San Tian Liang Jiao
Chapter 1211 Summer Memories (4)
“I just wanted to say, if the other party really has a physical form, don't think of it as a ghost. Think of it as a normal monster, and it won't be so scary,” Feng Bujue replied in a relaxed tone.
“Tch… if it weren't for the limitations, a hundred or two of these things wouldn't be scary at all,” Gui Xiao muttered, pouting.
That was true. If he had the support of “Data Vision,” even in the dark, he could clearly know the monster's specific location and strength. Then there would be nothing to fear.
“Nonsense. If there were no limitations, you'd be planning to carry the five of us through the scenario by yourself, wouldn't you?” Feng Bujue spread his hands and continued, “That kind of hypothetical is meaningless to talk about now… but in my personal opinion, ‘adaptation’ and ‘overcoming’ are what make this game interesting. The more limited the scenario, the more interesting it is.”
As he spoke, he reached out again and took a second flashlight from the wooden bookcase, showing it to his teammates.
“Okay, back to the point…” Two seconds later, Jue-ge said again, “There happen to be six flashlights in the bookcase…” He paused, glanced up at the light tube high above that was no longer glowing, “If I'm not mistaken, that light won't turn on again, so… we'll all have to rely on these flashlights to see from now on.”
“Ah…” Xiao Tan sighed, drawing out his voice, “I hate this kind of visually restricted situation the most.”
Even though he said that, he was the first to step forward and take the flashlight from Jue-ge's hand.
Da—
As soon as he got the flashlight, Xiao Tan turned it on and immediately swept it around the classroom, wanting to see if there was anything scary lurking in the darkness.
“Finished confirming?” Feng Bujue asked after seeing him finish scanning.
“Mm,” Xiao Tan nodded.
“Then turn it off,” Jue-ge replied.
“Huh?” Xiao Tan was stunned.
“Huh what?” Feng Bujue said matter-of-factly, “Do you know how long a flashlight battery lasts? If six people turn them on together, what if they all die out in twenty minutes?”
“Uh…” Xiao Tan thought for a moment, and awkwardly turned off his flashlight.
At the same time as their conversation, Ruo Yu and the other four also stepped forward to take the flashlights. Hearing Jue-ge's words, everyone was sensible… they only turned on the flashlights to see if they worked, and then immediately turned them off.
“From now on, we'll take turns turning on the flashlights to provide light.” After everyone had taken the flashlights, Feng Bujue spoke again, “I'll go first. When the power of this flashlight runs out and it goes off, then another person will be responsible for lighting.”
“Wait…” Hearing this, Xiao Ling interjected and asked, “Wouldn't that mean everyone's line of sight has to follow the same person's flashlight beam?”
“Yes,” Feng Bujue replied, “So I want to add a few more limitations…” He had naturally already thought of an answer to Xiao Ling's question, “When you feel something strange moving in the dark, when you leave the group alone in certain situations, or when you're searching separately… everyone can turn on their flashlights as needed.” He paused, “As for now…” He raised his flashlight and shined it up from below his face, creating the lighting effect from horror movies, and smiled, “Everyone, please follow me and look over there…”
At this point, he changed the direction of the flashlight again, shining the beam on the window where that strange face had appeared earlier, and everyone's gaze followed.
“Look at the windowsill,” Feng Bujue added, afraid that someone might not see clearly.
On that very narrow windowsill, a flashing dot had appeared at some point… if you looked closely, you could see that it was a key.
“It's a key!” Gui Xiao shouted excitedly the moment he recognized the object.
“Oh? You're quite excited,” Jue-ge followed up, taking advantage of the situation, “Then please go over and get it.”
“W… why do I have to go?” In a split second, Gui Xiao chickened out.
“Because someone has to go,” Feng Bujue said, “Even if I said I'd take you through a Nightmare scenario, I'm not exactly boosting you, am I? You can't just lie down and win from beginning to end, can you?”
“Oh…” Gui Xiao responded and said the opposite, “Then I have to thank you for your training and guidance?”
