I saw things that happened in the past.
Dim lights, a dilapidated little house, and a foul-tempered man drinking a beer.
I couldn't cry out loud, because crying would make Daddy angry, and when Daddy got angry, he would hit people. With a slipper, with a stool, with a wooden stick, with whatever he could grab nearby.
"Useless money pit! A financial drain! Trash!"
He would shout loudly as he hit.
"Why did I have a daughter? I wanted a goddamn son! The five great achievements, you get it? Cash, car, house, son, and wife, you understand?! Why did you give me a daughter? You want my family line to end, is that it? This kind of money pit gets married off and doesn't even take my surname. Why the hell am I spending money to raise this thing?!"
He would hit Mommy, too. He'd curse while grabbing her hair, shoving her to the ground and hitting her again and again.
"It's all your fault! If it wasn't for you, I wouldn't be living this kind of life!"
Mommy would hit people, too. She'd use a sewing needle to jab people, dig into them with her fingernails, and scream in a voice louder and shriller than Daddy's.
The reasons for the beatings were always varied.
Leaving the house too late in the morning was a beating. Coming home too late at night was a beating.
Speaking too loudly was a beating. Even being seen in the hallway was not allowed.
So hungry.
Because I never got enough to eat.
Daddy and Mommy said it was to remember past bitterness to appreciate present sweetness, that one must learn to endure hunger to grow.
Thump, thump, thump!
The sound of knocking came again.
Daddy owed a lot of money. When the debt collectors came to the door, he would pretend he wasn't home.
He said he would definitely win next time. He took all the money from his job, almost never bringing any home. He'd also snatch the money Mommy earned. If she didn't give it to him, he would hit Mommy, and then Mommy would hit me.
If the debt collectors cornered Daddy outside, he would get beaten, too. Then he'd come home and hit Mommy and me even harder, and then Mommy would also hit me.
My teacher told me that parents are a child's harbor.
What's a harbor?
Can it feel pain?
...
Gao Hai opened his eyes.
He felt as if his vision had been affected in some way. The scene before him was blurry and indistinct, and he couldn't see anything clearly.
Waves of dizziness pulsed through his head. It seemed like a sound was constantly present, yet he could never quite make it out.
His limbs were numb. Even when he struggled to move, his actions were incredibly sluggish, as if all his senses had been dulled, making it difficult to control his body.
Beside him came the sound of a woman's suppressed wails.
Someone was struggling next to him, unable to break free from something, and was therefore constantly rolling and convulsing on the ground.
Where is this?
In a daze, Gao Hai tried to sit up, but he just couldn't manage it.
"You disobedient mutt."
A voice simmering with suppressed rage spoke, accompanied by a cold touch.
A pair of hands grabbed Gao Hai's face, forcing his mouth open.
A needle and thread pierced his lip, pulling taut as the thin thread passed through his flesh.
"Mmph..."
He couldn't cry out.
His entire body had lost the strength to struggle.
Only the incredibly intense pain was abnormally vivid at this moment.
Pain... It hurts so much...
The needle and thread pierced through again, in and out.
Gao Hai could only hear the agonized wails of a struggling woman beside him, hear her increasingly muffled, pain-filled sounds as if her mouth was gagged, and feel the escalating, equally torturous pain on his own body that made him wish for death.
Can't... can't let this continue...
I have to do something... I must do something...
I absolutely cannot... just... die here...
He forcibly squeezed a sliver of thought from his completely muddled mind.
Gao Hai struggled, struggled with all his might, enduring the searing pain of boiling water dripping on his body, enduring the excruciating pain of his skin feeling like it was being sewn together with a needle and thread. Little by little, he grabbed the Rescue Team badge in his pocket.
There was no time to fumble with the pin on the badge.
Gritting his teeth, Gao Hai instantly stabbed the sharp pin on the back of the badge into his own shoulder, sinking the entire pin into his flesh.
The chaotic sounds in his ears seemed to momentarily switch to the shouts of a group of young people doing running drills. Then the two sounds intertwined, merging into a discordant, chaotic, and piercing noise before transforming into an extremely sharp roar and vibration.
