Mo Bai's right eyebrow uncontrollably twitched a few times. She raised her hand and rubbed her temple, suppressing the sudden spasm.

"Forget it. When soldiers come, I'll block them; when water rises, I'll dam it. My luck stat is only 4. I guess I'm just destined to live with trouble," Mo Bai said.

She had to keep a broad mind. If she didn't, the stress alone would crush her.

The magician continued to watch her with a smile.

Mo Bai put away the Inequivalent Exchange card he had given her and said sincerely, "Thank you."

The magician replied calmly, "There was a point during the instance when I couldn't hear your thoughts at all. You must have discovered a loophole in the rules and used it to avoid my mind-reading.

Later, after you regained your strength, you could easily block me anyway.

You clearly had the ability to destroy the Smiling Circus entirely, yet you chose to follow the rules and clear it like a puzzle.

There's nothing to thank me for. If anything, I should thank you for preserving the circus."

"I'm not as noble as you think," Mo Bai said. "I just wanted to conserve my energy and cards before entering Disease Town. Mainly to save my strength for a bigger challenge."

Using two Blessing of the Puppets cards was painful, but it was already the smallest loss possible.

After all, before making the deal with the magician, everyone had already lost half of themselves in the Heart Mirror Room.

And without that room, Mo Bai wouldn't be this strong now.

The magician smiled. "I was born with the ability to read minds and have heard too many ugly thoughts. In this world, there are countless people who look kind but are rotten inside. You, on the other hand, are the opposite. Your thoughts are pleasant, but your words come out harsh, as if you're afraid that others would owe you a favor. You're always eager to keep your distance from everyone."

"I find it troublesome." Mo Bai replied.

Not wanting to dwell on that, she asked, "Your true wish isn't to lose your mind-reading, nor just to keep smiles in the circus. It's that you don't want to hear ugly thoughts anymore, right?

"That's why you created the Heart Mirror Room, using time and space to split players' souls in two, letting the dark side leave while keeping the good, kind side trapped in your circus forever."

"You guessed correctly," the magician said.

"But no one can fulfill that wish," Mo Bai continued. "Unless someone kills you, it's impossible to clear this instance."

At that moment, Xiao Qi spoke in her mind:

"Player, the main system has released data on the Smiling Circus. It has a nominal survival rate of 50%, but the actual survival rate is 0%. No one has cleared it so far.

Also, other players enter as audience members, not staff. If you're an audience member, there's an additional rule: 'Do not lie inside the Smiling Circus.' If you lie, the magician will send you to the Heart Mirror Room."

The magician added, "That's right, no one has cleared it. But at least within my domain, I don't have to hear ugly thoughts."

Mo Bai asked, "I didn't technically clear it, and I destroyed the Heart Mirror Room. After Disease Town ends, will your instance still exist?"

The magician replied, "If a Fallen Lord is born, and we're still alive, we will become its subordinates. Our domains will be reshaped and tainted with its fallen attributes.

But if you successfully prevent the birth of the Fallen Lord, the domain of Disease Town will collapse, and the Smiling Circus will absorb part of its power and become whole again."

"Fallen Lord?" Mo Bai asked.

"That's what players call an Ultra-Star Rank monster," he said. "But that's just a nickname. Their true name is Fallen Apostles."

"You're telling me all this... Won't that be a problem?" Mo Bai frowned, sensing that the magician was being unusually kind.

The one she met while blind was hostile, but now, he seemed eager to share everything he knew.

"I'll say whatever I want," the magician said with a willful smile.

"Thanks for the information," Mo Bai said. "I'm heading to Disease Town to find my teammates. By the way, since the illness seems to be related to burns, you might want your staff to wear damp cotton masks. It could help block the spread."

Most coughing in fires is caused by smoke. Covering the nose and mouth with a wet cloth can help for a while.

"Understood, my la… ma'am. I wish you a safe journey," the magician said, placing his hand over his chest and bowing deeply.

Mo Bai sidestepped his formal gesture and quickly left the Smiling Circus.

She had been on the stage and exited through the audience entrance. According to the magician, her other three teammates had left through a staff-only passage at the back.

Almost as if fleeing, Mo Bai rushed out. As she pushed open the door, Xiao Qi let out a long sigh.

"Phew… finally out of there. That scared me."

"What were you scared of?" Mo Bai asked, surprised.

