Infinite spooky game

The car door slowly opened, and all the dead people in the car moved and stood up straight.

Holding their own urns and portraits, they lined up in the aisle and jumped off the bus one after another.

Qi Si followed the team and got out of the car through the back door.

The moment my toes touched the ground, the dead people lined up in front of me disappeared like smoke. Even the other vehicles I had seen earlier disappeared as well, as if they were just an illusion like a mirage.

Before your eyes is an ancient city with colorful prayer flags fluttering in the wind. It sits majestically at the foot of the snow-capped mountains. The city walls built of white bricks are tall and majestic, shining brightly in the cloudless sky.

Animal and human corpses were kneeling densely outside the ancient city, with their heads bent 90 degrees and hanging down to the ground. Qi Si couldn't help wondering whether the dead who had just got off the car had also become one of them kneeling here.

Lin Chen got out of the car right behind Qi Si, and stood calmly among the corpses, maintaining a calm expression for a long while.

The next to get off were Lu Li and Xu Yao. One of them was neither human nor ghost, and the other had been dead for many years. At this moment, they were as relaxed as if they were returning home.

Lu Li looked around and adjusted his glasses. "I studied folklore for a while before and found that folklore from all over the world contains the image of the dead lining up in a queue. In the East, there are ghost soldiers borrowing the road and driving corpses, and in the West, there is the flute player of Hameln. I wonder if it is a sign planted by the ancestral gods in the basic memory of living beings... If we add novels after the 19th century, there are too many such images."

Xu Yao asked excitedly: "What novel? It sounds like it should be interesting."

Lu Li talked freely: "There are many novels involving such elements, such as Edgar Allan Poe's "Premature Burial" and Agatha Christie's "Death's End"..."

Qis was too lazy to listen to the two inhuman creatures chatting, so he quickened his pace, walked around the corpses on the ground, and went straight into the city gate.

After walking a few steps, he was surrounded by a strong feeling of being watched, as if thousands of people were staring at him.

He looked back and saw that all the corpses had their heads lowered in the same way, their eyeless eye sockets facing the ground, dead silent and solemn.

Next to the city gate stood a man in a red cassock, holding a prayer wheel covered with runes in his right hand and a white flute in his left hand. He had various bone ornaments hanging on his body.

His body was so skinny that it looked like a layer of skin was stuck on his bones. His head was shiny black, and his dark eyeballs in his sunken eye sockets slowly moved, staring at Qi Si: "You are finally here... The Holy City has been waiting for you for a long time..."

Lin Chen followed Qi Si and stepped forward to ask, "Who are you? What does 'waiting for us for a long time' mean?"

“Amitabha, I am the guide…” The man grinned, revealing a mouthful of yellow teeth. “The Mother Goddess gave me a divine oracle in my dream last night. You are the destined ones who have been summoned by Her. I will guide you to live in the center of the Holy City and bathe in the Mother Goddess’s grace.”

It’s the Ancestral God again… He had already been openly hostile in “The Sacred City”, yet he still did this deliberately. It was simply like “walking into a trap” written on his face.

Considering that he knew nothing about the main quest and the world view, Qi Si smiled and asked: "I heard that everyone who comes to Shangri-La can gain eternal life. Is that true? What do we need to do?"

The messenger shook his head and said, "You don't need to do anything. There is no death here. If you stay here and don't leave, you can have eternal life like us."

His voice was extremely low and slow, like the prophecies told by monks in a temple, which made people feel awe from the bottom of their hearts and dare not disobey.

Lin Chen asked calmly: "If a dying person comes to you, can he also gain eternal life? What about the dead? Will he be resurrected directly?"

He heard with his own ears on the bus that the dead came all the way to the holy land of the snowy mountains to be buried in the cemetery. If there was no death in Shangri-La, how could there be a cemetery?
The messenger grinned, revealing a mouthful of yellow teeth: "Those who were unfortunate enough not to come to Shangri-La during their lifetime can also convert to Shangri-La after death. They only need to be buried in the cemetery for seven days, and then they can live in the holy city as they did in their lifetime."

"Seven days" sounds like the time limit of the dungeon, but there is no main task and no pre-prompt, so this time limit is naturally meaningless. Lin Chen couldn't help but look at Qi Si beside him, but didn't get any hint.

The young man lowered his head slightly, as if he didn't hear the messenger's words at all, but was distracted unconsciously. His red coat and cloak fluttered in the wind like a flag.

"The time has come, it's time to enter the city. What you see and hear may answer your questions." The messenger said hurriedly, slowly turned around, and walked in front to lead the way.

The four players followed him into the quaint town.

The moment you step through the city gate, it's as if you've crossed an invisible barrier, and a bustling street stretches out before your eyes. Monks in robes and tourists in colorful clothes come and go, and the sound of people is noisy.