Gao Hai fell to the ground.
His vision became much clearer. He could vaguely see that he seemed to be in an extremely distorted room.
The walls had a skewed structure, either concave or convex, or slanted to intersect with the floor and ceiling.
Tables and chairs were inverted on the ceiling, yet dinner plates were set on the walls. The stove was nearly broken in half, one side leaning against the floor, the other side lying horizontally on the wall, directly connected to the window. The rest of the room was the same; there wasn't a single normal piece of furniture or decoration.
Hummm—
Gao Hai saw kettles of boiling water, constantly letting off steam.
One after another, boiling kettles were placed in various positions around the room, so many that it looked completely wrong.
Countless boiling kettles, enough to fill the entire room with a smoky, misty haze.
"Hah... ugh..."
Gao Hai couldn't get up from the floor.
His clothes and pants were completely soaked, drenched with scalding water.
A distinct pain radiated from all over his body. Gao Hai could feel that in many places, his skin had fused with his clothes. The slightest movement would tear it right off his body, and soon his clothes were stained dark red.
"Hah... mmmph..."
Gao Hai couldn't speak.
His mouth was stitched shut with dense needlework, and blood dripped ceaselessly from the wounds. Every breath brought even more intense pain.
It's okay, there's still good news.
Gao Hai said to himself.
One piece of good news was that his severed right hand's wound had been cauterized raw by the boiling water and had mostly stopped bleeding.
The other was not far from him: a woman lying on the ground, struggling.
It was Miwa Maeda. Or rather, a veteran player who had infiltrated this game using the fake identity of [Miwa Maeda], a scumbag who planned to use him and Kaguya, these newcomers, to do all the work while she reaped the benefits.
Her state was far more wretched than Gao Hai's.
Dense stitches not only sealed her mouth but also ran all over her body, leaving marks of mending everywhere. The burns on her body were also far more severe than Gao Hai's; large patches of skin and flesh had sloughed off, making her look almost like a boiled monkey.
If her mouth hadn't been sewn shut, honestly, even though he was in enough pain to die, Gao Hai would have laughed heartily at this woman.
But before he could, the woman suddenly turned her head and looked at Gao Hai.
"This is all your fault!"
Although she didn't speak, Gao Hai could already imagine what she wanted to say.
He wanted to curse back, but his own mouth was also sewn shut. So, he thought for a moment, managed to raise his hand, and gave the woman the middle finger.
Seeing her expression seething with rage, Gao Hai was very satisfied.
But in the very next moment, the woman actually got up from the ground, on all fours, and scrambled toward Gao Hai at an incredible speed.
Holy crap, she's burned to this goddamn state and she can still move like that?!
Gao Hai desperately wanted to dodge, but he was also severely burned. Even gritting his teeth, he could only manage to roll over slightly; there was no way he could evade the woman's charge.
Thud!
The furious woman tackled Gao Hai to the ground and raised the small knife in her hand.
This knife looked unassuming, but it was so sharp it seemed like something that couldn't exist in the real world. A light slice could cut through bone, and it had severed Gao Hai's right hand directly.
Now, seeing the woman bringing the knife down, Gao Hai's heart pounded as he frantically dodged. He saw the knife stab into the ground beside him, the blade sinking into the concrete as easily as if it were a pile of sand.
This thing is definitely not a normal knife, right? Could this be an object of obsession?!
Horrified, the woman had already pulled the knife out and was about to stab Gao Hai again.
Can't keep dodging. At this rate, I won't be able to escape.
He clenched his fist.
Before the woman's next stab came down, Gao Hai threw a hook with his left hand, smashing it directly into her face.
Thwack!
Caught off guard by the punch, the woman's head snapped back, blood spraying from her mouth as her lips were torn open on the spot.
And Gao Hai, whose body had mysteriously regained some strength and whose clothes were beginning to transform into a rescue team uniform, shot up and pinned the woman to the ground.
Judging from this woman's exchange with Kaguya Shinomiya, although she was a veteran player, her physical abilities weren't actually that formidable. She was just much faster than an ordinary person. The fact that Kaguya's emergency counter-attack was able to kick her to the ground proved this point.
