As the merfolk closed in and Bai Liu seemed moments away from being bitten, the audience’s anxiety exploded. One after another, they transformed into furious backseat gamers, screaming at the small television.
“Wake up! Get up and fight the monsters!”
“Can’t you sleep after you clear the stage?! Are you really missing that one hour of sleep that badly?! Didn’t your mother ever teach you not to AFK in the middle of a game?!”
“I’ve watched game footage for years, but I’ve seriously never seen someone throw this hard. He could obviously win, but he’s practically handing them the kill!”
Amid the uproar, Bai Liu inside the television finally seemed to wake from the noise. His eyes opened sluggishly, half-asleep and unfocused.
He looked toward the fishermen slicing through the waves toward him, their grotesque fish heads bobbing above the sea, mouths stretched wide as they swam for the boat.
Beneath the water, their legs had already fused into eel-like tails that twisted and lashed like serpents, propelling them rapidly toward Bai Liu’s drifting skiff.
Not far away floated what remained of Andre’s boat.
Only a bloodstained skeleton was left behind, scattered with scraps of shredded flesh. The lower half of Andre’s bones had already begun mutating into something vaguely piscine, while strips of torn fabric from his clothes fluttered weakly against the side of the boat, drifting across the dark sea.
It was more than enough to show just how savage these merfolk were.
Yet in the middle of such a life-or-death moment, Bai Liu merely moved sluggishly, dipping the quilt repeatedly into the seawater before dragging it over the boat like a cover. Then he curled beneath it, shrinking into himself as though trying to hide.
This cowardly “turtle-shell” maneuver immediately triggered another wave of furious outrage from the audience.
But even this simple action seemed painfully difficult for him.
Every movement Bai Liu made was slow and stiff, as though his body were gradually freezing solid.
Vein-like marble patterns spread across his pale fingers.
He had already entered the same condition Lucy had displayed earlier—his body temperature dropping drastically, his limbs and mind growing numb, as though he were slowly turning into stone itself. The uncontrollable trembling running through him came from the cold.
Bai Liu glanced at the items in his inventory panel—the barrels of alcohol—and issued a command.
[Withdraw one barrel of alcohol.]
[System Notification: Withdrawal successful.]
A large barrel abruptly appeared on the tiny boat, its weight pressing the skiff dangerously lower into the sea. The audience became even more alarmed.
The monsters were practically on top of him already!
Bai Liu slowly pulled a box of matches from his pocket.
Wrapped in the soaked quilt, his hands trembled so violently that it took several attempts before he finally managed to strike a flame.
Even so, his expression remained perfectly calm.
After lighting the match, Bai Liu lifted one corner of the quilt and stood up. Stepping onto the barrel with difficulty, he began pouring the alcohol across the surface of the sea.
The viewers nearly went insane watching him.
“Pouring alcohol into the ocean?! Has his sanity dropped so low he’s completely lost it?!”
“It’s not that it can’t burn—high-proof alcohol can float and burn on water for a few minutes—but that amount is meaningless! And it won’t work against merfolk anyway! Those monsters aren’t afraid of fire!”
Bai Liu tossed the lit match onto the sea.
In an instant, flames erupted across the water.
Wrapped in the soaked quilt amidst the blazing heat, Bai Liu lowered his gaze toward the rapidly approaching merfolk. His eyes were calm—almost peaceful—as though he had been waiting for them to gather all along.
Upon the freezing black sea, a blazing bonfire suddenly bloomed.
The merfolk crowded around the skiff in dense clusters, circling greedily as their tails slapped against the water. Seated in the center of the inferno, Bai Liu remained motionless, the firelight and ocean reflected in his eyes.
The glow of the flames stained his pupils crimson-gold, making him seem less human than the monsters below the boat—as though he were some ancient Siren emerging from the abyss itself.
The alien beauty of his half-corrupted face carried an eerie, almost demonic allure.
The moment the starving merfolk surfaced, eager to feed, the flames engulfed them instantly.
A crackling hiss erupted across the sea—the unmistakable sound of flesh roasting over fire.
The merfolk shrieked sharply, flipping belly-up atop the waves as they thrashed in agony.
Soon, the scent of cooked fish began drifting through the air.
It was strangely fragrant.
The merfolk that had originally been charging toward Bai Liu abruptly changed direction, swarming instead toward the burning corpses of their own kind. The sounds of tearing flesh and crunching bones echoed around the tiny boat.
Blood and fish stench saturated the air.
Yet to Bai Liu, the smell transformed into something bizarrely delicious.
He slowly licked his lips.
