DA chapter 41

This time, the scene became clear quickly. First, a sharp smell of disinfectant entered his nose, then the image cleared, and white walls came into view.

Lin Jia heard Yan Xu’s voice beside his ear. “This time appeared pretty fast.”

Lin Jia raised his eyes and saw the Fishman.

This was a hospital. Not far away, the Fishman stood behind the nurse’s station at the consultation desk.

The Fishman’s clothing was somewhat different from the Fishman inside Fish Belly in the previous two times. Although it was standing behind the nurse consultation desk, it was not wearing a nurse uniform but rather maternity clothes.

Not only was the Fishman’s clothing worth noticing, but also the IV stand behind it. Many drip bottles filled with dark green liquid were hanging on the IV stand. Infusion tubes connected the bottles to the Fishman’s body, which was densely packed with needles.

However, upon closer inspection, it was evident that the liquid in the bottles was not decreasing but slowly increasing.

The dark green liquid in the bottles was not being delivered into the Fishman’s body. In fact, the liquid was flowing backward, as if extracting the liquid from the Fishman’s body. This caused the liquid in the bottles to accumulate.

While Lin Jia was observing the Fishman, the Fishman noticed them and grinned at Lin Jia and Yan Xu.

This was the Fishman’s special way of greeting them. Lin Jia had no interest in greeting the Fishman back, so he quickly moved his gaze to his feet.

The cat remained at Lin Jia’s feet after entering Fish Belly.

However, the cat’s courage showed a kind of cowardice. It pressed itself tightly against Lin Jia’s feet, obviously frightened by the Fishman’s smile.

Lin Jia lightly kicked the cat so that its claws would not hook his trouser leg and ruin it.

Although he had essentially confirmed that Yan Xu was most likely the cat itself, he left room for error. The reason was clear: the cat was too cowardly and stupid, while Yan Xu was a mad dog known by everyone. These two had very different personalities.

This time, he wanted to test Yan Xu and find evidence that Yan Xu and the cat were one and the same.

Just as Lin Jia kicked the cat away, Yan Xu walked past him and said, “First, find teammates.”

Only Yan Xu called the people inside Fish Belly “teammates.”

Lin Jia silently followed Yan Xu. The cat immediately sprang up, crouching on Lin Jia’s shoulder.

After looking at Yan Xu’s back, Lin Jia began to observe the surroundings more closely.

This was Yile Hospital. He was currently inside the first inpatient building of Yile Hospital. However, there was only one inpatient building. Outside the building was a lawn where patients could get fresh air. Other than that, Yile Hospital had no outpatient building.

The three-story inpatient building was shaped like an “L.” The first floor had an inpatient payment window, a pharmacy, and a medicine storage room. The second and third floors were wards. The second floor had a doctor’s office, and the third floor had a storage room for medical equipment.

For now, no one else had arrived. Lin Jia and Yan Xu were the first to arrive in D3155.

“The Fishman appearing this early means there’s a high chance NPCs already exist here.”

Suddenly, Yan Xu, who had been walking in front, turned back and said this to Lin Jia.

Lin Jia had heard a similar statement from Yan Xu in the previous Fish Belly. At that time, Yan Xu meant that existing NPCs were harder to deal with than materialized NPCs.

Cloud D3155 was expected to involve eight people. They had not yet met the other people involved, and the Fishman had not yet spoken Soup Surface, but there was already extra noise in the third-floor VIP ward.

There must be a pre-existing NPC inside the third-floor VIP ward.

Lin Jia narrowed his eyes slightly. All conclusions needed big data support. He did not know how many Fish Belly Yan Xu had entered to reach this conclusion.

“Lin Jia, Brother Jia!”

Xiao Yao’s voice came from the corner. Xiao Yao and Xiao Tian, who had entered Fish Belly, ran toward Lin Jia.

Xiao Yao was carrying food and other useful items from inside Fish Belly. After seeing Yan Xu, Xiao Yao paused for a moment. “Mad… Captain Yan is here too?”

Xiao Tian was also surprised, but, unlike Xiao Yao, who almost blurted out, “The mad dog is here too?” she called out, “Captain Yan.”

From the surprise in Xiao Yao and Xiao Tian’s voices, Yan Xu noticed something, and clicked his tongue with a complicated tone.

Lin Jia had come empty-handed. Clearly, Xiao Yao had prepared everything, and his surprise at Yan Xu’s arrival meant that Lin Jia had lied to him—Lin Jia had not prepared anything for entering Fish Belly.

Lin Jia had not told Sharp Knife that he would bring Yan Xu. To avoid Lao Zhou asking too many questions, he didn’t let Xiao Yao prepare supplies for an extra person. As for Yan Xu’s dissatisfied sound, Lin Jia pretended not to hear it.

He said lightly to Xiao Yao: “If you want to attract the NPC’s attention, you can be louder.”

Xiao Yao looked left and right. The other players had not even arrived yet, so how could there already be an NPC? Unless it was an NPC that origanally existed inside Fish Belly.

