Chapter 17: Rose Manor (16) – Converging Clues

In the guest room on the Second Floor, Ye Zi’s corpse slid slowly to the floor, her eyes wide open in death.

Even in death, she couldn’t understand how Zou Yan had killed her in an instance where “only Ghosts can kill humans.”

Zou Yan withdrew her right hand. Her originally fair arm was covered in ugly vine-like patterns, and occasionally, plant tentacles would bore out from her blood vessels, blooming into tiny, bloody flower buds.

The process of turning into a Ghosts was confined to her arm. At her shoulder, an iron ring clamped down on her muscles, preventing the vines from spreading further.

【Name: Isolation Ring】

【Type: Item】

【Effect: Slows the process of eerie spread】

【Note: Faced with a pre-ordained ending, what use are fear and hesitation?】

This was an item specifically equipped for this instance.

Zou Yan’s purpose had been different from the other players from the very beginning; she was here to find something.

Now, with the task completed, it was time to end this instance.

Two people were already dead; she only needed to kill one more…

Zou Yan pushed the door open and headed toward the room at the very end of the hall.

She remembered that Lin Chen, who was staying inside, was a newcomer.

…

In the room on the Third Floor, objective time seemed to have come to a standstill. Chang Xu remained in a bent-over posture by the bed, rigid and silent. Suspended dust floated in the air, casting tiny shadows on the floor.

The light dimmed, and the surrounding scene turned yellow and curled like an old photograph in a fire. Qi Si felt as if he were in a massive opera house; the curtain rose, the organ played, and the millennia-old myth of Gilgamesh was being performed.

The tyrant Gilgamesh was one-third human and two-thirds divine. His cruelty caused public grievances to boil over, so the gods created Enkidu to keep him in check. Enkidu was one-third human and two-thirds beast, and looked exactly like Gilgamesh.

One represented the crazy and evil divinity, the other signified the gentle and righteous humanity. After a fierce battle, they became good friends and cherished each other. The tyrant was reformed, and together with Enkidu, they became heroes of ancient Babylon.

“He will become another you, your second self.” The figure in the black dress recited the lines with a rich tone, then suddenly leaped off the stage like a butterfly and took the hand of the girl in the red dress.

The two girls kissed each other affectionately, the kiss sliding from their cheeks to their lips, just like Adam and Eve eating the forbidden fruit, thus gaining wisdom and desire, distinguishing them from beasts.

Lightning flashed suddenly, its ghastly white light illuminating their faces. One was fair and beautiful, while the other was crossed by a hideous red birthmark.

Screams rang out—a mix of anxiety, worry, anger, and disbelief. The lights came on, and a man and a woman rushed over to separate the two girls.

This seemed to be a family banquet with few guests. The hosting couple scolded sharply: “Annie, you’ve gone too far! Go back to the attic!”

The girl in black with the birthmark on her face lowered her head, but she smiled softly. A cold declaration echoed through the ancient castle:

“I love my sister. I will die if I leave her. She loves me too; she promised me that we would never be separated.”

“Just because I was born ugly and my sister is beautiful, everything I do is wrong, and everything she does is right.”

The guests and the couple turned into black shadows. The girl didn’t seem to be talking to anyone; it was more like a monologue, issuing an accusation to the passing guests across time and space.

She touched the birthmark on her face, knowing she was ugly, while her twin sister was a symbol of beauty.

People are always attracted to qualities they don’t possess, mistaking it for love when it is actually lack; because of the lack, they become greedy, breeding desire.

A torrential rain was falling outside the ancient castle.

In the attic piled with clutter, the girl sat quietly, neither crying nor making a scene, watching gray-white spiderwebs crawl over rotting wood, while dust mixed with lice and fleas danced in the air.

In a dust-covered corner, a small Idol glowed with a clean, lustrous radiance. The face of the deity carved from stone was exquisite, breathtakingly beautiful.

