Chapter 8 (2/2)

He raised his right hand without hesitation and waved it forward.

[ Night Cut ]

In an instant, a pitch-black sickle materialized in Flanders’s hand.

Swoosh!

The incomparably sharp black sickle cut through the crowd quickly.

In an instant, a few villagers who were closer to Flanders were cut in half by the waist.

Including Qiao.

1

At this moment, Qiao was still facing the crowd.

Suddenly, he felt a sharp pain in his waist.

And in the next second, his vision shifted.

No, it was not a shift.

It was his upper body falling to the ground.

Before his death, he seemed to have seen the scarecrow’s face.

It had a huge mouth and a hideous face!

[ Fear + 100]

[ Fear + 100]

[ Fear + 50]

[ Fear + 100]

…

Those with 100 points were all killed.

As for those with 50 points, they were alive but had witnessed the scene.

This slash had taken the quite a number of villager’s lives.

Although he had obtained a large number of fear points, Flanders’s heart ached.

His current actions were no different from killing a hen to eat an egg, where he killed the humans for temporary gains.

This was because he could have scared everyone first before killing them.

This way, he could obtain the most fear points.

But now, he had to kill some of them first.

“Strange… It really is strange! Run!”

Someone in the crowd screamed.

The others immediately reacted and were about to flee in all directions.

But in the next second, they were all stunned on the spot.

Because Flanders had activated his second skill — [ Fear ]!

Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation  Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

In an instant, all the villagers around fell into the illusion of fear.

Without any hesitation, Flanders immediately used [ Night Cut ] on the villagers who weren’t moving.

He swung the knife, again and again, each attack could take the lives of several people.

However, a hint of urgency appeared on Flanders’s face.

This was because the effect of [ Fear ] could only last for two seconds.

He had to kill as many villagers as he could during these two seconds.

After all, he had already been exposed. After finishing this job, he had to run.

One villager after another fell, but in the end, he still couldn’t kill them all in two seconds.

The villagers who hadn’t died woke up one after another.

Seeing the dead villagers around them, the villagers fell into extreme panic. At the same time, it provided Flanders with a lot of fear points.

Some people had already lost control of their legs and collapsed on the ground.

The others who had a strong desire to survive had already started to roll and crawl in all directions.

Looking at the fleeing villagers, Flanders snorted coldly and did not chase after them.

As he had heard previously, the police would arrive soon.

With the police, it meant that there would be guns and police cars.

At this moment, Flanders was not sure if he could withstand the damage of the bullets.

After all, the system’s judgment of him yesterday was that he was too weak, and was unable to test his actual strength.

Although he had received a lot of fear points and was stronger than before, Flanders did not have much time to test his own strength.

What he needed to do now was to seize every second to obtain the easily obtainable fear points.

Then, he fled the scene.

…

Half an hour later, two young police officers arrived late.

Seeing the ground full of corpses, the two young men immediately vomited aggressively for two full minutes.

Then, with a trembling voice, they informed the headquarters,

“Here… An extremely serious murder case has happened here.

“The dead… There are countless dead people, at least a hundred of them! Requesting backup!”

After another half an hour or so, two “commissioners” wearing sunglasses arrived at the scene and took over the case.

2

Although these two commissioners did not have any identification, the two junior officers left the scene without further questions after receiving the approval of the director.

They could not wait any longer.

They did not want to stay in such a place full of corpses for even a second longer.

After the police car left, the two of them began to talk with a serious expression.

“The wounds are extremely smooth. All the victims were killed in one move and died on the spot.

“This strange creature’s strength should not be too weak, but it shouldn’t be too strong either.

“At the very least, it should have a vicious aura or sharp claws

“The victim’s expression was extremely terrified, and his face was distorted. This means that the creature’s appearance or method should be very terrifying.

“The corpses are more densely distributed, which means that the victims didn’t die one by one. They likely died in batches, or even at the same time!

“Therefore, this strange creature’s weapon or body is very likely to be larger.”

The two commissioners were different from the police officers. After arriving at the scene, not only did they not feel any discomfort, but they also observed the scene very calmly.

One after another, they analyzed the situation roughly.