And considering Lao Guo, who didn't travel with the newcomers at all, perhaps this woman wasn't skilled in direct confrontation, which is why she had to pretend to be useless and hide in the team to reap the benefits?
If that's the case, then the most effective strategy Gao Hai could think of at the moment was to pin this woman down and beat her mercilessly.
"Mmm-mmm—!"
Eyes blazing with fury, the woman struggled, trying to get up and fight back. She was strong, even a bit stronger than the average adult male, but at this moment, strength was continuously surging through Gao Hai's body. He easily held her down, rendering her immobile.
He clenched his fist again.
The woman swung the small knife, stabbing toward Gao Hai's face.
Thud!
But Gao Hai's fist, with its longer reach, landed first, connecting squarely with the woman's left eye, turning the entire socket blood red.
The woman's struggles weakened slightly, but she still refused to give up, swinging the knife.
So Gao Hai's third punch, fourth punch, and fifth punch began to rain down, one after another. Each punch used his full strength, smashing into the woman's face without a shred of mercy, practically turning her face into a bloody mess.
At first, the woman was still trying with all her might to counter-attack.
The small knife cut Gao Hai's cheek, sliced his ear and arm, adding several more wounds to his body.
In response, Gao Hai's punches grew fiercer, each one aimed at the woman's head, each blow landing with a dull thud.
Soon, the woman's gaze became dazed. The hand holding the knife fell limp, and she lay paralyzed on the ground, her eyes vacant.
Panting heavily, Gao Hai snatched the sharp little knife from her hand with his left. The moment he held it, his entire body shuddered. He then realized his clothes had, at some point, turned into a life-saving uniform, and he quickly removed the badge pinned to his body.
It seemed to be a scalpel.
Just holding it, he could almost see a doctor with a blood-covered face, leaning over a hospital bed and cutting something with a knife.
Can't hold this knife for long. Holding it will affect my mind.
Realizing this, Gao Hai first aimed the knife at the stitches on his mouth and carefully cut them. Fortunately, the thing was exceptionally sharp; the thread basically snapped the moment the blade touched it, so Gao Hai didn't suffer much pain in the process.
As for the woman who had been beaten into paralysis on the floor, Gao Hai was still a bit afraid she'd turn into some kind of monstrous creature and come after him if she died. So, being kind-hearted, he didn't kill her. Instead, he cut the bones in both her legs, then searched her body, finding a dark red doll that looked like a ragdoll. Unsure if this was another of her objects of obsession, Gao Hai pocketed it for now, then shakily got to his feet.
As for the woman who had originally been on the ground pretending to be beaten to death, who started struggling again when he cut her legs and earned herself a few more punches from Gao Hai, one could only say that however triumphant she had been when she jumped out earlier, she now looked just as pathetic as a stray dog.
"Pah, still trying to play the fisherman and reap the rewards? Was it fun picking the peaches? Hiss—Damn it, you want to pick my peaches? Do you have what it takes? Hiss—"
After spitting at the woman and cursing her, Gao Hai, who was now grimacing from the pain in his mouth, turned and left, beginning to carefully observe his surroundings.
It looked like this was the structure of a normal house that had been completely twisted.
I don't see an obvious light source, but I can see the room clearly. Is it because I put on the badge and my body changed to some extent?
Gao Hai noticed that the burns on his body had significantly eased. The badge's effect seemed to be greater than he had imagined; wearing it could even heal his injuries. But the longer he wore it, the more his self-perception would inevitably be transformed, so Gao Hai didn't dare wear it for long and could only operate in his current state.
How do I get out of here?
Pondering this question, Gao Hai scanned his surroundings, his gaze passing over one steaming kettle after another.
And then, he saw what was behind the kettles.
A pale woman's face, slowly rising from behind the kettles.
The woman was holding a kettle, a sewing box in her other hand. Her face, so white it was bloodless, watched Gao Hai without any expression, her lips slowly beginning to move.
"You disobedient mutt!"
________________________________________
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