It held its hands together against its chest, its lowered eyes gazing at the blood-colored rose carved from gemstones in its hands—evil, peaceful, and compassionate.

The girl crawled over on her knees and carefully picked up the Idol. The moment her fingers touched it, she heard the voice of the god.

The god asked: “I can feel your pain and taste your desires. Do you wish to pray to me?”

The god in red descended from the sky. Its scarlet eyes, brighter than roses, opened slightly. Its features were as if carved by the Creator, every inch beautiful to perfection.

That voice and that face seemed to have a magic that made people lower their guard. The girl felt not a shred of fear of the unknown; hope ignited in the depths of her heart, promising a turning point in her fate.

She looked at the god with envy and obsession and asked: “What use is prayer? I was born ugly. They say I am the reincarnation of a demon, and perhaps my existence is a mistake in itself.”

The god placed an index finger to its lips and said: “Beauty and ugliness, good and evil, are all sentient beings. The soul is hard to carve, but external things are not hard to decorate. If you crave beauty, plant roses throughout the attic, and everything will be as you wish from now on.”

The devil and the god are born together. People always think the beautiful one is the god and the ugly one is the Ghosts, not knowing that the god is eternal, and only the devil needs to use beauty to lure people into falling.

The girl agreed to the deal with the god. For countless days and nights that followed, she secretly ran out of the castle, took rose cuttings from the manor to the attic, filled the cracks in the floor with soil, and planted the cuttings in them.

Her hands were cut by the rose thorns, covered in wounds. Messy bloodstains seeped out, dripping onto the floor and flowing into curse-like runes.

In the dead of night, she often recalled the candy her sister gave her when she was young, and the stories she told her. The phantoms of the past shattered into mist. Only she sat alone in the attic, keeping company with the nameless, abruptly descended god.

Because she had experienced beauty, the pain was heart-wrenching; because she had once possessed it, her desire was insatiable.

She thought of her sister, who was now busy attending various banquets and no longer gave her a single glance; her parents kept her locked in the castle, their eyes filled with worry when they looked at her.

She said to the god: “I want to become as beautiful as my sister, so that no one will treat me as a demon. I will be able to be with my sister, and she will love me as I love her.”

The god picked up a fallen rose and said: “The rose is a symbol of beauty. I like the roses you plant. As a reward, you will receive beauty.”

As the rose vines crawled over the attic, the birthmark on the girl’s face faded, and her appearance, already similar to her sister’s, became even more like her.

She looked at her features in the mirror, unable to tell the difference, adopted the gentle expression her sister often wore, and kissed the mirror.

She liked this version of herself. She thought her sister would definitely like it too, just as she liked her sister like this. They were born together, they should be the same…

But her sister was no longer willing to see her, and the look in her parents’ eyes when they looked at her became increasingly fearful, as if they were looking at a demon crawling out of a mirror.

The demon crawled out of the attic on a rainy night, wandered around the castle, and eavesdropped on her parents’ conversation through the wooden door.

Her father said: “Annie’s behavior is getting stranger and stranger. I’m afraid she will hurt Anna one day… Should we ask a priest to take a look?”

Her mother hesitated: “We can’t let the priest come. Annie will be executed. Let’s watch her carefully; nothing will happen.”

Her father sighed: “Let Anna go to the countryside tomorrow. We will arrange a marriage for Anna as soon as possible, let them separate…”

The girl listened calmly, returned to the attic without joy or sorrow, and prayed before the god.

She said: “I want two people to die in a way that won’t arouse suspicion. For this, I am willing to pay any price.”

The god looked down at her: “Destruction is easy, but repairing is very troublesome.”

She said: “They fear me and want to leave me. If I don’t kill them, I will have nothing.”

The god agreed. The girl’s parents contracted an incurable disease and lost their voices in just three days.

Her sister didn’t have time to go to the countryside. Together with the girl, she held a funeral for their parents and promised that they would depend on each other for life from then on.

