My ‘Healing’ Game
Chapter 429: Survive for Thirty Days

Chapter 429: Chapter 429: Survive for Thirty Days

When the mirror shattered, Han Fei’s mind went blank, and he vaguely remembered touching the Shrine.

His consciousness and soul seemed to be drawn by some force, and his brain was struck by a sharp pain.

When his vision returned to normal, Han Fei found himself lying on a single bed that was emitting a faint musty smell.

"Player 0000, please take note! You have successfully initiated a Level E Shrine Inheritance Task. Until you fulfill the Master of Shrine’s last wish, you will not be able to leave the game!"

"Attention! Time in the Memory World flows differently from the Deep World, and you exist within the Master of Shrine’s memories."

"Please be cautious at all times. If you die in the Memory World, there is a high probability you will be assimilated into the Master of Shrine’s memories and become a part of them. In that case, you will never be able to leave."

"The Shrine Inheritance Task poses serious dangers; please remain alert and rational at all times."

"In the Memory World, various Shrine tasks will be triggered randomly. Completing these tasks will earn you rich rewards and assist you in completing the ultimate Shrine Inheritance Task."

Clutching his throbbing head, Han Fei sat up on the bed and glanced at his Attribute Panel; he was in a special status and couldn’t log out.

"It’s this most desperate situation again." The logout key was Han Fei’s last resort, and he became even more cautious than usual when he couldn’t leave the game.

"The system’s prompts are always concise and to the point. Warning me so much this time suggests that the task of inheriting the Shrine is indeed very dangerous."

Surveying his surroundings with the quickest speed, Han Fei first assessed his situation.

This was a rental room of over thirty square meters with a cramped bathroom and kitchen, no bedroom, and the bed was placed in the living room. It was extremely crude.

The wallpaper was bulging and had severe water damage; the ceiling was covered with gray-green mold; the floor was cracked, and occasionally, he could see insects crawling through the gaps.

"Shouldn’t I be at a department store? How did I end up in this rental room?" Han Fei stood up and searched for useful things. The table was covered with rotten vegetable leaves, a small bag of rice was thrown in the corner of the kitchen, and upon opening the non-functioning fridge, he found some books and study materials. It seemed that the owner used the broken fridge as a bookshelf.

"It seems the original occupant of this room had just graduated not long ago, and he seemed to be preparing for some kind of examination."

All the books and materials had diligent notes taken on them; the room’s occupant had been very steadfast and hard-working.

"Huh?"

When looking through the notes left by the room’s occupant, Han Fei discovered a photo and a medical record.

The photo was taken in a hospital room where a shy boy sat next to a hospital bed holding a bowl of rice, with a middle-aged woman lying on the bed.

The woman looked at the child with a gaze full of apology. She had an oxygen tube under her nose, pale skin, and though in obvious pain, she was trying her best not to show it.

The photo had been taken a long time ago, but the medical record was recent.

According to the results on the medical record, the room occupant’s mother’s condition had seriously worsened, and surgery required a large sum of money.

Originally, some of the funds were sponsored by a charity organisation, but sadly, that money was taken away by the occupant’s father. Knowing the situation, the community rallied to raise funds again, but this time, there were far fewer willing to help them.

The homeowner’s mother was spending a lot of money in the hospital every day, and the surgery could not be postponed any longer. The homeowner pleaded desperately, and finally, the hospital agreed to perform the woman’s surgery first. However, the homeowner had to pay off the remaining surgery fees within a month.

"Player number 0000, please note! You have triggered a random task in the Master of Shrine’s Memory World—’Wish One: Surgery Fees’."

"Wish One: Surgery Fees: The player needs to acquire fifty thousand yuan within thirty days by any means necessary. Upon completion of the task, you will receive a generous reward."

"Attention! Every choice you make in the Memory World will affect the final outcome."

"Thirty days to earn fifty thousand?" If this were reality, Han Fei might consider acting, but this is within the Master of Shrine’s Memory World, and he barely has any room to maneuver.

The last page of the notebook marked a date, December thirty-first; Han Fei had to earn fifty thousand before that day arrived.

