Chapter 24
Rong Yuan was sitting in the office of the beautiful woman, flipping through a thick directory in his hand.
——Is it enough for only those people to pay the price? Of course not!
Rong Yuan would not think that killing those people would end Paradise City. Those dead outside were just people who happened to be here today to have fun and do evil. Outside Paradise City, there must be many "guests" who did not come today because of something else, staff who happened to be on shift and rest, and the real manipulators and controllers behind Paradise City. They are all the creators of the tragedy of this city and should pay the price for it.
This list records all the "guests" that Paradise City has received since its establishment and the leaders of each round. As for the victims, no words were wasted to record their names, origins, appearances, etc. There were only extremely bland words like: "45 goods arrived today, 2 in Class A, 13 in Class B, and the rest in Class C." Or: "19 goods lost in Area 1, to be replenished." And so on.
Simple numbers, records without any emotional color, can give people a glimpse of the tip of the dark and bloody iceberg behind it.
Rong Yuan glanced through the list, memorized all the names that appeared in it, and then closed the book without much emotion in his heart - before opening the list, he already had some expectations about what he was going to see, and now he just wanted to confirm how many more people needed to be sent to meet the god of death.
“Bang!”
The name list was put back on the table, and the seven throwing knives beside it suddenly jumped up as if startled, vibrating , and then flew out with a "swish".
In an underground passage leading to Paradise City, the heavy stone door was pushed open by an ingenious mechanism, and a fat man with his eyes covered was led in by the arm. He took off the black blindfold and said in a good mood, "Okay, no need to send me off. It's always so troublesome to come to your place. If I hadn't thought about my little baby who was waiting for me to love him well, I wouldn't have come here today."
The man who led him in was short and thin, and his appearance was very ordinary. When he heard the fat man's laughing words, he not only did not respond, but took a step back cautiously, bowed and said: "Then I'll take my leave, I wish you a good time."
He stepped back behind the door, pressed the mechanism, watched the stone door slowly close, and watched the fat man walk in impatiently, his face cold and expressionless. Suddenly, out of the corner of his eye, he seemed to see a short figure running from the corner. He blinked, and when he looked again, he found that the stone door had completely closed.
The guide stood facing the closed stone door and thought for a while. Without further investigation, he turned back to the entrance and waited for the next guest from Paradise City.
In another secret passage, two fat and big-eared men ran as hard as they could towards the stone door. When they got there, they realized that they didn’t know how to open it. They hit the stone door desperately and cried out, “Help! Let us out! Someone come quickly…”
Behind them, twenty or thirty skinny boys and girls covered in bruises, holding various torture instruments that had left scars on their bodies, rushed over viciously with deep hatred on their faces!
A few minutes later, the crowd dispersed, and several teenagers grabbed the men's hands and feet and dragged the two bodies to a small pink room nearby. Three or four more girls came over with buckets and rags, knelt on the ground and wiped the blood clean, as if nothing had happened here.
The door of the small room was slammed shut. Before it was closed, one could vaguely see a dozen or so bodies lying in a mess inside, their original appearances almost unrecognizable.
The passage in front of the stone gate returned to its usual quietness and tidiness. The boys and girls disappeared in the blink of an eye, hiding in the dark, waiting for the next prey.
In the small room, there were seven or eight men and two gorgeously dressed women hiding, all with varying degrees of injuries. But they had no time to bandage their wounds, half of them were holding the door tightly, and the other half were trying to push the gorgeous big bed in the room to block the door.
Outside the door, there was a constant banging sound like drums, and the wooden door was shaking, as if it would collapse at any time.
"Crazy, all crazy!" An old man with gray hair wiped the sweat from his forehead and said, "How did those little bastards get out? Where are the guards of Paradise City? Where are the people from Tyrant Army? Isn't there anyone to deal with those things?"
"People outside probably don't know what's going on here yet." Another man said calmly, "As for those in the city, I'm afraid they're all dead, or they're trapped somewhere like us, waiting to die."
