Chapter 829: His Mother
Gao Cheng’s greed persona was fully triggered. The strange mirror shattered. He knew that he was no match for the kid in the posters, but he wanted to fight him anyway.
“The love is not supposed to be yours. You and your biological parents are shameless thieves.” The kid in the poster spoke. Hearing this voice, the black mist boiled fully. The darkness of the Greed Persona wanted to tear the cursed object apart. They clashed in Han Fei’s mind. Curse and greed treated Han Fei’s mind as a battlefield.
Mental corruption rose. When they clashed, a lot of memory fragments fell from the posters. Strangely enough, the fallen memories from the posters became cruel red flowers. They bloomed in Han Fei’s mind, leaving behind unforgettable memories. The kid in the black and white posters seemed to come alive. He was the person with a pair of normal eyes in the family.
Since he was small, he noticed something strange. His blind parents would go around tearing down missing child’s posters from the wall. They couldn’t see, so why would they need the poster? They wouldn’t help search for the child, but they patiently tore down the posters and dropped them into the toilet. The child had no idea what his parents were doing, but since they were his parents, he didn’t expose them.
Bloodflowers bloomed in the abyss. Curse spread through his body. The hatred changed into the most vicious words and branded Han Fei’s skin. Han Fei was highly resistant to curses. Others would have died already. Wang Chuqing’s shocked expression showed how scary Han Fei’s curse resistance was. However, without any other help, it was only a matter of time before Han Fei was corrupted by the curse.
When the curse from the missing person’s report covered every inch of Han Fei’s body, the fake eye he gained from Third Optometrist Hospital changed. The ghost in the eye was triggered. Without any sacrifice, it mixed into the black mist radiated by the Greed persona. New memory fragments appeared in Han Fei’s mind, but they were very different from before. The memory of the missing person’s posters came from Gao Xing, but the memory of the fake eye came from Gao Cheng.
Many years ago, in the Third Optometrist Hospital, Gao Cheng and his adopted mother sat outside the high-class ward. His adoptive mother took good care of Gao Cheng. The nurse knelt to record the various data on the fake eye. They were planning the second eye surgery for Gao Cheng. The second building’s ward was showered with light. It was warm and comfortable. However, the first building’s wards were chaotic, hectic, and smelly. The moving patients begged the bug nurses. Everyone was frowning. Among the crowd, there was a thin kid holding the hands of his blind parents. He stood out among the crowd.
His adoptive mother arranged the best treatment for Gao Cheng.
Gao Xing and his blind parents collected a lot of money before they decided to come to the hospital to conduct an examination to see if there was a possibility of surgery.
The two memory fragments overlapped, and the two kids looked at each other. One could see, but he was surrounded by darkness. The other couldn’t see but he was embraced by the light. That was how they met for the first time.
The curse from the missing person’s reports and the Greed Persona clashed violently. The two didn’t care about Han Fei. They just wanted to consume the other so that they could be the only one remaining. For twinflowers to bloom, one of them had to die.
“We need to go!” Wang Chuqing was a good person. Even though it was dangerous, he didn’t abandon Han Fei. Of course, it was also he still needed the white stick from Han Fei. The ghost who had been hiding in the fake eye was Gao Xing’s nemesis. This battle in Han Fei’s brain became more violent. The curse spread from Han Fei to the booth. Rapid footsteps came from outside the booth. Children\'s laughter came from the red lanterns. The booths opened. The guests were moving their way.
“It’s over! We’re going to be killed because of you!” Wang Chuqing took out a blade wrapped in black cloth. He just wanted to block the door when all the anomalies in the building stopped. The crying, laughing, and footsteps disappeared. The silence was unsettling. Wang Chuqing gripped the blade and moved closer to the door. However, before he got there, the power of an Unmentionable shoved it open. Fresh flowers grew on the booth doors. The flowers then wilted, and the booth door turned into ash. A figure entered the booth. Wang Chuqing couldn’t see them clearly. His eyes were not fast enough. Fading warmth fell on Han Fei’s shoulders. The greed abyss and the endless hatred from the missing person’s reports started to roll back. They were like kids who had been comforted by their mothers.
“Mom?”
When Han Fei recovered, the missing person’s reports had been taken away. The curse on his body had been cleansed. Someone in the greed abyss tried to stop something, but he failed to get anything.
“Notification for Player 0000! You’ve survived Gao Xing’s memory curse! Your resistance to memory-type curse increases by 20 percent! Your overall resistance to curse increases to 5 percent!
