcony railing edge, and reached his hand out toward the Scavenger.
The feeling upon touch was somewhat rough and prickly, but overall still quite soft. It just probably hadn't been cleaned for a long time, as that smell—as if it had crawled out of a pile of corpses and a garbage dump—lingered around Xiao Gui'an's nose.
But since he was a ghost now, he didn't have any particularly uncomfortable reaction to this smell. In his youth, his hometown had many Chinese rural dogs, so his dog-petting skills probably hadn't degraded too much.
The Scavenger actually made a slight purring-like sound.
"Aww, ugh... so good, good doggie~ ugh..."
Xiao Gui'an slightly narrowed his eyes, appearing quite relaxed.
Within the black mist that devoured all life, during this Quiet Moment when Scavengers roamed, the long-robed youth with a gentle, scholarly demeanor and bookish aura casually played with the extremely bizarre monster as if no one else was around, without a trace of fear on his face.
And that monster seemed to truly docilely lower its head, showing submission before the youth.
Yet on its back, countless enormous white bones and writhing tumors intertwined, making the entire world appear crowded. A sharp mouth like an abyss seemed to be chewing something, with what looked like human dismembered limbs and remains tumbling within.
The black-haired youth's peaceful aura made it seem like he wasn't interacting with a terrifying, massive monster, but rather brewing tea and listening to music in a tea room.
What a bizarre yet sacred scene!!!
Far on the other side, in the detection squad, Chang Mingrui, who had been secretly observing Sunshine Residential Area, breathed rapidly as if about to suffocate. His back was already soaked with cold sweat, his entire body trembling.
Liu Feng immediately noticed something wrong, quickly stepped forward to snatch the ghost object from Chang Mingrui's hands, and delivered a chop to the other's neck, pulling him out of that trance-like state.
After a while, Chang Mingrui slowly regained consciousness, but his complexion remained terrible, his lips trembling slightly, his eyes revealing terror. "I... I..."
He couldn't spit out a complete sentence for a long time.
"Deep breaths, meditate and calm down. Your horror value almost broke through the critical threshold just now. If the captain hadn't discovered it early, your brain might have exploded."
The bespectacled youth gently patted Chang Mingrui's shoulder. His voice indeed seemed to have a power that could calm people. Under his comfort, Chang Mingrui's breathing stabilized somewhat.
But given his condition, their detection mission for today probably had to end.
Liu Feng slowly crouched down, looking directly into Chang Mingrui's eyes, and asked in a deep voice, "What did you see?"
Chang Mingrui's body trembled, the bizarre, distorted scene still seemingly before his eyes as he spoke intermittently, "There... there was someone treating the Scavenger like a pet, playing with it... This... is too... too unbelievable!!—"