The Cub Raised in a Horror Game - Chapter 10 - Your Little Treasure Has Arrived

In the months since Chu Wang had found Inia and taken her home, she had never fallen ill, no matter how frail her little body was.

The sight of the [Mild Cold] tag on her status nearly made the young man lose control of the murderous urge rising in him. He simply could not comprehend how someone in another world could feed the baby and still manage to let her catch a cold.

A cold or fever in an infant might be regarded as a minor ailment in a normal world, yet parents still needed to watch it closely to prevent the illness from worsening or leading to symptoms like high-fever convulsions.

But on the 36th floor of the Infinite Space, the danger level of childhood illnesses was drastically higher.

Medicine was extremely valuable here. Even Chu Wang, when he was still a child raised under the care of a pair of relatively wealthy players, was cast aside the instant he failed to recover from a high fever after drinking a low-grade healing potion. This was even more true for children born in the junkyard.

Without access to treatment, and with adults indifferent, survival depended solely on fate. Thus, for the children here, the most terrifying things in this world were sickness and injury.

Everyone felt guilty because Inia had fallen ill, believing they had failed to take good enough care of the baby.

“It’s not your fault; it’s mine.” Seeing the gloomy atmosphere settle over the small base, Chu Wang could only take the blame upon his own shoulders. “Maybe I accidentally let Inia catch a chill when I was feeding her outside.”

After barely managing to calm the other children, Chu Wang gritted his teeth in frustration. He cursed his own powerlessness, wishing he could lay eyes on the so-called divine being who ruled that other world.

He had cared for Inia with such painstaking attention for so long. It was bad enough that the other party was lucky enough to share his sister, but to be so careless? How dare he!

Truly, the one who raises a child well is the one whose heart aches the most.

Fortunately, Inia was no ordinary infant. She hadn’t fallen sick even when her body had been so fragile, so this cold was probably minor, perhaps connected to the energy she had absorbed.

Chu Wang proved right once more. Though Inia had a cold, she didn’t look especially uncomfortable, merely sneezing occasionally and sniffling, while still crawling swiftly across the floor mat.

Over the next few days, Inia began slowly absorbing the dark energy she had gained from the sea, no longer dreaming of it at night, and again refusing to eat during the day.

Thanks to Chu Wang’s concealment, no one noticed anything out of the ordinary about the baby.

Inia hadn’t reached the age of forming memories yet and just like the forgotten Vampire Lord before, when she stopped dreaming of the ocean, she completely forgot the ocean incident.

A few days later, however, the baby returned to the ocean in her dream once more.

And the ocean was cold.

In the past, Inia hadn’t reacted, but whether it was because the depths of the ocean were colder, or because the power concentrated near the abyss instinctively drew the baby to absorb it, the moment she arrived, she let out a loud “A-choo!”

Compared to the Vampire Lord Dreist’s negative power, most of which she devoured in a single night, the blackness surging in the abyss hadn’t diminished much, despite Inia’s visit two days ago.

Such overwhelming negativity and violent emotion could never have come from just one person.

The baby did not understand such complex matters. Her belly was already full and the earlier energy had not yet fully settled, but when she saw what felt like an endless valley of ice cream, she could not stop herself from feasting again, greedily absorbing the power while trembling from the icy chill of the ocean’s energy.

It felt like eating minty popping candy ice cream, the cold shooting straight into the skull, making the mind tingle with a piercing brain freeze.

The Ocean: …

Inia, who was busy chewing, chewing, chewing, had no idea what was happening. A current wrapped around her, gently sending the baby back toward the shallow, far-less-cold part of the ocean.

The water around her was no longer icy but warm, as though this ocean had awakened from its dead stillness and begun to live again.

The baby was displeased. She had only taken a few bites, yet her ice-cream valley had vanished!

She was just about to cry in protest when, suddenly, a small toy yellow duck appeared out of thin air in the warm water surrounding her.

Inia’s eyes widened. Her attention was captured by the little yellow duck floating before her, and she instantly forgot the ice cream that had been taken from her mouth.

