Chapter Summaries

Xie Qi suspected Song Nan had killed Stock and watched her reactions, while recalling the first time he killed someone and how it led him into the gambling world. He returned to the present and regarded the tense Song Nan as inexperienced.

• Xie Qi suspected Song Nan because she had assumed Stock was dead before his body was found and because their earlier clash seemed out of character for her.
• Xie Qi recalled working as a dealer at a casino while saving money for college expenses.
• When a gambler attacked him with a knife, Xie Qi disarmed him and instinctively slashed his throat.
• The casino owner saved Xie Qi from being taken to the police and trained him in gambling techniques.
• After the owner died, Xie Qi fought off rival factions, took over the casino, and became an experienced gambler.
• Xie Qi returned to the present and watched the tense Song Nan, thinking she would grow accustomed to killing with experience.

Song Nan admitted that she had killed Stock and revealed she had done it to avenge her sister, whom Stock had raped and killed and Bailey had helped get acquitted. Phil then asked Xie Qi whether Mrs. Caster approved of his actions, leaving everyone wondering whether the villa’s inhabitants were their enemies too.

• Song Nan confessed to killing Stock, and Bailey and Saul reacted in shock.
• Song Nan accused Bailey of helping Stock escape punishment for raping and killing her sister.
• Song Nan recounted her sister’s death, the failed trial, and how she had waited for a chance to kill Stock.
• Phil urged Song Nan to put revenge aside until they finished the game.
• Phil asked Xie Qi whether Mrs. Caster approved of what he was doing.

Xie Qi handed Saul the keys after declaring the six winners, but Phil warned that their apparent chance to escape might be part of the chef’s plan. The group found a way through a small side door, then decided to search the third floor for information about Mrs. Caster before leaving.

• Xie Qi said he was Mrs. Caster’s loyal servant, gave Saul the key ring, and privately treated the six as bait for his viewers.
• Saul proposed escaping by lifeboat, but Bailey warned that they lacked food and water, so the group considered searching the farm and villa first.
• Phil argued that Xie Qi had given them the keys to encourage exploration and that they needed leverage against the villa’s owner before attempting to escape.
• The six failed to open the main gate, but Song Nan remembered a small door behind the staircase, and they unlocked it to reach the outside air.
• The group chose to investigate Mrs. Caster’s third-floor corridor, assigning Saul to keep watch while the others searched for a study.

Song Nan, Annie, and Sofina discovered a diary in a bedroom that hinted at a dark secret involving Miss Caster and her family. The group then searched the study, where Phil found old newspapers filled with reports of missing people, leaving them to suspect the Caster family was connected to the disappearances.

• Song Nan, Annie, and Sofina searched a locked bedroom on the third floor and found a dusty diary written by a girl who appeared to be Miss Caster.
• Song Nan and Annie read diary entries that mentioned Miss Caster's absent brother and vague, disturbing visits involving underground darkness and pain.
• Annie wondered why Mrs. Caster was never mentioned, and Song Nan considered whether the family's hereditary illness had separated the siblings.
• Bailey led Song Nan, Annie, and Sofina to the study, where Phil and Bailey had found a large double door.
• Song Nan unlocked the study, and the group searched it while Phil examined old newspapers reporting missing-person cases over many years.

Song Nan, Phil, Annie, Saul, and the others searched the villa for the lock that matched a key Bailey found, then endured a meal of suspicious black pork served by Xie Qi. Afterward, the six resumed exploring, hoping to find the key’s lock and reach the breeding farm before nightfall.

• Annie noticed that the witchcraft books had been studied carefully and examined a passage about resurrection before Bailey found a key in the bookcase.
• Song Nan took the key, and she, Phil, and Annie searched the study while Bailey silently resented Song Nan.
• Xie Qi stopped Saul from letting the others leave the third floor, then returned to the kitchen after warning the guests to be quiet.
• Annie and Phil concluded that Xie Qi had deliberately given them the key, and Annie noticed similarities between the Caster family portrait and Mrs. Caster.
• Bailey asked Xie Qi to let the group switch to vegetarian food, but Xie Qi’s displeasure made Bailey and the others eat the black pork.
• After the meal, the six resumed searching for the key’s lock so they could leave the villa and visit the breeding farm before nightfall.

