DSMC Chapter 138

Yan Jiyun still hadn’t figured out what type of Instance B was.

Supernatural? Zombie apocalypse? Fantasy? Mystery?

The rolling shutter kept being slammed so hard it rattled loudly, the noise almost numbing their senses.

They had thought running into the supermarket would let them escape those things, but instead, it seemed like they had some kind of awareness.

Shi Yan said, “This thing never ends.”

He Yuanle was still shaken, and carefully asked the two “experts” who had carried him in, “What is this? Ghost hands?”

Lan Mo said, “That should be right. If you use the right props, you can eliminate them.”

He Yuanle asked, “What if you don’t have the right props?”

That question also reflected Yan Jiyun’s thoughts. As someone who had entered instances five times and almost never brought the right items four times, buying the correct gear was practically impossible.

Shi Yan said, “Then there are still ways. You just need to understand yin-yang techniques.”

He Yuanle: “……”

He didn’t dare say he usually cleared instances by using his brain in front of Lan Mo and Shi Yan anymore. Otherwise, they might just glance at him and throw him out to feed the ghost hands.

No one knew where these ghost hands came from or where they were going.

Yan Jiyun lay on a snack shelf, thinking whether these ghost hands were related to the NPCs from the music building earlier.

Since entering this instance, the information he had encountered included “spirit invocation game,” “Mirror Lake wish-making,” five players including Han Ruibai and Cheng Su— and now these bluish ghost hands. There was no doubt this was a supernatural mystery-type instance.

Please, just don’t let him see any terrifying ghosts. His young heart really couldn’t take it.

If the ghost hands had mouths, they would probably be endlessly shouting for them to come out and fight, slamming the shutter nonstop. If anyone was sleeping upstairs, they would definitely come down and curse them out.

Lan Mo and Shi Yan discussed, “This won’t work. The ghost hands will only gather more and more. Eventually they’ll break the door down.”

Shi Yan nodded. “Yeah, we need a solution. Let’s see if there’s anything in the supermarket we can use to hold them off.”

Yan Jiyun saw a lighter on the cashier counter, and also a mop on another shelf. Maybe lighting the mop on fire to deal with the ghost hands would work?

Lan Mo and Shi Yan were thinking about using “exorcism methods,” not fire. Yan Jiyun felt time was running out, so he jumped back onto the counter and pawed at the box containing lighters.

Because the supermarket was dark, Lan Mo and Shi Yan didn’t notice. But He Yuanle saw it and suddenly had an idea.

He excitedly held up a lighter. “Ge, how about we use fire?”

Yan Jiyun finally let out a small sigh of relief. He Yuanle really was a player who used his brain to clear instances. He had already thought of it when he touched the lighter.

But was He Yuanle actually a Hard-level player or not? Yan Jiyun suspected this guy’s crying was completely fake. He had been wailing nonstop, but never shed a single real tear.

Pretending to be weak in a game could reduce others’ guard, but Yan Jiyun didn’t really buy it. In fact, every time he heard He Yuanle crying, he wanted to shove a cloth into his mouth.

Lan Mo just happened to walk over to the section with mops and cloth strips.

Fire plus mop. This should work.

Yan Jiyun quietly jumped into a corner to hide. He had already done his part in giving hints.

Now it was time to let Lan Mo and Shi Yan handle the ghost hands. Their experience was definitely stronger than his.

With fire and mops, the three of them first poured oil near the window where the ghost hands were slamming the glass, then pushed a lit mop through a slightly opened gap and shoved the ghost hands downward. The moment the ghost hands touched the burning mop covered in oil, they hissed and ignited instantly, retreating from the flames.

Yan Jiyun jumped onto the highest shelf to watch the fight. He guessed the ghost hands weren’t running away because of being burned, but because of the light.

They were afraid of light.

He wasn’t sure if Lan Mo and the others had realized that yet.

The mop kept burning, and the sound of the ghost hands hitting the door gradually weakened.

As expected of veteran players, the three of them quickly figured it out.

Shi Yan said, “These ghost hands aren’t afraid of fire, but they seem to be afraid of light?”

Lan Mo said, “Then let’s find more mops.”

He Yuanle said, “I’ll go find flashlights!”

Shi Yan kept pressing the burning mop against the window. Once the cloth burned out, the ghost hands began crawling back again.

Yan Jiyun’s guess was correct; they really feared light. It was just unclear whether they feared firelight or flashlight beams.

Lan Mo and the others brought back flashlights and batteries, shining them through the glass. But the ghost hands didn’t seem to react to the flashlight beams at all.

Was it because flashlight light had no heat?

