You say this is a love game?

From behind, I could hear arms slapping the water unwillingly, still stirring in the darkness.

In order to prevent these things from jumping out of the water and dragging him under, Mizutani Makoto moved farther away and held on to the rotten and blackened bench in the rest area. He finally caught his breath.

The cold touch still lingered on my skin.

He looked down and saw that they were actually several broken arms. Even after he cut them off with his knife, these swollen arms still did not loosen, but stuck tightly to his skin, refusing to leave like parasites.

I entered the defeat CG?

Mizutani Makoto angrily pulled off the limbs and finally felt relieved.

He couldn't help but ask: "What the hell is this place?"

There don't seem to be any other monsters here.

Or perhaps these swollen arms are the monsters here.

Each arm only has 19 soul points.

It's even weaker than Miss JK's soul, but it has a few more points than Ksitigarbha.

Mizutani Makoto looked at his soul number and was shocked - he had just persisted in the water for a while, and his soul had soared by six or seven hundred. This meant that while swinging his sword, he had actually cut off more than thirty swollen arms?

...He himself doesn't know either.

There were simply too many of these creatures, packed together like sardines. He simply mechanically swiped his sword underwater, capturing a significant number of souls with each stroke. After this struggle, the amount of souls he received was surprisingly considerable!

"Is this still a soul farming spot?"

Mizutani Makoto finally reacted.

This place was full of arms, and in terms of form, it was very similar to the Cursed Death School he had experienced in his previous life. The Cursed Death attacks he encountered were pale arms sneaking up on him.

However, even the same arm postures can have different strengths.

The area around the school building was extremely weird. Mizutani Makoto didn't know how he died until his death. He only knew that when he was touched by those arms, his cursed death bar would increase. As for how to avoid or defeat them, he had no idea. Even if he asked Furuya Ruriko and Kurosawa Ryohito, they were unable to help him with this matter.

Yes, he had asked Lao Hei when he passed by the gymnasium just now, but Lao Hei knew very little about the school building and could not give him more help.

This was the oppressive feeling the school building gave him.

But the swollen arm on this side of the pool was much easier to deal with.

Even underwater, he could easily cut it with a swing of his blade.

And unlike the "whole" of the school building, these swollen arms seem to be separate individuals, but they are gathered together and will attack at the same time.

"Wait, this thing looks more and more familiar."

Come to think of it, had he seen these swollen arms somewhere before?

...He actually recognized it!

When the cracks eroded the real world, they created a twisted barrier that covered the entire Yami High School. Inside the barrier, when Ninomiya Statue struggled out of the lake, there was a mess of swollen arms under his feet. At that time, several arms were directly crushed by Ninomiya Statue, and he also received their souls.

That's right.

The swollen arm at that time came out from the swimming pool.

However, the strength of these arms was actually not very high, and they couldn't even deal with Ninomiya Statue... They just bullied him because he was a pure human, relied on the advantage of fighting in the water, and used the hand-wave tactics to wear down his physical strength, and almost overturned him, a warrior of the same level.

This venue and this number are really abnormal.

Logically speaking, as a warrior of the same level, with the help of two swords, he can kill even the gap girl head-on. As for those monsters of lower rank, such as Miss JK, even if there are thirty or forty of them, he can still roam freely among them.

But these swollen arms, which were not even as big as Miss JK's, almost killed him.

"It would probably be much easier for the Gap Girl to deal with these arms than for me."

"No, even if a paper-like Ninomiya statue were to attack it, it doesn't need to breathe and has no flesh and blood. The power of these arms is not enough to shake its joints. Then, killing these arms would be as easy as stepping on an ant."

"This underwater battleground...it magnifies my human weaknesses. Even though I'm a whole class taller than these monsters, given the combined power of the location and numbers, I'm still at risk of being overwhelmed."

Three dogs slaughtering firewood?

Mizutani Makoto shook his head - there were thirty dogs, or even three hundred dogs, they seemed endless, aiming to wear down his physical strength and drag him into a desperate fight to the death.

"You can level up here, but it's very risky... You have to manage your stamina at all times. If you're not careful, you'll be pushed off balance and ultimately dragged into the pool by those arms..."

As for the consequences of falling into the pool?

The water level in the shallow area is only 1.2m. Can people drown to death?

As long as you can swim, you will not drown under normal circumstances.

But if you are pressed down by countless arms... believe me, you will die in a few minutes.

Mizutani Makoto now experienced the difference between samurai and onmyoji that Furuya Ruriko once talked about.

To survive, you need oxygen.

Wielding a sword requires physical strength.

The human body is limited by this physiological limit. Even if it is trained to the extreme, it will still be fragile at certain moments.

Even if he could cut through iron someday, he still needed to breathe... He was still human.

But Onmyoji is different.

Summon Shikigami and use them to deal with monsters. For example, in this scenario, if he had the right Shikigami, he could kill monsters without any risk.

...The decline of the Samurai Society can't really be blamed on anyone else.

Mizutani Makoto regained some strength and stood up again.

After the investigation just now, he has been able to confirm that there are no monsters on the shore of this swimming pool area.

After thinking about it, he called out Satori Yoshiko.

As soon as the little god of fortune came out, he hurriedly circled around Mizutani Makoto, patting him here and there, until he was sure that Mizutani Makoto was really fine, and then he breathed a sigh of relief.

