First RPG Session (Part 2)

"The game will officially begin in ten seconds."

Only then did Liu Xing realize that he seemed to be locked in place. He could move his eyes, but his body was completely beyond his control, and he could not speak.

"The game has begun!"

It felt as though his soul had returned to his body. Liu Xing regained control of himself.

Silence.

The four people seated around the table sized one another up. No one seemed inclined to speak first.

It was already fortunate enough that they had not needed to make a SAN Value check. SAN Value was the most important attribute for Players in a Cthulhu Mythos tabletop RPG. It could be understood as Sanity Value. Whenever a Player encountered something difficult to accept, such as a terrifying corpse, a Mythical Creature, magic, and so on, they would need to make a SAN Value check. Failing the check would permanently lower the character's SAN Value. When it reached zero, the character would fall into permanent insanity, which was equivalent to death. Losing more than five SAN Value in a short period of time would cause Temporary Insanity. The specifics could be looked up online, since explaining all those settings could fill an entire chapter. After something this unbelievable, who would be in the mood to chat with strangers?

But Liu Xing did not want to sit around and wait for death. Rather than nervously waiting for the one-hour Game Time to end, he would rather take the initiative and identify the possible cultist among the other three Players.

To find the cultist, he first had to start a conversation. Although Liu Xing had never played a Cthulhu Mythos RPG before, he had played plenty of online tabletop games such as Lights Out and Werewolf Game. He believed he had a good chance of catching the cultist in a verbal slip.

"I'm Old Chinese Doctor. In real life, I'm an ordinary Office Worker."

The background story they had been given had already explained that the four of them were online acquaintances, so Liu Xing directly revealed his game ID, along with the identity assigned to him in this game.

"I'm Shan He, a college student," said the man in the hat to his right.

"I'm Wu Gen Cao, the owner of a small company." The uncle on his left nodded to the others and smiled.

"My name is Bai Wan. I organized this exploration of the old house, and I'm a student at Modu No. 7 Middle School." The girl did not look up, and there was a slight tremor in her voice.

Liu Xing looked at the girl in confusion. A screen name like "Bai Wan" did not seem like something a girl would choose.

"Oh, Bai Wan. Since you organized this, you should know something about this old house, right?" Liu Xing looked at the girl. He had already decided that she probably held a key clue. In a Cthulhu Mythos tabletop RPG, each Player received different information at the beginning based on their identity. For example, as the organizer of this expedition, Bai Wan would certainly have more information.

Meanwhile, Liu Xing's identity this time was merely that of an ordinary Office Worker, so he only knew the information from the game's background and nothing else.

Of course, Liu Xing had also begun to suspect that Bai Wan was the cultist. Since she had initiated this expedition, there was more than an eighty percent chance that she was the cultist.

At that moment, Wu Gen Cao suddenly cut in. "I probably know more than she does, because I witnessed the tragedy that happened in this old house ten years ago with my own eyes."

Wu Gen Cao recalled it for a moment before sighing. "Ten years ago, I lived next door to this old house. One night, I suddenly heard several screams coming from inside. I immediately called the police, but it was already too late. A family of three in the house had been brutally murdered. The criminal was later caught. He was the younger son's high school classmate. As for the motive, it seemed to have been some sort of romantic dispute."

Liu Xing could now be certain that this middle-aged man with the screen name Wu Gen Cao had participated in Cthulhu Mythos RPGs in real life before. The key to a Cthulhu Mythos RPG was immersion, which required Players to describe information learned from a third party as though they had experienced it firsthand. Wu Gen Cao's movements and narration had perfectly matched that requirement.

After hearing Wu Gen Cao's account, the girl immediately nodded. Liu Xing vaguely noticed what seemed to be a red necklace around her neck.

Bai Wan spoke up as well. "That's right. The suspect and the victims were both upperclassmen from our Modu No. 7 Middle School, so the case has become one of our school's biggest ghost stories. A few days ago, though, I heard from my classmates that there were many strange details surrounding the massacre, and this old house was often Haunted. That's why I organized this expedition online."

"Ding. Side Quest activated. Please uncover the story behind this massacre. Completing the Side Quest will allow you to end the game immediately and receive an evaluation bonus. Failure carries no penalty."

Liu Xing had not expected to trigger a Side Quest after just a few words. Fortunately, there was no penalty for failure, which reassured him greatly.

"I saw the news online too, and I even found some so-called crime scene photos. There are three in total, but I don't know whether they're real." As Shan He spoke, he took out his phone, fiddled with it for a moment, then handed it to Liu Xing and gestured for him to take a look.

