Chapter 132: Aberrant 22

Black Rabbit discovered that as long as he held the child’s hand, not even the eerie entities in Tianzi Building at night would dare attack him.

He could still sense those strange presences lurking in every corner, feeling their restless hunger and covetousness, but all remained hidden, silent.

Holding the child’s collar, Black Rabbit calmly stepped on the stairs for the first time. The usual haunting footsteps that always followed him were gone. There were no extra steps, and the rusty stair rail hadn’t turned into slippery guts.

So strange… He almost started to think this place was just an ordinary building.

Black Rabbit had once exchanged for a tool that let him see lingering obsessions, abnormal spirits, and invisible ghosts.

Now, he silently activated the tool, and in an instant, a riot of colors burst before his eyes. To him, Tianzi Building was filled everywhere with “energy” and “light” representing non-human entities.

The entire staircase flickered with red light, but at their feet, a narrow red path flowed, avoiding the child—and conveniently, avoiding him too.

A massive ghostly aura loomed in the stairwell. When the child jumped down a step and almost stumbled, the fierce ghostly energy suddenly contracted, sticking close to the wall without touching the child, as if afraid of being caught in a trap.

Black Rabbit reached out and pulled the child back.

“My mom’s downstairs. Let’s go find her to play!” Qian said.

Black Rabbit recalled how Aberrant had pushed the child toward him earlier, then walked away without looking back. He guessed she probably didn’t want to take the child at this moment.

Besides, Aberrant was dangerous—better to avoid her if possible. Why risk wandering openly in front of her?

So he changed direction, dragging the child along.

“Isn’t there anything fun here?” he asked casually.

Following the “bottle opener’s” instructions, Qian led him to a room and enthusiastically invited him to play the electronic keyboard.

Black Rabbit warily stepped into the room filled with lingering resentment and unwilling spirits, watching as Qian plopped onto the stool in front of the keyboard, pushing a pitch-black shadow that had been sitting there off and under the stool.

The thing that could be called a malicious ghost or evil thought was pushed off the stool, then climbed onto the keyboard, looking almost pitiful.

Black Rabbit remembered seeing another one of these in an S-grade Domain before—it had possessed a dozen Players in succession, manipulating them to suspect and kill each other in a sealed room.

Cruel, cunning, terrifying… and now, looking at this one.

As the child randomly smashed the keys, the black mass tangled around the keyboard vibrated, getting pounded by the keys and shedding a cloud of black dust.

So miserable.

Black Rabbit switched off the tool, and everything returned to normal. The gruesome scene disappeared, leaving only the adorable little girl playing the keyboard—a normal, even heartwarming sight.

He truly realized this child really was Aberrant’s daughter. Otherwise, she couldn’t behave so brazenly in Tianzi Building, making ghosts steer clear.

Roaming freely inside the lair of a domain boss’s daughter—this was an experience he’d never had before.

Especially compared to all the escape-and-death dramas unfolding simultaneously in this domain, it seemed so dull.

After playing with the little girl for a while, Black Rabbit decided to slip away—not for any other reason, just that handling a child was too troublesome.

He had never been good with kids before, and hadn’t gotten any better now.

Raising a ghost child was no different from raising a normal kid. You had to deal with their sudden magical ideas, endless questions and curiosity, unreasonable cries and tantrums. Most importantly, Black Rabbit didn’t like the kinds of things a little girl this age enjoyed playing with.

The infamous villain Black Rabbit—if word got out he played house and cooked pretend food with a toddler, would he still have any street cred?

“Don’t you want to go find your mom?” Black Rabbit tried coaxing the child to find her mom, and at that moment, he began to understand Aberrant’s feelings earlier.

Who wants to take care of a kid? Whoever wants to can have her.

Qian was easily distracted and did want to find her mom, so Black Rabbit successfully slipped away and ran far from Tianzi Building.

“Mom?”

“Mom!”

