Midnight Dumplings Are Never Free

Bai Ke had very little experience clearing instances.
The types of top players he had encountered were relatively uniform.
They all had ample items as backup and adopted the most cautious methods to progress.

When testing death rules, some top players would use newcomers’ lives as bargaining chips.
Although such behavior was unethical, in this survival-of-the-fittest rules-based world, ethics were always the cheapest commodity.

But this Su Lai… his style was completely different from any top player Bai Ke had met before.
This guy’s moves all seemed unreliable, yet their actual effectiveness far exceeded expectations.
The man himself also seemed quite dependable.

Taking daring risks to achieve unexpected victory.

Bai Ke thought he might have really latched onto a solid, sturdy thigh.

Meanwhile, Su Lai was still pondering how to blow up the entire street by igniting the electrical wires.
If he were ever pursued one day, that would be the only way to prevent being captured by the authorities.

The village committee had mentioned that under normal circumstances, staff would protect outsiders.
But what constituted “normal circumstances” was hard to define.

Based on Su Lai’s past experience reading novels, it wasn’t hard to see that the suited man in the broadcast had been completely mentally contaminated.

If a player failed the main quest, not only would they be identified as a vagrant, but their mental health would also be severely contaminated.

Su Lai put the drained plates back in the cupboard.
Then, acting completely at home, he opened the kitchen refrigerator.

Mother Wang and Uncle Wang, who had been staring blankly at the snowy TV, immediately turned.
They looked at Su Lai with warning-filled eyes.

Su Lai: “Mom, aren’t there any watermelons in the fridge?”
As he spoke, he quickly scanned the fridge’s contents—only neatly cut meat and frozen shrimp, no suspicious-looking corpse chunks as one might imagine.

Su Lai opened the freezer compartment again.
After a quick look, he found nothing suspicious.

It was a proper fridge.
This meant their food source was temporarily safe.

“Nor any ice cream.”
Su Lai turned around, looking back at Mother Wang’s questioning gaze with the disappointed eyes of a child who didn’t get the toy he wanted.

After all, a summer night without ice cream and watermelon was incomplete.
Su Lai’s complaint was perfectly reasonable.

After a brief standoff, Mother Wang averted her eyes.
“Uncle Wang will buy some for you from the convenience store tomorrow.”

Su Lai caught the keyword—”tomorrow.”

“Why not go now?” Su Lai asked.

Mother Wang: “The Spring Breeze Community is a mixed bag now.
It’s unsafe at night, not good to wander around.”
She pointed at the TV.
“The vagrant in the news just now is the best example.
This place doesn’t welcome homeless vagrants at night.
You’ll end up on the news.”

“So, Little Four, don’t run away from home casually.”
Mother Wang’s voice was eerie.
“And don’t get kicked out of the house.”

Uncle Wang, staring at the blank TV screen, burst into a “heh heh heh” laugh.
“Chunying, the child just returned.
Don’t scare him.”

Bai Ke, standing nearby, broke into a cold sweat for Su Lai.
Normally, players didn’t dare touch NPCs’ belongings without permission.
Even if searching for clues, they’d restore things afterward, trying not to leave traces.

Su Lai not only opened the fridge without permission, he did it right in front of the NPCs.

Su Lai finally closed the freezer door.
“Thank you, Uncle Wang.”
He thought for a moment.
“I want mung bean flavor ice cream.”

Bai Ke: “…”
This guy even made specific requests.

After washing the dishes, Mother Wang took them to a room on the second floor.
Urban villages were perpetually damp and sunless.
Mold spots crawled over the wall tiles.
The stair railing felt sticky to the touch, like the stacked corpses of microorganisms.

Bai Ke stepped on the slippery floor tiles, nearly falling several times.
Su Lai’s pink flip-flops, however, remained steady, not slipping at all.

Bai Ke, holding onto the wall, couldn’t help but look at the other’s pink flip-flops.
‘Even the expert’s slippers were this reliable.
‘If he wore flip-flops, he’d have fallen to his death long ago.’

