Working Records in a Weird World - 93

 

| WRIAWW | I Can't Wait to See Despair | 93

In the end, Joshua never did answer his question.

After the light beam dissipated, Zong Le stood expressionless on the spot, staring at the empty ground before him, beginning to doubt for the first time whether he had been set up.

But at this point, there was no need for a response anymore.

The black-haired young man simply lifted his foot and walked toward the abandoned classroom.

He lifted the white cloth he had draped over earlier and found the corpse of the A-level survivor still lying there quietly. Clearly, the main system had already made its stance clear through action. 

Survivors who died in the instance would not be brought back to the Infinite Space by the teleportation beam.

Their corpses would remain forever within the instance, never returning to the homeland they longed for.

"I guess I'll have to bury you in the ultimate dungeon and make do with it."

Zong Le sighed, rewrapped the corpse in the white cloth, and carried it all the way to the ambulance.

The ambulance was a bit cramped, with not many seats in the front. Left with no choice, he had to place the corpse in the back compartment. After all, the inspection team members had all been knocked out and tied up by him, so there was just enough space to squeeze it in.

After finishing all this, Zong Le finally returned to Sunshine Experimental Elementary School.

The faculty and staff members clutching folders and lesson plans hurried up and down the stairs, their discussions audible from afar.

"What's going on? Why did the inspection team leave so suddenly?"

"Normally, the principal has to send at least three rounds of gifts before they even consider loosening up. Why didn't they take anything this time?"

"Did the first round of gifts seem too generous? The inspection team never lets go of prey, there's no way they'd withdraw on their own."

"Whatever, let's not worry about it. It's good that they're gone. Hurry up and arrange to send the students home. It's rare to have a short holiday, every extra half-day of rest counts."

Zong Le turned a corner and saw Xiao Fu standing at the end of the corridor.

Strangely, the usually mischievous child seemed dazed this time, staring blankly at the floor.

"Xiao Fu?"

Zong Le walked over and called out to him. Only then did Xiao Fu snap out of it, looking up in confusion.

"What's wrong? Are you not feeling well?"

He frowned and reached out to touch Xiao Fu's forehead.

It was icy cold, perfectly in line with the nature of weirds. Come to think of it, non-human weirds probably can't get sick or a fever, right?

"No, Boss. I just felt a bit dizzy earlier, so I stood here for a while."

Because of this action, Xiao Fu completely came back to his sense. "Come to think of it, someone came up to ask me for directions earlier. I even chatted with them for a bit, but right after, I started feeling dizzy."

His words abruptly stopped as Xiao Fu blinked in bewilderment.

How strange. He couldn't remember the person's appearance at all, or remember what they had asked.

But then again, it was probably just some unimportant passerby not worth remembering. Xiao Fu quickly tossed the thought aside and looked up with his trademark well-behaved smile.

"Boss, are you done with your business?"

"Yeah, all done. And the parent-teacher meeting ended early too. Let's go home."

Zong Le casually picked up the child's backpack and headed for the school gate.

Seeing that Zong Le didn't seem to be in the best mood, Xiao Fu felt rather relieved.

A sudden bout of dizziness disrupted his plan to retrieve gifts from the student dormitories.

But since the boss hadn't mentioned it himself, of course he wouldn't be foolish enough to bring it up, so it obediently followed along.

Along the way, Zongle still remembered to ask Xiao Fu, "Does Guiyi City generally prefer burial or cremation?"

"Uh, usually it's cremation. But I heard the crematorium in Guiyi City is fully booked every day. You need to make an appointment three days in advance to secure a slot, otherwise you can't get a spot. So in recent years, many residents have started opting for burial instead. All you have to do is just dig a hole anywhere and bury it. The only difference is that if you bury it within the city, like in roadside flower beds, you can't erect a tombstone."

"......" What a simple custom.

"Boss, do you have a body you need to dispose of?" Xiao Fu immediately rubbed his hands together, volunteering eagerly: "Why not leave it to us? Our Happy Family is best at destroying corpses."

Whether it was the butcher's meat stew or Liu Rouya's hair-strangling technique, they could easily handle it. Besides, Xiao Fu hadn't eaten fresh blood in a long time. 

Although he heard the boss mention it was a corpse, as long as it hadn't been dead for too long, he could reluctantly make do.

"Yeah, he is my colleague. I'm planning to find a place to bury him."

Xiao Fu quickly dismissed thoughts of braising or steaming and said sheepishly, "W-well, how about we bury him in the yard behind the neighborhood? There's plenty of open space there, and the city inspectors don't patrol it. We could even sneak in a tombstone."

"Okay." Zong Le also thought this suggestion was good. "I can visit him often in the future."

Neither of them saw any issue with the burial, so they immediately drove home.

Meanwhile, within the Infinite Space, unprecedented chaos was unfolding.

With yet another ?-level mission suddenly unlocking, the entire forum server buckled under the strain and crashed completely. 

The homepage refreshed at a visible frenzy, with 99+ new posts popping up every minute. Countless survivors, like frantic melon-field raiders, scrambled for any insider information about this new ?-level mission.

The record of "the shortest clearance time for S-level mission" they created, as well as the various incredible situations during the mission, rushed to the corner of the second page of the forum before it had time to attract attention.

In the end, it only attracted a few replies, most of which were messages questioning the authenticity of the posts.

"My Lord, half an hour ago, the Temple received a letter."

