God's Taboo Game

The Moon Gate bore the four words "Bodhi Peach Garden," and a strange fruity fragrance drifted out from within.

[Plump, juicy peaches at eighteen were at the peak of ripeness!]

"Should we go in?"

Jin Yingzhen stood on tiptoe and peered into the peach garden.

The fog had thinned a little more. Some forty meters away, low peach trees stood in a grove, their branches heavy with fruit.

"Let's go!"

Lin Baici passed through the Moon Gate and followed the gravel path forward.

Having no weapon to defend himself with made him deeply uneasy.

Lin Baici considered breaking off a branch to use as a weapon, but after hesitating, he gave up on the idea.

What if it attracted that terrifying Buddha Statue Monster?

"These peaches are huge!"

Saliva welled up in Jin Yingzhen's mouth. She desperately wanted to pick one and eat it.

They were more than huge. Their pink skin was flawless, as smooth and tender as that of a young maiden, enough to make anyone drool.

"Don't you think these peach trees are strange?"

Lin Baici frowned tightly.

The peach trees were short, their branches twisting and spreading like claws. At first glance, they looked as though they were performing a ritual dance.

"Wouldn't it be stranger if anything in a God Ruins wasn't strange?"

Jin Yingzhen's ears twitched. "I think I hear people talking?"

"I hear them too!"

Lin Baici quickened his pace.

At the end of the gravel path, he saw a thatched cottage. In front of it was a small courtyard with a well and a dead dog.

To the east was a vegetable patch full of greens, where Birds hopped about.

More than a dozen people were gathered there.

Lin Baici and Jin Yingzhen's arrival immediately made them tense up and stare. Once they realized the two were not monsters, they finally relaxed.

The men's gazes immediately fell on Jin Yingzhen.

This girl was really beautiful.

Lin Baici swept his gaze around, then approached six Middle-aged Women resting beside a stone table in the courtyard.

"Hello, Aunties. Have you found anything?"

The six aunties were all around fifty, fashionably dressed. One look was enough to tell they were the sort of retired women who often danced in public squares.

One of them was even wearing a light blue qipao embroidered with peonies. She was sitting on a stone stool, rubbing her aching feet and grumbling nonstop.

Qipao Auntie glanced at Lin Baici and ignored him. However, an Old Aunt wearing a sunhat found him rather agreeable and answered him.

"There's no danger here. You can hide out for a while!"

The six of them were mahjong friends. They had arranged to come burn incense and relax together, never expecting to run into something like this. It was infuriating.

"Thank you!"

Lin Baici thanked her politely.

[This Old Aunt's family runs a food factory. She is worth tens of millions, and her husband has been dead for five years. She has just a tiny bit of interest in you.]

Lin Baici was speechless. What was that supposed to mean?

Do I look like someone who lives off women?

He headed toward the thatched cottage, planning to see whether there was anything useful inside.

"No need to go. We've already searched it!"

A round-faced uncle came over. "Got a cigarette?"

"No!"

Lin Baici shook his head.

The uncle was in his forties and slightly overweight. His left hand was bandaged and hung in a sling against his chest, while his right hand held a kitchen knife. Yet he had none of a thug's fierceness. He looked more like a househusband.

"My surname is Sima—the same Sima as Sima Yi from Romance of the Three Kingdoms. My given name is Mu. What are your names?"

Sima Mu was quite talkative.

"Lin Baici!"

Lin Baici noticed a young couple arguing near the vegetable patch.

[That woman has a severe gynecological disease and has had an abortion before, but the child was not the young man beside her.]

"..."

Lin Baici was stunned. What exactly was that voice?

It even knew people's private secrets?

"Oppa, let's go find weapons!"

Jin Yingzhen sounded cold and indifferent. She had no desire to speak with someone like Sima Mu, whose gaze was so improper.

"Sima, she looks down on you!"

A young man emerged from behind the thatched cottage after relieving himself. Seeing Jin Yingzhen's aloofness, he deliberately stirred things up. "Aren't you going to teach her a lesson?"

Jin Yingzhen moved closer to Lin Baici.

The moment Cui Feng appeared, the young couple stopped arguing, and the six aunties all stood up.

"Brother Cui, what do we do next?"

A flattering smile appeared on Qipao Auntie's face, a face that cost her thousands every month in beauty treatments.

"Brother my ass. Do I look that old?"

Cui Feng spat out a thick glob of phlegm.

Qipao Auntie was left utterly embarrassed, but she did not dare talk back. If they wanted to survive, they had to rely on this young man.

"I'm already this old. Why would I fuss with a girl?"

Sima Mu acted magnanimous.

"You're not scared of this kid, are you? Don't worry, I'm on your side!"

Cui Feng's triangular eyes shifted toward Lin Baici.

Damn!

That height, those muscles—he looked like he could fight!

Before this, Cui Feng definitely would not have dared provoke him. But now...

Sorry,

I can take ten of you!

A Firewood Chopper hung from Cui Feng's waist, and he carried a three-foot-two-inch Torch as thick as an adult's wrist in his right hand. That was where his confidence came from.

"Oppa, let's go!"

Jin Yingzhen tugged at Lin Baici's shirt.