The baby, absorbed in playing with the rubber duck, did not realize that compared to the ocean’s earlier coldness and scrutiny, its attitude now seemed to have softened slightly.

At last, it had responded to her.

The current wrapped gently around the tiny baby, and an invisible hand cradled her, carrying her toward the shore.

The ocean placed her on top of a tall tower.

This was the tallest building in the entire city. On the distant horizon, the setting sun was slowly descending, and orange light poured between the high-rise buildings of steel and concrete.

The entire scene, viewed from the tower’s summit, was beautiful and spectacular.

The Ocean invited Inia to watch the sunset. Perhaps this was its way of saying thank you—for Inia had eaten some of its negative energy, though to the ocean, that amount was merely a drop in the ocean.

“Ah-woo?”

Suddenly transported from the boundless ocean to a completely different place, the baby widened her eyes and patted the solid ground beneath her in disbelief.

She was drawn to the brilliant sunset where sky met earth, but a child’s attention span was short. After watching for only a moment, Inia became far more interested in the little duck she held in her hand. After playing with it for a while, she set the duck aside and began searching for an adult.

Everything in the ocean had been strange, and the baby’s memory reset with each passing night, causing her to forget the same things over and over. She had only cared about playing and hadn’t been able to think of anything else.

But back on the ground, the environment—so similar to real life—quickly made her notice the absence of her brothers and sisters.

She crawled a few steps across the platform at the top of the tower. Everything was unfamiliar, and no one was there. The baby stopped and looked around.

“Waaah?” She made a sound, calling for her caretakers.

The rooftop was silent; not a single person could be seen.

Inia sat down, blinking her large eyes, looking a little bewildered.

“Mmm… Brother?”

Her small voice was soft and sticky, like a tender little dumpling.

Only those who had cared for her knew that, while she sounded adorable now, if no one responded soon, this little dumpling would start summoning thunder and rain.

Her soft baby voice dissipated into the quiet breeze. The rooftop still seemed to hold only the baby.

And still, no one answered her. The child who had been treated like Her Majesty ever since Chu Wang found her had never experienced such neglect. Inia pursed her lips. Just as she was truly about to cry, the still air suddenly shifted.

The entire world twisted into a fast-turning wheel. The sun dropped at ten times its speed, and the moon and night rose instantly.

In the blink of an eye, deep night fell.

The baby was startled by the sudden change, but her attention was quickly drawn to the city below the tower.

The metropolis beneath the night sky glowed with a pale, icy blue light, resembling another cold ocean from afar.

Then, enormous three-dimensional projections burst to life between the skyscrapers, and the entire world turned dazzling and brilliant.

Inia didn’t know that these were simply the standard 3D advertisements of the Cyber World. She was deeply fascinated by the flashy, moving projections. Sitting by the tower’s edge, she focused intently on the city not far away.

A few minutes later, when the engrossed baby finally grew bored and turned around, she saw several small 3D projections materialize in the empty space behind her.

A neon-pink cat batted at a ball of yarn, while a fluorescent-green dog wandered about sniffing.
Beside them, a small yellow car spun circles on the ground. Each projection chimed and clanged with sounds carefully designed to attract a child.

—The main strategy was simply to keep the baby occupied enough to forget about crying.

Inia looked at them with wide-eyed curiosity. She had no idea they were only virtual projections. One moment the cat on the left captivated her; the next, the dog on the right seized her attention.

She tried to reach out and touch them, but her hand passed straight through the light. The baby stared at her tiny hand in disbelief, her eyes round with wonder.

Just like that, she played with the 3D projections all night. They ran around her and interacted with her like real animals, sometimes changing their colors and shapes, completely holding her attention and giving her no chance to notice anything else.

This night utterly exhausted the baby. She spent time batting at the projections, crawling around and playing with them, and her attention was constantly focused. A single night’s sleep met her entire daily exercise requirement.

