Chapter 175
Bei Qiao: I used to travel the world with my own identity, but now I want to try to change to the identity of a rich man to see if there will be any new gains.
"Wearing a mask in public makes you either extremely ugly or extremely beautiful. I guess this person is the latter! It's just a hunch!" A passerby passing by Bei Qiao slowed down, looked back at Bei Qiao's back, nudged his friend next to him with his elbow, and spoke in his friend's ear in a loud voice that he thought was very soft.
The friend observed Bei Qiao's steady lower body, rubbed his ears, and silently moved half a meter to the side, pretending that he was not familiar with the idiot next to him.
Bei Qiao heard what the man said, but she didn't particularly care. Since entering the other world, she has bought several masks of different styles. The mask that corresponds to her cousin Qiao's identity is very exquisite and luxurious. When others see it, they will not think that this person is suspicious, but just regard the mask as an expensive decoration.
Beautiful things always attract people's attention, not to mention adults, even the children in the adults' arms think that the shiny masks are very beautiful. They stretch out their little hands and insist on touching them. If they fail to touch them, they kick their legs in the adults' arms unhappily, making "oh and wow" sounds in their mouths, and are so anxious that they can almost speak.
Baby: "Ahhhhhhhhhhhh!"
Parents: "Oh, how cute, chirp!"
Baby: "Waaaaa!" It's so annoying to have adults who don't understand what babies are saying!
After enjoying the breeze on the deck for a while, Bei Qiao felt a bit bored and decided to go back to his room to read the forum. After politely declining a few strangers' invitations to go with him, he walked up the stairs to the second floor. Bei Qiao noticed that the door of the room closest to the stairs was wide open. He subconsciously stopped and glanced inside. He saw an unconscious teenager lying near the door, his eyes closed.
A large rooster, crowing at the top of its lungs, stepped on the boy's body and fled the room, only to be caught by a young woman who had chased him out, strangled by the neck. The next second, a flash of silver light, accompanied by a scream, the rooster's belly was ripped open, and the woman poured the bright red, hot contents all over the boy's neck. The scene, bloody and reminiscent of a murder scene, frightened another passenger passing through the corridor, causing him to scream, roll his eyes, and faint.
It turns out that screaming and fainting is a real thing... Bei Qiao stood at the stairs, observing the unlucky passenger from a distance, and found that the man's eyes were rolling around under his eyelids: Are you pretending to faint? What kind of brain circuit is it to pretend to faint in front of a suspected murderer?
"I'm not a murderer." Noticing Bei Qiao standing not far from the door, the young woman who was busy in the house hurriedly explained.
"I know." Bei Qiao glanced inside again, confirming the woman could handle it all on her own, and continued upstairs. Bruise marks on the neck suggested hanging, but there were no signs of urine or feces on the lower body, suggesting a chance of recovery. Cutting open a rooster's stomach and placing it around the neck to circulate blood was an ancient method of rescuing those who had been hanged... But why would anyone on the ship have noticed anything unusual beforehand?
Bei Qiao: I have a feeling that a storm is coming. I'll go back to the house and see if there is any useful information on the forum.
Hearing the sound of someone screaming and falling in the hallway, the people in the rooms on the second floor all locked themselves in their rooms for self-protection. The timid ones hid under their beds, trembling in fear, while those who managed to remain calm gritted their teeth and pushed the table out to block the door, ready to confront the criminals.
The screams had been short and muffled, so those on the other floors couldn't quite make them out. Some, concentrating on their work, hadn't even heard them. Those who heard them simply looked up and listened intently, then, once they were sure they couldn't hear anything else, went back to their own business. As for the rooster crows, no one paid much attention. It was just a chicken being slaughtered. There was a kitchen on the ship, so how could they eat the chicken without killing it?
The passengers on the second floor were on edge until the voice of "I'm not a murderer" was heard in the corridor and Bei Qiao's footsteps were heard leaving safely. Only then did someone muster the courage to quietly open the door a crack to see what was happening outside.
Hearing the sound of someone opening a door in the corridor, the braver passengers, carrying stools, opened their doors one after another and looked at each other from across the corridor. An acquaintance recognized the teenager being rescued in the room opposite and quickly ran to the first floor, hugging the stool against the wall, to call the teenager's parents.
Hearing the young woman's words, the passenger lying on the ground realized he had made a mistake and quickly climbed up, covering his face. Many people were opening doors in the hallway, so he didn't dare look back to see if there were any familiar faces inside. He groped his way to the stairs and hurriedly ran down, grabbing the handrail. He had completely forgotten his original purpose for leaving the room.
