Chapter 199: Inhuman (7) (1st update + 2nd update + 0.5 update) [VIP]
As soon as the storyteller finished speaking, a faint festive tune was heard outside the window.
Bai Jinshu stood up from the table, looked around for a while, and opened the live broadcast room to take a look.
There aren’t many comments in the live broadcast room, and most of them seem to be just chatting with each other:
[It’s dark now, so the story that starts in the daytime can be ruled out. ]
[What are you trying to exclude? Didn’t the storyteller just say that today is the day when the fox gets married?]
【This afternoon we are talking about a fox getting married?】
[It's not easy for a fox to get married. 】
[The anchor is the bride? That's terrible. It's not easy for the bride to escape.]
[Instead of worrying about the anchor, worry about others first. The anchor can tear apart the ghost story with his own hands. 】
【Did anyone get the Scholar this time? 】
[Give me the name of another live broadcast room. I’ll go check it out.]
[Guide: [AAA Yuan Shanming leads the newcomer Xiao Fei], [Follow Tang Tang meow, follow Tang Tang, thank you meow! ]……]
[I came back after watching it. This time, everyone is not a scholar, most of them are passers-by. 】
[Ah... this team of newcomers is so unlucky. Not only are they the first to run into a fox getting married, but none of them are scholars.]
[However, the Xiao Fei who often stays with the anchor next door got the Scholar Servant. ]
[Scholar servant? That's terrible.]
[Those who know how to play well won’t suffer. This identity is not bad. ]
…
I can’t tell anything from the barrage.
No one was surprised that he got the identity of the bride, which only meant that this identity was randomly assigned regardless of gender before.
The comments in his live broadcast room were much more normal. There were fewer comments that were a bit like the cute landlord's silly son yesterday. It was probably because after the whole team entered the Fox's Wedding, many people from other live broadcast rooms came to him to confirm his identity, which diluted the silliness in his live broadcast room.
Bai Jinshu looked around. He was now in a small room. Apart from the red clothes he was wearing, there was no other red decoration in the room.
It is impossible to tell what dynasty this place is from the decorations, and it is also impossible to tell when the costumes are from the clothing. This is probably because the original storyteller told this story in an unknown period.
There are no signs of life in the house. It looks like it was temporarily converted from other rooms. It can be seen that the original owner's financial situation was not very good and it was highly likely that he did not live here.
Taking advantage of the fact that no one else had arrived yet, Bai Jinshu searched the room thoroughly but found no useful information.
According to Yuan Shanming, there is a time difference between the time in this space and the outside world. After entering it, the environment and time of everyone will change with the storyteller's narration. Every time the storyteller's voice sounds, it represents a time change and transition.
By the end of the story, if they don't escape successfully, they will be left here forever.
"Escape" means escaping in the literal sense. If this story takes place in a house, then the criterion for escape is leaving the house. If it takes place in a palace, then the criterion for escape is leaving the palace. It is very simple and crude.
For example, this time, the story of the fox getting married took place in a mountain, so the criterion for escape was leaving the range of the wedding banquet.
After each successful exit, a rough rating will appear based on the performance of the ghost story. A total of ten storytelling sessions and ten escapes will be completed. Finally, the ghost story rating of the [Teahouse] is determined based on the overall completion rate.
In other words, after triggering the teahouse, it is not mandatory for the triggerer to participate in ten escapes, but the ones not participated in will also be counted in the overall completion, lowering the overall final rating.
If you want to maintain a relatively high rating, you must either participate in all ten escapes, or try to get the highest rating in the games you participate in to raise the average score of other games you did not participate in.
This is easy to understand.
Judging from Yuan Shanming's plan, he doesn't seem like the kind of person who would let everyone waste time in the teahouse every afternoon playing escape room, so Bai Jinshu concluded that unless some of the newcomers planned to stay here for ten days, the participation of everyone in the teahouse's ghost stories would decrease as time went on.
In the first few days after entering the Novice Village, a captain is needed to lead the team. In the later stages, everyone will show their magical powers. Capable people will not be willing to stay in the teahouse and waste their time. At that time, this place will really be just like an absolutely safe hotel.
