Finale (1)
Chen Li had braced himself to see a scene of brutal bloodshed. He was mentally prepared when he opened his eyes—but all he saw was a street he knew all too well.
Just a couple of steps further in was his residential complex, beyond that lay the bustling city center.
Except for the two of them, the street was completely empty—no sounds of people or traffic.
Everyone who had entered the core area with them had vanished without a trace. The world was so quiet it felt as if only they existed.
Fu Moyang lowered his head and asked: “Are you scared?”
Regretting that you came in with me?
“No.” Chen Li shook his head and glanced at their hands, still tightly clasped together. A faint smile quickly appeared on his face. “This time, we weren’t separated.”
His heart felt as if a feather had lightly landed on it, yet it was heavy.
Fu Moyang responded softly: “Mm.”
They moved forward, and as the Horror Game detected the source of danger and began to react, those sinister NPCs finally appeared.
Countless grotesque, cannibalistic monsters charged at them, intent on tearing them apart. But a massive black ghostly force instantly formed a huge barrier, blocking the frenzy of mindless creatures.
These monsters were hideously distinct in their ugliness—one even had multiple heads supported by a few spindly legs, making you wonder if it might collapse under the weight of its own dozens of heads. Its body defied all logic and biology. All its heads drooled foul-smelling saliva as they lunged forward, only to dissolve instantly when they met the black mist Fu Moyang summoned—like moths drawn to a flame.
Chen Li was so frightened he took a step back, but his eyes didn’t waver for a moment: “I think I’ve seen this monster somewhere before.”
System 001: [The mutant monster from the A-67 instance. It’s normal to find it familiar—remember the circus instance where Joker deliberately caught a terrifying monster during Fu Moyang’s beast-taming performance? That’s where it came from.]
Hearing Joker’s name made Chen Li momentarily dazed again: [Joker, where are they now?]
He hadn’t forgotten the pact he made with the other guide NPCs, especially Wendy—he promised to come back for them.
That was still part of his purpose this time.
He really wanted to see them again.
System 001: [Strange. The guide NPCs should all be here. They are objects filled with resentment and shouldn’t disappear just because the instance collapsed.]
But right now, only several mid-level instance bosses kept arriving endlessly, rushing to their deaths. Not a single guide NPC appeared.
This was completely different from what he had expected.
Chen Li soon had no time to dwell on it because the number of ghosts and monsters arriving kept increasing. Even the shop windows along the street reflected ghastly, peeled faces mouthing silent screams.
Everywhere was full of vicious ghosts and monsters, cries and wails echoing around. Though the trees and grass around were familiar, the place had turned into a hellish nightmare.
This was exactly the scene the Horror Game wanted to create—it wanted to turn reality itself into such a hell.
Chen Li was protected behind Fu Moyang like a precious child as they moved forward. Suddenly, he asked: “Can we use any props here now?”
“Mm,” Fu Moyang glanced back, understanding his meaning instantly.
Chen Li skillfully opened the in-game system backpack and summoned the Ghost Bus.
In reality, it was just a toy car, but inside the game it transformed back into its eerie, ghost form.
Fu Moyang pulled Chen Li onto the bus, quickly taking the driver’s seat and flooring the accelerator, crashing through the chaos.
Unlike ordinary bus, the Ghost Bus was completely unaffected by the wailing ghosts.
The little ghosts cheerfully reached for the wheels, hoping to pull a prank and cause a crash—but they all got crushed under the tires.
Little ghosts: ?
Some vengeful ghosts blocking the road pushed aside the hair covering their faces, revealing bloody ghostly faces without any features: “Ah!”
Then they were sent flying by the impact.
Vengeful ghosts: ?
They smashed through everything on their way. Fu Moyang didn’t forget to unleash his ghost energy to devour enemies as he drove—his ease and control made it seem less like “hell” and more like a carefree outing.
As the origin of all ghosts, the ghosts created by the Horror Game were like snacks to him. Consumed, they turned into ghost energy, which he used to devour even more, endlessly feeding himself.
Plus, with Chen Li’s innate ghost-attracting physique, the rogue ghosts not bound by the game’s rules all wanted to consume him, creating an unprecedented frenzy.
From a god’s perspective, it was like a buffet where the food jumped straight into the guest’s mouth.
And this guest was quite rude—driving wildly, crashing into buildings, leaving nothing intact.
The Horror Game was furious—especially because the guide NPCs suddenly stopped working, and its low intelligence caused it to constantly issue warnings to them.
Just the sound alone alerted Fu Moyang, who was driving recklessly around the city, to the location of its main body. Within half a second, all the wild black mist suddenly surged upwards.
The sky shattered like a thin layer of glass, revealing a gray, hazy core beneath.
Looking out through the car window smeared with bloody handprints, Chen Li felt nauseated: “What is that?”
A massive, purplish-red flesh orb hovered in the sky, countless yellow eyes blinking on its surface, dozens of gaping blood-red mouths wide open. The clouds and sky around it turned completely black, clashing starkly with the distant blue sky.
System 001: [That is the core of the Horror Game—the entity you are trying to destroy.]
