Not long after, the pig-headed brute lumbered out of the kitchen carrying two steaming, fragrant bowls of broth.

He walked over to Feng Bujue and Siyu's table, placing the bowls down. Then he said, "In these two bowls, one is human broth, one is pork broth." His gaze swept across their faces. "Each of you choose a bowl. If you drink the pork, you can leave alive. If you drink the human... you go into the freezer to become my next bowl of broth."

The shadow cast by Oink's massive frame blocked the light from the kitchen. In the dim glow of the lantern, the two bowls of golden broth on the table looked very tempting and smelled delicious.

"I'll state this in advance: no leaving any broth, and no dumping it out or spitting it up. Otherwise, you both go into the fridge together," Oink added.

Neither bowl contained any main ingredients; Oink had only ladled clear broth into them. The two bowls of broth were the same color, with a layer of oil floating on the surface, but the broth itself looked clear. Visually, the two bowls were indistinguishable.

And judging by smell, there was no difference either. Both pots of broth were seasoned in the same way. The rich fragrance of the auxiliary ingredients, spices, and red wine completely masked the greasiness of the meat. Human olfaction is not very sensitive in nature, and in this situation, relying on smell to distinguish is unreliable.

So, there was only one way... try it.

Although Thriller Paradise had extremely high odor reproduction for disgusting substances such as blood, internal organs, and sewer filth, players could basically eat anything as long as they overcame their psychological barriers. They could do things like chew glass and swallow nails, but it would cause esophageal damage, a decrease in survival value, bleeding, illness, and other chain reactions...

After more than ten seconds of mental struggle, Feng Bujue seemed to have made up his mind. He casually picked up a bowl of soup, said nothing, and without worrying about the temperature, tilted his head back and drank. Glug, glug, glug, he poured it all down in less than ten seconds.

Siyu looked at him, thinking that she seemed to have no choice either, and could only finish off the remaining bowl. At worst, it was just death.

Unexpectedly, after Feng Bujue finished his bowl, he grabbed the other bowl on the table without a word, brought it to his mouth, and poured it down, emptying it in less than ten seconds as well.

Siyu was completely dumbfounded. At first, she didn't understand what was going on, but after a few seconds, she suddenly realized... the first bowl Feng Bujue drank must have been the pork broth. After drinking it, he knew that the bowl on the table was stewed with human meat. To protect himself, he snatched it and drank it...

Feng Bujue's thoughts were indeed along those lines, but things were not that simple.

Before drinking, he was indeed thinking: in any case, he couldn't let a girl taste human meat. So, he had to strike first and drink quickly. If the bowl he picked was human broth, so be it; it was just death. But if he picked the pork broth, he would just snatch the bowl of human meat and drink it.

However, plans were just plans... After he started drinking, the situation changed.

The first bowl, to be honest, tasted pretty good. Even in this terrifying atmosphere, for a moment, Feng Bujue had a slight sense of satisfaction from enjoying a delicious meal.

So, he determined that this bowl was not made of human meat. If it was, then his problem might not just be losing fear; he probably also had the same habits as Professor Hannibal...

But when he tasted the second bowl, Feng Bujue was stunned. The taste of this bowl... seemed to be the same as the previous one.

He didn't care about anything else and drank it down in one gulp. After drinking both bowls, he was puzzled instead... which bowl was the human meat and which was the broth?

"What do you think you're doing?" Oink looked at Feng Bujue and said in a deep voice, "Protecting your companion? Hmph... Do you think I can't just ladle out two more bowls?"

Hearing this, Feng Bujue slammed the table and stood up immediately, glaring at Oink with a very arrogant look in his eyes. The unspoken line in his heart was: "Do you believe I'll trip you up!"

Oink was unmoved. He turned around calmly and walked towards the kitchen, saying as he walked, "Come with me." This sentence was obviously addressed to Feng Bujue.

Siyu quickly grabbed his arm, looked into Feng Bujue's eyes, and shook her head. She felt that Oink's invitation was to cut Feng Bujue up as a food reserve.

But Feng Bujue smiled, waved his hand, and returned the ownership of the lantern on the table to Siyu. Before turning to leave, he wrote "wait for me" on her palm with his finger, and then gestured, indicating that Siyu should just sit still.

For some reason, Feng Bujue's actions made people feel very at ease, as if he was really just going and coming back.

...

After following Oink into the depths of the kitchen, because Siyu was not present, Feng Bujue could speak in a lower voice. He said, "Neither of those two bowls was made of human meat, right?"

"Of course not," Oink said. "But that doesn't mean I can't make it... I invited you in to show you my stock." He walked to the freezer, opened the door to forty-five degrees, stood in front of the door, and pulled out a U-shaped piece of meat from inside, over a meter long, hanging on an iron hook. With a flick of his hand, he placed it on the counter.

