Being an Extra Actor in an Escape Game

In fact, the Missiontakers reacted sooner than the detective dalao has expected.

As soon as the fifth run of the Nightmare began, the bedroom team has already geared up for numbering off despite their lack of information.

No matter how anxious they were, the time spent numbering off was fixed at least seven minutes was needed.

Laosan, in the meantime, was more worried whether that eight-number sequence was really correct.

Fortunately, as they number off one by one, the man did not wrathfully descend upon them to reap their lives away. It makes them sigh in relief.

Dying in such a dark, cramped space slowly is an agonising experience, even if it wasnt the first time any of them had died in a Nightmare, but it is still vividly burnt in their minds nonetheless.

The situation was looking upIf the Nightmare didnt restart five minutes in.

Right now, the Nightmare has just restarted. For these people in the dark, they couldnt actually feel it at all. Visually, they cannot tell the scenery has reverted about them; sensually, it just felt as if they blanked out for a moment.

The four of them are all on high alert, of course, but they would only conclude they might have lost focus for one brief moment.

Although Laosan is feeling odd, but he is also more preoccupied with other things

When suddenly, the door to the bedroom is opened from the outside.

The almost blinding rays of light are shining on the four shocked Missiontakers.

Mu Jiashi says, all anxious, somethings wrong!

When the fifth run of the Nightmare began(TL: Raws say fourth run, but Im pretty sure it means the fifth. Might be a slip-up of the author)and Mu Jiashi realised the man in black was gone, he immediately questioned Selfish, who has been here, what was going on.

Yet, even Selfish didnt know.

Now, Mu Jiashi forced himself to calm down and, after thinking a bit, he immediately thinks of the crumbling of Nightmares.

Yes He is already in the bloody fifth run of the Nightmare! How could he have not noticed!

Mu Jiashi is chastising himself inside.

Selfish has clearly also made the same conclusion. He says fearfully, the last time, we didnt come as far as the fifth run

In other words, he also has no idea the degree to which the Nightmare will have crumbled by the fifth run.

The mood sinks in the corridor.

Mu Jiashi has to take charge Lin Qin couldnt care less, and Selfish and Scapegoat both look on edge already.

So he takes a deep breath and says, well split up. You go to the service area with me, he pulls Selfish over and tells Scapegoat, stay here with the dalao, and keep an eye on the bedroom.

Selfish asks, were not opening the door?

No, Mu Jiashi answers quickly, right now, we must figure out what the change in this Nightmare is. Most importantly, at the service area. They also have to number off in the bedroom so that they can take the boy away; dont disturb them.

Selfish is fine with that, but Scapegoat couldnt help but ask, what if the man in black is killing them in the bedroom right now?

Mu Jiashi glances at him, answering calmly, then, the service area will be business as usual.

Scapegoat looks at him with this stupefied look.

Again, he is met with the realisation that Mu Jiashi really puts the team above all else. The life of the four of them in the bedroom? Irrelevant.

Most importantly, they are currently stuck.

If they do not know where the man in black was, then they wouldnt even be able to ensure a Normal End. Forever being entrapped in this Nightmare is no longer an impossibility.

Therefore, what they have to prioritise is understanding what the change in the Nightmare was, and most importantly, where is the man in black.

That is why Mu Jiashi is heading to the service area. In the last run, the man in black had killed them there. Therefore, one possibility is that the man in black is still over there this time.

No matter what, starting from the corridor all the way to the service area would have them traversing the entire Nightmareother than the dark bedroom.

It is really the first target they should check, but, just as Mu Jiashi said, they are not sure what the change in the Nightmare would be.

What if there was enough time? What if they could just number off for seven minutes straight so that they could bring the boy out?

Since the fourth run of the Nightmare, the bedroom team will definitely number off without delay to buy as much time as possible.

And right now, in the corridor, they have already wasted a small amount of time. If they open the bedroom door now, and interrupt their numbering, causing it to fail Then, with even the owner of the Nightmare gone, this run is headed for catastrophe for sure.

Opening the door, means a greater chance of them failing this Nightmare.

Not opening the door, means the situation is still potentially salvageable.

Of course, the four Missiontakers of the bedroom team dying is also on the scales here, but when compared to endings of this Nightmare, they are, to Mu Jiashi, irrelevant. The choice is obvious for him Do not open the door.

Their deaths are irrelevant in his cold, calculative mind.

They can come back to life soon enough, anyway.

Also, building from that, if, before he could confirm the change in the Nightmare, it has entered another run already, then as soon as the next run starts, he will open the bedroom door without hesitation.

Because it would mean a change has definitely occurred somewhere. He could ask the bedroom team about whether or not there had been, instead of trying to drive in vain to the service area and look for signs again.

At this point, though, this Nightmare is still salvageableBecause they do not yet know what happenedSo Mu Jiashi will chase after this possibility and acquire information.

All his activities are for the sole sake of ensuring they can leave this Nightmare.

Scapegoat cant help but shudder looking at Mu Jiashi like this.

This is certainlyreliable, in a sense of the word, since all Missiontakers of a Nightmare are naturally teammates.

However

Mu Jiashi is treating the lives of the four Missiontakers in the bedroom, like pebbles thrown out to probe the way forward.