If that was the case, Bai Jinshu slightly lifted the edge of the paper window, took a look outside, and had already made a plan in his mind.
For those who have triggered the teahouse, the teahouse will definitely occupy one of the five positions. The wisest way is to raise the rating of each escape as high as possible in the early stage, so as to offset the gap caused by skipping classes in the later stage.
According to the [Bumping into Porcelain] that Xiao Fei triggered last night, the rating of the ghost story is determined by five dimensions, namely exploration degree, physical health, area exploration degree, reputation value, and camp value.
It is not known whether the positive or negative camp value will affect the rating, but the first four items are easy to understand.
The exploration degree requires the triggerer to understand the entire picture of the ghost story as much as possible, and it would be best if they could piece together the entire story of the ghost story. Like the last [Bumping into a Car], they completed the ghost story in a confused manner and had no idea why the whole process, so the final exploration degree was only a small 30%.
Physical health. This should refer to whether the triggerer is injured after completing the entire ghost story process. From this, we can see that most of the ghost stories in the Novice Village are probably quite lethal. Xiao Fei’s eyes being taken away is just the beginning, otherwise this would not be a criterion for judgment.
Regional exploration is easy to understand, and it's also the easiest to brush up on. Just run around the map. As long as you go to all the places where ghost stories exist, you can get the highest score possible.
The reputation value should refer to how many people within the scope of the ghost story know the triggerer. If you want to increase this, apart from playing all the ghost stories like Xiao Tang, the only options are some gentler methods.
As for the last camp value, Bai Jinshu still needs to study what the positive and negative values are based on. Their camp value in Qiaotou East Town reached negative 100, so could this be the reason why they moved away overnight?
And what if you get a positive 100? What will happen?
Will it be like Yuan Shanming, who became good friends with the teahouse owner Sun and used the strange stories for his own benefit?
Faint lights could be seen outside the window, and there seemed to be voices approaching at the door. Bai Jinshu looked through the small gap in the window and vaguely saw that an elderly middle-aged woman and a young man were walking in from outside.
Both of them were dressed festively, but the expressions on their faces showed more worry and fear than joy.
I understand.
After all, no normal person would laugh when faced with a fox getting married.
In the storyteller's story, the perspective is entirely on the scholar who bumps into a fox wedding party, and there is very little description of the bride. If Bai Jinshu wants to increase his exploration level, he will probably have to find out the ins and outs of this identity.
It's easy to find out other people's stories, but it's difficult to find out your own stories.
A series of thoughts went through his mind, and without making a sound, he gently lowered the window, put the veil over his head, and sat down steadily on the bed.
There were two knocks on the door: "Fourth Mother, Mother is coming in."
Fourth Lady?
Does the identity in this strange story automatically change its name according to the identity of the person entering? Or is it because the bride's name never appeared in the storyteller's story from beginning to end, so after he became this identity, the strange story world simply completed it according to his name?
There was a slight "creaking" sound from the wooden door, and the middle-aged woman's rough hand gently grasped Bai Jinshu's wrist. Perhaps because she was too sad, she did not notice that the hand in her hand had grown bigger.
The fingers are long and slender with distinct joints; these are a pair of men's hands.
“Fourth Mother, you… don’t blame Mother. It was really that demon who saved your father’s life,” the middle-aged woman’s voice was stable at first, but as time went on, she couldn’t control her faint crying. “We hid you for more than ten years, but we didn’t expect that his marriage proposal team would come to our door in the end. You have no choice but to marry me!”
"If there was a way, it wouldn't have turned out like this..." She tucked away the tears from her eyes and pretended to be happy, "But I see that the gifts that fox brought to propose marriage are all fine pearls and jadeite jewelry. Our fourth sister will go there to enjoy the good life, which is much better than staying in this small village."
"Fourth Mother...Fourth Mother?" The bride covered with a veil did not respond for a long time. The woman said in some surprise.
In the small room, there was only a red candle that illuminated the entire room. Under the dim light, she felt that her daughter, who was wearing the wedding dress she had sewn herself, suddenly looked strange.
