Chapter 66
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At the same time, a palm-sized black hole appeared in front of Lou Yan.
Seeing the black hole, Lou Yan suddenly flipped off the bed and quickly put out the cigarette, moving away from the black hole.
The black hole emitted an indescribable aura of terror, as if it could swallow all light. The surrounding air distorted because of the black hole. Lou Yan frowned. Under his gaze, after spitting out a black invitation, the black hole disappeared strangely into the air.
The door banged loudly. Lou Yan heard Lu Haixiu’s scream just now. He quickly picked up the invitation and opened the door, only to see Li Sanxin and the others, along with Little Yu, gathered outside his door, looking puzzled. Apart from Little Yu, who looked confused, everyone else held a pure black invitation in their hands.
Lu Haixiu was in a panic, “Brother Lou, did you just see a black hole?”
“I did,” Lou Yan raised the invitation in his hand, avoided their gaze, his face not looking very good but not too ugly either, “This is an invitation from the Amusement Park.”
Li Sanxin and Lu Haixiu exclaimed in unison, “An invitation from the Amusement Park?!”
“The Anomaly Lord occasionally invites humans who have performed well when confronting anomalies to participate in the Amusement Park. The Amusement Park is a domain formed by the power of the Anomaly Lord, equivalent to an unknown independent world. You can think of the Amusement Park as a party where adventurers and anomalies revel together. If a human can come out of the Amusement Park alive, he will gain countless wealth, enhance his own abilities, and have the opportunity to meet the Anomaly Lord. It’s all written on the invitation,” Lou Yan leaned against the door frame, hands in his pockets, speaking calmly, “After meeting the Anomaly Lord, within the range allowed by the Anomaly Lord, he will also fulfill the wish of the survivor.”
“Wish…” Lu Haixiu murmured, unconsciously tightening the invitation in his hand, “A wish like resurrecting the dead… is that possible?”
Lou Yan sighed silently, rubbed his forehead, “It is.”
Lu Haixiu’s breath hitched, his eyes suddenly moist, but before he could feel the ecstatic joy, he heard Lou Yan’s cold voice saying, “But.”
“But…” Lou Yan stared directly at Lu Haixiu, “Your parents are already dead. Even if you can really participate in the Amusement Park and survive, even if the Anomaly Lord can really fulfill your wish to resurrect your parents, your parents will no longer be your parents as you remember them, but the parents formed by the Anomaly Lord using strange powers. Do you really think they will be your parents?”
Lou Yan had heard in his previous life that some people participated in the Amusement Park to resurrect their loved ones. In the end, after surviving through great peril, the Anomaly Lord fulfilled their wishes. However, the resurrected family members no longer had human warmth and became as strange, bizarre, and cruel as the anomalies. They were no longer the same as the people they remembered.
Some people might accept their loved ones becoming anomalies in exchange for their resurrection, but Lou Yan firmly believed that this was not a desirable outcome.
When humans stare into the abyss, the abyss also stares into humans. Life and death have their own fates, and everyone has their own destiny. Trying to use anomaly powers to resurrect a person’s life will ultimately make the resurrected person a part of the anomaly.
The shattered star-like gleam that had lit up in Lu Haixiu’s eyes dimmed in an instant, as he lowered his head, his dejected and saddened aura evident to everyone around him. “No… they are not… I don’t want another pair of parents disguised as anomalies,” he said, his voice trailing off as he spoke to Lou Yan, his disappointment palpable.
“I understand what you mean, Brother Liu,” he discreetly wiped his eyes, putting on a cheerful facade as he lifted his head again, “just forget that I asked that question… Brother Liu, this amusement park seems to offer great benefits, doesn’t it? Will there be many people participating?”
Li Sanxin looked at Lu Haixiu with some pity, echoing his words sympathetically, “Exactly. Leaving aside the money, the opportunity to enhance one’s abilities and fulfill a wish are quite tempting. There should be quite a few people who can’t resist such allure, right? If it’s an amusement park, it shouldn’t be too difficult, right? The focus should be on the entertainment aspect.”
“It is indeed focused on entertainment, but note that this is what the Anomaly Lord considers entertainment,” Lou Yan sneered, “What the anomaly considers entertaining will only be more terrifying, thrilling, bloody, and stimulating than the anomalies we usually encounter. Think of it from a director’s perspective. If you were directing an entertainment match, would you prefer it to be mundane or filled with various conflicts, dangers, and desires?”
Li Sanxin rubbed his nose and honestly admitted, “Obviously, the latter would be more interesting.”
Lou Yan continued, “So you understand now. This amusement park is very dangerous. Don’t just see the cakes inside and ignore the traps.”
Duan Zege looked down, repeatedly reading the invitation, and asked hesitantly, “This invitation is sent by the Anomaly Lord. Can we choose not to go?”
“You can,” Lou Yan also opened the invitation and glanced at it, “Those who receive the invitation can choose to participate or not.”
The invitation only had two short sentences.
“Respected Mr. Lou Yan, based on your outstanding performance in Liushu Village, you are hereby invited to participate in the Anomaly Amusement Park on April 27th (three days later). Once you successfully emerge alive from the amusement park, you will receive double mental power, wealth bestowed by the Anomaly Lord, and the opportunity to meet the Anomaly Lord in person. If you choose to participate, please arrive at Chengjiang City Library at 7:00 PM that evening. I eagerly await your arrival. – Shadow Reaper, servant of the Anomaly Lord.”
