Welcome to the Nightmare Live

Chapter 76: Is this person so brave?!

After seeing the last rule of the amusement park, Wen Jianyan’s breathing was slightly stagnant, and he raised his head suddenly, looking at Mr. Ribbit, who was not far away.

It didn’t look any different from before, still wearing a cartoon green plush suit with a funny and exaggerated frog headgear on its head, but for some reason, even if people just looked at it from a distance, it could make them feel inexplicably frightened.

Mr. Ribbit’s voice returned to its normal cheerfulness just now:

“Okay, after confirming all the park rules, everyone can go in through the door behind me to play normally! I suggest you go to the Thriller Zone first; it has many popular items from our park there!”

It cupped its face and said cutely: “Of course, you are also welcome to buy a copy of my merchandise and take me home.” 

There was a dead silence in the North Square.

All the anchors stared cautiously at Mr. Ribbit, who was not far away. Their eyes flickered with surprise and uncertainty. Their feet seemed to be rooted, and they did not move at all.

Mr. Ribbit didn’t seem to notice the strangeness of the group of tourists at all. It bounced away from the door like any ordinary mascot, standing at the open gate of the park, swaying to the music.

Wen Jianyan lowered his head and looked at the park rules behind the map in his hand again.

[Don’t Trust the Frog]

The small black words printed on the last line were particularly dazzling.

Frog…

What does this mean?

An NPC in a frog suit? or something even weirder?

Or is neither to be believed?

More importantly, this was recorded in the rules provided by Mr. Ribbit, who asked them to follow them, creating a terrible paradox that caused people to become confused and unsure of which side to believe.

However, as the instance started, no matter how much doubt the anchors in the square had, they still started to move around.

Some anchors went straight to the point and walked into the park first. After all, no matter what the rules were, the main task would not change. As long as they experienced the five items in the park, they could leave this instance.

Some anchors still stayed in the North Square, some walked toward the food area and gift shop, and some walked toward the NPC on the North Square, seemingly going to collect more information before taking action.

Wen Jianyan folded the map and put it in his pocket, pondered for a while, and finally decided to walk in the direction of the gift shop.

The gift shop in the amusement park had clean windows and bright colors. Rows of shelves were filled with all kinds of stuffed animals. Even the clerks behind the checkout counter were wearing stuffed cat suits and shaking their heads to the music.

A group of anchors had already gathered in the store.

Some walked between the shelves, while others stood in the doorway, looking thoughtfully at the paper posted under the checkout counter.

Wen Jianyan stepped forward, looking across the gap between the crowd, and his gaze landed on the paper.

[Gift Shop Rules]

1. This store does not accept currency other than park coupons. If any staff tries to sell you any goods in any other way, please refuse with words, and after the other party leaves, call the phone behind the map to report it to us. There are staff to deal with this.

2. There will be no bloodshed, noise, walking, or eating people around the store.

3. Mr. Ribbit dolls are only sold to children under the age of twelve. If you need to purchase them, please contact the front desk personnel.

4. The sold items cannot be returned or exchanged after they are taken out of the store.

Please strictly follow the above rules. If there is any violation, you will be responsible for the consequences.

Except for the first rule and the fourth rule, which were exactly the same as those of the amusement park area, the rest were new and not mentioned on the map. It seemed that they should be special rules for this area.

Wen Jianyan looked away, walked into the gift shop, and briefly walked around the shop.

Except for the overly weird rules at the door, everything else in the gift shop was outrageously normal. All the dolls were priced at 5 coupons. The most important thing was that no matter what kind of doll it was, there were no instructions for use below, just like the products in any toy store.

Most of the anchors just went around, and no one really took out the coupons to buy them.

After all, without instructions for use, who knew if there would be any side effects when buying these things? Even if there were no side effects and it was just an ordinary plush toy, it wasn’t worth spending precious coupons on them.

“Check out.”

At this moment, the young man’s clear voice sounded in the small gift shop.

The anchors in the gift shop were startled and subconsciously turned their heads to look in the direction of the sound.

