Chapter 8: Rose Manor (7) The First Deceased

Qi Si savored the emotions behind the scream and, without changing his expression, stated the conclusion he already knew: “Someone is dead.”

“D-dead?” Lin Chen looked at Qi Si, his face pale. “Didn’t they say we didn’t have to open a single Blind Box?”

“Unfortunately, rational people only make up a minority of the group.” Qi Si pushed the door open and tilted his head slightly. “Lin Chen, interested in taking a look with me?”

He had seen many dead people, but encountering life and death in the Eerie Game was a novel experience.

He had always held a strong curiosity about death, and naturally considered the possibility of failing the clearance and dying. He was very curious about what it was like to die in the Eerie Game.

The moment he stepped out the door, the intense smell of blood rushed at him, briefly overpowering the floral scent. It mixed with the original nauseating fragrance in the air, creating a sickeningly sweet odor that clustered stickily around them.

Qi Si looked down. Just a few centimeters in front of his toes, a pool of paint-like blood was spread across the ground. It was semi-coagulated, its surface uneven like lava, lying lifelessly on the floor, barely avoiding staining his sole.

Lin Chen also saw the blood on the ground. The next second, he let out a high-pitched shriek, like a rooster whose neck had been stepped on.

He jumped up while screaming. If Qi Si hadn’t dodged in time, he would have been clinging to Qi Si right now.

“You go back first.” Qi Si stroked the bracelet on his right wrist, speaking as calmly as possible. “If you need to vomit, remember to clean it up yourself.”

Feeling as if he had been granted a great pardon, Lin Chen turned and rushed back into the room, followed by the sound of retching and vomiting.

The source of the blood was the center of the floor. A dark shadow lay there, surrounded by Zou Yan and Ye Zi, who were observing the object.

Qi Si carefully walked along the edge of the bloodstain and finally got a clear look at what was on the ground.

It was a mutilated, unrecognizable corpse, completely naked and curled into a ball. The surface skin was cut into small pieces by chaotic lines, and fuzzy tendrils, clearly plant roots and stems, grew out from the flesh.

Blooming roses spewed out from the corpse’s wide-open mouth. The thick stems and leaves attached to them plunged straight into the throat, making it look as if the head was being used as a flower pot.

Zou Yan and Ye Zi stood on either side, both relatively calm. Aside from the initial scream, whose source was unknown, there was no evidence to suggest their fear.

“Someone died on the very first night. I wonder what rule was broken. We haven’t even gotten many clues, and we’ve already lost a member so early on. This is truly terrible luck…”

Ye Zi examined the corpse, clicking her tongue in wonder. “This way of death, without even a complete body, is truly miserable.”

“The deceased is Brother Shen. Height 183–185 cm, medium build, which basically matches Brother Shen.” Qi Si made his judgment and agreed, “Yes, he certainly died a miserable death.”

Yesterday at the dinner table, after the self-introductions were complete, he had memorized the physical characteristics of all the players.

Coupled with the unique nature of his work, which gave him a certain sharp intuition regarding corpses, he could basically confirm that the dead person was Shen Ming.

The middle-aged man who claimed to be the most experienced among the group, briefly taking on the role of “leader,” yet was utterly mediocre and lacked responsibility.

Ye Zi disagreed. “Veteran Players have plenty of life-saving items. How could they die so easily? Who knows if their body shape changed after being processed by the eerie entity like this…”

“Mhm, that makes sense.” Qi Si smiled strangely, squatted down in front of the corpse, pulled out a napkin he had swiped from the dining table yesterday, wrapped it around his right hand, and gently touched the rose petals stained crimson with blood.

He carefully pushed the forearm-length rose aside. Thick, semi-coagulated blood slowly flowed out, spreading into a red pool beneath the head.

Zou Yan watched his movements, her expression odd. “Qi Si, what are you doing?”

Qi Si replied without lifting his head, “Didn’t I say? I’m a Specimen Maker. Dealing with corpses is right up my professional alley.”

Zou Yan: That’s a truly broad professional scope. May I ask if the specimens you make are legitimate?

As she spoke, Qi Si snapped the joint to close the corpse’s jaw. His slender, pale fingers smoothed the face of the deceased, sliding and dancing across the corpse’s features as if possessing magic.

The shattered skull was quickly pieced back into a human shape, revealing Shen Ming’s mutilated face to the three of them.

The identity of the deceased was now confirmed. Zou Yan gasped, and Ye Zi’s face also turned pale.

“Ha, how is that possible? Are you kidding me?” Ye Zi blinked repeatedly, her voice rough. “Are you sure you didn’t make a mistake? No matter how careless Brother Shen was, he shouldn’t be the first to die. He’s… he’s a Veteran Player…”

Qi Si countered, “Chang Xu, who shared a room with Brother Shen, is also a Veteran Player, isn’t he?”

He wiped his fingers clean with the napkin and lifted his eyes to look around. “Where is Chang Xu? He shared a room with Brother Shen. Even if he didn’t save him, he should at least know something.”

People tend to speculate. These words left plenty of room for interpretation and were intentionally suggestive and misleading.

Ye Zi murmured, “That’s right, Brother Shen is a Veteran Player. There’s no way he wouldn’t survive the first day, unless…”

She swallowed the rest of her words. Just a second ago, the door in the corner opened from the inside, revealing Chang Xu’s figure.

He was dressed neatly in black, clearly not having just woken up. It was unclear how long he had been awake or how much he had heard.

Qi Si narrowed his eyes, observing Chang Xu’s perpetually gloomy face, and asked with a half-smile, “As a Police Officer, your alertness shouldn’t be too low. You wouldn’t know absolutely nothing about Brother Shen’s death, would you?”

