The keeper stood in the doorway, silently watching them leave. Behind him were countless faint silhouettes of wax figures. In the darkness, their expressionless marble faces slowly emerged, like fish surfacing from the sea.
[Main Quest: Explore Siren Wax Museum — Completed | Reward: 50 bonus points]
[Current point balance: 81. Would you like to purchase props?]
"Hmm, 81 points…" Bai Liu stroked his chin and asked, Is there any high-concentration alcohol?
[Shop Opened — 218 types of special-quality alcohol available. 18 items can be purchased in this instance.]
[How much is the cheapest one?]
[9 points for 25 L. Warm reminder: alcohol in the game is not the same substance as alcohol in reality. After system conversion, its effectiveness may be higher or lower. Players are advised to read the instructions carefully before purchasing.]
[System Suggestion: Detected that the player has sufficient points. We recommend purchasing the Flaming Torch prop in this instance. It is more effective and safer~]
Bai Liu pondered for a moment. [Read the alcohol props manual.]
The system panel instantly exploded into a dozen densely packed pages. The ant-sized text was enough to make anyone's eyes ache after a second glance.
Bai Liu opened one page and read slowly and carefully.
Prop sales in this game were always like this: the cheaper the item, the longer and more complicated the instruction manual. In contrast, popular items on the best-seller list had manuals that were brief, direct, and dripping with temptation, focusing only on the effects—just enough to make desperate players buy them at a glance.
As someone perpetually short on money, Bai Liu was intimately familiar with the art of digging out the most cost-effective items from the sea of aggressive e-commerce marketing every shopping season.
The cheaper and more practical something was, the more obstacles there tended to be to purchasing it.
One of them is to put a lot of description text on cheap items so that people don't know what to do with it at first glance, and then jump over to buy something else.
Therefore, few people have bought these cheap things, so the sales volume is extremely low, and some are even single digits. It is estimated that few people have carefully read the user guide of these things.
Bai Liu narrowed his eyes and glanced at the menu bar beside [Flaming Torch] and [3D Projector]—
[Item price adjusted.]
[Flaming Torch price in "Siren Town" reduced to 17 points.]
[3D Projector price in "Siren Town" restored to original: 6 points each.]
Both props he had noticed earlier had undergone price changes.
Meanwhile, commonly used and highly effective horror-game props like [Flashlight] and [Flaming Torch] now appear more expensive.
It seemed that after Bai Liu used certain props, their prices fluctuated accordingly—and he knew this was a live-broadcast system.
He speculated that changes in player purchasing behavior during his run had affected item prices in real time.
Without slowing down, Bai Liu finished reading the manuals for all the alcohols and finally chose the cheapest one.
Bai Liu was feeling generous. I'll take them all.
[9 bottles of high-concentration alcohol have been added to Player Bai Liu's shopping bag. Thank you for your patronage.]
Wang Shun, sitting in front of a small TV screen, slapped his thigh anxiously when he saw this. "Ehhh! What is this newbie doing?!"
"You're going to burn wax figures with alcohol? These wax figures are afraid of light, not fire! Burning the outer wax just releases the monsters inside! How can he blow all his points at once—idiot!"
Other players whispered nearby:
"What's wrong with this guy? Spending all 81 points on the cheapest alcohol—is this guy an alcoholic? No one even buys that stuff, right?"
"Classic newbie mistake. Just because mermaid wax figures fear light doesn't mean they fear fire. Someone tried using a torch to burn them before instead of shining it on them and died the moment the flame dimmed."
"It's over. I thought he was something special—turns out he just got lucky…"
"The quality of the central screen keeps dropping. Even this kind of newbie can make it on now. The last batch of God Mu players was on a whole different level…"
[0 likes added to Bai Liu's mini-TV | +2 favorites | +166 stomps | 0 charges received.]
[1,447 new viewers are watching Bai Liu's mini-TV. More than half have stomped it. Player Bai Liu has received the title: Not Worthy of the Name. Poor performance—everyone wants you dead soon~]
[Player Bai Liu's central screen edge promotion has expired.]
[Stomp count increasing rapidly. Player Bai Liu has entered the "Death Comedy" section to entertain the audience with comical deaths and questionable gameplay!]
Wang Shun watched as the small screen at the edge of the central zone flickered and Bai Liu's mini-TV went dark.
Pushing his glasses up his nose, he thought of the god-level wandering NPC information he hadn't yet collected. After a brief hesitation, he stood up anyway and headed for the Death Comedy section, amid waves of laughter and regret for the newcomer named Bai Liu.
-----------------
In-game.
Night fell.