Lou Yan raised his finger and lightly traced over the sentence.
Shadow Reaper, the loyal servant of the Anomaly Lord, a powerful anomaly. Lou Yan hadn’t seen the Shadow Reaper, but he had heard rumors about it. In those rumors, the danger level of the Shadow Reaper was enough to be classified as A-level terrifying anomaly.
In his previous life, Lou Yan had not received an invitation to the amusement park during this period, so he didn’t know what would happen inside. But Lou Yan knew that as long as it was an amusement park, it would undoubtedly be extremely bloody and perilous.
The black invitation card looked as smooth as silk, but its edges were extremely sharp. When Lou Yan’s fingertips brushed against the corner, he felt a slight pain. A tiny wound had already been cut by the sharp edge of the card, and a drop of bright red blood flowed out, staining the surface of the black invitation.
Lou Yan wiped the blood away with his hand and looked at his thoughtful companions. After a moment of silence, he suggested, “You’d better not participate in the amusement park. This is the first amusement park organized since the Anomaly Resurgence, and no one knows what will happen inside. You can choose to observe this time and accumulate experience. Although you have faced anomalies before, the anomalies you’ve encountered and those inside the amusement park are not on the same level. I’m not exaggerating when I say that most likely eight or nine out of ten of you will die in the amusement park.”
Li Sanxin understood Lou Yan’s implied meaning from the tone of his voice and immediately frowned, staring at Lou Yan, “Do you want to go to the amusement park alone?”
“Exactly,” Lou Yan nodded decisively, admitting it bluntly, not meeting Li Sanxin’s gaze, his eyes dark, “The wish promised by the Anomaly Lord is useful to me.”
Li Sanxin felt his headache returning. He took a deep breath, “I’ll go too. We’ll go together.”
Lou Yan instinctively wanted to refuse, but when he saw the determined expression on Li Sanxin’s face that seemed to say, “Unless I die, don’t even think about going alone,” he gave in, “Fine, you can come with me.”
Although it wasn’t a good idea, Li Sanxin smiled broadly, reached out to ruffle Lou Yan’s hair, and said with gusto, “Wait for big brother to protect you.”
“Protect me with the baby in your belly?” Lou Yan pushed away his hand, deadpanning, “You better protect yourself.”
Li Sanxin’s forehead twitched, “If you don’t know how to talk, you can keep quiet.”
Seeing Lu Haixiu’s eager expression beside him, Lou Yan decisively extended a finger and shook it, “Lu Haixiu, you and Duan Zege better not think about going. Li Sanxin’s talent skills and fused anomaly possess strong offensive capabilities. He can handle it, but one of you can only divine, and you can only divine four times a day. The other one can only retrieve items remotely, unable to lock onto items by yourself. You two just wait outside.”
Lu Haixiu pursed his lips and pitifully reached out to tug at Duan Zege’s clothes, indicating that Duan Zege should try to persuade Lou Yan. But Duan Zege let out a long sigh of relief and said with a tone of post-disaster relief, “I was thinking the same. Don’t worry, I’ll stay home and take care of Little Lu and Little Yu. Oh, by the way, can you give me some living expenses when you leave? I can’t cook, and I have to take the two kids out to eat to survive.”
He looked sincerely at the big spender Lou Yan.
Lu Haixiu: “…”
Lou Yan: “…”
Li Sanxin: “…You really have some nerve, Duan Zege.”
Lou Yan rolled his eyes, took out a bank card, threw it to Duan Zege, and then, with the invitation in hand, tried to return to his room to be alone. However, he was stopped by Li Sanxin.
With a smile, Li Sanxin pressed Lou Yan onto the living room sofa and handed him a milk ice cream, “Wait here, I’ll make you something delicious.”
Lou Yan clicked his tongue irritably, but seeing the worried looks of everyone, he reluctantly began to eat the ice cream with a straight face.
His dissatisfaction stemmed from two reasons: one was the fact that he had to do that with Fu Xuezhou to survive, which made him extremely nauseous, and the second was Fu Xuezhou’s forceful attitude in front of his friends.
But his friends didn’t joke about him, nor did they mention the derogatory words that Fu Xuezhou, that scumbag, had said in front of him. This undoubtedly lessened Lou Yan’s sense of shame—at least he could calmly sit down and eat with his friends.
After a meal, Lou Yan slipped back to his room early to spend the afternoon and evening recovering his spirits. By the next morning when he left the house, Lou Yan had transformed back into the confident and elegant Mr. Lou.
Dressed in a perfectly tailored suit with precious jewels adorning the cuffs and chest, a beautiful and flexible gray-blue tie wrapped around his neck. With a brand-new watch, a hint of men’s cologne, shiny leather shoes… from head to toe, Lou Yan was completely renewed, showing no signs of the despair he had been struck with yesterday.
He adjusted his tie, twisted the silver ring on his finger that snugly fit his fair skin, and casually took the car keys out as he left. At ten o’clock in the morning, Lou Yan arrived at the company punctually.
He was greeted by numerous “good mornings” from the staff as he calmly made his way to his office, earning a hundred percent turnaround rate. Upon opening the door, Assistant Qin was already standing by his desk with files in hand.
Seeing his boss exuding a hormonal aura, Assistant Qin pushed his glasses up and forced a smile, “Boss, you’re an hour late.”
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