Rose Manor (19): Innocent Murder

Zou Yan stood outside Room 2 for five minutes, but she did not receive a response from Lin Chen.

It was as if the room had been empty all along.

Yet, she clearly remembered that Lin Chen had entered the room and never come back out.

In her years as a psychologist, Zou Yan had accumulated a wealth of experience; a brief interaction was usually enough for her to discern a person's character. She knew Lin Chen lacked initiative and cunning, and was prone to being soft-hearted and playing the good guy. Generally speaking, he was the type who would never stand by and watch someone die.

Where exactly had things gone wrong? Did he know something?

Zou Yan's gaze narrowed, a faint scent of what could be called a "variable" drifting into her mind.

She felt a flicker of unease, but upon seeing her right arm, which was wrapped in thick vines, her composure quickly returned.

It was fine. She had already grasped the greatest secret of this instance. Even if she couldn't kill Lin Chen, killing someone else would serve the same purpose...

It was a pity, though. Qi Si was clearly the type of person best suited for the Eerie Game. Since he refused to accept her olive branch, he would simply have to die.

Having made her decision, Zou Yan turned and headed toward the staircase.

Inside the room, Lin Chen's palms were slick with sticky sweat, making it nearly impossible to grip the slippery key. He listened to the footsteps outside fading away and let out a sigh of relief.

Zou Yan was definitely suspicious; it was a good thing he hadn't opened the door...

Was this what the Eerie Game was like? One had to remain vigilant at all times; even when dealing with fellow humans, one could not trust anyone...

Lin Chen felt as if he had realized something, and cracks began to form in the cognitive barriers shaped over the past twenty years.

He took a deep breath, exhaling slowly, and was just about to retreat to the bed when a knock sounded on the door once more.

Miss Anna's voice drifted in from outside: "Is anyone there? Could you please open the door?"

Lin Chen's hair stood on end, and he could no longer suppress the urge to vent internally: Why are you all picking on me? Do I really look that easy to fool? At least try a better routine, for heaven's sake!

On the third floor, Qi Si paused at the top of the stairs, standing behind the railing to peer downward.

Black-green vines snaked along the handrails on both sides, slicing his view of the floor below into jagged segments. Through the gaps between the branches and leaves, the path ahead was obscured, leaving him to guess at the shadows lurking in the gloom.

Qi Si clicked his tongue twice. "It's a real shame not to set an ambush in terrain like this. Do you think someone might be waiting down there to block us?"

Chang Xu understood what he meant.

The two of them had already spent an hour on the third floor, and there was no telling what kind of variables might have occurred downstairs.

The appearance of the Eye of Hermes suggested, at the very least, that either Zou Yan or Ye Zi was a veteran player who had their information at their fingertips.

An hour was more than enough time to set a trap.

"Lend me a blade." Chang Xu looked at Qi Si, his tone matter-of-fact. "I've trained; the weapon will be put to better use in my hands."

Handing a weapon to someone else was the height of stupidity, especially when trust was so precarious.

Qi Si pretended not to hear him. He drew a blade from his wristband, held it between his fingers, and took a half-step back, signaling for Chang Xu to take the lead.

He added a blatant dose of moral coercion for good measure: "Brother Chang, those with the most ability should take on the most work. I've always admired the police profession—the rest of this path is up to you."

Chang Xu glanced at him, noncommittal, then reached out to brush aside the vines on either side of the stairs and walked ahead.

Qi Si followed half a step behind, maintaining a distance that allowed him to both attack and retreat as needed.

After the preceding series of events, the cooperative relationship between the two was hanging by a thread.

Under the "survival of the fittest" mechanism of the Eerie Game, there was little trust to be found between players to begin with. Qi Si and Chang Xu's brief cooperation was merely a matter of mutual convenience.

Because of Shen Ming's death, Chang Xu had faced a crisis of trust, making it difficult to find allies. He naturally lacked the information needed to decipher the instance's worldview and required deeper exploration.

Qi Si had little understanding of the Eerie Game, and his combat prowess was nothing to write home about; he desperately needed a capable fighter to act as a meat shield during exploration.

For the exploration of the third floor, they had been the most suitable partners.

But now that the exploration was over, their cooperation seemed less important. Furthermore, Qi Si had openly admitted to withholding information on several key points...

Though Chang Xu was somewhat slow in social matters, he was not stupid. He was gradually coming to his senses, realizing that his initial status as a target for everyone seemed to have been influenced by Qi Si's words guiding the other players' thoughts...

