After the Evil God Pretends to Be a Player [Infinite] - Chapter 10

Li Zhu walked up behind Lalae, carrying the mask he had decorated with a die, and fixed his gaze on the mask she was painting.

Lalae had also refrained from painting human features or a face, but to his surprise.

She had painted a deep blue ocean onto the blank mask.

Waves crashed against dark, smooth reefs. Beneath the surface of the hauntingly blue sea, schools of fish were faintly visible, weaving through a city built of stone on the ocean floor.

It should have been an ordinary landscape painting, but Lalae had used vast strokes of dark blue and charred black pigments, lending the piece an air of desolation and eeriness.

Without turning around, Lalae asked coldly, “What are you doing here?”

Li Zhu casually gave his own mask a shake and smiled. “I came to exchange painting tips with you.”

Ignoring this obvious nonsense, Lalae dipped her brush into the black paint again and said softly, “I told you last time stop bothering me.”

Li Zhu looked completely innocent and argued, “But you also said that next time, you would tell me why you hate me so much.”

Lalae: “…”

Lalae put down her brush and, for the first time, seriously appraised the man before her.

Based on his looks alone, he must have been pursued by others since childhood. However, combined with this persistent, pestering personality, Lalae felt that the only reason he hadn’t been beaten to death yet was likely due to that rare, handsome face.

Lalae said nonchalantly, “There is no particular reason. I simply dislike everyone who follows me…”

Li Zhu’s reflex was to ask: Then why don’t you guard against that minor (Meng Luo)?

But in the next second, her final word settled the matter: “…men.”

“Furthermore, people like you don’t just stick around without a hidden motive. Young man, what is your objective?”

Her use of “young man” was very light, almost a mutter to herself, but Li Zhu caught it. A strange, inexplicable feeling suddenly arose in his heart.

He shook his head, his eyes filled with a lingering smile, as if he had heard the world’s biggest joke. “Just how old are you? Besides, we’ve only just met. How can you know what ‘type’ of person I am?”

He raised the mask in his hand. “Actually, it’s quite simple. This is the reason I wanted to get close to you.”

He stared intently at her pupils, making sure not to miss the slightest change, and said one word at a time: “Others might think you are weak and easy to bully, but I can see it. On the surface, you act as if you know nothing about the game rules, but you definitely know something that we players do not.”

His certainty caused Lalae to be surprised for a single second.

But after only half a second, she slowly broke into a smile.

This was the first time Li Zhu had seen Lalae smile. Someone who was usually so cold—someone who wouldn’t grant even a shred of attention—once she smiled, it was as if a thousand miles of willow embankments turned green and ten thousand miles of peach blossoms bloomed all at once. It was as if all the beautiful things in the world had gathered upon her in this single second.

Li Zhu was nearly dazed by the sight.

In the next second, Lalae said with a smile, “Let me guess. You overheard my conversation with Meng Luo, didn’t you?”

She had exposed him with a single sentence.

The soft emotions in Li Zhu’s heart felt as if they had suddenly encountered a blizzard, instantly scattered by the howling wind.

Li Zhu: “I just…”

“It doesn’t matter. Curiosity is a precious quality.”

Lalae interrupted his excuse. She no longer looked at Li Zhu, but instead lowered her eyes slightly to watch a small insect crawling slowly across the table. She said, “But look, how happy the ants are. They don’t feel fear in the dungeon, nor do they despair over an unknown future. They only need to crawl alone or with companions until they reach the path they believe is correct.”

The tiny ant had clearly taken a wrong turn. After lingering at the edge of the table for a moment, it made its way down the table leg.

Li Zhu said, “But humans are not ants. We explore the unknown because of curiosity, and we are filled with dread because of the uncertainty ahead.”

Lalae shook her head, her gaze as calm as still water. “No, you are wrong. Being an ‘ant’ is not an absolute state; it is a relative existence.”

“Humans are ants relative to the Boss of a dungeon. And sometimes, They are also ants.”

She let out a pitying sigh. “The morning mushroom knows not the cycle of day and night; the summer cicada knows not the passing of spring and autumn. Since we are all ants, why add to our sorrows in vain?”

The confrontation between Lalae and Li Zhu was conducted in very low voices. Therefore, the other players at most glanced in their direction once or twice before looking away, unable to hear the specifics.

