That Dropped Chinese Novel’s Useless Me Says No to the System

（I'm on vacation, so updates may be a little delayed.）

It was only then that I noticed several large jars of wine had been placed along the riverbank, with several pairs of straw sandals neatly stacked beside them.

And, oddly enough, the sandals were all tied together.

My heart tightened at once.

There was no way this setup looked like an invitation to guests.

It looked much more like bait.

The footsteps drew closer.

The black dots on the hillside had now become several burly men, the sort who clearly spent their days carrying knives and swinging clubs.

I held my breath.

When they reached the riverbank, one of them frowned.

“Huh? What’s this?”

I nearly choked on the water.

Another man came closer. The moment he spotted the jars of wine by the bank, his eyes lit up.

“Hey! There’s wine here!”

Someone immediately became wary.

“Let’s go. It could be a trap!”

The men looked at one another.

They hesitated for two beats, then actually turned and started walking away.

I was almost moved to tears on the spot. I was just about to lift my head above the water—

when they suddenly turned around and came back.

Me:

“？？？”

Once again, I had no choice but to bury my face in the water, soaking my entire head like a frog floating on the surface.

After coming back, the men finally couldn't resist. The smell of wine had completely captured their attention.

“Just one drink, then we leave!”

“What’s the harm in having a little?”

“We're grown men. What are we afraid of?”

Hidden underwater, I sank a little lower and thought silently:

Exactly you grown men are what I'm afraid of.

The men forgot all about their caution.

They grabbed the wine jars and gulped down the contents greedily.

Glug, glug, glug.

Their Adam's apples visibly bobbed up and down as they drank.

Once the jars were empty and their faces and necks had turned bright red, they burst into laughter and grabbed the straw sandals, slipping them onto their feet.

Unfortunately, the sandals were tied together.

They could stand.

They just couldn't walk.

Every time one of them tried to take a step, he nearly fell over. They shoved and stumbled into one another until they became a tangled heap, looking like several idiots who had somehow been tied together like snakes.

I rolled my eyes underwater.

This trap is downright vicious.

Whoever came up with the idea of getting people drunk and then tying their feet together must have one twisted sense of humor.

But I didn't dare laugh aloud.

I could only remain crouched underwater and wait for my chance.

The drunken men on the bank were making enough noise to shake the heavens, while I remained half-submerged, like a river loach waiting for the current to change.

I only needed one chance to escape.

Before long, the burly men were bumping into one another, swaying left and right like soybeans being shaken inside a jar.

Then, one after another—

Thump. Thump. Thump.

They collapsed onto the ground.

Their snores soon merged into one continuous chorus.

They were completely out.

I couldn't help muttering,

“What a bunch of idiots. They drink wine from an unknown source, put on shoes designed to trip them up, and still manage to sleep like they're lying in their own beds.”

I remained crouched in the water, watching to see whether they were pretending to be asleep.

But the bank remained completely still.

Only the overlapping snores continued.

I was just about to climb ashore when I suddenly heard another rustling of footsteps.

A tall, thin man slowly emerged from the shadow of the hillside.

He was extraordinarily tall, looking like a bamboo stalk that someone had stretched too far. His face was gaunt, with hollow cheeks and high cheekbones. He was practically skin and bones.

Yet on his back he carried an enormous cloth sack.

It was stuffed to the point of bulging, its shape vaguely resembling a wild boar.

Under normal circumstances, something that large should have weighed him down so badly that he would have staggered with every step.

Yet he walked steadily and effortlessly, without showing even the slightest sign of strain.

My heart gave a sudden lurch.

What the hell is he carrying?

When the tall, thin man saw the burly men sprawled along the riverbank, he wasn't surprised in the slightest.

Instead, he threw back his head and laughed several times.

The laughter was dark and unnerving.

He walked over, took the end of a thick rope attached to the sack on his back, swung it over his other shoulder, and gave it a hard pull.

Several dull thuds followed.

The burly men on the ground were dragged into the air one after another, strung together like candied hawthorn on a stick.

Scrape... scrape...

The thin man's steps remained steady.

The men dragged behind him like discarded sacks of cloth.

Such rough treatment should have been enough to wake anyone.

Yet not a single one of those grown men stirred.

I stared in disbelief.

The man might have been thin, but his strength was astonishing.

He hardly looked human.

I waited until the tall, thin man had dragged his string of “live candied hawthorn” into the depths of the forest and disappeared from sight.

Only then did I dare stand up in the water.

My legs immediately gave way, and I nearly slipped straight back in.

I dragged my soaked clothes toward the riverbank, shivering like a drowned chicken. My legs felt as heavy as lead, and every few steps I staggered.

