Was she guilty too?

Time slipped away bit by bit, like a countdown to death.

At last, music sounded over the broadcast. The sixth night was about to fall.

Luo Lingyue rose to her feet, her face pale. Her wounds had stopped bleeding, and Yin Chao stood beside her, his expression grave.

"Are we going to die?" Luo Lingyue asked.

Yin Chao turned toward her, a smile in his eyes. "Maybe we will, maybe we won't. It's a gamble."

With that, he walked over to Moqi Xinzhi and spoke in a voice only the two of them could hear. "I'll vote for Number 1."

Moqi Xinzhi gave no response, as though he hadn't heard him.

The next second, they appeared in the Judgment Hall once again.

This time, the discussion phase passed quickly. Everything seemed to be following a predetermined course-all they had to do was vote Yin Chao out, and the game would end.

Until the voting results were announced.

Four people had voted for The Gloomy Man, the Ares Guild member who had betrayed Earl the previous night. By contrast, only two had voted for Yin Chao.

The Gloomy Man stared at them in terror, glaring venomously at everyone before finally turning to ash in the flames.

"Judgment is over."

This time, the broadcast sounded a little hurried. It was different from the last time, as though it had been imbued with some "person's" emotions.

Yin Chao wasn't given another chance to meet Linmu alone. Instead, he returned straight to the classroom.

"What's going on? What's going on? Why did you vote for him?" Square Face shouted, breaking down.

He pointed at Yin Chao, demanding hoarsely, "Weren't we supposed to vote for him? The game would've ended if we voted him out!"

Moqi Xinzhi looked grim, his brow furrowed as he pondered something.

Yin Chao leaned casually against the charred wall. "If the goal is for the Werewolves to win, voting out you and Number 1 would end the game too."

"How is that possible? How is that possible? I made the right choice. I made the right choice..."

Square Face kept muttering, as though he had begun to lose his mind.

Yin Chao looked past him at Moqi Xinzhi on the other side. My gamble paid off.

He had been betting that his conclusion would shake Moqi Xinzhi. He had been betting on the man's suspicion and caution.

When Zhao Guojun received Moqi Xinzhi's signal to vote for Number 1, he had been utterly baffled too, but he had still chosen to follow his lead.

Still completely confused, Zhao Guojun was getting a headache from Square Face's racket. In a fit of anger, he knocked him unconscious with a chop of his hand.

"So fucking noisy."

After Zhao Guojun spat out that curse, no one else spoke. The abandoned classroom fell so quiet that they could hear Square Face's heavy breathing.

Accompanying his breaths was a series of barely perceptible rustles, like coarse fabric dragging across the floor.

The sound drew closer and closer, stopping outside the door.

Luo Lingyue was the first to sense that something was wrong. She looked warily at the charred door.

"Something's coming," she whispered.

The next second, the blackened door shattered. A Snake-Headed Man with scales stitched all over his face burst through it.

He was somewhat different from the other Ghost Monsters. The snake head that marked his identity wasn't made from a single piece of snakeskin sewn onto his face.

Instead, individual scales the size of fingernails had been stitched to fit the contours of his face, extending below his neck.

Each scale was ringed by ragged flaps of rotting flesh. The dense cluster made their own faces ache just looking at it.

He flicked out a long, forked tongue, his inhuman golden pupils narrowing into thin vertical slits.

"Snake-Headed Man?" Zhao Guojun wore an indescribable expression. "Holy shit, I have trypophobia. That's fucking disgusting!"

Hearing this, the Snake-Headed Man turned to stare at Zhao Guojun and let out a strange laugh.

Lizardlike claws slashed toward him, and Zhao Guojun barely dodged.

The wall behind him wasn't so lucky. The Snake-Headed Man's claws gouged a vicious gash into it.

"Run!"

Moqi Xinzhi snapped out of his daze and shouted.

They sprinted down the corridor outside the classroom. Yin Chao noticed that the space beyond the classroom seemed completely untouched by the fire, without a single trace of scorching.

It was as though some unknown force had sealed that blaze inside the classroom solely to punish the guilty.

After running a little farther, Yin Chao braced himself against the stair railing, panting hard.

Luo Lingyue glanced back at the pitch-black stairway and said between quiet gasps, "He hasn't followed us."

Zhao Guojun and Moqi Xinzhi, who had been running ahead of them, stopped as well.

Suddenly, everyone's system sounded a notification.

[Ding. Villager Yang Qi has died at the hands of a Ghost Monster. Four players remain: two Werewolves and two Special Roles. The game continues.]

"What's going on? All the Villagers are dead, and the game still isn't over?" Zhao Guojun's voice trembled. He whipped his head toward Yin Chao. "Do we have to kill all the Special Roles too?"

He looked rather frightening, like a drowning man struggling on the verge of death.

Yin Chao took two steps back, putting some distance between them before saying calmly, "I told you. Everyone misunderstood the rules from the very beginning."

Bewildered, Moqi Xinzhi sank to the floor in despair. "Then what's the point of this Werewolf game? Just to make us kill each other? A purple S-Rank Instance... We're all going to die here..."

The corners of Yin Chao's lips curled as he watched the two men sink into despair. Beside him, Luo Lingyue remained calm.

He reached out and tapped the railing. His fingernail struck the iron with two crisp clangs, drawing Zhao Guojun's and Moqi Xinzhi's attention back to him.

"The game is still going. So is the judgment," he said.

"What do you mean?" Zhao Guojun raised his eyes toward him.

The stairwell was dark, lit only by the cold, pale moonlight spilling through the high, narrow windows above them. Beam after beam pierced the thick darkness, falling across Yin Chao's profile.

He raised his slender, well-defined index finger to his lips, half concealed in darkness and half facing the moonlight.

"Judging the guilty-that should be the purpose of judgment."

The moment he finished speaking, "Für Elise" began to play. A new round of judgment was about to begin.

After the broadcast ended, the four of them gathered in the Judgment Hall. This time, there was no familiar instruction to close their eyes as night fell. In its place came a brief announcement: "Judgment begins."

The lights above everyone's heads came on. There were five beams in total.

Linmu sat beneath the extra beam.

Yin Chao smiled, savoring Linmu's twisted expression as he did.

"You're the first person who's thought of putting a Ghost Monster on trial," Linmu said bitterly.

Yin Chao gave no answer, quietly waiting for the elimination phase.

The final result was obvious. Linmu received four votes.

Flames danced over his body. He screamed and roared, struggling as his face shifted from one person's to another's.

At last, he gradually grew calm and took the form of a serene young girl. She smiled faintly, the two dimples at the corners of her mouth appearing and disappearing.

Her lips moved as she silently said, "I'm sorry. And thank you."

"Who is she?" Luo Lingyue asked as she watched.

Yin Chao nodded gently in response to the girl.

Only then did he answer Luo Lingyue's question. "She's Gao Louyu. She died because of other people's malice. After her death, she swore an oath to the Devil to kill those who were guilty."

Luo Lingyue looked puzzled. "So she was judged too?"

"Yes. Once you kill someone, you bear guilt."

At Yin Chao's words, Luo Lingyue grew nervous and silently clenched her fists.

Then she heard Yin Chao speak again. "Have you heard this saying? 'The world was murky from the start; sin and love sing the same song.'"