After the Little Crybaby Enters the Nightmare Cycle

Almost every half a second, he looked up to confirm the time. Now the clock in the room was pointing to 1:40 in the morning. In 20 minutes, the so-called trial scene was about to begin…

Xiao Wang put his hand to his mouth and nervously bit the nails that had become unshaped around the edges. The other hand scratched at his head that had very few hairs left at a very fast frequency. The second rang through the quiet guest room and amplified his fear infinitely.

Why… why was he assigned the role of ‘victim’? Why was everyone here to clear the instances and achieve their wish and they were lucky, while he was just a little cannon fodder to be killed? The murderer could even get the favorability of the dream god for it…

In addition, the other party was a noisy and self-righteous anchor and a little blind man born with a good-looking face who could attract the attention of girls wherever he went! Why should he use his own life as a price to let these people he disliked increase their favorability and realize their wish? Didn’t he deserve to have a wish? Didn’t he deserve to live in this Nightmare World?

It wasn’t easy to come to this world and he just wanted to make himself a bit more popular. He didn’t want to be disliked by girls, thought of as a bald man and his name always forgotten… was this too excessive? Why did he need to win the things that other people were born with by risking his life? He even made a wedding dress for others…

He wasn’t willing. It wasn’t fair.

As time passed, Xiao Wang’s facial expression became distorted due to fear and unwillingness. He was surrounded by chaotic voices and emotions. He curled up helplessly and panicked in a corner of the guest room, his eyes wide with horror.

It couldn’t go on like this… he couldn’t make it cheaper for these people…

His nails were gnawed until he reached flesh and the scalp he scratched oozed blood. Due to the pain, Xiao Wang regained a bit of consciousness. Then he noticed that on his system interface, the ‘awakening’ value was as high as 96.

He was suddenly shocked. Cheng Xu had said that the higher the awakening value, the more dangerous it was. Once it reached 90 or above, he would lose his sense of direction, judgment and desire to survive. If it reached 100…

It was a lie, it must be a lie. Xiao Wang thought he was sober now and wanted to live more than ever!

[Warning. Sleepwalker ‘Xiao Wang’, please note that your awakening value has reached 97.]

[Warning. Sleepwalker ‘Xiao Wang’, please note that your awakening value has reached 98.]

“F*king shut up!” Xiao Wang picked up the knife in his hand and slashed fiercely at the voice. The system interface only flashed a few times and the inorganic voice still spoke without any obstacles.

[Serious warning. Sleepwalker ‘Xiao Wang’, please note that your awakening value has reached 99.]

“Get lost!”

Xiao Wang stopped shaking. His eyes were red as he gripped the knife in his hand and opened the locked guest room door. He was a sleepwalker. He couldn’t sit still and wait to be killed by others. Compared with an uncertain death, counter-killing the ‘murderer’ Hei Cha was obviously more enjoyable!

He didn’t like this little anchor who kept chattering everywhere. Didn’t the script say that the bloodier the murder scene, the better? He would just use this knife to cut the flesh of the two men. It must feel very refreshing.

The chandeliers in the villa had been turned off and only the nine wall lamps were faintly lit. The dim light cut the corridor’s guardrails to pieces.

Xiao Wang was holding the boning knife. He didn’t know if it was a side effect of the high awakening value but he felt that the soles of his feet were a bit buoyant and his steps had become slow. In order to walk steadily, he could only stab his boning knife against the wall one at a time as he walked with difficulty along the broken light through the corridor.

His breathing was becoming heavier and harder…

“This guest, do you need any help?”

Xiao Wang raised his bloodshot eyes and saw a maid holding a tray and smiling at him. He remembered that the maids never smiled but at this moment, the maid was looking at him with a disdainful smile! Was the maid smiling at his embarrassment and misery?

Xiao Wang let out a hoarse sneer from his throat “Go away! Your death is the greatest help to me!”

He held the knife and slashed it at the maid’s neck. The moment the knife fell, blood sprayed out and splashed onto the eyes of Bai Yingzhi in the photo frame. The maid disappeared. Xiao Wang’s body staggered abruptly and he let out a dull whimper, blood pouring from his throat. He reached out to touch his wet neck. His palm was scarlet…

How could this be possible? How could it be…? He clearly cut the woman… Xiao Wang turned his head and looked at the photo frame. In the dim light, he saw his own white neck bone and… Bai Yingzhi in the photo was smiling…

Even the people in the portraits were laughing at him!

Xiao Wang slashed his knife at Bai Yingzhi’s family portrait on the wall. At his actions, blood splashed.

[Sleepwalker ‘Xiao Wang’ awakening level has reached 100. The system is about to start the clearing command.]

The system’s cold voice was heard in his ears. Xiao Wang clutched his neck and continued to walk to Hei Cha’s room. So what if his awakening value was 100? He was sober and well right now. Wait for him to kill that little anchor…

Xiao Wang’s footsteps stopped. It was because the people he wanted to kill, Hei Cha and Chi Nan were standing in front of him. His vision might be stained with blood but… he recognized these two people… these were the two! He would kill them!

Xiao Wang held the knife and slashed at the two men. The neck, heart, abdomen, back of the head… every knife slash was extremely vicious and deep, sparing no effort. The knife pierced skin and brought blood and flesh when it was pulled out.

“You want to kill me? You didn’t think I would fight back hahahahahaha!”

There was one knife blow after another. The blood soaking the wooden floor dripped from the edge of the corridor. Tick, tick. The slow rhythm was like the rain falling on the eaves on a spring night.

