Chapter 352: This Time, Let’s See Who Dares Play the Hero for a Ghost

The second live observation device was fresh off the assembly line.

This time, however, it wasn’t an uncontaminated version, but a highly contaminated one.

Qi Suian instantly gained a triple-layered truth vision.

In his own vision, there were no swarms of snakes and no colors—just a gloomy, gray ancient temple.

In the uncontaminated vision, the snakes hissed hoarsely, surrounded by a bizarre aura.

However, in the newest, contaminated version, the swarm of snakes wasn’t a swarm of snakes at all. It was a group of androgynous Snake Demon People with lewd expressions on their faces.

If that female Veteran had fallen into the hands of these Snake Demon People, she would have been filled up like a cream puff—the overflowing kind.

However, after the head was separated from its body, this group of Snake Demon People quickly dispersed.

Mostly because there weren’t many of them left; even if they did get their hands on her, they couldn’t make a cream puff.

The head was made into a live observation device by Qi Suian, and the body was naturally consumed as material.

Now, even if Qi Suian were to give the device to this group of Snake Demon People, they wouldn’t want it.

Once he landed, Qi Suian walked deeper into the temple, a severed head in each hand.

Qi Suian collected and stored a large amount of data, saving it for his research projects after he left this place.

In the main hall, a statue of a monster was enshrined.

It had the head of a pig, the torso of a human, and the lower body of a snake.

It wasn’t sculpted from clay or stone; it was more like a living creature, albeit one with its eyes tightly shut.

When Qi Suian arrived, the statue seemed to sense something and let out a strange grunt.

According to the data analysis from his contaminated vision, the entity was speaking.

It was spouting the sort of lines you’d hear in a pyramid scheme: "Enter my domain and enjoy eternal bliss."

But his other two visions showed no activity. In fact, in Qi Suian’s personal vision, the statue didn’t exist at all.

In the uncontaminated vision, the statue was there, but it was completely motionless, like an inanimate object.

When the statue finished speaking and opened its eyes, its confusion was plain to see.

It could only see two heads floating in midair; due to an observational paradox, it couldn’t see Qi Suian.

This was just like how Qi Suian needed the live observation devices to see it.

The observation was, by its very nature, reciprocal.

Qi Suian had not yet been pulled into the corresponding layer of truth.

"Another conscious ghost."

"A pity its consciousness can only exist in the truth layer, and it requires a stimulus," Qi Suian said. As he spoke, the act of observation caused his visions to begin synchronizing.

And then... the monster statue could see Qi Suian, too.

And then... it became afraid.

This was perfectly normal. Anyone who sees a ghost suddenly materialize and claims not to be afraid is lying.

And for ghosts, Qi Suian elicited the same reaction.

The ghost couldn’t be bothered with making empty promises anymore. It turned and scrambled up a roof beam, but before it could get away, Qi Suian yanked it right back down.

The ghost—its exact type still unknown—let out a piercing shriek. It was clearly terrified.

"A ghost! Don’t eat me! I’m not tasty!" the creature shrieked, trembling as Qi Suian dragged it back to the ground.

"I ask, you answer. Got it?" Qi Suian delivered two hard slaps to its pig head, and the howling immediately subsided.

Apparently, this ghost, much like the Hanged Ghost Qi Suian had encountered before, had acquired the consciousness of its host human. Within the truth layer, it considered itself the original person.

In that case, its fear of ghosts was perfectly logical behavior.

After all, ghosts were rampant in the Ziyue Dynasty.

"I... I was just tricking people into leaving incense offerings! I haven’t done anything evil!" the ghost confessed with complete honesty.

Qi Suian gave it another hard slap. "Who asked you that? Did I give you permission to speak?"

The ghost was so terrified it didn’t dare make a sound.

Meanwhile, Qi Suian was mentally recording his observations: ’The closer a truth layer is to the Sealing Layer or the reality layer, the stronger a ghost’s human consciousness. They will even ignore certain logical inconsistencies to a degree.’

’But once they cross over a complete layer, ghosts revert to being something like rule-based lifeforms.’

’The Doomsday Game calls the truth layers the Netherworld, and there’s some sense to that. The ghosts here are all continuations of human beings.’

After finishing his brief mental notes, Qi Suian turned his gaze to the ghost and asked, "How long have you been in this line of business?"

"It’s my first time! I really didn’t mean to trick anyone, it’s just..." The ghost immediately claimed it was its first offense, then launched into a long-winded story blaming everyone else.

In short, it claimed it was forced, it was its first time, and therefore it was just a poor, innocent little flower.

Qi Suian didn’t believe a single word of it.

"Oh, right, right, you’re absolutely right. I believe you,"

"Then you can help me with a little something," Qi Suian said, coaxing the ghost.

This gave the ghost a terrible premonition. Qi Suian’s malicious tone was so obvious it was practically a declaration of his ill intent.

"My... my eighty-year-old mother is waiting for me at home for dinner," the ghost wailed, on the verge of tears.

Qi Suian clapped a hand on its shoulder and said comfortingly, "Don’t worry. You can tell your mother not to cook your portion tonight."