Bai Jinshu only felt that the hand holding his wrist was getting stronger and stronger, with a force that seemed to want to crush him to pieces.
Under the red veil, a few comments suddenly appeared on the live broadcast room barrage:
【Ah, I’ve been discovered.】
[Here comes the first hurdle of the bride card. 】
[What's the big deal? She's not a ghost. The host can just knock her down.]
[Last time, the anchor pretended to be the bride. ]
[If it were that easy to dress up as a woman, this wouldn’t be called the first hurdle. ]
[Host, just do it. The storyteller will change the scene later. You can leave whether you win or lose.]
[Don't teach randomly, just do it, the exploration degree is estimated to be reduced by 40%]
Bai Jinshu raised his eyebrows slightly. A 40% loss? Forget it.
This was the first time that the live broadcast room gave him advice. Although it was not a good idea and it was obvious that he would fall out with the ghost story as soon as he came in, it did prove that these barrages could provide help and reference to the anchor.
But whether these references are credible is up to you to judge.
The woman holding her hand gained more and more strength, and her movements became more and more hasty. She stretched out her hand and tried to lift the veil: "Fourth Lady?!"
"Mom," a hoarse and choked female voice suddenly came from inside the veil, "I don't want to go."
The middle-aged woman's movements suddenly stopped.
Her eyes were filled with tears in an instant: "Mother doesn't want to... Mother doesn't want to..."
There was a sound from the door that sounded like a wolf howling and a dog barking.
"Time, time has come," she quickly wiped her tears and stood up, holding Bai Jinshu's arm, helping him up from the bed, and led him to the door of the room, choking with sobs and admonishing, "I'll ask your brother to carry you out later. Once you leave this door, you can't say what you just said."
"Sanlang," she turned around and hurriedly pushed the boy next to her, unable to bear it any longer, "Carry your sister out."
strangeness.
Why is "Si Niang" ranked fourth and "San Lang" ranked third, but Four is Three's sister?
The family doesn't look very wealthy, and the age difference between the two should not be that big, so boys and girls shouldn't be ranked separately. There should be at least seven people in total, three boys and four girls, right?
Sanlang, who had been silent all the time, squatted down silently and let Bai Jinshu lie on his back.
"You..." As soon as he stood up, he felt something was wrong.
This is not Si Niang!
On his back was another person.
"Shh..." A cold hand gently touched his neck, which made him shudder. Through the veil, a male voice reached his ears, "Don't scream, I'm not your sister, your sister is gone now."
【？ 】
【He's going to lie again! 】
[I hate it when the anchor tells lies. I can’t tell when someone is lying. I don’t know how to lie.]
Three barrages flew past quickly.
The audience in the live broadcast room were quite perceptive. Bai Jinshu raised his eyebrows in his heart.
He was indeed about to start lying.
If you attack directly, you will lose 40% of your exploration degree, so if you want to obtain information, you have to use some other methods.
"Then my sister..." When Sanlang heard the man's voice, his hand slipped and he quickly carried him back to his mother's side. He also lowered his voice and asked, "Where is my sister?"
"I don't know about that," Bai Jinshu said softly, lying without blinking, "I only know that I'm here to marry her off."
"This won't do! What if..." Sanlang's voice suddenly became a little louder.
Before he could finish his words, the cold fingers grabbed his throat and said, "Your sister is gone. If you shout now and they find out that the bride is a fake, not only will I be in trouble, but you will be too."
Saburo's voice suddenly stopped.
"Sanlang, what's wrong?" The middle-aged woman noticed the small conflict here.
"Mom, I said goodbye to Si Niang before I carried her out. I don't know when we will see each other again." Sanlang lowered his eyes and quickly fooled his mother.
"What do you want to do?" He lowered his voice, "You will definitely be recognized!"
"No." Bai Jinshu lied without blinking.
"I'm the Painted Skin Ghost. I need an identity. It just so happens that your sister doesn't need this identity, so she found me and I naturally took her place," Bai Jinshu glanced at the direction of the live broadcast room's barrage, and without blushing or beating his heart, he said the second lie casually, "If you want me to avoid being discovered, tell me about your sister's situation. The more you know, the better I can disguise myself."
