Chapter 1929: After the Rewind, Love You Again 04

A deathly silence lasting ten seconds.

Jin Chen couldn't help lowering his head to look at Ruan Fu's expression, meeting the extremely repressed scarlet depths of her eyes; he silently thought it was bad, and reacted extremely quickly, pressing Ruan Fu against the tree trunk.

"I'll go grab the branches, just wait obediently."

Amid Ruan Fu's unusually grim expression, Jin Chen turned and ran.

Scared the living daylights out of someone.

【Oh dear Host, you shouldn't say that now, isn't that counterproductive?】

Jin Chen thought that was right.

But he wouldn't change it.

Seeing Jin Chen easily slash the wildly moving vines that were a blur, Yun Zaozao's shocked expression was no less than Ji Luo's earlier.

Yun Zaozao clenched the needle tube that had slipped from her sleeve, her cold gaze behind the lenses fixed on Jin Chen.

But the injured back of her hand hurt too much.

Yun Zaozao's mind flashed with the scene of Jin Chen just saving her; she loosened her fist and looked back.

Ruan Fu was still beside that tree, head lowered, unknown what she was thinking, showing no intention of doing the task.

This person actually didn't kill Jin Chen.

Yun Zaozao sneered, thinking that Ruan Fu really wasn't ruthless enough—being hurt like that and still not wanting revenge.

Diligent and earnest in doing the task, painstakingly trying to clear his name, Jin Chen finally managed to snatch the sole branch.

The team members who failed to collect stared at each other, some even guessing this man had come just to farm experience in the novice stage.

After all, no newcomer could be this strong.

In Ruan Fu's gaze that looked at a dead person, Jin Chen seized his wrist and brought the branch close.

Hope team's first-day collection list:

Yun Zaozao, Ruan Fu: Shrub monster branch (1/1)

Jin Chen's hostility toward the monster hadn't dissipated; he leaned half against the tree trunk to rest a while, then pressed down on Ruan Fu's hand that still wanted to move.

"I'm a bit tired, I'll rest a bit, then go back and kill."

Ruan Fu: "……"

Ruan Fu felt an indescribable irritation in her heart.

"You lied to me again."

Ruan Fu suddenly spat out these words, her tone icy and extremely dangerous: "You said before that you basically wouldn't fight."

Jin Chen followed that line of thought for a moment, recalling this plot.

After saying that, Ruan Fu immediately dispatched the Research Institute's special security detail to protect him; the result was that when Ruan Fu encountered danger, that squad had already been disbanded.

He really deserved to die.

Jin Chen tried to make amends: "Actually, I deliberately said that to you."

Ruan Fu coldly snorted: "You're being honest now."

"Because I wanted you to care for me a little more," Jin Chen blurted out, his expression somewhat forlorn, "Back then I thought every day, if only you could spare a bit more of your thoughts on the research experiments for me."

Ruan Fu stared, oddly looking at Jin Chen, as if trying to judge the credibility of those words from his eyes.

But she saw no guilt in Jin Chen's eyes.

However…… that no longer mattered.

Ruan Fu immediately came to her senses, harshly shaking off Jin Chen's hand and walking back, her voice devoid of warmth: "Your nonsense is better left for ghosts to hear."

——

The players of each team returned to the wooden cabin, discussing the issue of time flow speed.

Since entering the game, this forest has been eternally shrouded in twilight, ominous crimson clouds filling the sky.

Losing sense of time is a dangerous thing.

But they soon lost the inclination to discern time; something even more dangerous happened after all the players returned.

【Broadcast: Current number of survivors: 17 people.】

【Points rewards for successful teams on the list mission have been distributed; failed teams enter the attic punishment chamber—please keep trying.】

The game prompt tone vanished, and immediately several teams disappeared altogether; soon, shrill screams came from the attic.

Besides the horror, the other players cared more about another matter.

The youth in the flat cap counted again, voice trembling: "Why do we have 18 people here?"

There are only supposed to be 17 survivors!

"……There, there's a monster." Another girl echoed.

The suffering of the failed teams in the attic continued.

Amid the screams, this unknown fear, like something clinging to the bones, gradually spread to everyone's hearts.

Who is not human.

They no longer trusted anyone, including the teammates they had just formed, fearing that anyone nearby might be a monster.

In such a sorrowful atmosphere, Jin Chen in the blink of an eye saw three villains using points to exchange game items, which only deepened his sadness.

One need not think to know that other players' items are used against monsters, while villains' items are used against the protagonist.

Sitting in the corner resting, Jin Chen couldn't help muttering to himself.

Suddenly Ruan Fu seemed to notice, lifting her eyelids to give him a cold look; in their mutual gaze, Jin Chen hid none of his sorrow, his eyes toward her wanting to speak but stopping short.

Ruan Fu unconsciously frowned, averting her gaze out of sight, out of mind.

It was precisely then, as Jin Chen's inner muttering was interrupted, that he heard some other sound.

It was not coming from the oppressive atmosphere of the wooden cabin's first floor.

Jin Chen slightly tilted his ear, lowered his gaze to discern carefully, and his attention followed the faint, fragmented sound through the stairs, through the attic, straight to the top floor of the wooden cabin.

"Rabbit…?"

Jin Chen looked up uncertainly.

Immediately afterward, the failed team in the attic was teleported back, each person's face deathly pale, some even with froth at the mouth, clearly having suffered a mental attack intense enough to drive a person mad.

〖Safe house time 9 o'clock, food supplies delivered, please players replenish stamina. 〗

Thud, thud-thud!

The players stared in disbelief upward; as they saw clearly what was making the strange noise, they simultaneously stepped back half a step, and the players near the stairs trembled violently from fear.

"Rabbit…" a long-haired girl squeezed out a sound from her throat, continually backing away, "So many rabbits."

The stairs were packed with relatively small rabbits, their blood-red eyes flickering, their mouths moving revealed faintly visible sharp teeth, and…

A face excessively similar to a human's, as the rotating eyeballs locked onto the players, just one glance made the scalp go numb.

Jin Chen: "…Ugh." Ugly thing.

"No way this is a mistake! This is actually our food?" someone with a short temper burst out.

Damn it, who exactly is treating whom as dinner!