However, some parts of their logic were correct, but the answer was wrong.

Flander’s size was not huge, and he did not have any huge sharp weapons or claws.

The scythe he used would only materialize when he needed it, and he wouldn’t carry it with him normally.

And Flander’s appearance wasn’t actually terrifying, he was just an ordinary scarecrow.

When he stood still normally, he even looked a little comical.

However, although this information misled the two of them, it was only temporary.

Soon, the two commissioners found the surviving villagers and asked for the information they wanted.

“The murderer is a scarecrow?

“Around 1.5 meters, he can conjure a scythe?

“He can also make people hallucinate a very terrifying illusion?”

One of the commissioners asked while taking notes. At the same time, he frowned slightly.

It had been a long time since he had made a wrong judgment.

Obviously, the strange creature this time seemed to be somewhat different from the usual ones.

At least, normally they did not have the ability to conjure weapons.

Moreover, it was the first time he had encountered a strange creature in the form of a scarecrow.

Looking at the calm appearance of the male commissioner in front of him, the villagers once again heard Qiao’s words.

“There should be a department in the world that specializes in dealing with paranormal activities, but it might just be a legend.”

One of the villagers asked tentatively.

“Excuse me, do you specialize in dealing with paranormal people?”

The man who was taking notes was slightly stunned and nodded.

“That’s right, how did you know?”

“When we found the body this morning, Qiao told us.”

“Qiao?”

“Yes, he used to be a policeman and heard such a legend. When we heard him talking this morning, we thought it was just a rumor, but we didn’t expect it to be true.”

The other villages nodded their heads in agreement.

No one had expected that this scarecrow who had stood in the wheat field for decades was actually a monster.

The male commissioner nodded and continued to ask,

“Where’s Qiao? Where is he now?”

“Qiao is already dead. He was killed by that monster scarecrow.”

When the villagers said this, their faces showed some fear.

It seemed that they had not recovered from the fear they had suffered from the incident.

“Then, are you the only survivors left at the scene? Is there anyone else?”

The villager turned his head and looked at the surrounding villagers, then nodded and said,

“They’re all here, but little Thomas didn’t see the scarecrow kill anyone…”

“That’s not important,” the male commissioner said with a smile.

Then, the female commissioner, who had somehow circled to the back of the crowd, took out a small ball from her chest and smashed it hard on the ground.

Bang!

After the small ball hit the ground, it made a soft sound and shot out a burst of white light.

Then, the villagers’ eyes turned white, and then they showed a confused expression.

The female commissioner said softly,

“This morning, a psycho killer came and used a chainsaw to kill a lot of people in the village.”

The villagers were still confused, but they muttered,

“Psycho… Killer… Chainsaw…”

Then, the Female Commissioner said again,

“The few of you escaped relatively quickly and were not killed. After the psycho killer killed people, he escaped.”

“We… escaped quickly… The psycho killer escaped…”

The two commissioners looked at each other and nodded.

Then, they drove away from the scene.

“We have to report this to the Mage Association now. The birth of a strange existence which is giving us a headache has happened.”

Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation  Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

Durham.

The Mage Association.

The pot-bellied Mediterranean was sitting comfortably on a leather chair, smoking a cigar.

Then, there was a knock on the door.

The sexy female secretary brought a document over and handed it to the Mediterranean.

“Mr. Casey, the investigation team has sent over a document. Please, have a look.”

The Mediterranean named Casey reached out with his left hand to take the document, his right hand not forgetting to pinch the secretary’s buttocks.

Judging from the female secretary’s unperturbed reaction, this was probably a common occurrence.

After tearing open the sealed envelope, Casey Cedria muttered disdainfully, “Are these swindlers still insisting on submitting the report in such an old-fashioned way?

“What a bunch of country bumpkins!”

In an attempt to curry favor, the female secretary said promptly, “That’s right. Sooner or later, these people will be abandoned by the times. I don’t know why the higher-ups value them so much.”

Sealing envelopes with lacquer was a common method of information transmission for mages.

This kind of lacquer contained a special magic. If someone other than the intended recipient opened the envelope, the words in the letter would immediately disappear.

