EM CH38

Chapter 38: Speedrun

Yu An accepted the USB flash drive: “I have no problem with it, though I’m not sure if that streamer in charge of drawing traffic is willing to play this.”

Zhao Ran answered lightly: “He is required to cooperate with the investigation. I’ve already sent people over to protect him.”

At that exact moment, a knock sounded at Huang Qi’s front door.

Standing outside were a man and a woman, both wearing Underground Railway Emergency Order Team badges and uniforms. Xiao An, the girl with a plaid silk scarf tied around her neck, bowed slightly: “Hello, Mr. Huang. We are operatives dispatched by Mr. Zhao to ensure your safety. Here are our credentials.”

Subordinate Xiao Qi stood aloof beside her, handing over a USB flash drive in an unquestionable tone: “Play this next.”

Seeing the label on the flash drive, Huang Qi’s heart tightened. Grey Crow: Dollhouse, the new title his company was busy promoting for its upcoming launch. He had nearly been disfigured because of this cursed game; having originally sworn never to touch it again, he hadn’t expected to be unable to escape it after all.

Sometimes while playing this game, you would hear knocking at your door. He had asked the company’s internal programmers, and every single one insisted it wasn’t a bug.

Colleagues whispered privately that the game was haunted. Just how haunted it was, Huang Qi had experienced firsthand.

“Can you guys actually protect me?” Huang Qi remained half-convinced. “If any danger pops up during the stream, I can shut down the PC immediately, right? You can’t force me to keep playing, can you?”

Smiling lightly, Xiao An waved a hand: “If any anomaly occurs, you may evacuate immediately and leave us in the room to handle the emergency. We will definitely not let you get hurt—that is our duty at Underground Railway, so rest assured.”

Hesitantly taking the USB drive, Huang Qi returned to his computer. After confirming the two Underground Railway operatives had tucked themselves into the camera’s blind spot, he put on a bright, breezy smile for his viewers: “I’m back, friends! I just got my hands on a demo build of our company’s upcoming release, Grey Crow: Dollhouse. Word is they added several new scenarios, so as an insider player, I get to check it out early.”

Many viewers were eagerly anticipating Grey Crow’s new title. Long ago, the company had released an earlier demo featuring only a single Central European sorcerer-themed stage called Plague Village. Plenty of players had tried it and praised the environmental details and gameplay design, claiming Grey Crow: Dollhouse had the potential to become a masterpiece. For unknown reasons, that demo had been temporarily pulled, so perhaps debugging was finally finished and the general public would get to play it soon.

“I’ve played through the Plague Village stage before, though some new viewers probably haven’t seen it. We’ll start a fresh save file from scratch this time. Plus, with Coal Blackie here today, we can play co-op. I suspect he runs a technical playstyle—anyone wanting to watch Coal Blackie’s POV can click the link below the screen!”

With the two Underground Railway operatives standing in the corner watching him like hawks, Huang Qi could only work twice as hard to funnel viewers toward Coal Blackie per company orders, before messaging him on his phone to coach him on audience interaction:

“Read questions from the bullet chat out loud every now and then and answer them. Say a few more sentences! The cold, aloof persona won’t carry you far!”

Coal Blackie: “Fine.”

The fact that Zhao Ran had dispatched both his squad’s lucky mascot and his strongest fighter to guard Huang Qi was proof enough that the Aberrant they faced this time was no pushover—far more formidable than the goat-headed man at Guxian Hospital or the surgeons at the beauty salon.

“You gave him two bodyguards—what about me?” Yu An crouched in the swivel chair, hugging his knees.

Sitting on the edge of the bed with his legs crossed and head propped on his hand, Zhao Ran laughed: “You’re left with just me to make do with.”

“Works.” Resting his chin on his knees, Yu An lifted his eyelashes. “I can make do with you.”

His phone vibrated incessantly with incoming texts. Glancing at the messages, Yu An silently launched the newly installed Grey Crow: Dollhouse and selected two-player co-op mode.

“What did he say?”

“Told me to interact more with the viewers—read questions from chat and answer them.”

“Just treat it like answering a teacher’s questions in class. Don’t be nervous.”

“Oh.”

Lowering his gaze to steel his nerves for a moment, Yu An stiffly unmuted his mic and mechanically read out questions from the bullet chat: “Why doesn’t the streamer show his face… Because I’m ugly.”

“How old is the streamer… Born in ’99.”

“Does the streamer game full-time? No… It’s an assignment from my boss.”

“Because the boss is stingy and wants to split one person into three. I wanted to resign, but my superior keeps gaslighting me, threatening me with an indifferent attitude… mmph, mmph…”

A hand darted over and slapped itself across Yu An’s mouth.

With Kaopu pressed over Yu An’s lips, Zhao Ran gestured frantically from the side: “Cut the useless chatter! Talk about the game! Narrate whatever you plan to do, just pretend you’re teaching me how to play.”

Yu An merely suffered from social anxiety; he wasn’t actually a man of few words. Once he tuned out the fact that the viewers across the screen were living, breathing people, all that existed around him was Zhao Ran and the text scrolling across his monitor.

