Chapter 60: The Bunny Dance

Happy Town not only boasted pleasant scenery, but even the temperature felt comfortable. Cao Yu glanced toward the horizon, noticing that the sky was gradually growing dim.

He checked his player panel, and the time had reached 6:34.

No doubt the residents of the town were already having their dinner by now.

The time he had wasted earlier making Song Qiao and her younger brother expose their embarrassing moments had been excessive.

Yet, there was nothing that could be done about that.

Without being certain what exactly would be lost, he would never dare to rashly execute the rule of prayer.

Fortunately, the area of Happy Town was not large; at their pace, it wouldn't take long to reach the cafeteria located in the center.

As they walked, the four of them noticed a figure ahead waving at them.

Because the distance was too great and the light insufficient, they could only barely make out through the clothing and the hunched posture that the figure was an old woman.

This sight caused the four of them to slow their pace, each growing vigilant.

"A townsman?" Song Hedi frowned, saying, "At this hour, the townsmen should all be dining at the cafeteria."

"Could it be a spiritual monster?" Song Qiao said with uncertainty, "The spiritual monsters my brother and I killed in the outside world never waved at people."

"Perhaps there is more than one kind of spiritual monster," Cao Yu said thoughtfully.

"The situation feels a bit off," Zhou Fan suggested. "Brother Cao, should we detour? Let's change direction and go to the caf—"

"She's coming over!" Zhou Fan suddenly shouted.

They saw that the figure resembling an old woman was waving her hand while breaking into a run toward the four of them.

And she was running faster and faster, soon surpassing the speed of a normal human.

However, the four of them did not place their attention on the approaching old woman.

This was because the shout of "She's coming over!" just now, although sounding like Zhou Fan's voice, had not originated from Zhou Fan himself—Zhou Fan was standing at the far left of the group and hadn't even finished speaking, whereas the shout had come from right beside him.

The hair on Zhou Fan's arms stood on end.

Fortunately, his player caliber was not low. He immediately used his supernatural ability, "Blood Thorn Hell," to accelerate his blood flow, boosting his physical performance and allowing him to rapidly shift his position. At the same time, he muttered, "Blood-Enhancing Vial."

Blood-Enhancing Vial—this E-rank item was obtained from his previous dungeon, and its effect was to keep him in a perpetually max-HP state.

With the assistance of this item, until his mental energy was exhausted, he could recklessly manipulate his own blood to fight.

Bright red blood pierced through the skin of his palms, beginning to gush out wildly and instantly covering his entire body. While forming a suit of crimson armor, it also condensed into a scarlet blade nearly two meters in length in his hands.

Zhou Fan looked toward the spot where he had been standing just moments ago—unbeknownst to him, a dim opening had appeared there, suspended in mid-air as if space itself had been torn open.

An icy, damp wind blew from within the opening, accompanied by an inexpressibly strange odor that permeated the air.

At the edge of the opening, a figure towering over two meters tall lunged into Zhou Fan's field of vision.

Cao Yu and the other three saw it as well.

It was a giant bear, yet it wore human clothing. If one were to block out the ferocious bear head and look from a distance, one might well mistake the entity for an old woman.

As soon as the giant bear appeared, the dim opening vanished.

The giant bear opened its mouth and continued to speak, mimicking Zhou Fan's voice:

"Blood-Enhancing Vial, Blood-Enhancing Vial..."

"...Damn it!"

Zhou Fan wielded the scarlet blade, swiftly slashing toward the giant bear's waist—his attack passed right through, failing to inflict any damage on the bear.

"Careful!" Zhou Fan retreated a few more steps. "It's a spirit!"

He began to adjust his mindset, filling his heart with surging emotions—blood and emotion had always shared a faint connection. Through the supernatural ability "Blood Thorn Hell," he could use blood as a vessel and emotion as a bridge, blending mental energy to deal psychological damage.

Having completed his mental adjustment, he charged at the giant bear once more.

On the other side.

The waving old woman who had sprinted from afar had now closed in to within twenty meters of the four.

Once she was closer, Cao Yu discerned her true appearance—she was also a massive giant bear.

"Costumed Rabbit Assault!" Song Qiao murmured the name of her item.

The next second, an upright rabbit of her height, possessing human-like legs, suddenly appeared in front of her.

The rabbit's two feet continuously stamped the ground as it danced the rabbit dance in place, its mouth humming a strongly rhythmic melody.

The charging giant bear was instantly captivated by the melody, its gaze locked onto the rabbit.

It directly ignored the four humans and lunged straight at the rabbit to tear it apart.