The room Mother Wang arranged for them was dark and cramped, less than ten square meters.
The only window directly faced the kitchen of the neighboring house.
An exhaust fan blew directly into their room.

The window glass was thick, old-fashioned blue-tinted glass.
There was also an anti-theft grille outside, making the already poorly lit room even worse.

If they encountered a crisis in the room, jumping out the window to escape wouldn’t even be an option…

Su Lai noticed the room only had two foldable stretcher beds.
Junk was piled all around.
It resembled a storage room more than a bedroom.

“Mom, why can’t I stay in my own room?” Su Lai asked Mother Wang.

Clearly, this was definitely not Wang Xiaosi’s original bedroom.
No mother would make her child endure such hardship.

Mother Wang’s murky eyes shifted.
“Your room is still being tidied up.”
“Do not leave your room lightly unless I call for you.”

Su Lai: “What if Uncle Wang calls us?”

Mother Wang: “He is also your elder, same as me.
Go to sleep early.”
Mother Wang didn’t want to chat further.
She closed the door heavily and left.

Bai Ke was about to say something.
Su Lai immediately pressed his index finger to his lips, signaling silence.

The room returned to quiet.
The walls had poor sound insulation.
They could hear Mother Wang’s footsteps descending the stairs.

Only after the footsteps completely faded did Su Lai speak.
“She doesn’t trust me.”

Bai Ke thought to himself: ‘She really shouldn’t.’

Su Lai didn’t speak further.
Later, Mother Wang would likely try various ways to test his identity.
Once he showed any flaw, this mother certainly wouldn’t go easy on him.

“Lai-ge, what do you plan to do?” Bai Ke asked.

Su Lai: “Try to learn to be a good son, gain Mom’s approval.”
He pushed the window open to test.
The anti-theft grille was firmly welded to the wall, immovable.
“If that doesn’t work—”

“Then blow this house up.”
He shifted his gaze to the tangled mess of wires above the anti-theft grille.

Just like before, red lights flickered faintly within the wire tangle.
It was as if invisible eyes hid in the darkness, watching every move in the urban village.

How to be a good son?
Su Lai pondered this while closing the windowpane again.

Bai Ke carefully moved a rusty fan at his feet.
Several cockroaches larger than bottle caps immediately scurried out, scrambling under the foldable beds.

Bai Ke yelped “Holy shit!” in fright, stumbling back several steps, nearly falling into the pile of junk.

“Don’t make noise.”
Su Lai calmly watched the direction where the cockroaches disappeared.

Bai Ke immediately covered his mouth, his voice trembling.
“How are we supposed to sleep tonight, for heaven’s sake…”

Su Lai: “By lying down.”

Bai Ke: “…”

Su Lai: “You can also stand.”

He quickly rolled up his sleeves and started cleaning.
There was a simple sink in the room, with rags and a mop nearby.
Su Lai worked without hesitation, soon tidying the messy room.
Space was cleared to unfold the foldable beds.
The bed surfaces were wiped clean, though the accumulated mold spots couldn’t be removed.

“Bai Ke, how many times have you been here?” Su Lai asked casually while working.

“Here” referred to the instance world invaded by contamination.

Bai Ke gave a wry smile.
“To be honest, this is my second time clearing an instance.”
“The first time I was suddenly dragged into this so-called contaminated world, I couldn’t accept the reality I was in.
I rushed around like a headless fly.
Luckily, my luck was good enough that I actually came out alive.”
“After the instance ended, the system said there had been an audience watching our entire clearance.
Based on my performance in the livestream, there were clearance rewards to claim.
At first, I didn’t believe it, until my account received an entire half-year’s salary.
That really scared me.”
“More accurately, overjoyed me.
After receiving the payment, I quit my job on the spot, leaving my previous company in style.”
“After all, it was a huge sum earned by risking my life.
I should let myself enjoy life properly, not continue wasting life at work, right?”
“But after lounging for over half a year, the money ran out.
The ‘deposit plus three months’ rent’ became the final straw that crushed me.”

