Not long ago, Wen Xishu felt the interview assessment at Three Towers Company was dragging on for too long and it was making him a bit tired.
So he thought about going back to the bunker to get some rest, but once he returned to the bunker, his craving for the Towers flared up again.
So he thought of this—if he’d been climbing the Deceit Tower too much, then he’d go to the Slaughter Tower to relax a bit. That way he could relieve both tower fatigue and tower addiction. Perfect.
Wen Xishu began staring at that letter in his inventory.
The stationery itself had no content, just an envelope that could not be opened.
The letter counted as a kind of item. Once you carried it, you would recognize Tang Rui even if her face changed beyond all recognition. At the same time, it massively increased the likelihood of running into Tang Rui.
And it was also a key item for unlocking Tang Rui’s advancement quest.
Previously, whenever Wen Xishu entered the Slaughter Tower, he had never brought this letter, but this time he decided to take it along and see.
Wen Xishu had a very particular impression of Tang Rui.
What he said at the Heart Inquiry checkpoint wasn’t empty talk. Among all the people he most longed to see again, the ones he had once saved, Tang Rui really did rank first.
Maybe it was because of those truth-or-drink glasses on that rainy night, maybe it just so happened that his Spiritual Bullet Screen ran into her when she was overwhelmed with mixed emotions.
It was as if he had lived through Tang Rui’s whole life.
That kind of empathy made him feel that this girl was someone just like him.
"Tang Rui, I hope my luck’s good enough that I can run into you again."
Wen Xishu was really looking forward to meeting Tang Rui, but he didn’t enter the Slaughter Tower right away; he was waiting to go together with the old headmaster.
...
...
Three Towers Academy, principal’s office.
Albert had received a sketch from the Academy Spirit. It showed what Hujiang’s number one monster, Yellow Springs, looked like.
Xun Hui happened to be in the principal’s office as well and also heard what the Academy Spirit said to the old headmaster.
"Let me try? With that kind of monster, it doesn’t feel like it needs you to make a move." Xun Hui volunteered, Login Device already in hand.
Albert shook his head:
"No, I’ll go first. If I think it’s fine, you can figure out a way to go after."
"This Yellow Springs... I think I’ve seen it. It’s not a monster from the low floors. Maybe it was on the eighties? Or the nineties?"
The eighties or nineties?
Xun Hui was a bit surprised. He wasn’t surprised by the monster’s floor; after all, the old man could definitely beat it.
What surprised him was how Wen Xishu’s experiences in the Deceit Tower were tied to a monster from such a high floor.
"Thanks for passing the message. Go back and tell Dean Wen I’m about to head to the Slaughter Tower. I think he should be going to the Slaughter Tower at the same time point as me. I’ll go find him right away."
At first Xun Hui didn’t really understand this sentence and was wondering if the old man was planning to take Wen Xishu into the Slaughter Tower with him.
But very soon, he seemed to catch on.
Killing a monster in the Slaughter Tower meant nothing; at most it was just practice, a way to farm some experience points.
Since Wen Xishu had gone out of his way to have the Academy Spirit convey his intention to kill Yellow Springs, it clearly wasn’t for practice.
After all, the old man’s grinding zones would only give even more experience.
So Xun Hui understood: Wen Xishu wanted the old man to complete a "Tower-Exit Kill."
A Tower-Exit Kill would sever Yellow Springs’ opportunities and fortune in the real world.
But Tower-Exit Kills were very hard to pull off. At present only Wen Xishu had managed to grasp a bit of the trick.
The Academy Spirit nodded, then left the principal’s office and headed toward Deceit Tower Academy.
Before long, Albert also left the office.
...
...
Slaughter Tower battlefield, Hujiang.
Zone 04.
Zone 04’s Ginza district had once been the most prosperous area of Hujiang.
But now, the buildings here had all been ravaged by various monsters. Many nightclubs and luxury hotels were in ruins.
Albert spent several hours using Fist Force to shatter space, constantly teleporting before finally crossing the ocean and several cities to reach Hujiang.
Hujiang was huge, and most of the monsters here looked bizarre.
Some were the size of buses but had eight legs. Some had a radio growing out of their heads that kept broadcasting sound. There were even deformed creatures that seemed to come from the deep sea, looking like fish-men.
Several zones of Hujiang were putting on a full-scale exhibition of deformed lifeforms.
Albert, however, didn’t care much.
He simply kept asking along the way, holding up the sketch and asking.
Of course, the vast majority of monsters in the Slaughter Tower didn’t share a language with humans, so when Albert couldn’t get an answer, he’d casually send them off to the afterlife.
Like a god of slaughter, he cut his way all the way from Zone 09 to Zone 04.
He crossed several zones, triggering multiple waves of group monster stampedes.
Until not long after, on Ginza Street in Zone 04—this street that had once been the most prosperous in Hujiang...
He ran into the monster from the sketch.
Yellow Springs.
This was a being wearing a yaksha demon mask, dressed in something like a straw raincoat, with a head of white hair, sharp ears, and a pair of enormous wings growing from its back.
Its weapon was a chain. The whole figure looked like a statue. Only in the two eyeholes of the yaksha mask could one see the life and violence in its gaze.
Albert vaguely remembered that during his tower climbs, he had been here before.
He had killed quite a few monsters with one punch. By rights, Yellow Springs should have been among them.
"I hear you make a big splash in the future. Is your fortune that overwhelming, and killing you once isn’t enough?"
"Or did you somehow dodge my fist?"
Albert put away the sketch, rolled up his sleeves, and clenched his five fingers into a fist.
Yellow Springs’ eyes lit up with a deep gray light. Its wings spread as it floated into the air, looking down on Albert from above.
Albert sneered:
"Quite arrogant, aren’t you. But you’re flying way too high."
Albert didn’t waste any more words. In his view, this showdown was purely a favor he was doing for someone—a one-punch-and-clock-out kind of fight.