“…”

“Mom, what are you eating?”

Aberrant turned around and looked at the child tugging on her skirt.

Where was her new toy? How had he run off?

Startled by the child, a piece of food suddenly turned to foam and vanished.

“Mom, what are you playing with? Bubbles!”

“I want to play with bubbles too!”

…

“Mom, look at the little rabbit gloves!”

The child showed her the fuzzy gloves she had taken from the supermarket.

Aberrant put the child on her back, wrapped her arms around her, and set off to hunt together.

“Hahaha!”

The child laughed happily as Aberrant blinked forward, causing the surrounding world to briefly freeze and spin like a game.

Silent Aberrant was like a walking speaker—just by listening, you’d know where she was.

Any normal person hearing a child’s tinkling laughter in Tianzi Building would know to stay far away.

Aberrant: “…”

While chasing prey, they passed a bougainvillea tree and the child started fussing on her back.

“Mom, mom, I want a ■■ one, pick me a flower!”

Stopping halfway, Aberrant picked a flower for her, then shoved her back into 414, into the midst of a crowd of hungry younger siblings.

Inexplicably, Aberrant had locked the 414 door! The large padlock hanging unused on the door for a long time was finally put to use by her!

Free from the younger siblings, Qian came out right after Aberrant, shaking the locked door, confused because it wouldn’t open.

She clawed and pulled at the door, pressing her mouth against the crack, calling “Mom.”

Perhaps because she wanted to go out so badly, at one point Qian suddenly realized her hand could pass through the door—just like passing through the walls of the “womb.”

At that moment, the child’s little brain suddenly understood. Mom often didn’t enter through the door; she could pass through walls and appear suddenly, so maybe Qian could do the same!

Having habitually opened doors to go out, Qian’s perception changed, and she awakened a new skill.

She passed right through the door and stepped into the corridor. Turning back, she looked at the door behind her with shock and excitement, then suddenly ran down the hall—she wanted to share it with her mom!

Mom locks the door, so the child learns how to crack it.

Black Rabbit couldn’t resist his curiosity. When he sneaked back into Tianzi Building to check on the child, Aberrant caught him on the spot.

Black Rabbit was sure he had been very careful sneaking in, and he only entered because he saw Aberrant was tangled up with other Players. Yet Aberrant let those nearly caught Players go and came after him instead!

Damn, did he just draw Aberrant’s hatred?

It had been a long time since Black Rabbit had been chased so relentlessly. In the end, in a certain room, Aberrant grabbed him. The entire room was filled with Aberrant’s presence, and various furniture and decorations were smashed to pieces by her wildly thrashing arms.

Just when Black Rabbit thought he was about to be devoured on the spot, Aberrant dragged him over to the child.

“Play. With. Her.” Aberrant said almost in a breathless whisper, enunciating each word.

Black Rabbit: “…?!”

Aberrant could speak! Aberrant was talking to him!

What the hell? Was he being influenced by some ghostly illusion?

With a stiff face, Black Rabbit took the child’s hand again and reluctantly took on the mission of watching her.

Qian, who had already boasted to her mom countless times, excitedly started showing off again.

“I can pass through walls!”

“Look at me, watch me!”

Watching the child go in and out of a closed door, Black Rabbit thought, as an Aberrant and Aberrant’s daughter, this was really normal.

If she were just an ordinary human child like before, that would be the real surprise.

Under the child’s proud gaze, Black Rabbit snapped his fingers and disappeared before her eyes. Then there was a knock on the door behind him. Qian opened it and found him standing there.

“You can do it too! I can do it! Mom can do it too!”

Qian happily said, then pinched two fingers, copying Black Rabbit’s snapping gesture.

“I can’t snap?”

Black Rabbit spent quite a while teaching her how to snap cool fingers, but the little kid just couldn’t make the sound. Annoyed, Black Rabbit hid his hands behind his back and, while Qian made the snapping motion, provided the sound effect himself, finally solving the problem.

