Chapter 4

【Who do you guys think will win?】

The Assault player on Jiang Yun’s team, 【He An】, typed in the team channel.

They were all lying dead anyway, unable to help in any way, so all they could do was discuss the situation and chat.

The Scout 【Suifeng Qianru Ye】 remembered how he’d just declared that 【ACE】 as a sniper had absolutely no chance of turning things around—and then the other had immediately slapped him in the face with actual results.

He felt extremely humiliated, so even though ACE was his teammate, he sent his text with a bit of a sour tone: 【Most likely the Joker on the other side. The lights were only on for that brief instant, yet that Joker could easily fire four bullets in rapid succession and precisely hit the vital points of all four of us. With that kind of skill, how could ACE win?】

【Shanshan Weichuan】, who had briefly held team command, had a different view.

【ACE is impressive too. With just that tiny bit of gunfire flash and sound, she could pinpoint the enemy’s location and score a kill. The difficulty isn’t any lower than Joker’s quadra kill.】

Perhaps the two of them were truly worthy rivals?

【Shanshan Weichuan】 sighed with emotion—to encounter two snipers this absurdly strong, almost godlike, in a single game was really quite a coincidence.

So coincidental it was almost like fate had deliberately arranged it.

It was fate that had orchestrated the meeting of Joker and ACE.

Medic Puppy: 【Anyway, I hope ACE boss wins! You can do it!】

Jiang Yun had no interest in reading the team chat. All her focus was on analyzing the current situation.

Holy Hymn Academy was a one-to-one replica of the real-world academy of the same name under the Holy Hymn Group. The map consisted mainly of four teaching buildings arranged roughly in a square, and the even-numbered floors of each building had connecting corridors linking to the adjacent buildings.

She was currently on the top floor of Teaching Building B, and the art classroom where Yan Xieyue had been was on the second floor of Building C.

But the art classroom was also close to the corner between C and D, so Yan Xieyue could reach Building D via the connecting corridor.

If he was in Building D, it would directly face Building B.

—Extremely convenient for sniping.

For her, and for Yan Xieyue alike.

Jiang Yun found a relatively open corridor and rapidly calculated in her head.

Then she moved at high speed, firing bullets as she moved.

Centered on the art classroom on the second floor opposite, a window in every surrounding room was pierced by a bullet.

He An: 【A-amazing.】

While moving rapidly and with extreme weather interference, she could still control the bullet’s point of impact so precisely.

Suifeng Qianru Ye: 【She still didn’t snipe Joker, did she? Just shooting out glass—meaningless flashy tricks.】

The Medic, completely shedding her earlier soft, cute tone, said firmly: 【If you’re so good, you go do it.】

She hated this kind of loser man who only knew how to run his mouth.

Suifeng Qianru Ye: 【……】

Jiang Yun slid from one end of the corridor to the other, swapped magazines, and planned to repeat what she’d just done—this time expanding the range further.

Just as she moved to the quarter point of the corridor, a bullet suddenly flew in and struck her controlled character’s left eye.

Her health continued to drop, and the edges of the entire screen were tinged with blood red, warning the player that the character’s current state was critically poor.

In the channel, Suifeng Qianru Ye felt he’d caught 【ACE】’s flaw and mocked: 【Told you not to pull these meaningless flashy tricks. Look, look—making all that noise, not even grazing the enemy’s clothes, and instead letting the enemy find your exact position. Stupid!】

Medic Puppy: 【Anyone can talk big. I think ACE is amazing, and now that Joker has fired, ACE boss can also figure out the enemy’s approximate location.】

The other two said nothing.

In long-range sniper duels, shooting was an active attack, but it also simultaneously exposed one’s own position.

It was indeed common for someone to fire multiple bullets, miss the enemy, and instead let the opponent lock onto their position—ultimately getting headshot.

Their ACE seemed to have not yet found Joker’s precise location, but Joker had already locked onto the former’s position.

The precisely fired bullet hadn’t been an instant kill, but it was close enough.

In the game’s settings, if a sniper was hit in one eye, when using the scope to aim at the enemy, afterimages would appear on screen, greatly affecting performance.

Not to mention that firing bullets now required piercing through a stormy, dark night environment—not a single deviation could be tolerated.