Liu Xing took the phone. The screen displayed a rather blurry photo. Judging by the furnishings, it appeared to be a kitchen. A corpse lay on its back on the floor, though its face had been heavily mosaicked.

There was also a large hole torn open in the corpse's stomach, though this part had been covered with a shadow using Photoshop.

Liu Xing swiped across the touchscreen. The setting of the second photo had changed to a bedroom. A corpse lay on the bed, with a large bloodstain near its head. It looked as though the victim had died from a heavy blow to the head.

As for the final photo, it was likely taken in the living room where Liu Xing and the others currently were. The corpse sat in a chair, and its neck had clearly been torn open, causing its head to droop beside its shoulder at an impossible angle.

Despite the mosaic, Liu Xing noticed that the corpse had long hair. Its clothes somewhat resembled a school uniform, and its slender build suggested that it had been a young woman.

In other words, the family of three annihilated ten years ago consisted of two men and one woman?

Liu Xing handed the phone to Wu Gen Cao, and the case began to take shape in his mind.

"These photos are indeed real." Wu Gen Cao took only one glance before letting out a long sigh. "Although it's been ten years, I'm still certain that these are them."

With that, Wu Gen Cao stood up.

Liu Xing's heart stirred. Could Wu Gen Cao be the cultist? Was he planning to blow out the candle?

But Liu Xing quickly dismissed the thought. Blowing out the candle would take a full five seconds, which was enough time for him to stop Wu Gen Cao. Unless Wu Gen Cao wanted to walk straight into a trap, he would not choose this moment to blow out the candle.

"Here, your phone." Wu Gen Cao bent over and handed the phone back to Shan He.

"It's fine." Shan He stood up as well and took the phone.

Everything seemed perfectly natural.

Liu Xing reached out and pushed up a pair of nonexistent glasses. Staring at the candle, he fell into thought.

Liu Xing was someone who enjoyed challenges—courting death, really—and he had a certain obsessive streak. Since this Novice Room had triggered a Side Quest, he was definitely going to complete it. That was simply the self-discipline of someone with obsessive-compulsive tendencies.

So, after combining the game's background with the information provided by the other three, Liu Xing deduced quite a few things.

First, there might be three Mythical Creatures in this old house. However, their abilities appeared to be very limited, since a single candle could currently restrict their movements.

Second, according to the Main Quest requirements, there should be no difficulty in clearing the game if he simply guarded the candle. However, since the Side Quest had been triggered so easily, the evaluation for clearing the game by merely guarding the candle would probably be very low. Therefore, the focus of this game lay in the Side Quest. If Liu Xing wanted the attributes on his First Character Card to look better and wanted to survive longer in future Cthulhu Mythos RPGs, he had to complete this Side Quest.

Third, the other three Players all possessed clues related to the Side Quest. Why did he have none? Had he simply failed to find them?

Thinking of that third point, Liu Xing began searching his pockets. He found only a wallet and a phone.

The phone was one of the great phones of its day, a Nokia 5230. Liu Xing remembered using one himself back in high school.

Looks like this Office Worker is pretty down on his luck, still using such an ancient phone. But it looks brand-new. I wonder where he even bought such an antique.

Liu Xing awkwardly turned on the phone and discovered that it contained only a few built-in Nokia apps. It did not even have QQ.

Furthermore, the phone showed no signal at all, crushing Liu Xing's plan to look up information online. He could only open the contact list.

The contacts were all phone numbers he did not recognize. However, in the call log, Liu Xing discovered that the most recent call had come from Shan He an hour ago and had lasted twelve seconds.

"Shan He, we talked on the phone an hour ago. What did we say then? Why can't I remember anything?" Liu Xing looked at his phone, and a bold guess formed in his mind.

"Oh, I remember. I asked why you still hadn't arrived. You were already ten minutes late, and Wu Gen Cao, Bai Wan, and I were all waiting at the entrance," Shan He replied without hesitation.

"Ah, no wonder it only lasted twelve seconds." Liu Xing smiled as he answered, while continuing to search his phone for clues.

There were several hundred messages from over a dozen contacts in the text messages.

Liu Xing felt that there should be plenty of important information there, so he began reading them one by one, word by word.

Sure enough, Liu Xing found a message sent by his "girlfriend" two days earlier.

"Darling, I put the protective talisman I got for you at Longhua Temple in your wallet. Don't lose it. I heard this talisman is very effective and can ward off all evil."

Liu Xing opened his wallet. Sure enough, there was a talisman inside, and it bore a familiar symbol—the Elder Sign!