Gamers Are Fierce-Chapter 733 - 731 Luxury (4K)

"If you think the Dolphin Hotel isn't good, then go and improve it. If you think the hotel staff are unfriendly, then apply for a position. If you think the guests lack quality, then start being a morally and culturally refined resident from now on. You set the standard for the Dolphin Hotel."

Li Ang frowned deeply, staring at the mirror as he spoke seriously.

In the elevator, Mule looked around hesitantly and asked, "...Are you talking to me?"

It was around 12:30 AM. Li Ang and Mule, who resided on the fifth and fourth floors respectively, hadn't received any notes. They took the elevator, intending to go downstairs and check on Liu Wu Dai and Wanli Fengdao.

"No."

Li Ang turned around and waved his hand casually. "I'm just putting myself in the shoes of the hotel staff, thinking about their daily routines."

"Huh?"

Mule was confused. "What do you mean?"

"Setting aside the absurd possibility that this hotel is a large-scale reality show run by Aliens, the staff here should all be ordinary people," Li Ang said calmly. "According to Judy Cecil, they age and get injured. Apart from being tight-lipped, they have their own emotions and desires, just like normal people. Older employees often retire, and new ones join. During the day, they must demonstrate the professionalism of five-star hotel staff to serve residents, while at night, they must always be prepared for the hotel being overrun, abnormal invasions, or the potential annihilation of all staff members. The difficulty of their job is probably even more demanding than when I was moonlighting as a mannequin model in a shopping mall."

"???"

Although Li Ang was seriously discussing the mission, Mule's attention was completely drawn to the latter part of his statement. "You had a job doing what?"

"A mannequin model. That mall was so busy all the mannequins had been sold to customers, so the owner had to hire me to pose as a model in the display window," Li Ang said casually. "The pay was quite good. Unfortunately, I was too enthusiastic and dedicated. I often wandered around the mall during lunchtime wearing a faceless rubber Mask, asking customers if they needed any help. The owner fired me."

"..."

Mule smacked her lips but made no comment. She felt like she was getting better at keeping up with Li Ang's train of thought.

"In any case, I'm very curious about what motivates these employees to work so hard in the hotel, as well as who is funding its operations."

Li Ang said indifferently, "For ordinary people to make such great sacrifices, it must be for either a sufficiently large benefit, a strong enough belief, or an unseverable emotion..."

DING DONG.

As they spoke, the elevator reached the third floor, and its doors opened.

「————」

BOOM!

A heavy tank, laden with dense arrays of cannon barrels, fired thunderously.

Liu Wu Dai, wreathed in pale white light spots, moved erratically. She barely escaped the shower of armor-piercing shrapnel, then drew a Crystal Arrow from her quiver without looking. She pulled the bowstring back at an angle behind her and sharply released her fingers.

The Crystal Arrow tore through the air, trailing a crescent-shaped energy blade nearly two meters wide, and struck the heavy tank hovering in mid-air.

Instantly, an explosion lit up the sky, scattering Broken building block fragments everywhere.

This wasn't a modern battlefield but Room 0372.

Minutes before, Liu Wu Dai had received that evening's note: "Play with toys."

Before she could react, all the furniture in Room 0372 swelled and enlarged rapidly, expanding the space tenfold, even a hundredfold.

No, it wasn't the surroundings that grew larger; I've shrunk.

Like Alice in *Alice in Wonderland*, who accidentally drank the Magic Potion, Liu Wu Dai was reduced to the size of a mouse. Chair legs resembled towering trees, and crystal chandeliers looked like suns hanging high above.

From the once-spotless ceiling, countless crimson giant eyes spontaneously sprouted.

Around these eyes, bubbling, brownish-black sludge grew and twisted into a mass, differentiating into more than twenty octopus-like tentacles. Each tentacle clutched a children's toy.

Toy trucks, toy tanks, toy pistols, toy dinosaurs, toy soldiers...

These toys, made of LEGO bricks, eco-friendly wood, lightweight plastic, and other materials, were initially motionless. But under some power emanating from the tentacles, all the toys swelled further, growing larger and increasingly resembling real killing machines.

A naive yet cruel emotion surfaced in the muddy eyes.

The twenty-odd tentacles swung in unison. The toys' artillery barraged Liu Wu Dai below.

Liu Wu Dai's combat experience was far from shallow, and her gear was much more luxurious than that of average players.

However, the shrinking Special Effect of Room 0372 also impacted all her skills and equipment's Special Effects.

Her explosive arrow rain, which could originally destroy a villa in one shot, was weakened to the point it could only knock away wooden chairs or repel toy dinosaurs.

