Serial Player
Chapter 882 - 540: Bait and Shark (1)

Chapter 882: Chapter 540: Bait and Shark (1)

Passengers disregarded the prey that was about to fall into the trap.

Some platforms could trade player identities precisely because they had intentionally attracted some players who were tracking tasks outside.

Those players would step into traps designed for them without any clue.

Whether they became mere tools or were trafficked for their player identities was entirely at the mercy of others.

This is what’s called fishing.

Of course, if they were unlucky and the bait hooked a shark, it was possible to be annihilated and counter-killed by the group.

There had been a post on the forum revealing that a player organization of moderate size had used a distress signal to randomly attract a pursuing player.

That player strode carelessly into the encirclement, then unfolded his pair of pitch-black wings and roared as he swung his black longsword.

In a single night, he killed eight players from the organization and over a dozen non-player members.

This was a classic case of running into a steel plate.

As for everything happening now, most passengers wouldn’t intervene, as this was the train station platform. The strength of the player organizations controlling this place was not to be underestimated.

The relationship between passengers and the platform controllers had always been delicate, with one side wanting to control the platform for more train resources, while the other just wanted to board the train to trade goods.

In a sense, passengers had to be careful to guard against the platform controllers. After all, it was not uncommon for passengers to betray and treat each other as goods, so naturally, they wouldn’t meddle in others’ affairs.

The sky seemed unwilling to witness this tragic scene and quickly became covered with dark clouds; large raindrops pounded on the buildings, producing a soft pattering sound.

Visitors wanting to enjoy themselves voiced complaints, while the passengers just watched the scene in the rain indifferently.

They planned to watch the drama, while also hoping this hooked fish might test the station’s strength.

The controllers had to remain deeply hidden to avoid official detection. Passengers had boarded the train at this station multiple times without discerning their true intentions.

The passengers hoped that this unfortunate female player might unveil some truth, clearly showing their interest in the controllers’ skills.

Meanwhile, in an off-road vehicle by the road.

Zhao Jiu, oblivious, was resting with her eyes closed, recovering her spent energy. A night’s search had left her somewhat fatigued.

However, she had secretly set up a formation in the staff dormitory to deal with the Chang Ghost, completely blocking its escape routes.

All that was left was to head to the Factory Building to eradicate the Chang Ghost and rescue the entwined employees.

Her previous paper effigy had already figured out the detailed routes inside the factory under her control. It was time to go; the sooner she dispelled the Chang Ghost, the sooner she could save those affected.

She opened her eyes and faintly sensed that something was amiss. Looking out the car window, she saw a downpour outside, with villagers and tourists taking shelter inside houses.

"Just my imagination?" thought Zhao Jiu as she started the car and headed for the factory. The gloomy weather in the heavy rain provided the perfect cover for her.

In this heavy rain, even if she went out in a yellow raincoat, no one would suspect anything.

Therefore, without hesitation, she drove straight toward the depths of the village entrance road.

Seeing this, some passengers shook their heads, others felt pity, and yet others let out cold laughs.

....

And from a distance, Zhao Jiu could already see that Factory Building, a three-story structure standing between the highway and the woods.

At the moment, the Factory Building was brightly lit, especially conspicuous and eye-catching against the dim rainy sky.

"This is the place," thought Zhao Jiu. About a hundred meters from the factory, she turned the off-road vehicle around and parked by the roadside to enable a quick escape in case of emergency.

After that, she put on that Epic Level yellow raincoat and walked into the rain.

As Zhao Jiu drew closer to the factory, the Black Fog in her view grew denser, and the entire factory seemed to be entwined by a colossal black serpent.

This signified she was approaching the Ghost Eel.

Although she had a natural advantage when facing such Spirit Abnormalities, she still took all necessary precautions with great care.

Ghost Eels of this scale might be hiding more than one Abnormality. She needed to be cautious.

With a flash of her hand, she took out a metal device the size of a mobile phone. This device was designed to mislead surveillance cameras. Once activated, the factory’s surveillance would be unable to capture her.

After she was ready, she turned and entered the Factory Building.

It had to be said that after becoming a player, her agility had greatly improved.

Hiding in the blind spot of the factory guard’s view and using the trucks parked in the yard as cover, Zhao Jiu successfully entered the factory.

As soon as she flipped in through a window, Zhao Jiu felt a chilly, bone-piercing coldness. At the same time, a Task popped up in her consciousness.

"[Trigger Task: Ghost Factory]"

She wasn’t surprised. Instead, she exhaled softly and then started to use her Yin and Yang eyes to trace the Chang Ghost’s trail.

As usual, once she could accurately locate the Chang Ghost, she would expel the malevolent ghost that harmed people.

Afterward, she would leave without anyone noticing, to avoid leaving any psychological scars on them. That was also why she didn’t want to be discovered by the public.

Many of the people she saved were unaware of the ghostly entanglements they had been freed from.

The paper figures she had previously planted under the feet of those two employees had already scoped out a detailed route through the factory for her.

She wasn’t worried about getting lost. She just needed to avoid the employees’ gazes.

"Unfortunately, there’s no lead. It might take some time," Zhao Jiu whispered as she pushed against the walls and climbed onto the ceiling of the workshop like a gecko. She silently treaded on the beams, observing the workers below.

The workers inside the workshop were wearing protective suits and masks, assembling mannequins by fitting together their limbs.

Since the mannequins were lifelike, the scene looked quite Abnormal, but the workers were chatting and laughing, showing no anomaly.

Zhao Jiu continued her journey to the next workshop.

Finally, in one workshop, she found her target.

The middle-aged man who had been haunted by the Chang Ghost stood next to several workers by the cleaning pool, immersing the assembled mannequins.

Because the mannequins floated up in the cleaning pool, they needed to use long poles to push the mannequins back down into the water.

It was as if they were pressing living people into the pool.... Zhao Jiu suppressed the eerie thought in her heart and listened carefully to the workers’ conversation. Unsurprisingly, there had been a loss of life in this workshop. Perhaps she would get some information from their chat.

She heard the middle-aged man whisper to his colleague, "Don’t you think these mannequins look a lot like him?"

The coworker who was working with him was startled and responded in a low voice, "Don’t talk nonsense."

"I’ve just always felt something’s not right," the middle-aged man said with trembling hands as he looked at the mannequins in the cleaning pool, "We were all here in the office at the time, so why did he, who had left work early, drown here? What if, after he fell in, we mistook him for...."

The workers stopped their movements, deathly silent.

Zhao Jiu, who was eavesdropping, felt her scalp tingle as she realized a terrible fact.

The worker who had drowned in the cleaning pool hadn’t died as the news reports suggested, from falling in while working alone.

Rather, he had disappeared while working with his colleagues, and nobody noticed at the time. They just kept pushing the floating mannequins back into the pool.

And the next day, amid these mannequins, they found the missing worker.

He had been mistaken for a floating mannequin and been pressed back into the cleaning pool repeatedly until he drowned!

The workers grew silent, then someone said, "You saw wrong, we were only pressing down mannequins at that time. You’re too tired, go rest in the break room for a while."

The middle-aged man nodded absentmindedly and left the workshop alone.

Zhao Jiu, hidden on the beam, followed quietly.

She noticed that the Black Fog around the middle-aged man was getting thicker. The Chang Ghost was about to appear!