They saw a slender young man standing in front of the checkout counter and placing a cat-shaped handing ornament and a clown bobblehead doll on the stage.

The clerk quickly packed the hanging ornament in a bag and put both things into a bag printed with “Fantasy Amusement Park”:

 “That’s 10 in total.”

The young man took out two coupons from his pocket, put them on the counter, and picked up the bag. Turning around and walking out, his side face was fair and graceful, with a leisurely expression, and there seemed to be a faint smile on his lips.

“Ding dong.”

Accompanied by the sound of the bell hanging on the door, the other party opened the door, and he walked out of the gift shop leisurely. Soon, there was only the view of his back figure left.

“……”

The anchors who stayed in the gift shop were silent, looking at each other in surprise.

Was this person so brave? Actually, come up and buy it!

And wasn’t he too generous! He spent 10 coupons to buy items that he had no idea what they were useful for; this was one-tenth of the coupons in their hands!

Or did he know something that none of them knew, and that’s why he bought these dolls?

Wen Jianyan carried the packing bag and walked briskly toward the main entrance of the amusement park.

As a player with negative luck who was often trapped by the instance system, no one knew better than Wen Jianyan that coupons, no matter how much they were saved, would definitely not be enough in the later stages.

And according to his understanding of the instance mechanism, players would definitely be guided to compete for coupons in the later stages.

Money was something that could not be saved.

It had to be earned.

Therefore, the reason for Wen Jianyan’s high-profile consumption in the gift shop was very simple.

——He just hoped that someone would come to snatch his coupons.

Facing the colorful light at the entrance of the amusement park, the young man narrowed his eyes slightly; the depths of his amber eyes were full of brilliance.

He really wanted them to take the bait soon.

Wen Jianyan walked toward the amusement park area and, at the same time, opened his live broadcast interface.

There were hundreds of anchors in this instance, not just a few NPCs. There was also no way for him to disguise himself as an NPC, such that his behavior wouldn’t attract the attention of others at all and even be considered common.

As the difficulty of instances increased, the proportion of senior anchors also greatly increased. Everyone attached great importance to the audience’s stickiness in their live broadcast room and would take time to interact with the audience whenever they had the opportunity.

After all, in this nightmare live broadcast room where the audience was supreme and entertained to death. Only by gaining more popularity and more audience love could they ensure a longer life.

In the “Integrity First” live broadcast room:    

[Aaaaaaaaaaaaah! The anchor has opened the barrage!]

[!!! (50 reward points)]     

[Aaaaaaah! So happy!!! New fan seeking familiarity! (100 reward points)]

After several live broadcasts before, Wen Jianyan has accumulated a lot of regular viewers, and each time the broadcast was no longer as deserted as the first time. But the number of people online in the live broadcast room this time was still beyond Wen Jianyan’s expectation.

There were actually 20,000 people!

Although the peak of his live broadcast traffic was much higher than this number, it hadn’t even been half an hour since the live broadcast started.

The number of people online had reached this number so quickly…

“Ah, hello everyone.”

The young man blinked in astonishment: “How did you all find this place?”

The barrage once again set off a heat wave:

[This ten-year-old fan came here uninvited! Dog liar rush!]

[Ah, me too. I’ve been chasing you since the Fukang Hospital instance. As soon as I saw the notification of the start of the broadcast, I rushed here!]

[This face-con fan just clicked in from the home page! The anchor is good-looking!]

[The anchor should have gotten the MVP in the last instance, right? Your live broadcast room is listed on the single-player list on the home page!] 

[I didn’t expect that there would be a level-D anchor in the Fantasy Amusement Park instance. Hehe, I’ll be squatting down here. He will surely be the first victim.]

[Hurry up! After the first victim is finished, I’ll go next door to the senior anchor I follow. Anchor hurry up and die quickly.] 

There were new and old fans in the barrage. Some confessed enthusiastically, and some maliciously urged.

As a result, the two parties soon started to quarrel.