Her energy shield, which could normally withstand the main cannon fire of a modern main battle tank, collapsed after a single hit from a rubber bomb dropped by a toy plane.

But Liu Wu Dai did not fall into despair.

Skills:

[Thunderbolt Arrow]— Shoots an Arrow imbued with the Thunderbolt attribute.

[Archery]— Shoots Arrows immediately from the bowstring without needing to draw.

[Double Shot]— The next ranged weapon attack triggers two quick shots; the second shot does not carry any attack Special Effects.

[Multiple Shot]— The next ranged weapon attack triggers three quick shots; the latter two do not carry any attack Special Effects.

[Arrow Recirculation]— Remotely retrieves retrievable physical Arrows.

[Meishan Six Steps Levitation]— Light footwork; increases running speed, allows running on vertical surfaces, and brief hovering.

[Direct Arcane Truth: Qi Concentration Method]— Enhances the speed of strength recovery.

[Dotted-line Magic Eye]— Sees the "death" of things, transmitting the flaws of all things in the form of dots and lines as visual information to the mind.

[Divine Weapon Blessing]— Enchants weapons, adding a holy attribute.

[Necrotic Strike]— The next attack will deal extra damage to undead units.

[Bio-luminescence]— Releases murky light, temporarily blinding enemies.

...

Equipment:

[Blood Bird Bow]— When used, has a chance to summon an undead creature that obeys commands, causing normal Arrows to deal random elemental damage. If elemental Arrows are used, their effects are enhanced.

[Aimeimei's Coarse Wool Bag]— A quiver that holds more Arrows than its capacity allows, speeds up the action of drawing Arrows; every seventh Arrow drawn will have an explosive effect.

[Blind Skull Helmet]— Provides a 360° view, enhances the effect of any one eye technique, increases the usage time of eye techniques, and reduces their consumption.

[Shoulder Pads of Thorn]— Launches a poisonous spike at enemies that attack the wearer.

[Demon Hunter Gloves]— Slightly speeds up hand movement; effect doubles against enemies of chaotic evil alignment.

[Phase Boots]— Increases running speed; body temporarily becomes incorporeal.

[Green Flower Ring]— Increases the speed of stamina recovery.

[Iron Ring of Blessing]— Increases the rate of physical damage reduction.

[Magic Cube Ring]— Increases the rate of magical damage reduction.

...

Indeed, faced with such large, easily targetable enemies with straightforward attack methods, Liu Wu Dai's luxurious array of skills and equipment finally had their moment to shine.

Helmet, hood, cape, bow, Arrows, quiver, boots...

If the sludge eyeballs perched on the ceiling possessed Spiritual Sense, they would have noticed Liu Wu Dai's entire body shimmering with the brilliant light of extraordinary items.

Even more extravagantly, each of Liu Wu Dai's ten fingers was adorned with a sparkling ring.

Thunderbolt Arrows, Crystal Demon-Banishing Arrows.

Arrows gleaming with Thunderbolt light, and Crystal Arrows wreathed in crescent-shaped energy blades, shot out like twin lotus flowers, striking the diving toy warplane directly and blasting it into a sky full of plastic fragments.

Liu Wu Dai's [Dotted-line Magic Eye] skill was a weaker, commemorative youth edition of the [Direct Death Demon Eye].

The prototype of the [Direct Death Demon Eye] came from Celtic mythology: the King of the Fomorians, the Evil God Balor. It could see the ultimate end of all things at their origin, projecting this vision as death lines and death points. Simply by cutting a thing's death line with a sharp tool, the thing would split along that line. If a thing's death point was directly attacked with a sharp tool, it would immediately end, collapsing and disintegrating.

This ability originated from the Type-Moon world series of literary works (including but not limited to games). In terms of lore alone, the Mysterious Degree of the [Direct Death Demon Eye] was astoundingly high. While its weakened version, the [Dotted-line Magic Eye], revealed far fewer death lines and points, and blurred the user's vision of other things, it could still achieve an effect close to a "one-hit kill."

Room 0372 could only reduce the destructive range of attack Special Effects; it couldn't weaken the death-inducing effect of the [Dotted-line Magic Eye]. As long as her Arrows successfully hit a target's weak points, she could still kill monsters as large as buildings.

Arrows filled the sky, severing one tentacle after another from the sludge monster—the first, the second, the third, the fourth...

The eyeballs on the ceiling struggled desperately, emitting sharp, piercing howls of pain.

SIZZLE—

A dazzling crimson column of light spanned the entire room, striking a tentacle that tried to sneak-attack Liu Wu Dai from behind, incinerating it to ash.

