Everyone is looking at Mu Jiashi.

“I’ll stay,” Mu Jiashi repeats himself.

Selfish makes a disdainful smirk and says with a surprised tone, “oh? I can’t believe I was right, you’re actually some selfless saint?”

Then, the man that has always been unenergetic and unmotivated raises his head, giving Selfish a stony gaze, as he makes himself clear, “in this situation, to leave this Nightmare, we have to work together. If you’re unwilling to sacrifice yourselves, then I can only sacrifice myself. At least, I have the right to decide when I’ll sacrifice myself.”

Selfish goes silent.

Scapegoat can feel a frigid chill down his spine as he realises that, Mu Jiashi isn’t just some kind, saintly figure – He isn’t. He is solely driven by risk and reward.

Right now, because neither Selfish nor himself want to sacrifice themselves, and it is not the time to abandon them for good yet, therefore, Mu Jiashi chose to sacrifice himself.

Yet, if the situation calls for it, then Scapegoat is sure that Mu Jiashi will immediately act in the most pragmatic way to maximise the gains from the situation, all in the name of the best interest for the team. He would not hesitate even if he had to betray every single one of them.

A naïve saint?

No! He’s a damned profit-driven demon that can even sell himself out if it means the greater good to him!

Scapegoat is shuddering, and is also thinking about the fact that there are all these monstrous Missiontakers in this Nightmare… Terrifying.

The Tower is a place filled with people of hidden talents——And that is not necessarily a praise; it implies there are all sorts of perverse, mad, insane people in the Tower, especially when the situation in the Tower often drives people to their limits and cause their values to change for the worse; death is no longer a deterrent or a haven.

They cannot die, so they can do whatever they want.

Scapegoat even knows a true nutcase himself – that person seeks the joy in death itself.

No matter what Nightmare they were together in, if they ended up with that nutcase, then the Missiontakers will have to wait until that person has had enough thrilling deaths, namely by experiencing all the possible ways to die in the Nightmare, before they can actually try to resolve it.

They’ll already have restarted the Nightmare several times by that point, and the difficulty of it would have risen sharply.

Though strangely enough, though the nutcase always seeks the thrill of death in those Nightmares, yet each and every time they at least achieve a Normal End, and even sometimes secure a True End.

Because of that, some Missiontakers who are truly desperate for a chance to ascend to a higher floor, would actually seek out the nutcase to join whatever Nightmare the person ends up in.

Though people like that nutcase are really the minority here. People that are merely weirdos——Are infinitely more common.

In any case, Scapegoat really is feeling under the weather by now.

He has never seen this man before; Mu Jiashi has an unremarkable appearance and was apathetic and self-loathing the entire time, calling himself a piece of trash and a loser, and yet, his ruthless attitude and behaviour means Scapegoat could never afford to underestimate him.

Selfish, meanwhile, couldn’t care less, and heads directly for the closest vehicle nearby.

Mu Jiashi is standing at the exit of the corridor. He turns his head around to look at the man in black; this time, they ran away more quickly, and so the man is still about two hundred metres or so behind them. He’ll be here in at least thirty seconds.

While he has the big machete in his hand, ‘chasing’ them, but he is moving at a sluggish pace.

Mu Jiashi is dissing inside, but then glances back at the Missiontakers and can’t help but mention, “I suggest that car closer to the road… never mind, just choose whatever you want.”

He suddenly loses motivation in the middle of speaking again.

Though Selfish and Scapegoat listened and headed for the car further away. In the car, Scapegoat honks and pokes his head out of the window to ask loudly, “dalao?”

Lin Qin hasn’t boarded yet.

He is leaning lazily by the wall on the right side of the exit to the corridor, saying, “I’ll stay here; leave me be.”

Mu Jiashi almost looks moved.

Lin Qin doesn’t even so much as lift his head to say, “not for your sake.”

Mu Jiashi “…”

His mood sinks back down immediately.

Lin Qin rubs his chin as he recalls what happened right in the final moments of the last run.

During all the chaos, gore and noise, Laosan and Mu Jiashi quickly finalised their cooperation, but Ding Yi also quickly approached Lin Qin.

That was also a factor that made Lin Qin unable to stop the man in black from killing someone in the end, otherwise, given his mood, he might have helped moved them out of harm’s way.

The woman with the grue hair walked to his side to quietly whisper, “dalao, please help out a little.”

Lin Qin ignored her at that point.

Ding Yi did not seem discouraged, when she continued, “I am aware that you are searching for drinks recently…”

Lin Qin furrowed his brow to look up at her with a cold gaze.

“I am a Necessities Merchant,” Ding Yi was perhaps aware that Lin Qin would not physically hurt someone no matter what, so she wasn’t deterred, explaining, “I could provide you with a shipment of the drinks you want. They are already packed up in a certain empty house in the Tower. If you help stop the man in black the next run of the Nightmare, I would tell you where that house is.”

Unoccupied houses are open to anyone in the Tower, though most people aren’t in the mood to acquire any, outside of Necessities Merchants like Ding Yi.

Lin Qin thought about it for a second before agreeing and also adding, “just this once.”

He did happen to be looking for drinks, for the sole purpose of trying to get Xü Beijin to fight him. He collected them openly without keeping anything under wraps, so naturally, well-connected Merchants like Ding Yi would learn of that news.

