Hourglass Project - Chapter 11

There’s always something shady going on in dark alleys.
Lin Yi crouched on the ground and reached out to check the woman’s breath.

Dead.

She took a moment to mourn the loss of life, then stood up, but paused mid-turn.

A man stood two meters away, holding a □□ in his right hand. His stance was sharp and clean.

Lin Yi glanced at the object in his hand, then at the woman, no visible wounds. She looked back at him and asked, “Are you trying to kill me?”

The man had already noticed her turning back. He replied, “I didn’t kill her. And I don’t want to kill you either.”

Lin Yi tilted her head, looking at his hand. “Then what are you holding that for?”

The man waggled the □□ and smiled. “Just something to threaten with.”

She straightened up. “You’re trying to threaten me…? Then you’ve probably picked the wrong person.”

He met her gaze. After a moment, he said suddenly, “I used to be a lawyer. When the game started, I was trying to find the final piece of evidence to defend my client, so he could suffer a lighter sentence in prison.”

His client was a 14-year-old boy charged with murder; he had killed his 7-year-old cousin. The cousin had smashed his game console after not being allowed to play. The boy, through some means, bought a □□ online and ended up killing his cousin at home. The cousin’s parents found out and pressed charges.

He had taken the case with a headache, not knowing whether the pain came from the inevitability of the case or from the sheer disgust of a murder stemming from a game.

He hated things that stemmed from games. And he especially hated murder games.

And yet, now he was inside a real-life game called the “Hourglass Project.”

He had survived the first global microspace phase and from then on, he carried the same □□ that had taken a life.

As a lawyer, he had seen too many murder and assault cases. Too many crimes. It made him despise such things.

Now the system was telling him, kill, or be killed.

It made him sick.

He wasn’t afraid to die. But he wanted to live.

So he had no choice but to do it.

After hearing this, Lin Yi fell silent. After a pause, she asked, “So the reason you’re looking for allies is to avoid being killed by other players?”

“Yeah.” The man nodded and looked at the woman lying behind her. “As you can see, the other players have already started making moves. They’ll target weaker players to eliminate competition.”

And he was just such a weakling. He had lied to those two girls about the purpose of the alliance, wanting to hide his true intentions, but now he had to tell the truth.

“What happens after you find a player willing to work with you?” Lin Yi asked.

The man said, “Then we do our best to avoid other players. Unless I absolutely have to, I don’t want to kill.”

Lin Yi recalled what had happened earlier and asked, “What’s your ability?”

“…I can make my movements completely silent.”

This power left him unsure, was the system encouraging him to escape quietly or to kill without a sound?

Lin Yi nodded in understanding. ‘No wonder I didn’t hear him approach earlier.’

Seeing her say nothing more, the man asked, “So… will you team up with me? You’re with those two girls, right? You must be strong too.”

Lin Yi perked up, realizing the two girls he meant were the “double Huang.” She asked in return, “They didn’t agree to team up with you?”

He shook his head. “They told me to come find you.”

“…”

‘Great.’ Her enthusiasm deflated.

If the “double Huang” had sent the man, that meant they would work with him—briefly. Only because he had value to use.

She stared at him in silence for a few seconds. Seeing his calm expression, she cleared her throat and agreed, “Okay.”

He nodded just as calmly.

She said nothing else, hesitated briefly, then walked out of the alley. The man followed close behind.

….

Later that night.

Inside the museum, a window was silently pushed open. A figure leapt inside and landed with barely a sound.

Bathed in moonlight shadows, the man fumbled through the darkness using memory. He located the placement of Ring I.

He paused in front of the glass display. After scanning the surroundings and examining the glass case, he noticed a seam between the base and the pedestal and was overjoyed!

He reached out to lift the case. But the moment his hand touched it!

Beep! Beep! …

The sudden alarm startled him so much he swore out loud! By the fourth beep, the museum’s front door burst open, several people rushed in!

Panicked, he yanked the glass case off and snatched Ring I, dashing away despite the risk of ruptured eardrums from the alarm.

Another window suddenly burst open, a tall figure flew in. Before he could react, a foot slammed into him!

Crash!

He slammed into a wall, then crashed to the floor. He scrambled to flee again, but the figure was already on him. He dodged the next kick in panic just as the guards arrived to grab him!

He rolled away to evade their hands, crawled, then staggered toward the window.

But the attacker caught up in a few steps, grabbed his shoulder. Instinctively, he threw a punch—caught! He suddenly remembered he was still holding Ring I, but before he could do anything, the attacker twisted him to the ground with a shove!

