Chapter 111: Death List
The temperature plummeted sharply as night deepened. Even with her temperature-regulating suit, Lin Huai felt the biting chill seep through the fabric. Hurrying across the snow, she reached the hearse, where Dong Xiaobao was already floating by the window glass, eagerly waiting to greet her.
Seeing the adorable little spirit, Lin Huai smiled. She climbed inside, sealed the door, and engaged the auto-drive system. After heading to the first-floor washroom to change into a clean, dry set of clothes, she walked up to the panoramic sunroom on the second floor.
Dong Xiaobao nestled against her shoulder, sweet and obedient. Lin Huai gently stroked the baby’s plump, soft cheek, but the sight of such innocence naturally brought back the memory of Wu Zhaodi—the little girl who had been abused and murdered by her own father. A heavy sigh escaped her lips.
Little girls were so precious and sweet. How could parents in the mortal world treat their own flesh and blood with such cruelty?
How could someone torment a child in every imaginable way simply because of her gender?
If they truly had no love to give, they could have placed her in another family’s care. Why resort to endless abuse and murder?
Lin Huai could never fathom the twisted minds of such monsters. Fortunately, the child’s spirit was finally free of her torment and had moved on toward rebirth, so Lin Huai pushed the lingering sorrow aside.
Rummaging through her storage space, she pulled out a carved, crimson shrine.
Since Dong Xiaobao’s altar was set up in the bedroom, placing another deity’s altar in the same room felt inappropriate. Lin Huai positioned the crimson wooden shrine along the wall of the glass sunroom instead. She neatly arranged plates of fresh fruit and pastry offerings, carefully invited the ink-jade carving of Black Impermanence inside, and lit three slender sticks of incense. Holding them with both hands, she bowed with deep respect:
“Devoted believer Lin Huai offers her prayers. My only wish is to reach the very end of this road. I pray the Underworld God Impermanence will watch over and protect me!”
The small shrine remained quiet, offering no supernatural sign, which did not surprise her in the least.
She settled onto the soft sofa, pulling out warm food and clean water to unwind. At the same time, she opened the squad chat interface to check on her teammates’ progress.
Every member of the Elite Squad had sent an update confirming they had cleared the instance, yet nobody was chatting.
Even Hungry Spirit Blue Knight hadn’t typed a single complaint about his embarrassing “Tragic King” title.
Usually, the chat would explode with excitement after a tough dungeon run, with everyone trading jokes and bragging about their loot. Today, the silence was almost deafening.
Lin Huai understood why. A faint, knowing smile touched her lips. Anyone who emerged from Ghost Gate Pass had to pass through this exact quiet stage.
Among the twenty major stations of the Underworld, Ghost Gate Pass drew the sharpest, most absolute line between life and death.
The City of Wrongful Death still mirrored life. The souls there lived, spoke, and traded just like ordinary mortals, creating a bustling metropolis that seemed almost alive.
Beyond Ghost Gate Pass lay only true death—silent, heavy, and final.
Whether a life had been glorious and accomplished, or bitter, tragic, and absurd, every traveler was forced to watch a fleeting summary of their past replayed before the gates before everything was cut short.
When someone stood before the grand archway and looked back upon their mortal existence from a detached perspective, nobody could walk off that bridge with a carefree smile.
A lifetime of striving, enduring, and dreaming—in the end, wasn’t this where it all led?
After a long stretch of silence in the chat, Flash Delivery Yellow Knight finally posted a single question.
He asked: What exactly do people live for in this lifetime?
Nobody replied. Lin Huai had lived through two lifetimes, yet she could not give him a neat answer either.
Perhaps Yellow Knight wasn’t even hunting for a solution; he simply needed to let the thought breathe. Such a question had no universal answer, but everyone eventually had to find their own peace with it.
The heavy mood hung over the group for two or three days before the channel slowly began to regain its usual spark. Seeing that her squad was finally shaking off the somber weight of life and death, Lin Huai let out a quiet breath of relief.
Her clearance rewards from Ghost Gate Pass were formal return gifts from Generals Ox-Head and Horse-Face. Aside from a Green Ghost Box, she received a generous supply of Blood Jades and the Memory Crystal Orbs she needed most for vehicle upgrades.
Her inventory now held twenty-two Memory Crystal Orbs, though only one currently stored an actual memory.
Looking down at the faint, pearly glow pulsing within that single sphere, she realized her teammates were still carrying a lingering sense of aimlessness. To truly reset their focus, they needed a crisp, righteous victory to shake off the rust.
As their squad leader, she had to steer them toward survival, but looking after their morale and mental strength was just as critical.
As luck would have it, she possessed a clear execution list of eight targets.
Lin Huai pulled up the squad channel and typed:
[Bone Ashes Mixed with Rice]: I have eight targets that need to be eliminated. Who wants in?
[If You’re Bad, Practice More]: Count me in!
[Dragon Emerging from the Sea]: I’m ready.
[AAA Building Materials Old Wang]: Who are we taking out? I’ve been irritable and pent-up these past few days. I need to blow off some steam—sign me up!
[Sparkling and Lovable]: Are they very strong? Can I handle it? What if Milk Tea and I form a pair to take one down together?
[Fastest Hand at SF Express]: Boss, our Three Knights are a trio! How do we split the targets? Can you add a few more names to the list?
[Peace and Violence]: I’d like to participate as well…
[Jiangzhehu Inheritor]: Count me in too!
Lin Huai gave them a concise summary of her meeting with the undercover police officer by the river in the City of Wrongful Death, then posted the target list directly into the chat.
[Bone Ashes Mixed with Rice]: This is a cross-zone bounty mission. In the mortal world, these eight individuals were violent criminals within an armed syndicate. Because of their backgrounds, they adapted to the survival game faster than most and hold solid combat power. They are extremely dangerous.
[Bone Ashes Mixed with Rice]: Form two-person teams. Use a Zone Transfer Card to enter their district, track them down with a Teleportation Talisman, eliminate them cleanly, and return immediately.
[Dragon Emerging from the Sea]: Boss, if we’re hunting across other zones, we shouldn’t send everyone out at once. We need people guarding our home territory.
[Bone Ashes Mixed with Rice]: Agreed. We won’t leave all at once. We will hunt in pairs. The next group will only mobilize once the previous pair returns safely.
With the tactical rotation finalized, the first hunting pair deployed without delay.
Sister Cai and Old Wang went in as the scouting team. To set a solid baseline, Lin Huai assigned them the strongest target on the list.
She wanted to use this operation to sharpen the team’s combat instincts. Sparkling and Milk Tea needed live combat experience as well; they couldn’t stay sheltered in the rear forever. In this harsh wasteland, every single person needed the skills to defend their own life.
It took Sister Cai and Old Wang three hours to complete the assignment. The fight had been tense and tight, but the outcome was clean.
The second they materialized back in Zone 444, the two began trading wild, lively war stories in the group chat, fully rediscovering their usual spark.
The second team—Dragon Emerging from the Sea and Milk Tea—departed right after.
Fastest Hand paired up with Sparkling, Blue Knight accompanied Jiangzhehu Inheritor, and Peace and Violence deployed alongside Yellow Knight.
For the remaining targets, Dragon Emerging from the Sea and Sister Cai each conducted a solo strike. As the squad’s top vanguard fighters, both possessed more than enough raw power to handle a single target alone.
Eight targets, systematically eliminated over three days of calculated strikes.
By the morning of the third day, only the final name remained untouched. Lin Huai decided to handle this last execution herself.
