Doomsday Wonderland c1-855

by N. Heller

Lin Sanjiu struggled to stand up. There wasn’t a single glimmer of light around her so she couldn’t tell what had just happened. The silence surrounding her made it seem as though entering that weird McDonald’s was just a dream.

  [It’ll be great if there was some light.] This thought surfaced in her mind, and she suddenly remembered something. She quickly took out a card, and a silvery light appeared in her hand. A wide area around her was instantly illuminated. The thing in her hand was the [Ability Polishing Agent] she had taken from Ren Nan’s corpse.

  It was a gigantic fish.

  The fish was staring at her with a pair of white eyes without pupils. Its mouth, the size of a train carriage, was half opened revealing its set of dense, uneven, jagged teeth. Only half the fish was above the surface of the water, and blood was spouting from its dark colored skin. Like countless little water fountains, the fish’s blood poured into the seawater beneath it.

  The magnet of her attention was the long appendage on its lower jaw which looked like a fluorescent tube.

  "Lin Sanjiu? Did you kill this Deep-sea Dragonfish?"

  Lin Sanjiu suddenly heard a voice in the darkness, coming from behind the large fish head.

  Chapter 101 - Shen Lianqi and His Friends

  "Actually, I'm embarrassed to admit that I have no directional sense."

  Red flames danced, casting a wavering light on Lin Sanjiu’s face. Roasted over the flames, the fats in the fish melted and oozed out like oil, which made a tantalizing sizzling sound. Every now and then, a few precious drops would fall into the fire, stirring the red flames.

  "Besides, I’m unfamiliar with this place so I didn’t know I would end up at the bottom of the ocean after jumping 300km south." Shen Lianqi laughed wryly as he touched the pair of shoes in his hand as if out of pity." Even though The Munitions Factory has already stopped the production of this old model, this still costs a lot on the black market. I didn’t expect that it would be damaged by seawater. Sigh… The Munitions Factory probably didn’t design this anticipating that someone would jump into the ocean."

  Lin Sanjiu also didn’t expect that she would meet Shen Lianqi, a few thousand meters under sea level. Moreover, a Shen Lianqi… like that.

  She wondered if it would be too impolite if she asked him about "that" since they were only acquaintances.

  Lin Sanjiu took some time to compose herself and finally pulled her eyes away from his body. She started turning over the half-cooked meat in her hands, acting nonchalant. As she didn’t have metal skewers or a wooden stick, she had chosen a few long bones from the fish and threaded the pieces of meat with the makeshift bone skewers. "You have been living here, in the deep sea, for a month?" she asked as she focused her attention on the skewers.

  "Yes," Shen Lianqi answered openly, "this is a very deep marine trench. Without those Escape Boots, I thought of climbing out, but it is a few thousand meters, and it was too hard. Luckily, there are still some mutated sea creatures here, so I didn’t starve to death. As time went by, I started feeling that living here, in the bottom of the sea, was quite carefree."

  "So, the weird gigantic fish is one of the mutated creatures?" Lin Sanjiu frowned, pondering about it. "But, why did I see a McDonald’s?"

  "Do you know what a Deep-sea Dragonfish is? It is a species of fish which have a light-producing appendage, a photophore, on their lower jaw to lure their preys toward them…" Shen Lianqi explained while he gestured around his own lower jaw, "When I first arrived, I was lucky. The dragonfish did not notice me but instead focused its attention on another mutated… Cough... who knows what that was. The fish’s photophore glowed, and the unknown creature foolishly walked into the dragonfish’s mouth, as if hypnotized. That unknown creature looked really happy, so I guess that, to that creature, the dragonfish’s head must have looked like females’ nest. It probably entered the fish’s mouth seeking for a mate, but the dragonfish closed its mouth and bit it into two.

  Once she heard his explanation, Lin Sanjiu recalled hearing about how some deep sea creatures use their photophores for hunting. She suddenly shivered. She was probably smaller than the other mutated creatures here, so the dragonfish did not even care to bite her. If it did, she would have probably died, considering the daze she was in previously.

  "Talking about this, Miss Lin, you are incredible! The gigantic dragonfish died within a few seconds…" Shen Lianqi sighed. "You said that it died from… Versu Poison?"

