Cui Tang had no time to answer her. His eyes widened as he looked toward Che Quan, almost delirious with excitement. "So you're that new big shot who came out of nowhere and landed on the Heaven Ranking?!!!"
Xuan Shuhui paid little attention to rankings like those. She was also a newly selected player, so his words left her rather confused. "What Heaven Ranking...?"
Hearing the unfamiliar term, Che Quan also shifted his gaze idly toward Cui Tang.
Seeing this, Cui Tang hurriedly explained in excitement, "The Heaven Ranking is also called the Player Strength Rankings. It updates in real time and ranks players by their average overall strength based on their performance in each instance. So it doesn't distinguish between veteran and new players. That ranking is all about strength."
Xuan Shuhui was a little surprised. "There's even a ranking like that? What benefits do you get for making it onto the list?"
Cui Tang scratched his head. "I didn't look closely at the benefits... I think one of them lets you choose the instance difficulty? The harder the instance, the better the loot you get for clearing it."
As he spoke, Cui Tang looked exactly like a gaming geek obsessed with good equipment.
Xuan Shuhui silently pressed her lips together and thought, Oh... well, that's one benefit I don't envy in the slightest...
Besides, she had actually learned about the powerful little beauty through the [Anything Can Be Shipped] section of the Player Forum. Her survival instincts told her she absolutely must not let that slip.
Especially not in front of Che Quan himself.
After listening to Cui Tang, Che Quan was only somewhat interested in the part about being "ranked by strength."
He thought for a moment, opened his Virtual Panel, and found the Heaven Ranking among the rankings for a quick look.
Once he saw the rankings clearly, Che Quan couldn't help raising an eyebrow slightly.
-First place: Jiang Cong [Overall strength rating: 99.99... infinitely approaching the maximum] Tied for first place: Che Quan [Overall strength rating: 99.99... infinitely approaching the maximum]
He was actually tied for first with that guy?
Tch.
Che Quan couldn't quite describe how he felt.
But he suddenly remembered how delicious Jiang Cong's blood was.
Che Quan couldn't resist lightly running his tongue over the places where his fangs had once again hidden themselves.
If he could drink that guy's blood again, he supposed he wouldn't object.
That was what Che Quan thought to himself.
Suddenly, Xuan Shuhui's quiet, eager voice reached him.
"Um... could you please tell us how you knew it was Fu Na and not that strange man? There wasn't any evidence pointing to him as the possible murderer, but... but not finding evidence doesn't mean you can rule him out completely... Isn't that how it always goes in novels? The person who seems the most innocent and least likely to have done it often turns out to be the criminal."
Cui Tang nodded cautiously in agreement. "Exactly. When I first saw that this instance had a five-star puzzle difficulty, I figured there had to be some earth-shattering twist."
Though the two of them had barely found any evidence at all...
Hearing this, Che Quan glanced at each of them and said casually, "I think this instance is so difficult because the murderer kills too quickly."
She had killed two people in less than a day. If Jin Jiang hadn't run into him today, he probably wouldn't have escaped either.
Liao Zhiming, who lived across from Cui Tang, had also died early on.
As for Xuan Shuhui...
Che Quan suddenly thought to ask her, "That day in the Community Office, did Fu Na say anything to you when you were leaving?"
Caught off guard by the sudden question, Xuan Shuhui froze before thinking back. A few seconds later, she nodded.
"Yes. She asked if I could walk her home and keep her company for a chat. She said she was frightened whenever she thought about how there might be a murderer in the apartment building who had killed Yu Yan so brutally."
"You didn't go?" Cui Tang guessed curiously.
"No," Xuan Shuhui confirmed. "There was no way I was going. She looked really upset, but my life mattered more."
That was very much in keeping with Xuan Shuhui's personality.
She always remembered to leave herself a way out. She valued her life.
As for how Cui Tang had blundered his way into surviving, that was entirely because Fu Na hadn't gone completely mad yet and was still cunningly planning to keep a scapegoat around to cover up her crimes.
Che Quan pressed his lips together.
If not for those two things, there would probably have been two more corpses tonight.
As for why it wasn't the strange man...
Che Quan said, "The person who frantically pounded on the door of Room 201, where I was staying, that night was dressed exactly like that strange man."
How did he know? Through the surveillance monitor in Jiang Cong's hidden room, of course.
Che Quan's tone was indifferent, as though he were saying he'd had cucumbers for dinner.
But Cui Tang and Xuan Shuhui both froze at his words.
Cui Tang was baffled. "Then... someone that terrifying definitely had to be suspicious."
"Quite the opposite." Che Quan's denial was crisp and decisive. "I said the clothes were the same, not the height and build. Someone was disguised as that strange man."
Hearing this, Xuan Shuhui murmured, "No wonder... no wonder. I actually opened my door a crack back then and sneaked a look downstairs."
Xuan Shuhui lived in Room 301, so it was easy for her to run back inside.
Even as she described the scene, she was still so frightened that she trembled slightly.
"I was already being really quiet, but somehow that person still noticed me. They turned their head and looked up, straight at me, while still pounding frantically on the door. It was... I was absolutely terrified. After I went back inside, I held a kitchen knife to protect myself and spent points binge-watching funny videos for ages before I finally calmed down."
Listening gave Cui Tang goosebumps all over.
But Xuan Shuhui wasn't finished. She continued, "I thought that since I knew who he was, he'd definitely come to silence me. But that strange man never did anything. He even seemed not to recognize me, which I found really odd. Now that I think about it, no wonder 'he' didn't kill me right away. She must have wanted to use me to mislead everyone too. Too bad I didn't do what she wanted."
Che Quan nodded impassively in agreement.
With her theory confirmed by the expert, Xuan Shuhui's lingering fear faded without her noticing. She asked one last question.
"Then how did Fu Na push Kang He off the building? Why didn't Kang He call for help? Could it be-"
As she asked, Xuan Shuhui suddenly arrived at an answer herself, her eyes widening. "Could Fu Na have knocked Kang He unconscious before pushing her off? But then how could she still scream...?"
Che Quan pressed his lips together at this, raising his finely shaped brows slightly, his eyes thoughtful. For a moment, he had no idea how to explain such a simple question.
Fortunately, Cui Tang figured it out just then. He clapped his hands excitedly and asked Xuan Shuhui, "Were you all downstairs, stunned by a pool of blood at the time? And the character you were playing was just coming back from class?"
The question left Xuan Shuhui rather bewildered. "Y-yes. Why?"
Seeing that Xuan Shuhui still hadn't made the connection, Cui Tang hurriedly gave her another hint:
"And at the time, I'd been called over to Fu Na's place to help. She wanted me to fix her computer. That's my specialty, so I had it fixed in no time. But when I went to open the door and leave, I found it had been locked from the outside. I could only wait for Fu Na to come back. Later, she explained that she'd forgotten I was still there and accidentally locked me in."
Xuan Shuhui frowned, seeming to grasp something, but she was still a little dazed. "So?"
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