ACE had no way to turn things around.

All these thoughts occurred in just two or three seconds.

No one noticed that ACE rolled on the ground, kicked off with her back foot, and continued charging forward.

“Bang!—”

A bullet fired, traveling through the empty window frame of a classroom whose glass had been shattered, into the room.

【Suifeng Qianru Ye】 grew even more smug and was about to grab his keyboard to intensify his mockery of ACE for firing yet another meaningless bullet, when that classroom suddenly blazed with light as bright as day.

The real-world Holy Hymn Academy was a standard aristocratic institution, with the finest facilities everywhere—the classroom lights were no exception, and the light source quality was excellent.

The in-game Holy Hymn Academy replicated this as well. The ceiling lights in the classrooms were dazzlingly bright, providing extremely high visibility in the dark night.

Before anyone could react, the ACE controlled by Jiang Yun instantly fired another shot.

The bullet traveled at an extremely tricky angle, through the intricate hollow patterns of the corridor railing, and then—

Sniper 【ACE】 killed Sniper 【Joker】

Looking at the line of text that suddenly appeared on screen, and the VICTORY that followed, everyone was still a bit stunned.

Because the game was over, there was no longer any need to worry about sound interfering with ACE. He An turned on his mic: “……So, we, uh, won? My god, thanks for carrying us, boss!”

Suifeng Qianru Ye stubbornly insisted: “J-just good luck.”

Medic Puppy turned on her mic and mocked him, completely devoid of the soft, cute tone she used with ACE: “Mmhm, we know you’re an unlucky bastard. You’ll never have ‘good luck’ like ACE boss in your life.”

Suifeng Qianru Ye: …Fuck!

Shanshan Weichuan took a moment to process, then suddenly said excitedly: “I get it now! Shooting out the glass windows just now wasn’t just to find Joker’s position—it was also to clear the way for the next step, because ACE boss wanted to hit the independent power boxes in each classroom and turn the lights on!”

With a bright light source, she could snipe the opponent more precisely!

That was also the crucial advantage that had let Joker rack up a quadra kill earlier in the game.

A sniper needed a clear field of view.

And the game design regarding the independent power distribution boxes was an original detail preserved from when Holy Hymn Academy was replicated from the real building. Before entering the game, it would also be noted in the lengthy map description.

But how many people would actually pay attention to these details?

The main reason Joker had been killed by ACE just now was probably that he hadn’t expected the lights to suddenly come on.

In other words, the two might not necessarily be distinguishable in terms of sniper skill, but ACE had won by grasping the map’s tiny details more precisely than Joker.

When experts crossed swords, victory and defeat were often decided by a hair’s breadth.

—So the loss wasn’t unfair.

In front of a certain screen, a blond man looked at the “DEFEAT” displayed and smiled with amusement.

ACE? Interesting.

In this gunfight game, the other had indeed been a bit better than him.

Just then, the communicator by his hand rang.

“Boss! They’ve made their move—already driven the truck out of the factory. Are they going after hostages again?”

The man revealed a cold smile. “Knew their fox tails couldn’t stay hidden. Wait for me—I’m heading out now.”

With that, he reached out his large hand and pressed a device on his desk bearing the official Inspection Team emblem.

Instantly, the device’s display changed from “On Leave” to “On Field Mission.”

On the other side, Jiang Yun ignored the “Someone wants to add you as a friend” notification in the game’s backend and directly exited the game.

She stretched, and heard the system say excitedly: 【Host, you were so cool just now—uh, but, does this help our conquest mission in any way?】

The moment the words left Its mouth, the system shut up, because It was shocked to discover: hey, among the four male leads, Yan Xieyue’s avatar had lit up, indicating the conquest had officially begun.

Current conquest progress: 8%

System: ?

Why would the male lead’s affection go up after being headshot in a game?

The little system indicated that it couldn’t figure it out.

On the other side, Jiang Yun didn’t know what the system was thinking. She only silently said in her heart: How could it not help?

A favored child of heaven like Yan Xieyue might not remember a Medic who healed and supported him in a game, but he would definitely remember the sniper who killed him with one shot in a sniper duel.

