IWOL Chapter 171: SCP-3008

The light coming through the window was already very dim, glowing with a warm yellow color. In a while, the first night in the arena would officially arrive.

The large lights hanging on the steel frame weren’t turned on, and so the dim lights in the factory weren’t conducive to fighting. However, it was good for sleeping.

As soon as Cui Zuojing closed his eyes, he heard another deafening sound come from below. Even the steel frame trembled slightly. Annoyed, he frowned and opened his eyes, displeased. 

The reasons why he chose to cultivate health and rest here was entirely because the noises from the conveyor belt here weren’t as loud as the machines in other areas. Now, this benefit was entirely gone. 

The three people below were still fighting. The young man, who was the “hunted” party, didn’t seem to be the opponent of the other man and woman, and they circled around him.

Forget it. Just observe these people’s strengths and use it to advise Dong Zheng.

Cui Zuojing was in an excellent position above; he could see everything. He observed the scene below like he was watching a movie. He even named the young man in hiding A, the man who was chasing B, and the woman C.

B seemed to be able to control gravity and had been manipulating the parts on the belt and making them fly towards A, launching a long-range attack. Cui Zuojing heard the loud banging sounds of nuts hitting machinery. Meanwhile, C was holding two short swords and chasing after A. She and B cooperated skillfully, and although she was chasing closely after A, none of the flying parts hurt her. 

Were two teammates assigned to the same arena?

A dodged awkwardly, clumsily weaving left and right. But he wasn’t hit. Several attacking parts barely skimmed passed his body, leaving a thin line of blood on his skin and making people marvel as his heaven-defying luck.

Cui Zuojing observed the three people circling the dozen conveyor belts below, and the corners of his lips slowly lifted.

A little something. (1)

The sky was getting darker and darker. Soon, even the last ray of sunlight disappeared. Other than the indicator lights on the machines and the safety exit signs posted on the walls, the entire factory had no other light source. 

At this moment–

A daggered pierced the woman’s left chest from the back. A grabbed the back collar of her dress and pulled the woman forward as a human shield, blocking a lot of the parts coming from B’s attack.

“Xiao Wen!” B glared angrily, roaring in shock. The parts slammed into C, immediately smashing her head and making it bleed profusely. The woman had already been stabbed in the heart and so it was difficult for her to make any sounds at all. She stared in disbelief, and blood poured out from her mouth. A few seconds later, A’s hands loosened, and the woman’s body fell heavily to the floor.

No one could see how A moved from in front of C to behind her in the blink of an eye, except for Cui Zuojing. 

This ability was interesting.

It actively reduced his sense of existence so that his attacker would lose sight of him for a short period of time. For these two people, the young man’s sudden disappearance resulted in their eyes wandering, and this half-second of “wandering” was enough to kill one of them in battle.

A panted heavily. He wiped the blood on his face, stared at the man, and said through gritted teeth, “You started it first, so don’t blame me for being impolite!”

“You killed her.” With one hand, B lifted the hundreds of parts on the belt and they floated in the air, the sharp tips of the screws all pointed at the young man. “You killed her!”

“Didn’t you want to kill me too?!” A shouted. He didn’t want to kill anyone, but that didn’t mean that if others wanted to do something to him, he wouldn’t kill them.

All the parts suddenly flew towards the youth. He rolled awkwardly and hid behind a machine. The nails smashed pits into the metal shell, giving people no doubt that if the youth wasn’t able to hide and ended up staying out in the open, he would definitely be immediately poked into a sieve.

At this moment, the switch was flicked, and the lights on the factory building suddenly turned on.

Cui Zuojing subconsciously squinted as the lights stabbed into his eyes. Then, he caught a glimpse of the humanoid creatures in blue coveralls standing by the door. They were as tall as normal humans, wore high rubber boots and rubber gloves, and all their body parts beneath their neck were completely covered.

Above their neck was a completely blank oval shape, without faces, hair, chins, or any other features.

The two men paused and warily watched the sudden intruders.

Frowning, Cui Zuojing got up on one knee, holding the vertical pole in his hand as he stared at those strange “people.”

The conveyor belt that had been continuously running gradually slowed to a stop. Even the rumbling of the noises from the hot die forging press and the hammer processing machine in the next factory had gone silent. It seemed as if the entire factory had stopped operating.

An eerie silence descended.

The heads of the coveralls were facing the two people near the belt, and they began to approach silently. They had hammers and wrenches in their hands, the shiny silver surface stained with old dark red blood.

“Fuck, what are these things?!” The man couldn’t help cursing, his voice ending with a raised, high-pitched sound. Those blank heads clearly gave him a great shock.

The young man took two steps back. They looked at each other, tacitly agreed to stop fighting in the face of an unknown danger, and each turned and ran, trying to avoid the coveralls. 

The coveralls immediately chased after them.

Two figures jumped out the iron gate that connected the other factory building and disappeared from Cui Zuojing’s field of vision. The four coveralls that didn’t follow went to the woman’s still warm body. While two dragged her away by her feet, the other two took out a mop and bucket out of nowhere, cleaned the blood from the ground and the machinery, and returned the parts on the floor one by one.