Even then, his expression never changed.
Surrounded by merfolk devouring one another, Bai Liu simply sat there quietly. The flames and heat roasted the pallor from his alienated features, painting his skin with an almost healthy flush.
Then he looked toward Andre’s abandoned boat.
For some reason, he smiled.
It was the smile of someone receiving a reward they had long anticipated—quietly pleased, deeply satisfied.
The exact same expression currently worn by the merfolk feasting around him.
Except on Bai Liu’s face, it was infinitely more chilling.
In a low, hoarse voice, he murmured:
“Goodnight, Andre.”
[Side Quest — Boat of True Love: Player Bai Liu has won the wager against Andre. Quest completed. Reward: 100 points.]
[Side Quest — Jeff’s Bloody Conspiracy: Progress increased to 90%.]
[Main Quest — Participate in the Merfolk Fishing Festival: Completed. Reward: 50 points.]
[《Siren Town Monster Book》 Updated — Merfolk (4/4)]
[Monster Name: Merfolk (Larval Form)]
[Weaknesses: Fire, light. Physically fragile; relatively close to humans.]
[Attack Methods: Biting and scratching. Does not trigger alienation state. Low intelligence; incapable of using tools.]
[The Merfolk (Larval Form) entry has been fully unlocked in the Monster Book. We hope the player continues to work hard.]
A long cascade of reward notifications and achievement panels flooded the screen, leaving the audience outside the television completely dumbfounded.
After a very long silence, the viewer who had earlier accused Bai Liu of “throwing the game” finally choked out a stunned curse.
“...Holy shit.”
The words snapped everyone else back to reality.
The crowd instantly erupted.
“What the hell just happened?!”
“Throwing my ass! This guy literally won while lying down! This play is legendary!”
“Fuck, I’m actually speechless. I’m going to the forums right now to ask God Mu what happened!”
“Why didn’t the alcohol dissolve in the water?!”
“I found the alcohol he bought! Holy shit, do you know what I found buried in the twelve-page product manual?! It’s specially modified oil-based semi-solid alcohol—it’s permanently water-insoluble! I’m losing my mind. How did a rookie even find something this specific?!”
“Wait... did he actually read all the manuals?”
“God Mu replied to me! He said merfolk statues aren’t afraid of fire, and mature merfolk sailors aren’t afraid of fire either—but larval merfolk are. In other words, merfolk without amulets still fear flames!”
“And Bai Liu’s insanely clever. He must’ve figured out that cooked merfolk flesh has an irresistible attraction to other merfolk, so he deliberately roasted some of the larval ones. Once that happened, the monsters stopped targeting the player and started devouring the cooked meat instead...”
......
[2,300 players liked Bai Liu’s small television.]
[2,670 players bookmarked Bai Liu’s small television.]
[499 players tipped Bai Liu’s stream. Player Bai Liu received 499 points.]
[Player Bai Liu has received over 2,000 likes within one minute. Reputation increasing rapidly.]
[Congratulations, player Bai Liu. You have earned a promotion slot and entered the system recommendation rankings for the single-player game zone. Viewership rising rapidly...]
......
Bai Liu sat lazily on the boat with his chin propped against one hand, watching the merfolk tear each other apart.
The soaked quilt remained draped over him to protect him from the flames.
Whenever the merfolk finished devouring one another, Bai Liu would calmly pour out more alcohol and ignite the sea again.
To the merfolk, the allure of roasted flesh far surpassed the allure of Bai Liu himself.
And so /N_o_v_e_l_i_g_h_t/ the monsters ignored him entirely.
Bai Liu sat steadily in the middle of the blazing sea like the owner of some grotesque all-you-can-eat barbecue stand, continuously grilling merfolk for the monsters to feast upon.
As he worked, he silently calculated the cost in his head.
Four or five barrels of alcohol should be enough to last until dawn.
That only amounted to forty-five points—a mere fraction of the one hundred and forty points required to purchase two underwater bubbles.
And on top of that, he still had five full barrels left.
The reason Bai Liu had purchased the alcohol in the first place was because the curator of the Siren Wax Museum had once mentioned that merfolk could be cooked—including grilled over fire—and that people loved eating them that way.
If they could be barbecued, then high-temperature attacks were obviously effective.
And once cooked, merfolk flesh would naturally become highly attractive to other merfolk as well.
After all, just from watching Andre’s obsession with fish steaks, the answer had already been obvious.
Tonight, Andre had barely touched the raw fish.
But during breakfast that morning, he had devoured an enormous amount of grilled fish steak.