“It’s normal for you to suspect me, but Shen Ming’s death truly has nothing to do with me.” Chang Xu’s voice was cold. “Last night, an NPC suspected to be Miss Anna knocked on our door. Shen Ming woke up and wanted to open it. I made a noise while trying to stop him. Subsequently, the door was opened from the outside, and a vine-like eerie entity reached in.”

The concise narrative gave off a feeling of indifference, which, combined with Chang Xu’s expressionless face, made people feel a chill.

Ye Zi sneered, “Only a fool would believe your side of the story! Why is Brother Shen dead, but you are completely fine? I’ve heard that some instances place ghosts and monsters among the players. You didn’t get hurt at all last night; how do you explain that?”

Chang Xu lowered his eyes to look at the corpse on the ground and stated concisely, “They couldn’t defeat me, so they had to change targets and drag Shen Ming out.”

“Didn’t you try to pull him back?”

“I pulled him once, but I couldn’t hold him. I estimated the comparison of strength; if I had pulled him again, he would have been torn in half.”

“Now that the dead cannot testify, naturally whatever you say goes.”

Seeing the tension rise, Zou Yan intervened appropriately. “Stop talking. The person is already dead. Mutual suspicion is useless now. This is a Team Instance, and I don’t think Chang Xu had any reason to deliberately harm Shen Ming.”

Ye Zi’s tone became aggressive. “Team Instance? There’s no such thing as a team in this game! We are all Veteran Players and know about the ‘Minimum Death Count’ mechanism. As long as enough people die, the rest can safely clear the instance and even get more rewards. Who knows if someone among us harbors that intention?”

Qi Si stood aside, listening quietly, noncommittal.

His questions from last night were answered. He hadn’t expected the Eerie Game to actually have such a cruel, dog-eat-dog mechanism.

Fortunately, he was naturally solitary and viewed all games as zero-sum. Harming others didn’t require a reason; as long as he found an opportunity, he would be very happy to try stabbing other players in the back.

For him, the situation actually hadn’t changed much.

Since Miss Anna had targeted him, if a certain number of people had to die, he was likely on the death list. The longer the time dragged on, the more dangerous it became. His only choice was to decipher the world setting and end the instance as soon as possible.

Of course, there was now an additional path: killing other players to trigger the so-called “Minimum Death Count” mechanism.

Zou Yan grabbed Ye Zi’s sleeve and earnestly advised, “Rule number seven states that only ghosts and monsters can kill humans. At least in this instance, players cannot kill each other.”

Ye Zi shook her head. “Who says you have to do it yourself? Even an idiot knows that you just need to hide a few clues and borrow the power of the ghosts and monsters… there are plenty of ways!”

Chang Xu suddenly looked up and stared coldly into Ye Zi’s eyes. “You seem to know quite a lot about how to harm people.”

Ye Zi snorted coldly, “The feeling is mutual.”

Qi Si stood aside, comfortably watching the farce unfold before him.

These players all seemed to have secrets, and the kind that involved a lot of complexity.

The factions within the Eerie Game were probably intricate and complex, having already evolved into various game theory models—more interesting and troublesome than he had imagined, necessitating cautious handling.

“I did not harm Shen Ming, and I was almost killed by Shen Ming. That is everything that happened last night.” Chang Xu glanced indifferently at Ye Zi and turned to walk toward the staircase.

Ye Zi scoffed, “Anyway, the person is dead, and there’s no third person to testify. Great, now the only Veteran Player died on the first day, and a rare Intelligence-type Player at that. What are we supposed to do for the next two days?”

She walked around the corpse, her toes restlessly scraping the floor, like a flock of sheep that had lost its leader, putting on a brave face to deal with the unknown fear.

Qi Si examined the girl’s expression with interest. “Whether someone has cleared one instance or two, I don’t think it makes much difference within the scope of the Novice Pool.”

He looked up at Zou Yan nearby and asked with a smile, “My ability happens to lean toward puzzle-solving. I believe Sister Zou’s does too, right?”

“I am indeed an Intelligence-type Player as well.” Zou Yan nodded politely, giving an affirmative reply.

“That’s good. There’s no need to worry about the puzzle-solving aspect. We just need to avoid being killed by others, like Brother Shen.” Qi Si’s eyes curved into a smile, his gaze toward Ye Zi and Zou Yan conveying reassurance.

He quickly walked toward Chang Xu, who was halfway up the stairs, and pretended to be confused. “Chang Xu, I have a question: after you woke up last night, how did you determine the exact time?”

In reputation models based on signaling games, since the parties involved in the game receive incomplete information and cannot fully trust each other, the person with the lowest credibility—or reputation—is likely to be excluded first.

As a low-credibility individual burdened with the suspicion of “bloodstains on his shirt,” if Qi Si didn’t want to be eliminated first, his only option was to muddy the waters further and push out a new scapegoat to bear everyone’s suspicion.

He looked at Chang Xu, frowning deeply. “You clearly violated the second rule, so why did you survive? Do you know something, or—do you have some other means?”

“Because I have a watch and know the exact time.” Chang Xu pulled a pocket watch from his clothes and threw it toward Qi Si.

Qi Si raised his hand and caught it.

The moment the antique copper watch landed in his hand, a hint of coolness seeped into his skin, and lines of prompt text appeared before his eyes.

【Name: Pocket Watch of Fate (Damaged)】

【Type: Item】

【Effect: Indicates Objective Time】

【Note: The God of Destiny established the following notion long ago: Punctuality is a good quality, especially after a contract has been established.】