“You're welcome,” Feng Bujue continued the other person's words without any pressure, “I've already felt your endless gratitude from your sincere eyes. Now… hurry up and get the key, and stop wasting my battery.”
“Hmph…” Gui Xiao snorted angrily, but he still went…
Although Jue-ge's tone was very sarcastic, what he said made some sense—as a member of the team, Gui Xiao should make some contribution. Since he didn't help much in the “puzzle-solving” part, then in this “adventure” part… he definitely had to step up when it was his turn.
One step… one step… Gui Xiao approached the window very cautiously.
Outside the window, it was still pitch black. The flashlight's light was swallowed by the heavy darkness in front of it after passing through the glass.
If a scary face suddenly popped out from behind the window glass at this time, Gui Xiao would most likely be so scared that he would jump up.
Fortunately… that kind of situation didn't happen.
When Gui Xiao approached the window, he suddenly accelerated, reached out, grabbed the key with his eyes closed… turned his head and returned, quickly running back to the others.
“Here!” When handing the key to Feng Bujue, Gui Xiao uttered that word with particular force, his smugness overflowing.
“What are you so proud of… how much effort did it take to get a key?” Feng Bujue narrowed his eyes and poured another bucket of cold water on his teammate.
After pouring it, he didn't give the other person any room to refute, and immediately said again, “In short… let's try this closer one first.”
According to the hints obtained earlier, there were only two places in this classroom that needed to be opened with a “key”: the first was the storage space inside the podium, and the second was the nine storage cabinets on the side and rear of the classroom.
The “closer one” that Jue-ge was talking about at the moment was obviously the podium.
Zi—
The key that Gui Xiao brought over smoothly inserted into the keyhole on the inner side panel of the podium.
The next second, Feng Bujue still didn't hesitate to turn the key and open the panel.
Then… a dark lump appeared in front of everyone.
“Ah—” When she saw the lump inside the podium, even An Yueqin couldn't help but scream.
And her scream scared the timid Xiao Tan and Gui Xiao into a shiver.
“W… what's the situation?” Xiao Tan asked immediately.
“Don't panic.” Feng Bujue always seemed to be saying similar things to his teammates, “It's just hair.” As he spoke, he took out a large clump of long black hair from inside the podium… and placed it on top of the podium.
“Holy crap?” Gui Xiao's scalp went numb, “What the hell is this…”
Hearing this, Jue-ge inexplicably revealed a smile and retorted, “It's not a ghost, it's a wig.”
“Pfft—” No one knew why, but after he said this, Ruo Yu burst out laughing.
She looked very beautiful when she laughed, but at this moment… no one except Jue-ge understood her punchline. The others only felt a faint sense of gloom from her laughter…
“Judging from your expressions, you all don't seem very willing to touch this thing.” After putting the wig down, Feng Bujue continued, “Then I won't be polite and will be responsible for keeping and carrying this item.”
“Carry?” Gui Xiao was getting more and more shocked at this moment. Although he had fought against Jue-ge before and watched his matches, he had never teamed up with Jue-ge in a team scenario before. Today was the first time he had seen Feng Bujue's performance in this kind of horror decryption scenario at close range, “What are you going to do with this thing?”
“Is that even a question?” As Feng Bujue spoke, he pressed his hand on the clump of hair, deliberately showing the item information to his teammates.
【Name: Strange Long Hair】
【Type: Scenario-Related】
【Quality: Normal】
【Function: Unknown】
【Whether it can be brought out of this scenario: Yes】
【Note: Human hair, placed here for some reason.】
“Look, this is a ‘scenario-related item that can be brought out of the scenario,’ which means… it's possible to trigger some kind of hidden plot with this later on,” Feng Bujue continued, “Even if it doesn't trigger, you can take it out and turn it into a puzzle card.” He paused for half a second and added, “Also… hair is very strong, in case there's a need for rope later, as long as you braid this hair, you can use it as a rope.”
“Someone who can't even tie their shoelaces properly is still thinking about weaving?” Just as Jue-ge finished speaking, Ruo Yu suddenly made another retort.