  [Yup.] Lin Sanjiu nodded.

  When Lin Sanjiu entered the "Mcdonald’s", the door opened automatically for her. When she walked in, she didn’t touch anything. However, when the floor started tilting, Lin Sanjiu fell on the floor, and that was when her skin came in contact with the "McDonald’s" — more accurately, the dragonfish’s mouth. Once there was a direct contact, the dragonfish died from [Versu Poison] six seconds later.

  "It happened too quickly, so I haven’t really recovered from it," she smiled, feeling slightly embarrassed by his praise.

  "Haha! But, you sure are quick when it comes to barbecuing that fish!" Shen Lianqi commented, laughing. Then, he smacked his lips looking enviously at the fish. "Sigh, since you poisoned it, only you can consume it…"

  Lin Sanjiu shifted a little uncomfortably.

  [How can you still think of eating fish with the way you are right now?] Lin Sanjiu thought silently to herself, she struggled to keep herself from muttering that thought.

  "Oh, I’ll give you my shirt. Even though there isn’t anyone around, a lady shouldn’t walk around all day without a top." Shen Lianqi took off his shirt and smiled. "Anyway, I don’t need it."

  Lin Sanjiu hesitated for a while, but she finally took it from him and wore it. A fishy stench instantly assaulted her nose.

  When the fish was almost fully cooked, Lin Sanjiu sprinkled some salt on it. She immediately smelled the fragrance from the cooked fish meat with a hint of sea salt. The deep-sea dragonfish was hideous, and its meat was coarse and hard to chew. But to someone like Lin Sanjiu, who had not eaten meat for such a long time, the fish tasted flavorful and extremely delicious.

  After eating 1kg of that fish meat, Lin Sanjiu finally stopped. It wasn’t because she was full, but she found it a little difficult to continue eating looking at Shen Lianqi’s current appearance.

  After some consideration, she decided to ask the question that had been on her mind.

  "Shen Lianqi, how... did you become a fish?"

  Calling him a fish might not be the proper term.

  Even though there were two things like gills on the cheeks of his face — his pair of feets were like two fins, with greenish-white fish scales extending from his calves, making his legs look as if a mermaid’s lower body had been split — he still retained his overall human form.

  "Haha!" Shen Lianqi laughed as he touched his head, a little abashed. "At the start, I wasn’t used to it. But as time went by, I realized that being this way is quite convenient!"

  [No, this isn’t an issue about convenience…] Lin Sanjiu looked blankly at him as he revealed a fin sprouting from his arm.

  [He is almost half a fish… But why do I keep feeling that has his personality changed so much from when we were at the pier.] Lin Sanjiu felt that Shen Lianqi had become more optimistic and calm, he seemed very different from the first impression she had of him, a quick-witted but extremely timid man.

  "Great, your question reminded me of something. Come with me, I’ll bring you to the place where I’m staying. Maybe, you could even meet my friends." Shen Lianqi suddenly stood up, his fish tail legs seemed very strong, and they easily supported his body.

  [Friends? We are in the deep ocean, where do your friends come from?]

  Lin Sanjiu was puzzled, but she stood up and kept some huge slices of meat she had cut from the dragonfish into her cards. Then, she walked with Shen Lianqi to the side of the water.

  "Beyond this waters, there is a shipwreck. The ship is stuck in between two rocks, so the hull is largely undamaged. I am living t
here now."

  "See, I told you it is convenient." He laughed delightfully.

  Lin Sanjiu simply did not know how to respond.

  Shen Lianqi seemed comfortable with his own body. [Perhaps, he chose to become a mermaid out of his own accord. Maybe he is using a special equipment from that Twelve Worlds Centrum?] Lin Sanjiu thought to herself.

  Amidst the darkness, there was only the sound of water parting as both of them glided through the seawater. After Lin Sanjiu half swam for a while, pulled along by Shen Lianqi, he suddenly announced, "We’re here!"

  She took out her Ability Polishing Agent and held it high above her head. The silver light from the bottle spilled all around them.

