[Steam World: Plague Doctor]
When Ledell finally woke from the magic of the ancient book in his hands, he was startled to find himself alone in the room. Dr. Kate and his sister Mary had vanished, and outside, a series of thunderous roars assaulted his eardrums.
Ledell looked at the book with a complex expression. Knowing it was a tome steeped in malevolence, he still tucked it away in his notebook compartment before following the direction of the sounds outside.
The scene that greeted him outside left him stunned.
He looked up towards the horizon, where dawn was approaching. The first light of morning revealed a massive shadow that covered nearly half the town. The rumbling noises were coming from this immense shadow.
As he gazed at the shadow, he saw its true form: a colossal mound of grotesque flesh, an enormous pile of meat composed of countless deformed chunks, with tentacles extending from it to support its bulk. This abomination was as large as a small mountain, moving slowly like a living hill. The towering chimneys and pipes of the factories around the town appeared insignificant compared to this gargantuan mass of flesh. Humanity seemed almost invisible in its presence.
A creature of this size walking along the distant horizon, as if strolling in its backyard, was unbelievable. But this was the harsh reality Ledell faced.
He recognized the meat mountain as the eldritch god summoned by Kate. In just one night, what was once a creature merely tens of feet tall had transformed into a flesh mountain beyond human comprehension.
The brutal shock of the reality left Ledell dazed. He swayed on his feet, almost fainting, but gritted his teeth and held on. He saw countless deformed townspeople emerging from dark corners, following the direction of this monstrous entity.
He knew he had to do something, or the eldritch god would soon leave the town's boundaries.
But… what could he do?
Ledell staggered after a nearby deformed townsfolk, eventually seeing the crowd come to a halt.
Why had they stopped?
Frowning, Ledell suddenly felt an ominous premonition. He looked up to see the massive shadow growing as he approached, now halted before him.
The immense shadow cast over the ground, the twisting flesh of the god covering the entire sky, instilled a profound and terrifying dread.
[@#￥@#￥%]
Meaningless mutterings emanated from the flesh mountain, and Ledell saw the nearby deformed townspeople covering their ears, their mouths wide open, emitting sharp, inhuman screams.
Ledell wasn’t sure if these townspeople could still be considered human. Dazed, he watched as the enormous shadow overhead erupted into a brilliant blood-red explosion, like an ancient miracle descended from the gods.
Boom——!!!!！！
A deafening sound, surpassing the power of millions of tons of explosives, blasted near Ledell’s ear. It felt as if a hammer struck his temple, instantly rendering him deaf and blurring his vision. Moments later, he saw countless spore-like fragments of meat flying through the sky in the shockwave.
Ledell's eyes widened as he saw the intricate patterns on the spores, the tiny, writhing tendrils resembling miniature versions of the eldritch god.
The roaring noise echoed in his mind.
The massive flesh mountain had dissipated into these spores, like mature dandelions scattering in a breeze, drifting beyond the town’s edge into a vast, expansive world. In the dawn’s early light, it had a breathtaking, horrifying beauty.
Blown away by the blast, Ledell barely managed to stand up, wiping the dust from his face. He saw that the once-deformed townspeople had become even more grotesque after coming into contact with the spores. They had lost all human shape and turned into monstrous beings, more bloated and deformed than the fiercest beasts, entirely devoid of reason.
These townspeople, who had once recklessly taken others' lives, had now paid a heavy price.
Ledell swayed again, unable to support himself. He leaned against a crumbling wall, blood dripping from his forehead, staining his vision red.
Struggling to open his blood-soaked eyes, he looked towards the vanishing direction of the eldritch god. The world was twisting, the blood-red sky turning pure and beautiful. The floating meat spores transformed into pristine white angel feathers.
Sacred and unblemished feathers drifted down. Ledell, in a daze, reached out to catch one. Beautiful heavenly music, only heard in paradise, filled his ears. Illusions of paradise descended, with countless angelic beings playing harps and flying towards the distant horizon, the direction where the god had vanished.
“It’s… beautiful.” In this unreal world.
Ledell murmured, and darkness fell over his vision. He didn’t know how long he slept, but when he awoke, the once-beautiful town was now a wasteland, and the monstrous townspeople had disappeared.
“…” Ledell touched his forehead, no longer bleeding, puzzled as to why the monsters hadn’t attacked him. Silent, he pondered and took out the ancient book from his belongings.
The book, obtained from Kate, still emanated an alluring magic. Ledell’s expression was somber, vaguely sensing that something significant had changed within him, possibly related to these eldritch remnants.
Despite this, he chose not to discard the book but carefully stored it away.
Even he wasn’t sure what he hoped to find in it—perhaps a way to resist the eldritch god, or merely a desire to possess this mysterious book containing the world’s most terrifying secrets.
Ledell, silent, returned to Old Tom's inn, packed his belongings, and left the now-dilapidated beautiful town.
Passing by Dr. Kate’s house, Ledell went inside to check and found that Kate had already left. He also noticed that Kate had anticipated his return and had drawn numerous malevolent curses on the walls, taking all notes related to her eldritch research.
Ledell meticulously searched and found only some disorganized manuscripts hastily left by Kate. These manuscripts concerned the language of the book, and as someone knowledgeable, Ledell knew they might be useful for deciphering the ancient tome, so he collected them.
