Money can make men slaughter ghosts

Watch... a ghost do a mukbang?

The casually spoken words were utterly shocking.

Silence settled over the room. Not only Granny Ghost, but even the usually indifferent livestream audience was momentarily stunned.

A scattering of comments drifted past, their senders wondering whether they had misheard.

Until now, NPCs had always lorded it over people in the instances, while viewers enjoyed watching streamers get tormented. This was their first time seeing a streamer... torment an NPC?

[Ooh... you know what, I'm actually kind of excited.]

Then the comments surged, the malice in the viewers' hearts laid bare as they went wild-

They didn't care who was being tormented. All they wanted was to indulge their greedy appetites through a livestream paid for in lives.

[Streamer, me, me, me! I wanna see it! Make her eat! Make her eat!]

[Aaaaah, no! The game rules say streamers can't kill NPCs! I'm worried about my gorgeous wifey! Don't do it!]

[Streamer, I'm getting impatient! Hurry up, hurry up! You're my new favorite from now on! (Tip: +5,000 points)]

The tip amounted to a quarter of the reward for clearing the instance-a lavish sum.

Yu Qing held Granny Ghost's bony shoulders down firmly. His gaze swept over the comments, ignoring the other excited messages and singling out the one concerned for his safety. "It's okay. You're the ones who give me my wealth, and I'm here to serve you. If you want to see it, I'll stream it!"

[Aaaaaaaaaah!]

The moment he finished speaking, the entire livestream erupted like water at a rolling boil.

The viewer count climbed rapidly, and the system announcements in Yu Qing's ears came faster and faster.

[Congratulations, streamer! Achievement unlocked: 2,000 concurrent viewers. Points +200.]

[Congratulations, streamer! Achievement unlocked: 4,000 concurrent viewers. Points +400.]

[Congratulations, streamer! Achievement unlocked: 5,000 concurrent viewers. Your content is now being promoted automatically and has been tagged "Weird streamers doing weird things." More viewers now have a chance to discover you in their feeds. Attract more viewers and earn more points!]

A new recommendation appeared in the trending section. Curious viewers poured into the livestream, only to flood the screen with shocked exclamation marks when they saw Yu Qing gently pressing the meat against Granny Ghost's lips.

[!!! Holy fucking shit, seriously? He's got a death wish, messing with an NPC like that! Followed!]

[Unless I'm mistaken, isn't this instance the "Angel Asylum"? The boss here is level four. That's basically hell difficulty for a newbie. Last time... almost eighty people went in, right? Not a single one came out alive.]

[Level four? This streamer just ran into a level-seven boss! A bunch of hands reach out of a huge cloud of black mist to bully him, torment him, play with him. Hehehe...]

[WHAT? Level seven? I remember the boss being level four the last time this instance opened! These fucking upgrades are out to kill people!]

[Wow, things are getting interesting~]

The livestream's concurrent viewer count shot past twenty thousand at an astonishing speed.

On the main screen, Granny Ghost fought desperately. Yu Qing spent ten minutes trying, but couldn't get a single bite into her mouth.

He wasn't particularly strong, and a thin sheen of sweat had already formed on his forehead.

His white hair fell loose, and suggestive marks from someone's gripping fingers peeked out from beneath his shirt, prompting another flurry of excited tips.

Of course, plenty of viewers were more impatient than he was.

[Fuck! Can't this NPC cooperate? We finally get a streamer with some guts, and all I want is a little excitement!]

[Seriously, this streamer is so nice. The others always fight us, but he's so, so obedient. He does whatever we ask and says it's all to serve his gods. Boohoo, he called me a god. I literally can't stop crying.]

[What's his name?]

[Oh, Yu Qing! (Tip: +5,000 points) Pretty boy, I'm running out of patience. Shove her head into the plate and teach her a lesson~]

That was exactly what he had been waiting for.

On-screen, Yu Qing's gaze abruptly changed. Smack-

He slammed Granny Ghost's head into the disgusting, greasy plate.

"Aaaaaaaaah-"

The excessive dose of hallucinogens smeared across her face and seeped into her skin, burning so badly that the old woman screamed and struggled nonstop. And she had prepared all of this for Yu Qing!

She had gone to all the trouble of cooking the food and adding hallucinogens, waiting for Yu Qing to eat it so she could poison him to death, then peel off that lovely face of his.

Now, it had all been used on her instead.

"Aaaah-aaaaaaah-"

The hallucinogens dissolved across her face, a little trickling into her mouth. Granny Ghost grew increasingly agitated, writhing constantly as humiliation and hatred filled her mind. Her long nails thrashed for a moment, then suddenly—swish—

They sliced across Yu Qing's arm.

Blood slowly welled up. Yu Qing frowned and drew a soft, sharp breath.

But in the next instant, Granny Ghost unexpectedly broke free of his grip, twisted around, and lunged at him.

Her scorched old face grew even more grotesque. Her unnatural limbs bled with every movement; without looking closely, she resembled a shapeless mass of bloody flesh.

Fighting down his nausea, Yu Qing dodged several times, earning repeated insults from the livestream for being spineless.

Before him, Granny Ghost had long since lost her head to rage.

After failing to hit Yu Qing several times, she charged recklessly forward, shrieking, "Die! You and all those viewers behind you deserve to die!!!"

One sentence.

That single sentence completely enraged the viewers who stood above it all.

Outside the livestream, they relished other people's suffering and wielded absolute power. Their authority tolerated no challenge.

Sure enough, Yu Qing glanced over and saw the comments explode again.

[Streamer, kill her. Kill her and I'll tip you.]

[This NPC sure talks big. Today I'll show her what it means when money can make men slaughter ghosts. (Tip: +20,000 points)]

As the points arrived, Yu Qing paused for a moment, his eyes subtly curving into a smile-

Not bad. Just exploiting poor Granny Ghost a little has earned me far more points than the system's reward for clearing the instance.

As the tips piled up and the viewers grew increasingly furious, Yu Qing finally stopped in a corner and stood still.

Granny Ghost's violent struggles and counterattacks had begun to tear open the stitches on her body. Her bleeding worsened, staining the floor crimson.

Bzzzt-

The surrounding lights were dim. Perhaps because of unstable voltage, the flickering tubes spat sparks.

Amid the boundless gloom, Granny Ghost's deformed hands and feet made her resemble an ugly doll sewn from human skin. She fixed her stare on the motionless young man a short distance away.

Thump-

Thump, thump-

The lights dimmed further. The eerie thumping drew closer again, echoing through the empty human-meat restaurant and making even the livestream viewers shiver involuntarily.

Suddenly-snap-

The restaurant lights went out again. Everything outside was once more enveloped in black mist, leaving the entire space so dark that he couldn't see his hand before his face.

Thump-

Thump, thump-

An icy terror pressed against every pore of his body. Yu Qing vaguely realized that Granny Ghost seemed able to control the lights on this floor.

Human imagination was naturally rich. Endless darkness was the perfect setting for her to create fear and wear away the players' sanity.

So this was Granny Ghost's true ability!

Yu Qing blinked twice, struggling to focus his vision. He had barely adjusted to the darkness when he saw a blurry lump of bloody flesh hurtling toward him. Granny Ghost looked increasingly hideous, her white hair hanging loose as her sharp nails thrust straight at his eyes.

The next instant-