“Things are put in holes to be forgotten…
“The deeper the hole, the darker the truth… Until one day…
“They realize the hole be not deep enough…
“So, they dig it up to look at the remains… to see if the truth survived being buried.
“Before they destroy it forever and write the truth that suits their purpose.
“I have been a prisoner here far too long. Washing da blood from da walls. They leave no trace of truth.
“Da order for my execution be welcome. My jailors said it be…
“The merciful slaughter of a lunatic.”
This sudden monologue appeared in Feng Bujue and Passing Rain’s ears. When it did, all the other voices disappeared. Both could read something from each other’s faces and knew that they heard the same thing. When the monologue ended, the din returned. The ghosts rammed against the door, and some were crawling through the broken windows.
Even though they did not understand what had happened, there was no time to think. Feng Bujue supported Passing Rain, grabbed the lamp, and led her to the kitchen. When they neared the counter separating the kitchen from the canteen, the light in the kitchen suddenly came on, and a large shadow was standing behind the counter, studying them.
The monster had a human body but a pig’s head. His exposed muscles were pink, and he wore a white tank top and military pants. The wiry muscles on his arms looked as tough as rocks. The character had the appearance of Ju Bajie from Journey to the West if the character had been through a phase of serious gym visits.
There was only a counter between the two and the monster, and an indiscernible pressure overwhelmed them. They could sense the scary presence radiating from the monster, and it was much more oppressive than the hoard of ghosts outside. Just being in the monster’s presence had frozen them in place.
“Hello, I’m Oink.” The monster opened his lips to greet them. By then, the hoard of ghosts had swarmed into the canteen, crawling over the tables and chairs to reach their target. Oink turned his pig’s head around and uttered to the hoard behind the two players, “Get out from my territory. Now!”
He emphasized that last word.
The ghosts cowered under his order. They stopped moving and slowly retreated with hungry eyes on their meals that had once again slithered away.
“Sit over there.” After the hoard retreated, Oink pointed at the table closest to them. The two shared a look and formed a consensus. They moved to the table, placed the lamp on it, and sat down across from each other.
It was clear that the fifth story in the song had been initiated. Thankfully, this quest did not appear like it needed any form of combat. This was because, from the butcher’s presence that practically oozed off the monster, they would have died in combat even if they were in their optimum condition.
After Feng Bujue and Passing Rain sat down, Oink started to work. He took out something from the fridge and hauled it to the table to prepare it. There were washing and chopping.
Standing up and wandering around would probably lead to a bad outcome. Feng Bujue did not want to take that risk, so all he could do was stretch his neck as far as he could to look into the kitchen. However, the worktable was at the back of the kitchen, and Oink’s large body had completely blocked Feng Bujue’s line of sight.
From the sound of it, Oink should have taken two large pieces of meat from the freezer, removed their skin, chopped them into pieces, and tossed them into two pots of soup. As someone who cooked fairly often, listening to the audio clues and smelling the aroma, Feng Bujue could roughly tell what the monster was doing.
A human cooking pork was something that Feng Bujue had done pretty often, but today, from the looks of it, a pig cooking human had almost the same procedure.
Naturally, Feng Bujue did not have any experience in cooking human and had no idea what a human meat soup would smell like. Assuming that Oink was working with two types of meat, one was probably pork and the other human. The question of which bowl of soup was made from human meat paste could only be answered after a taste.
Oink was serious with his cooking. For taste, he added carrots, celery, onion, garlic, red wine, butter, bay leaf, and other spices. His knife skills aside, he had prepared everything that he should, and the aroma that came from the kitchen was indeed quite alluring.
Feng Bujue and Passing Rain did not have any intention of running. They knew that it would not work. Even if Oink did not stop them, there were the ghosts waiting for them outside, and they would never let them go. So why not make use of this precious opportunity to rest? It took more than one hour to finish preparing the two pots of soup. Oink kept himself busy, adding the ingredients, controlling the fire. At times, it felt like he had forgotten about the two players.
This was a good time for Passing Rain to heal her injury. After a long rest, her menu said that her bleeding status had stopped. She no longer needed to hold her wound with her hands, but even so, her Life Points were still low, having only risen back to twenty.
Unlike Stamina Points, a player’s Life Points recovered very slowly, at only 1/10 the speed Stamina Points recovered. Passive skills and medicine would be useful at time like this, but unfortunately, neither of the players knew anything about that.
Silence was perfect for contemplation. Feng Bujue had been thinking. He went through all the information that he had received since entering the scenario to analyze their current situation and the meaning of the last line of the song…
Feng Bujue had heard the name Oink before, but he had no idea where. He rummaged through his mind for half an hour before locating that piece of his memory.
Heaven’s Butcher, Oink!
The memory was coming back to Feng Bujue. The monologue that they had heard earlier was the last thing that Oink said before he was executed.
It was a short comic, detailing a dark and heavy story. In terms of content, it was much more impressive than this scenario. He believed that the Oink before them did not have any actual relation with the Oink in the story. Perhaps he was merely inspired by the character.
Or, perhaps the system wanted to use this monster to present some kind of message. Feng Bujue could not help but think about the character Oink, who sent his fellow pigs to the slaughterhouse daily before finally seeing the truth and overruling the humans that enslaved him. In a poetic justice type of writing, Oink killed the humans in a big fire, cooking them alive like they had been cooking his brethren.
A loud noise brought Feng Bujue back to the present. He followed the sound and realized that Oink had switched off the fire and was ladling the soup into two bowls.