"What should we do now?" A tall, thin woman with messy hair and smudged makeup asked in panic, "Will they rush in?"
"Yes." The man glanced at the wooden door with a hole in it and added, "And quickly." While speaking, they were not idle either. Instead, they tried to collect the things in the room and tried to make them into weapons for counterattack.
Another woman who was twice as tall as an ordinary person and as fat as a mountain said coldly: "What's wrong with that guide? Did he deliberately bring us in to die? Was he bribed?"
The man frowned and thought for a while, then shook his head and said, "Impossible. Those kids have nothing, how can they be bribed? Moreover, even if one or two guides want to help them out of sympathy..." He pursed his lips, as if he was unhappy with this conjecture, and then said, "Aren't they afraid of the sanction of the Tyrant Army and our revenge?"
“Bang!”
The wooden door made another loud bang, revealing a hole as big as a head. Everyone could see the hateful faces of the children outside the door. The tall and thin woman screamed in fear.
They also realized at this time that blocking the door with the bed was a terrible idea. As long as the children could break open the door, they could easily jump on the bed to attack them. On the contrary, they themselves were blocked by the big bed and their way out was blocked. Therefore, they panicked for a while and shouted one after another.
“Calm down!” The calmest man shouted again. He held a chair leg in his right hand and a stone ball in his left hand. “Don’t be scared by them. They are just a bunch of skinny kids like kittens! They are just relying on their momentum. Actually, they are not as tall as us, nor as strong as us. If we really fight, they will be the ones to die!”
When everyone heard that it made sense, their morale was high and they each found a weapon and held it in their hands. But when they saw the expressions of the children on the other side of the door, they still shuddered with fear and felt weak in their hearts.
A young man with a pale face, who looked like he had indulged himself too much, suddenly asked weakly, "If these children have no fighting ability, then how did they occupy Paradise City? Where did all the original people in the city go?"
Everyone's heart suddenly tightened.
Before they could guess more, the answer appeared before them - two silver lights flew in through the top of the wooden door, like fluttering butterflies, circled around them, and flew away the same way they came.
Several people felt pain in their hands and feet. Not only could they not hold their weapons, they couldn't even stand steadily. They fell to their knees with a plop. The next moment, the wooden door broke open, and a dozen children rushed in howling.
Seven silver flying knives, transformed into the sickles of the god of death, constantly shuttled through the various entrances of Paradise City. The guides who knew nothing about what was happening in the city sent people in one after another. Those who came in with all kinds of tyrannical and cruel thoughts were soon besieged and died in pain after experiencing the same means they had used on others. Some people who were able to resist also had their hands and feet cut off by the silver light that came and went without a trace, and died miserably.
Bede was the oldest of them all, he was already twenty-four years old.
Those who are older than him, or to be more precise, those over the age of twenty, are often sent to the rooms on the ground floor as consumables because the guests' interest in them will be greatly reduced. They will then soon be tortured to death by some guests with special fetishes.
Since he was a teenager, Bede tried every means to please a great man, and finally because of his special favor, he was able to live in Paradise at the "advanced age" of 24. But that "favor" was not a pleasant experience. As they spent more time together, he felt that the other party's interest in him was becoming less and less, and the fear of dying at any time always woke him up from his sleep.
But he didn't need to think about it anymore.
This half-day experience was like a dream for all of them. After the initial confusion and bewilderment, as a stone door opened and the guide brought in a new guest, everyone seemed to have found the purpose and meaning of existence in an instant. They retaliated frantically and vented hysterically. Soon, they learned how to set traps, how to disguise the environment, how to confuse the guide outside the stone door, and how to effectively besiege and prevent the prey from escaping. Then, because Bede was the oldest, smart, rational, and comprehensive, he was pushed to the position of leader by everyone without knowing why.
He knew that this position was not an easy one to hold, but who cares? After what had happened, would the people above let them go? In that case, there didn't seem to be much difference between a miserable death and an extremely miserable death. And with him in charge, he might be able to drag a few more people down with him before he died.