“Notification for Player 0000! The Blood Feast is over! You’ve survived until the end! You’ve obtained a lot of EXP and a chance to access your inventory!
“Notification for Player 0000! Your mental corruption is 40 percent! You’re at the edge of a mental collapse!”
The mission was completed, but Han Fei felt no joy. His emotions were affected by the greed abyss. All the positive emotions had been consumed. If he didn’t walk out of it, he would be eaten by the abyss.
“This is bad.”
Lying on the ground, Han Fei was like an abandoned child. He looked as they walked away and chose another child. The pain of abandonment pierced his heart like needles. With each breath, his body trembled with pain. Living was torture.
“Let me die.”
“Stop being crazy!” Wang Chuqing carried Han Fei and rushed out. He was ready to fight to the death, but there was no one in the lobby. All the red lanterns had gone out too. “Did Ghost Mother just appear? All the ghosts went into hiding?” Wang Chuqing glanced at the dying Han Fei and said, “Remember our deal!”
Wang Chuqing barged into the kitchen. There was currently no ghost there. “Perfect opening!”
Wang Chuqing opened the freezer hidden in the basement. It was where most of the unique ingredients were kept. Other than ghost blood, there were also the hearts of Lingering Spirits and things from other monsters.
“The legends are true. Ghost Mother likes to taste different ghosts!”
A normal Red Building wouldn’t have these things, but Wang Chuqing wasn’t greedy. He knew he couldn’t carry everything. He picked a Lingering Spirit’s heart and enough ghost blood for Han Fei and rushed to the exit. After running for a long time, Wang Chuqing finally dared to turn to look. The red lanterns of Shi Wei Eatery came on again. A man in a red chef outfit chased to the door. It remembered Han Fei and Wang Chuqing.
“The heart of the Lingering Spirit and ghost blood are good for other ghosts. It’ll be hard getting back to school tonight.” Wang Chuqing didn’t know whether Han Fei was lucky or unlucky.
He rushed down the streets. Wang Chuqing sacrificed a lot to carry Han Fei back. He overused his persona. He dropped Han Fei in the infirmary and then grabbed much medicine to prevent the curse from spreading to his body.
“If living is torture, why live?” Despair overwhelmed Han Fei’s mind. He couldn’t control himself. His soul was sick due to the corruption.
“After Mad Laughter left, I’m much weaker. After all, I’m just a fake.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about, but you’re the first who I’ve seen who can speak normally at 30 plus mental corruption!” Wang Chuqing opened the ghost blood vials. “Drinking too much ghost blood will break down your body mechanism. It’s equal to suicide. I have no idea where your limit is. If you feel uncomfortable, tell me to stop.”
Wang Chuqing noticed Han Fei’s body temperature dropping as he poured the ghost blood down Han Fei’s throat. He wanted to stop, but Han Fei grabbed his wrist and continued to slurp on the blood.
“Hey! Stop! Even ghosts don’t dare to do this!”
Han Fei’s stomach was trained. His heart pounded. Han Fei didn’t feel like a person but more like a new ghost.
“Notification for Player 0000! Your mental corruption has dropped…”
The greed abyss in his mind was washed away by the ghost blood. Most of the memory fragments and negative emotions were digested. Han Fei’s eyes slowly focused.
“How are you not dead?” Wang Chuqing looked at the empty vials, and he was confused.
“Do you have meat? I need to eat.” The mental corruption was cleansed, but he was still very weak. Han Fei had no other choice but to use Midnight Butcher’s talent to recover Gao Cheng’s body.
“I’ll bring you to the canteen.” Wang Chuqing silently sneaked Han Fei to the canteen. He took out the stocked eat. “Can eating meat restore the damage caused by ghost blood?” Seeing how Han Fei feasted, he was shocked.
“Not enough! I’m still hungry!” Han Fei could move his body already. He opened the freezer door and placed all kinds of meats on the stove to cook. Han Fei’s body temperature rose after finishing the meat prepared for the whole class. He opened his menu to look. His mental corruption dropped to 20.
“Drinking ghost blood and eating meat. I think I’ve found a way to heal. This way I can use the Greed Persona endlessly.” The encounter that night shocked Han Fei. He still remembered the feeling of the hand on his shoulder. “Is that mom? Gao Cheng’s emotion was affecting me. Even I wanted to be close to her.”