Bang-
At last, the clown burst through the door. The scarlet eyes beneath his mask swept the living room before quickly fixing on the slender Yu Qing at the kitchen doorway.
The young man met his gaze for an instant, trembling all over with fear. His right hand gripped the door handle tightly, his expression blank, his legs barely holding him up.
The corners of the clown's lips curled involuntarily-
He loved watching fresh, vivid terror.
Little newcomers like this, sucked into the game and still undergoing their trial, were perfect for skinning, tearing apart, and slowly torturing to death.
If I suddenly moved closer and smiled at him now, just how terrified would he look?
Would he foam at the mouth and lose control of his bowels on the spot?
The more the clown thought about it, the more excited he became.
Endless slaughter was the most soul-stirring pleasure the beginner village had to offer.
So he arranged his features into a pleasing smile, pushed off the floor, and rushed toward Yu Qing.
Almost simultaneously, Yu Qing opened the kitchen door with a click and stepped to his left.
Then the clown's eerie smile came face-to-face with Mom's mutated features inside the kitchen.
Both monsters froze, then turned their heads aside at the same time. "Bleurgh!"
Still, the clown killed Mom.
Crouching, he unhurriedly severed the woman's limbs and gouged out her eyes. Then he stood, carrying his distinctive sharp knife, and searched the entire house for Yu Qing.
Unfortunately...
His eyesight wasn't very good.
While he had been busy dismembering Mom, Yu Qing had switched off all the lights.
It was pitch-black. He couldn't see a thing!
That little bastard!
The clown ground his teeth with a grating creak, resentment filling his heart and disappointment written all over his face.
He wanted to leave, but Yu Qing seemed to have rearranged the furniture. Every step he took, something tripped him.
Bang, bang, bang, bang-
Five steps, four falls.
"..."
The falls made the clown's teeth ache. He decided he didn't even dare grind them anymore.
The eerie creaking stopped. The clown felt his way upright, his hands trembling slightly.
He stepped forward, his legs trembling a little too.
For the first time in all these years, he had to tread carefully inside a human's home.
Rage gradually burned through his chest. After three more falls, he finally felt his way to the doorway. He was preparing to wait there and kill Yu Qing when he heard a creak.
A door inside the house had opened.
The bathroom light was on, giving him enough illumination to see the furnishings.
"Um..."
Someone spoke. The clown turned and saw Yu Qing standing at the bathroom doorway. "Um... my dad's here too. How about killing him as well?"
The clown: "???"
The young man, his hair long and flowing, stood meekly in the doorway and scratched his head.
As though he felt embarrassed about making an excessive request, he added, "Sorry for the trouble."
The clown: "..."
How fucking... filial!
But that was fine. He was happy to oblige.
Tonight, no one would leave this house alive.
Tap, tap-
Metal heels struck the smooth floor, the chilling sound echoing into the distance.
The clown approached Yu Qing step by step. When he was five paces away, he suddenly appeared at the bathroom doorway. The sharp tip of his knife neared Yu Qing's chest, and his smile stretched wider and wider. "Surprise... Aah!"
But before he could finish his signature deranged smile and greeting, he stepped on the trap at the doorway.
Another knife-wielding clown hand dropped from overhead, driving straight through his heart from behind.
After a few brief struggles, the clown died with his eyes wide open, unwilling to accept his end.
Dead...
All three monsters were dead!
Thank goodness Mom had lasted a little while. Long enough for him to set the trap!
Yu Qing caught his breath, slowly pressing a hand to his chest. Before long, "Bleurgh!"
The monsters' "stunning beauty" was still fresh in his mind. The moment his nerves relaxed, the stuffy air and foul stench of blood surged into his nostrils all at once. He couldn't bear it and spent a long while vomiting beside the sink.
He washed his face with cold water. Once his head cleared, he slowly stood and laboriously dragged the clown to the doorway.
He stitched up the clown's clothes to conceal the wound left by the knife, then arranged him in a standing position.
From a distance, it looked as though a clown were standing guard at his door.
Even with the door open, neither monsters nor humans would dare approach.
Only after finishing all this did Yu Qing stretch his stiff limbs, return to his room, find a fresh set of clothes, and head to the bathroom to shower.
The past few days had been terrifying. He had done nothing but break out in cold sweats. He needed a good wash.
Hot water poured down, giving Yu Qing's anxious heart a brief respite.
He finally had the energy to wonder where he was.
His limited memories lingered on the disappearances that had been appearing frequently in recent news reports.
For instance-
A death-row inmate from a certain prison had seemingly fallen under some evil spell on his way to his execution. Along with the police officers escorting him, he boarded a black bus that didn't belong to the police. They vanished without a trace, not even their remains to be found.