Xiao Yao immediately stopped and lowered his voice, saying, “Brother Jia, there is…”

Lin Jia raised his chin, the tip pointing toward the VIP ward.

Sure enough, after Lin Jia pointed it out, Xiao Yao could faintly hear a sound coming from inside the ward.

His expression stiffened. He had been to many Fish Belly before and had heard that some would already contain NPCs, but this was his first time encountering it.

He was worried about this Fish Belly trip. He knew himself well. One- and two-star Fish Belly were manageable for him, but three-star Fish Belly—especially with pre-existing NPCs—would definitely be difficult, especially since he had brought Xiao Tian this time.

Xiao Tian was also a newcomer who had only been through Fish Belly once. Xiao Yao and Xiao Tian had originally come to Fish Belly to provide logistics support for Lin Jia. However, given the current situation, there was a risk that they would drag Lin Jia down.

“Is the NPC in the ward the protagonist?” Xiao Yao asked, growing anxious and looking toward the ward frequently.

“Don’t know.” Lin Jia said lightly.

The ward was locked. The solid wood door prevented anyone outside from seeing through it.

Xiao Yao grabbed his hair and said, “I heard that if Fish Belly directly summons an NPC, that NPC will be harder to deal with than a materialized NPC.”

This kind of fear-before-fighting mentality could easily affect one’s performance later on. Although Lin Jia did not have high expectations for others, he slowly opened his mouth to avoid Xiao Yao causing a situation that would require himself to clean up the mess. “What are you afraid of? Captain Yan is here; he’ll protect us.”

Yan Xu took it as a joke. Before he could say, “Don’t put a high hat on me,” Lin Jia, who was putting a high hat on him, spoke first: “Why aren’t you thanking Captain Yan yet?”

In previous incidents, Xiao Yao and Xiao Tian had seen with their own eyes that Yan Xu cared about the lives of those involved. He shared life-saving clues with everyone.

Xiao Yao nodded, thinking that Lin Jia was a genius. Bringing Yan Xu into Fish Belly D3155 was a brilliant move. First, Yan Xu didn’t want Fish Spirit. Second, he would protect them. He hurriedly said, “Thank you, Captain Yan. Don’t worry. I guarantee that I’ll try my best not to drag you down. But if there’s really danger, don’t hesitate. Save Brother Jia first. I’ll never forget Captain Yan’s great kindness.”

For Sharp Knife, one Lin Jia equaled five Xiao Yaos. Xiao Yao knew he couldn’t help Lin Jia, but he could help him test traps.

Sharp Knife could manage without Xiao Yao, but not without Lin Jia.

Xiao Tian also quickly thanked Yan Xu.

Yan Xu did not respond; he only glanced at Lin Jia. He had seen through it; this person wanted him to risk his life for just one high hat.

How is that possible? His life wasn’t valuable enough to sell like this, but it wasn’t cheap either. In the Underwater Wold, many people wanted Yan Xu to risk his life for them. Who didn’t use benefits as bait? Only this person wanted to catch a wolf with bare hands.

Heh.

Footsteps gradually appeared in the hospital. The other people involved also appeared one after another in the building for inpatients.

Looking for clues before Fishman read Soup Surface was a well-known process.

Some people searched all the way up and encountered the few people standing in front of the VIP ward door.

Their expressions froze the moment they saw Yan Xu. Who in the Underwater Wold did not know the inspector captain? But why was this mad dog inside Fish Belly?

Damn, what situation was this?

Upon learning that an NPC was already inside the VIP ward on the third floor, their expressions worsened, as if they were surrounded by wolves in front and tigers behind.

Acting as if he did not see their expressions, Yan Xu asked, “Everyone here?”

The people who arrived later nodded.

Cloud D3155 estimated eight people were involved, and now there were eight people in the inpatient building.

Once everyone was present, it meant that the Fishman was about to read Soup Surface. Of course, the Fishman wouldn’t wait for all eight people to gather in front of it. As long as everyone was present, it would read Soup Surface. If anyone missed it, it would not read it a second time.

So, everyone went down from the third floor to the consultation desk on the first floor. There were no newcomers this time, so the step of explaining the situation to them was omitted. If there had been newcomers, this step would have been necessary; otherwise, uninformed newcomers would have been mistaken for Fishman questions, wasting the three safe Fishman questions per day.

Eight people stood before the Fishman, waiting for it to read the Soup Surface.

The Fishman stared at them, opened its mouth wide, and revealed a mouthful of sharp teeth. “Her abdomen was bulges. She is going to become a mother again.”

“So, just this one sentence…” One person’s expression looked unpleasant as he said in a low voice.

Another person explained it in a low voice.

The higher the star level of Fish Belly, the less content there was in Soup Surface. Pulling any clue from Soup Surface was almost impossible.

Of course, if no clues could be found from Soup Surface, then it would be even more impossible to find useful clues from the scene.

A high-star Fish Belly forced the involved people to ask the Fishman questions.

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