Chapter 99: Ailin's Physical Body

Hmm? Why is it Jianxing? Wu Chang was stunned for a moment. Didn't Jianxing just have his Inspiration value skyrocket because he took photos of the Count's manor, and he needed to rest for a few days?

How come, after only one day, he went to the small pier to take photos, and even rowed a small boat so far out?

Wait, who is the woman beside him? Although Wu Chang hadn't been in Brifor for long and hadn't met at least half of the townspeople on the island, he could be certain that there was absolutely no tradition on Brifor Island of dyeing hair half-black and half-white.

That woman is a player.

And a player he hadn't seen before.

After a moment of thought, he realized that the Administration must have sensed the difficulty of the Quiet Town and sent reinforcements for Jianxing through special means.

To be able to send someone in to save the situation halfway through an instance—was it through a special item, or the Administration's temporary administrative authority? Regardless of which it was, being able to break the rules of the Abyss Game to a certain extent meant the Administration was more capable than he had imagined.

It’s just that their eye for picking people isn't very good.

The woman who came to save the situation looked even more disheveled than Jianxing. At the very least, Jianxing could control his flying sword and leave some scars on the giant sea monster, which could barely count as acupuncture.

But the woman who came to save the situation only had energy-based and status-based skills; she couldn't even draw blood. Facing the giant sea monster envoy, it could at most be considered a massage.

Considering they helped lure out the Inner World, he wouldn't watch them make a fool of themselves.

He turned his attention back to his True Self and was just about to ask Ailin to go to the small pier with him when he found Ailin staring blankly in the direction where the sea monster appeared, saying:

"I can feel my body."

"Didn't I say that your body had already turned to charcoal..."

Wu Chang stopped halfway through his sentence. It wasn't because what he was about to say was too hellish and he was afraid of hurting Ailin, but because he suddenly remembered that he had awakened Ailin from the Bishop's mental echo.

He had not seen Ailin's real corpse.

Ailin was a doll crafted by Professor Ebet and the Church using every possible technique and material; her body was composed of treasures possessing occult power, so how could it be easily burned to charcoal?

The charcoal was merely an artistic embellishment in the Bishop's mental echo; Ailin's real body had very likely been "recycled" and used for something else.

For example, the sea monster in the small pier's Inner World, or perhaps the giant girl on the main building of the Count's manor.

Wu Chang asked, "What are you planning to do?"

"I want to take back my body," Ailin said.

"How will you take it back?" Wu Chang pressed. He didn't have Professor Ebet's craftsmanship to pick parts out of the scattered sea monster's body and piece together a new body for Ailin.

Ailin's body floated up, and the "Blessing of the Great Madonna" she wore began to glow.

"I will shrink my consciousness into the pendant. You put it on my body, and I will be able to regain control of it. I need your help."

"Wait!" Wu Chang reached out to stop Ailin's dissipation, made an exaggerated circle with his hand, and said, "The current state of your body is a bit large; it probably won't be able to wear this necklace."

Ailin: "Then let it eat it, or stuff it into its body. Any other questions?"

Wu Chang shrugged, "None."

"Then I'll trouble you, Mr. Saikesi."

Ailin's body turned into a beam of white light and merged into the Blessing of the Great Madonna.

The Golden Sea was adjacent to the Inner World where the small pier was located. Wu Chang took the necklace, transformed into a giant whale-man, and jumped into the sea.

Under the protection of the ocean, his swimming speed was much faster than traveling on land, and it didn't take long for him to reach the boundary between the two Inner Worlds.

The light from the Starlight Lighthouse shone over, clearing a path through the regional barrier, and he swam along the path into the small pier.

"Jianxing, haven't we reached the shore yet? I can't hold on much longer!" The Negotiation Master tried her best to maintain the magic shield, blocking the sea monster's repeated impacts.

"I've already done my best. This sea area is strange; my Sword Heart hasn't found a flaw yet!"

Just a short while ago, Jianxing had disregarded the danger of his Inspiration going out of control and made a desperate gamble, slashing out with all his might.

That strike had indeed worked; it split the sea monster's eye, and the flying sword rushed into the sea monster's body through the eye, shredding its brain.

He had thought the battle would end there, but before they could find a way to leave this sea area, the sea monster that should have been dead came chasing after them, full of vigor.

Not only was it fully healed, but even its damaged eye had regenerated.

Since that strike, Jianxing had stopped thinking about killing the sea monster and instead focused on rowing, looking for a chance to escape.

His rowing hands were already moving so fast they were a blur, and the wooden boat's speed was comparable to an ordinary speedboat, but even though the small pier was right in front of them, they simply couldn't reach it.

It was clear that this sea area had special rules that had trapped them in a "ghost wall" loop.

While rowing, Jianxing used his Sword Heart to sense the rules of the sea area.

