Chapter 213: 1V6, Ke Mingqing's Player War, Surprise Attack (1)

[Kuroki Hitomi: Tomorrow night at nine o'clock, at a billiards cafe called "Magic Ball" in the center of Leijing City. Those six players asked to meet me there.]

[Ke Mingqing: I'm coming too.]

[Kuroki Hitomi: I know, so I didn't invite Li Chunchun or Du Tingbei. I only asked you... Just use your Disguiser Talent to pretend to be an ordinary person and hide by my side.]

Ke Mingqing casually swiped away the Chat Panel as the last faint glow of the sunset fell across his cheeks.

"If only I could talk some sense into these idiots tomorrow," he muttered. "I'll just tell them Bai Ziling is in the hands of Death Crow. With the members of Death Crow all at A Rank, that should temporarily discourage them... right?"

"If I fail to complete the objective four months from now, Bai Ziling's heart will be my only backup escape route; failing that, giving her heart to Kuroki Hitomi works too."

"No matter what, there's no way I can hand something so important over to them."

With that thought, Ke Mingqing took a gentle breath, lay face down on the tatami mat, and pulled the ragdoll "Mio" out of his inventory.

The little doll dropped from the air, pressing down her skirt as she sat on Ke Mingqing's back to act as his plushie counter.

Ke Mingqing started doing push-ups, moving up and down while Mio held up the combat suit blueprints from the windowsill, cheering him on and humming, "One, two, one, two."

Before long, as the little doll blinked her mismatched red and blue button eyes and called out, "One hundred!", a notification box Popped up before the boy.

[Weekly Task 2 Completed: One hundred push-ups. (Task Reward Acquired: One chance to use the item roulette wheel.)]

"Mio."

Ke Mingqing pushed himself up from the floor and suddenly spoke.

"Present!" Mio answered loudly.

Ke Mingqing placed Mio on the windowsill and turned his head to look at her, speaking absentmindedly:

"Since Bai Ziling only has one heart, Lan Feng and the others will definitely keep this information strictly to themselves and won't leak it out..."

"Uh-huh, and then, Master?" Mio asked curiously.

Ke Mingqing thought for a moment, leaned the back of his head against the windowsill, and continued, "If I silence them right now, the other players won't have any channels to obtain this information. Wouldn't that be much safer?"

Mio nodded, raised one of her short little arms, and gave an extra "Uh-huh" to show her solemn approval:

"Uh-huh, uh-huh! This way the little vampire will be safe."

"It's not for her safety," Ke Mingqing said softly. "It's for my own backup plan."

"Not. For. Her. Safe. Ty—" Mio dragged out the syllables, covering her mouth with her stubby hands. "Mhm, mhm, mhm! Master is so wise! Master is the most rational person in the world!"

Ke Mingqing shrugged as he opened the reward roulette wheel in the upper right corner of his vision.

Mio tilted her head up, staring at him from the corners of her button eyes.

"What are you looking at?"

"Master, Master, are you going to sacrifice my lifespan to draw a prize just like White Jack did?" she asked cautiously.

Ke Mingqing didn't answer, merely glancing expressionlessly at the six sections on the roulette wheel.

The listed prizes were "6,000 superhuman coins", "5,000 EXP", "Single-Use Item: Clock Maker's Pocket Watch", "Rank Item: Sorcerer's Fan", "Single-Use Item: Personality Splitter", and "Single-Use Item: super-human species Historical Knowledge Pill".

Looking at that final reward, Ke Mingqing's eye twitched slightly.

'Not going to lie, I actually really need that thing...' he thought. 'Lin Yin promised me he'd get lost as soon as he helped me cram for my history subject.'

He tilted his head and sighed softly. "There are several magical girls at school, and at this juncture they are absolute sources of calamity. It's too dangerous for him to stay at the school as a history teacher. I need to get rid of the old man as quickly as possible."

"Master, Master, you haven't spoken to Mio for five seconds." Mio folded her two short hands together and grumbled, "Are you giving Mio the cold shoulder?"

In the next second, Ke Mingqing abruptly hoisted Mio up into the air and shouted at the ceiling:

"I sacrifice my remaining four months of lifespan! Give me a golden pull!"

"Nooooo—Mio doesn't want to die!" Mio wailed in shock, before realizing something was wrong half a second later. She quickly changed her tune. "Nooooo, Master, don't die—!"

Narrowing his eyes, Ke Mingqing ignored her and simply pinched the ragdoll Mio's hand, using her tiny palm to press the start button on the roulette wheel.

The blood-red pointer moved. It spun rapidly, reflecting in the pupils of both the boy and the doll, blurring into a circular afterimage.

Mio felt dizzy. A moment later, a notification box Popped up before their eyes.

[Congratulations, the pointer has landed in section 3. You have acquired a single-use item from the reward roulette — "Clock Maker's Pocket Watch" (Description: This is the pocket watch the Clock Maker could least bear to throw away) (Upon pressing the button on the watch, the casing will crack open and cause a violent explosion).]