But soon, Bede felt something strange.
“Bide!” A little boy named Lili ran over and shouted excitedly, “Five people were killed in District One! Three in District Two! Two in District Four! District Three had the most, a total of seven people were killed by them!”
"Are there any casualties?" asked Pedder.
"No!"
"So... has anyone seen the silver bird?"
——Silver Bird, that is the name they gave to the silver light that glided through the passage like a bird, always appearing and disappearing suddenly. They also noticed that whenever the silver light appeared, the originally difficult enemy would quickly lose its fighting power.
"The hill in District Three saw it."
"...Got it. Go back and tell everyone not to let their guard down just because of a temporary victory. Be careful and cautious. Only take action when you are absolutely sure. Don't let anyone escape." Bede ordered.
"Understood!" Lili gave a crooked military salute, turned around and ran away quickly.
Bede frowned and thought for a moment, then shouted, "Aquan!"
Soon a young man covered in blood and holding a roll of bandages ran over and asked, "Pete, what's the matter?"
Ah Quan was the best at healing among all the children, and he was also gentle, so he did not participate in their revenge. Instead, he and some younger children gathered those children who were tortured to pieces and seriously ill but had not been treated yet, and found the medicines originally stored in Paradise City to treat them. They also found a lot of food, drinking water, clothes, weapons, etc. to provide them with logistical supplies.
Bede was not optimistic about what Aquan did, because in his opinion, maybe the next moment, the fighting team of the Tyrant Army would rush in from all the passages to kill all of them, and it would be meaningless to treat the wounds at this time. But since Aquan liked to do this, he just let him do it. At the same time, compared to those companions who were blinded by the anger of revenge, Aquan was the most calm and rational one, so Bede regarded him as his assistant and was more willing to discuss anything with him.
"A Quan, I'm going to go up there ." said Bi De.
"Up there?" Ah Quan's face changed drastically, and he said, "You're crazy! There may be a guard team up there!"
The "above" they were referring to was the top floor where the controller of Paradise City, the woman known as the Black Widow, was. That woman was beautiful and vicious, and was the one they all hated and feared the most. If there was any force that threatened them in Paradise City, which was about to be wiped out, it was most likely there.
"No, I think the person who killed those people and is still helping us is probably there." Bede said, "I must go and see him."
Ah Quan was silent for a moment before he said, "What would happen if he met him? Do you still expect him to do more for us?"
"I do have this hope." Bede said, "Now we are just taking advantage of the fact that people outside may not know the situation here yet, so we can gain the upper hand temporarily. When people outside react, we will all die. The only chance of survival may be there."
Ah Quan said, "I heard from Lili that he saw that man through the crack in the door... He was so scary that he didn't even dare to look at him a second time. I don't think he will help us again. If you go find him, you're just asking for death!"
"But he killed those people," Peeta argued.
"Maybe he just has a grudge against Paradise City." Ah Quan said stubbornly, "Anyway, I don't trust any adults!"
"I don't believe it either, but I have to go. This is my last hope." Bede said, "After I leave, you take care of the others. If...if the Tyrant Army really attacks us...then commit suicide. Don't hesitate."
Ah Quan bit his lip and watched Bi De turn and leave. His lonely back had a sense of determination. He shoved the bandage in his hand to another child and chased after him, saying, "I'll go with you."
Bede's tense shoulders relaxed, and the expression on his face eased a little, but he said, "But the others..."
Ah Quan interrupted him and said, "Don't worry, we didn't survive until today because of you. When the time comes, everyone will know what to do."
Bede added: "If I am wrong, then you will die with me in advance."
There was a long silence, and then he heard Ah Quan mutter, "That's not a bad thing."
The two looked at each other, saw each other's stiff expressions and slightly trembling hands, and suddenly laughed at the same time, relaxed, and walked up the stairs side by side.
