IWOL Chapter 183: Kill You

Good bastard, don’t be caught by this grandpa!

Cui Zuojing’s mouth was twisted. Who would have thought that a villain crossing another villain would turn into being crossed by said villain? Obviously, his one hand could make the other person piss in terror.

But 21 secret letters was enough to upgrade this identity card.

There were too many secret letters to carry around, so Cui Zuojing used them all to upgrade the little goldfish. The steps were very simple: Just stick the secret letter on the card for three seconds.

Two minutes later, Cui Zuojing put the upgraded identity card back in his pocket, quite satisfied with the result.

He felt a little hungry so it’s time to ask the clown for dinner.

Cui Zuojing stretched. His anger came and went quickly, just like a real child. He quickly threw away the anger that had made him want to kill Kuroko. Of course, this didn’t mean that he didn’t bear a grudge.

Cui Zuojing slowly climbed down from the steel frame and looked for the pipe with the clown’s mark. He couldn’t find it in the factory where he was so he walked to the next building.

Someone saw him from afar and quickly avoided him. Cui Zuojing recognized that the person was someone he’d just very recently robbed and couldn’t help but ridicule him in his heart. But he left without paying that person any extra attention.

Cui Zuojing still couldn’t find the pipe he wanted in this factory building, but he saw a dark red door in an inconspicuous corner.

This door was similar to the door in the room where he’d awakened before entering the arena. It looked old and was stuck quietly in the corner.

Was this thing here before?

Cui Zuojing didn’t know. There were thirty or forty different smaller factories in this large factory, making it impossible for him to remember every detail.

He stood in front of the door and curiously stretched out his hand to push it. Unexpectedly the door opened a gap.

Not closed?

Cui Zuojing thought this and pushed the door completely open, exposing the room inside.

It was empty; there was nothing there.

What was this?

Cui Zuojing muttered to himself as he stood in place and looked at the room. He had no intentions of going inside. Since this was an elimination match to select the pilgrims who will receive tickets, the clown shouldn’t have set up any special challenges.

But at this moment, a huge force suddenly came from behind him, directly pushing him. Cui Zuojing staggered forward and inadvertently stepped through the door.

He immediately grabbed the door frame and tried to stabilize his figure, but something pushed him again, causing severe pain in his hand and forcing him to let go.

The door quickly closed behind him. Cui Zuojing had no time to turn his head, and so he didn’t see a huge figure in bright yellow coveralls standing in front of the closing door.

Bang!

The door immediately slammed shut. Cui Zuojing rushed over and pulled the handle hard, but it was useless.

He pounded on the door and then took out the steel sheet from his pocket to try to cut open the door.

The steel sheet strengthened by the power of the slayer should be invincible, but when it hit the iron door, the door emitted a mysterious ripple, revealing the image of a six-pointed star painted in the middle. The ripple had a huge amount of energy. It directly pushed Cui Zuojing back so that he was unable to get closer to the door.

A seal?

Cui Zuojing’s expression completely changed.

An enchantment specifically aimed at his slayer ability. This wasn’t a room at all but a trap designed specifically for him!

This kind of targeted barrier wasn’t something that was created on the fly. The person who wanted to deal with him had planned this. “He” knew that he would come to the circus and enter the factory arena during the selection process. He also knew about his slayer ability.

Cui Zuojing stepped back vigilantly toward the center of the room, far away from the iron door. Only then did he discover that this room wasn’t empty after all. The side of the room where the door was had bright, red texts painted all over it.

—Kill you.

The countless kill yous filled the entire wall, the dripping paint like dripping blood. The words were scribbled in a crazy manner, filling Cui Zuojing’s entire field of vision. It seemed as if the blood-red words were about to rush out from the wall, flashing teeth and claws in front of him.

Cui Zuojing suddenly found it uncontrollably difficult to breathe. He closed his eyes and turned away, no longer looking at it. Only after taking a few deep breaths could he barely manage to suppress the overwhelming sense of suffocation.

Those words were infused with powerful, psychological suggestions. If a person continued to stare at them, that person’s psychological defense would definitely quickly crumble.

He focused on observing the entire room. It was 60 to 70 square meters in size, was nearly four meters high, had no windows, and the only exit was the door he’d just entered, which was now sealed by the barrier.

The floor was common, rough concrete and the white-washed walls were faded into an off-white. Everywhere looked old, and there were dark-yellow stains left behind by water.

Cui Zuojing scanned the entire room, avoiding the wall with the kill yous written all over it. The entire room was filled with a soft light, but there were no light fixtures anywhere to be found. There were also no signs of ventilation, and though the air was currently still fresh, he didn’t doubt that he may start feeling the lack of oxygen in less than a day.

Cui Zuojing noticed something shiny in a corner of the ceiling and was about to lean over to take a look when he caught a flash of light from the corners of his eyes. He turned his head to look at the wall opposite the door. Patterns in the shape of human faces emerged lined up in a row, surrounded by Indian-style sigils. The face had the sun and the moon painted on its forehead, and its eyes were downcast.

The human faces’ closed mouths gradually opened, and water began to slowly flow out of them. Within a few breaths, the water increased until the sound of rushing water filled the entire room.

Each of the water spouts were equivalent to a pipe ten centimeters in diameters. The flow rate was incredibly fast. Not to mention, there wasn’t just one face but a whole row of nine faces, one for each square meter.

