Chapter 189: Messiah

The hotel staff, prompted by the massive commotion just moments ago, quickly sent people up to investigate.

The blood on the floor, and even the mangled flesh that had been beaten off the body, made the scene look highly suspicious.

And in the face of the knocking—

The Manager felt incredibly fortunate at this moment... finally, someone had come to rescue him from these two terrifying, violent thugs!

As long as he was rescued, he could record these two people in this cycle, and later, he could follow the trail to find them.

In the next cycle, he would definitely kill these two!

That was what the Manager thought, but the subsequent turn of events left him stunned.

Wen Xishu frowned, considering whether to knock the person at the door unconscious.

At this moment, Akiyama Xiaoxing also wore a look of fear, because she saw a trace of viciousness on the Manager's blood-mangled face.

She felt panicked, unable to stop herself from thinking that everything would return to how it was before.

But at this moment, Wen Renjing stood up, walked to the door, and opened it directly.

"Ah, welcome, welcome."

"My god, sir, why is there so much blood in your room! Ah! That's Mr. Sakai Shinichi! Mr. Sakai, how did you get so severely injured? This won't do, we must call the police!"

The hotel staff clearly recognized the Manager—Sakai Shinichi.

Sakai Shinichi desperately wanted to call for help, but his throat was suddenly pressed by Wen Xishu's fingers. And only then did he realize...

While Wen Xishu was a devil, the stunningly beautiful man beside him was certainly no angel either.

Wen Renjing suddenly asked a question:

"Hmm, the room is a bit dirty, apologies, but we will clean it ourselves. Do you have any other business?"

The sentence was asked lightly, yet it seemed to pierce through something.

The staff members immediately nodded in realization:

"Oh... right, what does it matter? It's just a dirty room. Then, sir, do you need us to arrange for someone to help you clean?"

"No need, we'll do it ourselves. Please notify the staff not to knock and ask about cleaning. We prefer to do things ourselves," Wen Renjing said with a smile.

"Very well, the customer's request is always paramount. Welcome to the Hujiang Qianxue Hotel, we won't disturb you further."

The Manager let out a muffled, panicked scream.

But the staff acted as if they hadn't heard it, bowed, and closed the hotel door.

Only then did Wen Renjing turn around, his expression incomparably cold. With this expression, Wen Renjing had the numbness of a gorgeous superstar after dealing with fans.

"Stop calling for help, no one is coming to save you."

Another power of the Desire Sequence.

Wen Xishu was amazed; all situations where fighting might occur could be avoided... this was Wen Renjing.

If the Three Towers rules were interconnected, those who prided themselves on being Slaughter Tower experts—if they lacked any mental defense—would likely not even conceive the thought of harming Wen Renjing.

In a sense, wasn't this a "disarming" or "silencing" skill?

"Xiaoshu, continue. You question this Mr. Sakai; I will have a chat with Xiaoxing. The hotel is safe for now, we don't need to take them away," Wen Renjing said, beginning to look for clothes for Akiyama Xiaoxing.

The wounds on Akiyama Xiaoxing's body surprised Wen Renjing somewhat.

Wen Renjing had dealt with many Corruptors, and some Corruptors would awaken certain traits—

"Hypnosis," "Presence Reduction," "Natural Favorability," "Orator," "Corrupt Soil," "Cycle Simulation," "Personality Substitute"...

It could be said that after the sixtieth floor, a portion of Corruptors would often possess a superpower.

In fact, in this scenario, which was highly likely a Level 7 mission, Wen Renjing had always felt that the Corruptor should have a superpower.

But just now, Xiaoshu's series of actions had beaten the Corruptor until he had no power to fight back.

In fact—

The Corruptor had no power to fight back.

It was just that the Corruptor was too easy to find and too easy to defeat. This left Wen Renjing very confused.

Admittedly, Xiaoshu had a bunch of cheat-like methods, but it was truly too easy.

And, did this Corruptor really have no special abilities?

Looking at Akiyama Xiaoxing, Wen Renjing thought...

Could the Corruptor's ability this time be to unlock the use of violence?

If not, why would Akiyama Xiaoxing have so many wounds? One had to know that Corruptors could not use direct violence.

Past Corruptors had all driven others to use violence.

But intuition told Wen Renjing that wasn't the case. The truth had another reason, because the power awakened by Corruptors, at least around the sixtieth floor, was without exception on the mental level.

So, looking at Xiaoxing's wounds, Wen Renjing couldn't help but think of a possibility—

Xiaoxing's ability.