When she woke, Inia no longer crawled around with her usual boundless energy. Instead, she clung to her brothers and sisters, quietly allowing them to hold her and causing almost no trouble.

Her sudden silence and good behavior made everyone uneasy, fearing that her illness had gotten worse.

Chu Wang checked the baby’s status and found that the [Mild Cold] tag had vanished—only to be replaced with [Fatigue].

…Did someone play with the baby all night long inside her dream?!

Holding Inia in his arms, the young man suddenly felt the heartache of a single mother who had raised her child through hardship, only for someone else to set their sights on her. What angered him even more was that he had no idea who was targeting his baby.

The baby looked up at Chu Wang from within his arms. Although she did not understand why her brother’s mood had been unstable recently, Inia still remained obediently nestled against him, even pressing her cheek to his chest.

From that day on, Inia would occasionally visit the Ocean’s world in her dreams. Sometimes she played in the water, and other times the Ocean would take her to the city’s high tower and give her amusing toys.

Chu Wang simply could not monitor everything. If Inia were old enough to speak fluently, it would be far easier. Crucially, she was still too young—she had only just learned to recognize people and call out to them. Though this already made her a very clever baby, it was still not enough.

So, even though the young boy had a brilliant mind capable of calculating the rules of the 36^th floor Great Purge, he remained powerless and missed most of the clues about the dreams the baby had of other worlds.

If only Inia could describe her dreams to him, Chu Wang could immediately draw many conclusions.

For instance, the “Ocean,” the Lord of the second dungeon world the baby visited in her dreams, appeared far more intelligent than the Vampire Lord Dreist.

Of course, this might be due to differences in their eras; after all, part of the Ocean’s world resembled a futuristic metropolis, while Dreist’s realm was still trapped in the Middle Ages.

Inia formed a mental link with every Lord whose power she absorbed. For now, this list included only Chu Wang, Dreist, and the Ocean.

Chu Wang, who stayed with the baby daily and was not truly a dungeon Lord, had a very dull perception of the mental link. However, the baby’s [Imprint] and her [Star Room] remained secrets known only to him.

Dreist had sensed the mental link and used it to exchange names with Inia. Yet after more than a month, he still had not found a way to use that mental link to contact the baby again.

Dreist had perceived the mental link, using it to exchange na   mes with Inia. However, after more than a month, he still hadn’t found a way to use the mental link to contact the baby.

The remaining Dungeon Lord—the “Ocean”—was very, very intelligent.

At first, it had secretly observed Inia for more than half a month. After she absorbed a small portion of its negative power, the mental connection between them began.

However, the Ocean existed as the ocean itself, and the baby had never met its “person,” so there was still no mental interaction between them. The Ocean did not know who the baby was, and the baby did not know that the Ocean was a living entity.

But within only a few days, the Ocean learned a more advanced use of the mental link—summoning the baby in her dreams.

From that point on, every time the baby dreamed of the Ocean, it was the Ocean initiating the contact.

Inia was too young to control her power, and her mental link remained completely open. As long as someone called her in the correct manner, her power would instinctively respond.

Each time the baby visited in her dreams, the Ocean observed her from every angle, eventually coming to understand her habits, her little preferences, and her temper, until it was certain that her appearance was accidental and not part of any plot.

However, this was not without its cost. In the days it spent familiarizing itself with Inia, the Ocean’s tower top inevitably began to fill with the baby’s belongings.

There was simply no avoiding it; Inia was a home-loving child, and empty spaces instinctively made her anxious and uneasy. Only after the Ocean analyzed her preferences and filled the emptiness with items she liked did she finally begin to relax.

Here, the baby received her own small bed, various children’s furniture, and toys.

Only after acquiring these things did the forgetful baby finally begin to remember that she had a new territory.

It was true that the Ocean carefully maintained control over its vast world and fully understood Inia.

But from another perspective, the baby had also managed to leave her mark in the Ocean’s realm. She had even carved out her own territory at the very center of its world… Was this not a reverse invasion?

The baby comes, the baby sees, the baby conquers!