Chapter 108 False Response
Generously sharing clues within the door is not a good thing, at least for the clue owner.
Because once you share the clues, you will expose your strength and attract everyone's attention, especially the higher the level of the sect.
The further you go, the harder it is to obtain clues. So after you make the clues public, you are likely to become a target, be guarded against by everyone, and even be plotted against.
And unless it is a special situation, no one would want to share the clues they have worked hard to obtain with others.
But the door in front of them was obviously special, because if they didn't tell others the rules of the game, it would mean that the dead would turn into box people, making it more difficult for them to escape.
"Should we tell them?" Lin Qiushi asked, "Will there be any consequences if we just tell them directly?"
"Of course we have to tell them." Ruan Nanzhu was not anxious after hearing the cry. "But there's no need to rush. They're all shrewd people. Even if we tell them everything, they might not believe it."
As the three of them were talking, they returned to the entrance they had just been in. They saw someone had already opened a box in the corner. Inside was something resembling a stethoscope, which someone had taken out and was examining. It was an item that humans could use in the game "Box Girl." Lin Qiushi remembered it, but he hadn't expected someone to be so lucky as to actually get the item directly.
"Who was shouting just now?" Liang Miye glanced at the stethoscope and then shifted his gaze elsewhere.
"It's me..." a little girl whispered, "I was just about to go to the kitchen with them and saw something else through the crack of the door. It looked like a little girl in a skirt. I couldn't control myself and screamed."
It was obvious that the little girl was a newcomer, she was timid and looked inexperienced.
When the other old people heard what she said, their expressions were very subtle. They wanted to stay as far away from those things as possible. Only the newbies would be stupid enough to go up and get killed.
Lin Qiushi took the opportunity to observe his surroundings and simply calculated the ratio of newcomers to old people.
Among the twenty-three people, at least four of the seven people in the group were newcomers, and one could even see confusion and bewilderment on their faces.
Excluding these seven, there should be some newcomers among the remaining sixteen. In other words, there might be more than one newcomer in this sect. So the number of newcomers is between eleven and twelve, half and half of the old members.
In fact, if you think about it carefully, you can understand why some people would do such a thing as not taking other people's lives seriously.
There are only a limited number of conditions for death. If you test one, you can avoid it. And taking someone else's life to test it is arguably the simplest method.
"Can you please stop opening boxes randomly?" Some of the veterans were already fed up with the newcomers' messing around. "Look at these boxes scattered everywhere. They must have special uses. Opening them randomly like this will definitely cause trouble!"
"What could possibly happen?" The man who opened the stethoscope was a young man. He was very brave and had a bad attitude. He said nonchalantly, "I'm fine, aren't I?"
"They're fine now, but who knows what will happen in the future." The person who raised the question seemed to be called Sun Yuanzhou. He turned coldly and said to the leader of this group of newcomers, "Can't you take good care of the people you brought in?"
The man who brought in several new people this time was a middle-aged man named Wei Xiu De. He had an ordinary appearance and seemed very amiable from the outside, but since he was willing to bring in so many new people, it was obvious that he was not a good person.
"Okay, okay." Wei Xiu De said it quite nicely, "I will take good care of them. Xiao Ji, please don't open the box again. It would be bad if something happens. It's dangerous inside the door."
"What could possibly happen?" the young man called Xiao Ji said impatiently. "You're just too timid. Without risk, there's no reward..."
As he spoke, he raised his hand to open the next box.
"Wait." Lin Qiushi stopped him.
Xiao Ji naturally wouldn't listen to Lin Qiushi. He opened two boxes in one breath. Fortunately, he was lucky. There was a piece of paper in one box, and the other box was empty.
"What is this?" Xiao Ji picked up the piece of paper and looked at it, then read the words on it, "False response..." There seemed to be only these four words on the card, with no other information. He spat, "What the hell is this?" and casually put the piece of paper on the table.
"Stop it." Seeing that he wasn't about to end it and was about to continue, Ruan Nanzhu finally spoke up. "If I'm not mistaken, this should be a board game I played before, called Box Girl. If you open the boxes randomly like this, you'll really get something dirty."
As soon as these words came out, Xiao Ji finally stopped moving. He said, "What? Why didn't you say it earlier?"
Ruan Nanzhu spread his hands: "You move so fast, there's no way I can catch up."
Because of Ruan Nanzhu's words, everyone in the room turned their eyes to him. There was excitement, suspicion, and questioning in these eyes.
"You said we are playing a game now? Have you played that game?" Sun Yuanzhou grasped the key point.
