Chapter 16 ~ Second Game Pt.7 ~
Hearing this, Gu Yian stepped forward, took the sage card in the Merchant’s hand, and said very calmly, “Mr. Demon killed him according to the death list.”
“The thief’s card ability is to exchange cards.”
She brought out the thief card in her hands, leaned over, and used it to cover the open eyes of the dead monkey-looking man.
“I was lucky enough to perfectly clear my previous game. When the cards were issued, Mr. Demon already said we should be able to guess what cards we would get.”
“He swapped away my card.”
“He is the thief and I am the sage.”
Gu Yian looked at the Witch and the Merchant’s shock that couldn’t be concealed.
She added, “In the end, this is just a card that symbolizes a character. I’m not really a sage who can plan for everything behind the scenes.”
Gu Yian had the self-awareness that she was able to perfectly clear the last game because she relied on the boy, Little Ze. She guessed right on the moral behind the four words, “Kindness is a crime”.
The Merchant reacted quickly and realized Gu Yian was actually the sage. “Doesn’t this mean that he swapped away your card at the very beginning?”
Gu Yian nodded, “Yes. That’s why I asked Mr. Demon a question at that time.”
Speaking up to here, Gu Yian recalled the question she asked Mr. Demon and how she was given a perfunctory effort by them.
She asked them twice and Mr. Demon brushed her aside twice. She also didn’t know if they weren’t answering her because of the game rules.
Gu Yian asked, “Does anyone feel that Mr. Demon is a bit displeased with me?”
“Why would you have this misconception?”
At some point in time, the Liar came over and joined the conversation.
Gu Yian had some suspicions in her mind about him, but she also wasn’t too sure.
But she still kept in mind the Liar’s help to her and so she replied, conservatively, “Mr. Demon always avoids my questions.”
The Liar said, “Maybe it’s because he doesn’t really like what you call him.”
Gu Yian fell silent.
If the Liar’s answer hadn’t been so specific, then even if he said the demon didn’t like people Gu Yian would not have doubted him.
But his answer was this specific.
In this instant, Gu Yian’s mind flashed through all her memories concerning the Liar.
This Liar player was extremely lively at the beginning and, at the round table, he called her over to discuss with everyone and even swore.
The Liar right now seemed to have never even said a swear.
When did a person get replaced?
After they left that room?
Gu Yian had no way to confirm this.
The Merchant contemplated and then said, “Looks like we still need to return to the round table.”
The Witch also had this intention. “Waiting around is useless. We have to find a breakthrough from the demon.”
“Let’s go right now then,” Gu Yian gave the final word.
The student who hadn’t spoken was a bit slow and didn’t know why it changed to them returning to the round table.
But seeing Gu Yian, the Liar, and the two others about to leave, he quickly moved his legs to follow them.
On the way to the round table again, Gu Yian, the Witch, and the Merchant began exchanging the information they each obtained.
The sequence of events to a story came out here.
A female student was bullied to death by her classmates and, after her death, those people who bullied her showed no repentance at all. They said with conviction that they were only playing with her and who knew she would suddenly die during their game.
The Witch added an explanation of the games played by the bullies and the murdered female student.
They would put glue on her chair, deliberately use a washroom bucket to splash her with dirty water, stretch out their legs to trip her when she was going down stairs, and even play adult games.
The Witch said, “When she died, she was already a month pregnant.”
Gu Yian looked at the full name of the school on the cover of the work log. The words behind it were junior high school.
In other words, the ages of these students were between twelve and fifteen years old.
The world view of minors was not finalized but, when they went wrong, they would become demons, one after another.
The group of players passed by the Butcher’s body.
Most of the bloodstain on the ground was dry and its color was a dark red.
The Merchant said, “The information I found didn’t bring up this death too much. It spoke about how, not long after this female student’s death, a ritual to summon a demon began circulating in the school and hundred of people died in succession.”
Gu Yian nodded. “These deaths were mentioned in the log I found. After the death of the very first person, her parents had wanted to get justice for their daughter but they were obstructed outside the school gates due to the power and influence behind the bullies’ families, and so they could only give up. After hundreds of students died in the school within a short period of time, the person who wrote this guessed that it was the ghosts of the deceased haunting the school. The school closed quickly and the students who were still alive were transferred. They left in such a hurry that some documents weren’t brought away.”
The group of players slowly climbed the stairs.
