Being A Beautiful Cannon Fodder In A Horror Story [Quick Transmigration] - Chapter 2

The dark figure that burst through the door was truly bizarre, resembling a human but lacking the essence of one. Upon closer inspection, it was wearing a hospital gown identical in color to Bai Xinjian’s.

After crawling into the room on all fours in a spider-like posture, the creature suddenly stood upright. Its pale, greenish eyes glared at Bai Xinjian, and it quickly raised its front limbs to pounce on him.

Bai Xinjian let out another startled cry. With quick reflexes, he grabbed a pillow from his side and began to beat the creature’s face with it, shouting, “Don’t come over here! Don’t come over! Ah, ah, ah, don’t come over, woo woo woo!”

The monster: “…”

Due to his “fear,” two strings of crystal-clear teardrops slowly traced paths down Bai Xinjian’s delicate cheeks. However, he did not stop his rhythmic assault.

0048 could not help but admire its own brilliance. When Bai Xinjian had first transmigrated, it had adjusted his face slightly. Bai Xinjian’s original brow bone had been slightly high, and his jawline was sharp. While his snow-white skin already gave him a scholarly air, 0048 had softened his facial lines and paired them with a small, rounded nose to perfectly fit the book’s description of a beautiful, useless individual pampered at home.

Of course, it would have been better if he had not used so much force while beating the monster with a pillow. Within moments, 0048 heard the monster emit a faint moan from the heavy impact.

0048: “…”

It had to be said, the pillow was of surprisingly high quality.

At that moment, the hospital room door opened again from the outside. This time, a sturdy, middle-aged woman walked in carrying a thermos. Upon seeing Bai Xinjian fighting with the monster on the bed, she let out a sharp cry and swiftly pulled a pistol from her waist, firing a shot at the bedside.

With a bang, the monster was hit in the neck and collapsed. As it fell, Bai Xinjian felt the creature struggle to reach out. Its five pale, greenish fingers, covered in bulging red and green veins, lightly grazed his waist, appearing to stroke him gently.

Bai Xinjian: “?”

A bizarre, fishy stench, reminiscent of rotten eggs and old fish, quickly permeated the room. Bai Xinjian pinched his nose and moved to the other side of the bed.

“Ma’am, are you alright?” The woman holstered her gun and hurried toward Bai Xinjian, kicking the monster on the floor as she passed. Bai Xinjian followed her gaze to look at the creature under the bed.

“Don’t worry, it won’t die,” the woman said as she set down the thermos and pressed the call button by the bed.

Before long, a group of burly men in orderly uniforms rushed into the room and dragged the monster away. Ten minutes later, a group of police officers arrived, asking the woman a few routine questions about the shooting incident before leaving.

“Is it always this casual?” Bai Xinjian asked 0048. “That was a shooting.”

“This world is not what you think. People who go mad after being infected by pollutants have no human rights in society.”

The woman re-entered the room. Seeing Bai Xinjian still curled up in the corner of the bed with his arms wrapped around his knees, seemingly terrified, she comforted him in a soft voice, “It is fine, Ma’am. It was just an unfortunate one from the next building who got loose.”

0048 began to brief Bai Xinjian on these “unfortunate ones.”

Before the apocalypse, everything had been without warning. It was only when people noticed more and more individuals on the streets suffering from a strange illness that the situation became clear. This illness not only turned people into unrecognizable, ghostly creatures, but more terrifyingly, there was no known way the virus spread. Some people were infected while shut away at home with no contact with others, while some had deep contact with patients without taking any precautions and remained completely fine.

Those infected would lose their sanity intermittently, become unrecognizable to their own families, and turn highly aggressive. To distinguish them from normal people, society named these infected individuals “unfortunate ones.” The term was fitting for those chosen by the devil.

The woman, Su Qin, was the housekeeper hired by Bai Xinjian’s husband. She could cook, clean, and was skilled in shooting and combat. It was said she came from a military academy background and was personally approved by Bai Xinjian’s husband to ensure his safety. In these times, even a housekeeper needed skills to defend herself, a privilege afforded to the family of a high-ranking military officer.

To comfort Bai Xinjian, Su Qin took the remote from the drawer and turned on the television. The news was reporting on current events. Several months ago, the Zerg had invaded, and Bai Xinjian’s husband, Shen Yuhuai, had led a group of soldiers to repel the Zerg army outside the Warp Wormhole just a week ago. This should have been joyous news. It was said that after the victory, some of the soldiers had returned, and logically, Shen Yuhuai should have returned to the Alliance to report for duty. However, military spokespersons claimed the General was finishing up some tasks at the front, and his return date was uncertain. This statement angered many, as the public felt he should be allowed to rest and reunite with his family after months of hardship.

The housekeeper, Su Qin, also fretted about this. She changed the stained sheets for Bai Xinjian and cleaned the grime left on the wall by the unfortunate one with a bucket of water and a rag. “They are right. The General has been away for a long time…”

Remembering that her mistress and the General were in a political marriage with little affection, her expression grew complex. “I don’t know what the military hospital was thinking, putting the general ward and the infection ward in the same area. They clearly had checkpoints and security guards downstairs, yet they still let an unfortunate one break in…”

With more and more infected people, the hospital was overwhelmed, and even high-end facilities housing military families could not avoid the chaos.