"I've played it a few times." Ruan Nanzhu sat down on the sofa and leaned against it. "I wasn't sure when I first entered the room, so I went upstairs to check out the key props. Now I can confirm that this is the board game."
Everyone gathered around and began waiting for his next words.
Ruan Nanzhu briefly introduced the rules, emphasizing that there were ghosts in the box. Opening it casually would likely release the ghosts, and the humans taken away by the ghosts would become box people and continue to harm living humans.
Ruan Nanzhu didn't hide anything about the rules, but instead described them all in detail and answered many people's questions. However, just as Ruan Nanzhu had expected, despite his sincere attitude, the veterans didn't believe everything he said.
"So, what do you mean? Shouldn't we just open the box?" someone in the crowd asked, questioning Ruan Nanzhu. "Aren't you saying that if we don't open the box, nothing will happen? You said the safe combination is four digits. Even though there are ten thousand possible combinations, as long as we spend a little more time trying, we'll eventually figure it out!"
Ruan Nanzhu spread his hands: "I'm just talking about the rules of the game I played. The rules here are not the same. There will definitely be changes, but I don't know what they are."
"How many boxes are there in this room? Let's count them first." A young girl spoke. She looked young, but very experienced. "My name is Yin Xinyi. It's a pleasure to work with you." She extended her hand to Ruan Nanzhu.
Ruan Nanzhu held her hand: "My name is Zhu Meng."
"The Box Girl will cry once on her first day," Ruan Nanzhu said. "Where she cries is where she is. After that, she will only howl when she wants to gain a skill..."
"Skills?" Yin Xinyi asked.
"Yes, he has already activated a skill." Ruan Nanzhu pointed at Xiao Ji. "It's a fake response."
There was a commotion in the crowd, and many people began to ask what this meant.
"In the board game, this is a skill of the Box Girl," Ruan Nanzhu said. "It means the player who plays the Box Girl can lie."
Yin Xinyi asked, "Lying? Could she still answer our questions?"
Ruan Nanzhu: "Reality can be answered. As for what derivative effects this skill will have, I don't know."
"Let's rest today." Sun Yuanzhou, with his assertive personality, dominated the crowd. "It's already past ten o'clock. Things tend to get worse at night. Let's discuss this in detail tomorrow."
"Okay." Most people agreed with Sun Yuanzhou's proposal.
Then everyone started to allocate rooms.
The villa has three floors. The first floor is some functional rooms, such as the kitchen. The second and third floors are mostly bedrooms. There is a study and toilet next to the bedrooms, and there is also a huge balcony, but the balcony has been sealed with cement.
There was no rule about how many people could live in the house, but most of the time there were two or three people in a room, and this was also the case for Lin Qiushi and his group.
After nightfall, the villa became extremely dark.
The steel plates nailed to the windows blocked out most of the sunlight, and the thick curtains acted like a screen, blocking out the last bit of light. The lights in the corridor were a dim red, illuminating everything like a darkroom, making it feel very uncomfortable.
There were also many boxes in the room where Lin Qiushi and the others were resting.
They just did a rough count and found that there were at least two hundred wooden boxes in the entire villa. Each box was about half a meter high and was neatly placed in every corner of the house. It was difficult to ignore their existence.
But in such a box, there may be a little girl with a twisted body hidden. When you think of this, you don’t want to take another look.
After washing up, the three of them went to bed. Ruan Nanzhu slept on the bed next to the wall. He could see the densely packed wooden boxes when he turned his head.
The three of them discussed some things before going to bed.
"What would happen if I didn't open the box?" Liang Miye said, "If no one opened it, wouldn't anyone die?"
"That's not going to happen." Ruan Nanzhu said, "There will definitely be some restrictions on us inside the door." But we don't know what those restrictions are yet.
The door would not allow them to waste time inside unconditionally, unless... there was only one person left inside the door.
"What kind of restrictions are those?" Liang Miye said, "But it's good to have restrictions, otherwise we'll just be counting on others to risk their lives."
Every time you open a box, it’s a gamble, and no one knows what you’ll get.
Ruan Nanzhu nodded.
Lin Qiushi's attention was also focused on the wooden boxes, but he was thinking about the stethoscope that the man had taken away during the day. The stethoscope was also a prop, but it could only be used once a day. The stethoscope could determine whether the woman was in the wooden box. If the woman was in the box, a subtle sound could be heard from the stethoscope.
This is a very crucial prop, but now it is in the hands of someone else.
