Chapter 122 Minotaur
It was getting dark. Since the room they had lived in before had completely changed its location, the three of them had no choice but to randomly choose a room on the second floor to live in.
Fortunately, after the room has been changed, it can only be locked from the inside, so there is no need to worry about not being able to get in.
The room they chose was also a triple bedroom. There were a few bags in the bedroom. It seemed that someone had dropped them there yesterday. Lin Qiushi told them to take them out tomorrow and not leave them in the house, so that they wouldn't lose them again.
Ruan Nanzhu nodded, agreeing with Lin Qiushi.
Not long after they returned to the room, it started raining again.
The howling sea breeze made the rain even more powerful. The entire ship looked so thin on the vast ocean, as if it would be capsized in the black sea at any second.
The boat kept rocking, and the bed itself swayed like a hammock, swaying from side to side. It was a deeply uncomfortable feeling, and even Lin Qiushui, who didn't suffer from seasickness, had to get out of bed to feel better. Imagine if someone who got seasick would have vomited everything in their stomach.
"Linlin, are you okay?" Ruan Nanzhu asked when he saw that Lin Qiushi looked unhappy. The shaking bed didn't seem to have much of an impact on him, as he continued to lie in bed without changing his expression.
Lin Qiushi shook his head, indicating that he was fine. He said, "I feel a little dizzy. I'll sit up for a while."
The position he looked out the window from kept changing. Sometimes he saw the cabin, sometimes he saw the side of the ship. At this moment, he happened to see the deck and the rain washing on the deck.
All the kerosene lamps outside were extinguished, and only vague outlines could be seen on the deck. Lin Qiushi watched for a while, and when the rain subsided a little, he planned to lie back down on the bed. However, just as he was about to lie down on the bed, he noticed two blurry figures appear on the deck.
One of the figures was standing, about two meters tall, while the other was lying on the ground, being grabbed by the taller one and dragged across the deck.
There wasn't anyone two meters tall in their team. Clearly, the thing that appeared before Lin Qiushi wasn't human, and what he was dragging in his hand...
Lin Qiushi turned around and gave Ruan Nanzhu a look.
The two understood each other without having to talk. Ruan Nanzhu quietly walked behind Lin Qiushi and looked outside following Lin Qiushi's gaze.
When he saw the tall figure, his expression suddenly became serious.
Lin Qiushi didn't dare speak. The creature was very close to them. If he made any noise, it would most likely attract its attention. What would happen then was unknown.
The tall figure stopped on the deck, bent down, and buried its head in the other figure it was dragging. The next moment, Lin Qiushi heard a deeply unpleasant sound: the sound of gnawing on raw meat. Sharp teeth ripped through the skin, tearing off chunks of fresh flesh, followed by rough chewing and swallowing. A fishy smell began to fill the air, the smell of blood.
Lin Qiushi understood everything that was happening before his eyes. The rain outside gradually subsided, and the rain on the sea disappeared just as quickly as it came. The dark clouds dispersed, revealing a bright white moon. Under the cold moonlight, he finally saw clearly what was happening before his eyes.
A towering monster appeared before Lin Qiushi. Its head resembled that of a long-dead fish, gills fluttering from its neck, and its body a sickening dark green. Most striking were its two enormous white eyeballs, lidless and abruptly embedded in its sockets, intently staring at its prey.
In front of it lay a half-eaten human body. The face was gone, so the appearance could not be seen clearly. One could only barely tell from the human's clothes that it was a man.
Looking at everything in front of him, Lin Qiushi held his breath. He thought of the Minotaur, the monster in the maze. When it ate people, did it look like the monster in front of him?
The monster slowly devoured most of the human's flesh, its face smeared with blood. A strange hissing sound emanated from its mouth, as if it were being forced from its throat. Although Lin Qiushi didn't understand what it was saying, he could still hear a hint of satisfaction in it.
It seemed very satisfied because the food in front of it was very delicious and it feasted its mouth.
After eating, it turned around and walked into the nearest house. Then the environment changed, and the house and deck disappeared from Lin Qiushi's sight.
Lin Qiushi finally dared to speak. He asked, "What is this—"
Ruan Nanzhu frowned: "Mermaid?"
Lin Qiushi: “…” To some extent, this really is a mermaid.
"This must be the Minotaur," Lin Qiushi said. "Can we defeat it?"
Ruan Nanzhu tapped his chin with his finger: "Give me a gun and I can try."
