lerbook Chapter 711 It's Too Late
Chapter 711 It's Too Late
Wu Wang's footsteps gradually faded into the corridor.
Zhou Ping slumped to the ground, looking at the ashes scattered all over the ground in front of him. He reached out and gathered them together, holding them in his palm and pressing them against his chest.
"Sorry……"
He has said this too many times.
Perhaps it was for his wife, perhaps for himself, or perhaps for this house that held so much regret.
Not important anymore.
He slowly stood up, picked up the fruit knife from the coffee table, went to the kitchen to wash off the bloodstains, and also used the cold water to wash away the ashes and tears from his face.
The reflection in the mirror showed a haggard appearance, a stark contrast to the hopeful look she had when she first entered the factory.
He looked down at his bracelet, which was flashing a red warning notification.
He became an inefficient asset manager at some point.
But at this moment, he was no longer afraid of being disposed of by the factory.
He believed Wu was dead.
He will live to witness the factory's destruction.
He will leave this godforsaken place.
Because someone wanted her to live, even though that person is no longer here, she still lives on in her heart.
This feeling will never fade...
After leaving, Wu Wang did not find a suitable place to hide in the ventilation duct, but instead slowly moved closer upstairs.
Finally, he stopped just one floor away from the talent incubation center.
"Okay, I've arrived at my stop."
Looking at the deserted staff quarters ahead, he said to Xiao Qiu, "After I move in, you can go wherever you want to have fun, just come back before the big purge."
Xiao Qiu echoed this sentiment.
These 48 floors are truly the top-floor employee residences, since above that, there's only the talent incubation center and that wishing well, whose existence is uncertain.
The theme here is—elites.
The entire floor exudes a minimalist aesthetic, devoid of any sense of everyday life, focusing solely on efficiency and practicality compressed to the extreme.
However, Wu Wang stood in the corridor without seeming worried about being discovered by anyone.
He simply walked silently to the door of one of the rooms and tapped his bracelet.
The door opened the next second.
That's right, the door opened automatically, as if Wu Wang were the owner of the room.
This is also how he deduced that on the first day the hawk entered the instance, when he was doing a task in Zhou Ping's room, the other party hid in the next room to spy on him.
It's actually very simple—just buy a one-time key from the Wish Shop.
Don't think of this as trespassing or as if you're going in to do something.
If you simply want to "enter this room," the store will give you a one-time key.
After all, this is a factory of desires.
Everything is geared towards fulfilling desires. Employees have absolutely no privacy whatsoever. Even if someone else is living in the room, as long as you pay enough wish points, you can still open their door.
Moreover, Wu Wang was certain that there was no one inside.
When he stepped into the room, he was met with an extremely cold chill, as if this were not staff quarters but an ice cellar.
He looked at the cabinets embedded in the wall inside and couldn't help but let out a cold laugh.
"Meow!"
[Boss! It's so cold! Is this even a place where people can live?]
Xiao Qiu huddled up on Wu Wang's head, trembling.
In response, Wu Wang explained calmly, "Of course it's a place where people live, just not living people."
After saying that, he suddenly pulled open one of the cabinets.
What came into view was an extremely stiff corpse, its eyes vacant and its expression blank, clearly indicating that it had undergone a process of having its memories and emotions extracted.
Xiao Qiu was so frightened by this bizarre scene that his hair stood on end, fearing that the thing in front of him might suddenly rise from the dead and jump up.
Wu Wang casually pushed the other person back and said, "I had my suspicions upstairs before. Since extracting memories and emotions takes time, modifying the body also takes time. Can that floor really handle the workload?"
"If we're too busy, for example, if an employee has been completely exploited, but the renovation room is still full, where should we put the other person?"
"We can't just have people waiting in line at the main entrance, can we? They'd die and become corpses very quickly in that state. If there were too many of them, wouldn't the entire talent incubation center reek of corpses?"
At this point, Wu Wang's gaze swept over the freezers.
He raised his hand to touch the piercing sensation and continued, "The factory must have a place to store surplus corpses. It can't bear to destroy these bodies, after all, they can be used as raw materials to make products in the future."
"This place can't be too far from the talent incubation center, otherwise it would be bad if the Smilers were to be spotted while being transported by elevator."
