Dimensional Store: Welcome to the Apocalypse Apartment - Chapter 244

Chapter 244

Every ten seconds, the Black-Skinned Bandit would glance toward the private hot spring pool.

Each time a bubble rose from the water, the interval between his glances grew shorter.

The Trial-taker hiding underwater had to keep herself from touching the Hot Spring Mansion Director or the merchant, while also making sure the Black-Skinned Bandit did not discover her.

She had only a very brief window to surface for air.

She had to obey the Rules and time everything precisely.

Gu Huaiwei felt these Anomalies were rotten to the core. They had definitely sensed that a Trial-taker was hiding in the pool. They were deliberately speaking at a crawl and even moving around in the private pool to increase the chances of exposing her.

And then there was that Black-Skinned Bandit. Whenever he looked anywhere else, his gaze was perfunctory, but the moment he looked at the pool, a vicious light glinted in his eyes.

He was like a cat toying with a mouse, blocking off the mouse’s escape route but refusing to strike.

The bubbles in the pool were appearing more and more frequently.

The Black-Skinned Bandit drew closer and closer to the water, an irrepressible grin spreading across his eerie face.

Just as the Black-Skinned Bandit reached out, ready to haul the Trial-taker hidden in the water out by the scruff, Gu Huaiwei strolled out from behind the bamboo rack.

For a moment, the atmosphere turned a little awkward.

It was as if all the air had been sucked away, plunging the place into dead silence. The twisted smiles on the faces of the three Anomalies present vanished completely. At the same time, they turned their heads and looked at Gu Huaiwei, this uninvited guest.

Among them, the Black-hearted Merchant, whose back had been to Gu Huaiwei, made the largest movement. His head twisted a full one hundred and eighty degrees, his thick neck letting out a warped series of crackling sounds as he kept his body facing away and sniffed in her direction.

“Crack, crack, crack… The scent is wrong…”

“Gentlemen, no need to be so tense. I am also a businesswoman. I run a Sanatorium in town.”

Gu Huaiwei spread her hands and swept her gaze over the Black-Skinned Bandit, introducing herself warmly.

“I came here this time to invite you two to visit the Sanatorium.”

The moment the Black-Skinned Bandit saw Gu Huaiwei, he instinctively took a step back, then shielded his Leather Drum.

The Director of the Hot Spring Mansion remained soaking in the pool.

As for the Black-hearted Merchant, he rose from the water, and the gorgeous crystals on his skin fell into the pool.

He was probably the highest-level one among these Anomalies.

At this moment, he stepped out of the pool and walked toward Gu Huaiwei, bringing with him a pressure that could not be ignored.

“You heard our business… crack, crack, crack… Then leave your tongue and fingers behind!”

Ten minutes later-

The Black-hearted Merchant, who had originally been overflowing with pollution, was now lying on the ground like a dead pig. His massive body was pinned firmly by a chair, his fat face pressed flat against the floor.

Bai Miemie sat on that chair, constantly scraping at the glittering things on his body with the tips of their toes, as if digging for treasure.

The Director of the Hot Spring Mansion had been grabbed by the white scarf around his neck and tied to the bamboo rack beside them in an utterly undignified manner.

The Black-Skinned Bandit’s Leather Drum had been confiscated, and he was kneeling in front of Gu Huaiwei.

Gu Huaiwei sat on the stone slab beside the hot spring pool and said with a bright smile, “Now, we can have a proper discussion about business.”

Gu Huaiwei stated her requirements for the Contract.

The Black-Skinned Bandit immediately agreed and even said he could loosen his own Contract terms.

In the end, Gu Huaiwei refused. “Ah, sorry. I don’t want you even if you pay me.”

Black-Skinned Bandit: …

She pointed at the other two Anomalies. “I want you two.”

The Anomaly in an Instance could not leave whenever they pleased.

Even with a Contract, she still needed to help them fulfill certain obsessions.

After Gu Huaiwei had an in-depth and friendly exchange with them, she learned that what the Director of the Hot Spring Mansion cared about most was his reputation.
He had two obsessions.

The first was relatively simple. It concerned his useless younger brother.

Gu Huaiwei needed to help the fat man at the braised meat stall lose weight, give up his absurdly unrealistic braised meat business, focus on running the convenience store, and become what society would consider a good family member.

Upon success, a short-term Contract would become available.

The second was more difficult. It concerned the Mayor of Gray Mist Town.

The Director of the Hot Spring Mansion wanted a seat on the town council. The Mayor of Gray Mist Town would visit the Hot Spring Mansion in three days and host a charity gala. Gu Huaiwei needed to help the Director of the Hot Spring Mansion canvass votes at that gala.

Upon success, a long-term Contract would become available.

The Black-hearted Merchant’s demand was even harder.

He wanted a special medicine for pneumoconiosis.

For this stage of Gu Huaiwei’s mission, she needed to bring back the Director of the Hot Spring Mansion, the Black-hearted Merchant, the town mayor, and the Number One on the Heavenly Ranking.

The good news was that the first three would all appear in the Hot Spring Mansion Instance, so she could take care of them all at once.

The bad news was that the conditions for making a Contract with them were extremely harsh.

The Director of the Hot Spring Mansion’s request was the most specific, so Gu Huaiwei decided to start with him.

There was a clock hanging in the private hot spring room. Gu Huaiwei noticed that its hands were moving extremely slowly, lingering around one in the morning without ever quite moving on.

The Anomaly beings whose freedom Gu Huaiwei had restricted began to struggle violently.

They were willing to twist their own limbs apart if that was what it took to leave this room.

“Crack, crack, crack… crack, crack, crack…”

It was obvious they were in agony.

Worried that these Anomaly beings might scream and vanish like Bella, Gu Huaiwei released them.

The Anomaly beings showed terrified expressions and crawled toward the door at incredible speed, then disappeared into the pitch-black Corridor.

The hands of the clock on the wall continued moving forward.

“Whew-” The girl who had been hiding in the pool surfaced and let out a long breath. “What a lucky day. I survived again.”

She looked at Gu Huaiwei. “You were this close to breaking those Anomaly beings just now.”

“How so?”

The girl patiently explained it to Gu Huaiwei.

Inside an Instance, Anomaly beings were like programs with preset movement routes. At fixed times, they needed to go to fixed scenes and say fixed lines.

Once they were stopped, the Instance’s operation would develop an error, and the program might crash.

Originally, this kind of situation should have been impossible, because humans simply could not block the movement routes of Anomaly beings.

But Gu Huaiwei did not belong to this Dimension. She was an outlier.

That was what had caused the Anomaly beings to get stuck on a bug just now.

The girl’s name was An Qiushui. She had met Gu Huaiwei once before. After getting separated from her teammate, the white-haired old man, she had been clearing the Instance on her own.

After introducing herself, An Qiushui fished a handful of crystals that had fallen off the Black-hearted Merchant out from the bottom of the pool. Then she climbed out and carefully picked up all the crystals on the floor that Bai Miemie had pried loose.

“These are good stuff. You can trade them for normal food inside the Instance.” An Qiushui held the shiny things out to Gu Huaiwei. “Want to split them evenly?”

“No need.” Gu Huaiwei did not need them.

“Then I won’t stand on ceremony. I’ll take them all.” An Qiushui stuffed the crystals into her pocket.

“Mm.”

“I heard you say just now that you want to make a Contract with the director and the merchant. Do you have any leads? If not, I can offer you some help.”

“What do you want?” Gu Huaiwei did business herself, so she naturally understood that there was no such thing as a free lunch.

An Qiushui’s eyes filled with admiration. “Me…?”