Upon closer examination, Han Fei discovered another interesting thing; the notebook conveniently had thirty-one blank pages left, each page already pre-marked with a date corresponding to the days in December.

"Player number 0000, please note! You have successfully discovered a Special Item—’Notebook’."

"Notebook: Keeping a diary is a good habit. You can use it to record... the last month of your life."

From the introduction, it seemed like a rather ominous item, but Han Fei still carefully put it away, perhaps the Master of Shrine once had the habit of keeping a diary.

"What I’m experiencing now must be what the Master of Shrine has been through. He has always lived in such a repressive environment; it’s indeed very easy to have issues."

Closing the fridge door, Han Fei’s stomach rumbled with hunger. Remarkably, he could clearly feel hunger and thirst in the Master of Shrine’s Memory World.

"They even replicated the sense of hunger?"

This Memory World was different from the ones Han Fei had experienced before; it was incredibly realistic. If one stayed here too long, it was easy to get lost.

"When I was doing the job of Manager at Yimin Private Academy, Jin Sheng only restored physical pain and despair. There was no sense of hunger. It seems that the Memory World of a top-level Grudge is quite different from that of the Unspeakable."

The original Master of the Shrine had been dead for a very long time, but his memories and obsessions had not faded away over the years, which was the most terrifying aspect.

"I still have to eat constantly in this world, but there isn’t much rice left at home." Han Fei, holding some rotten vegetable leaves, walked into the kitchen and poured out a portion of rice from the corner bag.

Turning on the faucet, the water flowed out slightly turbid, carrying a faint stench with it.

At this point, Han Fei couldn’t care much. After washing the vegetable leaves, he cooked a simple bowl of porridge.

With the warmth of the porridge in his belly, the hunger gradually subsided, and Han Fei felt his mood wasn’t so downcast anymore.

"Humans are iron, food is steel; even in the perilous Deep World, one must eat well."

While washing dishes, Han Fei suddenly heard a ringtone coming from under the bed. He quickly wiped his hands and went to check.

Lifting the bed board, Han Fei saw an old phone under the bed: "Is this the homeowner’s phone?"

He tried to answer the call, and the moment he pressed the answer button, he heard a roaring voice from the handset: "Why haven’t you come yet?! You’re going to be late on your first day at work! You were the one who thumped your chest and assured the boss your character and abilities were without a problem!"

"Going to work?"

"Were you sleep confused? Yesterday, you were crying and begging me to find you a job in the department store, saying you urgently needed money and wanted to work a part-time job at night. I pitied you, and that’s why I gave you this chance!"

"I got it, sorry, I’ll be right there!"

After hanging up the phone, Han Fei roughly understood some things: "That’s how the homeowner started working at the department store, that’s how he got involved with it, but what’s the problem with that department store? How could it turn an ordinary person into something ’Unspeakable’?"

Han Fei quickly fixed his hair in front of the bathroom mirror. While staring at his reflection, he always felt like the person in the mirror was watching him too.

A bizarre sensation, as if when he moved his gaze away, the him in the mirror kept looking at him.

Picking up his phone and finding his keys on the table, Han Fei opened the door of the living room.

"Attention Player Number 0000! Are you going out?"

"Are there system prompts for even going outside?" Han Fei was surprised, since during previous missions, the system "spoke" very little.

"Confirm going out." Han Fei chose yes, and as he walked out the door of his home, the system’s prompt sounded again in his mind.

"Attention Player Number 0000! You have triggered a random task within the Master of Shrine’s Memory World—’Wish Two: Survive’."

"Wish Two: Survive: Survive for thirty days. Only by staying alive can you change everything."

"Attention Player Number 0000! Your current hunger level is thirty. If your hunger level exceeds seventy, your mood will begin to decline; if it exceeds ninety, it will affect your physical condition; reaching one hundred will trigger diseases, increasing the likelihood of your death."

"Your current physical condition is ’Good.’ Physical condition is rated in six levels: Perfect, Good, Average, Weak, Poor, and On the Verge of Death. Your physical condition will affect your physical attributes."