It had to be said that this retort was really sharp…
“Can't I just say it! Can't I!” Jue-ge immediately roared in embarrassment.
At the same time, Xiao Ling lowered her voice and whispered into Xiao Tan's ear, “I feel like… big sis and Jue-ge's relationship is even better than before…”
“How can you tell…” Xiao Tan also whispered back, “I think these two are just getting deeper and deeper into some strange field…”
“Okay, okay… bring it if you want, I don't care if you braid it and use it as a jump rope.” Gui Xiao, who didn't know much about Jue-ge and the others' situation, was now talking about serious matters, “Hey… is there anything else in the podium?”
“Yes, there are two more things,” Feng Bujue replied, and casually took out a key and a yellowed piece of paper from the podium.
The key looked very small. The first impression was that it wasn't for opening doors. The players naturally thought… this was the key to one of the boxes on the storage cabinet.
As for that yellowed piece of paper…
“Both sides are marked with vertical lines, but there are no page numbers. Combining the size and thickness of the paper, I can deduce…” Feng Bujue held the piece of paper at an angle that everyone could see and concentrated the flashlight's light on it, “This piece of paper should have been torn from a workbook.”
“Looking at the handwriting… it's probably written by an elementary school student,” Xiao Ling added after staring at the text on the paper for a few seconds.
“Looking at the content… it seems to be a diary?” An Yueqin read, “By the way… is there anything on the back?”
“No,” Feng Bujue responded, and turned the piece of paper over for his teammates to see, then turned it back to the side with writing.
“So… the hints are all concentrated on the front, right?” Gui Xiao said and began to browse the contents of the paper.
【May 13th, Sunny.】
【During lunch break today, the warehouse across from the principal's office suddenly caught fire.】
【The teacher immediately organized us to go to the playground according to the evacuation drill.】
【The firemen came quickly and put out the fire in the warehouse.】
【I saw them carrying a person out of the fire on a stretcher and sending him to the ambulance. Although I don't know who it was, I hope he's okay.】
【Because of the fire, the afternoon classes were cancelled. After we returned to the classroom, the teacher told us to pack our bags and go home.】
【Before going home, I realized that I hadn't seen Suzuki since lunch break.】
【I asked the teacher where Suzuki went. The teacher said that he had already gone home first.】
【I felt relieved after hearing the teacher say that. For a moment, I thought Suzuki had been burned in the fire.】
【But Suzuki's memory is really bad. He forgot to bring the key to his storage cabinet this morning, so he put his recorder in my storage cabinet. As a result, he forgot to take the recorder when he went home after school.】
【Oh well, I'll return it to him tomorrow.】
【Class 2-A, Noguchi Eiji.】
The text of this diary was written from top to bottom and from right to left. Almost the entire diary was written in hiragana (a type of phonetic script used in Japanese), with very few kanji (but the system came with its own translation).
Whether in terms of wording, handwriting, or language organization, it did seem to be the work of an elementary school student.
“Noguchi is sitting to the left of me, which is… to the left of Tomigashi.” Feng Bujue waited for about a minute, and after judging that his teammates had all read the contents of the paper, he spoke, “He is the student I mentioned earlier who went missing on May 14th. According to newspaper reports… no one has seen him since he left home for school on the morning of the 14th.”
“Mm…” Xiao Tan said with a pale face, “The fact that there's no writing on the back of this piece of paper also shows from the side that… this entry written on the 13th is Noguchi's last diary, right?”
“No need to say it…” Gui Xiao also said in a trembling voice, “According to the content of the diary… he must have been tricked by Suzuki's ghost! In the end, he even ended up dying without a body.”
“Heh…” At this moment, Feng Bujue suddenly sneered and used the flashlight to cast a terrifying light on his face again, “Saying ‘dying without a body’ is too hasty, isn't it?”
“You…” Gui Xiao stuttered, “…what are you going to say again?”
“Hehe…” Jue-ge smiled maliciously and then shined the flashlight beam on the row of storage cabinets in the back of the classroom, “Maybe… we'll be able to see his bones soon.”