Players, Please Board the Train

Chapter 414: Seven-Day Civil Affairs Bureau

"You are merely a special item, barely possessing human-like thought. If Uncle Fan Xiao's body isn't here, how could the human skin on you possibly stay attached?" Bai Kou looked at him coldly. "Do you think I'm joking with you? Or must I peel all your skin off before you'll talk?"

"I'm warning you, once I peel your skin, you can only revert to being a toy spider, forever losing any chance of being the butler of Rose Castle again."

Mr. Dong stood silently in place, his usually expressionless face turning gloomy. Behind him, darkness rapidly crawled out from the corners of the ancient castle.

*

On the train heading to the Deep Blue Laboratory station, Xu Huo used the "Actor's Mask" to change into an honest, simple-looking face. Unfortunately, he stepped into a trap the moment he boarded.

It wasn't that someone targeted him, but rather, he accidentally stepped into it while a male player was demonstrating his item to other female players.

When the train arrived at the station, he was directly teleported to his seat. As soon as he opened his eyes, he saw a circle of red light at his feet rapidly retracting. Before he could react, the red light swiftly shrank onto his right wrist, transforming into a red cord. The other end of the cord was connected to the male player sitting in the seat next to him.

After he appeared, the other man also wore a look of utter disbelief.

The dozen or so players in the carriage burst into roaring laughter. Two hippie-styled girls in the front seats winked and made faces at them. "Chu Yuan, that item of yours is quite interesting, huh? The Civil Affairs Bureau? Can two grown men even get married?"

Xu Huo tried to cut the cord, but the young man in the next seat looked as if he had lost both parents, saying mournfully, "Don't bother cutting it. This rope can't be cut. It has to stay connected for at least seven days."Xu Huo's eyelid twitched. "Can't you just retract the item?"

"No…" Before the young man could finish, he saw the dagger that failed to cut the rope now swinging towards his own neck. He hastily leaned back. "Killing me won't work either! This item is called the Seven-Day Civil Affairs Bureau. Once two people are linked by it, they enter a 'marital relationship' that only automatically dissolves after seven days. If I die, you'll have to drag my corpse around!"

"Just chop the hand off, problem solved," a female player giggled, sticking out her tongue adorned with a tongue piercing.

"Hey, hey, don't say such terrifying things, okay?" the young man hurriedly said. "How can you harm your partner's body during the 'marital relationship'? Haven't you heard of sharing life and death? If you stab me, it's like stabbing yourself. You might not lose the hand, but for at least seven days, that hand will be unusable!"

"How are you supposed to do a dungeon then!"

Xu Huo narrowed his eyes, seemingly gauging the truth of his words.

"Don't be scared, little brother. I have a lie-detection item here. One use and we'll know if he's telling the truth." The tongue-pierced girl from the front took out a grotesque-looking stone face and placed it on the table. "Item: Mouth of Truth. Put your hand in. If you tell a lie, it'll bite your hand off. This is different from the Mouth of Truth for tourists; this one really bites hands off."

Other players in the carriage joined in the jeering. "What's losing a hand? A real man wouldn't shed a tear even if his dick got bitten off!"

"That's right! The weather's lovely today, perfect for losing a hand! Go ahead without fear, brother! We've got plenty of healing potions. We'll make sure it's a painless amputation!"

"Chu Yuan, hurry up! You don't want to be tied to a man either, do you?"

Not just this carriage, but players from the carriages in front and behind also crowded over to watch the spectacle, shouting and placing bets with those around them on whether Chu Yuan would get his hand chopped off.

Xu Huo noticed most of these people had tanned skin and tropical-style outfits. Although they didn't know each other, they roughhoused without any sense of restraint. For a moment, he thought he had walked into a Western saloon or was surrounded by people singing and dancing around a bonfire—completely different from the usual train atmosphere.

Chu Yuan, being jostled by the crowd, flushed red, his eyes and hand trembling as he stared at the stone face's mouth.

"No," Xu Huo pressed down his arm. "If his hand gets bitten off, I suffer the loss too."

"Boo!" the players drew out the sound in disappointment. The tongue-pierced girl winked at Xu Huo. "Little brother's so timid. Want me to give you a demonstration?"

After saying that, she openly placed a fake hand inside the stone face's mouth. First, she said, "I am a woman."

The stone face showed no reaction. Then she immediately said, "I am a man."

The stone face's gaping mouth suddenly snapped shut, biting the fake hand off with a crunch and chewing it up. Probably because the taste was off, it chewed twice and then spat all the pieces back onto the girl's face.

"Haha!" The tongue-pierced girl wiped the debris from her face and said to Xu Huo, "Any hand works, real or fake. The worst that happens is you get spat on! Hehe! My item just has personality!"

But the onlookers beside them weren't satisfied. "Fake hands are boring! We want to see a real man bleed!"

Chu Yuan simply hid his hand under the table. "If you're so eager to bleed, go do it yourselves. I'm not doing it. It's just being locked together for seven days anyway…"

Before he could finish, Xu Huo had already borrowed a fake hand from the tongue-pierced girl and handed it to him. "Go on. Better to lose a fake hand than a real one."

Chu Yuan's face flushed with anger. Just as he was about to stand up, a burly, tattooed player next to him pressed him back down. "Don't spoil everyone's fun. This train goes straight to the Sayir Coast. There's no place to get off after this. You know what happens at the coast if you don't follow the players' unwritten rules, right?"

Chu Yuan's face twitched. He shot Xu Huo a hateful glare before placing the fake hand inside. He repeated his earlier explanation of the item's effects and added in detail that during the item's activation period, if either party in the 'marital relationship' is injured, the other will feel it as if it happened to them. If Xu Huo chopped off his hand, it was uncertain whether the item would deactivate, but his own hand would definitely not recover within seven days.

The parties involved hadn't said much, but the people who had placed bets weren't happy. They moved the stone face to another table, started playing question-and-answer with real hands, asking all sorts of risqué questions without restraint. The people answering, of course, didn't care about privacy and dared to say anything.

But after a few rounds, some found it boring and started intentionally giving wrong answers, waiting for the stone face to bite. However, these players were also cunning, using their characteristics or other items to protect their hands. The stone face had nothing to spit out, only spraying one person's face with dust.

"Is there something special about the Sayir Coast that makes fighting on the train forbidden?" Xu Huo watched for a while before asking Chu Yuan. Earlier, Chu Yuan had wanted to fight but held back due to the rules. For players on the train to get along this merrily, there must be some external constraint.

"Why should I tell you?" Chu Yuan replied with a sour, uncooperative expression.

"You didn't tell the whole truth about the 'Seven-Day Civil Affairs Bureau' item, did you?" Xu Huo stared at him. "Can men really marry men with this?"

This was originally just a probing question, but Chu Yuan's face changed guiltily. He covered it up, saying, "In my hometown, same-sex marriage between men is legal."

"I can't attack you, but don't think you can attack me either. Otherwise, don't even think about reaching the Sayir Coast alive!"