landbeastnovel Chapter 10: Pain Points Emerge Like Bamboo Shoots After Rain
Chapter 10: Pain Points Emerge Like Bamboo Shoots After Rain
He is watching you!!!
With a loud crash, Winston lost his balance and fell to the ground, his flailing arms knocking over the pen holder on the desk.
The excruciating pain made it impossible for him to concentrate; his vision blurred, and he was drenched in sweat. His limbs thrashed about in vain, trying to grab onto something to relieve the pain. After what seemed like minutes, or perhaps tens of thousands of years, the pain seemed to lessen slightly, or perhaps Winston's endurance had increased a little under this inhuman torment.
He gradually regained his ability to think.
Why didn't anyone hear the noise and come in...? Where are the guards in front of the Prime Minister's residence...?
No, I can't make a sound... I clenched my teeth too hard just now, and my jaw muscles won't obey me... I'm practically Guan Yu reincarnated, I'm in so much pain and I haven't uttered a single sound...
I need to figure out a way to save myself... It still hurts so much... Damn! When they say there's no pain point, they don't mean this kind of obvious pain point!!
Winston curled up on the floor, biting the edge of the carpet, stiffly turning his sweat-blurred eyes, and barely managed to open the system panel, scrolling down little by little.
He is watching you!
The mystical attributes associated with it have already risen to over 600, and are still increasing at a visible rate.
[WARNING! Excessive mastery of occultism may attract the attention of unknown entities!]
...Do we even need to use this as a pretext?
Winston was in excruciating pain and furious.
His eyes were practically glued to me!
[Mysticism has reached its limit! To continue improving, please upgrade the passive skill "Absolute Materialism Lv.1" to at least Lv.5! Mysticism exceeding the limit will be converted into temporary magic power...]
Winston didn't look at the rest of the content in detail; his focus was entirely on the skills.
Oh, right! He also has the skill of "absolute materialism"! That's also the culprit behind his miraculous survival under the watchful eyes of the ancient gods, though he suffers from a splitting headache!
How can I upgrade...?
Upgrading skills requires "Authority Points".
Current authority points: 100
It's an upgrade given for completing the mission to establish the investigator organization... Upgrade as much as you can!!
[Consuming 10 Authority Points, Absolute Materialism Lv.1 → Absolute Materialism Lv.2]
[Consuming 20 Authority Points, Absolute Materialism Lv.2 → Absolute Materialism Lv.3]
[Consuming 40 Authority Points, Absolute Materialism Lv.3 → Absolute Materialism Lv.4]
[Insufficient Authority Points to upgrade to Lv.5.]
[Passive Skill: Absolute Materialism Lv.4 (Any mental pollution, curse, or clairvoyance targeting you will be forcibly transformed into mild to moderate migraines and thoughts about capitalism)]
The effects of the skill upgrade were immediate; Winston felt a sudden lightness in his body!
Although my head still aches and the words "He is watching you" are still in blood-red before my eyes, compared to the feeling of my brain being chopped into minced meat, it's just like being beaten up as a punching bag!
Winston opened his numb mouth, spat out the saliva mixed with dust and blood, took a deep breath and slowly exhaled, and struggled to his feet as his body trembled.
Turning around, I saw v1888 flapping its wings against the office window.
Let me in! Are you alright?!
"I didn't expect you to care about me so much..."
Winston disliked showing his distress to others, so he forced a smile and stumbled to the window to open it for the black eagle.
v1888 suddenly fell in.
Of course I care about you! Since we came into this world, our lives have been intertwined; if you die, I die too. So remember to leave the door open for me next time! That scared the hell out of me!
"Were you the only one... who heard the noise?" Winston began, but then felt the sound coming from his throat was like fingernails scratching a blackboard, forcing him to stop and cough twice before continuing. "Where are the guards at the door?"
"They're gone," v1888 said. "I overheard them talking before they left, saying something about not staying out at night."
Winston raised his hand to rub his temples, slowly recalling this setting from his memory.
Yes, in this world, no one goes out after 10 p.m.
