Forbidden Zone of Deception

Chapter 18 The Lost Layer (Please continue reading)
In fact, while there are rational reasons for choosing the hunter profession, for Jiang Jin, there is also an intuitive factor involved in this choice.

That's what this profession gives him—a kind of intense energy and spirit that other professions don't have!
We are the hunters, and you are the prey!
To survive in such a terrifying dungeon, strength is of course the most important thing, but spirit and energy are also very important!
Looking at Jiang Jin in front of him, Boss Chen suddenly said with amusement, "Are you feeling quite smug right now?"

“Hmm…” Jiang Jin was taken aback.

Indeed, he was quite nervous about this mission, but the Resentful Moss Ointment was far more powerful than he had imagined. Combined with the Death Knell's bite, it dispersed the evil spirits of the Huang family's old house in less than 3 seconds.

This mission didn't seem particularly dangerous. This made Jiang Jin feel a certain degree of pride.

After all, he was just a low-level police officer before, and the biggest case he had ever been involved in was a jewelry store robbery, where the perpetrators used a fake gun. Now, he could shatter an evil spirit with a single blow.

"I've given you the knife, but that doesn't mean you can use it well." A deeper meaning flashed in the boss's eyes. "Come with me."

The boss then led Jiang Jin into the kitchen, with Deathstroke quickly following behind.

The kitchen was larger than Jiang Jin had imagined. The walls were covered with various knives, and a huge cutting board sat on the counter, still stained with dark red blood. In a corner of the kitchen, several pieces of meat were piled up.

“Um, boss,” Jiang Jin took out the folded village rules from his pocket, “when I went to the Huang family’s old house this time, I found a piece of paper with something written on it…”

"Village rules, right? Do you think this place is a consulting service?" The shopkeeper didn't even look at the paper in Jiang Jin's hand and said, "I'm just a butcher. You help me find the wine jug, and I'll teach you knife skills, that's all."

Jiang Jin had anticipated this; as expected, it was a purely functional NPC who wouldn't do anything unnecessary.

He carefully put the paper away and said, "Then, we..."

"Wait a minute," the boss suddenly said. "Now, close your eyes."

"okay……"

Jiang Jin wasn't worried that the other party would harm him, since Deathstroke was watching from the side.

After closing his eyes, he waited for the other person to reveal what they were up to.

"Extend your hands and grasp them."

Jiang Jin reached out and grabbed two things.

Judging by the feel...

"Chopsticks? Fork?"

"You have a fork in each hand, with a piece of char siu on it. Now, eat the char siu on your left first, chew it thoroughly, swallow it, and then open your eyes. If you feel anything is wrong after opening your eyes, then eat the char siu on your right. Remember, don't reverse the direction."

"okay, I get it."

Jiang Jin couldn't guess what the other party wanted to do, so he could only do as he was told. He raised his left hand and put the char siu into his mouth.

The char siu tasted delicious, but this piece seemed to have too much fat, making it a bit greasy...

Ok?
As Jiang Jin chewed, something just didn't feel right.

The char siu... tastes alright, but the fatty part tastes a bit strange.

how to say……

Besides being greasy...

My throat feels strange, like...

just like……

As he swallowed the char siu, he immediately felt the meat slide down his throat and into his esophagus...

It's a bit like when I drank the water from the pool back then, it felt like fingers were scratching my throat!
He immediately wanted to vomit the meat, but it was too late; the meat had already entered his stomach.

Then, Jiang Jin quickly opened his eyes!

At this moment, a long string of text prompts appeared in my left eye:

Warning! Warning!

Reincarnator Jiang Jin, you have consumed a piece of 'contaminated' char siu!
Pollution impact calculation in progress...

Based on the assessment, your SAN value will be reduced by 20%!
Your SAN value has dropped below 60%! Warning! Warning!
You have entered the Lost Layer!
This is your first time entering the Lost Layer since becoming a Reincarnator; you will not be prompted again afterward.

At the same time, the Reincarnator's Watch also started to sound an alarm that SAN had dropped below 60%!