The Sword Heart was an inherent skill of the Sword Sect and also its most core skill.

It could not only amplify a player's sword techniques but also allow the player to transcend the shackles of their mortal flesh and observe the world using the sword as their body.

Stimulated by the crisis, he quickly discovered the anomaly in the sea area and immediately turned the boat, charging straight toward a certain reef. Under his full acceleration, the wooden boat launched off the water's surface, flying toward the front.

In mid-leap, he formed a sword seal with his hand, pointed forward, and shouted, "Open!"

The flying sword broke through the air, slashing out a strike. Wherever the sword light passed, it left a transparent sword mark in the air.

The wooden boat hit the sword mark like a finger poking into a layer of plastic wrap; it felt as if a transparent barrier was blocking him, preventing them from leaving.

If the space were intact, the wooden boat would have fallen back into the sea and been caught by the sea monster.

But now, a tear had been cut into the "plastic wrap" by the flying sword, and at this moment, with a poke of a finger, it was torn open after only slight resistance.

The wooden boat crashed through the sea area's space and landed heavily on the small pier.

They had escaped.

Jianxing and the Negotiation Master stepped off the wooden boat, just about to catch their breath and celebrate their narrow escape.

Who would have thought that before Jianxing could even catch his breath, the sea area space behind them was torn open entirely, and the sea monster rushed out from the hole, chasing them straight toward the shore.

"Damn it! This sea monster can come ashore!" The Negotiation Master swallowed hard, her whole body going numb.

What happened to the instance vacation? What happened to just taking a turn and getting paid? What happened to this being a rule-judgment instance?

I'm here to earn some extra money, not to risk my life!

"Jianxing, I'm laying it out: the outside world already knows your Sword Sect realm has had a major breakthrough, and they lowered the instance's pollution value from 75 to 20. It's pointless to keep pretending!"

She had originally wanted to play along with Jianxing to see how far he could act, but she hadn't expected this kid to be so composed; even with the sea monster about to kill them, he could still hold his broken flying sword and pretend to be weak.

Acting so deep, he should go be an actor in the future.

Jianxing was stunned, "Are you sure you didn't misread it when you came in?"

The Negotiation Master's mouth twitched slightly. Still addicted to acting, are we?

"Old Xu told me personally, what do you think?"

Seeing that the Negotiation Master was determined not to believe him, Jianxing helplessly revealed his severely damaged attribute panel.

"Look, it really wasn't me."

The Negotiation Master checked repeatedly, especially after seeing Jianxing's ridiculously high 45 points of Inspiration and only 10 points of Willpower remaining, and believed that the reduction in the instance's pollution value really wasn't his doing.

An Inspiration-to-Willpower ratio of 4 to 1—was he planning to go into a death-seclusion and die if he didn't break through?

If these attributes were on her, let alone fighting, she'd have to play the Great Compassion Mantra in her ears while sleeping at night.

Now the Negotiation Master panicked. While dragging Jianxing along in a mad dash, she shouted, "Then who did it? Hurry up and call for help!"

Jianxing was silent.

If he knew, wouldn't he have called for help already? The small pier's Inner World area wasn't large, and the two of them soon reached the end.

Perhaps the sea monster was tired of chasing, and it glared at the Negotiation Master.

The Negotiation Master's body shook, but she immediately returned to normal, though her demeanor became even more agitated.

"This ghost thing just performed a judgment on me. Luckily, my resistance to judgments is high. You need to think of a way; I can feel its judgment standard constantly rising. If it happens a few more times, even I won't be able to block it."

Sweat began to bead on the Negotiation Master's forehead.

The good news was that Quiet Town was indeed a judgment-based instance; if it had been any other player hit by that judgment skill, their attributes would have dropped by at least thirty percent.

The bad news was that the BOSS in the instance was not only powerful in judgments but also physically very strong.

A dry cough interrupted the tense atmosphere.

"Excuse me, are you two in trouble?" Wu Chang's True Self, wearing a black robe, turned out from behind the reef next to them.

Jianxing recognized the black robe on Wu Chang and exclaimed, "You're that player who was on the beach at the beginning!"

Among all the players who entered the instance, the black-robed person in front of him and another melancholy, artistic man were the only ones he hadn't seen once since the instance began.

Wu Chang didn't respond to that and continued, "You dropped something while you were running away in the sea just now, and I happened to pick it up."

From Jianxing's reaction, the Negotiation Master sensed that this person was extraordinary and asked, "What thing?"

Two necklaces appeared in Wu Chang's hand, and he asked, "That is the question for you two brave players: did you drop this silver necklace, or this gold necklace?"

He blinked and took out the "Blessing of the Great Madonna."

"Or is it this special quest item necklace that can kill the BOSS as long as you stuff it into its mouth?"

(End of chapter)