However, in Casey’s eyes, this was a very old-fashioned behavior.

What era were they living in now?

The digital era!

As a noble leader, he believed that ‘people who work hard’ should follow their own norms and use email.

Although he didn’t understand magic at all, he was a government official. Hence, he was able to sit in this position.

At the same time, because of his experience in the government sector, he understood the importance of superficial work.

Therefore, although he was dissatisfied, he still opened the envelope.

After all, it was his job to check the reports of his subordinates and give an answer.

However, the moment he took a look, Casey frowned in dissatisfaction. The flesh on his fat face was almost squished together.

“What’s ‘Casey’?

“Don’t they know what respect is?

“They should refer to me as ‘the beloved Lord Casey Cedria’!” Casey muttered in dissatisfaction. Then, he casually glanced at the contents of the letter at a speed of ten lines per glance.

“Strangeness of a new birth? They need to pay attention to that? What a joke!

“These guys will never understand the difficulties of our leader.

“How can they spend so much resources just for the strangeness of a new birth?

“The only thing these pedantic worms know how to do is ask us for this and that!

“Do they think I don’t know anything about the occult? Strange new births are very weak!”

With a face full of disdain, Casey wrote his reply on the envelope as if he was taking revenge.

‘Rejected!’

He didn’t even include a reason.

As the honorable high-ranking member of the Mage Association, Lord Casey Cedria, was he required to give a reason to these ‘people who work for him’?

Casey casually stuffed the letter back into the envelope and handed it to the secretary.

The secretary asked carefully, “Does this letter need to be sent back the same way?”

Casey waved his hand and sneered, “No need. Just leave it at the headquarters. They’ll see it when they return.

“You must know that postage is very expensive!

“We can’t waste the country’s money on such a trivial matter.”

After saying that, Casey put out the cigar in his hand before taking out another cigar from the beautifully decorated cigar box.

…

Six hours later, the Commissioner who was waiting for news at Nord branch received a call.

“What? Rejected?!

“Doesn’t that bastard Casey know how serious this matter is?

“Lei hasn’t returned yet?

“Alright, I got it.”

The female commissioner beside him frowned and asked, “Is that damn fatty making things difficult for us again?”

The male commissioner nodded. His face was dark.

This was not the first time such a thing has happened.

As long as Lei was not around, Casey would make things difficult for their investigation team without any bottom line.

However, there was nothing they could do about it.

Other than Lei, no one dared to go against Casey.

“Lucius, what should we do now?” the female commissioner asked with a worried expression.

She and Lucius were not the kinds who were good at fighting. If they did not have the support, they might not be able to deal with this strange scarecrow.

Moreover, the strange scarecrow even seemed to have the ability to create illusions.

This increased the difficulty of the mission to a whole other level.

Lucius gave her a bitter smile and patted her shoulder.

“Don’t worry, Teach. My brother says he’ll handle it.”

Teach was slightly surprised when he heard that. She looked around. After confirming that there was no one around, she lowered her voice and said, “Is Lucas crazy? He’ll be punished if he increases the number of personnel without permission!”

When he heard Teach’s words, the wry smile on Lucius’s face became even wider.

“Yeah, that’s why he told us not to participate in this matter.”

“This…” Teach was momentarily speechless.

Indeed. If Lucius and Teach did not participate in this matter, it would not be considered as an increase in personnel.

Moreover, Lucas and his brother were on the same level.

Doing so was still completely in line with the rules.

However, Teach was still a little worried.

“Will Lucas be alone? He won’t be able to deal with the illusion…”

At this moment, Lucius’s expression softened a little. He smiled and said, “Why would I let Lucas go alone?

“Don’t worry, Kai’s with him.”

Upon hearing his name, Teach’s expression instantly became much calmer.

If Kai was tagging along, this mission would be foolproof.

After all, he was Kai.

…

In an abandoned farm in the suburbs.

Flanders was hiding in his house, looking at the skill learning interface.

He had harvested a lot in that small village, bringing Flanders a huge profit.

More than 10,000 fear points!

What was the concept of more than 10,000 fear points?

It only required 100 fear points to learn each of the level 1 skills.

