Chapter 45: The Ancestral Hall |
The players trickled out of their rooms one by one. Though most had dark circles under their eyes and looked drained, they were at least free of any new wounds.
The situation was clear. Last night, Qi Si and Yang Yundong had each taken a room alone, while the others had paired up just as they had on the first night.
When Zhou Yilin saw Yang Yundong, his left arm severed and half his body drenched in blood, she started wiping at her eyes again, unable to form a coherent sentence. She was like a startled fawn, ready to bolt at the slightest sound.
Yang Yundong pressed his right hand to the stump of his left arm, his gaze sweeping over the four players who had emerged after him. "Did any of you run into trouble last night?" he asked.
The players exchanged uncertain glances.
"No," one of them ventured. "We all ate the divine meat. What trouble could there be?"
"I slept like a log all night," another added.
Each person wore a look of suitable confusion, showing no hint of deception.
Yang Yundong let out a heavy sigh. "Last night, Chang Xu and I were both attacked by ghosts," he explained. "If I hadn't managed to collect a few life-saving items, I doubt I'd be standing here now."
Perhaps it was the gruesome sight of his injury, or the undeniable authority in his voice, but no one objected. They all returned to their rooms to retrieve their brochures.
Qi Si stood by Yang Yundong's side, collecting the brochures as they were brought out.
On the title page of these brochures, four lines were scrawled in a flamboyant, almost dancing script:
[One must not occupy a room alone,]
[Nor to the ancestral hall venture on your own.]
[Weep not for ghosts of recent, mortal strife,]
[Their sins absolved, what cause to mourn their life?]
"'One person' versus 'two people.' A single word's difference, yet it led to a completely different outcome."
If Qi Si hadn't broken the spell with his recorder, backed by the security of his Fate Pocket Watch, the players would have undoubtedly suffered more losses.
Zhang Licai smacked his palm against his thigh. "That character for 'two'..." he cursed. "Someone must have added a stroke to the 'one.' What kind of sick bastard would do that?"
Zhao Feng's gaze shifted to Yang Yundong, his brow furrowed. "Are you suggesting one of us is responsible for this?"
The answer was obvious, but Zhao Feng had no intention of backing Yang Yundong without a cue from Qi Si. And Qi Si, for his part, had no desire to lay all his cards on the table just yet.
Yang Yundong's eyes swept over Zhou Yilin and Zhu Ling, his gaze lingering on Zhu Ling for a fraction longer than the rest.
Zhu Ling noticed his scrutiny and offered a strained smile. "It's likely a false clue from the Weird Game, designed to sow discord among us. I was just reading on the forums the other day that some instances intentionally plant misinformation..."
Zhang Licai, whether genuinely clueless or just playing dumb, muttered, "No way. If we can't even trust clues written in black and white, how are we supposed to survive this game?"
Ultimately, he didn't challenge Zhu Ling, despite how suspicious she seemed.
Yang Yundong was clearly on his last legs. Siding with a dying man and offending a player as capable as Zhu Ling—someone powerful you could latch onto—was a losing proposition.
In that moment, Yang Yundong was utterly alone.
"Breakfast is ready! Come and eat!" Su Po's call cut through the tense discussion.
It was time for breakfast.
Most of the players had little appetite. They picked at their steamed buns for a few moments before leaving the table one by one.
Watching the others depart, Qi Si lost his own desire to eat. He rose and made his way to the doorway.
Yang Yundong stood alone in the doorway. In the morning sun, the shadow of his single arm stretched out, long and frail, making him look as if he might topple over at any moment.
Qi Si approached him with a relaxed, easy gait. "Yang Yundong," he said with a smile. "Let's work together."
While Qi Si couldn't fathom why anyone would willingly play the part of a thankless hero, he didn't particularly dislike characters like Yang Yundong, so long as their interests didn't clash with his own.
On the contrary, he rather enjoyed when unexpected complications arose to disrupt a monotonous plan. It was a chance to observe the choices and ultimate fates of these self-proclaimed paragons of justice—valuable data for his own future disguises and machinations.
