Chapter 8: Rose Manor |
Parsing the notes of terror in the scream, Qi Si stated the conclusion he had already reached, his expression unchanged. "Someone's dead."
"D-dead?" Lin Chen’s face went white as he stared at Qi Si. "But didn't you say we didn't have to open any of the blind boxes?"
"Unfortunately, rational people are a minority in any group." Qi Si was already at the door, pushing it open. "Lin Chen, care to join me for a look?"
He'd seen his fair share of dead bodies, but to encounter life and death within the Weird Game was a novel experience.
He was quite curious to see what it was really like to die in this place.
The moment he stepped out of the room, the thick stench of blood assaulted him, momentarily overpowering the fragrance of the roses. It mingled with the nauseating perfume already hanging in the air, creating a cloying sweetness that clung to him like a shroud.
Qi Si looked down. Just inches from the toe of his shoe, a pool of blood, as thick as paint, was spreading across the floor. It had already begun to coagulate, its surface lumpy and uneven like cooling lava, a lifeless smear that had thankfully spared his soles.
Lin Chen saw the blood a moment later and let out a high-pitched shriek, like a rooster having its neck wrung.
He jumped back with a yelp, and if Qi Si hadn’t dodged in time, the young man would have latched onto him.
As if granted amnesty, Lin Chen spun around and bolted back into the room, followed by the sound of violent retching.
The source of the blood was in the center of the hall. A dark, huddled shape lay there, with Zou Yan and Yezi standing over it.
Qi Si carefully skirted the edge of the bloodstain and approached, finally getting a clear view of the thing on the floor.
It was a mangled corpse, its features mutilated beyond recognition. The body was naked and curled into a fetal position. Its skin had been sliced into small patches by a chaotic web of lines, and from the raw flesh sprouted fuzzy tendrils that, upon closer inspection, were clearly the roots of a plant.
A blooming rose erupted from the corpse's gaping mouth, its thick stem and leaves plunging straight down the throat, as if the skull itself had been used as a gruesome flowerpot.
Zou Yan and Yezi stood on either side, both appearing relatively composed. Aside from that initial scream—and it was unclear who had uttered it—there was no outward sign of their fear.
Yezi murmured in a strained voice, "Someone died on the very first night. I wonder what rule was broken..."
A pained look of shared vulnerability crossed her face. "What a wretched way to die."
"It's Shen Ming," Qi Si declared. "He was between 183 and 185 centimeters tall, with a medium build. The body is a match."
Yezi reflexively argued, "Even so, it's not necessarily him..."
Without a word, Qi Si knelt beside the body. He took a napkin he’d pocketed from the dinner table the day before, wrapped it around his right hand, and gently touched a blood-red rose petal.
He carefully pushed aside the forearm-length rose, and a viscous, half-congealed stream of blood oozed out from beneath it.
Zou Yan watched him with a strange expression. "Qi Si, what are you doing?"
"I told you, I'm a taxidermist," Qi Si said coolly. "Dealing with corpses is my area of expertise."
Zou Yan was speechless. *That's some broad expertise you have there. Are you sure the specimens you make are entirely... conventional?*
As he spoke, Qi Si pressed a knuckle against the corpse’s jaw, closing it. His long, pale fingers moved over the victim's face with an almost magical grace, dancing and sliding across the mangled flesh. In moments, he had pieced the shattered visage back into something vaguely human, revealing the face of Shen Ming.
The victim's identity was now beyond doubt. Zou Yan gasped, while Yezi's face turned ashen, hardly looking better than the corpse itself.
"How is that possible?" the girl choked out. "Shen Ming shouldn't have died. He was... he was a veteran player..."
Qi Si countered, "Chang Xu, who shared a room with him, is also a veteran player, isn't he?"
He wiped his fingers clean with the napkin and glanced around. "Where is Chang Xu? He was in the same room as Shen Ming. Even if he couldn't save him, he should at least know something."
Humans make connections. His words left plenty of room for interpretation, intentionally hinting at and guiding their thoughts.