On the other hand, 1,000 fear points were required to learn the level 2 skills.

After all three skills were upgraded to level 2, a new skill was unlocked in the skill learning interface.

[Five Bone: requires 500 fear points.]

After learning this skill, it can be used against surrounding enemies to constantly absorb their stamina.

[Crow Storm: requires 500 fear points.]

After learning this skill, he would have the ability to conjure crows from his body that would continuously attack the enemies around him.

[Disguise: requires 500 fear points.]

After learning this skill, his ability to disguise himself would increase, greatly reducing the vigilance of the people around him. Scaring enemies while in disguise would obtain him even more fear points.

Without any hesitation, Flanders immediately learned the three skills.

However, after seeing the requirements to upgrade these skills, Flanders frowned slightly.

To upgrade these three skills to level 2, it would require 3,000 fear points!

Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation  Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

At this moment, Flanders had just about 10,000 fear points left.

If all three skills were upgraded to level 2, then Flanders’s fear points would instantly hit rock bottom.

As for the first three skills, it only required 2,000 fear points to upgrade each of them to level 3.

This gap was obviously a little big.

However, Flanders did not waste too much time on this matter.

He quickly made a decision.

He raised Five Bones, Crow Storm, and Disguise to level 2!

The more expensive the cost, the stronger the power.

Such a simple principle. Flanders understood it well.

Since it required 3,000 fear points, it must be worth it.

At this moment, Flanders looked at his own data.

[Host: Flanders.]

[Bloodline: strange physical system — Scarecrow.]

[Strength: F+.]

[Skills: Fear, Demonic God’s Body, Night Cut, Five Bones, Crow Storm, Disguise.]

[Items: none.]

[Fear points: 800.]

There were a lot of skills, and they were all quite practical.

Although he only had 800 fear points left, Flanders was not the slightest bit depressed.

That was because his strength had gone from being undetectable to F+.

If he went up another level, he would reach E-.

This was not to be mistaken as a small increase since the difference between E and F was very big.

After checking his own data, Flanders had a clear target.

What he needed to do now was to harvest more fear points to increase his strength.

In such a world, it was difficult to survive without strength.

While he was thinking, the sound of an engine was heard coming from outside the house.

It seemed that someone had driven over.

Flanders immediately activated his Disguise skill and stood still.

At that moment, Flanders looked no different from an ordinary scarecrow.

“Dear, how did you find this place?”

A shrill female voice was heard coming from the door.

Then, another man’s voice rang, “How is it? This place isn’t bad, right? I spent a lot of effort finding this place. No one has come for it yet.”

The next moment, a grinding sound was heard.

The rusty iron door was being pushed open, allowing the sunlight to shine into the abandoned house.

Flanders remained motionless as he looked at the two people standing by the door.

They seemed to be a couple.

As for what they wanted to do here, it was still unknown.

At this time, Flanders was already contemplating if he should try out his new skills on these two people.

It was important to familiarize himself with the new skills.

However, Flanders gave up on this idea at the next moment.

The man took out a camera from his bag and placed it on a haystack while adjusting the camera’s angle.

It seemed that the two of them wanted to record a video here.

The man fiddled with the camera in his hand as he bragged to the woman, “How is it? Isn’t this location perfect for our script?

“As long as we shoot here, our video will definitely appear on YouTube’s homepage.

“When that time comes, we’ll be famous!”

There was a slight excitement in the man’s tone. The woman seemed to be affected by his emotions.

“If we can really get on the homepage, we’ll be rich. I heard that once we’re on the homepage, we’ll earn a lot of money just from the number of clicks!”

1

At this moment, the man was done adjusting the camera. He turned around and looked at the woman with an expression that suggested he knew what he was talking about.

“A little bit of money from the number of clicks? If we get popular, we might even get an advertisement. The advertisement fee will bring us a lot of income.”

After hearing the man’s words, the woman immediately had an eager expression.

In the heat of the moment, they immediately hugged each other, closed their eyes, and kissed.

As for Flanders, he took this opportunity to shift his position to stand within the camera’s field of vision.

…

After kissing for a while, they reluctantly parted.

Then, the woman looked at Flanders and was slightly stunned.