Everything seemed to be developing in the direction she hoped for. The girl was surprised to find that the god had not collected a price from her.

She rushed to the attic, passing by her parents’ bedroom, and saw the empty bed behind the wide-open door. Her heart felt as if a piece had been dug out.

She stopped outside the door, her beautiful face gradually weaving a childlike ignorance and confusion. She opened her mouth, seemingly wanting to say something, but couldn’t organize the exact words.

Rose petals drifted down from the attic, accumulating a shallow layer at her feet.

The girl stood silently alone until dusk, murmuring: “So quiet, so lonely.”

…

The scene dissipated before his eyes. Qi Si came back to his senses and found himself leaning against the wall. The two skeletons on the bed in front of him were gone, leaving only a pile of broken bone fragments.

Chang Xu was standing diligently to the side, trying to crush the bone fragments even further.

Seeing Qi Si looking at him with a strange expression, he explained: “You were just possessed by a nightmare. I deduced that the key was in the skeletons, so I smashed them.”

Although you are a combat-type player, isn’t this a bit too outrageous?

Qi Si was glad that he had adjusted his plan in time and did not continue to target Chang Xu, and even dragged this person onto his boat. He smiled inscrutably: “Brother Chang, being so skilled at dealing with Ghosts, you must be at least a veteran player, right?”

“Sure enough, on an occasion like a self-introduction, one shouldn’t expect anyone to tell the truth.”

“I didn’t lie to you.” Chang Xu shook his head, “My ability to counter Ghosts is innate and has nothing to do with the Eerie Game.”

“I see, I’m envious. It seems I will have to rely on you more in the future, Brother Chang.” Qi Si had no intention of arguing with anyone, smiled perfunctorily, and lowered his head to look at his hands.

The red dress in his arms was gone; clearly, it had been consumed as a plot item after triggering the event.

The paper he had fished out from under the pillow was also gone, leaving no trace, as if it had never existed.

He looked at Chang Xu: “If I’m not mistaken, there was a paper with clues under the pillow.”

Chang Xu had strong execution ability. The moment he said that, he reached under the pillow and took out the paper filled with text.

Qi Si leaned in, his eyes scanning the text on the paper:

【Anna and Annie were born at the same time…】

The content written on the paper was exactly the same as the previous one.

Another time loop?

If the previous time loop was just a conclusion inferred from the side by combining the movement of the hands on the pocket watch, then this time, it was a solid, personal experience.

Qi Si felt as if he had had a very, very long dream. In the dream, a blink was a thousand years of time. Countless thoughts flowed through his consciousness, leaving faint marks and impressions that seemed real yet false.

This feeling was very strange, as if it originated from the mechanism of the instance, and also as if it were a talent buried deep in his memory.

Chang Xu finished reading the content on the paper, handed it to Qi Si, and asked: “How did you know there was paper under the pillow?”

“I saw it.” Qi Si replied, “It seems like another time loop just happened. Of course, it’s also possible that I hallucinated.”

Based on the dog-blood love story he had deduced from the diary clues, he added some details and pieced together his recent experiences and observations.

Chang Xu raised his left hand to his neck, his eyes slightly fixed: “I feel that time in the Rose Manor has started to become chaotic. The time loop at 1:00 PM should be similar to a switch; once activated, the subsequent effects are uncontrollable.”

Qi Si had no intention of correcting his teammate’s guess. Anyway, no matter how outrageous the error, it didn’t affect its utility.

He raised his hand and knocked on his temple, scanning the few rules on the system interface from beginning to end.

The anomaly at 1:00 PM was undoubtedly the key to breaking the situation. The top priority was to figure out the triggering mechanism of the time loop.

But there were too few clues.

The only thing that could be certain was that the trigger of that time loop had something to do with Zou Yan or Ye Zi.

One of them had used an item, obtained the clue of the four-line poem from Chang Xu’s room, and immediately conducted an experiment.

The experiment was successful.