✨ Notice: Editing in Progress ✨
Hi everyone! This story is currently undergoing editing. If you don’t mind, feel free to proceed and read it as is. However, if you prefer a polished version, I recommend waiting until next week. 💖
As of today, December 27, 2024, I’m still working on fixing chapters 1 to 35. The writer rewrote the entire Arc 2 (chapters 17 to 35), but I’m starting from chapter 1, as my past translations were a bit confusing and need improvement. 🛠️
I estimate that all edits will be completed by January 9, 2025. Thank you so much for your patience and understanding! 🌸
Jiang Yan was awakened by the broadcast of the main system.
In a vast mountain forest covered in thick snow, a mechanical broadcast echoed:
[Instance: “The Sheep’s Forest,” Progress: 20%]
[Player: Li Xue, Escape Progress: 50%]
In the distance, the sky was dark and oppressive. Around him, gnarled, claw-like dead branches loomed like gravestones, haunting and ghostly. Amid the howling wind, there seemed to be faint roars of wild beasts.
At this moment, Jiang Yan was lying on the attic floor of a small cabin deep within the forest. He was covered with a down quilt, resting on a soft velvet blanket. The room’s fireplace burned brightly, filling the air with the sweet aroma of roasted chestnuts. The raging snowstorm outside seemed entirely irrelevant to him.
"How come it’s been five days, and the instance progress is still at 20%? How many are still alive?" Jiang Yan asked lazily, snuggled in the quilt with a drowsy and relaxed tone.
"Yo, ancestor, you’re awake?" System 663 joked.
This was a survival horror game known to the world as “Jian”
Players who participated in the game needed to successfully clear instances to earn game points.
In the game, these points served as a bargaining chip for trading with the gods. With enough points, the game could fulfill any wish of the player.
This was why countless people, knowing full well that entering “Jian” meant stepping into purgatory, still threw themselves in, like moths to a flame.
However, Jiang Yan was not a player in the game. Instead, he was a very special entity—a real NPC.
Not all "applicants" met the criteria to become players.
The main system of “Jian” would screen applicants. Those deemed unqualified would participate in the game in another capacity as real NPCs.
Real NPCs needed to play specific roles within instances as required by the main system and the instance settings. They could also earn points for doing so.
Jiang Yan was one of the few real NPCs.
However, he hadn’t volunteered to enter the game.
One night while he was sleeping at home, he was inexplicably dragged into the game by the main system.
Jiang Yan’s reaction to all this was simple:
“Well, since I’m already here, might as well make the best of it! Free food and lodging, NPC or not, I’ll take it.”
663 was the personal system assigned to Jiang Yan by the game.
It seemed the game had evaluated Jiang Yan and concluded that leaving him to act on his own might disrupt the players' experience, tarnish the game’s reputation, and hurt its prestige. Hence, they assigned him a chatty system to keep him in line.
“There are currently six players left alive,” 663 explained the players’ survival status.
As soon as he finished, the main system’s broadcast echoed again:
[Player: Li Xue, Escape Progress: Failed. Contaminated.]
“Great. Now there are only five left,” 663 commented. “Although The Lamb’s Forest is just a B-level instance, it’s unfortunate that this group of players are all rookies. They’re likely to be wiped out entirely.”
Hearing this, Jiang Yan sighed. “It’s been five days! There are only five left, and the instance progress is still at 20%. How much longer do I have to stay on this bed?”
“I thought you liked this persona,” 663 retorted with a mocking tone.
“I just don’t want to eat moose intestines again.”
With that, Jiang Yan shrank back under the quilt and fell silent. Lazily gazing at the snowflakes outside, he watched the world turn white, the snowy glow reflecting in his light blue eyes like glass.
At that moment, the sound of footsteps echoed from the wooden staircase outside.
Jiang Yan’s heart tightened. “He’s back?”
The footsteps came closer and closer, finally stopping at his door.
Jiang Yan held his breath, staring intently at the door. However, it didn’t open as he had feared.
