Chapter 2: A Walking Corpse? No, It’s Alive!
The rainstorm grew increasingly violent. With the typhoon approaching, Dange dared not linger over the sea any longer. After one final, fruitless search, it flew back to the island.
After the cranes departed, Yun Wuxiang watched from a distance as they carried the shipwreck survivors to a different island nearby.
[3339, if I turned into a bird, could I fly out of the island for a quick lap?]
[Host, since when did you learn the Monkey King’s skills?]
System 3339 replied offhandedly, but then the implications of the question sank in, and the entire System turned pale with shock.
[Host, you haven’t secretly sneaked out already, have you?!]
Yun Wuxiang: [I haven’t learned it yet. I just saw a related spell in the Library Pavilion. Also, you live inside my body.]
[Oh, right.] 3339 suddenly realized the obvious. It was with the Host 24/7; if the Host had left the island, it would definitely know. What kind of idiotic question was that?
3339 gave two fake coughs, pretending nothing had happened, and spoke with earnest gravity: [Host, listen to me.]
[According to novel tropes, do you know how many characters who should have lived peaceful lives ended up with miserable fates? It’s all because of curiosity, playfulness, or sudden whims that lead them out of their safe, stable base and into all sorts of accidents.]
3339 sounded like a possessed kindergarten teacher, tirelessly lecturing the only child in its care not to run around.
[Thoughts like “I’ll just do it once,” “I’ll be back in a bit,” “I won’t disturb anyone,” or “It’s fine, no one will notice”—these are all death flags! If you say nothing will happen, something definitely will! You absolutely cannot engage in such high-risk behavior.]
[The more you do, the more mistakes you make. Doing nothing is the safest bet. We must kill any hidden dangers that could lead to mission failure right in the cradle!]
[Host, are you listening? Host? Host, you’re spacing out again! Host, I am speaking to you very seriously, please pay attention.]
[Mhm, I heard you.]
Yun Wuxiang was staring blankly at the ocean surface, his unfocused gaze fixed on a specific area where a dark shadow bobbed up and down in the water.
Under the push of the currents, the shadow was drifting closer to the island. Yun Wuxiang’s loose gaze sharpened, locking onto the dark shape.
[3339, I think I see a person in the sea.]
The nagging voice in his head paused temporarily as 3339 shared Yun Wuxiang’s vision.
[Eh? There really is one. Did Dange and the others miss one? Or is it some poor unlucky soul drifting from somewhere else?]
The black shadow had already drifted very close, entering the island’s perimeter.
With the barrier in place, living people could not enter. As long as there was even a single breath left in them, the barrier would keep them out.
Therefore, whatever drifted to this position couldn’t possibly be a living person. It could only be a corpse.
Sigh, why did it have to drift here? The Host is going to be depressed for a while again after seeing a dead body.
[Host, don’t look. Who knows how long that body has been soaking? It’s probably bloated beyond recognition by now. Drowned corpses are incredibly ugly; you’ll have nightmares if you see it. Just wait for Dange to come back and have it fish the body out.]
Yun Wuxiang: [I’ll go fish him out.]
[Host? You?!] 3339 was first shocked, then tactfully persuasive: [Maybe you shouldn’t.]
[I’m fine. If a corpse soaks in the water too long, it will rot, or get eaten by fish. Once the rain stops completely, the fish will swim out from their hiding spots. They will nibble away the flesh on the body, bite off the face, eat the eyes, and burrow into the skull through the eye sockets…]
As Yun Wuxiang spoke, his gaze drifted far away, his eyes losing focus, as if his mind had wandered off.
[Host, stop talking! Don’t recall those details!]
3339 monitored the Host’s status with trembling fear, terrified he would fall into that nightmare again.
Under 3339’s nervous scrutiny, Yun Wuxiang slowly said: [Fish that have eaten corpses can’t be eaten.]
3339’s neural code gave a violent jump. There was nothing wrong with the logic of that statement, but coming from Yun Wuxiang, it was very problematic. Yun Wuxiang never ate fish. He didn’t even eat meat.
3339 hadn’t been with Yun Wuxiang from the moment he transmigrated.
The origin of its binding with Yun Wuxiang went back to a day when the World Consciousness woke up and found that the secluded expert who was supposed to be living on the island was gone. In his place was an unlucky transmigrator, Yun Wuxiang, who had arrived at some unknown time.
Upon closer inspection, this transmigrator had learned the cultivation methods in the Daoist temple, and his cultivation level wasn’t low. Wasn’t this a ready-made substitute for the “Otherworldly Expert”?
3339, having just sent off its previous host, was thus conscripted by the World Consciousness. It seamlessly updated to a new host, binding with Yun Wuxiang to assist him in maintaining the plotline.
“Hello Host, I am Elite System 3339. Host, are you… okay?”
In the span of a single sentence, the System’s voice had gone from polite and formal to soft and cautious.
Who could explain to it why its new Host was sitting next to a mangled, bloody corpse?
When 3339 first arrived, it was startled by the gruesome condition of the body and thought its new Host was some kind of perverted serial killer.
But then it looked closer. Sitting beside the corpse, Yun Wuxiang’s face was deathly pale, his pupils dilated, staring into the void as if trapped in some kind of hysteria.