By now, he had mentally labeled Qi Si as "not a good person." He would let it slide for this instance, but if they ever met again, he would never believe a single word this man said!

The staircase was not long, and even with the obstruction of the vines, it was not difficult to navigate.

Rounding the corner, the scene on the second floor came into view. Unlike the third floor, where vegetation grew wildly, the corridor on the second floor was clean and clear, like the calm before a storm.

Whether it was because Chang Xu had slowed his pace or some other reason, the distance between him and Qi Si grew smaller and smaller, until they were only half a step apart—close enough to touch with a single reach.

"Chang Xu! Qi Si! Ye Zi is trying to kill me, please save me..."

From behind the cover of the vines, Zou Yan appeared, her white windbreaker stained with reddish-brown blood. She ran toward the staircase in a panic, her voice sounding wretched.

Qi Si looked at her right hand, which she was hiding behind her back, and gave a mocking laugh. "Didn't you already kill Ye Zi? What is this performance? Are you being haunted by a vengeful spirit?"

Zou Yan froze for only a second before the look of surprise vanished from her face.

It was no surprise that her disguise had been seen through. Even if she had lost the chance for a sneak attack, she wouldn't necessarily be at a disadvantage in a direct confrontation.

Zou Yan knew the average strength of the players in the novice pool, and she knew exactly what she was capable of.

She slowly lowered her right hand, and dense clusters of vines erupted from the veins in her arm.

"My apologies, I was just guessing. I didn't expect you to expose yourself." Seeing this, the smile on Qi Si's face grew even wider.

Ye Zi was already dead, yet the photograph in the second room on the third floor did not display her face. Did this mean Miss Anna was not omniscient within this instance?

The guests who had been snatched from the air and dropped into the manor appeared to be at a disadvantage, but that did not necessarily mean there was no possibility of breaking the deadlock.

Qi Si observed Zou Yan's performance and recited softly, "My chest decays, flesh and blood spread upon the ground, roses dwell within, tomorrow they shall endure with me..."

"So, letting roses merge with one's own flesh and blood is the price to exchange for power comparable to a ghost? So that was the meaning behind those four lines of poetry. My thanks to you for testing it out for me..."

Zou Yan still did not speak. In an instant, she erupted with a speed that did not belong to a human, rushing to the staircase in a few strides and raising her right hand toward Qi Si.

The nourishment of flesh and blood provided soil for eerie growth; vines grew wildly in the corridor, clawing and brandishing.

The crisis triggered an intuitive warning. Chang Xu reflexively arched his back and clenched his fists, adopting a leopard-like attack stance, ready to strike.

He had been different from others since he was young, born with the ability to suppress certain anomalies, and those people had always intentionally cultivated him into a machine for dealing with the supernatural.

Even if Zou Yan had already grasped some of the anomalous power within this instance, he might not be without the strength to fight...

Chang Xu fell into an unusual state of focus; Zou Yan's figure split into views and slices from various angles before his eyes. He found the right angle, pushed off the ground, and lunged forward.

However, the next second, he felt a chill at the back of his neck, followed by the incredibly vivid pain of a blade slicing open his artery...

His pupils dilated and then contracted; Chang Xu realized belatedly what had just happened.

Warm blood sprayed out, soaking his neck and collar, but what followed was a coldness like falling into an ice cellar.

Death pressed in step by step, the outcome impossible to reverse...

Amidst his scattered consciousness, he heard Qi Si's smiling voice: "As expected of a trained fighter, your carotid artery is much more prominent than an ordinary person's."

The voice was so light and airy that it triggered his primal instinct of a beast facing a natural predator. He knelt powerlessly to the ground, struggling to turn his head.

In the dim light, a fresh layer of blood had splattered onto the young man's already blood-stained white shirt.

The killer used his finger to gently wipe the blood from the side of the blade, his smile becoming even more innocent and harmless, as if someone else had been the one to strike: "My apologies, Brother Chang, I'll have to trouble you to die once first."

He paused, adding in a joking tone: "But considering that you likely won't remember what happened during this time later, I'll skip the long-winded apology."

Still that same insufferably boring sense of humor...

Chang Xu did not know what kind of emotions he should be feeling. Anger, hatred, or unwillingness? Or perhaps, like in the past, indifferent and detached, without joy or sorrow?

All he could feel at this moment was the exhaustion urging him to sleep, as if he were being submerged in a stagnant Dead Sea.

He took one last look at Qi Si, finally drained of his last ounce of strength, his head drooping as he closed his eyes.