The circus didn't appear that dangerous.

Xiao Qi said, still shaken, "Didn't you feel like that magician wanted to replace me?"

Mo Bai: "…No."

Xiao Qi sighed gloomily. "You just don't understand me."

Mo Bai: "…"

Well, if she doesn't understand, she doesn't understand. Mo Bai didn't have time to worry about an AI's feelings for now.

The moment she stepped out of the circus, something irritated her nose and throat, making her want to cough.

Mo Bai immediately used Environmental Optimization to purify the air around her.

But it didn't work.

That meant the choking substance was an essential part of the environment. Removing it would collapse the environment itself.

Like how you can clean pollution from the ocean, but you can't remove the salt. Without salt, it's no longer the sea.

Likewise, without this choking element, Disease Town wouldn't exist.

Mo Bai quickly switched to Environmental Rejection to filter out the harmful elements. Only then could she breathe normally again, and the suffocating feeling faded.

Environmental Rejection could exclude harmful elements within the environment. For example, if she were in the ocean and the salt harmed her, she could exclude the salt within her range.

That was the fundamental difference between Environmental Optimization and Environmental Rejection.

But Mo Bai's understanding of the environment was still limited. She could only apply the ability within her immediate surroundings, which she could see.

To maintain it, she would have to recast it every five or six meters, and that level of energy consumption was unsustainable.

So she dealt with the immediate problem, then took out a damp towel from her storage pouch and covered her mouth and nose.

Since she could warn the magician, she naturally prepared for herself as well.

Back during their meal, they used bottled water to prepare these towels, intending to use them if they encountered an infection source.

What they hadn't expected was that the entire Disease Town was filled with this smoky substance.

Mo Bai didn't use the towel immediately because she had enough energy to test the smoke first. Moreover, she has to determine its properties and infer the strength of the soon-to-be-born Ultra-Star Rank monster.

What she hadn't expected was that the smoke was already fused with the entire town, becoming part of its domain and rules.

This Ultra-Star Rank monster was even stronger than the one in Biological Research Institute No. 7.

There, they still needed to control experimental subjects by injecting monster extract and monitored robots to maintain order.

Here, its power was omnipresent.

They had reunited at 10 PM, spent four to five hours in the time and space corridors, and another one or two hours passing through them. By the time Mo Bai exited the circus, it was around 4 or 5 AM, just as dawn was breaking.

Mo Bai saw a quiet town. The sky was faintly brightening, stars still lingering, and no pedestrians on the streets. It looked very peaceful.

The air looked normal, too. She couldn't see any gunpowder smoke, and the air here looked no different from that of a regular town.

But the moment she breathed it in, it felt like her nose, throat, and lungs were on fire.

Just as she was about to go around to the back of the circus to meet her teammates, a system notification appeared:

 

[

Congratulations on leaving the "Smiling Circus" and entering "Disease Town." Unfortunately, you have lost one opportunity to enter a safe house.

During the 20 hours you were trapped in the Smiling Circus, other diligent players have compiled the following rules for Disease Town:

Rule 1: Open flames are strictly forbidden. Do not carry any source of fire within the town. Violators will be subjected to execution by fire until death.

]

 

Seeing the first rule, Mo Bai's heart skipped a beat.

The situation was even worse than she had imagined!

Sheng Yan, as a Nature-type ability user, was essentially a living source of fire. It was impossible for him to eliminate that.

The moment he entered the instance, he would be subjected to execution by fire.

Twenty hours had already passed. Who knew what state he was in now?

Mo Bai's heart tightened.

Her only hope was that Du Heng and Liu Congyi were also in this instance and had spawned near him. Sheng Yan could withstand high temperatures for a while. Maybe they could use that time to find a solution.

 

[

Rule 2: As long as you remain in the town, you will inevitably fall ill. The longer you stay, the more severe it becomes. High-level players may last longer, but even they will be infected after 24 hours if no measures are taken.

Rule 3: Buildings offer some resistance to the disease, but you cannot force entry. You must obtain the residents' permission. If any resident is already sick, you will become infected at double speed.

Rule 4: "Fathers" and "husbands" are strictly forbidden within the town. Even role-playing is not allowed.

Rule 5: There are currently four safe zones: "Smiling Circus," "Plague Garden," "Abandoned Hospital," and "Love Amusement Park." Each carries its own dangers. The Smiling Circus is now closed and no longer accepting new members. Players in need may seek refuge in the other three zones.

