Love NPC in Nightmare Game - Chapter 38

Chapter 38: Doll’s House 12

Six people stood in a playroom filled with childish fun, and opposite them was a group of crying children. The children’s eyes were red from crying, and they were scribbling on the walls with crayons while sniffling. It was hard to tell what they were drawing at first.

The scene looked like six adults were bullying a group of children. The people exchanged glances with each other, their eyes showing helplessness. They didn’t know what Zhou Zhou had done to make these children cry, and they didn’t know how to comfort children either, so they could only stand there.

Each child had a crayon in hand, and they were all drawing on the wall in front of them. As their drawings became more complete and gradually connected with the drawings of others on either side, the group finally saw the true form of the picture.

It was a tree lying horizontally!

Could this be the exit they were supposed to find?

Eddie didn’t expect his threat to actually work. It turned out that the reason they couldn’t find any clues in the entire building was because the exit was drawn by the children.

If they hadn’t found these children’s headquarters, they might not have found the exit by the time limit.

While finding the exit should be a happy occasion, for Zhou Zhou, it was far outweighed by the distress of scaring so many children to tears.

After feeling sad, a sense of unease crept in. Zhou Zhou secretly glanced at the children with their backs turned and felt he needed to do something.

The children had finally finished their drawing. The lush green leaves and sturdy tree trunk looked very lifelike, except that the tree was lying horizontally. It didn’t look like a child’s drawing at all, not to mention that it was drawn with crayons.

After finishing the drawing, the children huddled together again, like a group of mice seeing a cat, their eyes filled with fear.

A chubby little boy who hadn’t seen Zhou Zhou before and had only followed the others in crying looked around. He was tired and couldn’t cry anymore, so why were the others still crying?

The chubby boy walked out from the group of children and stood in the front, his two eyes almost squished by his chubby cheeks, and pointed at the drawn tree, saying, “The exit is right there.”

Eddie walked over to the wall and looked at the painting up close, even touching it with his hand. The texture was smooth and cool to the touch. It was just a tree drawn on the wall, so how could there be an exit?

“Where is the exit?” Eddie turned and asked.

The chubby boy still pointed with his chubby finger toward what was behind him, but he stepped back a few steps.

Not only the chubby boy, but the other children also moved a few steps to the side.

Eddie looked at the children’s actions with confusion and then glanced at his companions.

Xue Li’s eyes were widening, and her mouth was unconsciously opening.

Ke Li was trembling and pointing behind Eddie, shouting loudly, “Behind you, behind you!”

Behind? Eddie turned around in confusion and saw an unbelievable sight.

The tree that had just been painted on the wall was now slowly protruding outward, changing from a flat surface into a three-dimensional form. However, what caused Xue Li’s expression wasn’t just this transformation, but rather the fact that a human face had appeared on the tree trunk.

The rough tree bark had formed an aged face, and the dense roots seemed like an old person’s feet, slowly emerging from the wall and then continuing to drag across the floor.

With a thud, the entire tree fell from the wall onto the floor. This creature, like a tree monster, lay on the ground, unable to get up.

Eddie was startled, almost hit by the falling tree, and he quickly hopped a few steps back to join his companions.

The tree monster rolled on the ground a few times, its roots also slowly swaying. Combined with its aged face, it looked like an elderly person who had fallen and couldn’t get up due to physical weakness.

The two slit-like eyes formed by the cracks in the tree trunk slowly looked toward the six people present. Although it didn’t make a sound, its gaze seemed to be pleading for help.

Ke Li gasped, feeling a chill run down his spine as he looked into its eyes. If it were a real elderly person in front of him, he would have helped them up, but this NPC, unclear whether it was a treant or a tree monster, could be left alone.

Xue Li also didn’t dare approach it. The children had drawn more than a dozen roots, short and thick, struggling and swaying densely, making one’s head tense just by looking at them.

After observing for a while, this strange tree monster slowly stood up on its own, reaching a height of about five meters. Without any human assistance, it managed to stand up by itself!

Even after standing up, the tree monster was still a tree monster. However, with it standing, the aged, human-like face became even more vivid.

At the bottom of the trunk portion, below that face, a small crack appeared under everyone’s gaze. The crack gradually widened, eventually forming a tree hollow.

This was the only place in the entire house that matched the mission objective, yet no one moved.

Zhou Zhou took a step forward but was immediately pulled back by several hands from behind.

“Zhou Zhou, what are you doing?”

“This exit looks problematic.”

“Why don’t we ask those children again?”

With the goal in sight, everyone hesitated because the tree hollow was too small. It looked like only a child could fit through it, while they as adults would likely get stuck after poking their heads in.

How were they supposed to get out?

Surely the instance wouldn’t just require them to stick their heads in to complete it?

Everyone thought Zhou Zhou wanted to try it out, so they quickly grabbed him.

Xue Li glanced at the elderly face above the tree hollow again. It almost felt like if they stuck their heads in, the tree monster would eat them.

Eddie turned to the children and asked, “Is this really the exit?”

The children nodded vigorously with red eyes, looking very sincere.

Zhou Zhou looked back at the others grabbing his clothes, then raised his head to address them, “It’s okay, I’m just going to try something.”

