Chapter 125. Liúshuǐ People (1) Wang Xue: Erlang Shen^[1]二郎神 (Èr láng shén): This is a Chinese deity, Erlang Shen. He is a powerful warrior god who is often depicted with a third eye in his forehead. Sister Jing?

     As soon as the fresh blood touched the formation on the testing device, the temporary yin-yang eyes were activated.

     Wang Xue’s gaze directly met a dark red eyeball rolling on the ground, and scanning her surroundings again, she couldn’t help but gasp. The residence she was living in was truly lively.

     Damn it, the house was full of ghosts!”

     Those black, gray, and shapeless ones are fine, they look almost like shadows.

     The colorful ones are the most terrifying. Bluish-white, pale, bloody, incomplete, some ghosts wear clothing from unknown ethnicities, while others sport t-shirts with jeans, and there are even long, ancient Chinese robes—

     A Qing Dynasty person?

     Sir, how many years have you been dead? Wasn’t the spiritual energy revival only something that started at the end of last year?

     At this moment, Wang Xue heard a familiar system voice:

   【Congratulations, survivor Wang Xueqin, you have triggered a reality copy, Do you wish to enter immediately?. (If you do not answer within 10 minutes, you will be considered to have given up by default. After giving up, you will not trigger the same instance again.)】

   【Note: When three types of instances conflict in time, the priority is: public test instance first, then free instance, and finally reality instance. Please allocate your time reasonably.】

   【The task countdown has started: 9 minutes and 58 seconds.】

     Zizizizi——

     The power went out.

     “Ah!”

     Wang Xue’s scream was truly terrifying to the ghosts, the yang energy inside was not to be trifled with.

     Wang Xue had been fearless since childhood, afraid of nothing in the heavens or on earth, except for things like ghosts. Whether it was Sadako from the mountain village climbing out of the TV or Kayako from the haunted ancient well, even looking at static images of them would send chills down her spine. Listening to ghost stories would definitely make her afraid to get up at night, she had a typical phobia of ghosts.

     The current scene made her heart race to 200 beats per minute. It wasn’t that she couldn’t defeat them, it was just that her heart would panic.

     The male ghost with a rat-tail haircut that was much uglier than the ones in ancient TV dramas didn’t know that Wang Xue could see them. He stretched his head in front of Wang Xue and was almost kicked away by her.

     “Ahhh!”

     The frequency of normal ghost sounds is lower than the range that humans can receive. The higher-level undead will cause air fluctuations and screams that can be heard by human ears, which will also consume energy.

     The undead around were all frightened. After the second, third, and fourth blind ghosts were beaten to death, they retreated one after another, and some even fled outside the yard.

     In short, this copy was beyond Wang Xue’s calculation range, and her brain was a little blocked now.

     Ghost phobia has nothing to do with strength. Thinking about the possible plots in the copy, such as zombies and coffins, and looking at the countdown that was constantly shrinking, it seemed a pity to give up the real copy. She immediately dialed the number for help.

     Ye Mo answered almost immediately: “Wang Xue?”

     “Sister Jing, help me. I just triggered a real-life dungeon. I saw dozens or hundreds of ghosts from different eras, including Qing dynasty pigtail ghosts. The countdown to the opening of the real-life dungeon is only 10 minutes. If you don’t join, it means you automatically give up. There are less than 8 minutes left.”

     When Wang Xue said this, the ghost undead around her who could understand what she said were shocked.

     This, this, this… This person can actually see them. The black ghost aura around an aunt who died in the village last month became two points thicker. Ah ah ah ah ah, reaching out her hand forward.

     Then, she was threatened by Wang Xue’s punch and stopped where she was. Now no ghost dares to offend this evil star.

     Ye Mo answered concisely: “Go to the forum.”

   【The companion magic scroll has been transferred. Fill in my name. You call Watson now to explain the situation. I will prepare some props and medicines. We will enter the dungeon in the remaining 1 minute. 】

   【Love you, Sister Jing! 】

     Wang Xue threatened the ghost undead while calling Watson to explain the current situation.

     Watson, who heard the brief process of his friends triggering the real copy, said: “… Be careful.”

     This is not Wang Xue triggering the copy, but she actually lives in a copy!

     …

     In a short period of time, Ye Mo bought minerals, forging agents, light crystal cores, wood spirit stones, space spirit stones, crystal cores of various attributes, fasting pills, hemostatic potions, mental recovery agents, thunder talismans, etc. from the system mall, plus wood weapons, which was almost enough.

     In order to test the problem of the real copy, she bought another partnership magic scroll, which cost nearly 100,000 points.

     Countdown: 1 minute and 30 seconds.

     Wang Xue wrote her and Ye Mo’s current account names on the magic contract, and then entered the copy. At the same time, Ye Mo received a question from the system: 【It is detected that the survivor Wang Xue invites you to participate in a real copy. Do you agree?】 

     “Agree.”

     Then, the two did not appear in any white space, this step was skipped entirely.

     Wang Xue didn’t even feel like she had participated in an instance yet.

     Meanwhile, Ye Mo felt an irresistible spatial force, and in the blink of an eye, she appeared in a Miao village in Yunnan Province, 2,500 kilometers away from Zhangjiakou City, facing Wang Xue.

     “Erlang Shen Sister Jing?”

     “Wang Xue.”

     The first time they met was in such an unexpected and hurried situation.

     The two had different dungeon bodies before, but the moment they saw each other, the previous impressions had disappeared. This look was the real her, the most suitable for her!

