Chapter 40 You Are Being a Bit Extreme

The monster's roar gave Cao Yu a very strange feeling. If listened to closely, many different biological cries could be distinguished within it. When blended together, these sounds not only caused intense psychological discomfort, but felt as though they would shatter one's eardrums.

Monster... Safe house... Cao Yu instantly assessed the situation.

Right now, the flesh and blood of the entire city was collapsing, the plaza had become a safe house, and monsters were wandering outside—judging from this roar mixed with the cries of multiple creatures, it was undoubtedly a "Symphonic Corpse."

A "Symphonic Corpse" was certainly not something E-rank players could handle; encountering one meant certain death.

In other words, the instance had entered its final stage.

With everyone in the city plunged into eternal sleep, the instance's normal functions had ground to a halt. Naturally, the other players had no conditions left to complete the first side quest.

With a fatal crisis waiting outside the safe house... under these circumstances, there was no telling how the instance would arrange the other players.

To be safe, Cao Yu reminded An Li:
"Later, if the others come here as well, play the bad guy and knock everyone unconscious."

"..."

An Li did not refuse.

Wearing the Pika headgear anyway, nobody knew who she was.
The one committing evil deeds was the Pika bandit; what did that have to do with An Li?

Soon, Cao Yu and An Li were surprised to find that the other surviving players—namely, the fitness coach and his group of six—were directly teleported into the plaza, entering the brilliantly illuminated safe zone.

Was the instance's design really this user-friendly?

"What's going on? I was right in the middle of crusading against the Breeder, how did I suddenly...!?"
"Has the instance undergone another mutation? A new crisis?"
"My negative buff of draining stamina hasn't been removed yet!"
"Could it be related to the big shot... Uh, I see the big shot."

While the other players were filled with alarm and uncertainty, the Green Tea Guy and the female executive quickly locked onto Cao Yu's figure.

Cao Yu gave An Li a subtle look of instruction, then proactively moved closer to the players' group.

As he walked, he called out and questioned:
"What is going on here? Why did the teleportation trigger all of a sudden? Did you guys trigger some hidden rule?"

"Ah? You're unaware of the situation as well, Big Shot?" the Green Tea Guy said in surprise. "I thought this phenomenon was related to you... We were all suddenly teleported here right in the middle of a hunting operation."

"Could this instance have a second-stage danger?" the fitness coach said with a grim expression. "This is way too sudden!"

By this time, Cao Yu and An Li had already approached the six of them.

Ever since building the graves, An Li had kept her item in an activated state. Therefore, upon reaching the six of them, she instantly calculated their positions in her mind and silently aimed at the back of each person's neck.

Not a single person was on guard against her.

Everyone trusted the reputation and standing Cao Yu had built up since entering the instance... They were already rushing to cling to his coattails, so why would they lower their guard?

As Cao Yu's little sidekick, An Li had also been listed by everyone as a trustworthy individual.

Such a scene filled An Li with a trace of emotion... No wonder Cao Yu always kept words like positive energy on his lips; it turned out they had such wonderful uses.

She had truly learned something!

The next instant, An Li suddenly struck.

Surging repulsive force, controlled by her, erupted from six different directions and slammed fiercely into the backs of the necks of the fitness coach and the other five.

Four of them were knocked unconscious on the spot.

The only ones still awake were the fitness coach and the martial artist.

Both of them felt dizzy, their bodies swaying, their consciousness somewhat blurred.

Vaguely, they heard Cao Yu's questioning voice:
"What are you doing...? No! You've been controlled by the monster!?"

An Li did not reply.

While using her item, she released two corpse puppets, which approached the fitness coach and the martial artist respectively, binding their bodies.

Then, she activated her item once more, pulling off a repeat performance to deal a blow to the two who were unable to dodge.

This time, the two could not hold on and passed out cold.

This set of sneak-attack maneuvers could be described as smooth as flowing water, incomparably seamless.

After knocking them unconscious, An Li did not let her guard down just yet.

She was seen controlling the werewolf corpse puppet to approach each of the six unconscious people and squat down, slashing fiercely with its long, sharp claws toward their necks... and then stopping just before touching their skin.

None of the six reacted.

Hmm, it seemed they were truly knocked out.

Next, she retrieved a potion unfamiliar to Cao Yu from her storage space, unscrewed the cap, brought it close to the noses of the six unconscious individuals, and let each of them inhale it for a dozen seconds or so.

