Appetite

The woman carried the candle all the way to the dining table. Its pale light was dim and ghostly, making the beautifully colored dishes look dull.

The village chief's words landed like a bomb in everyone's hearts.

"In the coffin? You mean... Zhou Yongsheng is dead?" Ju Lan asked, trembling.

"Huh? When did he die? Are you sure you haven't got it wrong, Chief? I was still in touch with him a few days ago." Carlos wasn't particularly surprised, but a probing look flickered in his green eyes.

The village chief looked astonished. "You were in touch? Well, I wouldn't know about that. A few days ago, we had a heavy rain around here. Xiaosheng went up the mountain to play with some friends and accidentally got buried. The villagers had to work pretty hard to dig him out."

He sounded certain. In other words, at least all the messages they had recently received from Zhou Yongsheng had been sent by a dead man.

As Yu Xing listened, his gaze passed over the fish on the plate. The aroma of braised fish drifted into his nose, stirring his appetite.

From what he could tell, Zhou Yongsheng wasn't an NPC meant to move the plot forward. He was a ghost.

So why had he pretended to be a fan and tricked Yu Xing into coming here?

Also, Ju Lan had said that her "boyfriend" was a classmate of Zhou Yongsheng's. If Zhou Yongsheng was definitely dead, what about her boyfriend?

Yu Xing licked his lips. Regret showed on his pale face, along with a hint of sadness and sympathy.

"Zhou Yongsheng was a pretty nice guy, and cheerful, too. I never thought he'd meet with an accident this year. I figured that since we knew each other, I should come and pay my respects."

He followed the village chief's lead and subtly shifted the reason for his visit. So many people had connections to Zhou Yongsheng, and all the clues pointed to him for now. Yu Xing believed the Main Quest was probably related to him as well.

It was time to coax the Main Quest out of them.

"It's wonderful that Xiaosheng had friends like you, who came all this way to attend his funeral. I'm sure he'll be very happy to see you in his coffin." The village chief liked Yu Xing a lot. The young man was fair-skinned and well-mannered, and he knew how to talk.

"Then, then I... What happened to the friends who went up the mountain with Zhou Yongsheng?" Ju Lan asked, eyes wide.

"Those young people... We found them all and dug them out. But they weren't handsome, and a lot of their bodies had rotted by the time we dug them up. They didn't look good. Not good at all." The village chief shook his head.

Ju Lan's expression changed.

"Don't feel bad, little miss. It's a good thing you didn't come with them. Otherwise, you'd be rotting now, too. And when you've rotted, you don't look good." The woman chuckled, her face shrouded in the flickering, dim light.

Her words killed everyone's appetite. Maybe it was what she'd said, or maybe it was the strange expressions on the village chief's and the woman's faces as they talked about the dead.

Even though Ju Lan, Wei Fan, and Xu Hong hadn't gone into the kitchen, they had noticed something was wrong. The village chief and his wife's logic was nothing like that of normal people.

Was it just these two, or was the whole village like this?

The food in their hands suddenly didn't taste so good.

"Go on, eat. It'll get cold." Seeing that no one was picking up their chopsticks, the village chief hurried to urge them.

They couldn't eat this food. What if eating it triggered some kind of death condition...

The ones who had gone into the kitchen thought the same thing. They quietly exchanged glances with the others who didn't know what was going on, discreetly stopping them from eating the food of unknown origin.

Just then, a pair of chopsticks reached out in front of them and picked up some scrambled eggs.

"...?"

Everyone looked over in surprise. San, who seemed quiet and well-mannered, had already stuffed a big mouthful of scrambled eggs into his mouth. He grabbed another piece of braised fish, his cheeks bulging like an unsuspecting hamster.

"..."

Was he hungry?

Hungry enough not to care if he died?

Xiao Xuechen frowned, inexplicably worried about him. Ju Lan sat between her and San, so Xiao Xuechen stretched her arm beneath the table. Ignoring Ju Lan's startled look, she managed to quietly tug at a tuft of fluff on Yu Xing's fleece.

Yu Xing was thoroughly enjoying his food. When he suddenly felt his clothes being tugged, he pretended not to notice and even smiled. "This food is delicious. You should eat, too."

Xiao Xuechen withdrew her hand and sighed. What was she supposed to do when her teammate defended a ghost? Anyone online? This was urgent.

Still, maybe he had an offering that could detect whether the food was safe...

With that thought, she reluctantly picked up her chopsticks and tried a bite of greens.

It was only so-so.

Seeing them eat first, the remaining Deduction Players were half-convinced. With the village chief and his wife watching, they all picked at a little food to be polite.

Yu Xing swallowed and asked casually, "When is the funeral?"

The village chief slapped his thigh. "Haha! Xiaosheng hasn't been dead long. Today's his First Seven, and the funeral's tomorrow night. I'll take you to see it then."

Several death flags came flying out in a single sentence.

The First Seven and tomorrow night's funeral both sounded like dangerous times.

[Main Quest triggered: Attend Zhou Yongsheng's funeral and leave Guan Family Village alive]

The Main Quest had become clear at last. Just as Yu Xing had guessed, it was related to Zhou Yongsheng.

"We'll stay for the funeral, then. Chief, where will we be staying tonight?" Wei Fan, the oldest of the Deduction Players, looked around at the rooms in the courtyard. There clearly weren't enough for seven people.

That meant they would be separated for the night.

"Sorry to impose on you for the next couple of days. We'll pay for our lodging." Xiao Xuechen chimed in right after him. She hadn't mentioned her profession at all so far. Though she was supposedly a colleague of Wei Gong's, she didn't seem much like a female engineer.