     Ye Mo didn’t know whether to laugh or cry: “It’s not Erlang Shen, this is HawkEye. Thanks to it, I was able to complete the task in the last dungeon.”

     “Hello, Hawkeye!” Wang Xue came to Ye Mo with her long legs over one meter long, as if she had found a backer. She wiped the non-existent tears on her face with her hands and complained: “Sister Jing, they teamed up to bully me, and I was almost scared to death.”

     The ghost undead who were stunned and frightened by the sudden appearance of a living person with three eyes: … Who are we? Where are we? What did we do? It’s so scary!

      Who is scaring whom? Who just lost their soul? ! ?!

     Ye Mo could see that behind Wang Xue’s seemingly funny appearance, she was indeed uncomfortable with the undead and her mood was a little unstable. She took out the high-level light crystal core from the space and handed it over, “Don’t be afraid, they are not even as good as a zombie finger in the doomsday supermarket.”

     The ghost undead: “…”

     Wang Xue took the light crystal core and could really feel the temperature of the light crystal core being passed to her little by little. Seeing Ye Mo’s calm smile again, her whole heart was at peace.

     Ye Mo: “Let’s take a look at the dungeon mission first.”

  【Dungeon: “Liúshuǐ People”

     * Main Quest: Assist Wang Xue in finding at least one civilization’s spark from the Baiyue people.

     * Note: The quest’s timer is based on Wang Xue’s lifespan. If the main quest is not completed within 10 (units of time), all surviving participants in the dungeon will be obliterated. 】

     This dungeon name is quite poetic and picturesque.^[2]The dungeon name Liúshuǐ Renjia (流水人家) is a Chinese idiom that doesn’t have a direct equivalent in English. It literally translates to “flowing water, people’s … Continue reading

     The Baiyue people, from ancient times to the end of the Qin Dynasty, lived in the coastal areas south of the Yangtze River, which include present-day Jiangsu, Shanghai, Zhejiang, Fujian, Guangdong, Guangxi, Hainan, and northern Vietnam, and partially include Hunan, Jiangxi, and Anhui.

     This time, it’s an instance related to the Baiyue ethnic group.

     Ye Mo and Wang Xue have both experienced the Spring and Autumn Period and Warring States Period instances, so they are quite familiar with the Baiyue people and know many things that are not in history textbooks, but they cannot match them with the current ethnic groups.

     “The emperor’s son descended to the northern bank, his eyes were dim and worried about me. The autumn wind was curling, and the waves of Dongting Lake were under the leaves.”

     At this moment, Wang Xue’s mobile phone music suddenly sounded. When she looked at the number, it turned out to be Watson from Guangdong.

     “Zizizi Wang Zixue?”

     “Watson Zizizi?”

     The call can be connected, but during their call, due to the influence of the ghost undead, there will be intermittent Zizizi sounds, a bit like the poor signal deep in the mountains.

     But after isolating the influence of the ghost undead, the call sound is clear again.

     The real copy is worthy of being a real copy. Wang Xue and Ye Mo are in the Miao village in Yunnan Province, China on Earth. They are not disconnected from the outside world and can even leave Yunnan Province to go anywhere.

     It’s just that when the survivor app is opened, it will show——【Survivors are detected in the copy and cannot log in temporarily. 】

     That is, they just can’t use the system function temporarily. The time flow rate of the real world and the real copy is the same. Watson and Wang Xue are a little worried about Ye Mo’s work.

     “…”

     Ye Mo calculated the distance from Hebei Province to Yunnan Province. This means that at least three new space nodes need to be established: one in Yunnan, one for the Chuan Ming Group, and one as a transit station.

     It’s better to take two days off next week. The mission is the priority.

     Watson said: “If it involves Miao Gu, I’d be interested in participating. Are companions allowed in the real-world  copy?”

     Wang Xue can, but Ye Mo can’t.

     However, they didn’t invite Watson for the time being, because the situation in the real copy is unclear, and one of the three of them must always guard the logistics and deal with emergencies.

     …

     Watson went to check the relevant information of the Miao village, and Ye Mo and Wang Xue started the real copy mission.

     With the Yang energy in Wang Xue’s body, these undead should have avoided them, but they didn’t. Possibly due to the imbalanced Yin and Yang in the environment. Two of them already possess the strength of low-level ghosts.

     Ye Mo and Wang Xue, no, Ye Mo first interrogated a hundred and eighty conscious ghosts. The information gained was limited, they all awoke on a certain day, and ghosts who had been dead for too long had forgotten their names

     It’s not that they don’t want to leave here, but only in this Miao village can their soul energy dissipate more slowly, especially in some houses in the village, such as the house that Wang Xue rented.

     “Let’s go out and take a look.”

     There is no difference between day and night for the survivors. Wang Xue led Ye Mo to walk around this Miao village first. It is indeed a place with beautiful mountains and rivers. The starry sky is a beautiful scenery that cannot be seen in the city.

     This Miao village is built on the mountain. The characteristic building in the village is the wooden stilt house connected by mortise and tenon rivets. It is said to be an intangible cultural heritage tribe.

     Because the road ahead is rugged, few tourists come. The advantage is beauty, but the characteristic is poverty. The village has only been connected to electricity in the past two years.

     At this time, most people in the village are asleep. Even if there are a few night owls, they can only choose to sleep after discovering that the electricity is not normal tonight.

     Ye Mo: “The villagers are people, real humans, not ghosts or zombies.”

     Wang Xue was relieved when she heard the result. She had just imagined too much.

     What Ye Mo didn’t tell her was that he had seen the ghost undead in almost every household in the village with the hawk eye. There were more ghosts than people in the village.