As for the Student who did not participate in the discussion, he looked at Gu Yian and the others were talking at the front and then looked at the Liar, who was also not participating in the discussion, and thought that the Liar and him were the same type of person.
For the sake of closing the distance between them, he quietly asked, “Brother Liar, are you always this relaxed? Just earlier, I had to run like hell and was nearly drowned in a toilet by those ghosts. I had thought this was going to be like my last game, where I had to keep running until the last moment.”
The Liar glanced at him coolly, his expression unclear.
The Student didn’t sense the Liar’s abnormality and his impression of the Liar was still stuck on earlier when the Liar warmly invited everyone to chat about their game experiences.
The Student proudly said, “I feel like my luck is pretty good. I’ve had to run to exhaustion every time, but at the end I’m always able to meet a good teammate who can carry me to victory.”
The Liar replied, “That may not be certain next time.”
Meeting this wall, the Student finally realized the Liar didn’t want to speak with him and so he closed his mouth in embarrassment.
Gu Yian and the others came back to the fifth floor.
The Merchant pushed open the door to 503.
The round table in their memories appeared before them.
Seven wooden chairs were arranged in proper order with no one in them.
Similarly, the luxurious seat that belonged to the demon was also empty.
The Merchant suggested, “How about we return to our seats first? They will probably appear after we sit down.”
Gu Yian shook her head.
She seemed to glance at the Liar unintentionally.
The Liar looked at her with pure and innocent eyes.
Gu Yian said, “Let’s lift the round table.”
The moment she said that the Merchant looked at her as if she was crazy.
It took the Witch a second, but she understood Gu Yian’s meaning quicker than the Merchant.
The Witch agreed firmly, “Lift the table.”
The Merchant realized now that there must be something underneath the table.
He had thought too fast and, at first, believed Gu Yian was provoking the demon and forgot that whatever was underneath the table was what was most important.
The Merchant and Student walked up and moved each player’s seat away first.
Once the chairs were moved, everyone could see that below the table was a black figure that looked like a human shape.
The Merchant and Student flipped the entire round table over.
The black figure underneath the table revealed its original appearance.
Astonishingly, it was a man who was curled up and he had the same exact face as the Liar!
The Student was struck dumb on the spot.
The Merchant and the Witch looked at the Liar beside Gu Yian and the shock in their eyes couldn’t be concealed.
The only person who was extremely calm was Gu Yian.
Previously, she had a speculation and the scene before her confirmed the truth of her speculation without a doubt.
One player had to die in the second night.
The original and real Liar player was replaced with the demon when he was leaving this place and then he was stuffed underneath the table to slowly wait for death to arrive.
Gu Yian looked at the Liar beside herself, or to be more accurate, the demon.
The person who helped her several times and told her not to be scared was the demon.
Gu Yian pursed her lips and felt a complicated emotion.
She suppressed that emotion and smiled lightly before saying, “Mr. Demon, the liar card suits you very well. Did you have fun playing the role of this character?”
The Liar, or more like Mr. Demon, was enveloped in a black mist the moment Gu Yian exposed their identity.
In a blink, what appeared in front of Gu Yian and the other players was Mr. Demon, wearing a monster mask and black robe.
They chuckled and their voice was as gentle as when Gu Yian first heard it.
They answered, “It was very interesting.”
Gu Yian smiled. “Can you tell us your wish then? We’ll achieve it for you.”
After going around in circles, they found a bunch of clues, but they still returned to achieving Mr. Demon’s wish for them.
The Merchant and the Witch suddenly held their breath.
The demon had previously set out two paths for Gu Yian.
Gu Yian didn’t pick either of them.
On top of this, Gu Yian deliberately returned to this place and exposed the demon’s identity.
They were terrified the demon would refuse to answer.
But Mr. Demon seemed to be in a good mood.
Gu Yian asked, and so they answered.
Their answer was, “Kill the demon.”
The faces of the Merchant and the Witch immediately turned ugly.
The Student was still dumbstruck and hadn’t realized what request the demon made.
Mr. Demon’s voice was filled with pleasure, “Achieve that for me.”
Their figure disappeared into thin air, leaving nothing in place.
Gu Yian looked at the place where Mr. Demon disappeared and, after staring for two seconds, she came back to herself and withdrew her gaze.
She told everyone, “Let’s go. We’re going to find the demon.”
