"The cleverest way to play the game is to stay behind the scenes, observing and probing, gathering as much information as possible while everyone else remains oblivious."
"Sister Zou, this isn't your second time in a game instance, is it? A newcomer wouldn't have an item like that. You're a veteran who spent points to choose this instance, aren't you?"
After time rewound, Zou Yan smiled at Ye Zi in Guest Room No. 1. "You're no ordinary player either, are you? You and Shen Ming are both with the Sariel Guild, aren't you?"
The moment the words "Sariel Guild" left her lips, Ye Zi's eyes widened. For the first time since entering the instance, she truly lost her composure.
She parted her lips and asked with a forced smile, "Sister Zou, how did you figure that out? Could you tell me?"
Zou Yan's smile deepened, but she sighed. "He didn't tell you, and you never bothered to find out for yourself. You still don't know what 'teaming up' means in this game, do you?"
Ye Zi remembered how, before entering the game, Shen Ming had repeatedly warned her not to reveal that they knew each other.
She had assumed it was so they could put on a double act. So, as soon as she learned that Zou Yan wanted to work with her, she had immediately put Shen Ming on the table as a bargaining chip.
Could it be...
"How amusing. You're clearly cut from the same cloth, yet you each play a different role in front of the other, both thinking the other is some fool who's easy to control and exploit."
Zou Yan chuckled softly, then suddenly took Ye Zi's right hand with gentle warmth and lightly pressed on her little finger.
A black ring slowly emerged on Ye Zi's once-smooth, fair knuckle. A butterfly in relief decorated its surface, though at another glance it looked like the letter S.
Zou Yan slipped the Black Ring off the girl's finger. During the process, Ye Zi couldn't move at all. All she could do was stare in fury, a hoarse "heh, heh" escaping her throat.
A loud chime rang outside the door. It was one in the afternoon.
Zou Yan tilted her head, studying the fear in Ye Zi's eyes. With a smile, she laid her hand over Ye Zi's neck.
"God won't protect you."
"Shen Ming was with the Sariel Guild. Liu Qingye knew him, so I suspect she was with them too." Chang Xu reached out to push aside a vine in his way, his voice as calm as still water.
On the third floor of the castle, dark green tendrils burst through the floor at all four corners. Like crawling reptiles, they crept across the gray-black walls.
The thick plants teemed with life. They grew to the ceiling before their eyes, then drooped down to the floor, sealing off the entire level layer by layer.
Qi Si tried slicing a finger-thick vine with a razor blade. Green sap splashed onto his face and quickly hardened into fuzzy tendrils that burrowed into his skin.
He reached up to rip them off, but tore away a thin layer of skin along with them.
"These vines are interesting. You don't think the setup is that they can parasitize people, do you?" Qi Si put away the blade and, like Chang Xu, used his hands to clear a narrow path they could just barely squeeze through. "...How do you know Shen Ming was with the Sariel Guild?"
He had no idea what the Sariel Guild was, but from Chang Xu's matter-of-fact tone, it sounded well-known—something every veteran player would have heard of.
Chang Xu stopped and pulled a ring-shaped object from inside his clothes, holding it out for Qi Si to see.
It was a plain black ring, with a black butterfly twisted into the shape of an S set into its surface.
"I found this on Shen Ming. It's their insignia," Chang Xu explained. "The Sariel Guild is far ahead of the curve in its research into the Eerie Game. They can already make some items that can be brought into the game. This ring, for example, increases the odds of two people entering the same instance."
The Sariel Guild... So they could make items themselves?
A flicker passed through Qi Si's eyes as he gently stroked the bracelet on his right wrist.
Noticing his temporary teammate's curiosity, Chang Xu said flatly, "If you're interested in this kind of information, you can look it up on the forum. Pretty much everything that can be made public is there."
He thought of something and added, "The Sariel Guild has done a lot of evil. They're now a target for everyone. Forces on all sides are hunting them down, both in the game and in the real world. It's only a matter of time before they're uprooted."
