She had half of Nan Yue's braid in her mouth, chewing on it with a sickening crunch.
Even from that distance, Nan Yue could feel Grandmother's malice, as her obsession with protecting her granddaughter had twisted into something foul.
After death, that malice had turned into a desire to kill her granddaughter. If not for the massive fire below that would harm her, Grandmother would have lunged down long ago.
Nan Yue backed away, knowing the entire house would be engulfed in flames in dozens of seconds, but she had to survive until then.
Her foot landed on something. Looking down, she saw the mop by the sink was already ablaze.
In that moment of distraction, Grandmother lunged, crawling rapidly toward Nan Yue despite the heat.
Humans experience the uncanny valley effect when faced with something that looks almost human but isn't, and Nan Yue was no exception.
Grandmother's speed was terrifying, and the heavy stench of burning flesh filled the air.
The fire didn't harm the living, but it was hostile toward the paper house and the dead woman.
As the fire prepared to swallow the house, Grandmother was already upon her.
Her face had melted away, leaving yellow and white pus hanging where her features used to be.
Her gaping, pitch-black mouth released a wave of rot, and Nan Yue reacted by thrusting the burning mop deep into her open mouth.
The flames traveled down the mop and into Grandmother's mouth, eliciting a shriek so piercing Nan Yue thought her eardrums would burst.
Despite the pain, she didn't let go, gritting her teeth and shoving the mop further in.
She felt warm liquid trickling from her ears and her chest throbbed with a dull ache. Just as she thought she might die there, the scenery shifted, and she found herself back in the high-tech room where she had started.
Nan Yue let out a long sigh of relief and slumped to the floor.
This was the evaluation space, the mandatory hub for data statistics and information entry when entering or leaving a Scavenger Project.
She looked at the screen; her information had indeed been updated.
"Nan Yue, ID FCY091452, Resident of Nameless City. Project: Qualification Exam. Result: Pass."
"Evaluating scavenger rank based on the cleanup process. Please wait..."
"Evaluation grade: A"
"Evaluation rewards: 300 personal points, ID card for the digital city state."
"Congratulations, FCY091452. You are now officially a glorious scavenger. We hope you will continue your efforts and devote your everything to the Scavenger Project."
"We look forward to your brilliant performance."
The mechanical voice was female, sounding gentle yet firm, naturally evoking a sense of goodwill.
Nan Yue stood up, shoulders back as she accepted the results, and whispered a small "thank you."
When leaving the evaluation space, one could choose to return to the project hall or to the school. After a moment of hesitation, Nan Yue chose the project hall.
By the time she realized it, she was back in reality. The noisy chatter outside reminded her she was no longer in the project.
Nan Yue realized she wasn't in the main hall from before, but in some kind of rest area in the back.
There were two or three other people in the rest area. Nan Yue recognized one of them, a cute girl who had been a few spots ahead of her in line.
The cute girl was now sitting in a chair, weeping miserably.
The two boys nearby looked dazed, clearly still reeling from the shock of the project.
Nan Yue didn't see the boy who had entered before her. She didn't think he had finished and left; she suspected he hadn't made it out at all.
This was a normal occurrence, one they would see often in the future.
Although their teachers had always taught them this, the reality of it still left Nan Yue with a sense of desolation.
She pulled a pack of tissues from her pocket, walked over to the girl, and handed them to her.
The girl looked up, let out a sob, and hugged Nan Yue to release her emotions.
"The teacher didn't say it would be this hard! It's way harder than the school's mock exams. I almost died!"
"I was so badly injured... it hurt so much... I thought I wouldn't make it. I don't even know how I passed."
"What am I going to do for the next mission? Waaaah!"
The two boys were moved by her words and began to wipe their eyes.
Even Nan Yue, who was usually solitary and detached, felt a wave of shared emotion.
The school had warned them that real missions were a matter of life and death, and that they must be prepared to sacrifice themselves.
They were also told that while injuries felt real and could kill, they would vanish upon successfully passing the mission.
Even if someone were on their last breath, they would be perfectly fine once the task was complete.
This was why many didn't fear the missions as much as they should have.
But now they knew it wasn't that simple.
At the thought of doing missions for the rest of their lives, working as a scavenger until death, no one could muster any spirit.
"Don't cry."
Nan Yue's voice was soft. She wasn't good at communicating, but the shared experience prompted her to offer comfort.
"Everyone goes through it. If you do well on missions, you can trade points for many things. The teachers said that once you have enough points for items and abilities, it becomes hard to die."
To her surprise, her words only made the girl cry harder.
"That's why I'm crying! I worked so hard to get out, and they only gave me 50 points! Waaaah!"
Nan Yue was startled. The school hadn't taught them about point conversions, as different city states had their own systems.
Most teachers in the Nameless City were just part-time scavengers looking for extra money to live a better life.
She had assumed the points for the Qualification Exam were standard, but the gap between her and the girl was massive.
As the others began to grumble about how stingy the Scavenger Project was, Nan Yue listened.
She didn't say much, but she gathered that their grades were all C or lower, with none of them receiving more than 100 points.
It seemed the evaluation grade was directly linked to the rewards.
"I'm heading back to school."
Nan Yue stood up and said goodbye. Although she didn't know them, they were certainly from the same school and would likely cross paths again.
"What's your ID number? Can we be friends? I heard we can form teams for missions later."
The girl seemed to have a good impression of Nan Yue, perhaps because of the tissue.
"I was just being emotional. It's not that scary. If we do a few more missions, we'll eventually get the ID cards for the digital city state and live the life we read about in books."
Rate on N.U.