After a long time, silence returned outside the door.
“Maybe he left?”
The main system had just announced another player’s failure to escape. As the boss of this instance, the entity outside should have gone to deal with the players and fulfill its task.
In the game, bosses were typically generated by the main system's data and acted solely to serve the instance’s progression.
Having waited for a while and seeing that the door still showed no sign of opening, Jiang Yan finally exhaled in relief.
Even though he knew the boss was just a virtual construct, the fear it instilled was very real.
To be honest, real NPCs feared the instance bosses far more than the players did.
According to the game’s rules, if a real NPC made a performance mistake, they would immediately become fodder for the boss.
Jiang Yan had once witnessed one of his “colleagues” in an instance being turned into human meat buns by the Butcher.
663 had told him that, in reality, real NPCs were just “snacks” prepared for the instance’s bosses.
As one of these "snacks," Jiang Yan naturally wanted to avoid encountering the instance boss. However, his persona in this particular instance was designed to be the closest to the boss—a "little sheep" raised by the hunter.
Hearing no movement at the door, Jiang Yan relaxed. Reaching out to the bedside table, he grabbed some roasted chestnuts.
Peeling one open, he popped it into his mouth.
Just as he was savoring the sweetness, he froze.
A split second later, he instinctively turned his head toward the door gap—
A pair of glowing, eerie green eyes were staring at him through the crack, silently watching.
Who knows how long he had been there…
—
"Let me go... I don't want to play anymore! I want to quit! I want to leave the game! I want to go home..."
Weak sobbing came from the basement of the wooden house.
The basement was dark and damp, with water seeping from the walls. Before it could drip to the ground, it had frozen into ice.
Gray-white icicles hung from the walls, perhaps the only source of light in the basement.
A massive iron cage was covered in dark red rust. Inside, five people—three men and two women—huddled together.
They wore thin, tattered clothes and crowded into the corner of the cage. In the midst of the raging snowstorm, they could only draw warmth from each other’s bodies.
Among them, a frail young man wearing glasses was quietly sobbing. He cried in a stifled manner, afraid of alerting the "hunting dogs" pacing outside the cage.
These were four beast-headed, human-bodied monsters. They had skull-like heads resembling reindeer, with long, sharp, uneven teeth protruding from their elongated jaws. With each breath, a stench of blood and rot seeped through their teeth, accompanied by ghostly howling sounds.
Their bodies resembled humans but were gaunt and skeletal. Their ashen gray skin clung tightly to their bones, accentuating every contour of their skeletal frames.
At this moment, they were pacing in front of the cage, staring hungrily at the “sheep” inside.
However, they would not harm the "sheep" in the cage without permission. As excellent hunting dogs, they would never act without their master’s orders.
Suddenly, the sound of footsteps echoed on the staircase leading to the basement.
The "hunting dogs" immediately retracted their gazes from the "sheep," excitedly wagging their goat-like tails as they gathered at the base of the stairs.
"Step aside; you're scaring him," said a voice.
A massive sheep hoof appeared before them.
Hearing this, the “hunting dogs” quickly dispersed from the staircase entrance, lining up neatly in front of the cage.
The people inside the cage shrank back, trembling as they looked toward the staircase.
What came into view was a towering figure, approximately two meters tall, descending the stairs.
It had a human-like torso but bore the head of a goat and two goat legs. Its long, narrow emerald-green eyes lacked pupils, resembling two drops of shimmering green water.
In its arms, it carefully cradled a beautiful black-haired boy.
The boy was wrapped in a warm, soft blue velvet blanket, making it clear how much care the creature holding him had for him.
As soon as it appeared, the five players in the cage widened their eyes in terror, shrinking further into the corner and trembling even more violently.
The reason was simple: this two-meter-tall goat-headed creature was none other than the dungeon’s BOSS—the “Hunter.”
The “Hunter” referred to all the people it captured as “sheep.”
The “hunting dogs” wagged their goat tails and brought over a massive chair.