Liu Wu Dai didn't turn her head; her [Blind Skull Helmet] allowed her to see directly behind her.

The door to Room 0372 opened.

Li Ang, Mule, and a rounded, two-meter-tall Mechanical Statue stood in the doorway. The recent blast of crimson light had come from the statue's right hand.

SIZZLE—

Another beam of light struck.

The Catastrophe Mechanical Golem standing at the door was not affected by the shrinking Special Effect in Room 0372. Its full-damage light column blasted the base of the sludge eyeballs' tentacles, sending sludge flying and causing the creature to howl miserably.

Li Ang, standing beside the Mechanical Statue, also took out a sack filled with soil and created metal Flying Knives. He launched a "righteous" sneak attack from a distance, occasionally performing the flashy move of three Flying Knives colliding in mid-air before scattering to hit targets at the three vertices of an equilateral triangle.

With the combined efforts of the three players, the sludge eyeballs were quickly, almost completely, cleared out.

Liu Wu Dai's size also gradually returned to normal.

She leaped lightly and used her Short Dagger to slice off the last eyeball from the ceiling, placing it into a Glass Bottle covered in Talismans.

This Glass Bottle could Seal almost all types of life forms. Any attack from a Sealed entity would be transformed into Energy that strengthened the Seal—as long as it didn't exceed the bottle's physical limits.

"Got it."

Liu Wu Dai finally let out a sigh of relief, wiping the light sweat from her forehead.

Inside the Glass Bottle, the eyeball, a clump of sludge, abruptly bounced, slamming against the glass. Its chaotic eyes were filled with irrational rage and hate.

"Come in."

Holding the Glass Bottle, Liu Wu Dai turned to let Mule and Li Ang into the room, closing the door behind them. Then she took out the note and showed it to her companions.

The three players surrounded the eyeball, quickly discussing what to do with it.

Based on their previous experiences, anomalies in the Dolphin Hotel's rooms were likely manifestations of guests who had died there. These Earthbounded Spirits, for some reason unable to dissipate, would randomly appear at night, following their Spiritual Body instincts to attack living guests. If players subdued them, they might be able to restore them to a sane state.

The question was, how?

Liu Wu Dai, through the Glass Bottle, unleashed a Divine Light Baptism. This made the eyeball struggle in agony, emitting green smoke.

Mule injected a light blue liquid into the Glass Bottle, alleged to restore sanity. However, the wide-open eyeball merely bobbed up and down in the water, its surrounding muscles bulging as if to say, I can't breathe!

This forced Mule to hastily withdraw the sanity-restoring liquid with a syringe.

Heaven knows why an eyeball needs to breathe.

Since Wanli Fengdao downstairs still needed checking on, Li Ang had to act fast.

He picked up the Glass Bottle and, like a croupier in a movie shaking a dice cup, shook it violently back and forth.

However, far from regaining any sanity, the eyeball of sludge shed copious tears of blood, as if dizzy and nauseous, or perhaps bemoaning Li Ang's tyranny and cruelty.

Li Ang didn't give up. He alternately poured various unidentified substances into the Glass Bottle while constantly threatening it verbally. He claimed to have all the information on the sludge eyeball's household registry, warning that if it didn't confess, its entire family would be handed over to his good brother, Xing Tian.

In the end, Li Ang even began to chant scriptures. Confucian, Taoist, Buddhist—sacred texts and golden phrases were recited in turn, interspersed with highly concentrated, enigmatic statements:

"How much does the 'two-dimensional' world weigh in your heart?"

"Three hundred grams."

"So light? I thought you loved the 'two-dimensional' world more than that."

"A human heart only weighs three hundred grams."

"The electric light leaping from your fingertips is my undying faith in this life."

"*5 Centimeters Per Second* taught me about first love, *Clannad* taught me about life, *Anohana* taught me about childhood friends..."

To the ears of Liu Wu Dai and Mule, who understood these references (as Slaughter Game Players were required to watch a vast number of artistic works and were all seasoned 'two-dimensional' enthusiasts), the sheer concentration of these words was comparable to carcinogenic substances.

Yet, the sludge eyeball showed no reaction whatsoever.

Seeing all methods fail, a murderous glint appeared in Li Ang's eyes. A relentless stream of Evil Qi spewed from his body, making the sludge eyeball inside the Glass Bottle shiver in fear.

Just as he was about to resort to more direct and brutal methods of persuasion, Mule suddenly raised her head, looking towards the hallway outside Room 0372.

"The telephone's ringing."