The Student blurted out, “The demon just left. How are we to find them?”
Gu Yian glanced at the Student. “Who said that the demon is Mr. Demon?”
“Huh?” The Student was a bit dizzy.
Gu Yian explained, “If you can’t tell the difference, then use God to refer to this Mr. Demon who played the game with us and just left.”
“The demon they are referring to is the little girl. That girl’s voice which we heard in the piano music.”
Previously, the Student didn’t listen to the discussion of Gu Yian and the other two, so at this time he had no idea why that little girl became a demon.
The Merchant and the Witch, still looking ghastly, walked over to join up with Gu Yian.
Gu Yian asked in confusion, “How come you two also misunderstood?”
The Merchant denied this, “No, it’s about how we previously discussed God.”
The Witch sighed, “Those words at the time were biased. God has always been merciful to us and the difficulty of games isn’t high.”
The Merchant echoed her, “Yes, God has always been tolerant of us and we’re the ones who can’t tell good from bad…”
Gu Yian heard this and her former bad mood was swept away as she was brought to laughter by the Witch and the Merchant’s words.
At that time, they were tricked by the demon pretending to be the Liar into talking about their view towards God.
Now, the demon’s cover was lifted and they connected this to the demon asking, in a roundabout manner, about the players’ views on God.
Wasn’t the demon just another cover for God?
The Merchant and the Witch realized things weren’t good and so they quickly sent a wave of praise towards the petty God.
Gu Yian said, “Let’s talk while we walk.”
The Merchant and the Witch had no objections.
The three of them, followed closely by the Student who was still in the dark, made their way to the office building.
Gu Yian said, “Everyone probably agrees about the little girl. She was the original victim who suffered school bullying.”
The Student raised his hand and asked, “Um, the girl’s voice that we heard is at most seven or eight years old, right?”
Gu Yian didn’t expect the Student to ask a question and paused for a second before planning to explain.
But the Witch answered, “The appearance of a ghost is what they wish to present. Generally, ones that aren’t strong can only maintain the appearance they have after their death.”
Once the Student heard the Witch’s explanation, he believed her immediately and obediently didn’t speak again.
After this interlude, Gu Yian continued, “The little girl summoned a demon, obtained power from the demon, and after killing hundreds of people she turned from a victim into a real demon. After I got the security log, she realized I was planning to find her and hid herself.”
Gu Yian’s tone was very calm.
“This is what we need to do now. Find her, and then kill her.”
Chapter 16 ~ Second Game Pt.7 ~
Hearing this, Gu Yian stepped forward, took the sage card in the Merchant’s hand, and said very calmly, “Mr. Demon killed him according to the death list.”
“The thief’s card ability is to exchange cards.”
She brought out the thief card in her hands, leaned over, and used it to cover the open eyes of the dead monkey-looking man.
“I was lucky enough to perfectly clear my previous game. When the cards were issued, Mr. Demon already said we should be able to guess what cards we would get.”
“He swapped away my card.”
“He is the thief and I am the sage.”
Gu Yian looked at the Witch and the Merchant’s shock that couldn’t be concealed.
She added, “In the end, this is just a card that symbolizes a character. I’m not really a sage who can plan for everything behind the scenes.”
Gu Yian had the self-awareness that she was able to perfectly clear the last game because she relied on the boy, Little Ze. She guessed right on the moral behind the four words, “Kindness is a crime”.
The Merchant reacted quickly and realized Gu Yian was actually the sage. “Doesn’t this mean that he swapped away your card at the very beginning?”
Gu Yian nodded, “Yes. That’s why I asked Mr. Demon a question at that time.”
Speaking up to here, Gu Yian recalled the question she asked Mr. Demon and how she was given a perfunctory effort by them.
She asked them twice and Mr. Demon brushed her aside twice. She also didn’t know if they weren’t answering her because of the game rules.
Gu Yian asked, “Does anyone feel that Mr. Demon is a bit displeased with me?”
“Why would you have this misconception?”
At some point in time, the Liar came over and joined the conversation.
Gu Yian had some suspicions in her mind about him, but she also wasn’t too sure.
But she still kept in mind the Liar’s help to her and so she replied, conservatively, “Mr. Demon always avoids my questions.”
The Liar said, “Maybe it’s because he doesn’t really like what you call him.”
Gu Yian fell silent.
