Chapter 82: Is Getting Infected While Playing the Villain a Cause for Pride???

Gao Qi immediately cursed under his breath, drawing a knife from his waist.

The knife was the one he had brought along before leaving the house—the very same one he had used for self-harm during his sleepwalking episodes. He had a gut feeling that something bad was brewing in the town, so he had tucked it by his waist as a precaution. Little did he expect it would come in handy so quickly.

Gao Qi had always valued his friends deeply. Anyone who dared lay a finger on his brothers would have their hands chopped off.

No joke.

谁知他刀尖刚要扎过去，就被另一人抢了先。

那只手修长有力，一把攥住“病人”长满疮口血肉稀烂的手臂，反向一拧。

就听“咔嚓”地一声。

That rotten hand twitched a few times, fell to the ground, and rolled over three times.

……

Everyone was dumbfounded, including Gao Qi, who was holding the knife.

He stared, stunned, at the ruthless man who had taken action.

Who else could it be but Qin Jiu?!

Pursing his lips, he casually shook off the blood on his hands, then turned to Yang Shu and asked, “I remember you brought tissues?”

The arrogant Miss Yang was taken aback by his sudden move and mechanically pulled a tissue from her purse hidden in her skirt pleats, handing it to him.

And Qin Jiu even courteously said, “Thank you.”

Gao Qi: “???”

“Why are you grabbing him?” Miss Yang finally couldn’t hold back, speaking the question on Gao Qi’s mind.

Qin Jiu didn’t even lift his eyelids, grabbing two tissues before saying, “The Black Death couldn’t have dragged on this long. Besides, you just said yourself, what kind of illness rots so badly and still lets someone survive? It wouldn’t be a problem to remove an arm, would it? Or are you seriously planning to give him shots and medicine to treat it?”

Yang Shuxin said, “Who was talking about treatment? Is that the point???”

But before she could speak, a scream rang out.

The patient whose hand had been removed finally realized what had happened, and his crying expression instantly changed.

His scream awakened all the “patients” in the room, and more and more wails began to rise.

The examinees were startled and instinctively covered their ears.

In the next second, the patients curled up in the sheets rushed out, their bloodstained hands reaching for the examinees in front of the beds.

For a moment, gasps and screams filled the entire church.

Qin Jiu felt a hand hook around his neck, fingers curled into a loose fist to avoid brushing against his face.

Next he was pulled by someone, who dragged him around the square pillar on the side and pressed him against the back of the column.

You Huo withdrew his arm from Qin Jiu’s neck and said with a frown, “Are you insane?”

“You’re talking about this?” Qin Jiu raised his blood-stained hand. “I’ve always been crazy—didn’t you know?”

The church’s stained glass windows stood high above, the gloomy daylight filtering through the panes, leaving only a few faint rays behind.

One of Qin Jiu’s eyes caught the light, and he playfully blocked You Huo’s line of sight, saying, “Don’t glare at me like that. If what the nun said is true, you’ve already been infected. Are you afraid?”

You Huo: “No, I’m not afraid.”

The illnesses in exams, as one would expect, are never particularly normal.

But he had even been inside a coffin, so why fear something called an “infectious disease”?

“That’s all that matters.”

“It gets lonely being sick all by yourself, Head Examiner.” Qin Jiu shook open a tissue and handed one over, saying, “Let me keep you company.”

You Huo’s heart was lightly tickled.

* * *

Inside the church, chaos and turmoil reigned, with everything in disarray.

On one hand, the candidates were scared; on the other, they had their worries—

If they fought, they feared hitting the infected wounds and turning into rotting corpses themselves.

If they didn’t fight, when the hell would they ever escape?

As for Gao Qi and Zhao Jiatong, they were skilled fighters.

Yet it’s hard to fend off many with only two fists, let alone more than forty hands comparable to biochemical weapons.

Using the bed, they pinned down four “patients” and tangled two others with the quilts.

Yang Shu wasn’t from the military, so fighting was definitely out of the question.

But both she and Zhou Qi avoided hindering the others; the two women showed top-notch agility and flexibility, and even managed to knock one down with a high heel during their evasive maneuvers.

But after all, they were not at an advantage.

These patients were already throwing their lives away, but they still wanted to hold on to theirs.

“Fuck! This knife is too short!”

Two pitch-black bloodied figures came crashing down from above. Gao Qi cursed furiously as he pulled Zhao Jiatong behind him.

He instinctively turned his head away and closed his eyes, thinking to himself: Damn it, so what if it’s an infection! Come on! Have the guts to aim for my face!

At the very last moment, there was a loud “thud.”

Instead of the expected spray of blood and flesh hitting his face, what came was the sound of something heavy hitting the ground.

Gao Qi opened his eyes and looked.

The two “infected” big shots intervened abruptly, swinging the stretcher to confront the scoundrels.

As they say, the strong fear the unruly, and the unruly fear those who don’t care for their lives.

And those who don’t care for their lives… fear those who are strong, unruly, and don’t care for their lives.

You Huo and Qin Jiu adopted a stance of “reckless abandon,” fearing nothing in their way.

Those patients fought relying on their sores. When it came to real skill, they were far inferior to these two.

So, in just fifteen minutes from start to finish, the dim little chapel was “refreshed” entirely anew.

Most of the beds were broken, leaning crookedly, and those so-called “patients” were each wrapped up in sheets and blankets, bundled from feet to neck, with only their half-rotted heads exposed.

Twenty-five people were stacked together neatly in the open space, looking, at first glance, just like a set of bowling pins.

You Huo held an iron stool and stood with a cold expression before one of them, exuding a silent threat.