This is not due to mandatory provisions made by temporary policies such as curfews, but rather to long-standing conventions and practices.
Legend has it that the apocalypse seven hundred years ago brought disease to this planet. When the red moon rises, monsters that devour people will be born in places where the moonlight shines directly, in places where the moon cannot reach, near rivers, and in the shadows of trees.
Of course, such legends are often difficult to verify. Victorian England did not have daylight saving time or winter time. It got dark around four o'clock in winter, but I have never heard of not being able to go out between four and ten o'clock. So, monsters can read watches?
And why list four monster spawn points? Aren't some of them duplicates?
As a transmigrator, Winston would hardly take this kind of statement seriously if he didn't have the original owner's memories.
However, the natives born into this world do indeed rarely go out at night. Even the poorest people will not choose to work the night shift, and even homeless people on the streets will go to the shelters established by the government before 10 p.m.
It's hard to explain people's behavior if the nighttime isn't truly dangerous.
This world holds more mysteries than I imagined. I thought inheriting the original owner's memories would allow me to know everything...
Winston sighed and said to the black eagle, "That's enough for today. I'm going to wash up and go to bed."
v1888 glanced at his expression and said:
Go drink some hot water first, I'll pour you some. Does your head still hurt?
"It hurts, like there's a UFC competition happening in my head," Winston said honestly. "And it's watching me, can you believe it?"
Pain points have sprung up like mushrooms after rain.
If this happened every night, it would be unbearable.
We must come up with a solution as soon as possible!
Winston, gritting his teeth against a headache, pondered the situation while glancing absentmindedly at his desk.
He discovered that the list of cabinet ministers he had written was missing.
Did you accidentally knock it to the ground just now?
Since there was no one else in the Prime Minister's residence, Winston was too lazy to search around. He went straight into the bathroom to brush his teeth and wash his face, preparing to go to sleep.
v1888 squatted on the toilet, making a confused sound:
[You said that if every prime minister is constantly monitored by their superiors after taking office, and they don't have a system in place, how do they manage to keep up?]
What I mean is, although many prime ministers have either gone mad or died, you couldn't possibly last a day without the skill of "absolute materialism," could you? Could it be that the nerves of locals have evolved under the glory of ancient gods, making them stronger than those of outsiders?
Winston stopped brushing his teeth and glanced at it.
good question.
Can't figure it out.
I'll think about it tomorrow.
He washed the sweat and blood from his face, turned off the light, and went to bed expressionlessly.
In the last second before losing consciousness, he thought:
I need to hire a maid with decent cooking skills tomorrow... to help with cleaning and cooking, otherwise I'll be too busy...
The state won't even provide this; damned capitalism...
On the system panel, the description after Absolute Materialism Lv.4 flashed.
Meanwhile, in the Prime Minister's office on the first floor, something was moving.
It was a translucent jellyfish, lying wet on the floor, its umbrella-shaped body undulating slightly, with hundreds of tentacles lying limply to the side.
After lying there for a while, it seemed to have rested enough. It slowly used its two tentacles to lift itself off the carpet, its umbrella-shaped body clinging to the ground as it slowly crawled forward.
Wriggling... wriggling...
Finally, it arrived at the draft paper with the list of cabinet ministers written on it and lunged forward with all its might.
With a soft splat, the umbrella-shaped object flattened the paper, and the resulting watermark gradually spread across the entire sheet. The plant fibers that make up the paper were rapidly corroded, making it look as if it had been eaten by a jellyfish.
After "eating" the draft paper, the jellyfish circled the desk again, laboriously gathering all the trash in the room together.
then.
It cracked.
It literally split open, and a widening fissure appeared in the middle of the umbrella-shaped body, filled with thousands of densely packed, seemingly soft but actually sharp teeth.
Crunch, crunch, the teeth shredded all the trash, then sucked it in like a whirlwind!
The more trash it inhaled, the smaller the jellyfish became. In the end, it perished along with the last piece of scrap paper in the center of the carpet, leaving only a small circular watermark.