Even the giant bear fighting Zhou Fan abandoned him and rushed toward the dancing rabbit.

Seeing this, Cao Yu narrowed his eyes slightly... A mental-interference type item?

The next instant, accompanied by a soft *squelch*, one of the two giant bears was split vertically down the middle, while the other continued attacking the rabbit.

It was Xiao Qi, sent out by Cao Yu, who had struck using the "Immortal-Slaying Incantation."

Although the bear was a spirit and belonged to spiritual energy aggregates, the "Immortal-Slaying Incantation" only needed to make contact to take effect.

Moreover, judging by the situation, this type of monster did not possess the immortality trait of being "formless in dispersion and gathering"—once the spirit was chopped in half, it would die outright.

It's dead already...?!

Seeing this, Song Qiao and her brother wore expressions of astonishment.

What kind of ability did their captain actually possess...?

Zhou Fan, on the other hand, was well accustomed to it and remained unfazed.

Suddenly, a dozen dim openings appeared in succession around the four of them, and over a dozen giant bears crawled out from them, lunging toward the group.

Song Qiao, her brother, and Zhou Fan all tightened their nerves.

Yet Cao Yu spoke at that moment:

"You guys go attack the one grappling with the rabbit; leave all the rest to me."

He needed to verify a few things.

The dozen giant bears lunging at them split apart one after another. In just a few seconds, they were completely slaughtered.

A large quantity of giant bear chunks littered the ground, rapidly dissolving into points of light that flickered a few times before disappearing entirely.

At this point, Song Qiao and her brother had just rushed in front of the final giant bear. Catching a glimpse of the monsters being thoroughly decimated out of the corners of their eyes, a chill ran down their spines.

Just how terrifying was their captain...?!

Good thing they were teammates!

"Grass carp, grass carp, the bunny is so cute, can I kill the bunny?"

Xiao Qi, having finished off the bears, flew back to sit on Cao Yu's shoulder. She pointed her small finger at the dancing rabbit, murder in her eyes, her face flushed, and her smile slightly ferocious, yet looking exceedingly cute.

Cao Yu coaxed her via mental telepathy: *'No.'*

Xiao Qi stopped smiling.

She began to sulk.

Zhou Fan and the other two spent four or five seconds ganging up on the remaining giant bear, successfully killing it.

With the final monster dissipating, Song Qiao deactivated her item, "Costumed Rabbit Assault," and the dancing rabbit instantly vanished.

Seeing that no more openings were appearing around them and no more monsters were lunging forward, all three of them breathed sighs of relief.

Cao Yu then approached Song Qiao and her brother and asked,

"Are these bear monsters any different from the spiritual monsters you killed in the outside world?"

"Their appearance is different, and their strength is different too," Song Qiao said as she recalled and compared them. "The bear monsters are easier to kill. As for the spiritual monsters in the outside world, their bodies could re-assemble after being shattered. My brother and I had to go through a lot of trouble, killing them five or six times before they finally dispersed."

"I get it!"

Zhou Fan suddenly understood why Cao Yu had deliberately spared one bear for them to kill.

It was to compare the monsters' strength!

He looked at Song Qiao and said,

"The bear monsters correspond to the rule of eating at mealtimes! Because we didn't rush to the cafeteria to dine at the proper hour, we encountered them. Meanwhile, the spiritual monsters you killed outside probably correspond to the rule of going to sleep at ten o'clock at night. Still... compared to the 'negative' transfer, the crisis with these bear monsters doesn't seem that intense?"

He wasn't exaggerating.

Even if Cao Yu hadn't intervened, given some effort, the three of them could still have killed those dozen bear monsters.

At worst, they would have looked a bit disheveled.

Compared to the "negative" transfer, these bear monsters were nothing.

"The prayer rule corresponding to the 'negative' transfer is the condition for triggering a side quest," Song Qiao said. "I feel that rather than calling it a crisis, it's more like a mandatory procedure. It's normal that we couldn't resist it."

She felt that Zhou Fan was getting a bit full of himself.

What kind of lineup did their team have?

Not only did everyone possess items, but their evolution levels were not low either.

If it were ordinary E-rank players, they probably would have only been able to flee toward the cafeteria.

"Um..."

Song Hedi suddenly offered a strange hypothesis:

"Don't you guys think these bear monsters are a lot like the 'Granny Bear' from folk legends? A bear disguised in the image of an old woman, and even speaking human words... Could this point have something to do with the 'negative' energy swallowed by Happy Town? Fear is also one of the 'negative' aspects. My mom used to tell me stories about Granny Bear to scare me when I was little, and I was quite terrified back then..."