"I was so worried just now."

Inside the amulet, Yoshiko Satori can understand what is happening in the outside world.

She felt like she was watching a movie through the screen. When Mizutani Makoto was entangled by many swollen arms and was about to fall to the bottom of the pool, her heart was in her throat. Fortunately, Mizutani Makoto had a clear judgment and did not decide to give up his life. Instead, he broke free and got ashore to keep his body useful.

"It's okay. I know when to hide."

Makoto Mizutani patted Yoshiko Satori's head and gave her the task of subsequent exploration.

Taking advantage of the time to recover his strength, he planned to investigate the props and souls in this place.

Satori Yoshiko nodded confidently.

"Leave it to me!"

The little girl stood on tiptoe and began to look around. She had no skills at all in finding treasures. She relied entirely on the "intuition" brought by the passive skill [Seek good fortune and avoid danger]. She would look wherever she felt there were good things. The amazing thing was that eight or nine out of ten places she looked through would contain something, the probability was terribly high.

The first place she looked for was the bench next to Mizutani Makoto.

"call!!"

The girl puffed out her cheeks, raised her wrist suddenly, and swung her long sleeves, flipping directly towards the dead leaves on the bench.

Click!

This girl is making quite a big noise, as if she's having fun.

A few leaves drifted slowly to the surface, stirring up seemingly calm ripples. The next moment, the swollen hand of a drowned person emerged from below, dragging the dead leaf to the deepest part of the pond. Mizutani Makoto happened to see this scene, and his eyelids twitched slightly.

After these evil things were exposed, they really didn't even bother to act anymore.

Ugh, disgusting!

At this time, Yoshiko Satori had already lifted all the dead leaves on the bench.

"Big brother, look!"

The little god of fortune proudly put his hands on his hips.

Just on the bench, after the dead leaves were swept away, a faint light was revealed underneath.

Five souls in total.

Three [Weak Souls], Two [Ordinary Souls]

"An ordinary soul?"

Mizutani Makoto frowned. According to the patterns he observed now, [Ordinary Souls] could only be formed when a large number of victims piled up together. Every time he picked up [Ordinary Souls] before, it was only after he killed the BOSS and looted the BOSS's small treasury.

But now, why did [Ordinary Soul] appear?

【Ordinary Soul】

[Description: Gain 500 souls after use]

[Comment: I have done what I promised you. Please, let me go...]

He focused on observing this "evaluation". In the absence of obvious clues, the last words of the deceased can also be used as a reference.

But what does this mean?

Is he talking to the monster or to someone else?

Mizutani Makoto really didn't understand.

After collecting the soul, he discovered that the bench was covered with something he couldn't make out clearly, and it gave off a rotten smell.

He frowned and lightly swept his fingertips, brushing away the few remaining dead leaves, revealing a pile of...student ID cards underneath.

Yes, student ID.

He brushed away the dust and picked it up. The name written on the student ID card at the top was [Kujo Hitoshi], with a black line crossing through the name, like a mark of "erasure".

There are more student ID cards further down.

One book, two books... more and more.

Yellowed and mottled student ID cards are piled up under dead leaves. Each ID card has a standard campus photo on it, but it seems to span different eras. The students in the photos are wearing school uniforms from different years and the backgrounds are slightly different.

Even though the styles are different, there is one thing in common that is undeniable.

On the student ID cards are young faces that still have the breath of youth, their eyes are clear and their smiles are innocent.

Mizutani Makoto's heart skipped a beat.

He suddenly had a very ominous premonition.

Bending down, I flipped through the student ID cards, my gaze wandering from face to face, lingering on the names crossed out with black lines. The wind blew through the shadows of the trees, slightly fluttering the edges of the ID cards, as if even they were telling the lament of the past.

There was deathly silence all around, with only the occasional slight ripple of the swimming pool water in the distance, like some creature breathing quietly.

There are a large number of souls piled up here.

A student ID card with a name crossed out on the bench.

Only a large number of victims can form [ordinary souls]

Makoto Mizutani suddenly stood up, called Sanatori Yoshiko, and started searching in the rest area.

Every bench here is piled with fallen leaves.

Every time the dead leaves were cleared away, the buried souls underneath would be revealed, as well as the student ID cards piled up like trophies.

Mizutani Makoto actually knew this a long time ago.

This crack has existed for hundreds of years, and countless victims have been killed during this period... But what he didn't expect was that in this seemingly inconspicuous swimming pool, he could find so many traces of victims.

Clean up the dead leaves, take away the soul, and then turn out the student ID card underneath, and repeat this process.

【Sada Takaya】, 【Sanada Hiroyuki】, 【Asada Yosuke】, 【Miyoshi Hidesuke】……

Without exception, all the names were crossed out.

Every student ID card here is a life that has been taken away.

Mizutani Makoto exhaled deeply, suppressing the surging emotions in his heart and not letting them disturb his reason.

These rows of benches are like silent tombstones, burying countless souls of victims.

There are a total of 11 [ordinary souls], which means there are 5500 souls in total. At the same time, there are many small souls, but ten of those souls are only equivalent to one [ordinary soul], which has little impact on the total number.

If he had been brave enough to come here and touch the map during his paper-level days, he would probably have become rich overnight.

Even though he is at the same level now, this soul is still very helpful to him.

It just doesn't feel very good to hold it, and there's no such joy as a good harvest.