The "Hunter" sat gracefully in the chair, holding his beloved in his arms while the “hunting dogs” obediently lined up beside him.
His movements were elegant and gentlemanly. If one ignored his horrifying appearance, he resembled a nobleman enjoying a hunting trip in the forest.
He looked at the trembling "sheep" huddled in the corner of the cage. His clear voice carried a hint of amusement: "Your friend has returned."
As he spoke, he snapped his fingers. "Don’t be shy. Come in."
Once again, footsteps echoed on the staircase. The people in the cage turned toward the sound, only to see another "hunting dog" entering the basement.
The moment it saw the "Hunter" holding Jiang Yan in his arms, it immediately became alert.
"Bleat!" It ran!
The hunting dog let out a ghostly, ethereal screech from between its teeth, staring intently at Jiang Yan.
Jiang Yan was overwhelmed by the rancid stench of blood and decay coming from the creature's mouth. Without thinking, he buried his face into the Hunter's coat.
Seeing this, the Hunter gently comforted his beloved little sheep while waving off the hunting dog. “Hush! You’ve scared him.”
At this, the newly arrived hunting dog reluctantly released its focus on Jiang Yan, turning to stand obediently alongside its companions, awaiting the Hunter's next command.
The Hunter then turned to the players in the cage and said, “Aren’t you happy to see your friend?”
Jiang Yan lifted his head at these words and noticed that the new hunting dog was noticeably smaller than the others.
Moreover, a strawberry-patterned hair tie dangled from its wrist.
The bright red strawberries looked adorably out of place on the hunting dog’s ashen, skeletal wrist. It clashed starkly with the frigid, dim, and oppressive atmosphere of the snowstorm-filled basement.
In the corner, a frail, pale man with glasses suddenly grew agitated. He lunged forward, clutching the cage bars as he shook them violently. “Xiao Xue! Xiao Xue!”
He was calling out to the hunting dog. But all he received in response was a chorus of howling warnings from the hunting dogs.
“Ah!” Inside the cage, two young women couldn’t suppress their screams.
They clung to each other, trembling, trying their best to stifle their cries, tears streaming silently down their faces.
Frightened by the hunting dogs’ howls, the man in glasses collapsed onto the ground. But his eyes remained fixed on the strawberry-patterned hair tie—a tiny, misplaced splash of color in the bleak space.
“Player Wang Yu and player Li Xue are lovers. This is their first dungeon,” 663 explained to Jiang Yan.
Hearing this, Jiang Yan furrowed his brow slightly. He tightened his grip on the fabric of the Hunter’s coat, his knuckles whitening.
“What’s wrong?” The Hunter’s voice was soft as he soothed the sheep in his arms, his tone as gentle as if coaxing a kitten. “Does my little Yan Yan want to join the game too? But Yan Yan is too small—it wouldn’t be safe for you in such a dangerous game.”
Jiang Yan shook his head frantically. Who in their right mind would want to join this game?!
The Hunter had an unsettling fondness for playing “cops and robbers” with his sheep. He would give them a chance to escape; if they succeeded, they would survive.
If they chose not to run, however, they would eventually meet their fate on the tenth day, when the Chef in the kitchen would prepare them for the Hunter’s dinner.
But those who failed to escape were not merely killed. They would be tainted by the forest and turned into hunting dogs.
Jiang Yan’s script as a real NPC contained only two key lines that players could trigger. Everything else was unrelated to him.
Although real NPCs could earn bonus points for outstanding performances during a dungeon, their experience wasn’t as valuable as that of the players.
As a result, the maximum score a real NPC could achieve was usually no more than half of the lowest score among the dungeon’s players.
Therefore, some real NPCs would take risks to increase their presence in the dungeon, aiming to earn more points.
But Jiang Yan had been passively dragged into the game in the first place, so points held no appeal to him.
"I think you should be a little more ambitious," 663 kindly reminded him.
"If you're so ambitious, why don't you be the real NPC, and I'll be the system?" Jiang Yan replied lazily.
663: "...Whatever makes you happy."