Jiang Yun wasn’t in a hurry to explain her actions to the system. She leisurely curved a smile.

Actually, before playing the game, she had already come up with an ingenious solution regarding the matter of “creating a manga character.”

Now, she felt even more certain that this solution was very feasible.

If, after a task-taker entered a manga world, the manga character they controlled could be compared to an account in a game—

Then—

“Who says I only have one account?”

Jiang Yun thought.

Jiang Yun felt a rustling sound beside her.

The next moment, something gently bumped into her.

“Wake up.”

Jiang Yun opened her eyes, pretending to have just woken up, and looked around in panic, “This—”

“Shh.”

The short-haired woman across from her said in a low voice.

Jiang Yun nodded and also lowered her voice: “Where is this place? How did I get here? And why are my hands and feet tied up?”

This was probably the interior of a large container truck. The vehicle was still moving, occasionally jolting, and a faint, hard-to-describe stench—like fishiness—could be smelled in the air.

There was no light at all. After her eyes adjusted slightly to the darkness, she could make out several women imprisoned inside.

Including her, there were four in total.

The short-haired woman explained briefly: “Calm down first and listen to me. We’ve all probably been kidnapped. I remember I was heading to the boundary between Black Tower Zone Five and Dense Fog Zone Four for work, but I suddenly lost consciousness. When I woke up again, I was here.”

Jiang Yun pretended to be aggrieved and sniffled, “Mine was about the same.”

The woman sitting beside Jiang Yun—the one who had nudged her awake with her shoulder—said, “You were probably the last one caught, because you woke up last. The three of us roughly compared notes before you woke up. Everyone had a similar experience—the criminals must have used some kind of drug to knock us out and loaded us into this truck.”

Jiang Yun: “What on earth do they want?”

The woman beside her: “What else? Murder and robbery—isn’t that what criminals do? —Though this group of criminals might indeed be a bit special.”

“Actually, I didn’t tell you guys just now—I was the first to wake up. I just kept pretending to be asleep, and only dared to open my eyes and communicate with you after you spoke,” the woman said. “When the last one—”

“My name is Jiang Yun.” This was the new name Jiang Yun had given herself in this manga, a way of simply distinguishing her real self from the manga character.

“When Jiang Yun was brought in by them, because the truck had stopped, I secretly opened my eyes and took a look around.”

The short-haired woman: “You’re really bold. If they’d caught you, you’d be done for.”

“But I found evidence. We’re currently in the Gray Tower Zone,” the woman said. “Because the moment the rear door opened, I saw the gray tower body. And I also saw what those people were wearing—yellow factory uniforms.”

“Yellow?” the short-haired woman repeated in confusion. “Factory uniforms are rarely yellow. Usually they’re blue.”

“Jinwu Pharmaceuticals.”

Suddenly, an unfamiliar voice sounded.

“—Has everything been investigated clearly?” The man in the Joint Inspection Team uniform had his eyes closed, the insignia on his chest declaring his captain status.

“Investigated clearly. Based on the tipline report, we applied to retrieve data from the nearby tower and confirmed it to be true. Moreover,” the team member reporting paused, “that cold-chain container involved in the transport belongs to a pharmaceutical factory under Jinwu Pharmaceuticals.”

“Beyond that, numerous clues regarding these kidnapping cases all point to Jinwu Pharmaceuticals.”

The man’s expression darkened. After a moment, he said: “We’re at a critical juncture right now. Nothing else can go wrong. Send someone to that pharmaceutical factory immediately to probe the situation. Have Yan Xieyue lead the team.”

“By the way, where is Yan Xieyue? I haven’t seen him this whole time?” Captain Tang Rufeng furrowed his brow, looking very serious. “Is he catching up on sleep in his room, or playing some game? Get him over here right now.”

At these words, the team members exchanged glances, looking like they wanted to speak but hesitated.

“What is it?”

“Actually,” an orange-haired team member began hesitantly, “boss—uh, Deputy Captain Yan set out a long time ago. He also asked me to pass along a message to you.”

“What?”

“Deputy Captain Yan said,” the orange-haired member said, trembling slightly, his voice quavering, “if we followed your regulations and waited to report to you before deploying… the hostages’ corpses would already be cold.”