Forces of Temptation

Jiang Fang didn't give himself too long a rest.

They hurried back to the church.

Guan Junliang was lying on his back on the prayer bench, clutching a torn corner of his clothes, his mouth and eyes closed, his whole body trembling, and he passed out in a coma.

Song Haining wiped Guan Junliang's sweat with one hand, and held the dagger that had been washed in the holy water of the church with the other.

Banhang also firmly grasped the rare exorcism props in their hands, and stood beside the two of them, putting on an absolute defensive posture.

Seeing the two people stepping in from the door of the church, the spirits of Ban Hang and Song Haining were relieved, and Qi Qi showed a look of asking for help.

...even though these two men are empty-handed, and they are fully armed.

Nan Zhou stepped forward and leaned over to check Guan Junliang's condition.

Jiang Fang hid the red marks on his palms from being strangled by the bridge cable, and said calmly, "Ban Hang, tell me the situation again."

Ban Hang sat down on the side bench in a slump, his arms propped on his long legs, and he stroked his earlobes up and down.

This is his expression when he is anxious, and the glaze on the earrings has long been bald by him.

He and Guan Junliang went to find the missing Hua Sisi.

Their original plan was to never divide their forces, especially in this foggy day. If they separated, they would just wait for the monsters hiding in the fog to be defeated one by one.

Guan Junliang is a well-known good old man in their team. He is far more worried about the life and death of his teammates than Ban Hang, and he didn't say a word along the way.

Ban Hang really couldn't bear such a lifeless state, as if Hua Sisi was really dead, so he racked his brains to think of topics to enliven the atmosphere.

Just in the middle of his bad joke, Guan Junliang suddenly stopped and grabbed Ban Hang's wrist.

"Hang, listen." Guan Junliang's speech speed suddenly increased, "...do you hear someone calling for help?"

Infected by his tone, Banhang immediately pricked up his ears to listen.

"Help……"

The extremely light and thin voice floated over the mist, making people get goosebumps for no reason.

"It's Huazi's voice!" Guan Junliang lifted his spirits, "On the edge of the cliff!"

He yelled loudly, "Huazi! Is that you?"

After the weak voice calling for help paused, a new message came from afar: "I...help me..."

Banhang didn't move.

Thick fog, getting lost, and a strange cry for help came from the fog...

too weird.

He believed it was an idiot.

But he ignored that Guan Junliang beside him was really a very nice person.

... so good that even though Jiang Fang had told them to be careful that Hua Sisi might be possessed by that unnamed "demon", he was still willing to take risks for a glimmer of hope beyond that "possibility".

Guan Junliang saw that Ban Hang's heart was fixed, he refused to move a step, and broke into the dense fog alone.

Ban Hang's footsteps slowed down, but within a few seconds, most of the man's figure had been swallowed up by the mist.

Ban Hang was so anxious that he broke out in a cold sweat: "Hey!! Laoguan! Don't go! Come back!"

Guan Junliang's voice came from more than ten meters away: "Follow me!"

Banhang stomped his feet angrily, and it was impossible to leave his friend behind, so he had to be brave enough to follow the voice blindly, and broke into the fog where the road ahead was unknown.

Ban Hang is not as good at listening to voices as Guan Junliang, like a headless chicken, he slithered in the middle and west of the mist, only to be caught by Guan Junliang's voice, the further he went, the more uncertain he was.

Seeing that they had come to the edge of the cliff, he became more and more suspicious that they had encountered a siren-style trap.

Just when he was restless, he suddenly heard Guan Junliang's pleasantly surprised voice from 20 meters ahead: "Here! Ah Hang, Huazi is here!!"

Ban Hang was startled, suspecting that Guan Junliang was also possessed, so he stopped suddenly and did not move forward.

There was chaos ahead.

The sound of cloth rubbing against each other, the faint murmur, and Guan Junliang's call sounded like scenes that would only appear in nightmares.

After a while, Guan Junliang's anxious and helpless voice sounded again: "Ah Hang, come and help, Hua Zi—"

Listening to his pronunciation, it seems that he is really trying his best to win back his life from the bottomless abyss.

Banhang fell into hesitation.

Is Hua Sisi really there?

Or is this another game?

Is he going to go back to church, find the boss, or stay here and see what happens?

It was at this moment of hesitation, deep in the fog, Hua Sisi suddenly hoarse his voice, and let out a hoarse scream: "Ah——"

Before the screams that resounded through the deep valley, there was the sharp tearing of cloth.

After the scream, there was the sound of falling through the fog and wind.

There was no sound of landing.

The valley is too deep, and the muffled sound of fragmented flesh is not enough to echo from the depths of the valley.

