Players, Please Board the Train

Zheng Liang cheerfully gave a thumbs-up, “If you can’t solve the problem, just solve the people who create it. Sister Lichun is awesome!”

Even the slowest among them had figured out that Lichun was no ordinary distant relative of Xu Huo. Their gazes shifted back to him.

Xu Huo was comparing the map to the video footage uploaded by the drones, showing little reaction to the Painting Woman’s words. Without looking up, he said, “Wouldn’t that be too troublesome? With all those rules, are you going to kill them one by one?”

The Painting Woman immediately shook her head. “No, I want to play games.”

“You won’t run into that many problems just from working odd jobs,” Xu Huo said. “If you really do, you can handle them the same way you handled that group at the hotel.”

The Painting Woman wasn’t very interested in the dense text. Hearing this made her happy, and she said cheerfully, “Then I’m going out to work. When I earn money, I’ll give you an allowance too.”

With that, she waved goodbye to Gu Yu and the others and skipped off happily.

Gu Yu looked worried. “Won’t she get taken advantage of out there like that?”

“With the way she was ready to take down a government agency, I doubt she’ll be the one getting the short end of the stick,” Zheng Liang called to her, “Gu Yu, wasn’t there a small river around here before?”

The people in the room went back to their preparations.At the same time, in a special prison under the Special Defense Department headquarters, Abel lay on his bed chewing gum in sheer boredom, staring at the sky outside the window.

Winter nights came early, and the light inside the room quickly dimmed. Without the lights on, the shadows steadily grew larger.

After about a few more minutes, the darkness in the corner gradually solidified. A figure slowly stood up from the shadows, like someone pushing up a cloth canopy. Only after it was fully erect did it take on a human shape. Once its form was stable, the face and hands gradually materialized from the darkness, becoming a foreigner with distinct facial features.

The entire process took nearly three minutes. Only when the person was truly standing in the room did Abel sit up and complain, “Why are you so late? Nie Xuan is an absolute monster—he threw me in here without even letting me brush my teeth, forcing me to chew gum instead.”

The man in black in the corner glanced at the walls on either side with his blue eyes and asked in a foreign language, “There are very few people here.”

Abel shrugged. “You think the Special Defense Department guys are all just slackers? Nie Xuan was about to let me go when he got that info you deliberately leaked. There’s no way he’d let me go to a crowded place. Being able to bring me along to Capital City is already pretty good.”

“This new prison only has about a dozen people. The Special Defense Department is all geared up for battle, and even the guards barely come around. Your plan backfired.”

The Special Defense Department had a few newly built prisons near the headquarters specifically for holding players. While players weren’t easy to imprison, those without train tickets were a different story. Some players who committed crimes had to stay in prison until their three-month sentence expired and they were automatically teleported into a random dungeon.

Prison One held the most players. Abel was in Prison Five, which barely had anyone.

“I heard Prison One is holding over a hundred players.” He handed a piece of paper to the man in black. “Inside is a strand of hair from a player. Coincidentally, when I came in, he was being transferred to Prison One. I went through some trouble to get into his room and find it.”

The man in black’s expression softened somewhat. “The nation will not forget your contributions.”

Abel twirled the cross in his hand. “It’s fine if they forget, as long as they don’t use my family’s lives to make me do things.”

“This is what you should do.” The man in black raised his hand, and the lock on Abel’s private cell door clicked open automatically. “For the next ten minutes, all the locks in this prison will remain open. You have completed the task I gave you, and you deserve your freedom.”

“However, your disloyalty to the nation must also be punished.”

As soon as he finished speaking, a small red bear suddenly appeared in the room, charging at Abel with a silent roar.

Abel tried to dodge, but the bear suddenly grew to fill the entire room. With nowhere to go, he could only run for the door. But the man in black was already blocking his path. “You have faith. You should know that only by finding inner peace can you return to God’s embrace.”

Abel slammed to a halt in front of him, and the small bear stuck to his back. The moment it touched him, it shrank back to its original size, branding a wound the size of a human head on him!

The sizzling sound mixed with the smell of burnt flesh echoed through the room. By the time Abel, covered in cold sweat, fell to his knees, the man in black and the bear item had already disappeared. Looking at his back, the flesh was almost completely burned away, with bone exposed.

After downing a few bottles of healing potion, Abel slumped to the ground to catch his breath. He gritted his teeth, snapped the cross in his hand, and let out a laugh. Only when he heard the commotion outside did he drag himself along the wall to leave.

Just as he left the cell, Nie Xuan also received the news. He contacted Special Defense Department members stationed at the other four prisons via an encrypted channel. “Follow the earlier deployment. Priority one on Prison One. Whether someone tries to enter or something happens inside the prison, kill on sight. No survivors.”

“Yes, Team Leader Nie!”

“That’s ruthless,” Team Leader Lü, sitting behind him, remarked with a sigh. “I think you’ve been wanting to deal with that batch of players in Prison One for a while. You just couldn’t move because of orders from above, so you used this opportunity instead. I’m old now. I don’t have the drive or the guts of you young people.”

Nie Xuan’s face remained cold. “If Team Leader Lü is willing to cooperate with me, doesn’t that count as having drive? Others can’t see it clearly, but the ones who will hold the power in the future are definitely the players. After the transfer of power, there’s bound to be a purge. The fewer dangerous players there are, the fewer innocent people will get caught in the crossfire.”

Team Leader Lü, with the characteristic tolerance of an older woman, said patiently, “Even if you don’t make a move, in less than three months, they’ll be teleported into random dungeons anyway. The ones who needed special attention have already been handled. They won’t pose a threat to Zone 014.”

But Nie Xuan cut her off decisively. “Their very existence is the threat.”

Do high-risk random dungeons have a one hundred percent fatality rate? Not necessarily.

Even if they do, after being forcibly detained and delayed from entering the random dungeons, these people would harbor a deep hatred for the Special Defense Department. There are other players from other zones in the random dungeons too. As long as there’s even a single possibility, it must be eliminated!

“I admire you very much. You’re resolute and decisive without lacking finesse.” Team Leader Lü smiled gently. “That’s why I strongly recommended you to become the new team leader.”

Nie Xuan stood up. “The first battle has begun. I’m going to the scene to command.”

Team Leader Lü nodded. “I’ll hold things down here. Let me know if anything comes up.”

*

Xu Huo hadn’t expected the chaos to start so quickly. First, a massive explosion rocked the residential buildings cleared out near the Special Defense Department headquarters. Then, drones captured footage of the special prison going up in flames, with gunfire ringing out. Shortly after, the Special Defense Department’s external units moved swiftly, carrying out rescues while simultaneously surrounding several player gathering spots and making arrests with disciplined efficiency.

The Special Defense Department acted fast. A few unlucky ones didn’t manage to escape. The arrest process wasn’t pretty, and the moment it was posted online, it caused a massive uproar!