Luckily, the child was still young and somewhat manageable.

So Black Rabbit was stuck babysitting Aberrant’s daughter for several days. Several times he tried to run, only to be caught and dragged back by Aberrant. When she saw how tense he was, he moved down to the first floor—and Aberrant came rushing to intercept him there.

By the time Black Rabbit returned to the real world, completely frazzled from forced childcare, he let out a long sigh.

Although he promised he’d bring the child a white rabbit mask next time as a gift, he really didn’t want to babysit anymore.

Next time, next time…

Just as he left the Monster Domain, new Players began to appear there one after another.

Players using Tickets to enter a domain were often dropped nearby. Coincidentally, three groups appeared on the same street, one after another.

The first group of five—four men and one woman—appeared in the middle of the street. One was Liu Zhi, who had visited Monster Domain before.

She wore slightly heavy makeup to mask her sickness. The injuries she’d suffered in Monster Domain hadn’t healed yet; even the expensive potions the Li family bought hadn’t restored her peak condition.

Still, she insisted on coming because the Li family’s eldest young master was here too.

Around thirty-five years old, mature and handsome, dressed in a suit, Li eldest young master stood with Liu Zhi by his side and three bodyguards behind him. He looked more like a CEO strategizing in a big company than someone who belonged here.

As soon as Li eldest young master steadied himself, his gaze swept the surroundings quickly, then caught sight of the five-person squad ahead.

He immediately recognized one of them and stepped forward to greet.

“Vice-President Cui, didn’t expect to see you here.”

Cui Xian, one of the vice presidents of the Players Association, was part of its radical faction. He and another president had been the first to propose conquering Monster Domain and insisted on sending a vanguard squad.

After the vanguard squad failed, he continued advocating for sending teams, believing the failure was due to the vanguard’s ineffectiveness. This time, he personally led the team.

Vice-president Cui was also surprised to see Li eldest young master, politely exchanging greetings.

The Li family was mostly active in Huaihai City, far from the Players Association’s headquarters in Dongshan, but the association’s power meant their paths inevitably crossed.

“Did Li eldest young master also enter using a Ticket? What brings you here personally?”

Li eldest young master gave a faint, wry smile: “Not long ago, my younger brother died in Monster Domain. The old man at home sent me to take a look.”

They’d exchanged only a few words when a third group appeared at the end of the street.

Another five-person squad, led by a man in a white shirt who looked refined and scholarly.

Vice-president Cui’s face darkened at the sight: “He’s here too.”

Li eldest young master noticed the group hurriedly glance over before disappearing quickly into an alley.

“Who is that…?”

“One of the Judgers’ twelve stewards, codename ‘Angel,’” Vice-president Cui frowned. “Why would he come?”

Could he have heard about the Association’s movement and wanted to intervene? If it were Pyramid, it would be more likely. Although Judgers were also targets of the Association’s crackdown, they preferred cleansing evil Players rather than targeting bosses in aberrant domains. Could it be that one of their targets was among the Players who entered this time?

Li eldest young master fell into thought upon learning it was someone from Judgers.

Liu Zhi tugged his sleeve.

Li eldest young master paused, then said, “Everyone has their own business. Let’s not disturb Vice-president Cui.”

The two groups parted politely.

After they left, the remaining Association five-person squad also prepared to leave.

A young girl following Vice-president Cui looked back at Li eldest young master’s group and suddenly said, “Why are there so many Players entering with Tickets this time? Could we be so unlucky as to run into domain fusion?”

Vice-president Cui shot her a glare: “Stop being a jinx.”

A tall man chuckled and added, “I think there’ll be at most twenty Players entering with Tickets. Domain fusion only happens if the number of Ticket users is more than twice the number of forcibly pulled Players. Usually, Monster Domain pulls in 30 to 60 Players at a time, so don’t worry.”