After the falling sound disappeared a hundred feet away, there was no sound around.

Banhang stayed where he was.

His hands and feet quickly lost their temperature, and the blood on his face faded away.

……No way?

After a while, his stiff limbs barely regained their mobility.

He hurried forward.

Breaking through the clumps of fog and miasma, after rushing for dozens of steps, he stopped.

He saw Guan Junliang kneeling on the edge of the cliff with a blank expression.

In his hand is a piece of broken cloth, which is being blown and swayed by the backflowing fog and wind, like a poor soul-calling banner.

...It is a fragment of Hua Sisi's clothes.

The corners of Banhang's mouth went from being stiff to trembling uncontrollably, and his eye sockets also became sore and tingling wave after wave.

Could it be that calling for help is true?

Hua Sisi is also true.

Not a scam?

Well, just now, if he was willing to let go of his guard and come to help Guan Junliang...

Guan Junliang fixedly stared at the rags flying in his palm, his fingers propped on the edge of the cliff kept closing together, grabbed a handful of floating soil, and clasped it firmly in his palm.

He stared at the direction where Hua Sisi fell off the cliff, as if he wanted to exhaust all his strength to see Tsinghua Sisi's final appearance.

However, what fell into his eyes was only a pale emptiness.

"why……"

Guan Junliang didn't look at Ban Hang, but Ban Hang knew that he was talking to himself.

There was a repressed indifference in his tone: "... Ah Hang, why don't you come and help me?"

After the words fell, he made a gesture to stand up, shook his body twice, closed his eyes, faced the cliff, and fell straight forward.

Ban Hang woke up like a dream, took a step forward, hugged the fainted Guan Junliang tightly, hugged him with trembling arms, and slowly sat down on the edge of the cliff.

……

Ban Hang's description was upside down, and after barely restoring the original state of the matter, he lowered his head and took two or three deep breaths in a row, as if he was forced out of breath by the weight of memories.

He said to himself, with unconcealable grief in his voice: "Huazi said before, if he is gone, let me go back and tell his mother that his bank card password is his father's birthday, and I promised him , Said that if he didn't return alive, he would take all his money..."

Ban Hang supported his head with his hands and rumpled his hair: "Damn, how can I tell people when I go back?"

While speaking, two or three drops of dark water were left on Banhang's knee dizzy.

He raised his elbow, wiped his face hastily, his voice was full of self-mockery and panic: "Damn... so many people have died, why can't I accept it..."

In the face of life and death, it is never possible to gently expose it with a sentence of "get used to it".

What's more, the current predicament is entirely caused by his "unbelief".

If he can let go of his vigilance a little, if he can help Guan Junliang, will Hua Sisi be able to live, will he...

Nan Zhou sat next to Guan Junliang, and reached out to touch his pulse and forehead.

Guan Junliang's heart beat extremely fast, his fingers and forehead were abnormally cold, and his face was ashen.

He asked Song Haining: "Why did he faint?"

Song Haining quickly wiped the corners of her eyes, forcing herself to get out of her depressed mood.

"Brother Guan has such a personality..." She understood Nan Zhou's slight lack of human emotions, and explained to him softly, "Watching Sisi fall off the cliff, he still can't accept it..."

Nan Zhou said "hmm" and didn't ask any more questions. He just sat beside Guan Junliang quietly, wondering what he was thinking.

Absolute silence fell into the church.

It has been a long time since such a downsizing event happened to them, and they have long been unfamiliar with the pain, so when the pain hit fiercely, they were powerless to resist.

And when Nanzhou briefed him about what happened on the suspension bridge, the atmosphere in the church became more gloomy.

After listening to the whole process, Ban Hang didn't say anything, he just kicked a chair next to him, buried his face in his palm, and rubbed vigorously.

The message Nanzhou brought back only represented one thing:

...Accidents happened on both sides of the East and West.

He had just lost a friend because of his jealousy.

Banhang doesn't want to lose any more.

With a hoarse voice, he softly asked Nan Zhou: "We... just look at them like this, can't we save them?"

Neither Nan Zhou nor Jiang Fang answered him.

When the words were spoken, Ban Hang himself felt that it was ridiculous, so he buried his head and said no more.

Although he is reckless, he is no longer the stunned young man who just entered the game.

No one knows what the consequences of violating the rules will be, and whether it will make the teammates on the opposite side fall into a more difficult and desperate situation.

But if you really do nothing...

The sound of falling wind rang again in his ears.

Song Haining really didn't want to let this kind of depression spread, so she took the initiative to try to find a topic: "Boss, tell me, what are we going to do next? Are we really going to wait for that demon... to kill us one by one? It's like killing It's like that..."