[? Can upstairs speak properly? Don’t just curse the anchor to die first because of the lack of fans for new anchors, okay?]

[How can you follow such a new anchor? Maybe he won’t be able to survive the first item. What’s the use of defending him like this? It’s so pitiful.]

[That’s right, the audience in this live broadcast room isn’t waiting to see a joke of a level-D anchor directly challenging the level-A and the entire Fantasy Amusement Park instance… Anyway, I am ready to watch the show.]

“In short, welcome everyone to the “Integrity First” live broadcast room.”

Wen Jianyan, who was at the center of the topic, bent his eyes as if he wasn’t affected by those malicious and cursing remarks at all:

“This live broadcast room advocates freedom of speech. Everyone can say whatever they want, as long as it is the truth. I love to hear it.”

[……]

[…The old fan is silent.]

[…Everyone beat this shameless dong liar on the public screen.]

[I think you’re the only one with the most freedom of speech!]

Old fans and new fans stopped fighting, and the barrage quickly calmed down.

Wen Jianyan began to answer a few questions related to the instance.

“Why buy peripherals at the beginning? Are you not afraid of pits?”

“Well, I don’t think it’s a pit.”

The young man thought for a while and said:

“This amusement park obviously needs to guide tourists to consume coupons. If there are problems with the dolls sold in the surrounding stores, players will not take the initiative to buy them, so I guess they are very likely to have a positive effect on the anchor’s clearance.”

He bent his amber eyes, and a faint light flickered in his eyes under his long eyelashes:

“And, if we talk about harm, these locals here still have a lot of ways to do it.
For example… Selling dolls with no problems in the early stage to reduce the anchor’s vigilance and, as mentioned in the rules, going around and eating people in the later stages.
The dolls that could be purchased with only 5 coupons in the beginning sold for a higher price after the anchor realized their importance, forcing the anchor to buy at a higher price…” 

The young man’s voice was clear and smiling, and in a gentle and calm voice, he spoke about these ruthless and deceitful tricks.

As he spoke, the bullet screen fell into dead silence and became blank.

After finishing speaking, Wen Jianyan blinked and added with a smile: “At least, if I were the designer, I would’ve done this.”

[F*ck…]

[F*CK!!!]

[God-level prediction… What kind of god-level prediction is this?! I was shocked. Does this live broadcast room really have an anti-spoiler mechanism? Can these really be deduced by normal anchors in such a short period of time?! (100 reward points)]

[Damn, my wife is really ruthless and beautiful, are you not going to think about hiring outsiders in your live broadcast room?]

[I feel like I understand why this level-D anchor entered the level-A instance; he is indeed something! (50 reward Points)]

[The above user’s remarks involve spoilers, and will only be open to the audience.]

Seeing a blank barrage area with only a few barrages that have nothing to do with the plot floating by, a pleasant smile swept across Wen Jianyan’s lips.

If the correctness of his guess just now was only 30%, then now the correctness of this guess has soared to at least 60%.

That’s why he voiced out his guesses without any scruples.

It was to use the instance “anti-spoiler mechanism” to verify his guess in turn.

 The content was blocked, but the accumulated points in the background were increasing.

Then, even if his guess was not necessarily correct, the direction should be correct.

“As for why I bought these two kinds of dolls…”

Wen Jianyan looked down at the barrage.

The clown was bought because it was mentioned in the rules on the map, and the cat was bought because the clerk in the gift shop looked like this. Wen Jianyan was not completely sure about his guess, but the probability of stepping on mine by buying these two dolls should be relatively small.

Wen Jianyan lowered his head and opened the shopping bag in his hand.

The two exquisitely crafted dolls were very cute, and there was a formal-looking invoice beside them, but it was empty and blank.

Wen Jianyan glanced at it thoughtfully, put the invoice back, and picked up the jade-green cat doll in its place.

Its head was tilted with a sly expression; it had a pair of round light-colored eyes and soft fur that felt good, and it looked arrogant, cute, and elusive.

The young man with amber eyes half-closed his eyes, holding the fluffy doll to his cheeks.

