Chapter 1 We Scare, Because We Care

In the public areas of Monster Electric Company, wall-mounted flat-screen TVs could be seen everywhere. These TVs played a promotional video for the company around the clock.

The content was roughly…

[Monster Electric Company, we're always reaching new heights! We power your cars, warm your homes, light up your cities, and accompany you every day...] Accompanied by narration, the promotional video also played various corresponding science diagrams, [We have the most outstanding scare employees in the entire monster kingdom. In the scare houses, humans who are teleported in will experience terrifying horror, and high-quality fear will be converted into continuous and stable energy for your use!]

[We know that humans' fear is getting weaker and their courage is getting stronger. But we dare to accept the challenges of the future! Our company has the scariest employees, the best power generation equipment, and is already working on developing new energy technologies. We... are Monster Electric Company! we_scare! because_we_care!]

In the security department's lounge, Ruoyu watched the above promotional video, which lasted several minutes, with a blank expression.

"Basically, they're using the setting of *Monsters, Inc.* (an animated film produced by Pixar)..." That was Ruoyu's impression.

Buzz—

Just then, the door to the room opened.

A slender, female monster walked in. Her body was humanoid, and she wore a neat black business suit. She had more than a dozen eyes of various sizes on her face, no ears or nose, but she did have a mouth...

"Hello, madam." The multi-eyed monster displayed a professional, calm demeanor. She walked slowly to the table and chairs in the lounge, raised her hand to signal to Ruoyu, and said, "Let's sit down and talk."

Ruoyu nodded slightly and walked over silently to sit down.

The multi-eyed monster sat opposite her and said, "Let me introduce myself. I'm Duomu, the manager of the security department."

"You can call me Siyu," Ruoyu replied in her usual tone.

"Alright, Ms. Siyu," Duomu said. "Let's get straight to the point..." Her gaze (all of her eyes) changed slightly as she continued, "You're a traveler from another world, aren't you?"

Ruoyu pondered for a moment before replying, "That's right."

"Hmm... as expected," Duomu continued. "Our monster kingdom... has long had rumors about you, in the form of urban legends."

"A monster with more than a dozen eyes is actually calling me an urban legend..." Ruoyu couldn't help but complain inwardly, but on the surface, she still replied calmly, "Then you must know something about us."

"We know some things, but rumors are just rumors, mostly one-sided and difficult to verify," Duomu replied. "In the end... we're just an electric company, not the kingdom's law enforcement agency. So, I'm also considering... whether to hand you over to the relevant departments."

"No, you've already considered it," Ruoyu immediately shot a sharp look at the other party. "Or rather, your superiors have already made up their minds." She interlocked her fingers, rested her elbows on the table, leaned forward slightly, and adopted a confident posture (actually imitating Feng Bujue), staring at Duomu and saying, "This exchange between you and me is essentially a negotiation. You very much want to obtain information from me, but you don't know what conditions to offer in exchange. Therefore, you started with 'whether to hand me over to the relevant departments,' which is basically... threatening my personal freedom and safety." She snorted coldly, "Unfortunately... your negotiation strategy is wrong."

"Oh? Why?" Duomu replied, feigning composure.

"Because... if we want to, we can leave your world at any time." Suddenly, another voice came from inside the wall on one side of the room. "Death... is just another way to leave."

Before the voice faded, the upper half of that wall began to glow faintly and gradually faded until it became a transparent piece of glass.

On the other side of the glass was a dark room. At this moment, two people were standing side by side in the dark room. One was the boss of Monster Electric Company—Freddy Krueger (the classic villain from the *Nightmare on Elm Street* series), and the other was Feng Bujue.

"How did you get over there?" Ruoyu turned her head to look at Jue-ge and asked directly, knowing that he could hear her.

"Ah... I only arrived a few minutes earlier than you," Feng Bujue replied with a smile.

As he spoke, he raised his hands. Ruoyu then noticed that Jue-ge's wrists were shackled with handcuffs.

"Mr. Feng, you promised not to interfere with their conversation, so I allowed you to listen in the observation room with me." Freddy turned his head to look at Jue-ge and said, "Why are you breaking your promise?"

"The negotiation is over, can't you see that?" Feng Bujue tilted his head and replied with a mocking expression. "My companion saw through your strategy from the beginning and recognized your bottom line. And you still know nothing about her, and she won't tell you anything... Therefore, continuing is just a waste of time."

"Ha..." Freddy sighed deeply upon hearing this. The next second, he waved his hand, and the wall between the two rooms dissipated into green light.

"Are you okay?" Seeing the wall disappear, Ruoyu immediately stood up and walked towards Feng Bujue.

"Don't worry," Jue-ge replied with a smile, and immediately raised his hand and tugged. The iron handcuffs on his wrist snapped open.

Seeing this, Ruoyu felt relieved and gave up the idea of ​​forcibly rescuing him.

Freddy and Duomu both changed their expressions when they saw this. The former even nervously took two steps back, creating some distance between himself and Feng Bujue, before saying, "Mr. Feng... it seems you've been hiding your strength..."

"Heh..." Feng Bujue smiled at the other party. "I didn't resist when I was handcuffed just to express my sincerity in cooperation." He paused, a hint of ferocity flashed in his eyes, "Now, breaking them is to tell you that if you want to resort to force, I'm willing to play along to the end."

"I see..." Freddy muttered in a deep voice. "Sorry, I was a little rude just now."

As a highly intelligent horror movie villain, Freddy instinctively sensed danger from Jue-ge. This traveler from another world, whose origins were unknown, was capricious, had unfathomable strength, and showed no panic or fear from beginning to end, as if everything was under his control... Facing such an opponent, Freddy naturally didn't dare to be careless.