Rule 6: All players must quickly locate and eliminate the source of the disease, otherwise everyone will die!!!

Rule 7: Everyone!

]

 

After reading those alarming lines, Mo Bai felt slightly less worried about Sheng Yan.

According to Rule Five, the so-called four safe zones were essentially four separate instances. As long as players entered them, they could avoid infection, and it would also protect Sheng Yan.

Du Heng and Liu Congyi might have already taken Sheng Yan into one of the other three safe zones.

What Mo Bai didn't understand was this: Rule Six had already stated that "everyone will die," so why emphasize "everyone" again in Rule Seven?

Could it be that the "everyone" mentioned in the two rules didn't refer to the same group?

The first "everyone will die" clearly referred to the players in the instance, so what did the second "everyone" mean?

Surely it couldn't mean all players, could it?

Mo Bai set the question aside for now. She glanced back at the circus behind her, which was a massive structure resembling a grand theater.

It was said that the Smiling Circus was mobile, able to leave at any time, though no one knew exactly how.

Following the direction the magician had given her, Mo Bai ran toward the back of the circus. Her teammates should have been waiting at the rear entrance.

But when she arrived, the three teammates she had finally reunited with were nowhere to be seen.

She had only left about half an hour later than they did. Was that really too long to wait?

Mo Bai searched the designated meeting spot and found a note stuck to the back door. It read:

[ Sheng Yan is in danger. Urgently need a Blessing card. Abandoned Hospital.]

 

Mo Bai examined it carefully. The handwriting belonged to Gu Tiandong.

So it was to save Sheng Yan. A matter of life and death, so it was understandable that they couldn't wait even for half an hour.

But did all three of them really need to go?

There were three people. Couldn't one of them stay behind to tell her what happened?

Mo Bai tried to reconstruct the situation and came up with three possibilities.

First possibility: All three were captured by some powerful force, and before leaving, the captor forced Gu Tiandong to write the note to mislead her.

This was the least likely. Mo Bai trusted their strength. Gu Tiandong had near-absolute defense, Ding Xun had powerful offensive perception, and Ye Pingjun had exceptional luck. To take all three without leaving any sign of a struggle, and even force Gu Tiandong to write a note, was almost impossible.

Second possibility: The one who came to them was Liu Congyi.

She had spent the past three months clearing instances with them and was a trusted teammate. Only she could convince them so quickly.

If Liu Congyi told them Sheng Yan was seriously injured and needed Blessing of the Puppets for emergency treatment, they would definitely rush to help.

In that case, the cautious Ye Pingjun would likely send the defensive Gu Tiandong and the offensive Ding Xun with the card, while he, being lucky enough to act alone safely, would stay behind to wait for Mo Bai and explain everything.

Unless Liu Congyi told them that the Abandoned Hospital had some restriction requiring all of them to go together, forcing them to leave in a hurry, thus leaving only a note.

But even then, they should have explained that clearly in the note.

So this possibility also seemed unlikely.

Third possibility: Two separate groups took them away in succession.

The first group took Ye Pingjun and Ding Xun, leaving Gu Tiandong behind to wait for her.

Then the second group used Sheng Yan as bait to lure Gu Tiandong away.

The Blessing of the Puppets card originally belonged to Ye Pingjun, but was being carried by Gu Tiandong.

Ye Pingjun used the card to save Gu Tiandong, who then used his own card to save Ding Xun.

Ding Xun had already returned her card to Gu Tiandong. He had wanted to give it back to Ye Pingjun, but Ye Pingjun insisted that Gu Tiandong should keep it, since his strong defense made him the safest carrier.

If anyone suffered a mental attack in Disease Town and forgot to use the card, Gu Tiandong would be the least likely to be affected, so he kept it to use whenever needed.

Only if Gu Tiandong had been the one left behind would it make sense for all three to disappear, leaving only a note.

Holding the note, Mo Bai felt her heart tighten again.

Everything was too coincidental.

So coincidental that it made her uneasy.

Was someone trying to isolate her, or was the real target Gu Tiandong?

She wasn't overthinking it. Both she and Gu Tiandong were on the verge of advancing into higher-tier Observation Group players, and there were high-level players in this instance.

She had always been worried that something like this might happen.

Please don't let it be what I think, Mo Bai silently wished.