  Under the cold light, she saw a large, white passenger ship stuck between two rocks as described. Half of it was above the surface of the water while the other half was underwater. The passenger ship probably sunk during the tsunami. Even though its outer paint had already deteriorated, it still looked new.

  Both of them stopped under the rock. They climbed to the tip of the rock and jumped onto the deck of the passenger ship. As Shen Lianqi had lived on the ship for a month, he was more than familiar with the interior. He guided Lin Sanjiu around, moving his two fish tails.

  "The guest cabins are all underwater, but the captain’s room and galley can be accessed. Oh, I also found a lot of bottled water on the bridge of the ship. There’s enough for both of us."

  "That’s fantastic! I was feeling worried about it just now. I thought I might need to drink fish blood to survive," Lin Sanjiu exclaimed as her eyes lit up.

  She had not drunk clean water for such a long time that she was reluctant to put down the bottle of water after she finished half of it, so she converted it into a card before following Shen Lianqi to the deck.

  "You can look around here first." He smiled. "I’ll go look for my friends."

  Seeing her expression, he quickly added, "You don’t have to worry. They’re good people. After I came here, they helped me out a lot. You can walk around, I’m leaving, okay?"

  [Are they people who ended up in the bottom of the ocean for some reason?] Lin Sanjiu wanted to ask, but Shen Lianqi had already dived into the water. Without much of a choice, she decided to look around. Lin Sanjiu held her [Ability Polishing Agent] and walked two rounds around the ship.

  Her initial excitement about the ship gradually faded. Without another person accompanying her, the surroundings fell into a dead silence, and darkness enveloped her like a tangible essence. Her footsteps made long and dull echoes as she walked around the empty steel ship. Each time she thought about the fact that she was a few thousand meters below sea level, Lin Sanjiu would feel empty and lonely.

  [Shen Lianqi must have some willpower, being able to live here alone for a month.]

  When she felt that she was tired of exploring, she kept her [Ability Polishing Agent] and took out her card with the bottled water. "Huh?" Lin Sanjiu muttered after she changed the card into its original form. She suddenly felt that something was wrong. But before she could think about it, she heard Shen Lianqi’s slightly excited voice: "Miss Lin, here are my friends!"

  Chapter 102 - Meanwhile, on land...

  This was the time of the day when the sunlight was the strongest. The ground was covered by countless deep cracks, and the air, filled with dust and sand accompanied by the vicious heat, made breathing so difficult that it felt like one would die of suffocation the very next minute.

  Usually, most survivors would look for a shady shelter and sleep during these hours, they would not act like these survivors here. About twenty to thirty people, around a white tent, were sitting directly under the sun, clearly enduring the torturous heat.

  Even though all of them were sweating profusely and were visibly suffering, for some reason, none of them showed any sign of standing up to leave. They all sat under the sun earnestly and threw a glance at the white tent every now and then.

  The height of the tent was about the height of a man. It was made of heat-resistant material, so it was definitely very cool inside. At that time, the entrance of the tent was tightly shut.

  "That pretentious guy really knows how to put up a show. It’s so hot, I could die."

  The thing beside the t.h.i.g.h of a young man with a cultured appearance let out a soft complaint. The young man quickly held the thing that was speaking, revealing a pair of gray mittens on his hands which were clearly modified from socks. "Don’t cause any trouble! If they hear us, we’re finished," he rebuked softly.

  A rabbit’s head popped out from his palms. B.Rabbit, whose fur was still covered with the little pink carrot symbols, clicked his tongue in a disgruntled manner.

  "Damn it. It’s just a sh*tty ability. How dare he act like a tyrant…" he grumbled.

  Hu Changzai actually felt the same way, but unlike the unruly rabbit, he continued sitting upright and proper.

  After sitting under the intense sun for quite some time, there was suddenly some movement from the tent. There was the sound of rustling clothes which was followed by heavy breathing sounds. A slight commotion arose among the people sitting outside the tent, then everyone lowered their heads as if they did not hear anything.

  After about ten minutes, the entrance of the tent opened, and a woman with a flushed face walked out. She pulled up the zipper of her mini skirt with one of her hands before she stepped out. The moment she came out, a person said aptly, "Miss Meihuan, has Mr. Ark woken from his afternoon nap?"