...Is he worried I'll join this so-called Sariel Guild?
Qi Si raised an eyebrow at Chang Xu, hoping to stir things up. "Sounds like you must have had something to do with Shen Ming's death, Brother Chang."
Chang Xu looked at him in confusion. "What does that have to do with anything?"
"...Boring."
Beyond the vines, the door was shut tight, its rusty keyhole packed with dust.
Qi Si stepped forward, pulled a thin piece of wire from his bracelet, and inserted it into the keyhole to pick the lock.
A few seconds later, there was a click, and the lock opened.
Chang Xu, who had witnessed the whole thing, eyed him suspiciously. You call yourself a taxidermist?
"My father was a locksmith. I learned from him when I was little."
Qi Si put away the wire, stepped back, and smiled at Chang Xu. "Brother Chang, I'm a bit of a germophobe. I hope you understand."
Chang Xu glanced at the thick layer of dust on the doorknob. He didn't seem particularly suspicious, and pushed the door open as he led the way inside.
Qi Si waited leisurely for two seconds. When nothing happened, he followed at an unhurried pace.
The room looked as if no one had visited it in a very long time. As they entered, dust billowed up to meet them, along with the musty scent of what people called "the passage of time."
A large bed stood in the middle of the room. A quilt lay spread across it, covered in a thick layer of dust. The lumps beneath it suggested two people were lying there.
Qi Si stepped forward and lifted the quilt.
Two skeletons lay side by side beneath it, their bare bones sending a chill through him.
For a moment, the boundary between reality and the game blurred before his eyes. Countless memories he should have deliberately forgotten surged through his mind.
First the red dress beneath the bedsheet, then the skeletons beneath the quilt... He had to admit, Miss Anna's taste was uncannily similar to his.
After a long silence, Qi Si gave a low laugh. "These must be Miss Anna's parents."
Chang Xu stared at the stark white skeletons, the back of his neck prickling. He couldn't help asking, "How do you know?"
Qi Si's smile didn't fade. "If I say I guessed, will you believe me?"
Death was inevitable. The dead vanished without a sound, and only those left behind found it hard to accept. So they tried in vain to preserve the dead with all kinds of methods, deceiving themselves by letting them remain as they had been in life, as a memorial.
That was the meaning of taxidermy.
Qi Si straightened and looked down at the skeletons lying quietly on the bed.
Two seconds later, he gently reached beneath the pillow supporting one of the skeletons. Sure enough, he felt several slips of paper.
He pinched them between two fingers and drew them out. Lines of writing were clearly visible on them.
[Anna and Annie were born at the same time. According to an ancient legend, one of a pair of twins is born cursed. We don't believe in such things. They are both our beloved daughters, and all we want is for them to grow up happy.]
[Anna is always so obedient, while Annie is forever coming up with all sorts of strange ideas. She really is a handful.]
[Anna is getting more and more beautiful. She's so perfect, and she'll find happiness. Annie's behavior is getting stranger and stranger. We suspect she means to do something to Anna. We're having a party at home, so let's lock her in her room for the day.]
[The cat died. We found its body in Annie's room. She killed it and used its blood to draw all sorts of terrifying symbols on the walls. She's cursing us!]
[Our illness is getting worse. We're going to die... It must be Annie...]
The journal entry ended abruptly.
A teeth-grating creak suddenly came from the bed.
Qi Si snapped his eyes up. The two skeletons on the bed had somehow sat bolt upright, and both had turned to face him.
His fingertips brushed something damp. The black writing on the paper in his hand was turning red, inch by inch, as if blood were seeping through the page and running down it.
He let go, but the paper seemed stuck to his hand. No matter how hard he shook it, it wouldn't come off. The bloody letters sprouted tendrils that burrowed into his skin, like the roots of a rose.
Qi Si's pupils contracted.
Before you continue