Beginner Edition · Class Reunion (Twenty

[But how were they supposed to stop Brother Hao from calling the police?]

Who was Brother Hao?

He was the school bully who had bullied Doctor Zhen back in school. After being expelled, Brother Hao had not turned over a new leaf. Instead, he had promptly joined the underworld and was now the organization's leader. Lawyer Jin had been set up by Ying De and, half-willingly, become the organization's legal adviser, handling unjust cases for important members, including the second-in-command. Meanwhile, the organization's second-in-command had just been imprisoned after being reported for drug use and trafficking...

In short, Brother Hao was a man who did every kind of evil, and he had once been classmates with everyone present, including the deceased.

This newbie scenario was called "Class Reunion," which could not have been more fitting.

Brother Hao had also loaned Ying De, the deceased, money at usurious rates. The night before, Ying De had called Brother Hao and sworn that he would soon repay the principal and interest. Unfortunately, things had not gone his way. Ying De had turned around and died miserably in the guesthouse. After receiving the news, Brother Hao had trapped Doctor Zhen and the others in the villa as well, threatening to burn them all alive unless they handed over the real killer within two days.

Obviously, Brother Hao's true goal was not to avenge Ying De's death. What he wanted most was probably money—or perhaps he had some other purpose.

Yet he had gone to such lengths to trap them here. There was an inexplicable contradiction in the logic behind his actions...

"Besides, don't you think Brother Hao showed up too quickly?" Although all this could be forcibly explained as the creator finding a reasonable excuse to gather them together to solve the case, Zhen Liu instinctively felt that things would not be so simple. "Who administered the sedative, and why? That's another question with no answer."

They had always suspected the deceased, but why would the deceased have done it?

Second-generation Zhao had checked his mission against the narration that had appeared when the deceased was first discovered, confirming that Zhen Liu had not lied to him. The main mission clearly stated that they had to hand the true killer over to the police, but the initial narration had said that Brother Hao, the loan shark boss, was furious and had given them two days to hand over the murderer.

They seemed like the same thing, but upon closer thought, they were completely different—indeed, they were diametrically opposed.

"Let's discuss this together." There was no longer any need to exclude Lawyer Jin. Zhen Liu said to Second-generation Zhao, "Many hands make light work. Only by pooling our wisdom can we find a way out."

Second-generation Zhao stared at Zhen Liu for a long time before finally nodding with difficulty. He had compromised.

After stubbornly holding out more than ten times, he had actually been persuaded.

[Oh my god, why am I suddenly a little moved?]

[Unity is strength!]

[Their current goal is to save themselves from Brother Hao first, then deal with everything else.]

[I hope this time there can be a different ending.]

[There definitely will be!]

After leaving the Black Room, Zhen Liu explained everything to Jin Zhuang, the only one still out of the loop.

Jin Zhuang was an experienced player who had played many scenarios and encountered all kinds of situations. He immediately spoke from experience. "This game feels very real. Sometimes, I even think it might actually be real—just a case that happened in another country, one I happened not to know about. Brother Hao appearing so quickly could not possibly have been the game simply finding an excuse to forcibly gather us together."

If the game had given them any cheat abilities, they were probably that each of their phones could access the internet to look things up, and that they could directly obtain test results for blood and corpses.

If there really had been five people trapped with a corpse for two days, they would never have been able to conduct such a detailed investigation.

Of course, this cheat ability could only help players look things up. They could not contact the outside world, and calling the police was even more out of the question.

Second-generation Zhao and Basketball Qiao sat quietly there, listening to Zhen Liu and Jin Zhuang's analysis while recalling what had happened back then. The situation had indeed been like this.

The villa had been dark day and night. Ying De's corpse had remained in the room, gradually rotting and stinking as time passed. Basketball Qiao had not dared to sleep in his room on the first floor at night, but even so, they had still gritted their teeth and searched for evidence, trying to find the real killer, because they did not want to die.

But how could it have been that easy?

Not to mention that their mental states had collapsed back then, leaving them unable to stay calm. They had only been ordinary people. Without testing equipment, they could not obtain accurate information about everyone. How could they possibly find the murderer through words alone? Even in the end, they had not known the secrets each person was hiding.

In the end, Second-generation Zhao could only harden his heart and secretly discuss things with Basketball Qiao. Finding the real killer was already impossible, and there was no need to go through so much trouble. Since Brother Hao wanted someone, they could just hand one person over.

Who cared whether that person was really the killer?

The choice of who to hand over was easy—the lawyer.

On one hand, both Second-generation Zhao and Basketball Qiao hated the lawyer because of their mothers' deaths. On the other, the professor loved the doctor, and the doctor also knew that the professor was his ally. If they tried to forcibly push out either the doctor or the professor, they would certainly fail.

The professor and doctor shared the same concerns, so they ultimately agreed to Second-generation Zhao's proposal.

Four against one. Even though the lawyer realized that something was wrong and tried to resist, his resistance alone was insignificant. In the end, he was tied up and handed over to Brother Hao.

The four people left in the villa thought the nightmare was finally over, only to be burned alive inside the villa anyway.

This was probably karma, Basketball Qiao thought. Even if the lawyer really had handled an unjust case for the second-in-command, he should have been punished by the law, not pushed out by them to take the blame.

"But what exactly was Brother Hao trying to accomplish with all this?" Jin Zhuang muttered to himself. He could not understand this underworld boss. Lawyer Jin's character profile had not written much about Brother Hao either. All it said was that Brother Hao had been very happy lately—the kind of happiness that came from being about to make a fortune.