He tilted his head: “Don’t you think it looks like me?”

[Aaaaaaaaaaah, so cute, aaaaaaaaaah!]   

[Yes, yes, yes, really alike!]

[Woo-hoo! It’s okay to arrange a cat play. I really want to rub him with my palm, damn it!]

[Aaaaaaah, f*ck, who can tolerate the anchor-selling meng?! My blood tank is empty. Wife, will you really not consider being a face value anchor?]

In just a few minutes of live broadcast interaction, the number of online users in the “Integrity First” live broadcast room had soared by several thousand, and a large wave of reward points had poured into the background.

“Okay, okay, I’m going to play in the amusement park items next.” 

The shameless dog liar blinked at the live barrage with a sweet and happy smile: “Goodbye, all the husbands.”

After finishing speaking, he closed the live broadcast interface.

The barrage was silent for a second and then exploded instantly:

Aaaaaaaah, help me, help me, help me! (100 reward points)]

[Aaaaaaahh, my wife called out for me! called out for me! called out for me! Babbling nonsense (100 reward points)]

[You were obviously a little shy when you saw it the last time, but this time you directly accepted the setting. You deserve to be called a dog liar! (100 reward points)]

[Damn, I knew this guy has no bottom line when it comes to deceiving people!!! (100 reward points)]

[This glib-tongued love scammer!!! You are taking advantage of our emotions again!… But I’m happy to be cheated, boo-hoo, boo-hoo. Lie to me more, please! (100 reward points)]

………

Wen Jianyan closed the live broadcast interface and walked into the park.

The outward view here was no different from that of an ordinary amusement park. In the center was a huge musical fountain. In the center of the fountain stands the statue of the mascot of the fantasy amusement park, Mr. Ribbit. The sound of water echoed through the park amidst the sound of pleasant music. There were lush trees and winding paths all around.

Different roads lead to different parks, separated by dense trees, where one could see all kinds of colorful rides and fairy-tale castles. NPCs in various costumes were bouncing around, dedicatedly trying to amuse any tourists passing by.

Wen Jianyan unfolded the map and carefully examined the signs on it.

Unlike others, the zone he least wanted to go to was not the thriller zone, but the leisure zone.

His eyes fell on the icon of the “Mirror Labyrinth”, and he shivered involuntarily. Many pictures that left him with a deep psychological shadow and that are still fresh in his memory flooded into his mind instantly.

 ——In any case, he absolutely wouldn’t go there.

At least until he found out how to get rid of the other party, he would never take the initiative to approach that place.

Wen Jianyan looked away and looked at the other two zones.

From the current point of view, the children’s zone should be relatively less life-threatening, so there must be a lot of anchors there… 

To be precise, after Mr. Ribbit said that, most of the anchors who read the rules of the amusement park would flock to the leisure zone and children’s zone.

Wen Jianyan rubbed the edge of the map with his fingertips, then folded it again and stuffed it back into his pocket.

Rules were scary things.

They possessed authority and the power to make people unable to control their obedience. To be precise, the entire human society was built on rules, and only by following the rules could one be safe. This was something that was deeply embedded in everyone’s heart.

But were the rules themselves credible?

If this couldn’t be judged, the sense of security was at stake.

What to believe?

What not to believe?

——If you wanted to deceive someone, the first step was to shake the other party’s cognition of basic common sense, so that the other party would fall into the terrifying abyss of not being able to rely on, not daring to believe, or even having infinite doubts.

This was a common tactic used by fraudsters.

Destroy the sense of security and create a cognitive void.

The young man took a step forward and walked in the direction of the thriller zone. There was a glimmer of light in those amber eyes, and his thin lips were raised in a half-smile.

So let me see…

If frogs can be trusted.

The author has something to say: 

Q: Let’s interview Mr. Wu Zhu. What is it like to hear your future wife call someone else’s husband?

Wu Zhu: “……”

Q: First, calm down, sir; don’t beat up the staff! Don’t destroy interview equipment either—security! Where are the security guards?