Ah, this is really a game of luck, Lin Qiushi thought. As someone who has never won even five dollars in the lottery, his luck is really not very good.
Besides, they can't afford to gamble their lives with their luck.
After nightfall, Lin Qiushi didn't sleep very soundly. Around three in the morning, a shrill scream was heard downstairs, waking everyone up from their dreams.
Lin Qiushi woke up instantly. He opened his eyes and met Ruan Nanzhu's gaze.
"Someone got into trouble?" Lin Qiushi asked.
"Yeah." Ruan Nanzhu said, "Let's go down and take a look."
Liang Miye also woke up, and she said, "Is it the second floor? Could it be that someone thinks he is unlucky and goes to open the box again?" Ruan Nanzhu had made it clear enough during the day. If in this situation, there are still people who insist on risking their lives to open the box, then Liang Miye has nothing to say.
But what makes newcomers more troublesome is their uncertainty. Under the pressure of fear, no one knows what bad actions they will make.
The wailing continued, and when they reached the second floor, they could still hear the sound through the door.
"Ahhh, it hurts! Help! Help! Ahhhh—" The miserable screams were chilling. Several people were already standing at the door. Lin Qiushi glanced around and saw that they were all veterans, including Sun Yuanzhou. He pushed the door open and said, "Lock it! I'll go get the tools."
"No need, let me do it." Ruan Nanzhu walked slowly to the door and began to unlock it.
Everyone's eyes were focused on him. After a moment, the lock opened and everything in the house appeared before them.
There was no one in the room. The wailing sound came from a wooden box. Not only wailing but also knocking sounds could be heard from the box, as if the person inside was trying to rush out of the box.
"Save me, save me, I don't want to die..." The closer I got, the creepier the voice became.
"Who lives in this house?" Ruan Nanzhu asked. As he spoke, he looked at a wooden box next to this one. "They opened the wooden box."
"Fuck." Sun Yuanzhou seemed a little angry. He turned around angrily and went straight to the next room. He called out to the people inside with a bang, "Wei Xiude, get out now. Is the person living here yours?"
After a while, the door opened and Wei Xiu De walked out. He asked, "What do you mean, are you mine?"
"That room!" Sun Yuanzhou pointed to the room where the incident happened.
Wei Xiude glanced at the room and frowned slightly. "Yes, there are two people living in it." He seemed to have thought of something. "Did something happen to them?"
Sun Yuanzhou cursed.
Wei Xiu De saw that everyone's eyes were on him, and there was some unfriendly taste in them. He smiled awkwardly: "Sorry, sorry, I will definitely remind them, but they have not been in the door many times, and some of them don't know the rules..."
Sun Yuanzhou said coldly: "Take care of your people, or don't blame me for being rude to you."
He left after he finished speaking, and it seemed that he was extremely fed up with Wei Xiu De.
That’s right, the ordinary tenth door was already difficult enough, but the newcomers brought in by Wei Xiu De made it as difficult as hell.
Everyone was in a bad mood, looking at Wei Xiu De with disgust. Wei Xiu De's behavior was always despised, but everyone in the sect was only concerned with their own affairs and had no time to care about others. But if Wei Xiu De's actions harmed everyone's interests, that would be another matter.
The box was still wailing, and the listeners had a splitting headache.
Lin Qiushi found some relics next to the box. Judging from the number of relics, it was obvious that more than one person was dragged into the box by the woman.
The death of someone means that the number of people opening boxes has increased, and the risk of opening boxes has increased again.
Lin Qiushi let out a breath, feeling that things were becoming increasingly troublesome.
No one probably slept much in the second half of the night. After all, the box cried the whole night. It was not until the next morning that the sound gradually became weaker and finally disappeared.
Lin Qiushi really couldn't understand. Ruan Nanzhu had clearly told them not to open the boxes casually, so why did some people still want to break the taboo? Did they think they were lucky enough?
After a bad night of sleep, everyone looked unhappy. The elderly were experienced and so were fine, but the people who were tricked into coming in looked almost dying, and there was a girl sitting in the corner crying.
Breakfast automatically appeared in the restaurant and tasted pretty good. Although Lin Qiushi had no appetite, he still forced himself to eat a little.
Ruan Nanzhu had been distracted that morning, seemingly lost in thought. Halfway through his meal, he said he wanted to go to the restroom. Lin Qiushi said, "I'll go with you."
"Okay." Ruan Nanzhu smiled, "I'm still a little scared."
The toilets in the villa were all cubicles, with no distinction between men and women. Lin Qiushi stood outside waiting, but after waiting for a while, he heard a strange noise coming from the toilet.