“You…” Jiang Jin looked at the boss in front of him in shock, while the latter leisurely took out a cigarette and lit it.

Immediately afterwards, Jiang Jin suddenly noticed several pieces of meat piled up in the corner of the kitchen...

That's not char siu at all, it's...

However, before Jiang Jin could even think, a hand suddenly reached out from that corner!

That hand had a blue sleeve, and on its arm was a bracelet!
Deathstroke followed Jiang Jin's gaze and looked ahead, but did not react at all.

"What's wrong?" The boss picked up a meat cleaver from the side and fiddled with it in his hand. "Don't you see anything wrong? Aren't you going to eat the char siu on the right?"

As another hand reached out, Jiang Jin felt every pore on his body begin to tremble!
His hunter's instincts told him: now he was the prey, and the other was the hunter! All his current tools—the boning knife, the resentful moss ointment, the death knell—were useless! Even the Dead Man's Bone Arrow would only stun the opponent for 1.5 seconds at most!
But, how about another piece of char siu?
Jiang Jin looked at the boss, who was leisurely blowing smoke rings and said, "What, you really don't see anything wrong?"

Jiang Jin gritted his teeth and could only swallow the other piece of char siu in one gulp!
This time, the char siu tasted much better, and it was noticeably free of any greasy fat.

After eating it, a new message appeared in my left eye:

Reincarnated Jiang Jin, you have consumed 'Chen Ji Roast Meat's Premium Char Siu'.

Your SAN value has been determined to be +6%.

His SAN was previously 78%, then it was reduced to 58% after a 20% reduction, and now it has jumped back to 64%.

We've escaped the Lost Layer!
He looked again at the corner where he had been standing...

Those two eerie hands have disappeared.

"me……"

At this moment, Jiang Jin felt cold sweat constantly seeping from his forehead.

"Are you still feeling smug now?" The boss skillfully exhaled a smoke ring. "You're nothing more than an incompetent hunter now. You caught a few rabbits and roe deer on the outermost edge of the hunting grounds, and you think this hunting grounds are nothing special, huh?"

Jiang Jin wiped the sweat from his forehead and looked carefully at the corner he had just been in.

The few pieces of meat piled in the corner now looked like normal char siu. However, upon closer inspection, one would notice... the char siu meat had a very strange blue marbling!
"That meat..."

"The meat you were holding in your left hand just now has this kind of blue fat. Sometimes, when I'm cutting meat all day, I'll occasionally find a few pieces of this kind."

Blue...it's blue again...

"You deliberately let me..."

"Let me show you what the inner perimeter of the hunting grounds looks like, so you know your own limitations." The boss, with a cigarette between his fingers, pointed at Jiang Jin. "You're still a kid, you haven't even grown your hair yet. The reason you're still standing here is because you haven't entered the truly dangerous area. Let me tell you, if you hadn't eaten that piece of char siu on your right hand, I bet you wouldn't have survived for more than five minutes."

"What exactly is that blue, fatty flesh?" Jiang Jin felt utterly disgusted. "Just now, I saw... it was clearly..."

“The inner perimeter of the hunting grounds is indeed what you see... but the outer perimeter here is nothing more than char siu that has been contaminated by 'her'.”

At that moment, Jiang Jin suddenly realized that he had indeed been too presumptuous.

Previously, he was always in the mysterious layer.

The SAN value of the Mysterious Layer is between 60% and 80%. Although intervention is needed in Muxu City, since the outbreak of meme contamination, it has been generally believed that the infectivity is extremely weak and the SAN value is reversible, so there has never been a need for isolation.

According to the latest WHO document, this stage of meme contamination syndrome is considered to commonly involve auditory and visual hallucinations, but globally, less than 25% of patients claim to have "hallucinations of seeing ghosts."

Whether it was the "ordinary evil spirit in the pond" or the "evil spirit in the Huang family's old house," they were just ghosts active in the mysterious layer.

The blue-clad female ghost clearly resides primarily in the Lost Layer!

He had only been in the Lost Layer for a few seconds when he became the enemy's prey!

　Please read each chapter in real time! Don't let it accumulate!

　　
　
(End of this chapter)