"Still haunting me, huh? You watch-playing old bastard."

Ke Mingqing chuckled dryly and rested his head against Mio's narrow shoulders. "I'm tired, time to sleep." With that, he closed his exhausted eyes and stopped moving.

Mio froze for a moment before gently hugging his forehead with her tiny hands, dropping her chin to rest on the top of his head as she drifted off to sleep.

...

...

The next day, September 10th, 9:00 PM.

Billiards Cafe — "Magic Ball".

This cafe was located in downtown Leijing City, far away from the Old Jingmai District. It wasn't very large, but the environment was clean and tidy.

Warm orange light spilled through the lampshades, spreading evenly across several pool tables.

At that moment, a customer was holding a cue, leaning slightly over the dark green baize, his lazy gaze aimed at the white ball on the table. It was Ke Mingqing, using his Disguiser Talent to masquerade as a bearded middle-aged man.

He had already used his talent to remove the player indicator floating above his head, and he had hidden the externally displayed "super-human species Blue Pigeon" panel. Thus, even if another player walked right past him, they wouldn't notice a figure like him.

Not far away, Kuroki Hitomi sat quietly on a leather sofa, dressed in a small black formal dress.

The agreed-upon time with "Lan Feng" had already arrived. Her eyes wandered, searching the long street outside the cafe for figures with player markers above their heads, but found nothing.

So, she opened her Chat Panel and sent a message to the strange bearded man rubbing his pool cue by the table.

[Kuroki Hitomi: Be careful. I found out from Kamishiro Ruri that this "Lan Feng" seems very strong. He's in the top tier among players.]

[Ke Mingqing: It's fine.]

[Ke Mingqing: But are you sure this is the place? It's so late and we still haven't seen anyone.]

"Are you sure this is the place?" Ke Mingqing asked.

"Yeah, they said to meet at this billiards cafe. I don't know why they haven't shown up yet," she replied.

...

"What about messages? Did they send you anything?"

"No reply."

Just as Kuroki Hitomi finished speaking, she suddenly paused. "They replied."

She opened another Chat Panel and looked at the message from the player "Lan Feng".

[Lan Feng: Sorry, but I never intended to meet you from the start. After all, despite being in Leijing, you've been harboring a Red Name Player and keeping your mouth shut about everything related to him.]

[Lan Feng: I haven't trusted you from the very beginning. Once this is done, we'll leave this city. Just pretend we never met.]

[Lan Feng: See you in four months, Miss Kuroki. I hope you can still keep your Red Name pet hidden when the countdown is almost over.]

[Lan Feng: As expected, not all players share the same stance.]

Kuroki Hitomi stared blankly for a moment before furrowing her brows. She didn't really care about the actions of Lan Feng's group—after all, that white-haired vampire had nothing to do with her—but it was hard not to be annoyed at having her time wasted.

She was just about to send a message when a red notification box Popped up before her eyes.

[Notice: Player "Lan Feng" has removed you from their friends list.]

Immediately after, the Chat Panel for her friend "Lan Feng" faded away, and his name in her list gradually vanished like ink fading from an old photograph.

[Kuroki Hitomi: You can come over now. They didn't show up.]

[Ke Mingqing: Damn, what's the situation?]

[Kuroki Hitomi: He lured us here on purpose. He never trusted me from the start. He thinks we might become an obstacle to him.]

Ke Mingqing stiffened, abruptly looking up from his pool cue and glancing at Kuroki Hitomi on the sofa out of the corner of his eye.

[Ke Mingqing: Could this be a multi-layered trap? What if they're actually inside the cafe right now, trying to flush me out, and that's why they lied to you?]

[Kuroki Hitomi: I don't know.]

It couldn't be ruled out that Lan Feng's group was still nearby keeping watch, so Ke Mingqing didn't speak directly to Kuroki Hitomi, choosing instead to continue communicating via the Chat Panel.

[Ke Mingqing: Where did he go?]

[Kuroki Hitomi: Judging by his tone, he actually already knows where that white-haired vampire is.]

[Ke Mingqing: He lied to us before, pretending he didn't know, just to divert our attention?]

[Kuroki Hitomi: He's very worried that we might snatch the vampire away. Based on that, she must hold some incredibly important clues, and only a small number of players can profit from her, otherwise they wouldn't be so secretive.]

[Kuroki Hitomi: They're most likely already on their way to find her. The location must be far from downtown; it's already too late to rush over there, otherwise they wouldn't have tricked us into coming here.]

To Kuroki Hitomi's surprise, she had barely finished sending the message when Ke Mingqing threw down his pool cue and bolted from the table. In the blink of an eye, his figure vanished into the long street outside.

The girl sat frozen for a long time. Then, she slightly lowered her head, the shadow of her bangs obscuring the teardrop mole beneath her eye.