In the midst of the dull sound of flesh being stabbed, Xiao Wang vaguely heard the screams of girls. It was one after another and was filled with fear and despair. It was probably a girl in one of the rooms who saw his ‘magnificent feat’ from a peephole.

Xiao Wang grinned and proudly showed off his great work. Hei Cha and Chi Nan in front of him were covered with bloody holes and there was already a pool of rotten meat.

“I killed you and won hahahahaha—”

His laughter stopped abruptly. In the blink of an eye, the bodies of Chi Nan and Hei Cha disappeared from his eyes. There was only the messy blood and flesh and himself covered in bloody holes…

All the knife damage just now was transferred to him!

How could this be? How could it… it must be a dream. Yes! Right now, he was in a nightmare and it was good to wake up…. just wake up…

[The cleaning program has started successfully.]

“Falling… falling can wake you up from the nightmare… right… it must be so…”

Xiao Wang didn’t even have the strength to stand up. He was full of blood holes as he crawled through the blood that was flowing like a river.

He crawled step by step to the top floor of the spiral staircase. Then he climbed over the railing and fell from this height in a head-down posture! As long as he fell, he could wake up from the nightmare.

Xiao Wang was convinced. Along with the dull impact sound, his body was smashed into rotten meat.

The nine wall lamps on the wall flashed and another one went out.

***

“Chi Nan, Chi Nan, wake up! Something is wrong!”

“Chi Nan!!”

The confused Chi Nan wanted to turn over. As a result, he plunged into the bath water and spat out a few bubbles.”

“……” Hei Cha directly grabbed his collar and fished him out of the water.

Chi Nan shook his head slowly, water dripping from all over his body. “What’s wrong?”

His voice wasn’t friendly and his face was full of displeasure at being woken up.

“F*k, how can you sleep like the dead?” Hei Cha looked at him in surprise. “If you hadn’t been crying the whole time, I would’ve thought you were really dead.”

“Oh.”

“……”

“There was an accident just now and the bald man died.”

“Which bald man?”

“…You wake up!”

“Oh, I remember.” Chi Nan asked, “What’s going on?”

Hei Cha thought about the death of the other person and shuddered. “I heard he first appeared in the corridor with a knife like a zombie. Then he stabbed himself dozens of times until he was like a hornet’s nest. Finally, he climbed to the top of the spiral staircase and jumped down. He died straight away.”

Chi Nan was silent for a moment. “So he was assigned the victim script?”

“He should be.” Hei Cha shrugged, his expression complicated. “I heard from Nan Lu and Song Yue that he was calling our names while waving the knife…”

Chi Nan didn’t speak. He quickly took a hot shower in Hei Cha’s bathroom and changed into clean clothes before meeting everyone in the corridor.

Due to the sudden changes, everyone had an impromptu meeting at Cheng Xu’s call. At this time, the smell of blood permeated the corridor while Aunt Mei was working hard to clean up the bloodstains with a mop. Bucket after bucket of red water went to the laundry room. It was far bloodier than everyone imagined.

Hei Cha’s gaze moved over the corridor’s guardrail toward the living room downstairs. The bald man’s corpse had been removed.

“I happen to have this in my room and I recorded the sounds made by the bald man before he died. You can listen to it and see if there are any clues…” Nan Lu carefully took out the recorder and pressed the play button.

There was the sound of a sharp knife sinking into flesh, crazy laughter and intermittent curses toward Hei Cha and Chi Nan. The eerie ‘dying words’ lingered in the silent corridor. At the end of the recording, everyone fell into a calm or fearful silence.

“This…”

“He was disturbed by the awakening value. First, he lost his judgment and had hallucinations. Once the hallucinations shattered, he lost his desire to survive and wanted to wake up from the dream by falling.”

Old Yu explained it. He had experienced three nightmare instances and it wasn’t the first time he had seen sleepwalkers affected by the awakening value. They had their own way of death. The only thing in common was that they all died miserably.

“So it is important to maintain your awakening value within the normal range. It must not exceed 90 or it is no different from suicide.” Cheng Xu warned the newcomers using the bald man’s tragic death as an example.

Song Yue sighed and frowned. “Still, it is hard to convince yourself not to be afraid if you get the death script…”

Nan Lu made a crying expression. “Yes, emotions are beyond our control.”

Old Yu let out a low laugh. “Thus, sleepwalkers are divided into the talented and untalented. Some people aren’t afraid and their awakening value is maintained at the lowest state. The ghosts can’t do anything about it.”

Then he looked at Chi Nan. “Little blind man, I am curious. What is your awakening value now? Is it convenient to say?”

“It is convenient. I’ll ask the system.” Chi Nan activated the system’s voice service to check it.

The other newcomers around him started to communicate their awakening status.

“Oh my god, I’m already at 80. It is terrible. I just rushed to 82!”

“Don’t become agitated. It will increase the more agitated you are.”

“I’m still at 65.”

“I’m so envious. I am 73.”

“It seems that I’m the lowest at 59.” Hei Cha sighed and turned to Chi Nan with a bit of worry. “Did you find it?”

Chi Nan nodded in a somewhat confused manner. “Maybe the system is faulty. It shows that my awakening value is 0.”

Everyone, “???”

Old Yu was surprised before exclaiming, “Congratulations. It is impossible for the system to malfunction.”

“Does this mean…?” Hei Cha wondered blankly.

“He is perfect for the Nightmare World.” Old Yu had an envious expression.

The author has something to say:

Chi Nan: My awakening value is 0.

Author: Yes, you are a 0.