He pointed his finger at the trunk area and explained seriously, “A tree hollow just opened up. I’m going to try to expand it a bit more because this tree hollow is too small for us to get out.”

Before he could finish speaking, Heya stepped past Zhou Zhou and said, “Let me do this kind of thing.”

He stared at the tree hollow and grabbed the edges with both hands. With a forceful tug, he managed to tear the hollow open even further.

As Heya exerted his force, the elderly face of the tree monster let out a shrill scream, catching the others off guard and making their ears hurt terribly.

The children had known about this in advance and had covered their ears as soon as Heya approached.

Xue Li and the others also quickly covered their ears.

Heya’s brows were tightly furrowed, clearly feeling uncomfortable as well, but he continued to forcefully widen the tree hollow.

In the end, he transformed the tree hollow from a neat circular shape into an arched doorway about half a person’s height, just tall enough for everyone to pass through while crouched. At this point, the elderly face above the hollow stopped screaming.

Inside the tree hollow was pitch black, as if fused with the darkness itself. Heya turned to glance at Zhou Zhou and Alvia, giving them a slight nod before being the first to crouch and enter the hollow.

Alvia seemed to sense something and glanced toward the entrance of the room. He then casually said to the others, “Let’s go, we don’t have much time left.”

Xue Li went in second, with Ke Li tightly gripping the back of her clothes as the siblings crouched and entered together.

Eddie looked at the two remaining people at the tree hollow’s entrance before crouching and going in himself.

Zhou Zhou stood still without moving. Alvia asked, “Aren’t you going?”

He pursed his lips, and his feet finally moved, but instead of entering, he walked over to the children and looked at them, still afraid of him. Zhou Zhou’s brows drooped slightly as he bowed to the children, “I’m sorry.”

Before entering the instance, Zhou Zhou had clicked on that black star, meaning that some of the NPCs inside were played by real people.

The characters closest to real people here were probably these children.

Zhou Zhou wanted to befriend everyone like Mo Lan did, but he failed and ended up scaring them instead.

“I’m sorry for scaring you. Now I have to go, but my ID is ##**&…, you can contact me, and I… I’ll treat you to a meal, okay?”

After apologizing to the children, Zhou Zhou finally crouched and entered the tree hollow.

Alvia noticed that several of the children’s eyes lit up when they heard about the meal, so it seemed many of them would likely contact him.

With a slight curl of his lips, Alvia felt like he had smiled quite a few times over the past two days. He looked toward the entrance of the children’s playground, and that small door opened at that moment, with Xia Yan leading the way. His brows were tightly knitted, and he only gave Alvia a cold glance before entering the tree hollow.

The moment his figure disappeared, the protruding tree also vanished.

Inside the tree hollow, they initially had to crouch and walk, but it gradually became more spacious. Everyone realized this seemed to be the same tunnel they had entered through.

In the darkness, Eddie’s neon green hair showed them the way, and the group gathered together again.

“What took you guys so long? We’ve been waiting for quite a while,” Xue Li complained, though her face was full of joy, indicating they had truly completed the instance.

Moreover, with such a high difficulty this time, they should earn a decent score.

Zhou Zhou said, “I said a few words to the children.”

Eddie stretched lazily, “This one really exhausted me. I feel like I’ve been in the instance for ages. I need to go home and rest soon.”

Ke Li nodded in agreement, “It was indeed tiring, and we have work tomorrow.”

Xue Li remembered they had work the next day, and her previously joyful expression suddenly dropped, “Ah? We still have to work?”

Eddie looked at them sympathetically, “Luckily, I haven’t started school yet, so I still have time to play. But come to think of it, the break doesn’t have many days left either. I wonder if I’ll be able to keep playing once school starts.”

Nightmare City launched during the break, and although it’s an official game that can even increase people’s spiritual power, it’s unclear how schools will handle it.

Most practical courses at universities are conducted in the holographic network. While Nightmare City is a game, it can train spiritual power, so schools might even encourage students to spend more time on it.

However, that was just his guess. After all, their university courses were extensive, and the academic pressure was heavy. When the time came, they might not even have room to play games.

With these thoughts, Eddie also sighed. With the light from his hair, he looked toward Zhou Zhou walking off to the side and asked, “Zhou Zhou, which school are you from? When does your school start?”

Zhou Zhou seemed a bit younger than him, yet had been immersed in the game all day, so he couldn’t be a lower grade student since those had already started.

He was probably also a university student. The Empire’s famous universities were concentrated on a few planets within the same star system. Many people lived far from home and had to take spaceships for a long time, so university breaks were generally in June, though the return dates varied between schools, typically concentrated in early August, the only real break in the year.

After two instances, Eddie felt Zhou Zhou must be a student at one of the top universities, excelling in areas like reflexes, acuity, and more. Maybe after school started, he could even visit Zhou Zhou’s university to find him.

Eddie genuinely liked Zhou Zhou as a person and wanted to become friends with him. However, his question had put Zhou Zhou on the spot.

Zhou Zhou’s mind was suddenly a mess. When Xia Yan had asked before, he could still brush it off, but now that Eddie asked, Xue Li, Ke Li, and Heya were all looking at him curiously.

He didn’t know the names of any schools outside the game world and couldn’t make anything up. Plus, he didn’t want to lie to them.

“I… I…”