Xiaoxiao couldn’t help but ask Wu Wang.

“Are you… a thief or an assassin in real life?”

The moment the words left her mouth, she frowned. Something was off.

The scene before her felt strangely familiar.

“An artist…”

Wu Wang started to reply, but she immediately cut him off.

“But you have a nemesis who hunts you down in the city at night, so you developed these skills in stealth and trap-making?”

With his performance interrupted, Wu Wang’s expression turned a little sour.

He looked her up and down with a strange gaze, then proceeded toward the Puppet Show stage without another word.

Seeing this, Xiaoxiao hurried after him.

She felt that something was wrong. She wanted him to stop so they could observe their surroundings first.

However, as she gave chase, she found that no matter how she quickened her pace, she always remained a certain distance from the back of his Purple Tuxedo.

It was as if she were trapped in Achilles’ paradox, forever unable to catch the tortoise just a short distance away.

Finally, as Xiaoxiao lifted her leg, she heard the clank and creak of turning gears and twisting joints.

She subconsciously looked down.

To her horror, her legs were growing increasingly stiff. They even reflected a woody luster under the moonlight.

“Carved to a form, a falsehood made to seem true…”

The Wu Wang ahead of her turned his head and once again recited the strange poem.

The familiar feeling instantly sent a cold sweat down Xiaoxiao’s back.

Just how many times have I come to the Puppet Show backstage?

However, in the next second, before the marionette-like Wu Wang could finish his halting recitation, a black shadow suddenly leaped out from the nearby bushes.

It raised a steel pipe-like rod and slammed it down on the marionette Wu Wang’s head.

The force was so great it sent the head flying, rolling on the ground like a rubber ball.

When the figure turned to look at her, Xiaoxiao froze.

It was a humanoid monster with countless pairs of blood-red vertical pupils on its head, its hair writhing like conscious tentacles. Each finger was as sharp as a claw, and its exposed skin was a chaotic mix of scales and feathers.

She felt a sharp pain, as if her brain had been struck hard several times with a sledgehammer.

She couldn’t help but squat down, clutching her head.

With trembling hands, she took out a bottle of water with no brand or label from her backpack. When she opened it, a faint scent of almonds wafted out.

【Quirky Almond Water (Fine Quality)】

An important item naturally generated in the Backrooms. Its nutritional value is slightly lower than walnut cakes. It is a bottled liquid with a faint, sweet almond flavor that may appear in several different types of packaging, or sometimes with none at all.

【Effect】

Drinking it restores some physical damage from The Twisted and helps maintain sanity and focus.

【Note】

You must be sure to check that it has not expired before drinking, as it is then as dangerous as Cashew Water. Believe me, you don’t want to know what happens when you drink Cashew Water.

Gulp, gulp…

Xiaoxiao tilted her head back and gulped down the almond water.

The excruciating pain deep in her brain gradually subsided, and her surroundings began to twist and warp.

A moment later, she realized she wasn’t backstage at all.

Instead, she was standing in the center of the stage, holding the wooden control rods for a marionette in her hands.

The one she had been unconsciously manipulating was a marionette dressed exactly like herself.

Except its head was now missing.

“Yo, you’re awake? You owe me one, remember that.”

Wu Wang’s voice came from below the stage.

Xiaoxiao glanced over. She was startled to see him sitting with his legs crossed like a member of the audience, his foot pinning down a bizarrely shaped marionette.

In his hands, he was toying with a round marionette head, spinning it on his index finger like a basketball.

Taking a closer look, she saw it was the missing head of the marionette she was just controlling.

And the thing he was stepping on looked just like the humanoid monster she had seen earlier.

“Thanks… What on earth happened?”

Xiaoxiao said this with a grim expression, dropping the control rods. She noticed the empty bottle of almond water by her feet.

This meant that what had just happened was no illusion.

Wu Wang casually tossed the marionette head aside. He stroked his chin and began to explain.

“We said we’d just wander around, and the first place we found was this Puppet Show garden. I was rummaging through chests and cabinets backstage while you went on stage to look for clues.”

“But I noticed you started twitching all over as soon as you got on stage. I thought your Purple Mood was leaking electricity, so I figured I shouldn’t go up and disturb you. What if you’re into that sort of thing?”

The corner of Xiaoxiao’s mouth couldn’t help but twitch. This guy was just like Yan Shuangying, always spouting nonsense even when he was being serious.

Wu Wang continued.

“Later, I saw you playing with the Puppet Show. Your movements were getting stiffer and stiffer, while the marionette in your hands was becoming more and more agile.”

His tone was both serious and a little teasing.

“I reckon if you’d played for a few more minutes, you would have completely turned into a marionette, left here for anyone to play with. That thing in your hands would have become another 【Xiaoxiao】 and mixed in with the players. I just don’t know if she would have inherited your backpack and equipment.”

With that, he stood up and waved his hand, preparing to leave the garden. After all, he had already obtained what he wanted.

But Xiaoxiao walked down from the stage and squatted beside the marionette that looked like a humanoid monster, frowning.

She remembered seeing two marionettes identical to her and Wu Wang at the beginning. The one in her hands when she woke up also proved this was true.

But where is Wu Wang’s marionette? And what is this monster marionette?

She glanced at her mental strength. It had already dropped from【37】to the【24】range. And this was after using almond water to recover some of it.

“Weren’t you affected by the Mental Contamination?”

Hearing Xiaoxiao’s question, Wu Wang recalled what had just happened.

He grinned.

“Mental Contamination? What’s that? I’ve never encountered it in an Instance. Guess I’m just lucky.”

Ten minutes ago.

When he saw Xiaoxiao dazedly walk onto the stage and start manipulating the marionette, another one that looked exactly like him had also seemed ready to make a move.

But as the Mental Contamination swept over, preparing to control Wu Wang’s body, the marionette met the gaze of the Red Vertical Pupil on his wrist.

In an instant, it cracked and transformed into this bizarre-looking thing.

Heh, trying to use Mental Contamination in front of the Abyss God?

Buddy, you might as well go star in the movie ‘Up’. You can play the flying house.

But Wu Wang didn’t rush to save Xiaoxiao.

Instead, he continued rummaging through the chests and cabinets, searching for something. It was something recorded on a slip of paper hidden inside his Chou (Clown Role) costume, which Wu Wang had found while lying in bed.

It was also the reason why Wu Wang, who seemed to be wandering aimlessly, was actually deliberately searching for the Puppet Show garden.

At the time, since Xiaoxiao’s Scarecrow was spying on him, it wasn’t convenient for him to take it out and examine it.

Only after he had exposed the Scarecrow’s existence and Xiaoxiao had recalled it did he quietly take out the note, glancing at it while vaulting onto the eaves.

Written on the slip of paper were two lines.

【The method to discern the Five Elements’ attributes, the art of calculating the Eight Characters of Birth Time】

【Hidden within a Marionette】