But guns are not allowed inside the door, and the door will not support the behavior of reckless people. There must be a way to easily kill the monster in front of you without having to fight it head-on.
Lin Qiushi thought of the ball of thread mentioned in the Minotaur myth.
Ruan Nanzhu also thought of it. As the two of them were thinking, Gu Longming, who was half asleep next to them, woke up. He said, "Why aren't you guys asleep yet? I've already had a nap..."
Ruan Nanzhu looked at Lin Qiushi: "Does he usually sleep so soundly?"
Lin Qiushi: "He said he only acts like this when I'm with him."
"Oh." Ruan Nanzhu said, "Then don't both of you go in together from now on."
Gu Longming looked confused, obviously not understanding what was going on.
"Let's go to sleep first," Ruan Nanzhu said. "We'll collect information tomorrow. We know too little about this ship."
Lin Qiushi nodded and agreed to Ruan Nanzhu's proposal.
The two went back to bed, and this time without the disturbance of rain and waves, they soon fell into a deep sleep.
The next morning, several people got up early and went to the deck.
At this time, there were already quite a few people gathered on the deck. They saw the corpse from yesterday that had been gnawed to the point where only bones were left, and they were having a noisy discussion.
“How could this happen? How could this happen—” A woman cried in the crowd. She said, “There is a monster. There is a monster on this ship!!”
"What exactly happened last night?" Song Yongning asked.
"We heard some noise in the room last night," the woman replied dully, "and then he went out to check and never came back."
"I think I saw that monster yesterday." The speaker was a little girl who looked quite young. She whispered, "It had a fish's head. It dragged this man onto the deck and ate... ate him."
"Then why don't you save him!!" The woman who heard the little girl's words seemed to have found an outlet for her anger. She roared angrily and even wanted to pounce on the little girl. "Are you just going to watch him get killed?!"
The little girl was frightened and started to cry, saying, "I'm scared too."
"That's enough." Someone stopped the woman with one hand and said with a bit of annoyance, "Why are you blaming others? If you were really worried, wouldn't you come out and look for them? The deck hasn't changed position."
The woman looked at the person who was speaking with resentment. She wanted to say something else, but the person continued coldly, "You can't blame others for your own incompetence."
The woman burst into tears.
Lin Qiushi remained silent, quietly observing the corpse in front of him.
It was obvious that the monster liked the food in front of it very much. It not only ate the soft internal organs, but also gnawed off most of the flesh and blood, leaving only the head, which was the most difficult to eat, and the limbs with little meat.
"What should we do with the bodies?" It was very hot here. After last night, the bodies on the deck had begun to rot, and there were even mosquitoes circling over them, which made people feel very uncomfortable.
"Throw it into the sea," someone said lazily, "you can't leave it here."
The woman who had been crying before did not say anything at this time. She just sobbed softly and did not dare to look at the hideous corpse again.
So a few men found a piece of rag, wrapped the body and threw it directly into the nearby sea.
As soon as the corpse entered the sea, it began to roll. Lin Qiushi looked carefully and found that the sea water was full of small fish with sharp teeth - it was a good thing that these small fish did not appear when Xiaomo fell into the water before.
It seems that the attitude of the gate is quite tolerant towards newcomers who try to escape when they enter for the first time, at least giving them a chance to reform.
The body was gone, leaving only a conspicuous bloodstain on the deck.
Song Yongning went to the side and got a mop, and cleaned up all the bloodstains on the deck, so that all traces of the man's presence disappeared.
Everyone stood on the deck and began to discuss the monster.
"It was a fish-man," said the little girl who had seen the monster. "It was very tall, at least two meters, and very strong... It dragged the man onto the deck, ate him whole, and then went into a random room."
"What happens next?" Song Yongning asked.
"Then the room changed," the little girl said. "I don't know where it went."
Now the rooms are constantly changing, and it is simply impossible to find this monster from countless rooms. Moreover, even if they find it, they are not sure whether they can defeat it.
Ruan Nanzhu seemed to be thinking about something and didn't say anything.
Lin Qiushi's gaze fell on the mosquitoes still hovering on the deck. He walked over to the mosquitoes, reached out and grabbed one, and frowned slightly when he saw the mosquito in his hand.
"What's wrong?" Ruan Nanzhu noticed the strangeness in Lin Qiushi's expression.
"Have you ever seen a mosquito like this?" Lin Qiushi spread out his palm, revealing the mosquito he had just caught.
