Chapter Ch183.1 - Blood Sacrifice

translator: xiin

editors: apricot & juurensha

Under the scorching sun, the Mayan city-state was strange yet fascinating.

The tall monuments and statues were surrounded by numerous buildings of varying heights, and the gods watched as the citizens of the city-state shuttled around amongst them.

It was easy to distinguish between nobles and civilians.

Most of the civilians only wore a plain piece of linen. They carried heavy loads or held livestock.

Aristocrats wore colorful clothes and had tattoos, jewels, and rings all over every inch of their exposed skin.

Wu Jin even saw a Mayan lady in a sedan chair with tattoos that extended from her elbows all the way up to her tongue.

However, almost everyone had a small amount of indigo paint on their bodies.

Ming Yao led Wu Jin and Wei Shi around the market. Exquisite stone tools and bone tools could be seen everywhere throughout the roadside stalls, along with all kinds of rainforest herbs, tobacco leaves, and mountain goods.

Wu Jin thought it over and felt that the scene in front of them should be a market that was being held before a sacrifice.

In the market, the shop in the most prominent location was a vendor who sold a variety of bone knives.

From time to time, there would be Mayans who stopped by to exchange one or two cocoa beans for these exquisitely crafted weapons. The stall owner would sharpen the edge of the blade for the buyer, and the buyer would then take away the knife. The first thing they always did afterwards was to go and kneel down in front of the nearest statue.

“They’re buying knives.” Ming Yao shrugged his shoulders. “It means that the sacrifice is about to start. The blood sacrifice.”

The Mayan nobleman who’d just purchased a bone knife knelt down and quickly cut his wrist. The red blood flowed out sluggishly, and the Mayan nobleman didn’t hesitate to smear it on the statue.

The blood dripped down and coagulated on the cold stone.

Wu Jin: “……”

Wu Jin: “!!!”

Wei Shi glanced at the scene, but he wasn’t very interested in it. There had been an abundance of lunatics in the R-Code Base back then.

Wu Jin turned to Ming Yao, “How is the sacrifice done?”

Ming Yao sighed, “This is why we wanted to cooperate with you.”

“We’ve been here for a couple rounds, and there’s been a constant stream of contestants coming in, and there has also been a constant stream of contestants being caught and sacrificed. Do you see the altar in the middle?” Ming Yao stretched out his hand, “I suggest that you guys stay away from it. The Mayan sacrifice to their Sun God is a living sacrifice, and nobody who was caught has ever come back down again.”

“The only clue we have right now is this,” Ming Yao poked at the blue dye on Wu Jin’s body. “This is the mark that allows us to walk freely through the city-state. However, it can only protect the body and doesn’t equal clearing the instance.”

Wu Jin had a question for him, “Why aren’t you blue?!”

Ming Yao proudly turned his left hand to show his white and tender wrist. A small Jingyi logo had been drawn there in blue dye, “See, this is my mark!”

Wu Jin looked at Ming Yao who only had a small blue mark, then looked at himself who was covered all over in blue. He then moved quickly, grabbing at Ming Yao and rubbing against him messily!

Ming Yao: “! Captain, save me, Little Witch is messing with me! Contestant Wei, can’t you help out––”

When he looked back again, Wei Shi’s bow and arrow was aimed at him once again.

Ming Yao: ! Why?! Am I a Little Ming toy?! Are you going to kill me if I don’t let Little Witch play? Contestant Wei, aren’t you being too unreasonable!

Zuo Botang smiled like a fox as he separated the two of them. Wu Jin then discovered that the indigo dye dried very quickly; he hadn’t been able to rub any of it off on Ming Yao at all.

When Zuo Botang approached, Wu Jin took another look at his wrist watch.

There was still no illegal team formation warning.

He turned back and gestured gently at the big boss.

There were two situations where the Crosson illegal team formation warning didn’t trigger. One was if the rules really allowed the formation of a team, and secondly… if Jingyi had been trying to set them up right from the start.

Regardless of which one it was, Wu Jin’s blue noble status allowed him to gain many benefits along the way.

Some food stall owners insisted on stuffing their roast meat at Wu Jin, some young girls gave him beautiful small shells, and some other nobles even jumped out of their sedan chairs to pat Wu Jin on the shoulder.

When they passed by a certain livestock stall, Wu Jin’s eyes brightened.

A little alpaca was tied to a stone pillar and grazing on grass.

The alpaca was one of the main types of livestock in Incan civilization. Its meat was fresh and tender, a cross somewhere between lamb and beef. When it was cold, they could collect alpaca fleece and use it to knit sweaters… and the main thing was that it was cute! Its eyes were moist and lively, its fur was warm and soft, and it was so small that it wasn’t even as tall as Wu Jin’s legs. After it finished eating grass, it leaned cleverly against the stone pillow. It wasn’t picky when eating, and its IQ wasn’t high. One could tell at a glance that it was easy to raise.

The owner who was taking care of the alpaca enthusiastically handed the rope over to Wu Jin and gestured that he could take it around for a walk as he liked.