The woman behind him was still whispering something. Sanlang paused and asked quickly, "Really?"
"What's so false about this?" The cold fingers loosened his neck. "Anyway, your sister is gone now. You have no other choice but to tell me as much as possible."
Sanlang paused and had to accept this statement.
"For the rest of the journey, you will answer whatever I ask you," the voice said. "First question, why are you the third and she is the fourth, but she is the older sister and you are the younger brother?"
"Because..." Sanlang paused, "Because my parents wanted to hide her at the beginning."
Not far away, a sedan chair with lit lanterns was getting closer and closer, and the magnificent golden decorations on the eaves of the sedan chair could be vaguely seen.
Bai Jinshu: "Hurry up, it's too late."
"At the beginning, my mother was weak when she was pregnant. My father went to the mountain to find wild ginseng to keep her alive during childbirth, but she slipped off a cliff. In the end, she was saved by a fox. Before saving his life, the fox asked his eldest daughter to be its bride in fifteen years. At that time, my mother was already eight months pregnant, and experienced midwives in the village and outside said that it was a boy," Sanlang said quickly. "My father was cautious at the time and asked if it was the eldest daughter. The fox said it was the eldest daughter, so he agreed to the fox."
“I didn’t expect…”
Unexpectedly, a few months later, outside the delivery room, the baby that everyone in the surrounding area thought was a boy turned out to be a girl.
From the perspective of modern medicine, any judgment on the sex of the fetus without ultrasound is inaccurate.
But here, only one thought came to the minds of all those who knew the situation.
fox.
This fetus was replaced by a fox.
The fox waited for the man to pass by and threatened to save his life before changing his tire.
Bai Jinshu frowned slightly: "So after her, there are actually three younger brothers, but to the outside world, she is the fourth? You want to hide her with the ranking."
"Yes, everyone thought that was all. But a few days ago, we found countless large and magnificent boxes placed in the yard of our home. A fiery red fox was squatting on the boxes. When it saw someone coming out, it barked like a human being, left a letter and left."
Bai Jinshu looked at the live broadcast room thoughtfully.
This information is probably the personal exploration level of the bride line.
I don't know if he was chosen for this identity because his name contains a four, but this information has nothing to do with the story. It seems that before the storytelling of the fox's wedding officially begins, the time left should be left for everyone to explore their own personal exploration line.
The relevant information about the ghost stories later on can be exchanged with each other, but the solo line that is pushed alone before everyone meets each other depends entirely on personal ability. If everyone can complete the rest of the story and exchange relevant information with each other, then the only thing that can make the difference is this little personal information.
From this perspective, the distribution of exploration levels in the strange story of foxes getting married is quite scientific.
While emphasizing teamwork, we also focus on individual abilities.
[This mountain and forest legend is so old that the time is unknown. It is said that a scholar once passed by a mountain forest with lush trees when he went to Beijing to take an imperial examination.]
The storyteller's voice suddenly rang out, and the surrounding scene changed. Bai Jinshu, who was on Sanlang's back a second ago, suddenly appeared and sat inside the sedan.
He glanced at the time in the live broadcast room and found that half an hour had passed since he came in.
In the outside world, the time interval between the storyteller's two sentences should not exceed half a minute.
Fortunately, he was quick in asking questions, because if he was a little later, he would have been forced to change his position as soon as the storyteller's voice sounded.
[The scholar was walking along the edge of the forest when he suddenly noticed that many people were coming out of this not-so-busy path.]
[He looked at the sky that was about to get dark, and then at the road in the distance that showed no signs of a town. He felt strange, so he stopped a passerby, bowed, and asked politely—]
"Brother, may I ask where are you going?"
Outside the forest, on a small path, a well-dressed scholar was walking in front, followed by a servant with a bag on his back.
"You don't know?" The man who was stopped by the scholar was a well-dressed man. "We are going to a wedding banquet. Lord Hu is getting married tonight! The surrounding area within a hundred miles has received invitations. Aren't you a local?"