A closer look revealed that it should be the lower half of a human body...

"The kid in the well was cowardly in life, but after death, he not only killed his enemies, but also killed many small hooligans who had no grievances with him," Oink said. "After being injured by that Yin-Yang Master, he was still restless, so I cut him in two to keep him quiet."

As he spoke, he dragged out a corpse without arms from the huge freezer, and said, "This is a ridiculous music teacher. He was very self-righteous in life, felt that being a teacher was a waste of talent, and always wanted to become a composer, but what he wrote was simply garbage. Until one day, he had a heart attack while creating garbage alone in the music classroom, and became a ghost who forced others to listen to his performances."

Seeing this, Feng Bujue had roughly guessed what would appear next: "Let me guess... is there also a dead child in the freezer?"

"The dead child was killed by you," Oink replied. He conveniently took a female corpse with its internal organs hollowed out from the freezer, "This is its mother. As you guessed, before committing suicide, she resentfully cut open her already pregnant belly."

Then, Oink closed the door of the freezer and took out a glass bottle from a cupboard. The bottle was filled with blood, and two human eyeballs were soaking inside: "This is a beautiful girl, especially her eyes, which are very attractive. She was very vain and knew how to use her beauty to achieve her goals. She dated several boys at the same time, making each of them buy expensive things to please her. One day, some girls who were jealous of her behavior pressed her head into a water-filled sink. They just wanted to 'teach' her a lesson, but they were blinded by jealousy, and sin overflowed from their minds and bodies... When the blood in that girl's lungs stained the water red, they realized that a tragedy had occurred." He paused. "This ghost's resentment is very strong and has killed many people. Even if I dug out her eyes, it didn't stop her behavior, but instead increased her habit of collecting eyeballs."

Feng Bujue said, "So... the other dimension accessed by the thirteenth step is also related to you?"

"Where do you think the people killed by those ghosts went?" Oink replied.

"Uh... you created that space and used it as a trash can for discarding dead spirits?" Feng Bujue said, "But what about those ghosts outside right now?"

"That's what I should be asking you," Oink retorted. "Why are the ghosts outside of the school gathering here to hunt you down?"

This sentence made Feng Bujue understand that the ghost chase assigned by the system after violating the rules had nothing to do with the Seven Unexplainable Mysteries of Ye Jie High School.

"I don't know..." He replied perfunctorily and quickly changed the subject, "You're telling me all this to illustrate that you're like the caretaker here, right? Then I want to ask, why are you putting on a human broth act here? Also, what does the last ballad mean?"

"I'm here to help you, of course," Oink said, "Or rather, to help those who have the courage to drink the broth."

Hearing this, Feng Bujue suddenly realized something. He opened the game menu and knew that he had screwed up... He had done a good deed but made a mistake. It turned out that those two bowls of soup could restore survival value. At this moment, his survival value was already full. Although he couldn't determine how much one bowl could restore, it was definitely a waste.

Upon careful consideration, this task had quite a bit of depth. It wasn't just testing whether players dared to try it, but also seeing who would drink first and what their reaction would be after drinking it.

If only one person came here to trigger the mission, this would be a simple test of courage. But if there were two players here, there would be various variables. If the two had ulterior motives, then surely neither would want to drink first, fearing that they would drink the so-called human meat bowl, while hoping that the other would drink that bowl...

"As for the last ballad," Oink continued, "You'll understand when you go to the school gate."

"Hmm... I see..." Feng Bujue replied thoughtfully. He understood that Oink's words were a direct hint of the trigger location for the last task in the Seven Unexplainable Mysteries.

Feng Bujue then tentatively asked, "Excuse me... could I have another bowl of the broth you just gave me?"

"Want to give it to your companion to drink?" Oink replied, "You can..." After a two-second pause, he blurted out the second half of the sentence, "But the third bowl is extra. What are you prepared to exchange with me?" His eyes suddenly became ferocious, "An arm? A pair of eyes?"

Feng Bujue felt that something seemed wrong. This butcher of paradise was both righteous and evil, and no one could guess whether he was friend or foe in the next second. Upon hearing words like arms and eyes, Feng Bujue instinctively took out a kitchen knife from his knapsack and immediately prepared to use the [Spoiled Brat's Downward Leg Sweep] for self-preservation.

"A kitchen knife?" Oink snatched the weapon from Feng Bujue's hand. His speed was so fast that the latter couldn't react at all. "Looks pretty good..." He weighed it in his hand a few times, tried to grip it tightly and swing it, and glanced at Feng Bujue out of the corner of his eye, "Go ladle the broth."