Task

Task

The impact of this room was far greater than that of the outside. Every stone platform and chopping block on the floor was piled with chunks of meat, all bright red. It was impossible to tell what kind of animal—or what part of one—they had come from. The thick, cloying stench of blood was no different from air that had solidified, at least to anyone with a keen sense of smell. The feeling of suffocation shot straight to the top of Xu Huo's head.

Xu Huo entered without changing expression and rummaged through the heaps of meat for a while. To his surprise, he found a numbered piece. Its skin had been peeled off, but the digits seemed etched into the muscle tissue and were clearly visible.

"Bang!" A door slammed open outside, and Skin Stripper Karl's voice rang out. "You've got five days' probation. You can stay and work only if you meet my standards!"

"What about the pay..."

"You expect to get paid during your probation?" Karl roared irritably. "Clean this place up for me. I'll be back in three hours. If I see even one cockroach, you're all fired!"

He slammed the door again. An engine started outside the Factory and soon faded into the distance. Only after a while did someone in the Workshop speak. "The skin stripper took Yang Can away. Do you think he'll be all right?"

"The skin stripper only went fishing. Yang Can should be safe for now." Another voice spoke up. "They'll be gone for three hours. This is our chance."

"Qin An is right." A woman's voice said, "Let's split up as planned."

"Qin An and I will look for the Collection Room. Xian Dazhi, you and Zou Weichang stay here and clean. We'll be back within an hour at the latest. We can't give the skin stripper an excuse to kick us out."

"Sure, sure, whatever you say." A fourth voice replied impatiently. "Hurry up and go."

Two sets of footsteps left the Workshop. Two people remained. The one who had spoken first said, "We'd better get moving."

"They're idiots. Are you an idiot too? You're actually going to clean?" the impatient voice said. "They're looking for the collectibles while we do the dirty work."

"We don't have a choice. Peng Fengnian said the skin stripper's collectibles are definitely hidden somewhere hard to find. Neither of our Abilities is suited for that."

"He sure talks big from the sidelines. This damn Factory's so small. How hard can it be to find a cellar or Secret Room? Anyone could find one."

"But Peng Fengnian said almost no one survives this skin stripper's Dungeon. It can't be that easy, can it?"

The other person snorted. Footsteps moved from the Workshop's front entrance toward the back.

"Zou Weichang, where are you going?"

"The Pigsty." Zou Weichang gave a strange laugh. "Maybe we'll get lucky and find a few piglets who've been wearing their skins for less than six hours."

"Didn't Peng Fengnian say that was impossible? The piglets are specially supplied. The skin stripper must have raised them for a long time..."

"Everything's Peng Fengnian's say-so. Try using your brain."

"Hey!" The footsteps stopped. "There are a few rooms next door. Why don't we take a look first?"

Zou Weichang ignored Xian Dazhi and went straight into the Pigsty. Xian Dazhi hurried after him.

The Workshop fell quiet again. Xu Huo remained in the room, in no hurry to leave.

Unlike him, these applicants were all ticket-holding Players who had agreed on a plan before coming.

The people he knew about were Qin An, Zou Weichang, Xian Dazhi, Yang Can, and Peng Fengnian.

Yang Can had been taken fishing by the skin stripper. Zou Weichang and Xian Dazhi were in the Pigsty, while Qin An and another female Player had gone to the front to look for the skin stripper's Collection Room.

It was hard to say whether the female Player was Peng Fengnian, and it was also possible that some Players hadn't entered the Good Taste Fresh Meat Supply Factory.

From their conversation, the ticket-holding Players' Dungeon tasks should be the same as his: steal the treasures in the skin stripper's collection, rescue three children, or complete the work the skin stripper assigned. They only had to choose one.

Of the three tasks, the third seemed to carry the least risk, but that wasn't actually the case.

The skin stripper probably knew the applicants were Players. He had only let them come work for some reason, which was why he resented them. The filthy Workshop outside also seemed to have been left that way on purpose.

Given that, it was almost impossible for Players to complete the work he assigned. Getting kicked out without clearing the Dungeon would count as good luck. Most Players had probably ended up as a pile of minced meat in the slaughterhouse.

The second task should be to rescue three children. Whether escaping the Dungeon or clearing it and getting a Return Ticket, either option was for one person only. To complete the task, they would need a way to take all three children with them, or at least free them from their pigskins. Without special items, it was nearly impossible for Players to complete this task, unless the skin stripper willingly let the children go.

The first task was the most likely one to complete, so the Players had practically given up on the other two.

Xu Huo's brows furrowed. He stuffed a few rats into a sack and used Cleaning Agent to wash the blood off his shoes before climbing out the window and returning to the Pigsty.

In the Pigsty, the honest-looking Xian Dazhi felt the piglet's belly and shook his head at Zou Weichang. "The stitches are almost invisible. Even if we take them out, they'll spend the rest of their lives as pigs."

Zou Weichang wasn't surprised. He lit a cigarette and took a long drag, his expression distant. "I expected as much before we came."

"They're only a few years old. It's awful."

"What's awful about it? That's fate. They're just unlucky." Zou Weichang ground out his cigarette and turned toward the Workshop. "But we're not any better off. We might die before they do."

Xian Dazhi followed him. Suddenly, a large pig in the Pigsty planted its front hooves on the Fence, clamped its teeth around Zou Weichang's sleeve, and tugged desperately.

"Is this pig crazy?" Zou Weichang kicked it away, not treating it like a person at all.

I'm human! I'm a Player!

Sima Xiao Er had been kicked to the ground. He screamed with all his might, but all that came out was a loud pig squeal. He glared furiously at the two men and scrambled up to charge at them again, only to be kicked back before he could get close.

"They can still be saved!" Xian Dazhi hurried to stop him.

Zou Weichang brushed his hand aside. "So what? Can they escape if we save them? This is a game world. Players can barely keep themselves alive. Ordinary people who get out are only going to die!"

"Don't drag me into your overflowing compassion. If the skin stripper catches us secretly letting them go, we're all fucking dead!"

Xian Dazhi couldn't argue. He turned his head away and refused to look at the pigs in the Pigsty.

"They might live a few more days as pigs," Zou Weichang said, then turned and left.

"Oink! Oink!" Sima Xiao Er stood with his front hooves on the Fence, squealing with all his might. But the two men still walked away without looking back. He retreated dejectedly, his eyes more despairing than anyone else's.

Just then, Xu Huo jumped into the Pigsty and knocked on the Fence. "Red Hair?"

Sima Xiao Er sprang up and charged at him.

Xu Huo held down his pig's head. "Don't you want to get out?"

"Oink?" Sima Xiao Er stared at him in confusion and anger.

"What those two said just now made sense. You wouldn't survive even if you got out. Too many people missing would attract attention."

Xu Huo cut through the two stitches under Sima Xiao Er's belly and asked, "Did you get a notification from the game?"