Trial

Jiang Qian's expression gradually turned cold.

It was not because of the subtitles appearing on the screen, but because the moment he sat down, he felt a wave of dizziness for no apparent reason.

This sense of vertigo was highly suspicious.

If he had to describe it... it was as if a certain region of his brain had suffered a concussion, with many images from his memories surging forth and dissipating rapidly. His Memory Palace, where massive amounts of data were usually neatly filed, flickered in and out of reach.

Jiang Qian raised a hand to press against his temple until the dizziness faded.

By then, the subtitles on the screen had vanished.

The feature presentation began.

Jiang Qian looked up, focusing on the screen.

In the high-definition footage, the back of a young boy appeared.

He was squatting in a corner, his hands busy moving up and down; his movements looked just like someone practicing how to cook.

He was focused, clearly enjoying himself.

The camera zoomed in, revealing the ingredients he was so fond of: it was a roasted rat.

The charred outline hung hideously between the gaps of a few bricks, two thick wires piercing its plump body to suspend it over the fire.

The smell of burnt fur mixed with the savory aroma of roasted meat drifted into his nostrils without warning, causing Jiang Qian's pupils to contract slightly.

At the same time, he was able to confirm that what this screening room was playing was indeed a segment of his memories from after he turned eight.

The images in his memory were playing in the form of a film on the screen, while other sensory memories, such as smell and taste, acted directly upon him.

The effect was that although Jiang Qian sat in the audience, he felt as if he were "in the play."

He silently clenched his fists.

"Jiang Qian, what are you doing?"

A voice suppressing anger came from behind the young Jiang Qian, causing him to instinctively drop the skewer and quickly turn to face the source of the sound.

Opposite the young Jiang Qian stood a big boy a head taller than him.

His skin was two shades darker than Jiang Qian's, his features already showing sharp angles, his build sturdy and tall. It was none other than Jiang Qian's older brother, Jiang Yang!

Jiang Yang was six years older than Jiang Qian. Jiang Qian was eight, and Jiang Yang was about fourteen.

At the time, Jiang Yang was still a brash, unruly bad boy, a tough character rumored throughout the school.

But in his younger brother's eyes, it was all just for show.

Jiang Yang's gaze moved past the young Jiang Qian and saw the charred rat; his expression was clearly shocked, and the corner of his mouth even twitched.

Then, he squeezed out an ugly smile: "Yo, the food is pretty good today, huh? It's cooked."

"Crispy on the outside, tender on the inside. Want a taste?" The young Jiang Qian pointed to the side, where six or seven freshly roasted rat pups lay in a row.

The atmosphere instantly became tense.

But both brothers knew very well that these things were not meant for eating.

For Jiang Qian during that period, small animals were like his toys, and roasting rats was just a hobby.

But this hobby was not appreciated by his older brother.

"...You freak!"

In the next instant, Jiang Yang rushed over, shoved his brother down with brute force, and followed up with a flurry of punches and kicks.

Every pair of brothers would argue and have conflicts; such disputes were inevitable under the same roof, especially when they were young.

But even when they did get into a fight, people usually held back somewhat and wouldn't go for the kill.

However, Jiang Yang's violent behavior had clearly crossed the line.

He didn't look like he was disciplining his brother; it looked more like... he was using force to purge the "devil inside" his brother's body.

This was Jiang Qian's true memory.

The pain gathered from all over his body to his central nervous system, so real it was almost nauseating.

Jiang Qian sat in the sofa with a calm face, but his palms were clenched into fists, his nails digging deep into his flesh.

On the screen, Jiang Yang, having finished venting his violence, grabbed his brother by the collar and pinned him against the concrete wall of the warehouse, warning him word for word: "If I catch you doing this one more time, I'll chop off those dirty hands of yours."

Looking at his brother's gritted teeth, the young Jiang Qian's slightly pale face showed no fear.

"Did you hear me? Did you hear me?!" Jiang Yang shook his brother by the collar.

It was as if he were using rage to cover up his own panic.

Finally, a trace of a smile broke out on the young Jiang Qian's bruised corner of his mouth.