Su Lai: “So you entered this instance again?”

Bai Ke shook his head.
“No, I found a new job.
Continued the miserable life of 9-to-10.”
“No one knows when the next instance will come, but life must go on.”

Su Lai: “As long as you clear a few more instances, you can outlast your landlord without working.”

Bai Ke waved his hand.
“I’ve come to terms with reality.
For a small fry like me, achieving financial freedom through instances is impossible.
Just getting out alive is something to thank heaven and earth for.”

Su Lai asked in a ‘let me test you’ tone.
“Do you know what kind of beings those livestream audience members the system mentioned are?”

Bai Ke shook his head, asking curiously.
“Lai-ge, what exactly are they?”

After a few seconds of silence, Su Lai also shook his head.
“How would I know?”

Bai Ke: “…”

Su Lai continued fishing for information.
“In your view, what exactly are contaminants and instances?”

Thinking the expert was “interviewing” him, Bai Ke thought carefully before answering seriously.
“Probably things that can completely collapse our human society.
To be honest, I’m not sure either.
I only know they’re extremely dangerous, and this danger is spreading at a speed we can hardly predict.”
“Lai-ge, is this world going to end?”

Su Lai pursed his lips, saying nonchalantly.
“Probably.
So lounging is pretty good.”
“How did you get pulled in this time?” Su Lai asked.

Bai Ke: “My work content team was planning a ‘Living in the Urban Village’ theme, intending to document the most authentic face of urban villages.
Data collection and interviews were only halfway done when I was inexplicably dragged into this world—and into an urban village already distorted by contamination, becoming the ‘local resident’s’ cousin.
It’s quite a novel experience.”
Bai Ke spoke, filled with emotion.

Having driven most of the day, Su Lai had an aching back.
He lay on the cleaned stretcher bed, analyzing the current situation while looking at the mold spots on the ceiling.

First, based on the information Bai Ke revealed, instances invaded by contamination descended randomly.
Players who could sense contamination were dragged in.
The process was sudden, with possibly no prior signs.
Second, players pulled in could earn real money by clearing instances.
Third, there were bored audiences watching their clearance process.
How much money one could earn in an instance might be related to the livestream audience.

Su Lai had no so-called system and hadn’t received any notifications.
He was a bit worried.
He didn’t know if a wild player like himself could earn money from the system and the livestream audience…

* * * *

Live broadcast backend moderation area.

[I want to see Wang Xiaosi.
Can you cut to Wang Xiaosi’s dedicated livestream POV?]
[Why isn’t Wang Xiaosi’s livestream mystery code displayed yet?
The main quest has clearly started.]
[I can’t see Wang Xiaosi’s personal info either.
What’s going on?]

Countless similar comments flooded the screen, only to be filtered out by the system.

[System detects an unknown bug in the currently running instance.]
[This bug cannot be corrected at this time.]

To watch Su Lai’s antics, the number of viewers in Bai Ke’s livestream kept increasing—

[One person begs in blood for Wang Xiaosi’s livestream link.]
[Two people beg in blood.]
…
[779 people beg in blood for Wang Xiaosi’s livestream link.]

[We apologize.
There is no precedent for opening a main POV livestream for a non-player character.]

[Holy shit? Non-player character!]
[Wang Xiaosi really isn’t a player?!]
[I guess Wang Xiaosi is an alt account of some top player, able to evade system identity tracking by pretending to be an NPC.]
[Another possibility: Wang Xiaosi really is an NPC in the instance, but his setting is to disguise as a real person and mix in with players…]
[Chilling to think about.
What is NPC Wang Xiaosi’s purpose?]
[But still, I really want to see his main POV.]

[Will someone please share where to get Wang Xiaosi’s pink flip-flops already—!]

* * * *

On screen, Su Lai was trying to find a thread of logic in a tangled mess of questions.

What identity had he entered the instance with?
If he wasn’t connected to the system, did it mean he couldn’t earn money?
But he also had no survival time limit, not needing to rack his brains to extend his life.