If the Liar’s answer hadn’t been so specific, then even if he said the demon didn’t like people Gu Yian would not have doubted him.
But his answer was this specific.
In this instant, Gu Yian’s mind flashed through all her memories concerning the Liar.
This Liar player was extremely lively at the beginning and, at the round table, he called her over to discuss with everyone and even swore.
The Liar right now seemed to have never even said a swear.
When did a person get replaced?
After they left that room?
Gu Yian had no way to confirm this.
The Merchant contemplated and then said, “Looks like we still need to return to the round table.”
The Witch also had this intention. “Waiting around is useless. We have to find a breakthrough from the demon.”
“Let’s go right now then,” Gu Yian gave the final word.
The student who hadn’t spoken was a bit slow and didn’t know why it changed to them returning to the round table.
But seeing Gu Yian, the Liar, and the two others about to leave, he quickly moved his legs to follow them.
On the way to the round table again, Gu Yian, the Witch, and the Merchant began exchanging the information they each obtained.
The sequence of events to a story came out here.
A female student was bullied to death by her classmates and, after her death, those people who bullied her showed no repentance at all. They said with conviction that they were only playing with her and who knew she would suddenly die during their game.
The Witch added an explanation of the games played by the bullies and the murdered female student.
They would put glue on her chair, deliberately use a washroom bucket to splash her with dirty water, stretch out their legs to trip her when she was going down stairs, and even play adult games.
The Witch said, “When she died, she was already a month pregnant.”
Gu Yian looked at the full name of the school on the cover of the work log. The words behind it were junior high school.
In other words, the ages of these students were between twelve and fifteen years old.
The world view of minors was not finalized but, when they went wrong, they would become demons, one after another.
The group of players passed by the Butcher’s body.
Most of the bloodstain on the ground was dry and its color was a dark red.
The Merchant said, “The information I found didn’t bring up this death too much. It spoke about how, not long after this female student’s death, a ritual to summon a demon began circulating in the school and hundred of people died in succession.”
Gu Yian nodded. “These deaths were mentioned in the log I found. After the death of the very first person, her parents had wanted to get justice for their daughter but they were obstructed outside the school gates due to the power and influence behind the bullies’ families, and so they could only give up. After hundreds of students died in the school within a short period of time, the person who wrote this guessed that it was the ghosts of the deceased haunting the school. The school closed quickly and the students who were still alive were transferred. They left in such a hurry that some documents weren’t brought away.”
The group of players slowly climbed the stairs.
As for the Student who did not participate in the discussion, he looked at Gu Yian and the others were talking at the front and then looked at the Liar, who was also not participating in the discussion, and thought that the Liar and him were the same type of person.
For the sake of closing the distance between them, he quietly asked, “Brother Liar, are you always this relaxed? Just earlier, I had to run like hell and was nearly drowned in a toilet by those ghosts. I had thought this was going to be like my last game, where I had to keep running until the last moment.”
The Liar glanced at him coolly, his expression unclear.
The Student didn’t sense the Liar’s abnormality and his impression of the Liar was still stuck on earlier when the Liar warmly invited everyone to chat about their game experiences.
The Student proudly said, “I feel like my luck is pretty good. I’ve had to run to exhaustion every time, but at the end I’m always able to meet a good teammate who can carry me to victory.”
The Liar replied, “That may not be certain next time.”
Meeting this wall, the Student finally realized the Liar didn’t want to speak with him and so he closed his mouth in embarrassment.
Gu Yian and the others came back to the fifth floor.
The Merchant pushed open the door to 503.
The round table in their memories appeared before them.
Seven wooden chairs were arranged in proper order with no one in them.
Similarly, the luxurious seat that belonged to the demon was also empty.
The Merchant suggested, “How about we return to our seats first? They will probably appear after we sit down.”
Gu Yian shook her head.
She seemed to glance at the Liar unintentionally.
The Liar looked at her with pure and innocent eyes.
Gu Yian said, “Let’s lift the round table.”
The moment she said that the Merchant looked at her as if she was crazy.
It took the Witch a second, but she understood Gu Yian’s meaning quicker than the Merchant.
The Witch agreed firmly, “Lift the table.”
The Merchant realized now that there must be something underneath the table.
He had thought too fast and, at first, believed Gu Yian was provoking the demon and forgot that whatever was underneath the table was what was most important.