The driver steered the van along the darkened streets. The streetlights on both sides flickered on one after another, illuminating fishermen dragging fishing nets and machetes along the road. They watched the van pass with dull, vacant expressions.
These were the fishermen who would be participating in the mermaid fishing tonight.
Under the dim streetlights, marble-like green and black veins spread densely across their faces, with strands of mucus slowly dripping from their skin.
The townspeople looked even more grotesque than they had during the day, their eyes glowing a muted green in the darkness.
The driver warned them again. "These townspeople are dangerous. They haven't had any income for a long time. Later, you just watch the mermaid fishing from your assigned boat. Don't touch them. You look like outsiders at first glance—easy targets for robbery."
As he spoke, the driver took a huge bite of the sandwich in his hand.
This man ate sandwiches for dinner. Minced fish meat fell from the corner of his mouth as he chewed. Bai Liu caught a whiff of the putrid fish stench and nearly gagged, but no one else in the van seemed bothered. Andre kept swallowing as he stared at the driver's sandwich, pressing impatiently behind his ears.
Lucy couldn't help saying, "That sandwich smells so good."
Andre snapped irritably, "What are we even eating for dinner? I'm starving!" As he spoke, he turned back and shot Bai Liu a disgusted look.
They had eaten dinner at the wax museum earlier. Bai Liu had ordered the cheapest all-vegetarian set and refused to eat any fish. Not only had this angered Andre, but it had even shocked Lucy. But Bai Liu had paid the largest share of the bill, stating calmly that since he didn't want fish, everyone would accompany him.
Andre had cursed at him then, "If you can't afford to play grown-up games, go home and drink your mommy's vegan milk!"
Bai Liu had only smiled faintly. "In that case, Andre, order your own meat if you want it."
He withdrew Andre's vegetarian set. The wax museum's food packages were outrageously expensive, far beyond what Andre could afford, and Bai Liu made it clear he wouldn't pay for him unless Andre behaved.
Andre didn't dare push Bai Liu further. After all, Bai Liu was paying for his hotel that night, and Andre didn't want to end up sleeping on the streets of a town like this.
Jeff, however, didn't care. Andre snatched Jeff's vegetarian meal and punched him several times.
Now, as the smell of the sandwich filled the van, Jeff's Adam's apple bobbed repeatedly. His eyes showed a restrained hunger before flicking toward Andre, red-rimmed and brimming with suppressed rage.
[Jeff's Bloody Plot — Branch Progress: 30%]
Bai Liu glanced at Jeff, who quickly lowered his head.
Driven half-mad by hunger and the smell of food, Andre scratched violently behind his ears.
Bai Liu noticed that the skin behind Andre's ear—scratched raw and reddened—suddenly split into several curved folds, opening and closing like the gills of a fish drawing breath. It lasted only a moment before the skin sealed itself again.
That patch of skin seemed alive, swelling in tiny pulses.
It throbbed faintly, like the gills of a fish stranded on shore.
Bai Liu scanned Andre with a coin.
[NPC Name: Andre — Highly Alienated]
Andre's alienation level has increased after leaving the wax museum…
Bai Liu raised his eyebrows slightly. "Andre, did you touch the mermaid wax figures in the museum?"
"So what if I did?" Andre snarled as he turned around. "Bai Liu, tonight we'll see who should go home and drink milk!"
In that instant, Andre let out a low, furious growl. In the dimly lit compartment, his gills flared open on either side of his head, and Bai Liu could clearly see the fin-like structures behind his ears trembling violently.
The driver suddenly scolded them, "Hey! Don't fight in the car!"
Andre instantly retracted his gills, though his glare remained viciously fixed on Bai Liu.
The driver continued, "I've found you a place for your duel—or rather, your bet—as you requested. A remote beach. Two wooden boats. Tonight. Take care of yourselves. I'm not responsible if you drown."
After a pause, he seemed to chuckle to himself. "But you've all been here long enough. You probably won't drown… You should be able to swim."
Bai Liu's expression tightened.
He couldn't swim.
Everyone in this town was becoming fish-like—including their group, who had only been here for a single day. They were beginning to crave strange fish meat, and a faint fishy odor clung to their bodies.
Fish were born to swim. Of course, they wouldn't drown.
Everyone—Except Bai Liu.
Unlike the others, he neither ate the bizarre fish meat nor allowed any mermaid wax figures to approach him at night.
Bai Liu suspected these two factors were what triggered the transformation. He had not been assimilated or evolved—and once the bet was set tonight, his danger level would undoubtedly double.
Who knew what lurked in the sea?
And who knew whether Andre would turn into a monster and overturn his boat before the night was over?