Although those guys were a little annoying, they did not deserve to die. Qin Guan had originally just wanted Lu Chuan to give them a little lesson and call it a day.
Who knew Lin Xiao would suddenly butt in?
He was clearly the vanguard team captain, yet he still dared to kill someone in broad daylight. This guy’s nerve was just too big.
Qin Guan frowned.
However, the people around them did not seem to think there was anything strange about it.
They gathered together, their expressions excited, but their eyes held an eerie hollowness.
It was as if they had been controlled.
“Captain Lin is so handsome! Did you see that sword strike just now? I’m going to fall for him!”
“So amazing! As expected of the vanguard team captain!”
Watching the crowd’s strange reactions, Qin Guan’s mind turned sharply, and in an instant he understood.
This was the other man’s exclusive mental control skill… “Knight’s Glory.”
“Knight’s Glory,” a Level 5 mental control skill. While it was active, it could rationalize everything the user did and cause others to feel a kind of admiration.
It was also one of the key reasons this guy with the terrible personality could become the Foundation’s vanguard team captain.
“I only wanted to stand up for you.”
Lin Xiao lowered his eyes with a smile, looking at Qin Guan with the same tender gaze. Deep in his pupils, a gorgeous fiery light shimmered, and that gemlike brilliance looked just like a siren luring people into ruin.
Mental control-type skills were extremely rare in the Filth Room; the mere fact that they existed already made them advanced. Although Lin Xiao’s “Knight’s Glory” had many limitations in effect, it still counted as a kind of forced control. Beneath that enchanting fiery glow, even Qin Guan could not help but feel his mind sway slightly.
Just then, a large hand reached out from behind him, pulling him into an embrace without discussion and forcefully covering Qin Guan’s eyes. A low voice came from above his head.
“This is mine.”
Behind him, Lu Chuan wore a dark expression. With restrained force, his arm half-wrapped around Qin Guan, holding him loosely in his embrace. It was a posture that seemed casual but was in fact extremely possessive, his pupils glinting with icy light.
He was clearly a Grotesque, clearly completely unable to understand human feelings.
And yet, when he caught sight of the way that blond boy looked at Qin Guan, a strange bitter jealousy surged through Lu Chuan’s heart like a wildfire across a plain. An inexplicable sense of anxiety made his teeth itch, and he suddenly wanted to tear something apart.
What kind of feeling was this?
That baffling irritability made even Lu Chuan, who had always enjoyed experiencing human emotions, feel a wave of inner turmoil. The arm around Qin Guan tightened uncontrollably.
His mood was terrible.
He wanted to dig that man’s eyes out.
Beside him, Qin Guan seemed to sense what he was thinking and gently took his hand.
『Don’t reveal your identity.』
A thought message was sent through the System into Lu Chuan’s ears. It was Qin Guan’s voice.
『This person is extremely dangerous. He absolutely must not discover that you are a Grotesque.』
Lu Chuan was silent for a moment, then replied.
『Why.』
Qin Guan was a little irritated.
『Why so many whys?』
Lu Chuan lowered his eyes and stared fixedly at Qin Guan in his arms. His voice was unexpectedly calm.
『Are you afraid he’ll kill me, or afraid I’ll kill him?』
Qin Guan froze, then quickly reacted and reclaimed the right to speak.
『…Do you still remember our pact?』
『You have to keep protecting me until the day we leave the Filth Room.』
A long silence.
Qin Guan did not know whether he was satisfied with that answer, so he could only carefully grab Lu Chuan’s hand, guarding against the man suddenly charging out.
Fortunately, Lu Chuan did not act out at such a critical moment. No one knew what he was thinking, but in the end he still let go, though his expression remained somewhat unwilling.
On the other side, Lin Xiao did not seem to notice their little movements. His attention was completely drawn to the ring on Lu Chuan’s hand. It took him a long time before he finally squeezed out a few words through clenched teeth.
“Who are you? Why is that thing with you?”
Lu Chuan grinned, as if he had been waiting a long time for that question, and provocatively showed him the ring on his hand.
“What do you think?”
Silence.
