Chapter 128 The Singer, Oh, Singer 61

Yes, this was Lin Xiangjun's goal.

How many NPCs were in the entire residential complex? Even if she hacked away until her blade dulled, she couldn't kill them all.

Besides, there was so much free labor here; it would be a waste not to use it.

The fervor in their eyes faded by half. They exchanged glances, each seeing doubt and hesitation in the other's eyes.

"Sister Lin, are you sure this method of clearing the instance is real? There are so many people in Xieyou Alley…"

"If there weren't many people and the difficulty wasn't high, how could it be considered an S-rank clearance? This is a three-star instance. A two-star instance already rewards three hundred, so how could a three-star instance be anything less than eight or nine hundred? Is that kind of money really that easy to get? Plus, an S-rank clearance also comes with items. How could it be possible to get items and underworld currency just by working easily?"

That did make sense.

However, their doubts did not completely fade.

After all, there were forty buildings in Xieyou Alley. Even if the occupancy rate was as low as thirty percent, with twenty-four floors per building, fifteen households per floor, and one person per household, there were four thousand three hundred people in the entire alley!

There were only five of them.

Five people surrounding four thousand?

Do you think this is some Indian self-defense counterattack where we have five people against two thousand, and the advantage is with us? Just start fighting?

Seeing their hesitant expressions, as if they didn't want to comply with her decision, Lin Xiangjun decided to fan the flames a bit more.

"It's already the third day, more than half of the short time has passed. Everyone here has a significant amount of contamination. Based on the current level of contamination, in just two more days, we will all enter the category of severe contamination. By then, even if you want to regret it, you won't have the strength to."

Zhang Zhendong was already numb inside.

Zhang Zhendong was the most intelligent and quick-witted among them. If he couldn't see by now that Lin Xiangjun was using coercion and inducement—seemingly offering two choices, but actually leaving only one path of slaughtering NPCs—then he would have wasted all those instances he'd cleared and all those high scores he'd earned in the college entrance exam.

But did he have any other choice besides obeying Lin Xiangjun?

Watching Lin Xiangjun's gentle expression, while the knife in her right hand never wavered, Zhang Zhendong smiled bitterly to himself but still took the initiative to respond: "Sister Lin, what do you mean by everyone being severely contaminated?"

Lin Xiangjun was quite satisfied with his compliance.

"To tell you the truth, I have a few rules in my hand. I used some methods to determine the correctness of these rules, and thus learned some very unfortunate news—"

"In the instance, black umbrellas must always be kept open and never closed, otherwise everyone will be contaminated. This contamination from the umbrellas deepens over time. Our contamination isn't heavy yet, but in a few days, it's hard to say."

"Then we can just open our umbrellas…"

Before Zhang Minxian could speak, Zhang Zhendong had already retorted: "We can open our umbrellas to avoid this rule, but what about other rules we don't know about?"

Cheng Shengtian looked at Lin Xiangjun with pleading eyes.

"Sister Lin, you're so capable, you should be able to find all the rules, right?"

Lin Xiangjun spread her hands helplessly: "Unfortunately not."

Unable to find all the rules, although they opened their umbrellas, the others were constantly worried about whether there were other rules they didn't know about that were continuing to contaminate them.

In the end, they decided to take a gamble.

Challenge the S-rank clearance.

Lin Xiangjun's goal was achieved. She finally coughed twice, relaxing her dry and sore throat.

"By the way, that person who was with Tiger Wang before, the one named Li something, why don't I see him?"

"Li Zhendong?" The underling thought for a moment. "I think I saw him this morning and talked to him for a while. After that, we split up to ask the residents about Hu Zhengzheng's life. He probably went to the buildings further back."

Speaking of which, Zhang Zhendong just remembered him.

"We agreed to come back at five to exchange clues, but he never returned. He probably…"

Probably died somewhere after unknowingly breaking some rule.

In an instance, countless people die for no apparent reason.

After all, they were companions clearing the instance together. Even if their relationship wasn't great, losing a companion's life was still very disheartening.

No one knew if they would end up the same way one day, dying inexplicably in an instance without even leaving a corpse behind.

Lin Xiangjun's peripheral vision was fixed on the Supermarket Owner.

Seeing a flash of guilt quickly cross his eyes, she understood in her heart.

As expected…

"So, let's divide the work." Lin Xiangjun clapped her hands, drawing everyone's attention to her.

There were five people alive now: Lin Xiangjun, Zhang Zhendong, Cheng Shengtian, He Jie Yu, and Li Yapeng (Zhang Zhendong's underling).

Lin Xiangjun was responsible for 1-8, Li Yapeng for 9-16, He Jie Yu for 17-24, Zhang Zhendong for 25-32, and Cheng Shengtian for 33-40.

The work was actually not as much as they had imagined.

Perhaps Hu Zhengzheng had done a thorough job clearing it out; the occupancy rate in the residential complex was frighteningly low, with the number of households in a single building actually being in the single digits.

Although some of them tried to use the same trick to lure Lin Xiangjun to their homes for a meal, Lin Xiangjun, already equipped with 【Sakamoto Ryota's Glasses (Replica)】, was well-prepared and completely unafraid of any contamination.

That night, Zhang Zhendong invited Hu Zhengzheng to sleep in the same room as them.

After all, there were only these five living people left in the instance, so it would be safer to live together.

Lin Xiangjun did not agree. After leaving them a few flowers of the corresponding colors, she returned to her own home.

When she returned home, the Landlady had moved a stool and was sitting at the doorway. Her complexion looked terrible, and her expression was filled with undisguisable panic and exhaustion.

When she saw Lin Xiangjun, she "leaped" up from the stool.

Lin Xiangjun acted as if she didn't see her complexion and still greeted her with a smile.

"Grandma Lin, good evening. Why are you sitting in the hallway? Isn't it cold?"

The Landlady squeezed out a somewhat awkward smile.

"Xiao Lin, back so late?"

"It's for a living; one always has to work."

The Old Lady rubbed her hands together, seemingly having made up her mind: "Xiao Lin, you know, don't you?"

Lin Xiangjun asked back with a smile: "Know what?"

Know what?

Know that this afternoon, the screaming in Xieyou Alley never stopped.

All day today, the screaming in Xieyou Alley hadn't stopped. She was all too familiar with those voices; they were all neighbors and friends who had lived here for many years.

One by one, continuously.

All gone.

When would it be her turn? When would it be her son's and grandson's turn?

"…I have a good-for-nothing grandson. He did some wrong things when he was young, but he later realized his mistakes."

"Can you… let him go?"

Lin Xiangjun found it somewhat amusing.

"Grandma, I'm not his creditor. How can we talk about forgiveness?"

The Old Lady didn't show any look of guilt.

She just sighed and said gloomily:

"Even if you kill everyone in the entire alley, you still won't be able to leave this place. You all guessed wrong."