Perhaps Xiaoxing's ability would be a breakthrough point to defeat Immortal Sentian.

At this very moment, Wen Xishu was questioning the Manager.

He was attacking the Manager's psyche:

"You have experienced many cycles, whether it was killing certain 'visitors' who suddenly appeared in the cycle."

"Or if you died yourself, you would find that you would return to the starting point, right?"

"I have killed many guys like you; they all initially thought they could start a new cycle through death."

"But in the end, before dying, they all understood one thing—meeting me is the last cycle of their life; life is no longer a maze, but a complete dead end."

"You know everything around you like the back of your hand, but you couldn't calculate our arrival, could you?"

First, destroy the Corruptor's inner sense of luck, then make the Corruptor realize he was not the protagonist of the world.

"You are just one of many NPCs. Facing real players, you have seen it... you cannot resist at all."

"However, I can let you live. To me, you are just a toy in this dimension."

"But whether you can live depends on how honest you are."

Sakai Shinichi did not know that his fear had been deepened by Wen Renjing's sequence.

He now began to doubt himself, accepting Wen Xishu's mockery and suppression.

With Wen Renjing present, it could be said that Wen Xishu's actions, aside from fighting, were exceptionally smooth. He was the strongest teammate Wen Xishu had encountered so far, besides Xunhui.

"Xiaoxing, have you discovered any abnormalities in yourself so far?"

Wen Renjing asked gently.

Akiyama Xiaoxing shook her head.

"I... I don't know."

Both Wen Renjing's conversation and Wen Xishu's conversation could be heard by both of them.

Coincidentally, at this moment, Wen Xishu was also asking:

"Does Akiyama Xiaoxing have anything special about her to you?"

Wen Renjing also said:

"He should have quite a few slaves. Do you think Sakai treats you differently than others?"

At this moment, Akiyama Xiaoxing nodded:

"He prefers to torture me, humiliate me... and... beat me."

Wen Renjing said:

"In other words, he prefers to spend time on you."

Akiyama Xiaoxing replied:

"Hmm... he often says I am a work of art, an existence born to be abused. Compared to other slaves, he is more willing to humiliate me."

Wen Renjing gently stroked Xiaoxing's hair and continued to ask:

"He hurts you, beats you; which time was the most severe?"

After being comforted by Wen Renjing, Akiyama Xiaoxing seemed to gradually gain the courage to recall the past pain with slight calmness:

"He stabbed a knife into my body... gouging out flesh, it was very painful."

Wen Renjing remained patient:

"Do you think that kind of pain... could be controlled?"

This question surprised Akiyama Xiaoxing:

"I am just an unfortunate person, a commoner; I do not possess superpowers. How could I possibly control that kind of thing?"

Wen Renjing confirmed one thing.

Xiaoxing must possess some kind of ability, but Xiaoxing herself could not perceive it.

Wen Renjing said:

"For so long, do you think you can adapt to these pains?"

Akiyama Xiaoxing began to shake her head frantically:

"I just feel that every time it is very painful, it hurts a lot; how could it be possible to adapt to such things!"

Her emotions became agitated.

Wen Renjing realized his question was too rushed, and he immediately apologized:

"I'm sorry, Xiaoxing, I just hope to clear up the mystery about you. We are here to save you, absolutely not to hurt you."

If a person like Wen Renjing made a mistake, they likely wouldn't be held accountable; if they really were, an apology could calm the situation.

Seeing such a god-like figure apologize to her, she immediately felt guilty in her heart:

"I... I'm sorry! You continue asking! I trust you!"

And at this moment, on Wen Xishu's side, he also obtained clues through Sakai Shinichi.

Wen Xishu's fingers stabbed into one of Sakai Shinichi's wounds, causing Sakai Shinichi's expression to change abruptly.

Although his face was already too mangled to make expressions, from his suddenly changing pupils, one could see that Sakai Shinichi was in great pain.

"You mean... she is a natural slut? I suggest you change your phrasing."

The intense pain made Sakai Shinichi change his words:

"I once tried to exile her outside... but almost no one was willing to respond to her with kindness."

"In her life, there was only her deceased mother, that actress who was played out... ah!!!"

"I'm sorry, it was the actress, Akiyama Rika, who held kindness for her. And... a ghost."

"A ghost raised by Immortal Sentian's family."

"It can be said that she was born with a fate to be hurt, abused, and inflicted with pain by others."

"I also only confirmed this point after experiencing several cycles."

Wen Xishu said:

"How did you confirm it? Just by the mockery of those around her?"