...

...

At the exact same time, in a remote corner of Leijing, on the second floor of an abandoned building.

This place was still the inn replicated by Lorenzo's ability. In a clean room inside, Giovanni abruptly opened his eyes, staring up at the familiar ceiling.

In the next second, he jerked upright from the bed like a suddenly malfunctioning machine, swiftly pulling a pink smartphone from beside his pillow and Unlocking the screen.

The white-haired girl sitting on the edge of the bed blinked in surprise, her red eyes shifting over to watch him intently without moving.

"Heimeng, how many people are in the base right now?" Giovanni asked.

In the center of the homepage, a chibi cartoon girl in a hoodie jumped out, rubbing her eyes as she replied:

"Jiang Qingzi is at the big mansion he bought. Everyone else and the boss are still in Tokyo. I guess Bai is the only one who might be at the base, but she just went out to the lake for a walk."

"And where are you?"

"I'm in Tokyo. Didn't I tell you that this morning?"

Giovanni paused for a moment. "So you're saying Bai Ziling and I are the only two people at the base right now?"

"Mr. Giovanni, did something happen?" the chibi Heimeng tilted her head.

Giovanni froze, taking a long moment to regain his senses before asking softly, "So you're saying we're completely cut off with no reinforcements?"

"No," the chibi Heimeng shook her head. "If you run into danger, I can call Bai to help you. Don't worry, she's very fast. It won't take her long to return to the base."

Giovanni stopped talking.

He put on his shoes while thinking, 'The one playing the role of Giovanni is puppet number 2, and the stat values of Theater Puppet number 2 are only fifty percent of my main body's. Damn it... If only the main body or puppet number 1 were here.'

"What's wrong, Giovanni?" the white-haired girl beside him looked up from her tablet and asked softly.

At the moment, Bai Ziling was playing a game called "Blue Pigeon Fishing" on her tablet. The scene on the screen was incredibly bizarre: a squat, cartoonish Blue Pigeon stood with one hand on his hip, while his other hand aimed a finger at the fish in the sea. Every time Bai Ziling tapped the screen, the Blue Pigeon fired a bolt of lightning that struck a fish, sending her reward score ticking rapidly upward.

"Ziling, we're leaving. Hurry up."

Saying that, Giovanni hauled the girl onto his back without brooking any argument. He swiftly slipped into his leather shoes, stepped away from the bed, and opened the door to the inn room.

He leaned against the window and glanced outside. The ruins were completely deserted, and lonely moonlight bathed the gravel-strewn ground.

Quiet. As peaceful as ever, as though danger had never arrived.

Giovanni averted his gaze and hurried down the dim hallway, keeping a wary eye on the shadows. He stepped into the stairwell and quickly made his way down.

Bai Ziling turned off the tablet and rested her head on his shoulder. Her red pupils suddenly narrowed into vertical slits, scanning the slightest movement like a natural-born hunter.

Giovanni's footsteps were virtually silent, and his voice was kept so low he was practically just mouthing the words.

As he descended the stairs, he spoke into his phone: "Heimeng, my ability detected that someone might be approaching us. I need you to pull up all the nearby security cameras and check every corner of our surroundings. Make it quick."

Bai Ziling stiffened slightly.

It was the first time she had seen Giovanni this agitated. She could even see beads of sweat forming on his forehead.

Truth be told, the last thing Ke Mingqing ever wanted to go up against was players.

Other super-human species at least had a panel that could be predicted, but players didn't. Who knew what weird and wacky items and skills players held in their hands? Just like how he had checkmated the Clock Maker with the "Future Loan Device".

Every single player was an absolute unknown, let alone the fact that the enemy numbered six, and all he had here was a single Theater Puppet with only half the stats of his main body.

"Roger that!" the chibi Heimeng raised her right hand in a sharp salute and said solemnly.

But when he reached the ground floor and barely took two steps out of the stairwell, Giovanni abruptly stopped.

He took a deep breath, lowered his head, and shifted a step to the left, hiding Bai Ziling—still on his back—in the shadows of the stairwell entrance.

At the same time, he lifted his gaze slightly, looking expressionlessly toward the front side of the abandoned building.

Three silhouettes with special text floating above their heads were slowly approaching.

'What about the back door?'

Giovanni thought to himself as he slowly cast a sidelong glance toward the exit at the rear of the abandoned building.

Another three figures with the word "player" floating above their heads were walking over. The leader among them was a red-haired man wearing sunglasses and a Hong Kong-style floral shirt.

Swirling above the man's head were two striking words—"Lan Feng"—a name exactly the same as his forum handle.

"You are... surrounded," Lan Feng said as he swept his red bangs upward.

Ke Mingqing stayed silent for a moment before steering Giovanni two steps forward to meet his gaze.

"You guys delivering yourselves to my doorstep is doing me a huge favor," he said. "It's hard to say who exactly is surrounding who here."