"Therefore, it can only be the employee residences right below this talent incubation center."
"It seems that the high price of Wish Points makes it impossible for any employees to live here, but in reality, they just don't know the conditions for living here—all they have to do is die and be drained dry."
That's absolutely ridiculous.
The employees below always felt that this seemingly unattainable top-tier residence was meant to motivate them; they believed that as long as they worked hard, one day they would be able to trample everyone under their feet.
Little did they know, this seemingly glorious temple was actually their morgue.
Wu then pulled out one freezer after another to check, and soon found an empty spot.
He skillfully climbed onto the freezer, then lay down and said to Xiao Qiu, "Okay, push me in now, goodnight."
Tie Jian, Lao Fan, and others are now taking rapid action, and the number of people with inefficient assets is increasing rapidly.
Although the number of people is unlikely to surge rapidly and spread virally during the daytime when people are crowding into elevators or taking lunch breaks, there is still a risk that the factory will notice something amiss.
He now needs to hide himself as quickly as possible to become fuel for [White]'s burning computing power.
Wu Wang planned to hide in this morgue.
The most dangerous place is the safest place. The factory could never have imagined that the mastermind it was so painstakingly searching for was hiding in a place it didn't care about at all.
Because the temperature here is simply not suitable for human survival.
Xiaoqiu stood up, used its paws to brace against the freezer, and forcefully pushed it inside.
Upon hearing a loud crash, Wu Wang became roommates with the group of corpses.
His teasing voice also came from inside the freezer:
"Wow, the spaces inside are all connected. I thought it was a single supreme coffin, but it turns out to be a large dormitory."
"Hey buddy over there, could you please lie down a bit? I don't want you to melt when I start burning it."
Then there was a rustling sound coming from inside, which seemed to be Wu Wang helping his roommate adjust his sleeping position.
Xiao Qiu rolled her eyes and walked towards the door, closing it behind her.
Now he's going to wander around. The whole building is his cat tree; he can go wherever he wants!
As the cheerful jumping sounds outside faded into the distance, Wu Wang gradually calmed down.
Then his body began to wither in a strange way, as if his life force was rapidly dissipating, with only the faint light of the Desire Bracelet on his wrist gradually increasing.
He started to burn.
After the fire had been burning for an unknown amount of time, Turtle, in a conference room outside, finally put down his pen.
He stretched his aching fingers a little and pushed the thick stack of questionnaires in front of Zhang Mingyuan.
Staring at the other person's smile, he said coldly, "Now that you've finished writing, can we leave?"
"The questionnaire has been successfully completed." Zhang Mingyuan announced with a smile: "Thank you for your cooperation. Please leave in an orderly manner."
This was the longest he had ever helped delay things.
If he continues to make excuses to stall the other party, even if Dai Mao and the others don't complain, the factory will notice Zhang Mingyuan's unusual behavior.
Watching the players and the departing doctor hurriedly leave the meeting room, Zhang Mingyuan silently collected the questionnaires, hoping that his little bit of help could play a role in Wu Wang's plan.
At this moment, Daimao and the others were absolutely furious.
The departing doctor quickly contacted his sales colleagues to inquire about the whereabouts of Tie Jian and the others.
Not long after, clear news arrived that Tie Jian was resting in the tea room on the seventeenth floor, Lao Fan was encouraging other employees on the twentieth floor, and Wen Xiaolou was...
Without any hesitation, they rushed over and blocked all of these people, trying to figure out a way to take them away from under the Smiling One's nose.
To everyone's surprise and even confusion, they did not resist.
There was no need for the players to come up with a solution. When Tie Jian and the others realized they were surrounded, they all had a strange expression on their faces that said, "You've finally come," and then they obediently followed along.
After those dozen or twenty employees were taken to their residences.
Before the hawksbill turtle could even ask them anything, Tie Jian stepped forward first.
Then, using extremely clear and logical rhetoric, he recounted everything Wu Wang planned to do, without even finding a single flaw.
This bizarre situation left the players somewhat dumbfounded.
The hawksbill turtle seemed to realize something, and her expression gradually turned ugly. She gritted her teeth and asked, "He told you to say that, didn't he?"