  The woman called Meihuan looked at the person speaking with her dewy eyes, "Mr. Ark just woke up. He is a little thirsty. Anyone who can provide Mr. Ark with some fresh fruits may enter the tent to get a visa."

  Once she said that, the twenty to thirty people outside the tent were stunned, including Hu Changzai.

  In the past, getting fresh fruits could be effortless, but now they were in Hyperthermal Hell...

  "Miss Meihua, as you know, we can’t store fresh fruits here. What about juice? I have quite a few flavors with me," a middle-aged man immediately asked.

  Fruit juice was really the best option available in such a situation. The others in the group only had some bottles of mineral water. Thus, no one spoke for a while. Meihuan re-entered the tent without saying a word. She poked her head out after some time, "The person with the juice may enter!"

  The middle-aged man entered the tent with a happy expression. But that was expected since this Consular Officer with the last name Ark was known to charge a lot for his visas. The man definitely got a deal being able to get a visa for a few bottles of juice.

  "I wonder what he will ask of us." Hu Changzai sighed softly feeling a little worried. "We only have a few presentable special items."

  After he said that, Meihuan walked over to him holding a small booklet in her hand. She gestured to him with her chin, "Hey you, how many visas are you applying for?"

  "Oh, I… I am not here to ask for a visa. We want to look for two people’ names. We want to see if they’ve gotten any visas…"

  "Looking for someone?" Meihuan stopped writing and eyed him. "That’s expensive. What are the names?"

  "One of them is Lin Sanjiu, the other is Hai Tianqing. Um, the jiu used is the word for wine, and the Hai is the word for sea."

  —

  Lin Sanjiu’s kick had really sent him flying to the skies. When Hu Changzai got up and walked for half a day, he realized that he had landed in the neighboring province. Even though he had landed so far away, he had been lucky and quickly met B.Rabbit.

  But after that, both human and rabbit could not find a trace of Lin Sanjiu and Hai Tianqing."[1]

  They were running out of ideas when they coincidentally heard that a Consular Officer from another world was nearby. Thinking that Lin Sanjiu might be searching for a Consular Officer, both human and rabbit came to this place holding onto a glimmer of hope.

  —

  After recording the requests, Meihua returned to the tent. She brushed past the middle-aged man when she e
ntered the tent, the latter had quite a terrible expression on his face. Someone immediately asked, "What’s wrong? You didn’t get a visa?"

  "I got it." The middle-aged man waved the paper in his hand but looked downcast. "I gave him three crates of fruit juice, but I only got a visa for a B-level world."

  "Oh sh*t, a B-level world! That’s a little dangerous. You might as well leave it to random chance… Where did you actually want to go?"

  "Where else? I just want to go to Twelve Worlds Centrum!" the middle-aged man didn’t say another word. He sighed and left.

  Hu Changzai, who had been listening by the side, couldn’t really make any sense of their conversation. When he heard the middle-aged man footsteps much further away from them, he pulled the other man over and asked quietly, "Does the destination on the visa make a difference to the Consular Officer? Why didn’t the Consular Officer give that man the visa he wanted?"

  The man, with a head of long hair, lifted his brows and sneered, "You are a first-timer?"

  Hu Changzai nodded.

  "No wonder," the long-haired man muttered. He didn’t say anything else to Hu Changzai but instead just concentrated on playing with two glass balls in his hands. Hu Changzai waited for a while, but noticing that the man did not have the intention of saying more, he felt a little anxious. Just when he was about to question him again, he heard the middle-aged man stopping.

  Hu Changzai looked up and scanned his surroundings. The middle-aged man was standing at the end of the street and was looking into the distance.

  "Puppeteer!" the man’s terrified voice traveled to the people surrounding the tent.

  Hu Changzai’s heart froze for a second.

  "Puppeteer, is that really him?"

  "Why is he here?"

  "F*ck! Let’s escape…"

  Shortly after, the people around them stood up, and everyone started whispering to each other. Everyone was suddenly feeling extremely restless and unsettled. One street wasn’t quite really that far. Before all the whispering stopped and before the people who had decided to escape could make a move, Puppeteer already appeared before everyone. He stood in front of the tent as if he didn’t even need to take a step.