Yezi muttered, "Shen Ming was a veteran. There's no way he wouldn't survive the first night, unless..."
She swallowed the rest of her sentence. Just then, a door in the corner opened from the inside, and Chang Xu emerged.
His black clothes were neat and tidy, a clear sign he hadn't just woken up. The only question was how long he had been awake, and how much he had overheard. Qi Si narrowed his eyes, studying Chang Xu's face, which was as gloomy as if it had never seen sunlight. He asked with a hint of a smirk, "You can't possibly know nothing about Shen Ming's death, can you?"
"It's normal for you to suspect me, but I had nothing to do with Shen Ming's death," Chang Xu replied, his voice calm and detached, as if he hadn't detected the accusation in Qi Si's tone. "Last night, an NPC who looked like Miss Anna knocked on our door. Shen Ming woke up and went to open it. I made some noise trying to stop him. Then, the door was opened from the outside, and vine-like monstrosities reached in."
The concise narrative, combined with Chang Xu’s expressionless face, gave off a chilling sense of indifference that was deeply unsettling.
Yezi questioned him coldly, "Then why are you perfectly fine while he's dead?"
Chang Xu's answer was blunt. "They couldn't beat me, so they switched targets and dragged Shen Ming out."
"And you didn't even think to give him a hand?"
"I tried to pull him back once, but I couldn't hold on. I calculated the forces involved; any more pulling and he would have been torn in half."
"That's just your side of the story..."
As tensions mounted, Zou Yan stepped in to mediate. "That's enough. The man is dead. Suspecting each other now is pointless. This is a team instance; I don't think Chang Xu would have any reason to intentionally harm Shen Ming."
Yezi let out three cold laughs, her tone sharpening. "Team instance? There's no such thing as a team in this game! We're all veterans here. We know about the 'minimum death quota.' As long as enough people die, the rest can clear the instance safely, maybe even with better rewards. Who's to say one of us isn't thinking just that?"
Qi Si listened from the side, a single eyebrow raised.
His question from last night had been answered. So the Weird Game really did have such a brutal, survival-of-the-fittest mechanic.
It hardly mattered. He had always been a loner, treating every game as a zero-sum contest. He didn't need a reason to harm others. Given the chance, he would gladly test his blade on another player's back.
For him, the situation hadn't really changed at all.
Zou Yan grabbed Yezi's sleeve, reasoning gently, "Rule number seven: only ghosts can kill humans. In this instance, at least, players can't kill each other."
Yezi's voice was bitter. "Who says you have to do it yourself? All it takes is hiding a few clues and letting the ghosts do the work..."
Chang Xu, who had been staring down at the corpse, suddenly lifted his head and fixed his cold gaze on Yezi. "You seem to know a lot about how to get someone killed."
"Takes one to know one," Yezi retorted.
Qi Si stood by, watching the unfolding drama with leisurely amusement.
It seemed these players all had their secrets, and complicated ones at that.
The factions within the Weird Game were likely far more intricate than he'd imagined, having already evolved into various models of conflict. This was more difficult—and more interesting—than he had anticipated.
Chang Xu shot Yezi one last indifferent glance, then said no more, turning to walk towards the staircase.
Qi Si watched him go, a faint smile playing on his lips as he followed.
"Chang Xu, I have a question. After you woke up last night, how did you know the exact time? You clearly violated the second rule, so why did you survive?"
He intended to muddy the waters even further, probing from every angle to push a scapegoat into the center of everyone's suspicion.
He paused, feigning hesitation before asking his final question. "Do you know something we don't, or—do you have some other means?"
Chang Xu remained silent, but he reached into his coat and tossed a pocket watch to Qi Si.
The moment the old-fashioned bronze watch landed in his palm, a faint chill seeped into his skin, and lines of text materialized before his eyes.
[Name: Fate Pocket Watch (Damaged)]
[Type: Item]
[Effect: Displays objective time]
[Remarks: The God of Fate established a certain belief long ago: punctuality is a virtue, especially after a contract has been made.]
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