He was very interested in the entire instance mechanism.
All those years reading infinite flow novels weren’t for nothing.

From the currently available information, the rules given by the village committee intentionally made outsiders please the original residents.
If the village committee really existed to protect outsiders, then, was pleasing the original residents beneficial for outsiders?

Another question: was the village committee truly trustworthy?

Su Lai suddenly remembered something.
He immediately sat up from the bed and started rummaging through the messy pile of junk.

Bai Ke was baffled.
“Lai-ge, what are you looking for?”

Su Lai didn’t answer.
The next second, he pulled out a large bundle of yellow duct tape.
“Found it,” he said.

Bai Ke blinked.
“Ah?”
“Who are you going to tie up?”

The sound of tearing tape ripped through the air.
Su Lai secured the cat plushie to the iron frame, wrapping its head and limbs with layer after layer of tape.
He always acted faster than he spoke.

“Tying it up.
Afraid it might run off during the night.”
Su Lai finally taped the cat plushie’s tail.
“Not fully tamed yet.”

Bai Ke: “… I mean, aren’t you afraid the real Wang Xiaosi might return?”

Su Lai: “If he were coming back, he’d have done so long ago.”
“Even if he really returns, not afraid.
Mom just gets one more son.
Just means one more pair of chopsticks.”

Bai Ke gave a thumbs-up.
“Truly Lai-ge.
Broad-minded.”

After handling this, Su Lai collapsed back onto the foldable bed.
Tossing and turning, he couldn’t find a comfortable position.
The rusty bed frame creaked and groaned in response.

The room without air conditioning was like a huge steamer.
Damp heat seeped in everywhere.
Both men lying on their beds had their eyes open, too hot to sleep.

There was a dusty electric fan in the junk pile, but no power outlet could be found in the entire room.
Su Lai simply wet his clothes, picked up a supermarket promotional flyer from the junk, and started fanning manually.

Unable to bear the stuffy heat, Bai Ke opened the blue-tinted window.
Light from the opposite building’s walkway shone in, casting the shadow of the anti-theft grille onto the cement floor littered with junk.

The pair of pink flip-flops lay by the bedside, one upright, one overturned, strikingly eye-catching in the dim, gray-toned room.

“Lai-ge, where did you buy these flip-flops?”
Too stuffy and hot to sleep, Bai Ke lay with eyes open, unconsciously drawn to the brightly colored flip-flops.

Perhaps it was an illusion, but the omnipresent damp heat made him irritable.
Yet after the flip-flops were illuminated by the light and he took a few more glances, his restless anxiety calmed somewhat.

—’Even the expert’s slippers were this reliable.’
This absurd thought flashed through his mind again.
Bai Ke couldn’t help but shake his head at himself.

Really, what was he thinking?
Too cringe-worthy.

“Qiaotou Night Market, five kuai a pair.
Buy from my friend, get two with one free.”
Su Lai repeated exactly what he’d said to Old Lady Chen earlier.
“You’re the second person to ask about these flip-flops today.”

Bai Ke craned his neck.
“Who was the first?”

Su Lai: “An old lady living near my home.”
“She’s blind,” he added.

All the weirdness had started from that moment.
The image of Old Lady Chen catching the fly with her tongue flashed through Su Lai’s mind again.

Bai Ke cautiously asked, “That blind old lady… is she alive?”

Su Lai: “In my memory, yes.”
But how credible his memory was now was hard to say.

Bai Ke shivered involuntarily.
He looked at the pink flip-flops again to maintain mental stability.

‘Lai-ge’s flip-flops were like coordinates in a dream, helping those lost within find their way,’ he thought.

Mother Wang had warned them not to leave the room without her “invitation.”
Fortunately, Bai Ke had randomly been allocated 48 hours of survival time at the start.
He wasn’t in a hurry, planning to get through tonight before gathering clues.

The stuffy heat made the night feel long.
Su Lai closed his eyes.
The moment his vision cut off, the room suddenly became “noisy.”