Bai Xinjian looked back at the floor. The creature had bled profusely when shot, but the fluid was a viscous, yellowish-green substance, more like pus or tissue fluid than blood. It was his first time seeing such a bizarre fluid leak from a body, and he could still smell the foul, fishy stench in the air. Yet, the arc of the spray was perfect. He had watched with his own eyes as the bullet pierced the creature’s neck and sent the fluid splashing onto the silk sheets, the floor, and the walls.

Bai Xinjian narrowed his eyes slightly. It reminded him of the scene before his death in the car accident, the only moment in his life he had felt a glimmer of pleasure.

Su Qin did not notice the smile that flashed across Bai Xinjian’s face and continued her chatter. Before Bai Xinjian transmigrated, the original host had caught a common cold. He was already physically weak, and after running a fever for three days and lapsing into unconsciousness, Su Qin had no choice but to call a car and take him to the military hospital. Now that his fever had broken, the doctor issued his discharge papers, and he was cleared to leave that afternoon.

“Your husband has actually been infected by pollutants and is currently in the Alliance’s most secret ward. Aside from the Alliance leadership, no one else knows. It is a secret, but he will soon undergo alienation. After alienating, he will become a V level threat and escape from the Alliance. During this time, he will appear normal. He will even think he has recovered. You need to provoke him constantly until he evolves into an IV level species.”

“IV level?” Bai Xinjian communicated with 0048 in his mind. “Four levels is the maximum? That does not seem to have any challenge at all…”

His tone was thoughtful. 0048 was surprised by his arrogance: “This is an IV level horror story. You are just an intern; finish your novice mission first!”

“I see,” Bai Xinjian said, feeling that he would be quite busy. He raised the corners of his mouth happily. “I will work hard.”

He had always been a competent worker. When he was a web editor, he was the one who worked the most overtime. Because he did not understand emotions, he did not know what resentment was; his colleagues said he was like a donkey pulling a millstone for a production team.

0048 was very satisfied with his attitude: “Go home first. I will issue your plot missions.”

The first mission was to play the role of the useless cannon fodder beauty. So far, Bai Xinjian had performed well. His acting was so refined that even the housekeeper who had spent years with the original host had not noticed that her mistress had been replaced. 0048 felt it was grooming a top-tier employee for the Transmigration Bookstore. It began to dream of another excellent staff member under its guidance.

In the afternoon, Bai Xinjian and Su Qin packed their things and left the hospital. The original host was named Bai Yu, a graduate of Imperial University. Imperial University was the top institution in the Alliance, meant to cultivate officers and military talent; ironically, it even had a home economics department and a flower arranging class. Bai Yu had graduated from the flower arranging program. Upon graduation, his parents sent him off to a marriage of convenience. At the time, Shen Yuhuai was just an ordinary officer. Unexpectedly, within two years of marrying Bai Yu, he climbed the ranks and became one of the Alliance’s youngest high-ranking generals.

“A young officer has moved in next door,” 0048 continued, explaining the plot to Bai Xinjian. “He reportedly serves in the war zone adjacent to Shen Yuhuai. He is lower in rank but younger, promising, and has a bright future.”

“Once you get home, you should start seducing him,” 0048’s words were shocking.

Bai Xinjian did not mind; to him, it was just work. The only thing he found strange was, “There are many ways to provoke a monster. Why is infidelity the preferred choice?”

“The premise of a transmigration mission is to comply with the plot settings,” 0048 explained. “We cannot let the monster discover your existence as a missioner, or it will cause chaos.”

“The novel we are currently transmigrated into was born on the Flower City platform,” 0048 reminded Bai Xinjian cryptically.

“…” Bai Xinjian knew the mysterious Flower City website, but… “Isn’t this a horror story?”

“Who said horror stories can’t exist on Flower City?” 0048 felt a little guilty. It should have warned him of such important information earlier, but what did it matter? Bai Xinjian was its chosen worker.

As they spoke, the car carrying them stopped.

“Ma’am,” Su Qin called from the front seat, “we are home.”

Bai Xinjian looked out the window and saw a white garden cottage. It was housing specifically allocated by the military for soldiers and their families; everyone living in the vicinity worked for the Alliance military district.

Bai Xinjian and Su Qin got out of the car. Upon entering, they were greeted by a garden filled with blooming flowers. It was clear the plants were well-tended. In the center was a fountain, and next to it, a person dressed in dark-colored coveralls was bent over, busy with something. Because the person’s back was turned, Bai Xinjian could not see his face.

“Claude, why are you tending to those Black Baccara roses again?” Su Qin said to the person’s back with dissatisfaction. “There is still a pile of work to do in the backyard. Don’t let me catch you slacking off again!”

The gardener named Claude straightened his back and turned to look at Su Qin and Bai Xinjian.

Bai Xinjian found the man very strange. He had a square face crossed by several flesh-colored scars, and his left eye socket was hollow, as if he lacked an eye. Yet, his other eye did not match his rugged appearance at all. Bai Xinjian saw that the iris was a deep, dark blue with a profound undertone, like a raging storm at sea or a thousand-year-old glacier buried in the earth. It looked even more like the bizarre, treacherous mist emanating from the depths of a frozen hell.