Yan Jiyun looked around the small supermarket but couldn’t find a power switch. It must have been intentionally designed that way.

Apart from flashlight light, only firelight remained. One had no heat, the other did. So… what the ghost hands were actually afraid of might not be light itself, but heat?

That wasn’t hard to guess. The three of them gathered all cloth-related items in the supermarket, like towels, mops, and anything that could burn.

They lit them and threw them outside the window. After doing this once or twice, the ghost hands really stopped approaching.

But the supermarket wasn’t a fabric store. Their supplies would eventually burn out. The night was cold, and they would have to wait until morning for the ground to heat up under the sun.

Yan Jiyun checked the time. There were still several hours until dawn. The supplies in the supermarket could only last one or two hours at most.

Lan Mo and the others were still busy dealing with the ghost hands and hadn’t explored the rest of the building.

The supermarket had two floors. Yan Jiyun jumped down from the shelf and headed toward the stairs leading to the second floor.

There was no separation between the first and second floors, so he easily went up.

It turned out the second floor also sold goods. The first floor had snacks and daily necessities, while the second floor had even more items.

Yan Jiyun deliberately stood at the stairwell and meowed twice to attract Lan Mo and the others’ attention.

Lan Mo was thinking that the little black cat might be Feng-ge’s cat, but at the same time he also felt it could be an NPC. After hearing the sound, he immediately said to Shi Yan, “I’ll go take a look and see if the kitten can bring us any new clues.”

Shi Yan and He Yuanle both knew that the black cat had led them to the supermarket, and they didn’t think of it as a player cat. Shi Yan and He Yuanle continued to cooperate; one ignited items, the other threw them toward the direction where the ghost hands could crawl in.

After going upstairs, Lan Mo saw the black cat jumping around on a pile of women’s supplies.

It was obvious it was having a lot of fun playing in the soft pile of tissues, and it let out a couple of cheerful meows when it got excited.

Yan Jiyun saw him come upstairs and, noticing that he had found him, jumped around a bit more inside. Besides daily necessities, there were also hardware items.

There weren’t many burnable items left. Later on, they would definitely need manpower to resist the ghost hands, and the hardware might come in handy.

Yan Jiyun had never encountered a supernatural instance before, but he was still trying his best to help find useful items.

Lan Mo followed behind it, his gaze fixed on the black cat as he pondered. “Caramel?”

Yan Jiyun’s movements paused almost imperceptibly. But in the darkness, Lan Mo couldn’t see it. He only saw that the black cat gave no reaction to the name.

Lan Mo muttered to himself, “Could it be that it’s not Feng-ge’s cat?”

“Right. Feng-ge’s cat would definitely be accompanied by someone. How could it appear here alone? That would be too unlucky, and even be chased by a bunch of ghost hands.”

Yan Jiyun stared at him with his green eyes: ‘If you keep talking, I guarantee you’ll be just as unlucky as me later.’

Call anyone unlucky, just don’t call him. Being black is just a natural color, not a sin.

With a generous mindset, Yan Jiyun decided to reconcile with his fur color and not hold it against Qi Feng’s teammates.

Lan Mo tried calling again. “Caramel? Caramel?”

Still no response.

“Then it definitely isn’t Feng-ge’s cat. It should just be an NPC.”

“Forget it. Let’s deal with the ghost hands first. A black cat appearing in a supernatural instance is normal.”

Yan Jiyun didn’t expect Lan Mo to be this cunning, calling his name twice in different ways. He almost responded by reflex.

He knew Lan Mo had no ill intent, but since Lan Mo was Qi Feng’s teammate, and knew about him, Yan Jiyun couldn’t even guarantee that Qi Feng would protect him without hesitation, let alone someone only loosely connected to Qi Feng. Trust would definitely be much lower.

So he continued acting as an NPC, jumping around in the pile of miscellaneous goods, then gradually disappeared from Lan Mo’s sight, slipping back into the darkness to hide.

Upstairs, Lan Mo found hardware items and made makeshift weapons using things like pipes. When all burnable items were used up, these would become useful.

Time passed little by little.

The long night dragged on endlessly. The ghost hands never grew tired, but the humans who had survived the day were already beginning to feel exhausted.

The three of them decided to take turns resting.

Yan Jiyun found a less noticeable spot and curled up, half-closing his eyes while resting and listening to the surroundings.

Suddenly, he sensed something coming from upstairs. He immediately lifted his head, and above him, a ghost hand was quietly crawling down!

Yan Jiyun deliberately jumped from one shelf to another, waking Shi Yan, who had been lying on a blanket.