"It doesn't matter," Feng Bujue spread his hands and replied easily. "At least... from this moment on, we can discuss cooperation on a more equal footing."

"The cooperation you're referring to is..." Freddy probed.

"You, everyone at Monster Electric Company... and my team cooperate with each other," Feng Bujue replied. "To deal with the 'real invaders' together."

"And what are those?" Freddy asked again.

"That is your doom..." Feng Bujue instantly changed to a solemn expression. "I have reliable intelligence that, at this very moment, a very powerful humanoid life form, half a dimension higher than you, has come to this universe, and... is lurking in your company." He met Freddy's gaze for two seconds, observing the changes in the other party's expression. "I don't know his/her gender and name yet, but... I can tell you that his/her race is called 'Derivatives,' a extremely dangerous group. To you, they have god-like abilities..." As Jue-ge spoke, he pointed at Duomu. "For example, this Ms. Duomu, with her strength..." Several black data streams quickly flashed in his eyes, "...she is very likely to be directly controlled by a Derivative, becoming an obedient puppet."

"You better have some basis for what you're saying!" Duomu immediately retorted in an agitated tone. It was only natural for monsters to react this way; anyone would be annoyed to hear such a thing.

"Hehe... I'm just giving an example." Feng Bujue's face changed faster than flipping a book, and in the blink of an eye, he put on a warm and gentle smile. "Please don't take it to heart."

On the other side, Freddy pondered for a while, then touched his festering chin and asked, "Do you have any evidence... to support your claims?"

"Not yet, but..." Feng Bujue replied, "By the time you get solid evidence, I'm afraid it will be too late..."

"Then, if you'll excuse my frankness, Mr. Feng," Freddy continued, "I can't completely trust you."

"It's okay if you don't trust me for now," Feng Bujue had already predicted this result. "Right now, I happen to have another thing to do. If you allow it, then through this matter, I can further express my sincerity."

"Oh?" Freddy asked suspiciously, "What is it?"

...

Five minutes later, the company's underground garage.

"I've already told you everything I know! Don't do this! I just want to go home!" Edward, who was kneeling on the ground, had already given up his birth date and time, and was on the verge of exposing his dark history of lifting girls' skirts in elementary school, but the three players still showed no sign of letting him go.

"How is it?" Juan Menghuan looked at Xiao Ling and asked. For some reason, he seemed to have regarded Xiao Ling as the person in charge here.

"Hmm... it seems there's really nothing left to ask," Xiao Ling muttered thoughtfully.

It had only been a little over ten minutes since they captured Edward. In this short period of time, Xiao Ling had very methodically asked him about all the valuable information he knew, and successfully grasped some basic worldviews of the monster kingdom.

"But there's still something... very strange," Tanlang said.

"Yeah..." Xiao Ling also nodded, muttering, "Why hasn't the main quest been triggered yet..."

[Ahem, hello hello~ Can you hear me?] Suddenly, a familiar voice rang out from the parking lot's speakers.

In fact, it wasn't just the parking lot... Feng Bujue's voice rang throughout the entire Monster Electric Company.

[This is Feng Bujue, I'm with Siyu. Everyone from Hell Front, and... Juan Menghuan, Tanlang, you two, listen up.] Jue-ge said through the speakers, [Please immediately find a security guard nearby and have them take you to the company's security department.] He paused for two seconds, then added, [You should have noticed it too, the main quest hasn't appeared yet. I can tell you for sure that this is caused by the Derivative.] This second half of his statement was completely different content to the NPCs, because it had already been shielded and converted by the system. [Everyone still remembers the core content of the v1.10 patch, right? In the new version, after entering a nightmare difficulty team scenario with six people, there will be a 0.2% chance of encountering a Derivative. Right now, we've encountered one.]

At this point, the players who heard this broadcast basically confirmed that it wasn't a trap. Because... it was possible for NPCs in the scenario to impersonate players and issue broadcasts, but they would never say lines like "v1.10 patch." Furthermore... Feng Bujue's unique tone was indeed difficult to imitate.

[The scenario has barely started for half an hour, and the Derivative's data is probably not fully formed yet. However... I can already determine that we've encountered a very powerful character this time, so much so that the scenario's own plot has been affected.] Jue-ge's words continued, [If I'm not mistaken, when the Derivative's complete form is generated, the main quest prompt will appear, and it will definitely be a quest directly related to that Derivative.] He took a breath. [In short... the system is also waiting now, preparing to make arrangements based on the situation. So... we'd better hurry up and prepare.]

Having said that, he felt it was about time, so he added one last sentence: [Anyway, please come as soon as possible, we'll talk about the specifics when we meet.]

...

At the same time, in the security department's central control room.

"Alright, I'm done talking," Feng Bujue turned off the microphone button and said to Freddy.

"Then... let's wait and see," Freddy said, with his hands on his hips, looking at the many surveillance screens in front of him.

"Bujue," Ruoyu, who had been silent in the back, suddenly spoke to Jue-ge, "Xiao Tan probably won't be able to come."

"Huh? What's wrong?" Feng Bujue replied, already glancing at the game menu. "He's clearly still in survival mode, right?"

"I don't know about others, but he definitely didn't hear the broadcast," Ruoyu replied.

"How do you know?" Jue-ge asked.

"Sigh..." Ruoyu sighed, raised her right hand, and pointed to her right side with her index finger.

Feng Bujue followed the direction of her finger, and his gaze quickly stopped on a small screen in the corner of the room.

At this moment, the screen was displaying such a scene... There was a square room, and in one corner of the room was a dressing table and a chair. On the chair sat a woman in red, slowly and unhurriedly combing her hair in front of the mirror. And in the other corner of the room, there was a man (Xiao Tan). He was squatting in the corner, hugging his knees with his arms, staring at the woman combing her hair with a face full of sweat, not even daring to breathe.