"Oh, I passed by here..."
Xiao Fei stood behind with a bag on his back, his eyes drifting uncontrollably towards the barrage of comments in the live broadcast room.
[This anchor is so unlucky. ]
[It turns out to be a scholar servant. How nice it is to be a scholar. 】
[The fastest servant death record is one and a half minutes. He was recognized and killed one and a half minutes after entering.]
[…What a pity. ]
[Come to think of it, the escape rate of the scholar servant seems to be only higher than that of the bride, right? It's the second to last. ]
【It was tragic that Xiao Yuan's team got the fox wedding at the beginning. 】
[No way, the identities in the teahouse are randomly assigned, which one you get depends entirely on luck.]
It’s over. It’s over.
Xiao Fei's mind went blank as he read the barrage of comments.
He didn't memorize too many stories to begin with, so his impression of this one was surprisingly small. He only remembered that it was about a scholar who met someone going to a wedding banquet. As it was getting late and there was no place to rest nearby, he shamelessly decided to join the banquet. Unexpectedly, he ended up wandering into the story of a fox getting married.
After listening to Yuan Shanming's story, who would the person least want to be assigned to would definitely be the scholar's servant.
There is no other reason for this, it is simply because in this story, only two ordinary humans appeared from beginning to end, one was a scholar and the other was a servant.
The scholar wanted to attend the wedding banquet, and he mixed into the group of monsters without knowing it. After discovering the clues, he disguised himself as a monster in order to avoid being recognized as a human. The servants who were not as smart as him were seen through by the monsters and became their meal on the way to the wedding banquet.
As Xiao Fei watched the plot unfold, he couldn't help but feel his legs go weak.
This scholar didn't know that the person in front of him was a monster, how could he not know? !
Each of these things looks more human than the other. Who would have thought that they are all monsters who enjoy eating humans!
Seeing the scholar and the thing covered in human skin greeting each other and deciding to go to the wedding banquet at the last minute, he wanted to pounce on him and cover the mouth of this unfortunate scholar!
You finally escaped with the help of the bride! What about your servants? What about me?
Please give me some attention! The life of a servant is also a life!
Noticing the gazes of the monsters around him, Xiao Fei forced himself to cheer up and tried not to look so scared.
And in his heart——
Erge...Erge!
Help me, Erge!
Erge, where are you? Erge!
*
At this time, Bai Jinshu, whom Xiaofei was thinking about, was in the sky.
Literally heaven.
Bai Jinshu sat in the sedan chair, sticking half of his head out to look outside.
Although he was sitting in the sedan chair now, the sedan chair was not on the ground.
Outside the curtain of the sedan chair, there were wisps of clouds. Looking down was like the perspective of being on an airplane. The towns below all turned into small squares and passed by quickly in front of his eyes.
The sedan was carried by four creatures whose shapes could not be clearly identified, but considering the context of the times, they were probably some kind of magical power that could shrink the distance to an inch.
He overestimated the bride's parents and underestimated the fox's abilities.
He said that this family was so scared when they saw the yard full of betrothal gifts and a fox a few days ago. When he walked out of the yard, he was stunned by the desert in front of him.
In order to avoid the fox, the family actually moved all the way from the Central Plains to the Western Regions.
And this fox who came to get married had traveled across several provinces, but no one could catch up with him and keep offering betrothal gifts.
Really has a strong spirit of contract.
Bai Jinshu's mouth twitched. He lowered the curtain of the sedan chair, slightly extended his fingers, and tapped lightly three times on the right side of the sedan chair.
After a while, there were four equally light knocks from outside in response.
Bai Jinshu glanced at the time in the live broadcast room and estimated the time.
This period of time is probably reserved for the scholar's story. The next time the perspective changes is when the scholar finds that he has mistakenly entered a monster wedding.
The four knocking sounds just now represented that the sedan he was riding in would arrive at its destination in about four minutes.
Among the four people carrying the sedan chair, three were monsters of unknown origin, and the fourth was Lao Ma, a crane worker.
It was he who just tapped to convey the message.