He crouched on the highest shelf and stared straight at the ceiling. Shi Yan shone a flashlight upward, instantly shaking off all drowsiness.

“Lan Mo, those ghost hands somehow got in!”

Lan Mo followed the light upward. “I just checked the area. There are no openings. Everything is sealed except the first-floor window. How is this possible?”

They had been constantly burning items and throwing them out; there shouldn’t have been any survivors slipping in.

Yan Jiyun looked toward He Yuanle, who had been unusually quiet.

Something was wrong. He shouldn’t be this quiet.

There wasn’t just one ghost hand on the ceiling. One, two, three—

While Lan Mo and Shi Yan focused on the ceiling, Yan Jiyun stared at He Yuanle behind Lan Mo.

He Yuanle suddenly dropped the lighter in his hand. His eyes turned blank, his mouth curling into a strange smile. He raised his hands and grabbed toward Lan Mo’s neck.

So it really was possession.

Lan Mo had already noticed something was off from the corner of his eye. Just as He Yuanle was about to reach his neck, he turned and blocked him with his elbow.

He created distance and calmly said, “Shi Yan, he seems to be possessed.”

Shi Yan replied, “I know. He might have been infected on the way here. He probably let ghost hands in when we weren’t paying attention. We don’t know how many are inside now.”

Lan Mo pointed at He Yuanle. “Let’s deal with this one first.”

Yan Jiyun was also seeing this kind of situation for the first time. If it were him, he really wouldn’t know what to do. But regardless, he needed to observe how they dealt with so-called “ghosts.”

He Yuanle looked extremely strange now. His mouth couldn’t close properly, twisted into a grin, his youthful face distorted into something almost grotesque.

Shi Yan said flatly, “Kill him?”

Lan Mo replied, “I might not be able to kill him.”

“He Yuanle” gave a low, eerie laugh. “You think you can kill me?”

He grabbed a faucet nearby and swung it at Lan Mo. Lan Mo had to hold back because of He Yuanle’s body and kept retreating, trying to exorcise the thing without harming the host.

Yan Jiyun carefully moved closer from shelf to shelf, watching more clearly now.

The fight escalated. Lan Mo kept dodging while “He Yuanle” pressed in aggressively. Lan Mo couldn’t find a good angle to flank him.

He was forced into defense, while “He Yuanle” went for lethal strikes with terrifying force.

Lan Mo fought back, but the possessed body had unnatural strength. He was hit several times. Human flesh and blood really struggled against something like this.

Yan Jiyun kept preparing to escape, but with the two of them drawing attention, the ghost hands ignored him for now.

He carefully observed “He Yuanle,” searching for any weakness.

Then he noticed something.

The possessed He Yuanle avoided red objects.

Yan Jiyun deliberately knocked down a small red flag from the shelf. It landed on “He Yuanle,” and his body trembled slightly.

Lan Mo immediately noticed.

This thing was afraid of red.

Yan Jiyun recalled some supernatural films he had seen. On the shelf beside him was a box of red thread used for sewing. He deliberately kicked it down.

Lan Mo wasn’t sure if it was a coincidence, but the black cat really was an NPC. Otherwise, why would it deliberately knock down red thread?

After kicking it down, it even hid again. That must be system behavior.

Lan Mo knocked “He Yuanle” into a shelf. The shelves were unstable, and he fell.

hen he got back up, Lan Mo had already grabbed the red thread and quickly wrapped it around him.

The possessed body began convulsing violently.

Lan Mo didn’t stop. He kept wrapping the red thread around his arms.

If there had been enough thread, he would have wrapped him completely.

But even this was enough. “He Yuanle” suddenly collapsed to the ground. The thing possessing him had been expelled.

Lan Mo threw more red thread to Shi Yan. “Confirmed. Red thread works. They’re afraid of it. Try it on the ghost hands.”

Although fire and heat worked against them, it only repelled them. It didn’t kill them.

Shi Yan tied screws to the red thread and flung it at the ghost hands. The moment it wrapped around them, a sizzling sound was heard. The ghost hand on the ceiling dropped down. Its bluish-purple skin turned black like it was burned, and the moment it hit the ground, it disappeared.

The red thread was extremely effective.

It looks like finding the corresponding method works, or if they have brought items, they can deal with it that way too.

Yan Jiyun thought the same. He remembered that when he first entered the beginner instance, he had used the correct prop to stop the protagonist’s bleeding. The red thread should be similar in effect to the “bandage” item. In fact, different instances don’t necessarily require carrying props; most of the time, players can still improvise on the spot.

Lan Mo and Shi Yan used this method to deal with the ghost hands in the supermarket.