Now, he met Yang Yundong's sharp, falcon-like gaze without wavering. "You've seen the situation," he began. "Three days left, and only six of us remain. It's highly probable that some are already planning to kill off the others to trigger the game's minimum death-count mechanic."
"As the de facto leader, you'll be the primary target. The opportunists will want to eliminate you first to create the chaos they need. And, of course, they'll also come after me—the unknown variable."
"You and I were lucky to escape this time. I doubt we'll be so fortunate again."
It was a classic tactic: use a shared predicament to build rapport, frame the situation as one of helpless isolation, and mix in some undeniable facts with a dash of exaggeration. It was an easy way to win someone over.
Yang Yundong was silent for a beat, then countered, "So I work with you, and then what? We eliminate the others, and then you and Zhao Feng turn on me?"
Qi Si didn't show the slightest hint of embarrassment at having his plot exposed. Instead, his face broke into a brilliant smile. "Impressive. It seems you're not as naive about these things as I thought, Yang Yundong."
"But what does it matter?" Qi Si continued, his tone reasonable. "Work with me, we end this instance ahead of schedule, and at least four of us can make it out alive. Survival is the only thing that matters. Do the methods we use to achieve it really make a difference?"
Yang Yundong's voice was grim. "I can't read you, but I can sense it. You have no respect for rules or morality, no basic human decency. Someone like you surviving would be a threat to every other player."
Qi Si didn't argue. He simply watched him with an unreadable smile. "Let me ask you a question, Yang Yundong. If a terminally ill young man in, say, America, needed a full organ transplant to survive, and you were the only match... would you give him yours?"
Yang Yundong’s eyes shot up to meet Qi Si's, searching for the intent behind the question.
Qi Si's smile never wavered. "If your answer is no, then on what grounds can you demand I sacrifice my own survival for your so-called moral principles? And if your answer is yes... well, why don't you just die for my sake right now?"
"Or perhaps," Qi Si pressed on, "you're just a tiresome utilitarian, weighing everyone's value based on their nationality, age, education, or health before deciding who is worthy of sacrifice? Or maybe, just maybe, you're exactly like me—deciding who lives and who dies based on nothing more than personal whim?"
Without targeted logical training, very few people can untangle such a messy web of propositions and analyze each point on its own merits.
Logical fallacies—begging the question, ad hominem attacks, false dilemmas—were traps that most people fell into time and time again.
With each question, the color drained from Yang Yundong's face. He was clearly caught in the intricate web of paradoxes Qi Si had so carefully constructed.
Qi Si began to tick off points on his fingers, his tone becoming that of a bookkeeper. "Of course, I'm sure your preconceived notions have already cast me as the villain, so you're unlikely to believe a word I say. In that case, let's stick to the practicalities. I'll offer you a few viable choices." "Option one: you uphold your principle of ridding the world of evil and kill me. You'll then be executed by the group for the sake of 'procedural justice.' As my ally, Zhao Feng would inevitably be next on the chopping block."
"Option two: you take out Zhu Ling, trading your life for hers. The outcome would be similar. I guarantee I would then eliminate her entire faction, root and stem. Of the three people left, if they're lucky, they all live. If not... I live."
"Option three: you take the most innocent of the bunch, Zhang Licai, down with you. That leaves exactly four people—two alliances. We achieve a perfect Nash equilibrium, and the rest of us survive."
Qi Si tilted his head, his expression one of serious analysis as he delivered a conclusion that was impossible to verify. "Based on utilitarian principles, the third option offers the greatest overall benefit. Wouldn't you agree?"
Yang Yundong's voice was ice. "'Slaughter-stream' players who profit from the suffering of others deserve nothing but death."
"Slaughter-stream" was a broad term for players with antisocial tendencies. They operated on a strictly zero-sum basis, preferring to kill other players for personal gain rather than cooperating for mutual survival.
Qi Si knew such labels were merely human constructs. Kill one man, and you're a murderer. Kill millions, and you're a god.
He smiled, his eyes curving into crescents. "But all life is precious, isn't it? And you're no god. What gives you the right to judge anyone's choices as right or wrong, good or evil?"
"A murderer should pay with their life," Yang Yundong stated flatly. "And those who cause harm must face retribution."