After walking only that short distance, I was already exhausted to the point of collapse.

I dropped onto the bank, sprawled out on my back, and couldn't get up again.

The sun wasn't very high in the sky. My whole body was still cold, but gradually I began to feel some warmth returning.

My mind, however, refused to stop turning things over.

Who exactly were those people who appeared one after another?

The first group were wine-crazed idiots who were as stupid as pigs.

The man who came afterward had unbelievable strength, yet his origins were completely unknown.

Could Lian and the others have been imprisoned in that underground passage too? I should go back and search for them...

The more I thought about it, the worse everything seemed.

One moment I was worrying.

The next I was imagining all sorts of terrible possibilities.

With the sunlight warming me, my thoughts gradually became a tangled mess.

Eventually, my head tilted to one side.

I fell into a deep sleep.

I had no idea how long I had been asleep.

Half-dreaming and half-awake, I seemed to hear the system's voice.

But the sound was faint and fragmented.

More importantly, it wasn't its usual cold, mechanical voice.

It sounded almost like someone was crying.

I waved my hand groggily.

“Stop crying... I'm tired... let me turn over...”

The moment I rolled onto my other side, a sudden chill ran through my body.

The hairs on my back stood straight up.

Wait.

Something's wrong.

How could the system possibly have a woman's voice?

Could it be...

Could that eerie woman in white from the strange courtyard have followed me here?

I shot upright with a gasp, nearly frightening myself unconscious.

But when I looked around—

There was no woman in white.

Instead, I was surrounded by monkeys.

Dozens of them.

Their fur was wild and disheveled, and their eyes bulged like lanterns in the night.

They had formed a circle around me.

They made strange, shrill cries while pawing at things scattered across the ground.

Several of them were busy poking at the broken wine jars with their claws, their tongues hanging out as they licked up the remnants of the wine with great enthusiasm.

Me:

“……”

All the monkeys looked up at once.

They stared at me with an expression that seemed to say:

Why isn't this thing dead yet?

Cold sweat poured down my back.

So these drunken monkeys were the ones who had woken me up?!

What had the world come to?

Even monkeys were living better than I was.

I swallowed and slowly edged backward.

“Gentlemen monkeys... I have no grudge against you... and I'm out of wine too...”

The largest monkey bared its teeth, revealing a row of yellow fangs.

I froze.

This was bad.

Was I really destined to wake up either to a ghost or a bunch of monkeys?

What kind of terrible luck was this?

I gritted my teeth.

No.

I couldn't worry about these monkeys who had apparently gotten drunk and were now rummaging through wine jars.

Saving Lian and the others was more important.

By now I was ninety-nine percent certain that the people in that courtyard were anything but friendly.

Lian and the others had probably been ambushed too.

If I didn't hurry back and find out what had happened, who knew what would become of them?

The problem was—

I was currently surrounded by monkeys.

They tilted their heads and stared at me, baring their teeth as if they were discussing among themselves:

Can we eat this thing?

I gave a nervous laugh and slowly backed away.

“Gentlemen monkeys... I'm only a weakling. I have no spiritual cultivation, no roots in the mountains, and I don't even grow grass in the wild... You won't get full from eating me anyway...”

The largest monkey suddenly lunged forward!

I screamed.

“Mercy, Your Monkeyship!”

I turned and ran for my life.

Water weeds flew into the air and splashed all over my face.

Behind me, the monkeys shrieked wildly, sounding as though they were about to catch up and tear me apart.

As I ran, I cried out miserably,

“Good heavens! What have I done to deserve this?! First I get drugged by a woman, then I nearly drown three times, and now I'm being chased by monkeys! Are you messing with me, Heaven?!”

I had no idea how long I ran.

My legs felt as though they were about to break.

Only then did I realize that the sounds behind me were gradually fading.

The monkeys weren't chasing me anymore.

I practically collapsed against a tree, gasping for breath.

“Huff... huff... Gentlemen monkeys... you truly are merciful...”

Once I had finally caught my breath, I realized something.

I was lost.

This was very bad.

I hadn't walked from the land to the river.

I'd been blasted out of the underground passage by an underground current.

Where the hell was I now?

I had no idea which way was north, south, east, or west.

“Oh no, oh no, oh no...”

“Don't tell me I'm supposed to dive back into that river?!”

An image immediately appeared in my mind:

The monkeys crouching along the riverbank, calmly watching me drown.

I shuddered.

“No way! My life is precious! I'm not going back into that water!”

With no other choice, I gritted my teeth and picked a random path.

I had only been walking for a while when I suddenly heard several people loudly chattering and arguing about something behind the bushes ahead.