Trivial, chaotic sounds rushed in from all directions.
Su Lai’s ears twitched.
He realized the sounds came from neighbors all around.

The walls of self-built houses were thin, the alleys narrow.
If you reached out a window, you could literally shake hands with the resident across the alley—hence the nickname “handshake buildings” for urban village homes.
In such extremely compressed living spaces, life privacy was nonexistent.

Almost instantly, the previously silent urban village seemed to have a play button pressed, becoming filled with the “livelihood” of people.

These noises, like tonight’s damp heat, seeped in everywhere.
Quarrels and curses mixed with flirtatious banter, eventually becoming part of the clatter of pots and pans.

The range hood across the alley roared loudly, blowing directly into Su Lai’s room’s window.
The choking fumes carried a hint of rotten fishiness.

The already poorly ventilated room grew even stuffier.
But when Su Lai opened his eyes, all the noise evaporated instantly, vanishing like a dream.

Bai Ke in the adjacent bed also heard the strange sounds.
He went to the window again.
But the moment he pushed it open, he saw nothing.
The streets were deathly quiet, not even a stray dog in sight.
It resembled a district that had died in the past, with only scattered streetlights and empty streets.

Recalling the noise he’d just heard, Bai Ke sucked in a cold breath.
“What were those sounds just now?
A mirage?”

—”Or illusions caused by contamination affecting our minds…”

Situations with strong contrasts were more likely to disturb people’s cognition, thereby destroying their will.
Deathly silent streets and omnipresent noise shouldn’t appear simultaneously, yet they overlapped at the same time and place like a mirage.

Su Lai: “The noise we heard might actually be the daily norm of the urban village.”

Bai Ke, borrowing memories of daily life, tried hard to push fear from his mind.
“Yes.
During my interviews for the project, I heard a phrase: ‘Nighttime is when the urban village is most alive.'”

Bai Ke looked around cautiously from the window, confirming there really were no suspicious people on the street, then closed the window again.
Although the room was stuffy, closing the window made him feel safer at the moment.

Su Lai lay back on the foldable bed and closed his eyes.
“Since we’re here, might as well properly experience the urban village’s most lively moment.”

This time, a thump-thump-thump sound of chopping meat overlaid everything else.
Su Lai knew immediately the sound came from the first floor—Mother Wang’s kitchen direction.

What was Mother Wang chopping meat for so late at night?

Bai Ke obviously also heard the cleaver’s movement.
He curled up, turning towards Su Lai opposite him.
“Cousin, your mom seems…”

“Shh.”
Su Lai pressed his finger to his lips, signaling silence.

As the room quieted, the noise became clearer.
Su Lai closed his eyes, pressing his ear against the wall, listening hard—

“Whose family is dying! Chopping meat so late at night, rushing to deliver food to the underworld before dawn?!”
“Looks like disposing of a corpse to me.
Keep it up and I’m calling the police.”
“Being neighbors with these breakfast sellers is an eight-lifetimes curse.”
“Didn’t their Zhang San Wonton Shop close?
Why are they still chopping meat?”
“Said the child who went missing years ago has returned.
That mother of his, always muttering about chopping meat to make wontons for the child.”
“So annoying!
It’d be better if their child stayed lost.
Now we’ll have to hear midnight meat-chopping for wontons every day again.
Let people sleep!”
“That Wang Xiaosi, right?
His mom Wang Chunying has already started a new family with the Wang next door.
Isn’t it awkward for him to come back…”

In self-built houses with no secrets, pressing an ear to the wall could yield a lot of useful information.

So, Wang Xiaosi’s mother really was surnamed Wang, named Wang Chunying.
His earlier guess was correct.
The reason Zhang San’s child was called Wang Xiaosi was indeed because he took his mother’s surname.

Wang Chunying and Zhang San ran a wonton shop, which later closed down.
Moreover, Wang Chunying liked to thump-thump-thump chop meat at night, making fresh wontons for Wang Xiaosi’s breakfast.

