Chapter 11: A Modern-Day Assassin’s Creed!?
This instance was designed for newcomers, with relatively low difficulty. He wasn’t concerned with merely completing the main questline; what truly mattered was how to obtain as many hidden items as possible within the map and complete secret missions to deepen his foundation.
Indeed.
Thanks to years of training under his master, he started at a higher level than others and had a teammate he could trust completely.
However, such advantages would quickly be caught up to by veteran players in the more challenging instances to come.
Leveraging this early edge to gather as much foundation as possible was essential for sustainable progress.
With that—
He twisted his wrist, and the Uzi submachine gun in his hand vanished, tucked away into the folds of his loose robe. Then, he retrieved two pistols from the armory before stepping out and smiling at the middle-aged man still standing in the hall.
“Don’t be afraid.”
“I know your son. He’s a freshman at Chaoge University, right?”
The middle-aged man blinked in surprise, then rasped, “Yes. How do you know that?”
Chen Jiang said nothing further.
He simply turned and walked out of the enforcement bureau, saying, “Come with us. We’ll help you complete the hidden mission. Don’t make any unnecessary moves, and I guarantee you’ll survive until the instance ends.”
...
Though it seemed like a long time had passed,
only seventeen minutes had elapsed.
In two minutes, all the residents of this city would once again transform into crawlers.
“Boom...”
The engine’s roar filled the streets once more as Chen Jiang sat behind the wheel, lightly pressing the accelerator, speeding toward the television station on the map.
Killing humans was somewhat easier than killing crawlers.
He wasn’t sure how many people were at the TV station at night, so he planned to wait at least half an hour before heading there.
As long as the vehicle kept moving, the crawlers couldn’t catch up unless they were completely blocked by a horde on the streets.
In other words—
This was the correct way to clear the instance:
Start at the spawn point inside the bar, steal a car key from a customer, then use the vehicle to evade crawler attacks. There were many ways to optimize the run, such as using the sewer entrance outside the bar.
The difficulty was low.
Unless...
Five new players all lacked driving skills and hadn’t chosen any “racing basics” buffs—that would be a death sentence.
...
After driving around the streets for thirty minutes,
once all the crawlers in the city had returned to human form, Chen Jiang casually arrived at the TV station, a modest seven-story building brightly lit inside, likely bustling with many people working late.
It was a bit tricky.
Two heavily armed guards stood at the entrance.
Holding—
Fully automatic rifles, they now aimed their barrels at Chen Jiang and his companions as they stepped out of the car, hoarsely commanding, “Raise your hands and identify yourselves!”
...
Chen Jiang sneered, cooperating by lifting both hands. How chaotic was the background setting of this instance? He hadn’t seen a single fully automatic rifle in the enforcement bureau—only pistols. Yet here was a TV station guard wielding one.
Was that reasonable?
It seemed their professionalism was far superior to that of the enforcement bureau’s officers.
Seeing Chen Jiang comply, the two armed guards finally exhaled in relief and approached for inspection.
However—
The next moment,
an arm suddenly shot out from under Chen Jiang’s clothes, flipping off the safety on his Uzi submachine gun. The night was shattered by rapid gunfire. Within half a magazine, the two armed guards lay sprawled in pools of blood.
He grabbed one guard’s fully automatic rifle, lifting it in hand, and rifled through pockets for extra magazines.
Then he looked up at the brightly lit building before him, murmuring,
“Big haul.”
The tougher the defense, the better the loot. Though he was just a new player, he already knew only items that could be carried out of the instance were truly valuable. Fully automatic rifles were useful here but only mission props since they couldn’t be taken outside, so their worth was limited.
Then he turned his head to the silent Snake beside him, extending his hand.
“Give me the stuff.”
Soon—
Silent Snake pulled a flat, round iron box from his chest and handed it to Chen Jiang.
The next moment,
Chen Jiang approached the building’s entrance, executed a casual three-step wall run, light as a swallow, landing on the first-floor lobby platform. Under the cover of darkness, without any safety gear, he began climbing toward the rooftop along the air conditioning units.
In just half a minute,
Chen Jiang had successfully scaled the rooftop with bare hands.
Silent Snake, clutching another automatic rifle, vigilantly surveyed the building’s entrance and other possible threats.
Meanwhile, the middle-aged man looked up in bewilderment at Chen Jiang standing on the rooftop edge, whispering,
“Is he... Spider-Man?”
He was now certain these two were not veteran players. Since the instance was exclusively for newcomers, the only possibility was that these two were no ordinary people in reality.
He even suspected they might not be human.
To be honest.
When he first got caught up in the “Paradise of the Gods,” he felt he had an advantage. With years of social experience and tactics, he had prepared many strategies before entering the instance.
For example—
The bulletproof vest hidden beneath his clothes.
He couldn’t guarantee survival until the instance ended, but he was confident he had a better chance than other players.
Yet now—
In front of these two, he felt like a raw recruit.
The next moment!
Chen Jiang, standing on the rooftop, lit a cigarette and brought it to his lips. Leaning back, he began a rapid descent along the building’s exterior like a high-rise construction worker, precisely stopping outside the brightly lit seventh floor.
Suspended in midair, held by a high-strength carbon fiber rope, his body swayed slightly in the wind.
Click!
With one hand, he adjusted his rifle and pressed the muzzle against the glass curtain wall.
“Rat-a-tat-tat!!”
The glass shattered under the barrage of bullets, fragments scattering like ice crystals. Gunfire erupted in the darkness, crimson tracer rounds slicing through the air, each shot precisely claiming a life inside the seventh floor—no wasted movement, like the reaper harvesting souls.
Screams mingled with sobbing pierced the night.
Seventh floor.
Sixth floor.
Fifth floor.
Fourth floor.
Chen Jiang paused at each level, the rope reeling and releasing, making his silhouette glide like a ghost outside the windows.
Gunfire, shattering glass, screams.
Like a symphony performed by a master.
When the last survivor’s temple was pierced, blood splattered against the floor-to-ceiling window, staining the moonlight red.
Chen Jiang released the rope and landed steadily on the ground. His cigarette had just burned out, and he casually tossed the stub aside, then dropped the empty automatic rifle at his feet. Drawing two pistols from his chest, he strode into the building.
“Mostly cleared. There might still be some stragglers.”
“Silent Snake, come with me.”
He glanced toward the middle-aged man.
“You wait here.”
...
...
The middle-aged man stood silently, expressionless. If not for the weakness creeping into his legs, he might have thought he was sitting in a cinema watching a 3D movie.
He never imagined he’d witness such a scene in reality.
What was that?
A modern-day Assassin’s Creed!?
What nonsense about magicians.
Were these two the ace assassins trained by some secret organization? In reality, the magician was the one disguised!
It was utterly ridiculous!
Both were newcomers, but was this even the same level?
At the start, in the bar spawn point, he’d wanted to lead a team to clear the instance. Now, all he could say was thanks to his son’s connections—this feeling of coasting by was wonderful.
Just...
Could they hurry up and come down?
The middle-aged man glanced around the empty streets, feeling a chill and an unsettling lack of security.