This follow-up device seems to be quite handy. I wonder if I can bring it out when the instance ends. This was what Gu Mian was thinking.
However, his expression was interpreted differently by others.
At this moment, Mr. Slaughter was sitting in the live broadcast room. A huge screen was in front of him, divided into one hundred frames. Each frame contained one of the ’Lower Class People’ who had been thrown into the forbidden zone.
Although Gu Mian didn’t particularly like the term ’Lower Class People’, he had no choice when people insisted on calling him that.
The frame showing Gu Mian was magnified and moved to the center. Likely because of his white coat, Mr. Slaughter was paying special attention to him.
Mr. Slaughter smiled at the camera, "This participant is even wearing a white coat. Of course, I know that ’Lower Class People’ are not qualified to be Doctors. He probably comes from some remote clinic in a poor rural area.
"You can see this participant is quite calm. He seems to want to show us that he’s not afraid. But we all know that our ’forbidden zone’ is a place of extreme danger. Other participants have also shown this kind of expression before, but later... HEH HEH HEH.
"Let’s first enjoy the scenes of other participants fleeing in panic. As for this ’Doctor’ who isn’t really a Doctor, we’ll enjoy his frantic escape later.
"Ah, it seems a participant on another screen has encountered danger. Let’s take a look..."
At this point, the live broadcast room’s feed was being broadcast to the whole world simultaneously.
Countless people were glued to their screens, watching every move of those in the forbidden zone, occasionally letting out hearty HA HAs.
Gu Mian knew he was on TV. However, unlike a presenter, he had no way of communicating with others, so he ignored the follow-up device that kept hovering above his head.
The follow-up device was flying quite high. Even if Gu Mian wanted to secretly pocket it, he lacked the means.
He looked around and saw no other players. Chu Changge and Fatty were nowhere in sight.
He didn’t know where his saw had gone. Of course, this reality show didn’t allow participants to bring weapons in directly.
But whether he had a chainsaw or not didn’t matter now. The environment he was in would likely allow him to find a weapon easily.
This was a deserted city—at least, that’s how it looked to Gu Mian.
He was currently standing in the middle of a road. Due to a long-term lack of maintenance, the road was starting to crack, with green grass poking through the fissures.
Two rows of two-story villas, seemingly on the verge of collapse, lined both sides of the road.
The window frames were twisted and sagging. In the moonlight, Gu Mian could barely make out the interiors.
He walked along the row of houses.
These houses had clearly been inhabited once. Some still contained furniture, apparently left behind by residents who had fled in too much of a hurry to take everything.
It seems the people in this city fled in a hurry for some reason... This is quite similar to the plot of some horror movies. Gu Mian murmured to himself.
He didn’t plan to sneak into these houses, unless he wanted to use a large flat-screen TV or a refrigerator as a weapon.
Although Gu Mian could carry such items, his intuition told him that running around with them here wasn’t a wise choice.
After walking a little farther, he finally found a potentially useful piece of information.
A huge green sign stood by the roadside. It appeared to display a map of the city, with several lines of text above it.
Gu Mian approached the sign and found that the text was an introduction to the city:
"Welcome to Kuangcheng City, home to the largest coal mining base in the country, truly a city of coal mines... Doesn’t this background sound a bit like Silent Hill?"
Gu Mian continued to read.
Underneath the text was a map of the entire city. The most prominent features marked were the ’hospital’ and the ’coal mining base’.
The hospital, named Kuangcheng Hospital, was in the center of the city.
The previous introduction to the instance had mentioned that this was a world with developed industry but relatively backward medical conditions, so the entire city had only this one hospital.
The coal mining base was located in the top right corner of the map.
Assuming the standard map convention of top as north, bottom as south, left as west, and right as east, the coal mining base should be in the city’s northeast.
At the very bottom of the map, the southernmost point, a small flag was drawn.
Gu Mian observed this flag for a while. He reckoned it represented the position of the map sign he was standing before—his current location.
"To obtain ’Jin Hu’s Redemption,’ first, we have to find out where it is," he said.
Perhaps because he knew he was on TV, Gu Mian adopted the tone of a horror game streamer.
Muttering to himself, he examined the map in detail, trying to find the words ’Jin Hu’s Redemption’.
Of course, in the end, he didn’t find any related words.
"HA HA... I knew it wouldn’t be that easy to find," Gu Mian said, looking at the map again, though he knew it was likely in vain.
He used to be a medical student, and his brain had been saturated by dozens of professional textbooks multiple times, so his memory was quite good.
After studying the map a few times, he had essentially memorized the city’s topography.
"Alright," Gu Mian finally tore his eyes from the map. "Now we can start exploring. First, I should go to the police station to grab a couple of guns, or head to a supermarket for some machetes or similar. I wonder what kinds of dangerous entities are in this forbidden zone..."
So far, he hadn’t encountered anyone. The city was large, and with a hundred people thrown in, it was difficult for them to meet. This was especially true since Gu Mian’s Xingyun value was negative, making the possibility of him running into a strong teammate almost zero.
Although his Xingyun value was negative, it didn’t prevent others from having high Xingyun values. Fatty, for instance, had already met another player.
「At this moment, Fatty was huddled in a dark corner of a library. Next to him was a female player, likely in her twenties. Her nickname was "Love Burial Ice Sealing"—a name suggesting she was not to be trifled with.」
If Gu Mian were there, he would definitely ask this female player what could have possibly corrupted her mind to make her choose such a nickname.
But Fatty had no intention of commenting on other players’ nicknames. He was currently whispering to the person beside him, "Do you plan to stay hidden here?"
"Of course," Love Burial Ice Sealing whispered back, "I was forced to come here. I absolutely don’t want to enter such a ghostly place."
Fatty was silent for a moment. "I think I’m going to leave. By the way, have you met any other players since you came in?"
He felt awkward saying Gu Mian’s name directly, so he started to describe him instead: "A Doctor, and a young man with glasses..."
Feeling his description wasn’t quite adequate, he continued, "That Doctor is quite noticeable... How should I put it? He really draws attention. Even in the dark, you could spot him at a glance..."
Love Burial Ice Sealing’s brows furrowed. "Are you talking about a light bulb?"
Fatty grew anxious. "No, it’s..."
Before he could finish his sentence, they suddenly heard a CREAK from one side of the library.
It was the sound of the main entrance being pushed open.