Chapter 197: Scream

“Shanshan, it’s us… Sister Gong is here! Don’t be scared…” Gong Xue comforted the naked girl and gently patted her forehead and long hair.

The girl was completely naked, which made Gong Jian feel very embarrassed. After helping ‘Lin Yin’ hold her down, he immediately looked away.

Lü Yang saw a lot of himself in Gong Jian, but this young man was clearly much simpler-minded than him. Also, because of his upbringing environment, Gong Jian’s character was more introverted and lacked some of Lü Yang’s roughness.

Yi Ya and Hu Yulan also came over. They took out a raincoat and wrapped it around Shanshan’s body.

Lü Yang shone his flashlight on the girl’s face and recognized her immediately. This girl, whom Gong Xue called ‘Shanshan’, was the same one he had possessed last night. Her breasts looked very familiar to him, and her face completely matched the one he saw on the swamp’s water surface last night.

As for why the possession phenomenon happened after entering the dream, Lü Yang did not know. Perhaps after becoming an Intermediate Gui User, he gained some preliminary predictive abilities? Or maybe this was a special hint given to him by the Mysterious Domain?

From many events that had already occurred, Lü Yang felt that the hint for the Path of Survival in this Mysterious Domain was likely hidden in his nightmare last night.

Path of Survival… Path of Survival… Could the Path of Survival be to destroy all the Faceless Persons?

That seemed unlikely. Based on his experience in last night’s nightmare, these Faceless Persons were extremely tough. Their bodies were hard like iron, their fists could punch through walls, and their physical strength exceeded that of normal people by more than ten times. It was simply impossible for ordinary humans to harm them.

Last night, Lü Yang fought a Faceless Person with an Iron Shovel and even struck its neck, but the result was disastrous. The shovel blade was as fragile as paper in the Faceless Person’s hands.

Previously, the Dark Predator could be defeated by breaking its armor with flashlight light and then destroying it. But what was the weakness of these Faceless Persons?

Let’s think carefully… What other useful hints were there in last night’s dream?

Ah, when lightning and thunder happened in the sky, the Faceless Persons would momentarily stiffen and freeze in place. At that time, Lü Yang was caught by a Faceless Person and pinned to the ground. The situation was extremely dangerous. Just then, a thunder strike happened in the sky—a truly earth-shattering clap of thunder—and Lü Yang managed to escape from the Faceless Person’s grasp.

Since they weren’t afraid of light or the brightness of lightning, then they must be afraid of sound! Very loud sound! Deafening thunder!

The Faceless Persons’ faces were blank, with only ears remaining. They took the students’ faces and put them on their own faces. Probably, without enough time, they couldn’t fully use the eyes, nose, and mouth functions.

After long periods of life without faces, without eyes, noses, or mouths, they mostly relied on their hearing to live. They used hearing to find and lock onto targets, so their hearing was exceptionally sharp. Even very tiny sounds, like breathing or heartbeat, could be detected by them. So it was easy to imagine that loud sounds would be a disaster for them, causing temporary deafness. Once deafened, they could no longer lock onto targets.

Just as light was the enemy of the Dark Predator, sound was the enemy of the Faceless Persons!

However, even last night’s earth-shattering thunder only made them briefly stiff; it didn’t harm them. He didn’t know how loud a sound was needed to completely destroy them…

Or perhaps the Path of Survival in this Mysterious Domain didn’t necessarily require destroying these Faceless Persons. Maybe it involved finding other clues and completing certain tasks?

Clues…

Lü Yang thought repeatedly and always felt that the murals in the Ancestral Hall were the most suspicious…

At one moment, an idea suddenly flashed in Lü Yang’s mind. Could the Path of Survival for this Mysterious Domain be…

It was a pity; they had already left the Ancestral Hall.

If he had thought of this method while still inside the Ancestral Hall, maybe those girls wouldn’t have been harmed.

To test whether the Path of Survival was as Lü Yang suspected, he first needed to confirm whether sound could make the Faceless Persons briefly stiffen. Otherwise, there would be no chance to re-enter the Ancestral Hall safely to test if this idea was indeed the Path of Survival.

Shanshan’s surname was Zhang, and her full name was Zhang Shanshan. Although she calmed down a bit and stopped struggling to escape, no matter how everyone asked her, she refused to say a word. She just kept trembling, probably due to extreme fright.

According to Lü Yang’s guess, she likely ran into the Cliffside Cemetery while being captured by the Faceless Persons. Or maybe all four of them were originally at the Cliffside Cemetery and suddenly encountered an attack by the Faceless Persons. Among the four, only she hid in a Coffin Pit and survived.