Silence, silence, silence, silence.
After quite a while, Lin Xiao suddenly broke into a radiant smile.
“Since when? Why didn’t you tell me sooner?”
Qin Guan looked at him coldly.
“What does it have to do with you?”
Lin Xiao put on an extremely standard smile, warm as a spring breeze turning rain into nourishment: “As a friend, I should be sending you my blessings.”
He bit down hard on the word “blessings.”
“No need. This is my own private matter.”
Qin Guan pushed him away and walked out beyond the crowd.
“I won’t tell anyone about you using mental control on others in violation of the rules today. I hope you can keep your mouth shut too.”
“Wait!”
Lin Xiao suddenly called out to him from behind.
Qin Guan did not look back. Instead, Lu Chuan looked at the other man with obvious impatience.
Lin Xiao stared fixedly at Qin Guan’s back, his voice dry. The dazzling fiery light flashed in his eyes again: “…Have you thought about joining the Foundation?”
“Captain Lin, I hope you do not misunderstand,” Qin Guan said slowly. “I am not the kind of person who can be mentally controlled by you. And between us, there has never been any relationship from beginning to end.”
“Whether it is toward you or toward the Foundation, my attitude has always been refusal.”
No one knew how long passed before a faint laugh came from behind him.
“I hope you do not regret it when the time comes, G.”
After that, the two bought a lot of supplies and tools in the Atrium, and they spent several peaceful days in a row without anyone coming to cause trouble, as if the matter of offending the Foundation that day had never happened.
Qin Guan was also happy to have some peace and quiet. He used every moment he could to rest, so he could recover his strength and prepare to enter the next instance.
After entering an instance, every survivor could stay in the Atrium for at most 7 days. If they still had not entered the next instance after the time limit, they would be erased by the System.
On the 6th day, Qin Guan finally summoned the System again after a long absence.
“191.”
The little octopus dumpling appeared out of the void in response.
“Long time no see, boss! Are you going into an instance?”
Qin Guan nodded, pointed at Lu Chuan, and said concisely, “Open a two-player team room. Take him along.”
Wow.
191 peeked at Lu Chuan from Qin Guan’s shoulder.
The boss had always gone into instances alone before. Why was he suddenly opening team mode this time?
And even teaming up with… this kind of guy.
How strange, meow.
However, after years of training under Qin Guan, 191 had already become skilled at only doing the work, not asking questions, and always keeping its own little head in mind. It immediately waved its tiny little arms and started working the System interface in a flurry.
“If you enter an instance as a team, you cannot enable anonymous live stream mode, boss. Your identity information will be displayed normally. Is that okay, meow?”
Qin Guan gave the person beside him, Lu Chuan, a cool glance, then looked away. “Can I enable paid mode?”
“That is no problem, boss. What do you want to set it at?”
“9,999 per minute.”
“Wh… what?!”
The little octopus dumpling nearly fell off his shoulder.
Qin Guan looked puzzled. “What, did I remember wrong? Isn’t the maximum setting only five digits?”
“Th… that’s right, but boss, isn’t this…”
Robbery?
191 swallowed the last three words back down and did not dare say them.
Qin Guan did not react much.
After all, 9,999 was only the upper limit set by the System, not his.
At last, 191’s trembling little hand slapped the “Confirm” button. A faint white light wrapped around the two of them, and Qin Guan and Lu Chuan’s figures gradually blurred.
『Access request received. Instance Floor 421… “Homecoming on a Snowy Night” is about to begin. Player, please prepare.』
『Praise the glory of the Filth Jade God! May the lost ones ultimately be granted passage.』
The white light suddenly converged, and Qin Guan and Lu Chuan vanished from the Atrium.
Not far away in a corner, a spying gaze slowly withdrew. The person opened the communication System and sent a message to someone.
“Captain Lin, they have set off.”
A reply came back quickly from the other side.
“Continue observing their movements. Find an opportunity to eliminate the man beside G.”
“What about G?”
The communication interface paused slightly, and another message followed immediately after.
“If he truly cannot be absorbed as an ally, you can consider using force.”