[A piece of trash Ingredients does not deserve your stomach. Suggestion: steam it, then feed it to the dog!]

The voice was clearly referring to Brother Cui.

"Heh heh, leave? Did you ask me?"

Cui Feng sized Jin Yingzhen up with ill intent.

Longchan Temple had become a terrifying God Ruins. Everyone here would die today anyway, so what did he have left to worry about?

He might as well have some fun first!

A gust of wind swept past. As the mist dispersed, the peaches in the trees suddenly began to tremble.

Rustle! Rustle!

A slit split open on those ripe peaches, like a mouth.

"Eat me!"

"Eat me!"

"Eat me!"

Screaming, the peaches dropped from the branches. Four long legs like those of a Scorpion sprouted from them, and they scuttled rapidly toward Lin Baici and the others.

"Monsters!"

Qipao Auntie's face filled with terror. She turned and ran, only to trip over her own feet and fall flat on her face.

"Damn it, what the hell are these things?"

Cui Feng's scalp went numb.

Despite the bandages on his left hand, Sima Mu ran the fastest. But after getting only a dozen meters away, he was forced to stop.

There were simply too many Peach Monsters with Scorpion legs—over a thousand of them. They surged over in swarms, blocking everyone's way out of the peach garden.

"Stop running! You'll anger them!"

Jin Yingzhen hurriedly warned them.

It looked like those peach trees were God's Taboo Objects. If they wanted to survive, they had to obey their rules.

No one ran.

Because everyone was afraid of dying.

"What do we do now?"

Sunhat Old Auntie looked at Jin Yingzhen and asked quietly.

From what the Goryeo Woman had said earlier, she could tell that Jin Yingzhen seemed to know things the others did not.

Once everyone stopped moving, the Peach Monsters stopped chasing them as well.

More than a dozen of them quickly crawled up to a Middle-aged Woman with permed curls and screamed at her.

"Eat me!"

"Eat me!"

Their voices were shrill and miserable, just like the cries of starving babies.

The curly-haired Middle-aged Woman trembled and looked toward Cui Feng. "S-save me!"

Cui Feng remained unmoved. He planned to observe these monsters first before deciding what to do.

[Better one fresh peach than a basket of rotten apricots. These freshly ripened peaches are delicious and juicy. Start tasting them now!]

Taste my ass!

Lin Baici felt sick.

Just looking at the four Scorpion legs on those peaches was revolting. If he ate one, it would haunt him for the rest of his life.

"Why don't you try eating one?"

Sima Mu suggested.

"How could anyone bring themselves to eat that?"

The curly-haired Middle-aged Woman shook her head furiously.

"Eat me!"

"Eat me!"

Dozens of fist-sized Peach Monsters surrounded the curly-haired Middle-aged Woman and kept urging her. When they saw she was unmoved, they became anxious. "If you won't eat me, then I'll eat you!"

After saying that, the Peach Monsters' huge mouths suddenly split open, revealing rows of fangs dripping with some unknown liquid—either peach juice or saliva—as they pounced on the curly-haired Middle-aged Woman.

Each bite easily tore away a palm-sized chunk of flesh.

"Ah!"

The curly-haired Middle-aged Woman screamed in agony, flailing her arms in an attempt to block the Peach Monsters.

But the dozens of Peach Monsters tore into her like piranhas. In the blink of an eye, they had left her covered in blood, without a single patch of intact flesh.

In less than a minute, the curly-haired Middle-aged Woman stopped moving. She had been bitten to death alive.

The Peach Monsters did not leave. They continued gnawing on her corpse.

The sight made everyone's hair stand on end.

Dozens of peaches crawled up to a Middle-aged Woman with double-eyelid surgery.

"Eat me!"

"Eat me!"

The double-eyelid Middle-aged Woman trembled violently. "Brother Cui, help me!"

"If you eat them, you probably won't die!"

Cui Feng wanted to see what would happen after someone ate these peaches.

The double-eyelid Middle-aged Woman looked at the legged peaches, then gagged and vomited.

She could not bring herself to eat them!

Suddenly,

the Middle-aged Woman broke into a mad sprint, trying to escape.

That was like kicking a hornet's nest. The Peach Monsters charged after her in unison, caught up with her in no time, and completely buried her beneath their bodies.

Several dozen seconds later, the Peach Monsters moved away, leaving behind only a stark white skeleton.

The other aunties were so terrified that they barely dared breathe.

Lin Baici turned and quietly asked Jin Yingzhen, "Does everyone have to go through this once?"

"Among God Hunters, this kind of Rule Pollution is called a God's Taboo Game. Generally speaking, everyone has to go through it once!"

Jin Yingzhen explained, "When humans face God's Taboo Objects, if they do not obey the rules of their supernatural powers, there is only one outcome: death!"

Dozens more Peach Monsters crawled out on their Scorpion legs.

"Don't pick me! Don't pick me!"

It was not just Qipao Auntie praying. Everyone was muttering under their breath.

Lin Baici suddenly shuddered. The Peach Monsters were crawling in his direction.

What now?

Could he really have to eat these disgusting things?

But the problem was, who could guarantee he would survive after eating one?

The Peach Monsters crawled up to Lin Baici.