For instance-
A battered bus stopped outside a market without warning. There was no driver.
Mothers out buying groceries boarded one after another, only to mysteriously disappear under the surveillance cameras.
Another example-
A CEO worth hundreds of billions insisted on taking the bus after work. He vanished that very day and never returned.
More and more bizarre incidents were piling up, all involving buses.
He had been forced onto a bus too. Could it be...
Splash-
The hot water rinsed the suds from his head, clearing his vision again. Yu Qing saw a beam of blue light slowly spilling across the floor from one direction.
He immediately looked up and saw that the bathroom door in front of him had changed!
The originally white door had turned black. A ghostly blue screen floated on its surface, its words read aloud by an emotionless mechanical female voice.
[Congratulations on passing the beginner trial and successfully activating the game "Stairway to Heaven."]
Yu Qing paused, put on his clothes, dried his waist-length hair, and slowly approached the black door.
As he drew closer, the door opened inch by inch. Beyond it was no longer his living room, but a flight of glowing scarlet steps.
The surrounding walls were insubstantial, flickering with tens of thousands of screens in assorted sizes, showing different people struggling to survive in different desperate situations.
Yu Qing stepped onto the stairs. Behind him, the door slammed shut and locked completely. Red light instantly flared across the steps, like hell itself, its searing glow stirring an inexplicable panic.
[New streamer, congratulations on becoming part of the game!] [Go earn points! Earn those all-powerful points and redeem them for endless wishes!]
As the voice faded, Yu Qing's lashes stirred. He saw that a screen roughly fourteen inches across had appeared in the lower-right corner of his vision.
It displayed his face.
[Loading profile-] [Name: Yu Qing] [Sex: male] [Preference: men (a gay guy, too)] [Height: 176 (probably a bottom)]
Yu Qing: "..."
[HP: 100/100 (Your health bar is full, and you are in good health... for now, anyway ^ω^)] [Stamina: 15/100 (Yep, definitely a bottom)] [Sanity: 101/100 (... unknown error detected)] System: [?] [Danger rating: *￥&$#/100] [Intelligence: *￥&$#/100] [Identity: *￥&$#*￥&$#...] System: [???] [Calculation error. Profile data is being corrected...] [Danger rating...] [Danger rating...] [Dan... beep beep... beep beep beep beep beep...] [Warning! Warning! System overload! Severe system data overload! Requesting immediate switch...]
Bang-
A violent explosion rang out beside his ears, the shock making his eardrums ache. Yu Qing had to cover his ears as he looked at the two lines displayed on the screen.
[The system has exploded. Reassigning a system to you...] [Streamer, please proceed to the top of the stairs and enter the instance first.]
"Tsk."
Yu Qing muttered, "Kind of garbage."
Meanwhile, in the newcomer section of the livestream lobby, thousands upon thousands of screens glittered in a vast array. Accompanied by faint popping sounds, they lit up one after another, illuminating the entire modern viewing hall.
The next second, the spectators seated in circles, who had been waiting for so long, immediately raised their eyes.
They wore identical white smiling masks. Their gazes swept forward over one terrified, uneasy face after another, the curves of their lips revealing extraordinary satisfaction.
Before long, a chime rang out!
[Look! This newcomer isn't crying, freaking out, or wetting his pants! He's so calm! Love him!]
As the notification sounded, a spectator was the first to notice him, and a scrolling comment followed.
Yu Qing paused, slightly bewildered, and located the comment area:
[Hahahaha! He looks so clueless! Hey, gorgeous, look here! I'm over here!]
[? Am I seeing things? Intelligence off the charts, sanity over the limit, but only 15 stamina? 15? Can he even run in an escape game?]
[My gut says he'll definitely be the first of this batch to die!]
[Don't be so nasty. His stamina's a little low, but... waist-length white hair! He's gorgeous~ (Tipped points +500)]
[There's a question mark after his identity? Every streamer's identity is human, but his is a red question mark? Hiss... what the hell is he?]
The audience gradually grew, and comments scrolled past one after another, seemingly surveying the surroundings on the streamer's behalf.
Yu Qing paid them no attention. He drew his gaze back, and the instant his foot landed on the final step, there was a click!
As though he had triggered some sensor, white light suddenly blazed before him, and malice pierced his heart.
His body shuddered involuntarily. Yu Qing raised a hand to shield his eyes. He couldn't quite... see.
The comments also fell silent for a few seconds. Then, as though the viewers had discovered a rare cause for celebration, they erupted into a frenzy!!
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