Jiang Fang answered, "It's very strange."

Song Haining: "Yes, we still don't know the purpose of that demon..."

Pastor Keith is meticulous in his work and covers up all the traces too perfectly.

Even in the ashes of the burnt paper, Song Haining couldn't find any clues.

Obviously, the plot of this dungeon is simpler than ever before, and the core contradictions can be easily grasped by anyone.

——The main NPCs on both sides of the strait are in a relationship, but because one party is suffering from serious illness, and their feelings are obviously not tolerated by the current world, they have to find their own solutions.

The clues are clear and the plot is clear, but they just have a sense of cramped feeling that they have nowhere to start and nowhere to focus.

Jiang Fang interrupted Song Haining: "What I meant by 'strange' was why Hua Sisi died only now."

This made Ban Hang shiver slightly.

But after he calmed down, he didn't feel any dissatisfaction.

They followed Jiang Fang, not because of Jiang Fang's always smiling smile, but because at any time, he was cold enough to deal with all emergencies.

And the doubts he raised are indeed justified.

Hua Sisi was kidnapped silently for more than ten hours, could he still hang on the edge of the cliff for more than ten hours?

They surveyed the topography of the east bank in advance.

There are no flowers, no grass, no trees on the edge of the cliff, and the person who is about to fall has nothing to rely on except his own hands.

To say that Hua Sisi hung there for more than ten hours waiting for someone to rescue him would be the most absurd of absurdities.

Song Haining speculated: "Did the devil do it on purpose... When Brother Guan and He approached, they put Sisi on the edge of the cliff. Brother Guan and Ah Hang might not go there because of doubts. Only then will I know..."

Aren’t all the demons in movies like this, in order to occupy a body, they will do things by any means, create terrorist incidents, and grab every gap in the soul without mercy.

As the speculation deepened, she became more and more worried about Guan Junliang and Ban Hang.

Both of these two witnessed the death of their friend with their own eyes, and both of them suffered a huge psychological shock. Will they be targeted by the devil as their next target...

Jiang Fang was noncommittal, and instead asked Nan Zhou, "What do you think?"

Nan Zhou put his hand on Guan Junliang's wrist: "If that's the case, it's really boring."

Song Haining, who was still deeply worried: "...huh?"

He looked at Guan Junliang's face: "As you said, when normal people hear a person who has been missing for more than ten hours calling for help on the edge of a cliff, they will never go to the edge of the cliff to check the situation, let alone rescue them. They will only think it is a trap. That's all."

Song Haining wanted to refute: "But, Brother Guan's character..."

At this point, she choked suddenly.

How could the demons know their personalities?

Of course, the devil may have great powers and omniscience, or it may have been summoned by Keith a long time ago, lurking around them, secretly spying and observing, and figured out their temperament in the past few days.

But if such a scheming demon is sure and confident that he can trick Guan Junliang to the edge of the cliff, after going through so many twists and turns, is it just to make Hua Sisi die in front of him?

As Nan Zhou said, if the devil's purpose is only this, it would be too "boring".

Song Haining became more and more confused.

"'Don't cross the bridge'..." Nan Zhou recalled the rule that was mentioned repeatedly, "Will it be related to this matter?"

Judging from the current situation, whether it is the devil or the game, they are all trying to make them "cross the bridge".

If the devil kills their friends one by one in front of them, it may indeed make them panic, and even flee to the West Bank in order to save their lives.

The east bank is a cliff, and there is no other way down the mountain.

They want to stay away from this land dominated by demons, so they can only cross the bridge.

However, what exactly does "crossing the bridge" lead to?

Compared with the strange powers and gods here, the style of storytelling on the west bank can be said to be completely different.

Here is a demon summoning led by a priest, and there is a Frankenstein led by a doctor.

Even if you cross the bridge, what will happen?

Nan Zhou couldn't help thinking of what the tuxedo deacon blurted out on the bridge.

"... Defilement of God's gift to the world must invite God's curse".

This is the only content related to "God" on the West Bank.

What is "God's gift to the world"?

What does "God's curse" have to do with "the devil"?

Duke Shelley, what exactly do you want to do?

What broke Nanzhou's thoughts was a muffled sound from far away.

Four pairs of eyes looked at the outside of the church, even the South Pole Star was awakened, crawled out from under the pillow in the bedroom on the second floor, stood sleepily by the window, and looked at the flickering lights in the forest on the other side .

Nan Zhou asked, "What's the sound?"

Jiang Fang stood up, his expression becoming more and more serious.

He answered curtly, "Gunshots."

As soon as the words were finished, there was a second gunshot from the direction of the West Bank.

Then came the third and fourth beeps.

"They are chasing someone."