But later, Wang Xiaosi went missing, and Wang Chunying formed a new family with Uncle Wang next door.
Mother Wang had mentioned earlier that Zhang San went to work in another city and never returned.

Thump-thump-thump chopping meat, making wontons for Wang Xiaosi…
Su Lai pondered this piece of information, recalling Old Lady Chen saying something similar before he left: ‘Your grandmother chopped meat today, said she’ll make wontons for you tonight!’

Coincidence?

Su Lai listened at the wall a bit longer.
It was the same phrases repeated, no new information.
The chopping sounds grew louder, even shaking the foldable bed slightly.
He simply put on his earphones.

These earphones had been broken by the child stepping on them in the morning.
They only produced crackling static, couldn’t play music, but stuffing them in his ears reduced noise.

Su Lai usually slept very well.
After a day of running around, he was long tired.
Soon after collapsing on the bed, he drifted into sleep.

He didn’t know how much time passed.
The chopping sounds ceased abruptly.
Bai Ke, who hadn’t slept at all, felt relieved.
But the following sound of footsteps ascending the stairs instantly made his scalp tingle.

The sound of slippers on cement steps grew from far to near, finally stopping outside their door.
Bai Ke wanted to wake Su Lai, who was wearing earphones, but he didn’t dare make a sound.

Creak.
The door was pushed open from the outside.

Bai Ke, lying on the bed, widened his eyes.
Before he could gasp, he immediately covered his mouth tightly.

Light from the opposite building brightly illuminated the open doorway.
The person opening the door was Mother Wang.
Her eyes were murky, expressionless.
She held two cleavers in her hands.
Bits of crimson meat clung to the blades.

Now, Bai Ke truly didn’t dare make any sound voluntarily.
He didn’t have sufficient physical strength or combat ability, nor any auxiliary combat items.

He could only watch as the cleaver-wielding Mother Wang approached, step by step.
The sound of slippers scraping the cement floor grew sharper and more piercing.
—Mother Wang was heading towards Su Lai’s bed.

Bai Ke’s palms were sweaty.
Lying in the shadows, eyes wide open, he broke into a cold sweat for Su Lai in the adjacent bed, still wearing earphones.

Mother Wang, moving like a zombie, stopped beside Su Lai’s bed.
Without a sound, she looked down at the sleeping “son.”

The distance was closer now.
Bai Ke clearly saw the two cleavers continuously dripping liquid.
Drip-drip-drip.
Mother Wang’s fingers gripping the handles were damp and sticky.
Her apron was splattered with mottled bloodstains.

Bai Ke’s breath hitched.
‘The chopping sounds earlier… could Mother Wang have chopped up Uncle Wang…?’

Su Lai, sleeping fitfully, suddenly felt something bloody and sticky drip onto his forehead.
He wiped it away impatiently.
A burst of sharp static erupted in his earphones.

Hiss.
Su Lai woke instantly.
The moment his eyelids opened, the deathly face of Wang Chunying filled his vision.

Wang Chunying stood by his bed, cleaver-wielding hands raised high.
Her murky eyes were fixed intently on Su Lai lying on the bed.

Su Lai felt like pork on a chopping block at this moment.
Those two sticky cleavers could come down at any time, hacking him into pieces.

This old woman, wouldn’t let her “son” sleep properly even in the middle of the night?

Su Lai glanced at the meat stuck to the blade, blinked, then shifted his gaze to Wang Chunying’s face.

Silence spread.
The cleavers dripped blood.

The accumulated meaty, bloody smell of the chopping block fermented in the room.

Beside them, Bai Ke could hear his own heart thumping.
He unconsciously hugged his pillow, covering his face.

Despite the sweltering heat, the chill from the blades seemed to freeze the room.

They remained in this tense standoff for less than three seconds.
The newly awakened Su Lai yawned.
He casually removed his earphones.

“Mom.”

Su Lai uttered this “Mom” very smoothly.

His gaze lingered between the cleavers and Wang Chunying’s numb, expressionless face.
Then his Adam’s apple bobbed, and he opened his mouth to say—