“Dear, was this scarecrow standing here earlier?”

The man turned around and said with some uncertainty, “It seems like it.

“But it’s strange. I didn’t see a scarecrow when I came here a few days ago.”

The woman’s expression and tone became serious.

“This scarecrow… Could it be a ghost?”

When Flanders heard this, his heart skipped a beat.

These two people actually managed to guess he was not an ordinary scarecrow so easily?

This Disguise skill was completely useless!

However, the man and woman burst out laughing at the same time in the next second.

“Baby, you’re too funny.”

“Hahaha, I was just joking. How can there be ghosts in this world?”

“Of course, you can say that now. You won’t be able to say the same once we start filming.”

“Don’t worry.”

Then, the two of them walked out and started moving some props from the car into the house.

The props were not complicated.

A table, a chair, a mirror, and a rope.

And a very simple ‘ghost’.

It was just a white sheet wrapped around a ball to form its head.

The sheet was tied up with a rope.

It looked like a sunny doll.

After the man tied the ‘ghost’ up, he threw the other end of the rope over the beam.

Then, he found an angle that was out of the camera’s field of vision. After he straightened the rope, he hung the ‘ghost’ on the beam.

They then moved the table in front of the haystack where the camera had just been set up and placed the mirror on the table.

Following that, they placed the chair in front of the table.

After adjusting the ghost and making sure the mirror could be seen, the man picked up the camera and ran to where Flanders was positioned.

From this angle, they could capture the scene from the mirror while still concealing the location of the camera.

Once everything was ready, the man hit the record button.

The woman approached the table slowly and sat down. Then, she turned to look at the mirror.

“Charlie, Charlie, are you there?

“Charlie, Charlie, are you there?

“Charlie, Charlie, are you there?”

Then, the woman put on a nervous expression and looked at the mirror seriously.

The man, who was out of range from the camera’s lens, slowly loosened the rope.

The ‘ghost’ that was hanging on the beam slowly descended under the man’s control.

Soon, the sight of the ‘ghost’ descending appeared in the mirror.

The woman opened her mouth in an exaggerated look, revealing an awkward expression of fear. She screamed and pushed the chair away before running out.

Just as Flanders was filled with doubt, the man controlling the ‘ghost’ turned off the recording function and said with satisfaction, “Perfect!”

This time, Flanders was completely shocked.

He wanted to get onto YouTube’s homepage with that?

Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation  Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

After hearing the man’s words, the woman returned to the house and said excitedly, “Darling, how was my performance?”

“It was simply amazing!”

The two of them lost themselves in each other’s embrace and kissed again.

Meanwhile, Flanders, who was still standing there by the side, felt that his intelligence had been insulted.

The acting in this scene was simply too clumsy.

Not to mention, the woman’s expression was way too exaggerated.

The most maddening part was when the ‘ghost’ was descending into the frame. The rope it was suspended from was exposed in the mirror!

It was completely exposed!

However, these two people didn’t seem to care about these details at all.

With one look, it was obvious that these two laymen who were dreaming of overnight success were just entertaining themselves.

After their kiss, they both excitedly came to Flanders’s side and picked up the camera to watch the video.

Meanwhile, Flanders was observing the both of them.

He wanted to know how strong his Disguise was.

The video was just as he thought.

A complete pile of dog sh*t.

To these two, however, it was considered ‘perfect work’.

The video had already played to the end. Looking at the two of them who were still excited, Flanders heaved a sigh of relief.

It seemed that the plan had succeeded.

The exaggerated acting skills and the exposed rope were completely ignored by the two of them.

More importantly, Flanders, who suddenly appeared to be grinning in the last scene, was also ignored by the two of them.

That’s right.

After the woman ran out screaming, Flanders revealed a creepy smile in the mirror.

Naturally, it was all part of his plan.

On one hand, he wanted to test the effect of his Disguise skill.

It seemed that the effect was pretty good.

The two of them did not notice him at all. Although it could be because they were in a state of excitement, it was still fine as long as they did not notice him.

If they did, Flanders would just have to kill them on the spot and gain some fear points.

Since they did not notice him, there was no need to kill them.

