[Soul-Shaking Ancient Village] Room Assignments

The old village chief gradually disappeared at the mouth of the alley. The moonlight had faded from the sky, and night fell.

The two farmers looked somewhat excited. They hurried after the old village chief and vanished into the hazy darkness.

The group pushed open the door of the three-story building beside the eldercare tower. The dust they had expected to see flying did not appear. Instead, the place was exceptionally neat, and the lighting was soft rather than harsh.

The living room was on the first floor, with a spiral staircase leading to the second and third floors.

Si Yehan stood near the back of the group. The burly man turned to the ponytailed woman and said, "Let's check the house first. The two of us can take the third floor. We're more experienced, so we'll have a better chance of surviving anything unknown."

He then looked at the male student and cautioned him, "Kid, go check the second floor with them. Don't wander around or touch things at random."

The male student nodded. The ponytailed woman glanced at the burly man. He looked vicious and spoke bluntly, but she hadn't expected him to be so kind.

She went with the burly man to check the third floor, while the female doctor took the male student and a man in a suit to the second floor.

Only Si Yehan, the woman in the white dress, and the woman with loose hair remained on the first floor.

Si Yehan didn't look at either woman. He couldn't kill them yet, so there was nothing worth looking at. He chose to walk around and inspect the first floor.

He entered the kitchen and found it had long been unusable. The kitchen in this three-story building didn't use a fire for cooking, but a gas cylinder. There hadn't been one here for a long time, though.

It was out of place in the countryside.

Si Yehan felt that the timeline of this village was very strange and out of step with the outside world, whether it was the clothes, the houses, or the jarringly conspicuous eldercare tower that looked like a product of the last century.

It was, after all, a product of a deity's mighty power and couldn't be judged by the common sense of the outside world.

Aside from that, there was another piece of good news for Si Yehan: these natives were real, with the vitality of living people. The instances in the Weird Game were all real worlds.

After realizing this, Si Yehan felt a little happier. Killing the natives wouldn't be like slaughtering NPCs in a game, utterly devoid of fun. He could take pleasure in it, too. There would be screams and suffering, and there were also so-called bonds and beliefs that could be crushed.

His pleasure didn't show on his face. Si Yehan left the kitchen and returned to the living room, where the ponytailed woman and the burly man had already come back downstairs and were sitting on the sofa.

The burly man's expression looked grim. The ponytailed woman wore the same gentle smile as before, but there was a hint of coldness in her eyes.

A little later, everyone returned.

"The third floor is a storeroom," the burly man said heavily. "It's filled with all kinds of objects used for sacrifices. It's very strange, and there are also eight dolls. They look exactly like us, and..."

"There's a faint trace of ghostly aura on the third floor. None of you have cleared an instance yet, so don't go getting involved with it rashly," the ponytailed woman added for the burly man.

Once the burly man and the ponytailed woman had finished reporting what they'd found, the female doctor adjusted her glasses and said, "We checked the second floor. There are five rooms, each with a large bed big enough for two people. Besides that, there's a mirror facing the bed in each room. It's very strange. The lights in the hallway are sound-activated, which seems very advanced for the countryside."

Si Yehan said calmly, "The kitchen can't be used, and there's no food here either. If we want to survive for ten days, we'll have to get food from the village."

The other four said nothing.

The burly man nodded. "All right, we can talk about food tomorrow. For now, let's decide on sleeping arrangements. If we pair up, there'll be one room left over. We can sort it out among ourselves."

He pointed at the male student. "I'll share with this kid."

The male student quickly agreed. As a student and a newcomer in a place like this, he felt it was an immense honor to receive a veteran's help. He was filled with gratitude toward the burly man.

The burly man looked at the grateful tears welling in the male student's eyes, and memories of his son rose in his mind again. He forcibly suppressed his emotions. His desire to bring his son back to life grew even stronger. After participants cleared instances to a certain extent, their abilities would become increasingly terrifying, and they could even meet a deity.

The man in the suit looked at Si Yehan. He had calmed down somewhat, though he still felt a little uneasy as he said, "Hey, brother, how about we share a room?"