Upon hearing this, the others realized something and a sense of foreboding arose in their hearts.
If it really was Wu Wang's instruction, then it proves that the other side is one step ahead of them again. That bastard already guessed when they would come to arrest the employees!
Tie Jian didn't hide anything and grinned, "Of course, you're already too late."
That's right. Before they made their choices and left the fourth floor, Wu Wang also said that if anyone came to arrest them, as long as they weren't the Smilers, they should just answer whatever they were asked and there was no need to hide anything.
The hawksbill turtle's breathing faltered.
With a dark expression, he asked, "How many people have you contacted... or rather, how many people have you infected?"
At this moment, even Wen Xiaolou, facing the players, stood tall and said neither humbly nor arrogantly, "There are at least a hundred on each floor!"
The office area has a total of twenty-three floors.
If there are 100 people on each floor, that's a reach of over 2,000 people!
Now they finally understood what it meant to be too late.
Zhang Mingyuan has stalled them for a long time, and now it's past midnight, and most of the employees are resting.
Whether it's the repeated contact that occurs when these people squeeze into the elevator to return to their residences to rest, or when they go to work or to the cafeteria after waking up, the transmission could be spread through these means.
The number of people who have been infected is already sufficient.
They can't possibly stop thousands of people, can they?
"That bastard... he wants to tie everyone in the building together as a bargaining chip." Turtle said with a dark face, "If the factory gives in, everyone lives; but if the factory has a backup plan and doesn't give in, everyone dies!"
Tie Jian then extended his hand towards the hawksbill turtle and sneered, "So, together?"
Upon hearing his invitation, all the surrounding players instinctively took a step back, afraid of being accidentally touched by this guy.
After all, the employees had followed along voluntarily, and there was no forced escort process; they had not been touched yet.
In addition, since Zhang Mingyuan had been dragging me to do the questionnaire, it hadn't been spread by other employees.
They didn't want to be kidnapped like this.
The tall man said with some delight, "As long as we don't get infected, the factory won't be cleaned up if it has a backup plan. It doesn't matter if it chooses to give up the big cleanup if it doesn't have a backup plan. At least our value will far exceed that of all the employees infected with the waste virus. We can also stand out and be quickly promoted. It will also help with taking over the factory, right?"
His words elicited silent nods of agreement from the other players.
That makes some sense...
Since Wu Wang has gone to such extremes, why don't we sit back and reap the benefits?
Anyway, the number of people spreading the word isn't much less than theirs.
In this way, no matter how the factory reacts, they will definitely be the beneficiaries, without having to bear any risk.
However, Qingning suddenly said, "If all the factory employees are infected, and we are the only ones who haven't been infected by the waste virus, wouldn't that be considered a form of screening? What if the factory uses that to deal with us?"
The room fell silent upon hearing this.
Oh no... now that you mention it, it's true.
If the waste virus can truly spread silently throughout the entire building, it is enough to prove its stealth. Those who haven't been infected must be people who know inside information.
They know the inside story but don't report it.
If the factory doesn't arrest you, who will they arrest?
What the hawksbill turtle just said is indeed correct.
This guy is trying to tie up all the employees in the building, which naturally includes all the players.
Should we choose to stand with our employees through thick and thin?
Or should we gamble that the factory will allow the remaining members to rise to prominence?
Both options carry risks.
Everyone's eyes turned to the hawksbill turtle.
She was frowning as she pondered a question.
Is this really the only way Wu Wang can save all his employees?
If he had other options, yet still chose this most extreme and insane path, it can only prove one thing—he didn't just want to save people.
This behavior must have some other meaning.
"What a bastard, forcing everyone to make a choice, huh?" She sighed after a moment's thought.
He then addressed the players, saying, "I won't offer advice on this kind of issue. The choice you make is entirely up to you. After all, I can't force you to gamble your lives together."
"Sorry everyone, we've lost this round."
After saying that, she turned around and patted Tie Jian's hand.
The crisp sound signified that she had chosen the path Wu Wang had given her, and it also represented a helpless fact—she had accepted her fate.
At this stage, she couldn't outmaneuver that guy in the backstabbing phase; she'd have to let him lead her by the nose first.
Will there be a chance for them to turn things around?
Hopefully... (End of Chapter)