After confirming there was nothing else to gain, Ledell left. Perhaps he would never return to this town filled with terrifying memories, but…
On the dusty, winding path, Ledell looked back at the vanishing Lost Town with a tired gaze.
But for some reason, he felt that the spores spread by the eldritch gods might bring about some terrifying changes to the world. He needed to find a way to resist these changes.
He needed more power. Ledell touched the book in his arms, knowing it would provide him with what he desired.
A cold wind blew, as harsh as when Ledell first arrived, shrouding his figure in the swirling sand and dust, and he disappeared from view.
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After completing the game, Ke Su, feeling accomplished, returned to the main page and saw that the Ancient God’s Awakening level had increased by 3 points.
The current awakening progress was 0.5%.
Ke Su looked at the progress bar with a bored expression.
A wave of operations like a tiger, and the result was only 0.5. The progress was too slow. As a collector of achievements, Ke Su felt uneasy unless the progress bar was fully filled.
Moreover, the game seemed a bit boring. It was just moving around all morning, manipulating a rubber figure, and then an explosion—there was no challenge.
Ke Su moved the mouse to the first Zerg World dungeon block, Manor’s Old Tales, which he had been eager to play. But if it followed the same pattern, it might not be worth playing.
Noticing Ke Su’s dissatisfaction, the game page subtly flashed, and a new Faithful World block appeared, this time a mini-game.
Curious, Ke Su clicked on it and discovered it was a simulation and management game.
[Mechanical Era: Endless Ferry]
An introductory text appeared.
[A journey without return begins. Passengers with tickets discover they are aboard a ferry that endlessly sails across a vast sea. They want to escape, but little do they know, the one controlling this ferry is not one of their kind but a higher-dimensional deity...]
The mouse hovered over the block, revealing a thickly painted card. On the card, a grand luxury ferry sailed across a vast, gloomy sea, the waves crashing with a sense of impending apocalypse.
The introduction was engaging, and Ke Su’s interest was piqued. He decisively abandoned Manor’s Old Tales and clicked to enter, only to find it was a ship simulation game.
“……”
Ke Su looked at the game page with its high-tech cockpit, various complex buttons and precision instruments, and the vast blue deep sea beyond the glass.
It was truly a time-killing mini-game!
Ke Su clicked around and discovered he could also control characters outside the cockpit, managing the passengers onboard to ensure their survival.
It was a bona fide simulation and management game, with all the necessary living supplies, just waiting for Ke Su to allocate to the passengers.
However, with only two or three passengers currently, it wasn’t very engaging.
So, Ke Su chose to exit.
He wasn’t bored enough to play a ship simulation game on his computer. He decided to play another dungeon, at least that one had a storyline and could be watched like a movie.
With this thought, Ke Su opened Manor’s Old Tales and responded to the summon.
The prelude to this world had been reviewed before. In summary, it was about a young lord suspecting that his father was summoning an eldritch god and setting out to seal it.
After entering the pixel-style page of the Zerg in the Faithful World, Ke Su thought he would once again become the evil god and challenge his youngest son in a battle of wits and courage. However, the game had changed its approach this time. Now, he needed to solve puzzles in the manor and reveal the truth to his youngest son before he could engage in a battle of wits.
Ke Su found it somewhat interesting. After checking, he discovered that the game page included many essential game values and functions for puzzle-solving.
Unlike the previous 3D pixel style, this time the entire manor was composed of flat pixels, resembling an RPG puzzle game from his past life. It was retro yet exquisite, with realistic action feedback, clearly crafted with care. It was much more refined than the previous summoning screen.
Although it differed greatly from the card images on the introduction page, it still pleasantly surprised Ke Su.
Looking at this familiar page, Ke Su felt as though he had returned to his past life’s puzzle-solving days. He saved his progress happily and then started the game.
In the game, he was still an evil god, but now in an unawakened state, only able to solve puzzles through other people’s bodies. The main character, his youngest son Dell, was currently not controllable.
Ke Su opened the information panel and discovered that due to the manor lord’s decree, Dell was not allowed to wander during the day. Thus, he decided to explore the manor at night to uncover his father’s hidden secrets. This meant Ke Su would have to wait until nightfall to control the main character.
So, what could he do now?
Ke Su found that he seemed to be able to control characters with sanity values reduced to zero in the game. He searched the manor and discovered an ant maid dressed in a maid uniform on the fourth floor.
This ant maid appeared to be in a state of confusion, with her sanity value reduced to zero. Observing the terrified reactions of nearby people, it seemed that the maid was going mad and smashing things. Zooming in, it was clear that the smashed items had left nearby insects severely injured.
In this chaotic situation, a few burly black-clad insects finally arrived, attempting to subdue the crazed maid.
Ke Su blinked and maneuvered his character to avoid one of the black-clad insect’s attacks. He knew this was a challenge provided by the game and was undaunted.
He considered his skills to be top-notch. Since the game allowed for dodging, it meant he could use force to escape this room and solve puzzles!
Snap—
The next moment, the ant maid fell from the fourth-floor balcony, shattering into a mosaic of fragments.
Ke Su fell silent for a moment, pressed the rewind button, and started the second attempt as if nothing had happened.
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