Still, it is an invasion of privacy, so he is slightly annoyed.

Therefore, despite Ding Yi offering him drinks for practically nothing in return, he is not at all friendlier towards her.

He saw it as her way of making it up to him; an equivalent exchange.

Merchants being Merchants, even if Ding Yi is taciturn and introverted in the Tower, she still possesses certain qualities.

And it has to be said that Ding Yi’s information network and her use of the information were intriguing.

Nowadays, Missiontakers like Ding Yi, who has managed to forge her own empire in the Tower through her efforts, rarely enter Nightmares anymore.

In fact, that was why Mu Jiashi was surprised to see her in the first place.

The reason is that they now value their lives and the faction they have built up. If they did end up losing themselves forever in a Collapsed Nightmare, all that work would have been for naught.

The Tower never forces any Missiontaker to go into a Nightmare, so many Necessities Merchants would, of course, stay inside the Tower and not visit Nightmares barring extraordinary circumstances, and that applies to Ding Yi as well.

She hasn’t entered a Nightmare for nigh-on three years now, and the fact that she chose to enter this one, should mean she has prepared herself to the bone; even if she wasn’t able to achieve a True End, she should at least have means to guarantee her safely leaving the Nightmare in the end.

Mu Jiashi didn’t know what the guarantee was.

Meanwhile, right now, seeing Lin Qin staying at the entrance of the corridor, the curious Mu Jiashi asks, “dalao, why did you stay?”

Lin Qin gives him an idle peek, but still answers, “that Necessities Merchant promised to give me drinks for free. In exchange, I’ll stay here.”

Mu Jiashi has figured out Ding Yi’s guarantee by now.

It’s Lin Qin. And not just because Lin Qin is here, either, but because, Ding Yi has acquired information——Information that can influence even Lin Qin. Even if it was a method that would only work once, and even if she may very well anger Lin Qin, Ding Yi still had to gamble.

Perhaps…

Is Ding Yi genuinely disinterested in ascending to a higher floor? No. Of course not. No normal person would be.

She could always look for the Golddiggers, but that is not a foolproof course of action either. Even the most famous of Golddiggers could still fail.

And the one and only Mu Jiashi who had maintained a 100% track record was on the higher floors, as far as she knew.

Thus, Ding Yi still decided to seize the opportunity and gamble on Lin Qin.

As for the ‘seized opportunity’ known as Lin Qin, what he would feel about that…

Right, he’s not happy about it, at least.

Nor is he ever really happy, in any case. Like right now, he is more preoccupied with wondering whether the drinks Ding Yi has prepared would be enough to persuade Xü Beijin to fight him seriously for once.

If it could, then all is well; Lin Qin is not one to mind using his martial prowess to help out a little.

That’s how he has been all these years in the Tower. He pays no mind to whoever it was that received his help every now and then, but many of them probably remembered the favour——Assuming they haven’t succumbed to any Nightmares yet.

This was a part of how even someone behaving as strangely as Lin Qin could still live carefree in the Tower and to be crowned the ‘dalao’ by all the Missiontakers. Otherwise, not everyone would have just stood by watching him idly hanging out about the different Nightmares.

Many a Missiontaker have a sliver of hope that, somehow, one day, Lin Qin would suddenly ‘activate’ and save them all from the Nightmares, you see. Even people like Ding Yi would think this way.

While Lin Qin looks to have agreed to Ding Yi’s deal, though if even those drinks aren’t enough to make Xü Beijin agree to fight him…

Well, Lin Qin would never go back on his word; he will deal with the man in black, alright, but Ding Yi would not exactly look good in Lin Qin’s eyes anymore, either.

All this is to say that, Xü Beijin is the crux of everything right now.

And the person in question himself…

Xü Beijin, he…

He…

Xü Beijin “…”

Wait, what?!

What did Lin Qin just say?!

The Necessities Merchant agreed to provide drinks, so Lin Qin is helping out in this Nightmare?

Ｄ・Ｒ・Ｉ・Ｎ・Ｋ・Ｓ?!

Xü Beijin is sitting stone-faced behind the bookstore counter, seriously pondering a question.

If, he did brawl with Lin Qin in a Nightmare, then, he probably, could revive… couldn’t he?

It just feels like it would hurt. Bad.

But… How should he say it? What Lin Qin is doing is actually really troubling him.

Xü Beijin heaves a weary sigh, trying to ignore all the friendly teases from the viewers in the stream. He could just about picture those comments, but hopefully they won’t start to fantasise about the relationship between him and Lin Qin.

He chooses to see no evil.

With his mood now souring, he feels like eating the soft candies Dai Wu gave him, but he only remembers when he is going through his pockets, that the Nightmare has restarted, and so the free candies have been ‘respawned.’

Xü Beijin “…”

He sits there quietly, yawning, bored with living already.

So sleepy…

Then he decides to try to energise himself a little. He pokes his head out above the counter to look at the water dispenser in a corner of the bookstore, and grabs some warm water from there. He takes some sips as he returns to the counter, when his casual glance notices something, and he stops.

“Eh? This is…”

He has actually kept what Dai Wu said in mind, that there were clues about the Nightmare in the bookstore.

Though he didn’t find any when he was back. Until now, that is.

Xü Beijin puts his cup of water onto the counter and extends his hand to grab a newspaper from the shelf below the counter.