A believer wrapped in sackcloth knelt in the middle of the road, knocking his head towards the snow-capped mountains with each step, his forehead touching the ground, making a loud "bang" sound each time.

The houses on both sides of the road are two-story wooden buildings. The first floor is a shop with restaurants and silver shops, and most of them sell Buddhist products. At a glance, there are prayer wheels and Buddha statues, as well as many black objects that cannot be named.

The second floor was probably a residence, with windows tightly shut, and colorful flowers squeezed out from the gaps and hung down along the outer wall. Colorful prayer flags were fixed on the roofs of the buildings on both sides, spanning over the street, swaying like butterflies when the wind blew.

The picture was clearly moving and the ears were noisy, but Qi Si felt that this place was unusually quiet, like a cemetery during the Qingming Festival. Even if many people came to pay their respects, it would still be cold and silent.

Listening more carefully, no one, whether monks or tourists, said a word of practical significance. They were all chanting scriptures that were difficult to hear clearly. The voices were low and rapid, and the frequencies were chaotic and inconsistent. After listening for a long time, I just felt uneasy and depressed.

From the moment Qis set foot on this land, he was enveloped by an inexplicable feeling of discomfort, and after seeing the messenger, this discomfort became more obvious, as if everything he saw was the externalization of the remnants of the ancestral gods, and the lingering ghosts that were taking his life.

He vaguely heard the sound of footsteps following closely behind him, which were always two steps behind him, making a continuous clattering sound.

Looking back, he was just a devout believer, kneeling on the ground with every step. My previous feeling seemed to be that he was just suspicious and self-indulgent.

After walking for about ten more minutes, a tall snow-capped mountain appeared in front of us, stretching endlessly to both sides.

The pure white snow comes into view, causing the brain to go blank for a moment, and it is difficult to continue with the original thoughts. All the messy thoughts and dirty desires are purified by the pure creation of nature.

At the foot of the snow-capped mountains stands a wooden building that looks like an inn. Its style is full of Tibetan characteristics, with red pillars, yellow walls and a white roof. The eaves are painted blue and green, as bright as oil paintings.

The messenger pointed at the wooden building in the distance and said joyfully, "This is it. You can just stay here. They have already arrived, and they are the only ones missing."

Lu Li asked: "Who are the 'they' you are talking about? Are they other passengers? The four of us came here together, and we don't know anyone else. Did you misunderstand something?"

The messenger just kept shaking his head, smiling vaguely, without answering.

Qi Si was the first to enter the inn. Perhaps because of the wind brought by his steps, the white wind chimes hanging on the door kept shaking, making a muffled "clang clang" sound above his head. Lu Li spoke at the right time: "I suddenly remembered a saying that if you make wind chimes out of dead people's bones and hang them on the door, once a dead soul passes by, the wind chimes will ring..."

These words, intentional or unintentional, seemed to carry some kind of omen. Qi Si interrupted him expressionlessly and said, "Lu Li, I suddenly feel that you are a little noisy."

Lu Li laughed and said no more. Xu Yao said disappointedly, "I really want to hear what happened..."

The messenger led the four people into the hall where the travelers gathered. As expected, there were already many people waiting inside. Men and women were sitting all over the wooden sofas. It was very lively, as if they were really here for a trip.

Most of these people were strangers, but there were also a few familiar faces. Fu Jue and Shuo Meng sat together, and on the other side was Jiang Junjue, whose skin was green.

Fu Jue's face was pale with fatigue. It was unclear whether it was the aftereffect of the "Holy City" copy or he was overworked from running around in reality these days.

He looked straight ahead and nodded slightly to Qi Si and Lin Chen as a greeting. He did not say a word from beginning to end, like a machine in standby mode, or a silent sculpture.

Shuo Meng was holding a cigarette, seemingly hesitating whether to smoke it. When he saw Qi Si coming over, he put away the cigarette awkwardly, took out a bottle of perfume and sprayed it on his face twice.

Jiang Junjue had already lit a cigarette and was holding it in his mouth, puffing out smoke as if no one was around, blinking his eyes as if trying to relieve his nervousness.

Qis cast his gaze towards him, and two seconds later, a line of virtual images of text rolled across his face: [This player has used the item "Water Mirror Mask". Since this is not the first time you have met this player, his true appearance will be revealed to you.]

Qi Si almost understood that Jiang Junjue had most likely survived in the "Red Maple Leaf Boarding School" copy through some not-so-legal means, and could only appear in the public eye with another identity.

However, considering the characteristics of the Water Mirror Mask, the fact that he is still alive should not be a secret in the two major guilds, Jiuzhou and Tingfeng. Going through all this trouble can at most fool the public.

Standing next to Jiang Junjue was a female player wearing camouflage clothes and a crew cut. She had shown up at the guild conference. Qi Si remembered that her name was "Li Yunyang" and she was the holder of the [Eternal Witch Priest] card. She had been on the first place on the rookie list for a while, but she never had much of a presence.