As the thing possessing He Yuanle disappeared, the ghost hands outside also vanished.

Yan Jiyun looked at his Main Mission 1. Combined with what he had experienced so far, was there any connection between the two?

What exactly was the main plot?

He felt it was likely about uncovering a long-hidden incident in the school. Students must have died, and now they have returned for revenge.

So who was this avenger?

In a haunted campus event, it was usually about finding the truth behind the incident.

He guessed that this [Mermaid] level 2 instance probably didn’t originally have supernatural elements, but instead involved man-made “haunting phenomena,” while Instance B directly had a supernatural background, where the goal was to uncover the truth within a ghost story setting.

Was the thing that possessed He Yuanle and controlled the ghost hands a human, or a ghost?

Yan Jiyun wrote these questions down first, planning to solve them one by one later.

After the supernatural entities in the supermarket were cleared, He Yuanle was also woken up by Shi Yan pouring bottled water over him.

He jolted up from the ground in shock. “R-rain? Is it raining?” He shielded his eyes from the flashlight. “Why are you all looking at me like that? Where am I now?”

Shi Yan said, “You’re awake? When did you lose consciousness?”

He Yuanle pouted and was about to cry again. His body felt like it had been taken apart and reassembled, aching all over.

Shi Yan immediately pinched his cheek. “Get to the point. I don’t want your crying routine.”

He Yuanle protested, “I’m not crying on purpose! I just get like this when I’m scared. My whole body hurts. It’s all Lan-ge’s fault for hitting me.”

Shi Yan stared at him. “Answer the question.”

This time He Yuanle really started crying, silently letting tears fall without making a sound.

“I only remember being dragged into the supermarket by you guys. When we jumped through the window, I already started feeling dizzy. After that, I could still hear you talking, but my body completely stopped responding. I couldn’t control it.”

Lan Mo said kindly, “Shi Yan, don’t be too harsh on him. Being possessed by that thing is already pretty miserable. But it also shows his body is weak and his yang energy is low.”

He Yuanle immediately hugged Lan Mo’s leg. “Ge, you’re so nice! I was born premature, and I’ve always been smaller than people my age. My energy really is weak.”

Yan Jiyun, crouching in a corner, also quietly relaxed. If it were someone else, they might not have recognized He Yuanle so quickly. Although this guy was a chronic crybaby, his optimistic, active, enthusiastic personality was very distinctive and easy to identify. Of course, if he was acting, then that would make him harder to read.

Yan Jiyun didn’t make too many judgments yet and continued observing.

Lan Mo and Shi Yan were now considering a new issue: whether to continue resting in the supermarket until dawn, or move out immediately.

He Yuanle said, “There’s food and drinks here. I think it’s pretty good.”

But Lan Mo and Shi Yan weren’t just here to clear the instance. They had more important things to do.

Since ghost entities were still active at night, something else might be happening elsewhere in the school. They couldn’t afford to rest too safely.

Shi Yan said, “We should leave. Who knows if we’ll miss important plot events.”

He Yuanle said, “At this time, there shouldn’t be any new plot, right?”

Shi Yan replied, “In supernatural instances, most events happen at night.”

He Yuanle said, “But when we came out, everything was pitch black. Where would we even find a plot?”

While they were debating whether to stay or leave, Yan Jiyun calmly lay down on a soft cushion and rested.

This was a supernatural instance. He didn’t feel like going out to die.

Lan Mo remained focused on the black cat. Seeing that it wasn’t moving, he said, “Since the black cat is an NPC and it’s not leaving, that probably means there’s no immediate event. Let’s rest here for a few hours first. The supermarket also has food and water.”

Since Lan Mo made the decision, Shi Yan didn’t argue further. He Yuanle happily went to find a braised chicken leg to feed the cat.

Yan Jiyun wasn’t hungry, but he still tried a few bites. It was a bit salty.

He Yuanle also gave him water. “I didn’t expect to raise a cat in the game. I’m so happy.”

Yan Jiyun drank the water and lay down to rest, all the while staying alert to his surroundings.

Because of He Yuanle’s possession incident, Lan Mo and Shi Yan decided to take turns keeping watch.

Outside, everything was quiet. No other players had emerged.

With Lan Mo and Shi Yan here, Yan Jiyun was able to get some sleep.

The three people and one cat stayed in the supermarket until dawn.

At 5:30 AM, the sky began to lighten.

Yan Jiyun heard a scream. He perked up his ears and confirmed the direction. It was coming from the lakeside.

He stretched, then jumped to the window. He Yuanle was already awake and opened it for him.

Yan Jiyun leapt out through the window.