The moment Joshua stepped onto the marble floors of the Temple, a messenger waiting by the teleportation array hurried forward.

Joshua unfolded the letter, it was a summon from Qin Ye. Judging by the format and his understanding of the sender, this summons had likely been broadcast to all S-level survivors, inviting the top combatants of the Infinite Space to scout out the newly unlocked ?-level mission.

"Where are they now?"

"They've already formed teams and left."

"Alright."

Unlike other survivors who happened to be free, Joshua had been in the middle of an S-level mission when the ?-mission level one unlocked, so he was unable to catch up with the first wave of teams entering.

"Then I will wait until they come back and take a look"

Joshua casually handed the opened, wax-sealed letter to the messenger and strode toward the inner Temple.

He had a habit to take an incense bath every time he returns from a dungeon after completing a task. He uses the holy spring water in the temple, which contains the breath of light, to wash away the weird aura he has been infected with in the dungeon.

After the Patriarch succession ceremony, Joshua's power source was completely transformed into the light attribute. The advantage of possessing such power was that it repelled weirds, allowing him to wield abilities like healing and purification.

The drawback was his heightened sensitivity to weird aura of dark energy. Let alone enduring places like the Ultimate Dungeon where such auras saturated the air, which felt like wading through quicksand to him.

Steam rose from the grand Roman-style bath. Joshua's slender fingers leisurely undid the sash of his robe, letting the fabric cascade like water from his shoulders.

The man stepped into the pool barefoot, and the clear spring water of light golden color flowed over his ankles and flowed over the contours of his well-defined muscles.

At the same time, the water surface was emitting tiny golden light spots, which was the holy spring purifying the remaining weird aura from his body.

Midway through the purification, he idly gathered a handful of his long hair, lifting his gaze at the magnificent painted murals on the dome. His expression was one of languid weariness.

"We have already reached the second question mark-level mission. I wonder how long it'll take for those survivors to uncover those earth-shattering secrets?"

Amid the swirling mist, his blue eyes, now freed from the monocle, suddenly sharpened with predatory intensity, brimming with amusement and delight.

"I hope that day comes soon... I can hardly wait to witness their despair."

That is what Joshua is looking forward to most besides his new toy and his hidden identity.

......

On the forums, discussions showed no signs of stopping.

At noon, the Watchtower Guild was the first to release news, stating that their leader, Qin Ye, had joined forces with the Moon Guild and led dozens of S-level survivors, along with several artifacts, into the ?-level mission site in the southern district of Guiyi City, the Central Court.

Two hours had passed since Qin Ye entered the courthouse, and people were eagerly awaiting the outcome.

[What is the situation in the Central Court?]

[Has any S-level boss who went in posted an update? Why has everyone gone silent after entering?]

[Yeah, even during missions, phones should still work, they could at least drop a forum post. This radio silence is making us spectators nervous. Is the mission so difficult they can’t spare a second to post?]

At first, people still chatted casually on the forums, optimistically speculating about the future.

But after five hours passed without a single post from the S-level team, the crowd belatedly realized something was wrong, and the mood took a sharp downturn.

[Wait, earlier we could chalk it up to them being too busy, but five hours without a single post? There’s no way this is just a prank or lack of time.]

[Could the courthouse’s weird domain be blocking communication? But is that even possible... We’ve been through so many missions, even high-difficulty ones like the S-level dungeon "Temple," none of them have ever restricted forum access.]

[It has to be a isolate information. Come on, this time the team was stacked with nothing but S-levels, almost all the top ten were there except the 1st (who was on another mission when the question-mark-level opened), the 3rd, and the 10th were resting. If a lineup like this gets wiped, we might as well give up on returning to the real world and just lie down to sleep.]

[Indeed, I also think the comment makes a lot of sense. Since things have come to this, we might as well get some sleep first. This whole "one person clearing the level means everyone passes" thing... Anyway, even if the sky falls, it has nothing to do with us D-level survivors.]

The forum chaos continued unabated, with countless speculations and rumors constantly emerging.

The first rays of morning light pierced through the clouds as several white doves fluttered their wings and landed on the carved railings outside the palace. Their clear cooing, carried by the salty sea breeze, drifted through the half-open gilded windows, creating faint echoes in the quiet chamber.

Joshua suddenly opened his eyes, his ice-blue pupils shimmering in the morning light.

He rose, casually picking up the white robe draped nearby and fastening it before pushing open the door.

"How are things with 2nd?"

"Reporting, my lord, they haven't returned yet."

"If I recall correctly, it's been nearly eighteen hours, right?"

"Yes, my lord."

Joshua returned to his chambers thoughtfully to begin his morning routine.

The wait continued until evening.

As the setting sun slowly sank below the horizon, painting the entire sea in molten gold and crimson hues, the messenger priest finally arrived with news.

The silver-haired patriarch was leaning on the railing and looking into the distance, his silver hair gently fluttering in the salty sea breeze. The afterglow of the setting sun cast a layer of flowing gold on him, and even his long eyelashes were stained with a tiny halo of light.

The priest did not dare to disturb him, but lowered his head and stood quietly until the last ray of golden light at the junction of the sea and the sky was swallowed by the dusk, and only then did he hear the other party speak.

"Speak."

"My lord, the S-levels who went on the mission to the Central Court have returned. They are currently waiting in the reception room of the temple for your audience."

Finally, Joshua thought.

He lifted the hem of his robe and walked towards the stairs.

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