Dark Sand: My Players Are All Actors
Chapter 35 - 31: A Ruthless Person!

Chapter 35: Chapter 31: A Ruthless Person!

Wang Chong left, but second stage knew very well that the instance’s second stage was still not completed.

He had merely upheld his own ideals in the confrontation with Wang Chong, but more grueling tests awaited him.

In previous failures, he had lost several times at this stage.

Second stage picked up the broken porcelain bowl pieces from the ground again.

"Please bring me another lamp."

The prison guard, hearing this, came over with another oil lamp.

This time, however, his expression was serious, clearly prepared mentally.

The last time, Yang Yan had also asked him to provide light, and at first, he was puzzled as to why, since there was no book to read in the prison.

What he witnessed had left him speechless: Yang Yan had used the light from the oil lamp to pierce all the abscesses on his legs with the porcelain shards and squeeze out the pus!

After that, he hadn’t been able to eat properly for three days.

He expected a similar situation this time.

The prison guard adjusted his mindset, thinking that even if it happened again, he should be able to hold himself together.

Using the light from the oil lamp, second stage looked at the wounds on his legs again.

Only this time, his legs were entirely different from before.

His legs were no longer as swollen and thick as before, perhaps because all the pus had been drained previously, but this didn’t mean his health was improving. On the contrary, the wounds had worsened!

They were rotten to the point where the bone was visible.

The rotting flesh hanging from his legs, if not treated properly, could cause infection and necrosis, threatening his life soon.

And piercing the abscesses to drain the pus was clearly no longer feasible.

Second stage remained silent, his hand holding the porcelain shard paused. Then, he finally made up his mind, clenched his teeth, and began to cut the rotten flesh from his legs.

A wave of intense pain struck him!

Though it was just rotting flesh, and the area around the wound had somewhat lost sensation, cutting with the porcelain shard was still excruciating.

Piercing the abscesses and squeezing out the pus had been painful, but that was a momentary pain, whereas the pain he was suffering now felt like a prolonged torture.

The porcelain shard was not sharp at all, and the rotten flesh on his legs was hard to cut off, so second stage had to clench his teeth and slowly keep cutting.

At this moment, he was extremely grateful for his "iron will" talent, which allowed him to somewhat ignore this pain, or else, he feared he might soon pass out from the pain.

Even with this talent, it was still a terrifying ordeal.

At first, second stage could hardly exert any force, partly because he was weak and partly because he hadn’t completely overcome his psychological barriers.

But as time passed, second stage began to cut more ruthlessly.

He started using all his strength to cut off the rotten flesh, and sometimes, when the porcelain shard hit the bone, it made a horrifying, grating sound.

To divert his attention, second stage could only repeatedly recall the historical texts he had read before.

"At midnight, waking up, smashed a porcelain bowl, hands cut off the rotten flesh. When the flesh was gone, tendons hung, then further cuts were made by hand."

When second stage had seen this text while researching, he was completely shocked.

The history books mentioned only a few words, but just thinking about the real scene these words depicted was enough to send chills down one’s spine.

Initially, second stage simply couldn’t muster the courage, so he made a superficial cut, hoping it might be enough to pass.

However, the outcome of the instance ruthlessly proved him wrong.

Therefore, this time he dared not harbor any wishful thinking, but instead had to grit his teeth and meticulously remove every piece of rotten flesh from his legs using all his might.

Even the phrase "when the flesh was gone, tendons hung, then further cuts were made by hand" had to be perfectly executed.

And the more he recreated that scene, the more second stage respected Yang Yan.

The difficulty of this scholar instance was indeed no less than that of the soldier instance.

It had two objectives: to battle with words and to survive in the prison.

Although historical records mention several other highly regarded verbal confrontations, those protagonists were almost always esteemed guests. But what about Yang Yan? Not only was he not an esteemed guest, he was a prisoner at the foot of the stairs!

In prison, he dragged his injured leg around, with no doctor or medication, relying solely on a piece of a broken porcelain bowl to perform surgeries on himself that could be considered akin to actual medical procedures.

Had it not been recorded in authentic historical documents, Chuge might have thought it an impossible task.

Fortunately, Chuge was merely a player, boosted by the talent of a Reorganizer.

With the aid of "Iron Will", Chuge experienced significantly less pain, and the repeated challenges gradually accustomed him to these extreme conditions.

The rotten flesh had been fully cut away, and Chuge wanted to immediately put down the shard of porcelain bowl and lie down, but he couldn’t, because he had not completed the last step recorded in the history books.

Tendons still clung to the bone, and these too had to be cut away.

Chuge paused briefly, then reached again with the shard of porcelain bowl towards the wound.

"Creak..."

The fascia was much more firmly attached to the bone than the rotten flesh, and the shard of porcelain bowl wasn’t very sharp; Chuge had to try several angles before finally finding the best point of entry.

But slicing through it was not possible with one or two cuts; he had to continuously rub the shard on the fascia, continuously crossing the leg bone, emitting a sound that made one’s flesh creep.

At that moment, the light began to flicker.

The prison guard standing outside the bars was the first to break.

He thought he had mentally prepared himself, thinking that the task of lighting the area was nothing more than watching the usual scene of piercing an abscess and squeezing out pus, but it was only then that he realized he was entirely wrong.

If the horror before was rated a ten, then it was now a hundred, increased tenfold!

He forcibly calmed himself, watching as Yang Yan bit by bit cut away the rotten flesh with the shard of porcelain bowl, thinking it was over, only to be shocked to see Yang Yan continue to cut the fascia from the bone!

Especially when the shard of porcelain bowl kept grating against the bone, the prison guard completely lost his composure.

His hands shook uncontrollably, causing the flame of the oil lamp to flicker unpredictably.

Chuge paused temporarily, turned his head towards the prison guard, his expression calm, "Please don’t move, I can’t see clearly."

The prison guard swallowed, "I’m sorry, Lord Yang."

"It’s alright," Chuge continued with the porcelain shard.

Finally, the fascia on the bone was entirely scraped clean.

Chuge then put down the shard of porcelain bowl and collapsed onto the pile of decaying straw as if he had exhausted all his energy.

Meanwhile, the prison guard fled as if he had seen a ghost.

Everything around him dimmed once again, and Chuge could feel his consciousness gradually fading, the passage of time quickening.

This was a good sign, indicating that the second stage had also passed safely.

But there was still a third stage to come.

In truth, Chuge wasn’t sure what the exact method to successfully pass the third stage was; he had already tried twice and failed both times.

Because this third interrogation was a dialogue not recorded in any historical documents.

It was like an open-book exam with a high difficulty level, where he could only think about his answers based on the opponent’s questions.

Moreover, his response could neither be too weak nor too extreme, which was the biggest challenge.

Chuge slowly closed his eyes, like a humanities student about to face a major exam, silently repeating some well-memorized points in his mind.

Moments later, he heard the prison guard loudly say, "Bring the prisoner for interrogation!"

Two prison guards came into the cell, picked Chuge up without explanation, took him to the torture room, and tied him to an upright wooden rack.

The light was dim, and a person dressed in a black robe sat at a desk opposite.

When Chuge first saw him, he didn’t know his identity, only perceiving him as mysterious, unable to match him with any official from the current Great Wei dynasty.

Later, Chuge would confirm through various clues.

This man was none other than the current Emperor of the Great Wei dynasty, Emperor Weizhao!

In the final stage of the scholar instance, he had to refute not someone like He Xueyi, filled with utilitarian motives, nor Wang Chong, who used twisted and perverse reasoning, but the supremely powerful, cunningly clever Emperor Weizhao himself!

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