Chapter 201: You Bastard! You're Here to Steal Our Stuff
"I know that."
Kaguya waved a hand, her tone entirely matter-of-fact.
Wu Lian swallowed hard, the words dying in his throat. He stared at the young girl, momentarily speechless. He had assumed she was simply ignorant of the terrifying toll such items demanded, but she was perfectly aware. She knew the cost, yet she used it anyway? Did she have some hidden trump card to rely on, or did she simply place zero value on her own life?
The veteran player was utterly puzzled. Still, driven by the ingrained responsibility of an elder surviving in these nightmare games, he offered a grave warning.
"Do not use that thing anymore," Wu Lian said, his voice heavy. "It is far too dangerous. If you are short on ghost artifacts to protect yourself, I can give you another one as thanks for saving me that first night."
"No need, no need." Kaguya dismissed the offer immediately. For answering a single, simple question, she had already fleeced a perfectly decent ghost artifact from him. Even her slightly skewed moral compass could not bear to scam this earnest man any further.
Leaning casually against the nearby table, Haruto chimed in to spare the poor man's sanity. "Do not worry about her. For Kaguya, the 'heavy price' demanded by that item is practically negligible."
"Negligible?" Wu Lian whipped his head around, his eyes wide with shock.
He looked back at Kaguya, who merely offered a nonchalant shrug that practically screamed, 'It is what it is.'
Seeing her relaxed demeanor, the heavy stone weighing on Wu Lian's heart finally dropped. If the survival instance demanded he hack people to pieces or slay terrifying ghosts, he would not even blink. But if his actions caused a child to pay a horrific, life-altering price, he would never be able to rest easy for the remainder of his days.
Checking the glowing dial of his watch, Wu Lian shifted back to business. "It is almost eight o'clock. You two had better hurry and participate in the games to collect your stamps. No matter how precious a ghost artifact is, you have to survive this instance first."
"We have almost enough. We are just missing the final step." Kaguya straightened up, her playful demeanor vanishing into sudden seriousness. "How about this? I will give you a piece of vital information for free. Just do not spread it around."
Seeing the solemn expression on her face, Wu Lian nodded gravely, silently promising to keep the secret.
"Take out your tourist rules," Kaguya instructed.
Though he did not understand her angle, Wu Lian reached into his pocket and produced the crumpled sheet of rules. Before he could even fully extend his hand, Kaguya snatched the paper away.
A sharp tearing sound echoed in the quiet space.
In one fluid motion, she shredded the tourist rules into pieces.
Wu Lian shot to his feet, his pupils trembling violently. He scrambled forward, frantically grabbing at the scattered pieces of paper fluttering onto the table. But as his fingers brushed the torn edges, he froze. A sudden, chilling realization washed over him.
"Do you understand now?" Kaguya asked, a knowing smile playing on her lips.
Wu Lian remained completely silent for a long moment. Finally, he gave a slow, stiff nod. "When... when did you find out?"
"Around one or two in the afternoon. Relying purely on my own brilliant intellect and natural talent, I saw through the trap during the very first game." Kaguya lifted her chin, her tone dripping with smug satisfaction.
"Hey, I am clearly the one who discovered it first!" Haruto grumbled from the sidelines, thoroughly dissatisfied with her stealing the credit.
"Haruto, if you found it, it is the exact same thing as me finding it." Kaguya shot him a look that shamelessly declared, 'What is yours is mine.'
Wu Lian slowly released the paper scraps, letting them drift back onto the table. His expression was completely dazed. It was a bitter pill to swallow. The stamps he had risked his life all day to collect, bleeding and fighting through countless dangers, were nothing more than a futile, meaningless effort. The entire system was a rigged trap.
"At least you are still alive, are you not?" Haruto's calm voice cut through the silence.
Wu Lian raised his head. The deep confusion and despair in his eyes gradually faded, replaced by a quiet clarity.
Haruto was right. At least he was still breathing. Compared to the dozens of players who had long since been torn apart and died agonizing deaths in the various games today, he was already unfathomably lucky.
"Thank you."
Leaving behind a single, sincere word of gratitude, Wu Lian turned and walked away into the dimming park.
Another fifteen minutes ticked by.
Aside from Wu Lian, not a single player approached their little stall to buy information. Nobody even bothered to ask for a price. Instead, passing survivors shot them wide-berth glances, looking at the trio as if they were absolute lunatics.
Haruto checked the time. It was exactly 7:10 PM.
With only one hour left until the Animal Zone officially closed, he picked up a rag, silently wiped the old words off their makeshift sign, and began rewriting a new advertisement.
Kaguya leaned in, her curiosity piqued, wanting to see what kind of ridiculous trick Haruto was pulling to attract customers this time.
She read the new text aloud. "One ghost artifact for all stamps, plus one piece of vital intel included." She looked up, highly suspicious. "Are you sure anyone is actually going to believe that?"
"I do not know, I am just giving it a try." Haruto shrugged, completely unbothered. They were just killing time waiting for the park to close anyway. If he could earn even a single extra item out of this, it was a net profit.
As it turned out, the new, highly exaggerated advertisement was incredibly effective.
Barely a minute later, a young man spotted the sign, hesitated, and cautiously approached the table.
"Are you... are you the players who took out one of the Circus members?"