Yu Xing had been observing her closely. He guessed she played someone at the level of a boss, and that her social status in real life was probably high, too. Her accustomed air of authority was hard to fake.

"No problem. I'll arrange your lodging! Almost every household in our village has a spare room. I'll find you two reliable places. Oh, and our house can fit two people. There's a spare room with two beds!"

The village chief was the very picture of hospitality. Then he looked eagerly at Yu Xing. "Young man, you can stay at our place. I took a liking to you at first sight. I like you very much."

"Sure." Yu Xing smiled at the village chief and readily accepted.

"Then I'll—" Carlos's eyes lit up, but the woman cut him off before he could finish.

The woman fixed her black eyes on Xiao Xuechen, making a bad feeling rise in her chest. "I took a liking to this young lady, too. You can stay at our place as well."

Yikes...

Xiao Xuechen quietly clenched her teeth, her heart skipping a beat. She had seen what the woman's corpse looked like earlier. Had this ghost marked her for that reason?

The woman's tone had an unmistakably sinister edge to it. Was she threatening her?

It was almost as if she were telling Xiao Xuechen that something would definitely happen to her tonight!

She still wasn't sure whether the village chief was just a human with something wrong in his head or a ghost himself. But one thing was certain: San's luck was no better than hers.

He'd been targeted by a ghost.

"But Auntie, Xiao Xuechen is a girl. It wouldn't be appropriate for her to share a room with the men, would it?" Carlos objected. He seemed to be trying to arrange for himself to stay at the village chief's house.

"That's right, Auntie. I'm a girl, too. I'd like to stay with Sister Xiao." Ju Lan put her talent as a young girl to use, her tone carrying the unease of someone far from home.

"Come now, we don't fuss over such things in our village. What's wrong with a young man and a young lady sleeping in the same room? It's not as if they're sharing a bed." The woman clearly wasn't giving up. It was as though she'd set her sights on Xiao Xuechen. Xiao Xuechen sneered inwardly.

"Fine. I don't mind." The woman had kept staring at her, and Xiao Xuechen was getting annoyed.

Did she really think she was an easy target?

Besides, she'd be sharing a room with San—eye candy!

Yu Xing didn't mind, either. Or rather, it made no difference to him who shared the room.

It wouldn't affect him anyway.

Most people weren't happy with that meal, but Yu Xing had an especially hearty appetite.

After they finished eating, night fell completely. Yu Xing remembered asking earlier, and the village chief had said the villagers came out to roam after dusk.

He said he wanted to take a look around. As the village chief was also going to take them to other villagers' homes to stay, everyone left together.

His lodging had already been decided, so he didn't follow the group. Instead, he strolled off in another direction, seemingly at random.

This village was truly strange—strange without even trying to hide it. It practically had the words "something's wrong" written all over it.

As night fell, specks of pale light began to wander through the village.

The wind stirred the branches of the village's dead trees, making them rustle. Apart from that, there were no insects, no animals, and not a trace of life.

Only those white lights remained. Up close, they revealed vaguely human silhouettes, and he could hear snatches of conversation.

They were villagers carrying white candles!

Yu Xing felt a chill at his collar and down his back. He lingered near a few villagers for a while, and the conversations he overheard were mostly like this—

"Out to get some air?"

"Yeah. It's so stuffy at home. I came out for a breather."

"Did you hear? Xiaosheng's funeral is tomorrow."

"I did. I'll definitely go."

As he listened on, Yu Xing grew interested.

"A few outsiders came to the village today. The village chief's taking them around to find places to stay!"

"Really? Which lucky households got them?"

"Not sure. Maybe some of the families in the west of the village."

As he listened, a bold idea came to him.

Unfortunately, before he could do anything, he heard footsteps behind him. Then a young woman lowered her voice and asked, "San, what are you planning to do tonight?"

"Hm?" Yu Xing turned around. It was Xiao Xuechen, who had also wandered away from the group.

She and Yu Xing were both staying at the village chief's house tonight. She'd come to find him to discuss what they should do.

He lowered his head slightly to look at her. "What, you think the village chief's wife is going to gank you tonight?"

"...I think it's possible. She... She didn't look at me in a very friendly way. I think I'll be her first target." Xiao Xuechen wore no makeup. Her curls fell loosely around her face, and she looked composed. She hadn't even forgotten the nature of this Deduction, either. "San, you're a painter. I don't know if you believe there are things in this world that science can't explain. Wei Gong and I... We're actually from the Weird Event Investigation Studio."

"Oh?" Yu Xing looked at her with a knowing smile.

"Maybe you don't believe in this sort of thing." Xiao Xuechen thought that no Deduction Player could fail to believe in it, but for the sake of her character's logic, she still had to explain it seriously!

"Wei Gong and I came here because someone asked us to investigate the strange events in this village. Also, from what we've learned, Ju Lan's so-called boyfriend is actually an investigator like us. He went missing during the last mission, and I have reason to believe Ju Lan is one of our colleagues." Xiao Xuechen was being quite generous. By saying this, she was effectively revealing that she, Wei Gong, and Ju Lan were all veteran players.

Yu Xing said, "So?"

"So if you're also here under a false identity to investigate, please help me tonight—"

"Ah, I really am just a painter." Yu Xing looked innocently at the stunned young woman. "How can I help? At most, if you're scared, I can hold you while we sleep?"

Sorry, the little devil inside him was itching to get out. He couldn't resist teasing his dear teammate.