Ruan Nanzhu was slightly stunned when he saw the mosquito in Lin Qiushi's hand.
I saw that the mosquito actually had a human face. Although the face was very hideous, it did look like a human, with eyes, a nose, and a long, needle-shaped mouth that looked like a mouthpart.
This mosquito is only the size of a grain of rice, and you need to look very carefully to see its appearance.
Looking at the mosquito, Ruan Nanzhu suddenly remembered something. He asked, "Do you remember the NPC that appeared in front of us at the beginning?"
Lin Qiushi thought about it and understood what Ruan Nanzhu wanted to say. He said, "Are you talking about the bugs on his body?" The NPC's body was indeed covered with a dense mass of bugs, but they had not looked closely at it at the time. Now, seeing the horrible appearance of these mosquitoes, they thought of the things on his body.
"Yeah." Ruan Nanzhu said, "He seems to be in the restaurant."
Lin Qiushi glanced at his watch. It was almost time for lunch, so he said, "Let's go and take a look."
Their daily meals were brought to them by this NPC, whose body was covered in mosquitoes. To be honest, this was not a pleasant thing, because looking at the dense insects on his body, people could not help but wonder if a few of them would fall into their plates.
Ruan Nanzhu came up with a solution. He took out a hot pack from his backpack, tore off the sticky side at the back, and walked around the NPC. When he came back after a while, the hot pack was covered with dense black mosquitoes.
After observation, they determined that the bug on the NPC was the same one they saw on the deck - a bug with a human face.
"How disgusting." Gu Longming expressed his extreme disgust. "Could it be that all the mosquitoes on this ship are these things? I even killed a few last night."
"It's likely." Lin Qiushi looked at the mosquito thoughtfully. "Do you think... could this mosquito have something to do with the maze?"
"What you mean is..." Ruan Nanzhu looked at Lin Qiushi.
Lin Qiushi nodded and said one word: "Line."
Clearly, the maze they were in was very different from the Minotaur's. Each room was constantly changing, so it was impossible to find the monster hidden deep within the maze with just cotton thread. Could the thread have another form, like the insect before them...
Gu Longming's eyes lit up: "It's possible!"
This kind of mosquito with a human face seems to have a special sensitivity to blood, so after the monster eats a person, its body will definitely be stained with a lot of blood. Maybe the mosquito can really help them find the monster's trace.
"The source of the mosquitoes..." Gu Longming shifted his gaze to the expressionless NPC and said with a bitter face, "Could it be that we are going to get it from him?"
"High probability." Ruan Nanzhu said.
Gu Longming: “…” To be honest, he felt disgusted even looking at that NPC for a few more seconds.
"If mosquitoes are thread, then what is wine?" Lin Qiushi propped up his chin and fiddled with the dead fish in front of him, which looked unappetizing. "I think this is more important."
According to the myth, Theseus used a ball of thread to enter the labyrinth, found the Minotaur, and killed him while he was drinking an aperitif.
Obviously, wine has other meanings here, but we have no idea yet.
Aperitif? There wasn't any alcohol on this ship. Gu Longming had complained yesterday, saying it was unusual for a ship like this to have no alcohol.
The three of them didn't touch the dead fish on the table and continued to eat the dry food they brought with them. These dry food could last for at least ten days, which was more than enough for them to leave this door.
The NPC gave them a time limit of ten days to find the door. That is to say, if they failed to find the door and leave here within ten days, some bad changes would definitely occur on the ship.
"Will the ship really reach the shore in ten days?" Gu Longming asked.
"It's impossible to reach the shore." Ruan Nanzhu said, "The most likely thing to happen is that once the time limit is up, the monster will go crazy, kill a group of people, and then enter reincarnation again." Ten days will pass again, and then the cycle will repeat until there is only one person left on the boat - that person is invincible under the protection of the door rules, and can do whatever he wants. It is only a matter of time before he finds the key and the door.
"But..." Gu Longming felt that this matter was a bit problematic. "But if it were an ordinary person, they wouldn't be able to easily associate it with something, such as this mosquito." He pointed at the human-faced insect that Lin Qiushi had placed on the table. "Can an ordinary person notice it?"
Ruan Nanzhu: "There's plenty of time inside. You can think slowly." He said in a calm tone, "Just get out before you go crazy."
Gu Longming: “…”
However, from Ruan Nanzhu's words, Lin Qiushi remembered a newcomer that Obsidian had brought back, Qin Bushai. It seemed that because he took too long to enter the house, he was unable to recover after leaving the house and was eventually disposed of.