The moment the core revealed itself, the surrounding horde of monsters went even more berserk, fearlessly throwing themselves forward to attack. The Ghost Bus were covered with malevolent ghosts; once one was devoured, new malevolent ghosts quickly surged forward again.
Ahead of them, the perfectly replicated streets of reality vanished, replaced by several strange, otherworldly spaces.
Fu Moyang gripped the steering wheel and drove toward a wooden door that suddenly appeared in the middle of the street. The bus smashed through the spatial barrier separating them and crashed into what appeared to be a cozy house.
Xiao Li tightened his face and raised his gun. When he saw someone suddenly driving a bus to break open the door he couldn’t open no matter what.
A large bus forcibly squeezed into the living room, overturning tables and chairs into shattered debris.
He and several others trapped here looked numb.
There was probably nothing that could surprise them more than this.
But when they saw the terrifying Ghost Bus followed by a string of malevolent ghosts and monsters, expressions of sheer terror flashed across their faces—likely the most intense facial expressions they’d ever made in their lives.
Chen Li opened the car door and waved at them: “Get in quickly.”
Without hesitation, they grabbed their weapons and climbed in.
In that moment, Chen Li looked like an angel to them.
After getting in, Xiao Li popped his dislocated shoulder back into place. Just as he was about to say thank you, he caught sight of Fu Moyang in the driver’s seat, looking like a demon.
Xiao Li: “…”
He stood up with righteous resolve: “Mr. Fu, let me drive.”
Fu Moyang’s face, which had been visibly darkened by their interrupted private moment, immediately cleared up. He gave up his seat without hesitation, reminding them: “Just crash into anything.”
Xiao Li: “…Alright.”
The others in the bus finally snapped out of their shock, still uneasy as they glanced at the ghosts chasing after them—ghosts that kept lunging and getting taken down one after another.
Finally, someone couldn’t help but ask: “How did you end up running into so many ghosts?”
Chen Li blinked innocently: “Don’t know.”
One experienced player inside quickly analyzed the situation: “Looks like we’ve been split into different spaces. Our numbers were already small, and this is how they’re trying to pick us off one by one. We have to regroup first.”
The Horror Game’s tactics were clever, but things didn’t go as expected. They never imagined most of the ghosts would all chase after Fu Moyang, who had the highest combat power.
That drastically eased the pressure on the rest of them.
Chen Li asked: “What were you guys doing in that house just now?”
They all looked a little battered.
Each had some shame on their faces, but the experienced player finally spoke up: “We were ordered by an invisible ghost in the living room to find all the corpses inside the house. Every five minutes, it comes out to attack us.”
Facing just one ghost was tough enough; it was terrifying to think that without Fu Moyang and the others drawing most of the firepower, they would’ve been wiped out within minutes.
Chen Li clearly felt their respect for him grow as they glanced his way. He half-laughed, half-grimaced: “So what about that ghost?”
“It got run over and killed by your bus when you crashed in.”
Chen Li suddenly understood why their expressions had looked both shocked and numb earlier.
He probably would’ve questioned his life choices, too.
Xiao Li’s driving skills weren’t as steady as Fu Moyang’s. Plus, the Ghost Bus was a very peculiar vehicle: when its beloved owner sat in the driver’s seat, it behaved like a well-trained cat; with the owner’s terrifying boyfriend behind the wheel, it obeyed like a loyal dog. But with a stranger, it swayed and jolted wildly, completely wild and uncontrollable.
The passengers quickly felt queasy from the rough ride. Chen Li, however, was safely sitting on Fu Moyang’s lap, steady as a rock.
This new space was much smaller than the first one. Xiao Li quickly found the next space and crashed the bus right into it, as instructed.
They plunged into a lake, but the Ghost Bus somehow drove on the water as if it were solid ground.
Beneath the surface were countless ghostly hands reaching up.
The ghosts chasing them were caught off guard and all fell into this bloody lake. The water ghosts, lacking any brains, grabbed whatever they could, instantly pulling them under.
Once submerged, there was no coming back up. Soon, countless white bones floated on the water’s surface.
Someone pointed to a house floating on the lake: “They’re over there!”
Xiao Li yanked the wheel sharply and drove up to the wooden cabin in the middle of the lake. Someone opened the door and shouted: “Get in quickly!”
They all saw the various degrees of fright on their companions’ faces.
Ha, so I was the dumb one earlier.
These people also didn’t hesitate to get in the bus. It wasn’t that they doubted the people inside the car, they just didn’t think their enemies would go through such elaborate efforts to kill them. The water ghosts in this lake alone were enough to wear them down.
Eight people got on this time, but the bus still wasn’t cramped; it was just as spacious, somehow its body stretched a little longer.
System 001 explained: [One of the Ghost Bus’s functions is to accommodate all players participating in the instance. Although you were split into different spaces, logically speaking, all fifty-two of you are here for the same instance, so it can fit everyone.]
The Ghost Bus continued to bounce and jolt wildly across the lake. Most of the ghosts behind them sank without Fu Moyang needing to lift a finger—an unprecedented spectacle.
Fu Moyang and Chen Li were like the biggest bugs in this game. Wherever they went, things fell apart. They basically turned this instance into a full-team co-op—on cheat mode.