Yes. They are all tool-persons tool-lives.

Those are the words floating into Scapegoats mind.

In fact, to Mu Jiashi, perhaps that is all his own life amounted to as well.

If Ding Yi were here right now, she would probably be nodding this really is, that Golddigger who once had a 100% track record on the bottom floor of the Tower.

That is who he was, and who he is. In the Nightmare, achieving an ending is top priority. All his teammates lives, items, even bodies, are evaluated per their usefulness.

Anything and everything, is for the sake of the customers wishes being fulfilled.

Which just meansTrue Ends.

It really has been a pretty long time since Mu Jiashi has shown such a side.

After he left the Golddigger group he was in and became a lone wolf;

After he fell from grace from a higher floor in the Tower, back to his origins;

After he called himself a piece of trash, a loser, unreliable, untrustworthy

He was so dejected he was even unwilling to tell his thoughts to everyone else.

Yet, the sudden crumbling of the Nightmare seems to have reawakened a particular part of this disheartened man. That ruthlessness, strength, that domineering, decisive aura, makes even Selfish shut up and quietly follow behind Mu Jiashi.

Three minutes later, they can already hear the screams coming from inside the service area in their car at the entrance; it was clear what was the change in this Nightmare by this point.

They leave the car and observe the bloody scene happening in the central plaza of the service area at the entrance.

Mu Jiashi is murmuring, so it really was indiscriminate slaughter?

Selfish is wondering, the NPCs wont be a problem even if they died, right?

Mu Jiashi gives him an odd look, and shakes his head, explaining, no. We always say that a Nightmare restarts when anyone diesIt really means any death.

Selfish can feel his cold sweat dripping down as he asks, including, these NPCs?

Mu Jiashi nods.

Selfish looks like he could cry, cussing, shit what do we do?

Mu Jiashi ignores him to focus on the issue of time.

Naturally, he has also noticed the issue of time the detective dalao mentioned in X Beijins stream.

How long does this slaughter here last? When will the first Tower resident death occur?

What if it was too short for the bedroom side to finish and take the boy here?

Seven minutes numbering off. Three minutes on the road. Just in case, add another minute for good measure. Then, eleven minutes.

Though

Mu Jiashi glances over at the flowerbed in the central plaza, where the residents lay strewn about. To be honest, it seems unlikely.

They hurried here in three minutes flat, but adding about a minute for the time spent thinking and discussing, this is at least four minutes, yet, four minutes is far too short of the eleven minutes he needs!

There must be a way, Mu Jiashi murmurs, there must be a way to stop that man

The Server never creates a Nightmare without a solution. At least, he has never run into any like that. Though that said(TL: This is a flag. Itll be explained in I dunno, a hundred chapters later? Hehe)

His thoughts pause for a moment before he immediately shakes the thoughts aside to focus on this.

In this mission, they have Lin Qin. It means they can try to come up with ways to force the dalaos hand and suppress this man directly.

He saw Lin Qin fight earlier. He could dispatch this man in black without sweat.

The problem is, how do they force Lin Qins hand.

And really, there is no way other Missiontakers could have been fortunate enough to run into Lin Qin every single time anyway. This must mean there is a method in this Nightmare that they can utilise to resolve this slaughter.

What, would that be?

Selfish hesitantly asks besides him, should we use utility cards?

There is a risk to him asking; anyone mentioning utility cards in the Nightmare would be suspected for being a Carddealer.

So Selfish quickly adds, Im not thinking about stealing anything, of course!

Mu Jiashi snaps out of his thoughts and explains simply, I dont have them.

What?! Selfish looks at him in shock, repeating, you dont

Mu Jiashi nods, reaffirming, I dont have utility cards. None.

Selfish has his jaw on the floor.

None? How could that be?

Seeing what Mu Jiashi has done so far, Selfish is convinced he is a dalao, a super capable dalao; perhaps he had a slip-up on a higher floor, which is why he is now on the bottom floor.

Even so, why would he not have a single utility card on him?

Even if a Carddealer has stolen from him or touched his corpse, but he must still have cards at home. Unless his home was burgled clean.

Unless

Selfish suddenly has an idea.

Unless, someone Mu Jiashi trusted deeply, who had rights to enter his home, stole all his utility cards.

After that thought, Selfish is looking at Mu Jiashi with even wider eyes.

Hed obviously understood something even Scapegoat could work out; Mu Jiashi is fundamentally, an emotionless, pragmatic Missiontaker.

Nobody can ever truly trust each other. Could Mu Jiashi, who has such a mindset himself, fail to heed that truth?

Well, there are still many possibilities; someone forcing Mu Jiashi to hand over his utility cards, or Mu Jiashi having traded those cards away already in this Nightmare in a secret deal.

Yet Selfish couldnt chase away the thoughts in his mind.

Or rather, the moment he thought about that, his mind was also addingis it any surprise that such a cruel, merciless man in Nightmares has been betrayed?

Selfish knew he had a terrible personality, but even so, he still cant be like Mu Jiashi, and be completely unfazed by others deaths.

If it comes to life or death, Selfish would still feel stressed.

Yet Mu Jiashi looks like hes built differently. He is used to deaths in the Nightmares already.

Thinking so, Selfish sniggers, and mutters, then I wont use any utility cards either

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