The patient: “…”

His eyes moved, and as he lifted his head, his gaze met that of another formidable presence.

Qin Jiu stood right behind him, one hand resting on his shoulder through the blanket, leaning down to ask, “That nun left in a hurry and spoke too vaguely. We’re having a bit of trouble understanding, so we’d like to ask for your help. What exactly is this ‘illness’ of yours?”

The patient fell silent.

He suspected that one wrong word from him, and the stool in front would be swung at him, while the person behind would twist his head clean off.

The examinees nearby were already spellbound.

On one hand, they felt exhilarated beyond words, while on the other, they were a bit dazed…

Gao Qi said to Zhao Jiatong with a complicated expression, “Hey, these two… tsk, they really put a peaceful middle-aged man like me in a tough spot.”

Zhao Jiatong replied, “What’s the tough part?”

“Looking at it this way, we’re more like the villains, don’t you think?” Gao Qi whispered, clenching his fist and chanting the slogan: “Justice will ultimately triumph over evil—and we’re that evil.”

Zhao Jiatong was speechless…

It really does seem a bit like that…

Zhao Jiatong suggested, “Maybe we should let them ask in a different way?”

Gao Qi replied, “That won’t do; I was just being polite.”

Smash or twist it off?

This is a death-trap question.

The patient mumbled for a moment, his voice hoarse, and said, “It’s not the Black Death…”

Yang Shu, hugging her arms, rolled her eyes off to the side, muttering, “No shit.”

“There was indeed the Black Death in the town once, but that’s in the past. Those destined to die have died, burned clean. Winter brought a whole season’s worth of snow, freezing away the disease. Fewer people died in the town than in Kelton Castle…” the patient spoke slowly.

His eyes were so large that with just two turns, they seemed about to roll out of their sockets.

There were moments when the movement of his left and right eyes varied in intensity.

Yang Shu, standing nearby, furrowed his brows, then turned to glance at the light inside the castle before quietly walking away, barefoot.

The patient continued, “Speaking of the Black Death, the Duke himself did contract it.”

Another patient beside them rasped, “Not just him—the Duke, the Duchess, their children, the steward, and the servants… many more.”

“That’s right. The plague spreads like wildfire. Even the doctors wore masks and heavy black cloaks, sealing themselves from head to toe, yet they couldn’t stop it. Who in the castle could have escaped?”

These patients looked like corpses, and their voices were as eerie as ghosts.

Many examinees got goosebumps listening, but no one interrupted.

“Later on, after who knows how long, news came from the castle, saying the Duke had found a witch doctor and would soon recover from his illness. Maybe he wanted to accumulate good karma? He sent food to every household,” the patient said.

“Right, I remember that… He said he was afraid of spreading the illness, so he didn’t invite us to the castle. But he sent fresh beef and lamb and big barrels of wine. It was the best meal we’d had since the plague. I think I ate too much that day, threw up twice at night, and started running a fever…”

Hearing this, You Huo asked, “Was the food tainted?”

That patient shook his head and said, “Not at all, I was the only one sick for a few days. Everyone else was fine.”

The other patients chimed in in agreement.

“I had fevers again and again, and after a few days, maybe my body couldn’t hold on anymore, blood sores started to appear, spreading in large patches. And later on… I…”

That patient tilted his head, thinking for a long time, then said, “I forgot… I think I’ve just been sick in this church the whole time.”

The illness couldn’t be cured, so he lay in the church all along.

Gradually, more and more people gathered around, covered in sores just like him, their flesh mangled and bloody.

“Every so often, a wave of doctors would come by, just like you all. But we can’t remember the details clearly… Maybe some were scratched to death? Or maybe they infected some others?”

One examinee finally couldn’t hold back and asked, “Are you guys… still alive?”

The patient was momentarily at a loss, then said, “I’ve forgotten.”

It’s been so long, the torment has lasted too long.

They had already forgotten whether they were still alive…

Yang Shu’s voice suddenly came over: “Come to me.”

You Huo straightened up and followed the sound. Yang Shu had somehow moved to a corner of the church.

Above her head was the largest stained glass window in the church.

You Huo tilted his head toward that side and said to Qin Jiu, “Let’s go take a look.”

The two finally released the patient and walked one after the other to Yang Shu’s side, as the other examinees also gathered around.

Looking up close, they realized that what was depicted on the stained glass window wasn’t the usual suffering scenes of a church, but rather a person wearing a hood and a mask, surrounded by a circle of candles.

The outside light filtered in through the candles. From this angle, it was clear that those wrapped patients were no longer human—there wasn’t a shred of flesh or blood left on their faces, only stark white skulls.

Those skulls stared blankly at the group with hollow black eye sockets, their gazes both vacant and eerily uniform.

Gao Qi cursed, “I knew the history question was just a front! What kind of history looks like this?”

The Black Death was fake—what was real was witchcraft.

One examinee said with a shiver, his tone earnest, “Maybe I’ve read too many novels, but this feels like a curse to me.”

Another examinee asked, “They look like skeletons in the sunlight… How do we cure this? How do we free them? Kill them all?”

You Huo thought for a moment, then turned to Qin Jiu and asked, “I’m going to tie up the nuns, are you coming?”

Qin Jiu chuckled. “How could I possibly miss out on such mischief?”

Other examinees: “???”

Gao Qi said, “I’ll go too.”

Qin Jiu asked, “Were you infected?”

Gao Qi said, “No.”

“Unfortunately, I do.” Qin Jiu grinned and patted his shoulder. “Stay put, be good.”

Gao Qi: “…”

Is contracting an illness something to be proud of???