Qi Si acted as if he hadn't heard a word. He drew out the question, enunciating each syllable. "So... what is... your choice?"
...
A short while later, the players reassembled outside the residence.
A crisis of trust had taken root, but everyone maintained a tacit, unspoken silence on the matter.
With Yang Yundong still taking the lead, the six players followed the map's directions toward the ancestral hall.
Shallow footprints marked the dirt path through the village, punctuated by specks of blood that glistened like drops of red lacquer.
The sun had yet to fully crest the rooftops. Beneath a vast, pale sky, dust danced on the dirt path.
The houses lining the path were dilapidated, growing more decrepit the farther they walked. Weeds choked crumbling mud-brick walls, and shattered roof tiles lay scattered in the dirt.
The players rounded a grove of locust trees and stopped before a large building.
They had reached the ancestral hall.
The Su Clan's ancestral hall was a grand, handsome structure. Two large, crimson lanterns hung from the eaves, their brilliant color a stark, jarring contrast to the decay of the surrounding village.
Its doorposts and window lattices were intricately carved, and even the paint seemed fresh. Yet, from a distance, it exuded a cold, sinister aura.
Zhu Ling frowned. "The feng shui of this hall is all wrong," she observed. "Locust trees at the entrance attract restless spirits. And a door that opens to the east and west is said to trap vengeful souls. It's almost as if it was built to contain something."
Zhang Licai shuddered. "Hey, don't say things like that. I don't know the first thing about feng shui..."
While those two were bickering, Qi Si had already moved to Yang Yundong's side and was picking the lock on the door ring with a thin piece of wire.
He reached for the hall's crimson doors. He expected to have to put his shoulder into it, but at the slightest tug of the ring, the doors swung inward on their own.
As if pushed by an unseen wind.
A faint smile played on Qi Si's lips as he made a joke that wasn't particularly funny. "How hospitable. They seem quite eager for us to come inside."
Yang Yundong's face was a deathly, earthen gray from blood loss, and his body swayed slightly, but he managed to hide any overt signs of exhaustion.
He shot Qi Si a brief, flat look before turning his gaze forward and stepping over the threshold.
Qi Si pressed his lips together and followed right behind him.
The interior of the hall was intensely unsettling. It felt as though countless pairs of eyes were watching them from every angle, their stares brazen and unnerving, making one's skin crawl.
Behind the hall's main altar, memorial tablets were packed together in dense rows, stacked one on top of the other. A quick count suggested dozens, if not hundreds, of them.
There were no idols, no signs of worship to any god. The players exchanged glances, each seeing the same question reflected in the others' eyes.
Qi Si recalled the clue he'd acquired the night before and felt he understood.
He spotted a wooden bucket in front of the altar—the very one Su Po had been carrying the day before.
Only a few scraps of meat remained inside. The rim of the bucket was covered in a chaotic mess of teeth marks, which looked unsettlingly human.
The bites varied in size and angle, painting a vivid picture: a horde of starving creatures—human or ghost, it was impossible to say—pouncing on the bucket, tearing at the meat from all sides like feral beasts, so frantic they had even bitten into the wood itself.
*Drip.*
Something dripped onto the floor, congealing into a thick, viscous pool.
Zhang Licai, who was right behind Qi Si, looked up at the sound. His breath hitched in his throat, and a strangled gasp escaped his lips.
Lining the ceiling, arranged in neat rows, were human faces of all sizes. Their skin was so wrinkled it looked as if it might crumble away like dry bark, yet every single one of them wore a cheerful smile—a sight that was profoundly, grotesquely unsettling.
Qi Si gave the ceiling a cursory glance before his gaze drifted back down, sweeping over the tightly packed rows of memorial tablets.
Each tablet bore the surname 'Su.' The birth years varied, but the year of death was identical on every single one: the year the village's strange transformation began.
The physical evidence here matched the village history perfectly. A thought occurred to Qi Si. He took a few steps back toward the entrance and offered Zhou Yilin, who was also lingering by the door, an innocent, harmless-looking smile.
Zhou Yilin kept her eyes fixed firmly on the floor, doing her best to appear unobtrusive. She carefully shuffled to the side, giving him a wider berth.
On certain matters, they shared a silent understanding.
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