Meanwhile, Huang Qi joined the co-op lobby, and the pair entered character selection. The same three classes remained: Pumpkinhead Warrior, Fierce Witch, and Potion Master.

Using in-game voice chat, Huang Qi narrated for the audience: “Fierce Witch is the strongest class here—essentially a battle mage. Her staff casts spells and can also bash enemies directly at melee range for absurdly high damage. Best pick for beginners; even if you get swarmed and lack mechanics, you can brainlessly hack your way out.”

“I barely touch Potion Master. It’s a support class that gathers ingredients to brew potions, though clearing solo feels impossible—or maybe I just don’t know how to play it.”

“Pumpkinhead Warrior has the steepest learning curve and relies heavily on mechanics. Clumsy players picking him will straight-up tilt themselves into depression, because his signature weapon is the Noble Flintlock. Ammo drops across an entire run are super scarce, you have to reload after every two shots, and while bullet damage is massive, the hitbox detection is unforgivingly strict—miss by a hair and it counts as a whiff.”

Without a word, Coal Blackie locked in Pumpkinhead Warrior immediately.

Huang Qi let out a dry chuckle: “Pretty rebellious, aren’t you? Have you played this stage before?”

Coal Blackie answered truthfully: “Played it, though I didn’t explore much of the map. I did a speedrun and skipped all the lore.”

Every gamer chased a different thrill: some enjoyed leisurely combing every corner of a map to collect achievements and lore items, while others relished the rush of toppling bosses in record time. Yu An fell squarely into the latter camp, dedicated to exploiting every glitch a game had to offer.

“Awesome, then follow my lead through the main storyline. I haven’t tried co-op mode yet either, so the difficulty should scale up.” Huang Qi locked in Fierce Witch, and the pair loaded into the stage.

The co-op intro cutscene had been tweaked: the Fierce Witch strode forward with her staff slung over her shoulder, while the perpetually downtrodden Pumpkinhead youth dangled by the back of his collar from the tip of her staff, bouncing up and down with every step.

The two awakened inside the gloomy village. No wonder Fierce Witch was hailed as beginner-friendly—she spawned right in with her gem-encrusted staff, whereas Pumpkinhead Warrior dropped in empty-handed and had to scavenge gear.

Yu An casually picked up a [Worn Woodcutter’s Cleaver] to serve as self-defense until acquiring his signature weapon.

The true charm of this game lay in exploration. Acquiring a signature weapon wasn’t strictly mandatory to clear a run; if a player had the patience, they could spend hours gathering materials to upgrade a [Worn Woodcutter’s Cleaver] until its stacked damage cleaved off half a boss’s health bar in a single swing.

The pair roamed through the pitch-black village. Most cottages had their doors and windows barred tight, guarded outside by watchdogs. The moment a player stepped into aggro range, the hounds lunged forward with gaping, bloody maws.

These starter mobs were called [Mad Dogs], designed to let players get a feel for the controls.

At first there was only one, but a short distance further, five pounced simultaneously. Swinging his cleaver, Yu An slashed a hound mid-leap, knocking it to the dirt. As it scrambled back up in relentless pursuit, Yu An stepped back nimbly and delivered two more slashes before the [Mad Dog] finally collapsed.

Huang Qi’s witch, however, needed only a single sweep of her staff to one-shot a [Mad Dog]; her raw damage was undeniably high.

Yu An looted a [Mad Dog Fang], which could be socketed onto the cleaver’s hilt for +3 Attack.

Not far ahead, over a dozen villagers stood huddled in a circle with their heads pressed together, whispering in an eerie posture.

Drawing closer, their hushed murmurs grew distinct.

“That outsider looks strange; we cannot let him inside.”

“Agreed, he appears afflicted with a contagion. If we let him in, all of us might get infected.”

In the direction the villagers kept stealing glances toward, beyond the village’s wooden palisade, stood a gaunt, sallow-faced beggar gripping the fence posts with skeletal hands. His eye sockets were deeply sunken, his skin drained of nearly all color, twitching spasmodically like a zombie on the verge of turning—any fool could tell something was wrong with him.

Having played the main storyline before, Huang Qi knew that a bleeding-heart NPC would shortly step forward to persuade everyone to let the beggar inside. Once admitted, the beggar’s illness would flare up, transforming him into the stage’s first mini-boss, [Sickly Traveler]. He was a nightmare for beginners: once reduced to half health, he would thrash on the ground howling, aggroing every [Mad Dog] across the entire village. Forced to fend off the beggar with crude weapons while watching out for hounds lunging from blind spots, most newcomers panicked and wiped four or five times before clearing him.

Sure enough, a righteous young man stepped out from among the villagers, pleading earnestly: “He is merely a pitiful passerby. Take him in—our mercy is bound to bring good fortune.”

Just as the villagers wavered toward agreement, the Pumpkinhead Warrior abruptly leaped out and, without a word of explanation, buried his cleaver straight into the righteous youth’s skull.

The youth dropped dead on the spot, sprawling in a pool of blood. Because the gate remained unopened, the mini-boss [Sickly Traveler] never triggered.