Flanders intended to let them go to let them post the video online.

Once the video was successfully posted, many timid people would be scared by Flanders’s last smile.

This would gain him a lot of fear points.

Watching the two of them leave excitedly, Flanders became a little excited as well.

If this video could really make it to the home page, how many fear points would he receive?

After all, the number of hits a video on the YouTube homepage could get was terrifying.

There were often millions of hits!

Even if only one-tenth of the viewers were frightened, it would still be a big number.

1

Since there would be a big influx of fear points coming in, Flanders was not in a hurry to leave.

He would remain on this abandoned farm for a few more days and leave once his strength increased.

…

In the evening, a bearded man in Manchester City had just got off work and was dragging his exhausted body home.

The sound of running water came from the bathroom.

It was the bearded man pouring hot water into the bathtub.

He was sitting in front of his computer, logging into YouTube.

As soon as he opened the web page, a video on the homepage caught his attention.

[Shocking, Charlie’s game is real!]

The bearded man had heard of Charlie’s game before.

It was a very old game.

It was said that in the middle of the night, one could summon a ghost named Charlie by holding a pen in hand while saying, ‘Charlie, are you there?’ to the mirror three times.

Then, the Summoner could ask Charlie some questions.

As each question was asked, the pen on the table would be moved by an invisible force.

Of course, a piece of white paper had to be placed on the table, and on the paper, two ‘Yes’s’ and two ‘No’s’ had to be written in its four corners.

Although the theory behind Charlie’s game had long been explained scientifically, the bearded man, driven by curiosity, clicked on the video nonetheless.

He wanted to know how the video was going to prove the authenticity of Charlie’s game.

However, after clicking on the video and watching it for a few seconds, he regretted it.

“What the f*ck is this?”

The bearded man stared at the screen in front of him with a look of disdain.

The woman’s acting was way too exaggerated, which made people want to ridicule her.

What was even more ridiculous was that when the crude ‘ghost’ descended from behind her, the rope attached to the ‘ghost’ was exposed.

Anyone who was not an idiot could tell that someone was definitely using the rope to control the ghost’s rise and fall.

The thing he could not accept the most was that the guy who made the video had made a mistake in Charlie’s game.

There was no paper or pen on the table.

Also, it was not midnight.

The video continued as the woman let out an exaggerated cry and ran out of the room.

By now, the bearded man was in a terrible mood.

He felt that this video had wasted a minute of his life.

Just as he was about to turn off the video, the screen was filled with a barrage of comments.

[High energy ahead. Cowards, please, retreat!]

After hesitating for a moment, the bearded man decided to continue watching the video further.

After all, this video was on the front page. It was definitely not that simple.

The barrage of comments that filled the screen already hinted in that direction.

Just as the bearded man was attentively watching the video, trying to find some clues in advance, the scarecrow in the mirror who had been in the background of the video suddenly grinned.

That smile was incredibly eerie and terrifying. It was even a little distorted, causing one to shudder.

When the bearded man saw this scene, his entire body trembled. He was so frightened that he threw a hard punch and smashed the screen.

In an instant, the screen was smashed into pieces by the bearded man’s punch.

1

A moment later, the bearded man, who was gasping for breath, finally reacted. He held his head with both hands and cried out in pain, “F*ck! F*ck! What did I do?!

“I actually smashed my newly bought monitor!

2

“F*ck! F*ck! F*ck!”

The bearded man wailed in pain a few more times before his emotions calmed down slightly.

In the next moment, he took out his phone.

He logged onto YouTube again.

He had to take another look to confirm if his eyes were playing tricks on him.

However, even though he was mentally prepared this time, the bearded man’s hands still trembled when he saw the scarecrow grinning.

His newly bought iPhone fell to the ground.

Unsurprisingly, the screen shattered as well.

1

…

At that time, the same story was unfolding all over the world.

Countless phones and screens had been wiped out that night.

Many people angrily complained about this video in the comments section, saying it made them spend a large sum of money as they had to repair their phones or replace their broken screens.

However, the comment with the highest number of likes in the comments section was not a complaint.

[Can anyone explain how this video effect is done?

[This is too f*cking awesome!]