"Our reputation has spread that far already?" Haruto raised an eyebrow, genuinely surprised by the speed of the instance's rumor mill.
Without missing a beat, Kaguya smoothly pulled out the official stamp they had looted.
The moment the young man laid eyes on the stamp and recognized the genuine, blood-red ink, his entire demeanor shifted into frantic excitement. He had already sneaked over to the tent earlier and seen the mangled, horrific corpse of the Circus member for himself, but seeing the actual stamp in their hands made it real.
"How on earth did you kill her?" the young man asked, his voice hushed with awe. "I heard that game is extremely difficult. Two powerful veteran teams have already been completely wiped out trying to clear it."
"Not worth mentioning." Haruto waved a hand dismissively, cutting the gossip short. "Are you buying or not? If you are, hurry up and pay."
"Buying! I am buying!"
Trading a single ghost artifact for a guaranteed clear was the absolute steal of a lifetime. The young man frantically dug into his pockets and pulled out a single, weathered wooden chopstick.
"Will this do? This is all I have."
Haruto stared at the lone piece of wood. "What is this? Shouldn't chopsticks come in a pair?"
"This is a Ghost Chopstick. It is not very useful for combat. It just allows ghosts who cannot touch physical objects to eat human food. I only had half of the pair when I originally found it."
"That works."
Haruto casually tossed the chopstick into the cardboard box resting on the table. He took the young man's tourist rules, lined up the stamp, and rapidly stamped all the remaining empty areas on the back in one fluid motion.
"Thank you! Thank you so much!"
The young man was practically weeping with joy. He bowed deeply and turned to sprint away, but Haruto called out to stop him. The young man froze, terror flashing across his face, thinking the overpowered player was about to go back on the deal.
"Do not be in such a hurry," Haruto said calmly. "Did I not say there is a piece of vital intel included?"
Even Haruto's flexible conscience would not allow him to run such a black-hearted scam without delivering the goods. He pulled out a stack of yellow sticky notes, tore off the top one, scribbled a single sentence across it, and handed it over.
The young man took the note in utter confusion. The moment his eyes scanned the words, his pupils constricted to pinpricks. The hand holding the small square of paper began to tremble violently.
"This is a Ghost Sticky Note," Haruto lied smoothly, his face a mask of deadly seriousness. "You absolutely cannot tell anyone the information you just read. Otherwise, you will face a severe backlash at best, and instant death at worst. Now go. After knowing this secret, surviving the night will not be difficult for you."
Haruto waved him off dismissively.
"Understood... thank you!" The young man stood up straight, delivered an incredibly deep, ninety-degree bow, and hurried away into the shadows.
His dramatic, terrified reaction was the perfect catalyst. The surrounding players who had been watching from a safe distance instantly believed in the stamping service. The hesitation vanished, replaced by desperate survival instinct, and they swarmed forward like a tidal wave.
Other passersby, seeing a massive crowd gathering, immediately rushed over to join the frenzy. The tiny, deserted stall from just moments ago was now packed so tightly that not even a drop of water could leak through the wall of desperate players.
It was a chaotic blur of trading and stamping. It was not until the final fifteen minutes before the park closed that Haruto finally stamped the rules for the very last customer in line.
Even so, nearly half of the surviving players in the zone still had not come over. Some were trapped deep inside ongoing death games, while others were simply too paranoid to believe the deal was real.
Haruto stretched his arms. He could not do anything about the skeptics. Perhaps dying in the dark was just their fate.
Kaguya leaned over the table, eyeing the remaining stack of blank yellow paper. "Is it actually true that a third person cannot see the writing on those sticky notes?"
"I was bluffing."
Haruto casually tossed the entire stack of sticky notes into a pitch-black Gap that tore open in the air beside him, looking as though lying to desperate survivors was the most natural thing in the world.
"If I did not say that, how could I have earned so many ghost artifacts?"
Kaguya's lip twitched in sheer disbelief at his shamelessness. Just as she opened her mouth to insult him, a flicker of movement caught the corner of her eye. She glanced toward the front left.
Haruto noticed it at the exact same moment. He could not see a physical body, but the faint, displaced air and a distinct, unnatural aura gave it away. Someone was using an invisibility-type ghost artifact.
Youmu did not even need to be told. Her hand was already resting firmly on the hilt of her katana, her thumb pressing against the tsuba, ready to draw.
The three of them maintained completely neutral expressions, not showing a single outward reaction. They simply watched out of the corners of their eyes as the invisible figure crept silently up to the table, reached out, grabbed the cardboard box overflowing with freshly earned ghost artifacts, and bolted away.
Kaguya slammed her hands on the table.
"You bastard! You're here to steal our stuff!"
[Inorin's Note:
Hey guys, hope you're enjoying the novel! A quick Power Stone, comment, or review really helps the story grow and keeps me motivated.
Hate waiting for updates and cliffhangers? You can skip the line, avoid all those annoying ads, and binge 50 chapters ahead by supporting my work here:
🌐 Read on our site: Search for Elysian Reads on Google or Check the link in my Webnovel Profile bio!
✨ Patreon (50 Advanced Chapters & Ad-Free): Search InorinTL on Patreon
Thank you so much for reading and keeping this project alive!]