Underground Otherworld Player

Unlike other places, after walking through the dark passageway, the first thing that hit everyone's noses was an extremely strong smell of blood.

The unusually strong smell of rust permeating the air even made the Dead Zero frown slightly.

This was a rather small, gloomy Torture Chamber. Torch on both sides provided bright lighting, and in the firelight, a scene of utter chaos could be vaguely seen.

"A place like this..."

He covered his nose with his hand, Fireworks of Romance before he could finish a sentence, he felt as if he had kicked something.

When she looked down with a hint of confusion, she saw a long clump of black hair with a touch of scarlet that she had kicked aside. Upon seeing that thing, Fireworks of Romance's expression changed slightly.

This place, clearly Torture Room for punishing prisoners, couldn't possibly be a barbershop. So, that clump of hair I just kicked...

Covering her mouth tightly, Fireworks of Romance suddenly felt nauseous. Looking up at the white paper not far in front of her, she suddenly couldn't understand why the other person wanted to bring Anna into this kind of place.

Even a seasoned Player like her found the environment somewhat unbearable, let alone a little girl like Anna.

"... Where is Catherine?"

Clutching tightly at Bai Zhi's clothes with one hand, Anna, who had never seen such a cruel scene before her, was terribly pale.

She's right here.

His gaze shifted to the mangled, unrecognizable corpse on the rack, and Bai Zhi spoke calmly.

"Everyone in the castle has been Curse with mutated, including your parents. However, there are two exceptions within the castle."

"One is Anna, and the other is Catherine, Anna's personal Maid who takes care of her?"

Covering her nose tightly with one hand, Fireworks of Romance began to speak, seemingly somewhat dazed.

"So, if that's the case, Catherine wasn't Curse because of Anna's influence, and if the Doll Curse can counteract the Mutation Curse... then Anna is the main body of the Doll Curse?"

"You're overthinking it. Whether it's the [Mutation Curse] or the [Doll Curse], they're just different forms of Anomaly. The source of the [Mutation Curse] is easy to find; it originates from the thousands of Blood-Red Tentacles hanging down from the Lead-Gray Clouds above Rose Manor. But the source of the [Doll Curse] isn't Anna. She's just a common, innocent child who was persecuted... at most, she has some peculiarities in certain aspects."

Walking slowly to the rack, Bai Zhi reached out and picked up the incongruous Plush Cat that was placed to the side.

"Some things are not as simple as they seem on the surface. Various mysteries are intertwined and entangled, eventually becoming a big, tangled ball of yarn that cannot be untangled or cut..."

After glancing at the Plush Cat a few times, Bai Zhi calmly put it into his Pinky Ring, then turned to Anna, who was standing there in a daze, and began to speak.

"As you can see, Catherine is dead and can't come back to life. Do you have any other wishes?"

"Death... What is death?"

Anna looked up at him blankly.

"Death means ceasing to exist, no longer speaking, no longer moving; from then on, you can only remember the other person in your memories."

Seeing the other person's eyes gradually dimming, Bai Zhi thought for a moment before speaking.

"Letting the deceased rest in peace is what's best for her..."

"Anna!!!"

However, before Bai Zhi could finish speaking, a slightly hurried voice rang out, and a figure stumbled over from the entrance. Upon seeing Anna standing in the center, the voice rushed forward and hugged her without hesitation.

"Catherine ...?"

Anna was slightly stunned at first, but when she saw the face of the person who had hugged her, her eyes immediately lit up again.

"You're not dead?"

"I was rescued by a kind person who told me, Anna, that you would be deceived by some bad people... Anna, don't believe them, that person said they are all bad people."

As if she had just thought of something, Catherine quickly shielded Anna behind her, her face full of vigilance.

"You've gotten ahead of me again...?"

Looking at Catherine and Anna in front of him, Bai Zhi nodded thoughtfully after a moment of silence, without offering any explanation, and turned to walk out of the Torture Room.

"Hey, what's wrong? Anna's still here... Wait for me!!"

After glancing at Catherine, who looked wary, and Anna, who was timidly hiding behind Catherine, Fireworks of Romance made a decision in a moment and quickly followed behind Bai Zhi, asking him with some confusion.

"Although I don't know why you brought Anna here, if you just leave like this, then what we did before would be..."

"We've been tricked."

Bai Zhi glanced back at the Fireworks of Romance, and spoke calmly.

"Given that Catherine, who should have been dead, has reappeared, Anna will not Trust us. There is no point in staying there any longer."

"But this kind of thing..."

"To put it simply, that Otherworld Player entered this place before us. What it did wasn't just leaking our predetermined location, leading to our ambush; it also used a silence-locking Skill to seal Dead Zero's Skill, further increasing our Danger Level. And what it did even more ruthlessly was rescuing Catherine ahead of time..."

As he said this, Bai Zhi narrowed his eyes slightly.

"Whether in here or outside, Anna is the absolute key figure. We've already lost the initiative... The other side is quite interesting."

"... So we've been tricked again?"

After thinking for a moment, Fireworks of Romance frowned.

"It can only be said that the other side has more intelligence than us, and they entered the market first, giving them more opportunities and time to make their moves."

Bai Zhi shrugged, looking completely unconcerned.

"But it's alright, I have one more card than them, and it's hard to say who will win in the end... I do have some experience in reasoning and strategy, so let's have a contest."

So what do we do now?

Stepping out of the passage and looking at the castle that had begun to show some signs of life again, Fireworks of Romance asked a question.

"Should we continue to hide?"

"More or less, we'll talk about the specifics later. For now, it'd be better to find somewhere to stay."

Tilting his head and pressing his neck slightly, Bai Zhi turned to look at the Dead Zero, with a hint of helplessness.

"There's one more thing... Could you please stop staring at me with that murderous aura the whole way?"