"Your current mental state is ’Slightly Depressed,’ with a mood value of fifty. If your mood value falls below fifty, your physical attributes will slowly decline; below forty, you will experience psychological discomfort; below thirty, you will begin to have wild thoughts; below twenty, you will start seeing strange things, with an increased chance of falling ill; if your mood value stays below ten for a long time, your chance of death will greatly increase, and you might uncontrollably choose to commit suicide."

After reading all the system prompts, Han Fei noticed something: "This is only ’Wish Two’ of the homeowner’s survival; Wish One of the homeowner is to earn enough money for his mother’s surgery. From this perspective, the homeowner is not a bad person."

The more innocent and good-natured the person, the more regrettable it is to watch them walk towards the Abyss.

After accepting the task, Han Fei stepped out of his house.

The Unmentionable Memory World was just like reality, everything was perfectly reproduced.

Walking through the dark corridor, the sound-activated lights overhead were a bit sluggish. Han Fei had to clap several times before they lit up.

This was an old building slated for demolition, with only four floors. Most of the tenants were concentrated on the first and second floors. Landlords did not allow random access to the third floor and above, and many warning signs were pasted in the stairwell.

"Quite lively, isn’t it?"

It was already evening, yet the corridor was anything but quiet. Han Fei could faintly hear the sound of arguments, children crying, the advertisements from televisions, and even the sounds of lovemaking.

Han Fei lived at the very back of the second floor. He did not rush to work but instead memorized all the rooms that made noise, roughly gauging the character and age of the tenants inside.

As he walked out of the old building without encountering the dangers he had imagined, Han Fei still didn’t dare to let down his guard.

Looking back, several households in the building had their lights on.

His gaze slowly moved, and Han Fei pretended to notice nothing, walking away along the small path.

The moment he turned, his expression had changed.

Just earlier, as he was exiting the building and looked back, he spotted someone in an unlit room on the third floor staring at him.

"First, go to work."

Han Fei did not know where the department store was located, but luckily, advertisements promoting the department store with its location marked were plastered on walls and utility poles.

The area where the old building stood was a demolition zone, almost deserted at night. To get to the department store, he first had to pass through two alleys and go by an abandoned park.

During the day, these places might not seem so scary, but walking alone through them at night certainly felt eerie.

Entering the first alley, Han Fei saw from a distance someone curled up at the entrance, laughing idiotically to himself, dressed in tattered clothes, covered in dirt on his face and body, leaning against a wooden box, inside which was a dog with a lame leg.

"A homeless man?" Seeing a mentally unstable homeless man in an alley at night, most people would walk around him.

Han Fei entered the alley, and the dirty-clothed homeless man immediately stood up. He kept laughing idiotically at Han Fei, holding out his cupped hands in front of him.

"I don’t have any money right now, I’ll help you when I do," Han Fei politely declined. As he walked on, the homeless man followed him, stepping on his shadow as he kept up behind him until they left the first alley.

"I need to pick up the pace." Han Fei ran into the second alley, where houses on both sides were low and appeared to have been uninhabited for a long time, giving off a desolate feel.

After passing through the second alley, Han Fei did not enter the park, choosing instead to take a detour.

He had seen the park’s swings swaying on their own, and could faintly hear the sounds of children playing.

At the end of the abandoned park was a concrete bridge. Standing on it, Han Fei could already see the department store.

He wasn’t planning on lingering, but just as he was about to cross the concrete bridge, he heard a sound like something falling into the water, as if someone had jumped off the bridge.

Han Fei leaned on the railing to look at the water’s surface. Because the nearby streetlight was broken, the water was pitch black and nothing could be made out.

"It feels just like I’ve returned to reality, yet everything seems so bizarre."

Descending from the stone bridge, Han Fei was only a few dozen meters away from the department store. He jogged the rest of the way and finally arrived below the department store.

The streetlights here were still working, although occasionally flickering erratically, whether due to unstable voltage or some other reason.

"Finally arrived safely."

Han Fei looked up to see the sprawling department store shrouded in darkness, eliciting an inexplicable sense of oppression just by approaching it.

It seemed to have been built many years ago, its exterior wall lacking maintenance, and even the huge lit-up sign had issues.

What should have read ’Department Store’ had the horizontal stroke of ’Department’ gone out, leaving it to read—’[...]partment Store.’