Wu Jin was in a trance, and it seemed as though he’d been hit by surprise, “……” He’d clearly just turned blue, but how come there were even pet benefits to being a noble?!

It seemed that the amount of blue pigment on his body was directly proportional to the amount of preferential treatment he received––Ming Yao made a sound and stretched out his hands, “I want to hold it, I want to hold it!”

Wu Jin dodged away with a whoosh.

The youth’s eyes were shining as he reached out to slowly rub the little alpaca’s soft belly. The little alpaca immediately bleated quietly, its dangling limbs moving around like it was stepping on cotton.

Wu Jin quickly evaded Ming Yao’s attempt to snatch it away, holding the alpaca in his arms to rub and pet.

Ming Yao complained, “Let me play with it for a while, just a little while!”

Wu Jin was full of revenge, “No!”

Ming Yao: “……” Jingyi’s vice c-position reached out snatch away the alpaca, butWu Jin turned around and stuffed the small animal into the big boss’s arms.

The man was expressionless as he accepted it, raising the alpaca up like he was holding a gun and asking in a hoarse voice, “You like it?”

Only now did Wu Jin discover that the big boss had changed cores again without him realizing it.

Wu Jin was suddenly relieved and exhilarated. With Big Wei there, what kind of alliance did they need to talk about?! He now felt a sense of safety and decided that they could simply leave Jingyi to hang right now…

Zuo Botang suddenly spoke up, “Contestant Wei.”

Wu Jin looked up. The sniper’s expression was gentle and smiling, but his gaze was always locked on Wei Shi. Wu Jin was put on alert; Zuo Botang’s senses were incredibly keen.

Wu Jin subconsciously took a step forward to block the big boss behind him.

Wei Shi raised his brows and gestured for Wu Jin to leave. Those who went their own ways had no need to fear conspiracy.

Zuo Botang nodded, as though he’d expected this to happen. “Since it’s come to this point, we’ll go our separate ways. My advice is to stay away from the temple.”

“The sacrifice is about to begin.”

“Little Ming.” Zuo Botang led Ming Yao away.

The Jingyi captain skillfully loaded an arrow onto his bow and said goodbye to Wu Jin, “We’ll meet again if fate allows it.”

The two of them eventually disappeared off in the direction that led towards the temple guard post.

Big Wei didn’t have the patience to continue holding the alpaca and tossed it at Wu Jin, “How did you turn blue.”

Wu Jin hurriedly hugged the alpaca in his arms and reported his complaints about Ming Yao, then quickly summed the situation up for the big boss, “The theme of this Mayan instance is blood sacrifice. Along the way, we saw more than one person cutting themselves and smearing blood onto the statues.”

Across the entire marketplace that spread outwards from the altar on top of the pyramid, the scent of blood was growing stronger and stronger.

“The screams we heard when we came in through the entrance should be from an eliminated player.” Wu Jin thought back, “The sun rose up because players were eliminated.”

If this was the mechanism for the game, then this haunted house instance would be the instance that was responsible for controlling and limiting the rankings in the sixth elimination match.

“As for the rest…” Wu Jin shook his head. He didn’t know much else, “We’ll head to the altar. The important murals are all there.”

The big boss nodded, then suddenly reached out to touch the fleece on the alpaca’s head.

Then, he reached out to run a hand through Wu Jin’s soft and fluffy curls.

Wu Jin and the alpaca turned to stare at Wei Shi at the same time.

Wei Shi ordered, “Keep this little beast with you. When he comes up, have him hold this sheep.”

Wu Jin corrected him, “It’s an alpaca…”

Wei Shi was cold and indifferent, “He’s only allowed to hold the sheep and isn’t allowed to touch you.”

The two of them were finally less than 100 meters away from the temple.

Wu Jin crouched beneath the low wall and watched as the crowd around them grew increasingly fanatical. As the sacrificial rites began to start, the Mayan crowd was practically cheering as they went to pour blood on the stone wall of the temple. All of them seemed to ignore the pain caused by their blood loss.

Wu Jin watched the scene for a long time before discovering that this self-mutilation type of sacrifice was accompanied by a large number of natural, unrefined drugs that included tobacco leaf and frog poison. The drugs that could be stuffed into their mouth were stuffed in, the stuff that could be burned was inhaled as smoke, and there were even some Mayan nobles who were so high that they simply took off their pants and stuffed the drugs up their rectum to enjoy it.

All pain was converted into joy through piety.

“The sacrifice is for… the sun god.” Wu Jin looked at the mural on the stone pillar.

Beneath the pyramid, the elderly priest wandered around and lingered repeatedly, as though waiting for the prisoners of war who would be used as sacrifices to arrive. Ming Yao and Zuo Botang were to the right and left of the elder.

“What a big liar! He even said that we shouldn’t go to the altar!” Wu Jin complained, then pulled the big boss with him to head over, “Let’s go over there too.”

The entrance to the Mayan instance was on the other side of the altar. Wu Jin did some mental calculations on the size of this entire entertainment facility and guessed that the altar was at the end of the instance building.

If there was an exit for the instance, then it was most likely to be somewhere on the altar.