Roughly speaking, there are four identity card holders in the inn, two from the Unnamed Guild, and two from Jiuzhou and Tingfeng, which is pretty evenly distributed.

But if you count the small players...except for the four people who just arrived, the remaining dozen or so people in the inn are from Jiuzhou and Tingfeng.

Come to think of it, the two cards [Fallen Savior] and [Eternal Witch Priest] sound like they will have a bunch of miscellaneous small cards...

The messenger brought the people and left, and the four people sat down one after another.

A girl with a ponytail and freckles on her face saw Lu Li and became emotional: "Lu Li? Aren't you dead? What happened?"

She was about to stand up from the sofa, but was held down by Li Yunyang, her expression still indignant: "You really deceived all of us... Jiuzhou's reputation started to be ruined because of you!"

After all, Lu Li was once a member of Jiuzhou, and a very famous one at that, so it was expected that he would attract attention.

Without waiting for Lu Li to answer, Qi Si looked at Jiang Junjue and said with a smile: "The final instance doesn't seem to say that the dead are not allowed to enter. If there is indeed a rule that I don't know about, why not make it clear now."

Fu Jue said calmly: "There is no such rule."

The girl was a chatterbox, and seemed not to understand Fu Jue's subtext, and continued to babble: "What do you mean? Your Unnamed Guild is clearly going to be the same as Xila? The matter of the "Hopeless Sea" dungeon was not directed and acted by you guys, right?"

The cooperation between Fu Jue and Qi Si is carried out in secret. On the surface, Jiuzhou and the Unnamed Guild are still in a relationship that has just been reconciled for a short time and has not yet completely broken the ice. It is reasonable and logical that the relationship is tense.

However, the players who can enter the final dungeon are all elites who have been carefully selected. Even if they are ignorant of the ways of the world, they will not go past the team leader and offend the opposing guild right from the start.

Lin Chen didn't know whether this conflict was instigated unilaterally by Fu Jue or tacitly agreed upon by Qi Si and Fu Jue, but no matter what, as the president, he had to express his attitude when he encountered a fire in his own guild.

At that moment, he glanced at the female player who had made the trouble, and said with a half-smile: "I have always felt that the evaluation of unknown things can well reflect a person's ideas and attitudes. Why can't it be that we respond to the call for unity and cooperation and resolve our past grievances with the former hostile forces?"

He shifted his gaze to Fu Jue who was sitting upright on the wooden sofa, and his meaning was clear: the peace talks in Sunset Ruins took place in full view of everyone, so there was no reason for them to turn hostile right after entering the dungeon.

Some of the people present knew more secrets, while others, although not fully aware of the entanglements behind it, could sense that there was something going on. The atmosphere in the hall instantly became stagnant.

They all came to Shangri-La on the first day and settled down here as tourists without knowing what was going on. No one was sure how many cards the other party had or how much ability they had left.

Lin Chen and Qi Si's fearless attitude, mixed with some real and fake, true and false, no one planned to test them further for a while.

"President Lin, Vice President Sicily, long time no see, haha, have you eaten this morning?" Shuo Meng spoke first, changing the subject, "Well, I didn't eat either, I entered the dungeon in the blink of an eye, it was quite sudden.

"We arrived about ten minutes earlier than you. We had just gone to bed last night, but today we woke up in the car for no apparent reason and were dragged all the way here.

"I wonder if you guys feel the same way? I think most of the people have arrived, why don't we summarize the clues?"

Lin Chen said calmly: "Our situation is similar to yours. The messenger told us on the way that the dead can gain eternal life if they are buried in the cemetery for seven days."

"We've heard about it, too." Shuo Meng nodded and said, "The dead from all over the world come here and bury themselves in the snow-capped mountains. It is said that when you look up at the snow-capped mountains at dawn, you can see a series of small black dots, which are the bodies buried underneath."

Lin Chen nodded and said no more. Although he was very curious about the main task, he would never do something stupid like asking questions in public and exposing his own information.

Unexpectedly, Shuo Meng continued speaking: "By the way, do you know the content of the main quest? We haven't seen the shadow of the system interface since we came here, what about you?"

"Same for us," said Qi Si. "Let's stay here for one night and search the rooms on the second floor. Maybe we'll find something new when it gets dark."

"That makes sense." Jiang Junjue interjected, "I guess all the foreign travelers will stay at this inn. If we look carefully at night, we may find the relics and ghosts of the previous travelers."

As if to confirm his words, the originally bright sky outside the window quietly darkened. Perhaps because it is located on a plateau, Qis always feels that it gets dark especially early here and the days are especially short.

An old man in Tibetan clothing came out from behind the counter carrying a bowl of rice and placed it on the low table in the middle of the hall. His toothless mouth opened and closed: "It's time to eat. Let's share the rice." (End of this chapter)