Sakai Shinichi said:

"Of course not."

"I discovered that this world held malice toward her..."

"It was because I once also thought the world held malice toward me."

"Once, I had a death... that was my first death. A slave escaped; he was a ladyboy from a village in Southeast Asia, with a more charming appearance than a woman, and he had been taking hormones, which also led to him not having much strength..."

"But he killed me; I couldn't resist at all. I could only dodge."

"At that time, I realized that I seemed to have been suddenly deprived of some kind of ability."

"When the new cycle began, I naturally knew everything. I started arranging for people to stop that slave. Then, with a crowd watching, I wanted to try beating him."

"But I couldn't do it."

"The world granted me the power of cyclic memory, but the price was that I lost the ability to commit violence."

"Although I could let others commit violence, I myself could never pick up a whip to lash these lowly creatures... ah!!!"

Whenever Sakai revealed some desire to belittle others, Wen Xishu would poke Sakai's wounds.

After repeating this several times, Sakai's phrasing became much more standard.

"I cannot attack others, whether they are rich, poor, old, or young... I cannot attack anyone divided by any level."

"But I quickly realized, so what? Although I cannot use violence, I can indirectly master violence..."

"Information is money! Money is royal power!"

"As long as there is money, a bunch of people will be willing to use violence for me."

Wen Xishu was annoyed:

"Get to the point."

Sakai Shinichi immediately said:

"Until I met Akiyama Xiaoxing! At first, I just felt that Akiyama Rika's daughter's genes should be good..."

"But even so, it wasn't necessarily worth me adopting her. But the moment I heard her voice... I felt that I really wanted to bully her."

"After seeing Akiyama Xiaoxing, I couldn't help but want to beat her, whip her; I wanted to make her suffer, to see her face in agony!"

"You... don't you have this desire? I always thought this wasn't just my idea; it was everyone's idea."

"I have done experiments, more than once; everyone who stays with her for no more than three hours will develop the desire to make her feel pain."

"The... the thing that excited me the most, I'm sorry... the thing that surprised me the most, is that this world doesn't allow me to hurt others, but it allows me to hurt her!"

"Only when facing her can I exert violence, and I wantonly bring her pain!"

"So... Akiyama Xiaoxing is a person cursed by the whole world, loathed by the whole world!"

"She is, in the true sense, a child abandoned by heaven."

On the other side of the hotel room.

Akiyama Xiaoxing said:

"I don't know why, everyone seems to hold hostility toward me, not the kind of restrained hostility, but the kind they want to vent on me..."

"Do you... do you have it?"

Wen Renjing shook his head:

"I will not hurt you."

Akiyama Xiaoxing's tears fell.

For a long time, she felt she didn't deserve happiness, partly because of her tragic past, and partly because of the twisted logic of the Manager, Sakai Shinichi.

But more...

It was because she couldn't even receive kindness from strangers.

At this very moment, Wen Renjing and Wen Xishu both realized this point.

This was also why...

Morita Hitomi clearly only expressed friendliness, clearly only chatted with Akiyama Xiaoxing... which was the reason Akiyama Xiaoxing could trust Morita Hitomi so much.

Because in Akiyama Xiaoxing's world... the character 'Xing' (happiness) in her name seemed to be something she could absolutely never possess. This was a girl entangled by misfortune and pain.

In her miserable life, the kindness expressed by Morita Hitomi was something she hadn't encountered since her mother died.

Wen Renjing and Wen Xishu looked at each other.

Wen Xishu knew very well that there were no people cursed by the world; there were only Qualified Ones.

Qualified Ones were often such because they had mastered a certain sequence.

And sequences might have negative effects, but they must also possess more powerful positive effects.

Just like Morita Hitomi, he absorbed others' misfortune, making himself look like a monster, but correspondingly, he could truly change a person's fate.

Then what about the Qualified One, Akiyama Xiaoxing?

Her life of constantly collecting pain and being loathed was all a negative effect, but what was the positive effect?

At this moment, Wen Xishu suddenly had a terrifying guess.

The birth of pain currency, the existence of the pain auction... perhaps it wasn't because of the obsession rule...

But the real, explosive power of some sequence. The human hole was indeed terrifying, and the power to extract misfortune was indeed magical...

But perhaps in this mission, the strongest Qualified One was not Morita Hitomi at all.

Wen Xishu suddenly smiled:

"Xiaoxing, you were never an unfortunate person; pain and misfortune... are just nutrients for your growth."

"You are the one qualified to flip the roof."

(End of chapter) ===== CHAPTER 190 =====