Lin Qiushi listened carefully, and when he understood what the sound was, his expression changed slightly. This voice... was actually Ruan Nanzhu's.
Ruan Nanzhu seemed to be moaning softly, mixed with weak cries for help.
Lin Qiushi hurried into the bathroom and called out, "Zhu Meng, Zhu Meng, are you okay?" He wanted to push open the door of the cubicle, but found that it was locked. He quickly took out his tools and opened the lock of the cubicle in two or three moves.
As soon as the door opened, he saw the situation inside the cubicle. There was no one inside. Next to the toilet was a black wooden box. The box was not locked and could be opened with just a reach.
Ruan Nanzhu's voice came from inside the box.
Lin Qiushi's expression changed instantly. Many thoughts flashed through his mind. He quickly walked to the box and shouted, "Zhu Meng! Zhu Meng! Are you in there?" He felt that Ruan Nanzhu was not someone who would open a box casually, but the world inside the door was full of surprises. He was afraid that Ruan Nanzhu had encountered some emergency and was dragged into the box by the box girl.
"Zhu Meng!" Lin Qiushi patted the box and said, "Are you in there? Say something—"
“Save me… Save me…” Ruan Nanzhu’s voice grew weaker and weaker, as if it would disappear in the next moment. “Save me…”
Within a few minutes, a layer of cold sweat appeared on Lin Qiushi's forehead. He stared at the lid of the box, swallowed hard, and said in a hoarse voice, "What's my name? Tell me, what was my name outside the door—"
"Linlin, save me..." Ruan Nanzhu replied to Lin Qiushi.
After hearing Ruan Nanzhu's answer, Lin Qiushi breathed a sigh of relief. He put his ear to the box and heard the things inside, still calling his name in Ruan Nanzhu's voice.
"Linlin, Linlin, save me... Linlin, I'm in so much pain... Linlin..."
Lin Qiushi stared at the box for a while, turned and left the compartment, then began knocking on the doors of the adjacent compartments one by one.
Soon, he knocked open the door of a cubicle. Ruan Nanzhu, who was lifting her skirt inside, gave Lin Qiushi a puzzled look: "Linlin, what are you doing?"
Lin Qiushi looked at his face, said nothing, and walked over to hug him tightly.
Ruan Nanzhu was stunned for a moment, then reached out and hugged Lin Qiushi: "What happened?"
Lin Qiushi: "I understand what's changed."
Ruan Nanzhu: "Hmm?"
Lin Qiushi said, "The box girl's skill... is fake response." He looked at a compartment and said, "The box girl can imitate human voices and call for help from inside the box." Caring too much can lead to confusion. When something happens to someone important to you, you won't have enough time to think about whether it's reasonable. But once you really open the box, there will be no chance to regret.
"What did you hear?" Ruan Nanzhu instantly understood something from Lin Qiushi's expression and words. "Did you hear me calling for help from inside the box?"
"Yes," Lin Qiushi said, "Luckily, you don't like to call me Linlin when you're out there."
Ruan Nanzhu said, "I didn't hear any sound. It seems that's how those two people were tricked into going in last night."
"Hmm," Lin Qiushi said, "It seems like they have a good relationship outside the sect."
Ruan Nanzhu asked, "The box girl you mentioned was crying in this room, right?"
Lin Qiushi nodded.
"Then we can determine her location." Ruan Nanzhu pondered, "She must have some restrictions on her movement, otherwise we wouldn't be able to open the box at all."
If there is no restriction, it means that you have just selected a box and are about to open it, and the box girl will move in front of the box.
"Yes." Lin Qiushi said, "It is confirmed that the box woman is in this room... but two people died last night." This means that there are two more box people in the room, and no one knows which box they are hiding in.
Ruan Nanzhu said, "Let's have them confirm it with a stethoscope first."
Lin Qiushi: "The stethoscope is with the newcomer Wei Xiude brought in."
Ruan Nanzhu nodded and said, "Well, I know. I'll go talk to them first to avoid wasting this prop." This stethoscope must have changed, but as to what the change was, no one knew.
The author has something to say: The strongest bosses will not collide with each other, because they usually have their own clues to enter their own doors, and the rest of the assigned ones have no clues, so their strength will be relatively weaker. Emmm, I personally think that it is a character breakdown to bring out the clues as soon as they come out. After all, fundamentally they are all competitors. There is only one clue to the next door and it is very important. Ruan Nanzhu certainly cannot say that he has a clue to attract other people's attention as soon as he enters.
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