It took 3339 a long time to call Yun Wuxiang’s consciousness back.
Later, 3339 watched as Yun Wuxiang—looking frail, pale, and critically ill—dug a pit with his own hands. He dismantled the temple’s door and bed boards to assemble a coffin and buried the body in the earth.
Since there were no nails, he used mortise and tenon joints to assemble the coffin, following a structural diagram 3339 had searched for in its backend database.
After burying the body, Yun Wuxiang had nightmares for a full half-month.
3339 constantly played funny videos and comedy movies for him, talked to him whenever it had time, and made sure two or three white cranes slept with him every night. Only then did he slowly recover.
In 3339’s opinion, its poor Host was truly unlucky.
Transmigrating to a strange place was bad enough, but this broken island had no people—just a corpse, and a terrifying one at that.
A drowned corpse that hadn’t been bitten by fish would at least look human. A skeleton picked clean by fish wasn’t that scary either.
But when Yun Wuxiang found that body, it was in the transition phase between the two states. The flesh had been half-eaten by schools of fish—mangled, internal organs crushed and scattered. The appearance was utterly miserable, bloody, and disgusting. Anyone who saw it would have nightmares.
3339 didn’t know how long Yun Wuxiang had stayed with that corpse.
As for why Yun Wuxiang didn’t leave immediately after seeing the body but instead froze on the spot, 3339 dared not ask. Yun Wuxiang’s state at the time looked very much like a response to severe psychological or mental trauma.
It was just a System. It couldn’t moonlight as a psychiatrist, nor would it intentionally do things to hurt the Host, like ripping open old wounds by asking about them.
[Host? How are you feeling now? Should I play some stand-up comedy for you?]
3339 lowered its volume, asking in a gentle tone reserved for coaxing children.
[Don’t worry, I’m not that afraid of corpses anymore.] Yun Wuxiang mobilized his internal energy, about to move, when his gaze suddenly froze. A shark fin sliced through the water, leaving a long wake as it swam toward the corpse.
The body was quickly dragged underwater. Ripples spread across the surface, and a patch of red bloomed from the depths, rapidly expanding like red ink on gauze, dying the deep blue sea an eerie crimson.
[Ah, this… Host, it seems you were a step too late. That body was eaten by a shark.]
Although it was a bit disrespectful to the brother buried in the fish’s belly, it was great that the Host didn’t have to retrieve the corpse!
3339 was genuinely worried about Yun Wuxiang’s mental state.
[Host, let’s go back to the temple.]
Yun Wuxiang looked at the red-stained sea and asked: [3339, is it possible for a living person to enter the barrier?]
He thought he saw the corpse move.
[Impossible. Even in a state of shock, a person’s brain and organs are still alive. Only dead people who have completely lost all signs of life are judged by the barrier as ‘meat’ and allowed to pass through.]
3339 felt this was a massive loophole. Letting corpses drift in—how detrimental was that to its Host’s mental health?
[When the World Consciousness wakes up, I definitely need to report this bug.]
[I originally thought… I would ask Dange to take the body to the survivors for identification. If they knew him, they could take him back to his family. If not, he could be buried in a lively place.]
Yun Wuxiang gazed at the sea, a trace of loneliness spilling onto his handsome, otherworldly face as his long eyelashes fluttered gently.
3339 was momentarily blinded by the Host’s beauty.
Sob, my Host is so lonely, so pitiful. How long has it been since he spoke to a human? What does it matter if a dead person drifts in? If you have the ability, fix the bug enough to let a living person in!
[By the way, Host, didn’t you say yesterday that Dange’s egg, ‘Fifteen,’ is about to hatch? Let’s hurry back and check.]
Don’t stay here. Hurry and look at cute animals to improve the mood.
Yun Wuxiang was successfully distracted, his thoughts shifting: [Fifteen’s egg will take another ten days or so to hatch.]
[The flock of cranes you raised are practically spirits. Maybe the incubation period is different from normal cranes too. Just go take a look.]
Yun Wuxiang: “Mhm.”
The churning crimson water had quieted down.
Just as Yun Wuxiang turned to leave, a figure broke through the surface of the blood-stained sea with the power and agility of a merman leaping from the deep.
Yun Wuxiang spun around, looking up.
The figure that had burst from the sea floated on the surface. With one hand, he pushed the long hair obscuring his face back behind his head, combing it with his fingers. Red seawater coalesced into droplets within his hair, sliding down his forehead, brow bone, eye sockets, and the high bridge of his nose, meeting his vermilion lips and tracing the contours of his skin.
He looked like a demon born from a pool of blood.
[Holy crap! A fraudulent corpse? Is this for real?] 3339 screamed.
I just thought about it randomly, how did a living person actually get in? Is the barrier broken?
Yun Wuxiang stared straight at the figure. “Alive.”
Those word instantly snapped the System back to reality. Bad news!
[Host! Wait, Host!]
The System’s scream couldn’t stop Yun Wuxiang from stepping into the air and rushing toward the sea surface.
3339 was going crazy inside!
What is happening? How can a living person pass through the barrier?
It immediately ran to ping the World Consciousness.
World Consciousness! World Consciousness, are you there? Are you seriously still sleeping?
Sleep your ass! How can you sleep at a time like this? Your barrier is broken! A living person drifted in, do you know that?!
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