Having finished all this, she put away the potion, looked at Cao Yu, and said:
"Done. Barring any accidents, they will sleep straight through until the instance ends, until they are automatically teleported back. Even if we actually manage to clear with an S-rank, they will never know."

Cao Yu couldn't help asking: "What do you do in reality?"

Although he was the one who instructed An Li to play the bad guy and knock people out, wasn't this young girl's routine a bit too practiced?

"High school student," An Li replied. "This time next year, I'll be taking the college entrance exam."

"I truly couldn't tell," Cao Yu remarked dryly.

An Li glanced at the six sleeping people and said:
"I thought you would kill all of them to prevent the secret from leaking."

"..." Cao Yu didn't know how many times he had been choked up by An Li, and could only reply: "You're a bit extreme."

"No, I thought you would do that," An Li said with an envious tone. "My moral sense is a bit too high; I could never be as outstanding as you."

You really are a pervert... Cao Yu said: "Let's save the small talk for after the instance ends. Right now..."

He looked outside the plaza:
"With the safe house providing a fallback guarantee, we can go out and scout the situation. Let's first check out the strength level of the 'Symphonic Corpse' before considering whether to... hmm?"

The ground suddenly surged with violent tremors.

In the distance, the sight of high-rise buildings collapsing entered the fields of vision of Cao Yu and An Li.

Colossal entities were moving through the city with reckless abandon, tearing apart every obstacle in their path and rapidly approaching the fountain plaza.

Soon, that massive monster appeared within the sight of Cao Yu and An Li, delivering an indescribable visual impact to the two of them.

Its height—or rather, its diameter—was visually estimated to be over thirty meters. When standing on the ground, it completely towered over residential buildings of more than ten stories, presenting an overall massive spherical shape.

Yet its surface was far from smooth; it was densely covered with the characteristics of all sorts of creatures. There were terrifying, proportionally magnified mouthparts of giant king crickets, sharp forelegs extending like ghost mantises, massive tentacles writhing flexibly like giant squids, with the tip of each tentacle featuring its own lamprey-shaped spiral mouthpart...

Terrifying mouthparts one after another, horrifying biological limbs one after another...

It was a chaotic posture comparable to an Evil God, one that felt as though it could cause sufferers of trypophobia to instantly perish just by looking at it.

That was the Symphonic Corpse.

Boom—The massive body of the Symphonic Corpse rolled, crushing toward the fountain plaza, only to slam into an invisible, intangible barrier. A deafening explosion blasted out, triggering an earthquake-like reaction.

Airwaves in the air rolled like ocean waves, visible to the naked eye, yet unable to force their way into the fountain plaza.

The safe house's protection blocked this monster, which was comparable to a mythological creature.

The mouthparts on the Symphonic Corpse sounded in unison, and the multi-toned, mixed roar poured into the plaza, making Cao Yu and An Li feel so uncomfortable they nearly vomited.

It kept ramming against the invisible barrier, shaking the entire plaza so violently that Cao Yu felt a dizzying spin.

Fortunately, the safe house's protection was remarkably reliable, showing not the slightest sign of being breached.

Stabilizing his footing, Cao Yu asked An Li:
"The other players won't be shaken awake, right?"

"..."

An Li understood—this meant he intended to crusade against the Symphonic Corpse and farm an S-rank.

Faced with a monster like this, he still wasn't going to give up... After adjusting her mindset, An Li replied: "The mind-fog potion I had them inhale is a game item, producing mental interference. Once E-rank players are hit by it, they will sleep like dead pigs for twelve hours and cannot wake up."

Having answered Cao Yu's question, she countered:
"A monster of this caliber... are you planning to make a move?"

"The original Symphonic Corpse was an entire city of flesh and blood. Its current scale is already as small as it can possibly get."

Cao Yu's tone unconsciously grew passionate:
"We've completed all the side quests, and the instance has provided an opportunity to crusade against it. It's time to take a gamble!"

He wasn't inherently a gambler by nature.

However, with Serial Number 11 as a sharp offensive weapon and the safe house as a fallback guarantee, holding such a massive advantage, if he didn't even try... he probably wouldn't sleep well for a week or two after the instance ended and he returned!

"Alright."

Seeing that Cao Yu's confidence was high, An Li agreed while simultaneously pulling out three potions and drinking them down—a mental potion, a stamina potion, and another potion unfamiliar to Cao Yu.

Recalling that she had even obtained a "virility potion" in her previous instance, Cao Yu didn't dwell on it. He took out his potions, adjusted his state, transformed into a zombie, and rushed out of the safe zone first.