As they were talking, the NPC finished distributing the food and turned away.
Seeing this, Lin Qiushi followed, but saw that the NPC just entered a room and disappeared before their eyes.
However, the NPC should appear at fixed times, so there is no need to worry about him disappearing. But how are they going to collect the mosquitoes on his body... This is a rather troublesome matter.
Use a bottle? Use blood? But where would the blood come from? They were discussing this when another argument broke out in the restaurant. This time, the two were fighting between Shen Juexin, who was seasick and looked like he was about to die, and Jian Qianyuan, the woman who had lost her companion that morning.
Because she saw her partner being half-eaten, her mood seemed to be greatly affected and she seemed very irritable.
However, her irritable mood is not the most strange thing. The strangest thing is her terrible eating habits.
While everyone else showed disgust at the stale dead fish in front of them, she seemed to like this food. She kept stuffing the white and smelly fish meat into her mouth, and her face was full of satisfaction. She looked particularly happy.
Shen Juexin, who was standing next to him, was already seasick. Seeing Jian Qianyuan grabbing the fish and eating it with relish, he finally couldn't help it and ran outside in a panic, vomiting everything in his stomach directly on the deck.
His behavior seemed to have irritated Jian Qianyuan's already fragile nerves. She yelled loudly, even slamming the table and roaring angrily: "Why are you vomiting? Do you think I'm disgusting?!"
Shen Juexin was confused by the yelling and explained that he was just seasick.
"Then why didn't you vomit just now?" Jian Qianyuan said coldly, "Why did you vomit while I was eating--"
Shen Juexin said: "I didn't mean to do that. I was holding it back just now, but I couldn't help it now."
Jian Qianyuan smashed the fish head in her hand directly at Shen Juexin, and a suppressed roar came from her throat. Shen Juexin was also angry after being hit like this, and started arguing with Jian Qianyuan. The two of them argued back and forth, and in the end, Shen Juexin almost vomited in front of Jian Qianyuan again.
Seeing that the situation was not good, the others quickly pulled the two of them apart.
Jian Qianyuan was still in a very irritable mood and scratched the hands of the people trying to stop her, leaving several bloody marks. In desperation, everyone had to find something to tie her up and asked Shen Juexin to leave the restaurant quickly.
"Forget it, you know her friend just died. She's just a girl, so don't bother with her." Everyone persuaded Shen Juexin to calm down.
"She's totally incomprehensible." Shen Juexin said aggrievedly, "It's not like I want to vomit, and how could she eat that fish..."
No one said anything. Shen Juexin's words actually made sense. The fish didn't taste like it was meant to be eaten. The flesh was powdery and crumbled with a sip. There was no salt, as if it had been sitting for ages. There was even a faint stench of rancidity. Jian Qianyuan had complained about the fish meat a few days ago, but today she was enjoying it with such relish, even chewing the head. Seeing this, the people around her felt a lot more complicated.
At this moment, Jian Qianyuan was tied to a chair, and her emotions finally calmed down. She said, "Let me go. I won't quarrel with him anymore."
"Qian Yuan, calm down. We know you're sad." Someone else continued to persuade her, "You need to be strong."
Jian Qianyuan didn't say anything, just nodded.
The others loosened the rope for her and let her down. They thought Jian Qianyuan would leave after being released, but she sat down at the dining table again and continued to gnaw on the disgusting fish.
Everyone looked at this scene with ugly expressions.
Gu Longming couldn't help but asked quietly, "Is it delicious?"
Jian Qianyuan glanced at him and said coldly, "So what if it doesn't taste good? Do you have anything else to give me?"
Gu Longming: “…”
Although she received such an answer, it was obvious that Jian Qianyuan was enjoying her meal very much. She seemed to think that the fishy fish in her mouth was particularly delicious. She kept stuffing the dead fish into her mouth without any pause.
Faced with this situation, everyone tacitly left the restaurant and walked outside. They were obviously feeling a little nauseous. If they continued to watch, someone might not be able to hold back and vomit like Shen Juexin did. If Jian Qianyuan saw it, she would probably make another scene.
"How can she eat it?" Gu Longming said with a grim face.
"Do you think Jian Qianyuan is lying?" Ruan Nanzhu suddenly spoke.
"What?" Gu Longming was stunned.
"Are you talking about what happened last night? What did Jian Qianyuan hide?" After saying this, Lin Qiushi glanced in the direction of the restaurant.
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