"What kind of expression is that, you brat? I'm beating the hell out of you!" Jiang Yang's eye twitched with anger, and the hand gripping the collar trembled slightly.

"You'd better chop me up right now, or kill me, otherwise don't mess with me."

"What?" Jiang Yang seemed not to have understood.

"I said, brother, do you dare to chop me up?"

"Damn it, Jiang Qian... what does that mean?! You want to go down with me?" Jiang Yang became increasingly hysterical. "Do you even have the ability?"

"You have to sleep sometime," the young Jiang Qian said calmly.

Hearing this, Jiang Yang's expression turned to one of bewilderment.

Then came hesitation.

Finally, the hand gripping Jiang Qian's collar even showed signs of loosening...

However, immediately after, Jiang Yang's hands tightened abruptly, his pupils freezing!

"Damn it... Jiang Qian, you really don't want to live anymore, do you?!"

In the next scene, the young Jiang Qian was pushed to the ground.

Jiang Yang stepped over him, kicked over the "stove" his brother had rigged up, and stomped it viciously until it was extinguished, the crispy rats inevitably crushed into a pulp.

Not only that, he rushed into the warehouse and dug out stacks of small animal specimens... those creatures that had been killed but still retained their original appearance were completely smashed to pieces under Jiang Yang's trampling.

Seeing this, the young Jiang Qian lunged like a bullet, and the brothers began to brawl again.

The images switched amidst the escalating violence.

This was the first time the conflict between the brothers Jiang Qian and Jiang Yang had escalated, a clash of wills—one using violent discipline, the other refusing to bend.

Jiang Qian sat on the sofa with his body tense, and only when the images of the violent conflict on the screen cut away did he slowly loosen his white-knuckled hands.

This memory, including all the physical sensations within it, was fed back to him simultaneously; the pressure was imaginable.

Fortunately, Jiang Yang wasn't that old back then, otherwise, my state right now would be much worse... Jiang Qian thought to himself.

He flexed his hands, which were stiff and numb from being clenched for so long, while his memory footage continued to play.

The Jiang Qian on the screen had grown into a young man in the blink of an eye.

That day, he returned home, carefully locked the door, and placed the items hidden in his backpack on the desk one by one:

Sleeping pills, piano wire, gloves, a boning knife, and a powerful cleaning agent.

Jiang Qian on the sofa became increasingly focused.

The high-definition memory was being fed into his sight exactly as it happened.

Jiang Qian watched the screen, watching himself put on gloves and begin to carefully crush the entire bottle of sleeping pills. An indescribable sense of burning anxiety slowly exploded in his chest.

Subsequently, the lights in the screening room suddenly dimmed.

The scene on the screen vanished abruptly.

The space before him twisted and folded, and when it unfolded again, he had arrived at a solemn and grave courtroom!

Trial officials wearing black robes and masks sat high above.

The sofa Jiang Qian had been sitting on had somehow turned into a prisoner's iron bench, his hands and feet fixed by iron rings, unable to break free.

The piece of rebar he had brought in earlier was also gone...

At this moment, a powerful voice pierced the silence, announcing from on high:

"Criminal suspect Jiang Qian, you are charged with the murder of your brother, destruction of evidence, and concealment of crimes. Following a court investigation, the case is confirmed. The trial proceedings now begin."

This voice came from the Chief Judge sitting in the high seat, wearing a scarlet mask, his voice suppressing indignation:

"Public Prosecutor, please present the case!"

As the words fell, another black-robed man wearing a gray mask stood up: "Thank you, Chief Judge. I must say, this case has refreshed my new understanding of the evil of human nature."

As the case introduction began, the television screen on the side of the courtroom continued to play the memory content that had just been interrupted, perfectly achieving audio-visual synchronization.

"On July 9, 2017, the criminal suspect Jiang Qian returned home from school early with the murder weapon, prepared to commit the crime. He was only 14 years old that year."

The Public Prosecutor paused, his face wrapped in the gray mask slowly turning toward Jiang Qian.

Although the other party wore a mask and his facial expressions were unclear, Jiang Qian could still feel a suffocating sense of oppression.