Question marks flooded the bullet chat.

“This game is so well designed,” Yu An sighed to himself. “Characters like that in movies always make me want to hack them to death in one swing.”

Huang Qi blinked in shock—you could actually do that?

As it happened, someone in chat had pulled the exact same stunt before and chimed in: “That righteous youth is Priestess Yiman’s son. If you kill him here, the mini-boss Priestess Yiman goes berserk later on and becomes insanely hard to beat.”

Yet upon being slain, the righteous youth actually dropped an item—the Noble Flintlock, Pumpkinhead Warrior’s signature weapon.

“This gun is normally supposed to be looted near the charred corpse on the altar,” Yu An muttered softly, picking up the Noble Flintlock, which came loaded with two rounds plus four spare bullets.

Viewers spammed the chat in frantic warning: “DON’T PICK UP THE GUN!! Grabbing it triggers Priestess Yiman right now!”

The villagers scattered in sheer terror. Instantly, wooden ground spikes erupted across every exit path, sealing off all escape routes as a glowing heptagram sigil flared across the ground beneath their feet. At the far end of the light, an elderly woman draped in black priestly robes with a strip of black cloth bound across her eyes stepped slowly into view.

Her silhouette flickered like a phantom, teleporting endlessly across the open plaza—now inches from the players, now vanishing into the distance—murmuring hoarsely: “You murdered him… and exposed his secret before the crowd. Then let the flames of the altar interrogate your sins.”

Exposing his secret—did that refer to the firearm dropped by the righteous youth?

The old woman’s teleportation accelerated abruptly, lingering in one spot for barely a fraction of a second before vanishing, materializing unpredictably behind Huang Qi’s witch. Raising the pendant at her chest, she rasped in an aged voice: “Repent, child.”

A ring of heptagram runes flared beneath the witch’s feet, flames roaring upward from the light. Startled out of his wits, Huang Qi dodged frantically, yet the area of effect was massive; even as he swung his staff in counterattack, the fire scorched him hard, instantly chunking off half his health bar.

Following the intended storyline progression, Priestess Yiman was meant to be a mid-to-late-game boss, encountered once players possessed refined gear and thicker health pools rather than being caught virtually defenseless like this.

After activating the sigil, the old woman vanished from her spot, reappearing far away from the players. Chanting an incantation, the earth began to tremor as jagged ground spikes erupted upward, tracking the players’ footsteps.

Fortunately, Huang Qi possessed solid mechanics and awareness, leaping and dashing across the plaza to evade the ambushing spikes.

“Brother Coal, you totally griefed me! You killed her son!” Sprinting away from erupting spikes while occasionally eating point-blank bursts from the old woman, Huang Qi could only dodge while searching for an opening.

Eyes locked intently on the monitor, Yu An observed Priestess Yiman’s attack patterns while evading: “She only teleports back and forth between the fourteen intersection points of the heptagram on the ground. Plus, she rotates clockwise first, then counterclockwise—you can predict the exact spot she’ll appear next.”

“She’s way too fast! Even if I predict it, I can’t close the distance!”

Bang! A gunshot rang out.

Struck squarely between the brows, the old woman’s eyes rolled white, her arms dropping limp as she froze in a stun.

Smoke curled from the barrel of Yu An’s Noble Flintlock as he issued a crisp command: “Bash her.”

“Holy crap, what a shot!” Piloting his witch right up to her, Huang Qi swung his staff furiously, unleashing a barrage of heavy hits.

Stunned for barely two seconds, the old woman regained mobility, vanishing abruptly as ground spikes erupted across the plaza once more.

Yu An spoke flatly: “Got the timing down. Let’s speedrun this.”

As his words fell, another gunshot cracked. The exact millisecond the old woman materialized from her teleport, a bullet struck her cranium, locking her in hit-stun. Gradually syncing with Yu An’s rhythm, Huang Qi charged in the instant she staggered, smashing her relentlessly with his staff. The split second her stun began wearing off, Yu An had already finished reloading and fired again, pinning the old woman in place so she couldn’t even teleport.

Six flintlock rounds in total—not a single shot missed, each timed to the absolute razor’s edge to chain-stun the old woman in place, allowing Huang Qi’s witch to stand practically still and pummel the boss nonstop.

With one final sweep of the staff, blood streamed from Priestess Yiman’s blindfolded eyes. Her black robes erupted into raging flames, finally dissolving on the spot into black smoke absorbed by the heptagram beneath her. As the glow faded, a line of text materialized across the screen: Those who judge others by fire shall themselves be judged by fire.

Under Yu An’s surgical crowd control, two characters less than ten minutes into a fresh save had ground down a berserk mid-game boss, Priestess Yiman, to death.

The bullet chat flipped instantly from walls of question marks to frantic praise.

Watching his stream’s popularity metrics climb steadily, Huang Qi knew the company was taking advantage of the hype to boost their front-page exposure.

Yu An leaned back against his chair to rest his eyes. Having only his right eye functional meant staring at a monitor grew exhausting quickly.

Knock, knock.

Someone seemed to be knocking at the door.