Soon, the water reached the soles of Cui Zuojing shoes. At this rate, the entire room would be filled in less than an hour.

Cui Zuojing was certain that someone wanted him to die here.

There wasn’t much time left for him to dawdle. He needed to find a way out as soon as possible.

Cui Zuojing immediately jumped into action. He’d encountered this kind of dilemma many times before, and the fact that he could stand here now meant that he’d passed through all of them without danger.

First of all, he needed to investigate the reflective object in the corner. He couldn’t destroy the wall, and he couldn’t use nails to climb up for a closer look. This left him with little choice but to stand at the base of the wall and raise his head to look.

Fortunately, he had good eyesight. When he was in school, he was one of the rare students in his class who weren’t short-sighted. By the time Cui Zuojing finally made out what the light was, the water was well over his ankle. The light was a small mirror.

When he stood in a specific position, the mirror would reflect the reflected lights into his eyes. This meant that there must be a light source in this room.

Cui Zuojing hurriedly returned to the point where the reflection was the strongest. He bent down a little, allowing the light to become stronger. He then calculated the trajectory of the light according to the angle between himself and the mirror, trying to find the position of the light source.

It was difficult to search with the naked eye alone. The water was now at mid-calf and the iciness made him suck in a breath. If the temperature of the water stayed this way, not only would he have to contend with the possibility of drowning but he must also worry about his body temperature dropping.

Finally, he successfully found the source of the mirror’s light; it was another mirror.

The mirror was placed in an extremely hidden location. If he hadn’t calculated it based on the first mirror, he wouldn’t have been able to find it.

Since he was now at a height of 1.7 meters, he was able to study it closely. The entire lens was only half the size of a palm, and the number “6” was lightly engraved on it.

Were there more?

Cui Zuojing did exactly what he’d done before; he used the reflective light from the last mirror to locate the next one.

By the time the icy water reached his chest, Cui Zuojing had already found four mirrors. Except for the one that was out of reach in the corner of the ceiling, the numbers carved on the mirrors were 6, 7, and 2, respectively.

Cui Zuojing followed the reflective path to search for the next mirror, only to discover that this mirror was probably submerged under the water’s surface. Due to the refractive differences between water and air, the reflective light path had changed, making it extremely difficult to find.

The water level slowly rose to the point where he was now floating in the water. The icy water enveloped him, the cold piercing his skin nearly to the bones. He took a deep breath, held it, and plunged under the water. He could only search in the approximate location where a mirror should be.

It was hard to open his eyes in the cold water. Not to mention, the lens were very small. The first time Cui Zuojing dived under, he found nothing. He kicked the water and went back up to the surface. He took a deep breath and, without delay, dived underwater again.

The water’s surface was now only a little bit more than one meter away from reaching the ceiling. This left him less than 20 minutes to work.

Finally, he found the little mirror flowing in the water. The number 3 was engraved on it. He studied it but failed to find any traces of a mechanism, which meant that he hadn’t yet found the beginning of the ray of light.

Cui Zuojing floated up to take a breath and turned a little bit to search.

According to the law of reflection, the mirror he was looking for was most likely on the wall full of kill yous.

Cui Zuojing closed his eyes and calmed his state of mind. The text on the wall contained bad psychological suggestions. He wasn’t someone with a mental ability. If he was careless, he would become affected. He must be extremely careful.

He swam to the wall.

Because he was looking for a tiny mirror, it was impossible to focus on only specific areas of the wall. Therefore, he would inevitably see those words. The bright red letters twisted and swayed in the constantly fluctuating water, making him feel an uncontrollable nausea. Even after only glancing at them a few times, he already felt that it was unbearable. He broke the surface and hurriedly sucked in a deep breath. But a thought stole into his mind like a thief.

—This is it. The room is about to be filled with water. I don’t know how many more mirrors I’ll still need to find. It’s too late now. No matter how much effort I put in, it’ll all be useless in the end.

Cui Zuojing clenched his teeth hard, anxious as never before. This mental pollution was more serious than he thought. At this point, he should find a clean place and take a good rest, but the room would be completely submerged soon. There was no time for him to settle his mood.

No matter what, there was only one path left for him now. Cui Zuojing dived underwater. But this time, he closed his eyes and felt along the wall, trying to locate the mirror.

Although this method was slower, it was better than giving up hope altogether due to the chaos in his mind.

His body was submerged in water and his eyes were tightly closed, but the countless kill yous on the entire wall were firmly etched in his memory. They repeatedly appeared in his mind.

—That’s it…

He suddenly couldn’t hold on to his breath anymore. He choked on the water and hurriedly kicked out his legs to swim back up to the surface.

Cough! Cough! cough…

Tears streamed down Cui Zuojings face as he coughed out the water from his nose and mouth. He gritted his teeth and cursed inwardly. He turned and swam toward the mirror in the corner of the ceiling. Now that the water level was high enough, he could easily see the number “7” engraved on it.

Xixi: I wondered if author forgot about Rabbit and the fact that Cui Zuojing could control time? I felt that he could have used time to slow the flow of water so he’ll have more time to explore the areas along the base of the walls. Though, to his credit, I don’t think he could control it very well and he did already use it on Kuroko.