With a creak, the door in front of them opened.
A stronger stench of blood wafted in from the living room, causing all six of them to cover their mouths.
The small living room was in complete disarray.
Blood, flesh, body parts, and blood splattered everywhere; some red and yellow stains marred the white walls.
“Ugh!”
Sang Yue let out a low retch and stumbled backward, pushing everyone behind her.
Yu Yezhou instinctively shielded her from the horrifying scene.
To be honest, even though they were playing an infinite game, this game didn't particularly enjoy torturing players. It only made the deceased feel pain; the living rarely faced such a shocking scene directly.
This chapter had thrust them straight into such a grand spectacle. Sang Yue's evaluation of it as “perverse” was indeed accurate.
“Be careful; let’s go see what’s going on.” After observing for a while and noticing there was no movement in the living room, Yu Yezhou said.
They then dispersed from Xiao Ming's room.
Gu Zhan walked in front, carefully avoiding the bloodstains on the floor.
It was clear that the victim was female; her body had been dismembered, and her head was missing.
Moreover, aside from the blood, there seemed to be other traces on the ground, but they were obscured by the body parts and blood, making them hard to discern.
At that moment, the system’s voice echoed again: “A deceased person has appeared in Xiao Ming’s home. Please identify her.”
They needed to determine the identity of the deceased.
Yu Yezhou looked up and asked, “Her identity is Xiao Ming’s teacher.”
“Correct. Please restore this story,” the system responded.
They needed to restore the story. Yu Yezhou looked at the others and said, “Let’s split up and check out these rooms.”
The group scattered: Sang Yue went to another bedroom, An He Yan and Xu Ke checked the bathroom and kitchen, while Gu Zhan and Yu Yezhou stayed behind to investigate the living room, and Xu Yu went alone to the balcony.
In the corner of the sofa lay the female teacher’s backpack. Upon opening it, they found Xiao Ming’s report card inside, glaringly displaying a string of zeros.
Yu Yezhou held the report card in his hand and sighed, "No wonder he committed suicide. If it were me, I might not be able to go on living either."
Gu Zhan was crouched beside the female corpse, looking down, unsure of what he was observing.
Yu Yezhou walked over to the TV cabinet and noticed a photo pressed against it. He flipped it over and saw a man and a woman standing closely together, the woman wearing a bright smile.
"Huh? Are these Xiao Ming's parents?"
He picked up the photo, intending to show it to Gu Zhan. But when he turned around, he found Gu Zhan was observing the corpse up close.
Yu Yezhou frowned and asked, "Dude, what are you looking at?"
Gu Zhan replied, "There’s something underneath this corpse."
"What is it?"
Yu Yezhou walked over to Gu Zhan and bent down to take a closer look.
However, the smell of the corpse was overwhelming. He couldn't understand how a freshly dead person could emit such a strong odor. The stench stung his eyes, making it impossible to see clearly.
"What else could there be besides blood on the ground?" Yu Yezhou asked, puzzled.
Gu Zhan couldn't directly touch the corpse and the blood either. He looked around and grabbed a tablecloth from the dining table to wipe away the blood. The red marks on the wooden floor finally became visible.
Gu Zhan was familiar with this type of mark; it was similar to what the cultists used in that copy of the game to resurrect the Shadow God.
Yu Yezhou's eyes widened. "What kind of cult is this??"
This copy was set in ordinary reality; there shouldn't be any gods or ghosts involved, especially since their items and skills were restricted.
Gu Zhan said, "Not sure. Let’s investigate further."
Even after using the tablecloth, Gu Zhan still got some blood on his hands.
He stood up and headed to the bathroom to wash his hands.
When he turned on the faucet, he noticed that there were only two toothbrushes on the sink.
After washing his hands and returning to the living room, Yu Yezhou told Gu Zhan, "It seems like there are three people in this house: Xiao Ming, Xiao Ming's mother, and..."
Gu Zhan interrupted, "There are only two. The bathroom only has two people's toiletries."
At that moment, Sang Yue, who had gone to check the bedroom, returned and said, "Xiao Ming's father doesn’t seem to live here; there’s nothing belonging to him in the bedroom."
"You guys should come take a look."
An He Yan suddenly called from the kitchen.
The group walked towards the kitchen and, at the doorway, saw An He Yan setting jars on the counter, each filled with different human organs. The water soaking the organs had started to turn red, creating a foreboding sight.
Sang Yue covered her mouth again. "What is this?"
Just when they thought it was an ordinary family drama, they were met with dismemberment and human organs.
Yu Yezhou frowned and said, "There aren’t enough clues; let’s keep searching."
The group dispersed once more.
There wasn’t much information in the living room. After checking the TV cabinet, Yu Yezhou quickly moved to the coffee table to examine its contents.
Gu Zhan thought there wouldn't be any more useful information there, so he wandered around the living room. Suddenly, he spotted Xiao Ming's room.
This was a blind spot; having just left Xiao Ming's room, they wouldn’t think to return.
However, the child’s room would undoubtedly have the most information in the house.