By the time Bei Qiao returned to the third floor, some players who had heard the commotion had already left their rooms and rushed to the second floor to watch the excitement, though the crowds weren't particularly large. The third floor was a player-only area, and all the rooms were occupied by players. Aside from those who needed to play jifeng with their fellow natives, everyone else had taken advantage of the time before reaching their destination to log off and rest. Some even took the opportunity to travel, their bodies lying motionless in their otherworldly rooms.
The ship has four floors: the fourth floor houses the staff and captain's quarters, the third floor is for players, the second floor is for the natives, and the first floor is the lobby, which houses dining, entertainment, and public restrooms. To ensure the safety of players and staff, the third and fourth floor staircase entrances have separate fences to prevent curious natives from wandering around.
To ensure a comfortable environment for everyone offline, the third floor would not be occupied by natives, even if most of the rooms were vacant. Also, to provide cover, the crew would pretend to deliver meals to them regularly. Since everyone was on the same floor, there was no need to worry about being caught by neighbors.
Bei Qiao returned to his room, opening the forum and occasionally distracted by the noise outside. The young man in distress on the second floor was eventually rescued by a young woman. The captain, upon hearing the news, also rushed over with a doctor. Coincidentally, a young county magistrate on the same floor was about to depart for a provincial post, so everyone simply began the investigation right there. In such a hurry, they couldn't think of anything else.
Lacking a gavel, he took a wooden block from the ship's repair crew. Since the table in the corridor was in the way, the captain dragged over a small coffee table and a stool for the magistrate to sit on while he heard the case. Although the magistrate insisted that such formalities were unnecessary, the captain didn't dare to neglect the matter.
This matter was not that complicated. The murderer committed the crime in a fit of passion and fled in a hurry after succeeding. He had no habit of erasing traces of the crime. After checking the timeline and the staff's duty roster, everyone immediately identified the suspect.
"He will bring disaster!" The murderer was very panicked when he was pinned down by the thugs beside the county magistrate. However, he did not seem to think that he had done anything wrong. Instead, he behaved in a mysterious way, like a charlatan who had gone astray: "He is a disaster! He is a variable!"
"What nonsense are you talking about!" The boy's mother was in the house thanking the young woman profusely. When she heard this, she was so angry that she rushed out and wanted to hit her, but was stopped by the woman.
Wow, this incident actually has a sequel! The indigenous passengers who were originally preparing to disperse gathered around again, looking at the screaming murderer enthusiastically: Come on, tell me more?
The county magistrate, who was just about to get up and go back to his room to rest, said: "..." Well, our people are still so free and easy. If it were a neighboring country, if there was a little noise on the street, everyone would run away skillfully and have no habit of watching the excitement at all.
The captain was a little curious, but tried hard to suppress his expression for the sake of his image: "Yo, there is an excuse for killing people." What kind of disaster turned you into a murderer? Tsk tsk, didn't you ask for it?
"You don't understand, that's..."
"What's going on? Why are there so many people?" A passenger who went to the deck to get some fresh air came back and was shocked by the people blocking the corridor.
"Let's just watch the fun. Do you want to see a weird murderer?" As time went on, the crowds of onlookers grew stronger. The passenger's acquaintance, having arrived late, didn't get a good seat and had to stand on a bench to watch the show, otherwise he wouldn't be able to see anything.
The rescued boy was still resting in the house. Out of care for the wounded, the county magistrate, after consulting with the captain, decided to tie up the murderer and lock him in the ground-floor utility room, waiting to be handed over the next time the ship docked or encountered the navy. The young woman, having saved the boy, saw that the matter was over, carried the gutted rooster out to the kitchen, intending to make some soup as a reward for her hard work. Before leaving, she reminded the boy's parents to go to the first floor to get medicine.
The tied-up murderer was not convinced. Facing accusations from others, he acted as if he was the only one sober while everyone else was drunk, shouting at the sky, the earth and the air. Even when his mouth was gagged, he could spit out the gag and continue to shout. It was obvious that he had some serious brain disease.
But he was not the only one who was sick. Among the people watching the excitement, some people actually thought that killing chickens to save people was too bloody and cruel.
The young woman who saved the boy was too lazy to argue with this stupid guy. She just rolled her eyes and walked away. But the boy's parents were so angry that they grabbed the man by the collar and yelled at him: "Are you saying that my son's life is not worth more than a chicken?" If you dare to say yes, I will slap you in the face!
The man was a coward after all. Even when the father of the boy, whose arms were thick enough to run a horse, spit on him in the face, he didn't dare to say anything. He just groaned a few times and ran downstairs without looking back after being released.
The boy's father sneered and spat at his back, then remembered that his injured throat needed medicine, so he hurried downstairs to find the doctor who was brewing medicine in the kitchen. However, the man who ran down the stairs in front of him misunderstood and thought that he could not escape the beating. He was so scared that he almost missed a step and fell down the stairs: I just said something nonsense, why did you chase me and beat me?
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