In his impression, Lao Ma was an honest and simple middle-aged man with a weak presence. If he was not older than the average age of ordinary newcomers, Bai Jinshu would not have paid attention to him.
After entering the teahouse's ghost story, Lao Ma was assigned a very insignificant role. Compared with the bride, the storyteller did not even mention these four people as the sedan bearers who carried the bride to get married.
Bai Jinshu had previously thought that everyone would be assigned the roles mentioned by the storyteller, but he didn't expect that Lao Ma would actually show his marginal characteristics in the ghost story and be assigned a role that had never been mentioned.
So when Bai Jinshu threw away his veil and stuck his head out of the window to look around, both of them were stunned.
Bai Jinshu was a little surprised: "Old Ma?"
Old Ma was even more surprised: "Er... Ersi, you are a woman dressed as a man!"
Bai Jinshu:?
As soon as a personal scene entered the story, we saw that the joy of the focus object was suddenly diluted by his words.
"Do you think so?" He paused, observed that the sedan bearer in front of him did not notice their conversation, then looked over with a speechless face.
Hearing this question, Lao Ma glanced at him a few times, and a bit of embarrassment broke out on his face, which was very inconsistent with his appearance: "You acted very... very similar, I didn't even notice it, very impressive."
Bai Jinshu: "...Ah?"
"Old Ma, what I said was a rhetorical question," Bai Jinshu twitched his lips, "Wake up, of course I can't be a woman dressed as a man, I just drew the bride card."
What is language comprehension?
"Oh...I see." Old Ma nodded honestly and said sincerely, "You are really amazing. Unlike me, I can only be a sedan bearer."
If it weren't for his sincere face, these words would have sounded like a provocation if said by anyone else.
If Xiao Tang were here, he could continue to add fuel to this topic.
Thinking of another newcomer who loves to draw hatred towards him, Bai Jinshu changed his posture unhappily: "Are you awesome? How about you switch with me?"
The identity of a bride is definitely one of the most troublesome identities. At a wedding, it doesn't matter if a guest runs away, or if the sedan bearer runs away, but if the bride runs away, that would be a big deal.
At the very least, all the spirits launched a search, and at most, the fox groom had to chase and kill him directly.
"Ah... Isn't this a bit bad?" Old Ma scratched his head and looked at Bai Jinshu embarrassedly, "I... I'm already over 40 years old, and wearing such bright red clothes doesn't match my age. It doesn't look good."
It turns out that sincerity is the eternal killer skill.
No matter how confused and speechless Bai Jinshu was, he became numb after hearing these extremely sincere responses.
"I don't really intend to exchange with you. This ID card can't be exchanged..." He paused, "Forget it."
"Did you see anyone else before you came here?" Bai Jinshu changed the subject. "Besides the two of us, Xiao Fei is the scholar's servant, you are the sedan bearer, and I am the fox bride. What about the others? Did the comments in your live broadcast room mention them?"
He lied to Saburo a few minutes ago, and now the live broadcast room is no longer watchable. It is simply a scene of philosophical speculation.
If an innocent passerby walked into this place now, he would probably think he had accidentally walked into a philosophy discussion room.
In this case, if you want to understand the situation, you should ask other people.
"Live broadcast room?" Lao Ma showed a confused expression, "What live broadcast room?"
Bai Jinshu frowned: "You haven't opened it? Brother Yuan mentioned it on the subway."
"Is it the box with a lot of words on it?" Lao Ma gestured.
Bai Jinshu: "Yes, did you reveal the identities of other people in your live broadcast room?"
"This... Brother Er," Lao Ma showed an extremely embarrassed expression, "I can't read, I can't understand it."
Bai Jinshu was silent for a long time: "...Just pretend I didn't ask."
Except for him, every newcomer who is suspected to be from the Foundation in this Novice Village has chosen to play dumb, right?
The author has something to say:
Metal: Ma Dongmei.
Lao Ma: What Dongmei?
Metal: Ma Dongmei——
Lao Ma: What plum?
Metal: Ma Dongmei!
Lao Ma: Ma Dong what?
Xiao Tang in the next chapter: The child is quiet, he must be making trouble
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