Gu Zhan returned to Xiao Ming's room.
Standing at the door, he scanned the surroundings and walked toward the bookshelf.
Most of the books on the shelf were useless.
As he flipped through them, he suddenly came across Xiao Ming's diary.
He opened it and read.
The diary contained mundane entries, merely detailing an average middle school student's unsatisfactory school life.
But Gu Zhan noticed a particular sentence: "Ever since Dad left, Mom has become more reclusive. She hardly talks to me, and whenever we do chat, she always brings up grades. It’s so annoying; it’s like grades can explain everything about a person. If good grades meant a better life, then why did Dad leave?"
This meant they had originally been a family of three, but the father had left.
After the father’s departure, the mother had undergone some mental changes...
But why did she kill the female teacher? Was it because of the unclear array in the living room? Or were there other reasons?
Finding no more clues in Xiao Ming's room, Gu Zhan left and returned to the living room.
At that moment, a retching sound came again from the adjacent bedroom.
An He Yan came out of the bathroom, looking at Gu Zhan with a hint of mockery. He wasn't part of this team, and he didn’t care about Sang Yue’s condition, but with the game just starting, Sang Yue’s early display of weakness made him doubt the team’s strength.
Gu Zhan had worked with Sang Yue in the past and knew she was quite capable, so this behavior was indeed unusual for her.
He walked into the bedroom and found Sang Yue kneeling beside the bed, her face notably pale.
He asked, "Are you okay?"
"I'm fine," Sang Yue said, rubbing her temples. She leaned back against the wall and looked at Gu Zhan with a bitter smile. "Haven't you noticed something strange?"
"What?" Gu Zhan asked, surprised.
Sang Yue said, "Ever since we entered this copy, I've been enveloped by a feeling of discomfort. The longer I stay, the more intense it becomes."
She wasn't feeling nauseous just because she saw the corpse.
It was simply that the discomfort was so overwhelming that she couldn't help but react.
Gu Zhan frowned, unable to understand what this feeling of discomfort she mentioned could be.
Suddenly, he widened his eyes as he remembered something.
"Quick, check your sanity value!"
Sang Yue immediately opened her status panel and her expression grew serious.
Just as Gu Zhan suspected, her sanity value was gradually decreasing.
The game was treacherous; sometimes it loudly proclaimed the lowering of sanity values to instill panic, while at other times it quietly reduced them, making players unaware.
Gu Zhan opened his status panel, and his sanity value was also slowly decreasing.
He quickly assessed the situation: "We need to hurry; this scenario might continuously decrease our sanity."
"What?" Sang Yue's already pale face became even paler. She hadn’t anticipated this turn of events. "I'm very sensitive to fluctuations in sanity values. I’m afraid I might drag you all down in this round."
"It’s fine." Gu Zhan had learned from Qin Yue that what appears to be weak or unfavorable might not be as bad as it seems. Diverse voices can lead to unexpected outcomes. Sang Yue's sensitivity to sanity values might just help them.
"Let’s get up first," Gu Zhan said. "I found some information that could be useful."
With Gu Zhan’s help, Sang Yue stood up. They walked toward the living room, where Yu Yezhou was approaching them with a coat in hand.
"You’re out! I found a useful clue. This trench coat has a photo of the male protagonist in it, but I suspect that the coat doesn’t belong to the mother; it belongs to the female teacher."
He compared the coat to the scattered remains on the floor. "The size seems to match."
Sang Yue’s brows twitched. "You can tell that?"
Yu Yezhou looked puzzled. "Huh? Isn’t it obvious?"
He turned to Sang Yue. "You went to the bedroom, so tell me, does this style of clothing belong to the mistress of the house?"
To be honest, after a quick glance, Sang Yue had to admit that the style of the trench coat didn’t match the mother’s taste at all.
Was this just luck for Yu Yezhou? A blind cat stumbling upon a dead mouse?
Sang Yue speculated, "Could it be that this female teacher is related to the missing father? Did the mother kill her in a fit of rage?"
"That’s possible," Yu Yezhou nodded. "Let’s try to piece the story together."
The system quickly chimed in, "Please reconstruct the story."
Yu Yezhou began, "This female teacher is actually connected to Xiao Ming's missing father. The mother misunderstood her as the third party and killed her in a rage."
But the system questioned, "You’ve already found traces in the living room; how do you explain those if it was merely a crime of passion?"
"Is that wrong?" Yu Yezhou frowned.
At this moment, Gu Zhan interjected, "Xiao Ming's family consisted of three members: the father passed away early, and the mother, wanting to resurrect him, set up a cult ritual in the living room. The female teacher happened to visit and became the mother’s sacrifice. But for some reason, the ritual failed, the mother left home, and only Xiao Ming was left, eventually committing suicide in his room."
"Um."
The system seemed to hesitate for a moment before responding, "Congratulations, player, your answer is correct."
As soon as the words fell, Sang Yue felt a lightness in her body and quickly opened her personal attributes panel to see that her decreasing sanity value had slightly risen.
It seemed that answering correctly had an effect!
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