Since she refused to speak, they couldn’t confirm exactly when the four of them encountered the Faceless Persons.

…

“This hill only has one narrow stone stairway going down. Next to the stairs, there’s a slope that can also be used to descend, but people below can’t climb up from the slope. All the grave pits on the hill are empty.” After getting up and carefully scouting around again, Gong Jian reported this to Lü Yang.

“Everyone else stays here. Gong Jian, you come with me down there. I need to do some tests to see how to deal with those Faceless Persons and get everyone out of here safely…” Lü Yang told Gong Jian and the others.

“Are you going down?” The girls seemed quite afraid of staying in the Cemetery. With Gong Jian here, he could boost their courage. If he went down, they would be even more scared.

“If we don’t think of some methods, we’ll be trapped and die here. We won’t be down long; we’ll come back soon. Stay together and don’t run around, and you’ll be fine.” Lü Yang instructed everyone and glanced at Yi Ya.

“You go ahead, but be careful.” Yi Ya’s face was somewhat pale, but she calmly replied to Lü Yang.

“Later, I might let out some screams down there as part of the testing. Remember, no matter what happens below, you must not come down…” Lü Yang reiterated to everyone.

“Please be very careful!” Gong Xue looked worriedly at Gong Jian and then at ‘Lin Yin’.

“We’ll be just a short distance below. If anything unusual happens up here, just scream loudly, and we’ll run up immediately.” Lü Yang comforted the girls again. He could see they were scared, and he didn’t want to leave Yi Ya at such a time.

But he had to think of ways to save them. Otherwise, staying in this Cemetery would only lead to death.

Mysterious Domains often had time limits.

“Maybe… we should go down with you?” Yi Ya suggested to Lü Yang.

“No, it’s too dangerous down there. If it’s just the two of us, we can escape easily if danger comes. If you all come down too, it might distract us.” Lü Yang shook his head.

After comforting the girls a few more words, Lü Yang steeled himself and went with Gong Jian to the stone stairs leading down. They slowly climbed down the cliff. He carried a flashlight, and Gong Jian held an Iron Shovel.

On this stormy night, even with a flashlight, the visible range was very limited. Instead, when lightning flashed, it allowed people to see a bit farther.

“Yinyin, what’s your plan?”

After descending the cliff, Gong Jian asked ‘Lin Yin’. Tonight, ‘Lin Yin’ was acting very strange, but since ‘she’ didn’t seem to want to explain, Gong Jian didn’t ask further and only inquired about what he needed to know.

“These Faceless Persons originally had no eyes, noses, or mouths, so their hearing is abnormally sharp…” Lü Yang explained his thoughts to Gong Jian and then moved on to his plan.

“After we go down, we’ll first try to find one or several lone Faceless Persons. Then we’ll test how sound affects them. If it works, we can proceed with my next plan. This might be the key to solving this Mysterious Domain.”

“Mysterious Domain?” Gong Jian clearly paused at hearing this term.

“We are not in the Real world now. We are trapped in a place similar to an Alien Space or Parallel World—a very Strange Point place, so it’s called a Mysterious Domain… Mysterious Domains have specific Tasks that, once triggered, can end them. This is also called the Path of Survival. If we don’t find the Path of Survival quickly, we might end up dying in this Mysterious Domain. You just need a rough understanding; it’s too complicated to explain fully right now.” Lü Yang briefly explained to Gong Jian.

“Oh…” Gong Jian responded somewhat understandingly, but his face still showed confusion.

He wanted to ask ‘Lin Yin’ how ‘she’ knew these things, but ‘she’ already seemed unwilling to talk, so he swallowed the words that came to his lips.

…

After Lü Yang and Gong Jian entered the rear gate of Mountain Peak Village, they cautiously moved closer to the Ancestral Hall. Not far ahead, two female classmates who were wandering aimlessly in the Torrential Rain noticed their movement and chased after them.

From their expressions, it was clear they weren’t the original girls. At that moment, they were just the girls’ faces placed on the blank faces of two Faceless Persons who came out of the Mural.

Now, Mountain Peak Village was full of such face-wearers. After emerging from the Mural, they all put on the clothes of the male and female classmates and ‘wore’ their faces, making them look very Strange Point.

Lü Yang and Gong Jian turned and ran. As they were about to exit the village, Lü Yang turned back and let out a sharp scream at the two face-wearers…

The two chasing face-wearers stopped in their tracks upon hearing ‘Lin Yin’s’ scream. Their bodies seemed to freeze, and their faces showed extreme agitation.