Fifteen minutes later, what was left of the fight had mostly disappeared. Only the few potholes on the metal shell of the machine was left to silently bear proof that everything wasn’t an illusion.

After they finished cleaning up the factory building, the coveralls left. 

Silence returned to the factory, and Cui Zuojing was the only one remaining.

He leaned back against the steel frame, deciding not to go down to investigate. Who knew if the coveralls would suddenly appear again?

Endless space, humanoid entities coming out at night, day and night regularly alternating…All of this reminded him of a very famous SCP item. 

SCP-3008—A very ordinary and standard IKEA furniture store, also known as “Endless IKEA.” 

Simply put, 3008 was a space similar in appearance to the interior of an IKEA furniture store, but its extension went far beyond the physical limitations that an IKEA furniture warehouse could accommodate. The boundary of IKEA could not be detected in any direction, giving rise to speculations that the space may be infinite.

In Endless IKEA, there were humanoid entities that wore the uniforms typical to IKEA staff. When the lights go off in IKEA, they would violently attack any people left inside, repeating the phrase “The store is closed, please leave the building.” Once the lights were restored to indicate “day,” the “employees” would become relatively harmless and normal.

Because it was difficult to locate an exit, the humans who wandered into 3008 would inevitably have little chance to leave alive. They could only set up bases and defensive teams in IKEA to jointly resist the violent employees at night.

Cui Zuojing was almost certain that the basic setting of this arena was an adaptation of 3008. The factory would operate normally during the day, allowing participants to search for secret letters or fight with each other as much as they want. At night, once the daylight outside the windows became dark, the factory would stop production, and the “maintenance worker” would enter to clean up any traces the pilgrims had left behind during the day. At the same time, they would also hunt those who failed to hide in time.

This was likely to increase the difficulty level for the pilgrims. How could it be so easy to get such a precious thing as a circus ticket?

Thinking of this, Cui Zuojing closed his eyes again.

This was the first night, and there must be many people who were either busy searching or fighting or being chased by the workers. His attitude of watching from the sidelines just happened to save himself some trouble.

So tomorrow night, everyone would hide themselves. 

In this case, he had a plan.

The light was too bright, making it difficult for him to call back asleep. As he was quietly perfecting his plan, he suddenly heard the sound of someone running in.

A middle-aged man ran into the factory. He was bleeding profusely on one leg, leaving a bright red trail on the floor. He was breathing heavily and was staggering. It was clear that his injuries had weakened his physical strength, making him struggle to run.

Three coveralls chased after him, moving quickly.

The man’s eyes were full of terror as he looked back at them. Panicked, he accidentally stepped on a nut that hadn’t been cleaned up.

He fell to the ground.

The coveralls followed.

The man screamed in terror. In the next instant, a wrench slammed into his head.

The scream abruptly stopped.

Cui Zuojing closed his eyes, choosing not to look at the bloody scene. The smell of blood gradually spread in the air as the coveralls dragged the man’s corpse toward the iron gate, casting long shadows against the light.

No one knew where these humanoid creatures came from and where they would go with the corpses. 

It would be great if I could get this person’s cards.

Cui Zuojing suddenly thought.

He took a screw from his pocket, held it in his hand, and threw it to the other side of the factory building.

Ding–

The screw hit a conveyor belt, creating a metal crunch. The coveralls immediately stopped and looked in the direction where the sound was coming from.

Realizing that there was another sound, the coveralls “looked at each other,” put down the man’s corpse with its collapsed skull, and went toward the sound.

Cui Zuojing waited until they were far enough away before jumping down directly from the steel frame.

He didn’t take any protective measures as he jumped down from the ten-meter-high roof. But he found his landing position very accurately. After rolling, he half-kneeled beside the corpse.

The muffled sound of landing surprised the coveralls, and they whipped their heads around. By this time, Cui Zuojing had already reached into the man’s pocket and pulled out two cards and a secret letter.

He held the cards between his fingers and smiled triumphantly at the coveralls, who were turning around.

He put the cards in his pocket and flicked out the screw that he’d been holding in his palm.

The screw slammed into the forehead of the humanoid creature in front, leaving a bloody hole.

The other coveralls paused, but the figure in front didn’t stop. It fell forward onto its stomach, convulsed, and quickly stopped moving.

Could be injured, could die, could be beaten.

After confirming this, Cui Zuojing didn’t stay to attack the two remaining coveralls. He ran to the ladder he had set up before. The two creatures seemed to be frightened by Cui Zuojing’s behavior and didn’t chase after him. Instead, they squatted beside their dead companion.

By the time Cui Zuojing had climbed back up onto the steel frame, the two coveralls were dragging the bodies away, one pulling their dead companion and the other pulling the man’s corpse. They left silently and slowly.

Cui Zuojing’s fingertips were stained with the blood on the man’s body. He wiped the blood off on the wall and focused on the two cards he’d pilfered.

——————

Xixi: Here’s the link for SCP-3008, in case you want to read more about it. The entities are known as SCP-3008.2. 

Translation Notes:
(1) A little something — a Chinese internet slang that is used to describe a person whose strength is higher than appeared or anticipated. 

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