Bailey and the others escaped the villa while Saul stayed behind to lock the door and face the chef. After telling the group about his guilt over eating human flesh during the war, Saul decided to confront the chef, but Lina encountered him before he could carry out his plan.

• Bailey led the group out through the villa's back door, but they discovered the outside lock was missing.
• Saul refused to leave, explaining that wartime memories and the guilt of eating human flesh had made him unwilling to keep living.
• Song Nan gave Saul the dagger she had used to kill Stock, then left with the others as Saul locked the door behind them.
• Saul moved through the dark villa and accidentally knocked Lina over as she carried Xie Qi's clothes.
• Saul asked Lina to call the chef downstairs so he could try to kill him before he could hunt down the others.

Xie Qi confronted Saul, who had come to kill him, and defeated him in a fight. Saul collapsed from his wound as Xie Qi wished him sweet dreams.

• Lina told Xie Qi that a tall Black guest wanted to see him, and Xie Qi asked her to wait upstairs while he went down.
• Lina grabbed Xie Qi’s shirt but let go in embarrassment, and Xie Qi ruffled her hair before heading downstairs.
• Saul waited behind a sofa to ambush Xie Qi, but Xie Qi circled around and threw his Chef’s Knife at him.
• Saul lunged at Xie Qi with a dagger, but Xie Qi dodged and cut him with the long knife.
• Saul’s wound continued bleeding until he grew weak and fell to his knees, and Xie Qi told him, “Sweet dreams, Mr. Officer.”

After Xie Qi defeated Saul, Lina ignored the dying man and cleaned the blood from the floor, prompting Xie Qi to wonder about her unusual past. Meanwhile, the five escapees found the farm and opened its locked doors, hearing beastlike roars from inside.

• Lina wiped the blood from the floor instead of helping Saul, who died while Xie Qi watched.
• Xie Qi recalled that the chef had found Lina by the sea five years earlier and that Mrs. Caster and Sai Basi had treated her mistakes with unusual indulgence.
• Xie Qi returned to the kitchen to deal with the ingredients and let the five escapees roam free.
• Song Nan led Bailey, Phil, Sofina, and Annie through the dark forest until they found the farm, where Bailey broke one lens of his glasses.
• Song Nan opened the farm's locked doors, and the group heard roars from inside.

Song Nan and the others searched the farm for food while disturbing voices and banging came from behind locked doors. They opened a cellar and encountered a fast-moving, skinless monster, leaving Sofina and Bailey alone in the hall as the others hid.

• The group heard desperate voices and pounding behind the doors, but decided not to let whoever was inside out and searched for other food.
• Sofina found a concealed cellar door, and Song Nan used the key from the study to unlock it.
• Song Nan lit a kerosene lamp and held it over the cellar, but a dark figure lunged out at her.
• Song Nan escaped, while the monster attacked Phil; he dodged and pulled Annie to safety beside the corridor.
• Song Nan hid nearby as the monster revealed its exposed, blood-red muscles, leaving Sofina and Bailey in the hall.

Bailey tried to escape the monster by using Sofina as a distraction, but the creature pursued him outside while the others survived. Song Nan and Phil later searched the cellar and found a medical record bearing the name Cassandra Cast, raising questions about Mrs. Caster.

• Bailey threw a stone toward Sofina to lure the monster away, then fled through the front door, but the monster chased him outside.
• Sofina shut the door behind the monster, and Song Nan, Phil, Annie, and Sofina regrouped inside.
• Song Nan asked why the monster had pursued Bailey, and Annie suggested it was following the smell of his blood.
• Song Nan and Phil went down into the cellar and found an abandoned laboratory, including a barred enclosure strewn with flesh and severed limbs.
• Phil found a bloodstained medical record naming Cassandra Cast, and he and Song Nan wondered who Mrs. Caster really was.