At the same time, the sound of iron chains rubbing together rang out above his head.

Jiang Qian instinctively looked up at the sound, only to find a giant, blood-stained iron axe hanging high above him!

The giant axe's blade was gleaming, as if ready to decapitate the guilty at any moment.

At that moment, Jiang Qian felt his heart, which had always been steady and composed, showing signs of accelerating.

"The course of the case is exactly as in your own memory..."

"First, you injected the dissolved sleeping pills into juice, prepared in advance in the kitchen. Then, using physical discomfort as an excuse, you avoided dinner. That night, the family members who drank the juice all fell asleep early."

"At that time, you and Jiang Yang shared a room. After confirming that your brother had fallen into a deep sleep due to the drug, you used the prepared piano wire to strangle his neck, resulting in his death."

As the gray mask spoke, the giant axe hanging above Jiang Qian's head dropped suddenly by a large margin, the sound of the iron chains grating and harsh.

It was as if it couldn't wait to punish an evildoer.

"Afterward, you used the prepared boning knife to dismember your brother at home and cleaned up the scene by yourself."

"Your movements were precise and skillful; we speculate that you possessed certain anatomical knowledge and experience. The cleanup of the scene was also done carefully enough to leave no obvious traces."

The giant axe descended again!

The sharp axe blade hung a mere three feet above Jiang Qian's head.

"Afterward, you used your brother's phone to forge text messages claiming he had left home for a trip, sending them to key family members to cover up the actual time of the crime."

"You utilized the time before the police intervened to dispose of the murder weapon and the body in batches at various trash collection sites throughout Jinping City."

"It is a pity that this evidence can no longer be recovered..."

The giant axe descended all the way down this time, stopping just barely as it grazed the back of Jiang Qian's neck!

He was forced to hunch over the interrogation table just to narrowly dodge the lethal blow.

Seeing this, the Gray Mask sighed sorrowfully, "Ah, to commit such a grave crime at such an age—it is truly unimaginable."

As he spoke in his capacity as the Public Prosecutor, the corresponding scenes played out in Jiang Qian's memories.

The statement matched the memories perfectly.

This was indeed his memory, even if he could not recall the specific time or the cause and effect of this event for the moment.

Pinned to the interrogation chair by the giant axe, Jiang Qian's face turned slightly pale, his fingers clenching tight.

The statement of the case concluded.

The Chief Judge, wearing a scarlet mask, roared in the courtroom, "Criminal suspect Jiang Qian, what else do you have to say regarding the above crimes?!"

The shout was like a thunderclap, pressing the atmosphere of the scene to the breaking point.

At the same time, the giant axe hanging over Jiang Qian's head seemed to possess a life of its own, stirring faintly as if ready to crush his skull with its blade at any moment.

[Judgment moment, please make a choice]

[Choose to plead guilty: Sacrifice your sinful hands to the Court of Truth]

[Choose to overturn the case and defend: You have a certain chance of successfully clearing your name, but it is more likely that you will lose your life on the spot]

"?"

The dungeon provided a prompt that only Jiang Qian could hear.

This clearly did not conform to normal trial procedures, but the dungeon world had its own rules of operation.

The Gray Mask stepped forward simultaneously, his tone sinister, "You deserve to die. But if you admit your guilt and repent sincerely, the Court of Truth guarantees you will receive a deserved sentence reduction. So, I will ask you one last time: do you plead guilty?"

"I..."

Jiang Qian's chest heaved as he sat in the interrogation chair, appearing to be under immense pressure.

The psychological motives and the memories that fit the case details perfectly all pointed the blame at him; it seemed there was no possibility of defense or exoneration.

He had personally planned and killed his brother.

The motive was clear, the means of the crime cruel; once he accepted the judgment, his hands would have to remain here.

The Chief Judge's stern voice came through the scarlet mask once more, "Jiang Qian, do you plead guilty?"

A bead of cold sweat slid down Jiang Qian's temple.

"I do not."

He raised his head, his bloodshot eyes staring straight into the Chief Judge's scarlet mask, "Jiang Yang's disappearance has nothing to do with me."