Even knowing that Si Yehan was no decent person and had blood on his hands, the man in the suit still wanted to try to befriend the handsome young man. The person before him had an air of lazy refinement, and his background was surely extraordinary. If he wanted to survive, he had to try to befriend every capable person and improve himself.

Only then could he ensure that his mother in the outside world survived safely as well.

Si Yehan had been about to agree, but after another thought, he declined. "No, we can each have a room."

He had initially wanted to agree because he hadn't hunted anyone for a while, and perhaps he could kill the man in the suit tonight. But on second thought, the ghost had yet to appear, so perhaps he could keep the man around as a chance to test things by trial and error.

Once the first person died, it wouldn't be too late to kill someone. As for whether he himself might be the first to die, Si Yehan had considered that too. If that really happened, he could only blame his own bad luck.

But before he died, he would do everything he could to drag everyone down with him.

The ponytailed woman looked at the female doctor. "How about the two of us ladies share a room? I can also tell you about some of the game's rules."

The female doctor had originally wanted to share with the woman in the white dress, but now that a veteran had offered to take her along, she naturally wouldn't refuse. "All right, thank you, sis."

She was a little wary of the ponytailed woman, but not very much. After all, she had lived under an orderly system for more than twenty years. Without witnessing actual killing before her eyes, it would be difficult to change her mindset in such a short time.

The woman in the white dress took a deep breath and said to the woman with loose hair, "Then how about the two of us share a room?"

The woman with loose hair was no longer quite so numb, though she remained very quiet. She nodded.

After assigning the rooms, everyone went up the spiral staircase to the second floor.

The light in the first-floor living room was left on. Light could always bring people some comfort in the dark, even if it was useless against ghosts.

Si Yehan kept recalling the instance background the others had mentioned, pondering the killing patterns the ghost might have.

As they were splitting up, the ponytailed woman seemed to see through what Si Yehan was thinking. She smiled and reassured him, "Don't rush to figure out the ghost's killing pattern. In a beginner instance like this, there usually aren't too many deaths. Ghosts act according to their killing patterns and have no intelligence."

The ponytailed woman paused, then lowered her voice. "Be careful around that burly man for the next few days. He wants to kill you."

Si Yehan keenly sensed that she was probing him. The woman wanted to use him for trial and error while investigating the burly man's background. Her earlier show of kindness had been no more than preparation for her later schemes. He nodded without speaking.

They then went into their respective rooms. As soon as Si Yehan entered, he saw a bed and a mirror. The room was very sparsely furnished. Through the window, he could see the entire village shrouded in darkness, without the slightest light. Not a sound came from any of the houses. It was deathly silent!

The stars shone in the sky, casting down an eerie, blood-red light.

Si Yehan turned the mirror around and moved it to the window, pointing it outside. The ghost's killing pattern most likely had something to do with sound, since the sound of a child crying was already a clear enough clue. As for those nearing the end of their lives, that should refer to the elderly, silently walking through the village...

From the background introduction for clearing the instance, he could still work out several conditions that might be part of the killing pattern.

First, he had to avoid hearing the sound. Si Yehan had always been an excellent sleeper. As long as no killing intent appeared, he certainly wouldn't wake up.

From what the burly man and the ponytailed woman had said earlier, he could infer that the ghost was a product of rules. It would only instinctively follow its killing pattern to erase living beings, and only at that moment would its malice and killing intent pour out. So it wouldn't affect him.

After standing at the window and watching for a long time, Si Yehan took off his overcoat, folded it, and placed it on the other side of the bed. He went to sleep in his long white shirt and black trousers, lying face up with both hands resting on his chest.

As his mind gradually emptied, a thought occurred to Si Yehan. Could firearms and blades from the outside world be brought into the Weird Game?

Perhaps not, since neither the ponytailed woman nor the burly man carried a gun or wore a blade.

Ever since he entered the instance, people had looked at him one after another as though he were prey or resources. It was truly laughable.

Starting tomorrow, he would kill the burly man first.