The players had more irritating things to worry about—namely, how to deal with these masks.

The art studio was chilly. Even though the air conditioning and fans were off, the players felt a ghostly, cool breeze constantly snaking down their necks.

The punk (Shamate) spent the entire afternoon sneezing.

As the afternoon passed, the veil of night slowly began to fall.

According to folk custom, when the sun sets and the day gradually enters twilight, it is the time when one is most likely to encounter ghosts.

Wang Kai felt that the various masks hanging from the ceiling looked increasingly sinister and terrifying in the shadows of the dusk.

Just then, there was a sudden knock on the art studio door.

Knock, knock, knock! Knock, knock, knock!

Wang Kai’s girlfriend, Zhou Wen, looked up from the table, hunched her shoulders, and whispered with a trembling breath, “Who is it?”

Wang Kai was about to say that it was fine whatever it was couldn’t get in since they themselves couldn’t get out when the lock clicked. In the next second, the door opened.

Wang Kai: “…”

Two people looking like students entered. The group was still traumatized by student NPCs, but these two didn’t even look at them. They walked straight to the area directly beneath the masks hanging from the ceiling and began taking them down one by one.

The two were very efficient. Over a dozen masks were removed in sequence and collected into a square crate.

Then, the two of them picked up the crate and prepared to leave.

“Wait!”

Wang Kai called out to them by reflex.

Then, two heads turned in unison, staring in Wang Kai’s direction.

He gasped instantly.

Only then did he see the faces of these two students clearly.

Though their builds were different, they had identical faces.

Wang Kai suddenly remembered why the students he saw in the corridor earlier were so eerie. It wasn’t just their stiff movements; it was also because their faces all possessed a certain similarity, as if they had been shoddily manufactured in the same factory.

Two pairs of pitch-black eyes stared straight at him. Cold sweat broke out on Wang Kai’s back, and for a moment, he couldn’t say a word.

“Where are you taking the masks?”

On the other side of the room, a magnetic male voice rose slowly. It was Li Zhu, bailing him out.

[Persuade] Check/Result: 50/28 Success

The two students spoke in unison: “To the School History Museum.”

Their dull voices echoed through the spacious art studio, creating countless reverberations that felt especially sinister.

Meng Luo gathered her courage and interjected, “When we finish our masks, do they have to be sent to the School History Museum too?”

The duo’s gaze instantly shifted to her face, as if they wanted to pierce a hole through her.

After a long silence, one of them grinned eerily. “You certainly don’t need to.”

Just as everyone breathed a sigh of relief, the other one added slowly, “After all, your masks haven’t been ‘attached to the face’ yet.”

With that, the two said nothing more and left straight away.

After they departed, the door was locked once again.

Li Zhu looked around at everyone and summarized: “Good news: the process of us painting the masks should be relatively safe.”

“Bad news: once the masks are finished, we might all be finished at the masquerade ball in two days.”

Everyone was in a terrible mood. No one wanted to know what exactly would happen the moment the masks were “attached to the face.”

When the clock struck 9:00 PM, a light click came from outside—the door was unlocked.

The time for the first day of mask-painting ended. Although Lalae and Li Zhu had high completion rates, only Meng Luo had managed to paint half an apple following their nonsensical style. The others were still hesitating, not daring to put pen to paper.

Li Zhu comforted them, “If putting them on means game over, then it doesn’t matter what you paint.”

The others felt even more like they were having a breakdown.

Following the room assignments from the previous night, everyone went back to the dormitory to rest.

That night, perhaps due to the exhaustion of the day, Lalae fell asleep—a rare occurrence. It was a dreamless night.

An unknown amount of time passed before a high-pitched, piercing scream stabbed directly into her mind.

She opened her eyes and quickly flipped out of bed. She could tell the scream came from the room next door—the one occupied by the female streamer and Zhou Wen.

Meng Luo was also awake, rubbing her sleepy eyes and asking in a daze, “It’s only 5:00 AM. What happened?”

However, very soon, none of them could sleep anymore.

In Room 615, the female streamer lay flat on the floor. Winding trails of blood flowed down from her facial features, forming a small puddle beside her.

Or rather, they used to be facial features.

The skin of her entire face had been brutally torn off. Her once beautiful and elegant features were now unrecognizable, their contours completely gone.