“F***…”

Pinned down, unable to move, he could only curse as the guards secured his limbs and dragged him away.

They hauled him into a car. Where it was going, he didn’t know.

Players hiding in nearby buildings saw it all, but made no move.

Tao Luo watched the car drive off, then turned back toward the museum. “Just one…”

“Mm~”
Li Moyao sat lazily at her feet, smiling. “Tomorrow there might be more~”

Tao Luo said nothing, still surveying the area.

….

Daylight.

“Is this the thief they caught last night?”

“Yeah! He tried to steal Ring I from the Platinum Ferry Museum!”

“So bold? Good thing he was caught!”

…

On the platform stood the captured thief. Now bound, awaiting execution by gunfire.

Honestly, he was terrified.

His eyes were dull, face pale and haggard. He didn’t struggle, either his soul had died, or his body had.

“Some people are dead… but still alive,” Huang Yuhan muttered from the crowd. “Some people are alive, but already dead.”

Borrowing the words of poet Zang Kejia, she just thought they fit.

After a long wait, the gunshot finally shattered the silence.

Bang!

A gut-wrenching sound.

The man fell from the high platform with a sickening thud, his body collapsing into a crumpled heap.

“Honestly, it’s my first time witnessing death this up-close. I feel terrible,” Huang Yuhan said.

“Another life, huh?” Huang Jijun watched as three cityfolk came to move the body. They lazily swept up the bloody remains, leaving a glaring stain behind. “That’s why the system urges players to grow stronger. It’s looking out for us.”

Becoming stronger is the only way to survive.

A simple, universal truth.

Huang Yuhan didn’t respond at first. Then she quietly muttered, “He was human too—an Earthling.”

Born from the same root, yet now trapped in a strange microspace. On someone else’s turf, there was nothing they could do.

…. 

“You alright?” Lin Yi asked the man, smiling.

He opened his mouth, then vomited again. There’s no solid food left to throw up.

Lin Yi immediately turned and walked away.

They had just gone to watch the execution. The man had been so disturbed he ran to puke.

Two minutes of retching.

Finally, he gasped and looked around for Lin Yi, only to see her walking back toward him from another direction, holding a cup of water.

She handed it over. Seeing his puzzled look, she explained, “Got it from an NPC.”

He took a big gulp, rinsed his mouth, spat into a bin, then drank the rest. Wiping his mouth, he coughed. “Sorry. I just couldn’t stomach that.”

“I get it,” Lin Yi said with a sympathetic smile. “It was disgusting.”

The man looked toward the execution platform, eyes filled with revulsion.

Lin Yi glanced around and muttered, “Let’s go,” heading into an alley.

He checked his surroundings, tossed the cup, and followed. “Did you notice something?”

Just then, Lin Yi stopped suddenly.

He looked past her shoulder, saw a man blocking the alley. He turned another tall, burly man behind them.

Lin Yi: “I’ve found the two murderous thieves.”

He instantly recognized them, they were the ones who killed the woman yesterday.

The two approached without a word. The man panicked, reaching toward his waistband for a weapon.

Lin Yi glanced at him, and raised her right hand.

“!”

Before he could react, he was teleported to the rooftop! Looking down, the three were already fighting.

With a flick, Lin Yi threw a dagger, dodged a punch, spun around, and slashed the big brute behind her!

Turning back, she kicked the other man out of the alley.

The thud wasn’t loud.

She didn’t like trouble—so she dealt with it before it started.

Ignoring the man with the pierced heart, she walked to the one she kicked, crouched, and without hesitation—

Slash!

Hot bl00d splattered.

Two lives. Barely a minute.

She wiped the blade clean on the man’s shirt, sheathed it, and then released the lawyer from the rooftop.

Standing by the still-warm corpses, she blinked.

‘These were real people.’

Back in the Boundary Arts Domain, the four girls had trained in sparing simulations, killing illusions in fake environments to build up courage. Everything disappeared once the task was done.

That had been their emotional reset.

The lawyer saw her frozen in place, shocked by her speed and strength. Now, he felt worried. “What’s wrong?”

Snapped back by his voice, Lin Yi shook her head. “Nothing. Just thought… that was kind of easy.”

Relieved by her joke, he laughed nervously. “Thanks for helping me out too.”

She figured he was good at talking, typical of a lawyer. She smiled but said nothing.

He glanced at her. “Not leaving?”

Suddenly, she grinned. “Let’s go.”

‘Weird’, he thought.

They walked side by side toward the museum, talking about stealing Ring I.

And deep inside, Lin Yi suddenly really wanted to see the other three girls again.