"Or, how about you lead the way? I’d love to meet your mother."

’If the ghost actually managed to produce a mother, it would be a double blessing.’

Qi Suian was now certain: as long as you didn’t break the operational logic of the truth layer, the ghosts acted just like people.

Unless he meddled like he did last time—snatching the guqin from the Hanged Ghost, Wang Qin, and causing it to lose control—they would retain the thought processes of their mortal lives.

The ghost instantly fell silent. Qi Suian’s words were too vicious. It had just been spouting nonsense, but Qi Suian actually seemed intent on "dealing with" its mother as well.

It felt a bitter taste in its mouth. ’What kind of monster came up this mountain? And why is it so damn brutal?’

"Sir, whatever you need me to cooperate with, just say the word!" At this point, the ghost could only puff out its chest and put on a brave face.

Hearing this, Qi Suian replied matter-of-factly, "Oh, just the usual. Have your heart and guts gouged out and grow them right back. Roll around in a wok of boiling oil like it’s a warm bath."

The moment he said it, the ghost turned and fled without a shred of hesitation.

’How could I survive getting my heart and lungs ripped out? And boiling oil is pure torture! This monster has no intention of letting me live. If I don’t run, I’m just waiting to die.’

’It’s death either way. If this monster kills me, at least it might be quick. And if I’m lucky, maybe I can get away and live!’

But it hadn’t taken two steps before Qi Suian stomped on its serpentine tail. The ghost snapped back like a rubber band, flying straight into Qi Suian’s arms.

Qi Suian immediately locked it in an iron grip.

In that instant, the ghost’s heart leaped into its throat.

"HELP!!!"

Its voice rose into a piercing shriek.

A savage grin spread across Qi Suian’s face. "Go on, scream. Scream your lungs out. No one is coming to save you."

The ghost’s piercing screams stopped abruptly. It never imagined Qi Suian would actually say something like that.

Next, he trussed the ghost up tightly, then tried to cut its body with polymorphic energy, but the attempt failed.

Seeing this, Qi Suian could only break off a large chunk of flesh from the Fei’s body and shove it directly into the ghost’s mouth.

The flesh dissolved into Fiber Worms. Through the Tai Sui God’s racial gestalt-thought module and his own connection to it, Qi Suian began collecting data from inside the ghost.

Once inside, the Fiber Worms immediately found themselves in a bizarre, indescribable space filled with a large amount of a black, gelatinous substance.

It contained a multitude of unanalyzable rules, along with a structure born from extreme emotions and memories.

’The scenes ghosts generate in the truth layer are based on the host human’s most profound memories—specific moments accompanied by intense emotional fluctuations.’

’They are, in essence, stored memory fragments.’

’If I can find a way to extract them, it will be critically important for my subsequent research.’

’I might be able to figure out why ghosts in the reality layer are completely different from those in the truth layer.’

’I might even discover where the Zhiyue People go after death.’ Qi Suian began devising a way to extract the black, gelatinous substance from the ghost’s body.

It would just take some time, and he needed the ghost’s cooperation.

So, he decisively gave the ghost two more slaps.

"Quiet down. I told you to swallow. Why are you spitting it out?" Qi Suian snapped. The ghost immediately quieted down.

-----------------

"Tang Ya, that broad... she’s dead," Ye Rui said, his expression shifting slightly as he heard a ghost’s piercing scream.

"Stupid woman. Guess she went dumb from plying her trade."

Earlier, when they had met up at the mountain temple, the other female Veteran survivor had actually tried to seduce a ghost.

You couldn’t entirely blame her, though. After her last survival trial, she’d acquired a charm-type talent.

If she had actually succeeded, it would have been a huge advantage in the current trial.

But her actions triggered some kind of mutation in the ghosts. Her charm worked, all right—not on one, but on an entire swarm.

Moreover, the lust radiating from this swarm was overwhelming. Under her charm’s influence, they had turned into perverts with minds full of nothing but filth.

Once they realized something was wrong, they naturally fled at the first opportunity. If she had been caught, she would have been tormented to death.

As for Ye Rui and the other two survivors, they hadn’t run into any trouble. After all, they weren’t women, nor had they tried to charm anything, so they weren’t the targets.

"We can’t go to the main hall anymore. Let’s continue exploring the rear hall. We need to find the cause and effect of all this as quickly as possible to increase our exploration progress and unlock the truth," Ye Rui said to the other two survivors.

He could see that the contamination levels of these two survivors had likely already reached the moderate stage. He sighed to himself. ’They can only be used as cannon fodder now,’ he thought.

Even without encountering any danger, with their D-rank contamination resistance talents, they wouldn’t survive for three days unless they went all out.

But Ye Rui was different. He hadn’t used the exploration progress from his last trial’s reward settlement to acquire a new talent. Instead, he’d upgraded his contamination resistance talent from D-rank to C-rank.

His resistance had been drastically improved.

So as long as he didn’t run into any danger, lying low and surviving for three days would be no problem.

But he understood that only by gaining enough exploration progress could he ensure his long-term survival.