The Merchant and Student walked up and moved each player’s seat away first.
Once the chairs were moved, everyone could see that below the table was a black figure that looked like a human shape.
The Merchant and Student flipped the entire round table over.
The black figure underneath the table revealed its original appearance.
Astonishingly, it was a man who was curled up and he had the same exact face as the Liar!
The Student was struck dumb on the spot.
The Merchant and the Witch looked at the Liar beside Gu Yian and the shock in their eyes couldn’t be concealed.
The only person who was extremely calm was Gu Yian.
Previously, she had a speculation and the scene before her confirmed the truth of her speculation without a doubt.
One player had to die in the second night.
The original and real Liar player was replaced with the demon when he was leaving this place and then he was stuffed underneath the table to slowly wait for death to arrive.
Gu Yian looked at the Liar beside herself, or to be more accurate, the demon.
The person who helped her several times and told her not to be scared was the demon.
Gu Yian pursed her lips and felt a complicated emotion.
She suppressed that emotion and smiled lightly before saying, “Mr. Demon, the liar card suits you very well. Did you have fun playing the role of this character?”
The Liar, or more like Mr. Demon, was enveloped in a black mist the moment Gu Yian exposed their identity.
In a blink, what appeared in front of Gu Yian and the other players was Mr. Demon, wearing a monster mask and black robe.
They chuckled and their voice was as gentle as when Gu Yian first heard it.
They answered, “It was very interesting.”
Gu Yian smiled. “Can you tell us your wish then? We’ll achieve it for you.”
After going around in circles, they found a bunch of clues, but they still returned to achieving Mr. Demon’s wish for them.
The Merchant and the Witch suddenly held their breath.
The demon had previously set out two paths for Gu Yian.
Gu Yian didn’t pick either of them.
On top of this, Gu Yian deliberately returned to this place and exposed the demon’s identity.
They were terrified the demon would refuse to answer.
But Mr. Demon seemed to be in a good mood.
Gu Yian asked, and so they answered.
Their answer was, “Kill the demon.”
The faces of the Merchant and the Witch immediately turned ugly.
The Student was still dumbstruck and hadn’t realized what request the demon made.
Mr. Demon’s voice was filled with pleasure, “Achieve that for me.”
Their figure disappeared into thin air, leaving nothing in place.
Gu Yian looked at the place where Mr. Demon disappeared and, after staring for two seconds, she came back to herself and withdrew her gaze.
She told everyone, “Let’s go. We’re going to find the demon.”
The Student blurted out, “The demon just left. How are we to find them?”
Gu Yian glanced at the Student. “Who said that the demon is Mr. Demon?”
“Huh?” The Student was a bit dizzy.
Gu Yian explained, “If you can’t tell the difference, then use God to refer to this Mr. Demon who played the game with us and just left.”
“The demon they are referring to is the little girl. That girl’s voice which we heard in the piano music.”
Previously, the Student didn’t listen to the discussion of Gu Yian and the other two, so at this time he had no idea why that little girl became a demon.
The Merchant and the Witch, still looking ghastly, walked over to join up with Gu Yian.
Gu Yian asked in confusion, “How come you two also misunderstood?”
The Merchant denied this, “No, it’s about how we previously discussed God.”
The Witch sighed, “Those words at the time were biased. God has always been merciful to us and the difficulty of games isn’t high.”
The Merchant echoed her, “Yes, God has always been tolerant of us and we’re the ones who can’t tell good from bad…”
Gu Yian heard this and her former bad mood was swept away as she was brought to laughter by the Witch and the Merchant’s words.
At that time, they were tricked by the demon pretending to be the Liar into talking about their view towards God.
Now, the demon’s cover was lifted and they connected this to the demon asking, in a roundabout manner, about the players’ views on God.
Wasn’t the demon just another cover for God?
The Merchant and the Witch realized things weren’t good and so they quickly sent a wave of praise towards the petty God.
Gu Yian said, “Let’s talk while we walk.”
The Merchant and the Witch had no objections.
The three of them, followed closely by the Student who was still in the dark, made their way to the office building.
Gu Yian said, “Everyone probably agrees about the little girl. She was the original victim who suffered school bullying.”
The Student raised his hand and asked, “Um, the girl’s voice that we heard is at most seven or eight years old, right?”
Gu Yian didn’t expect the Student to ask a question and paused for a second before planning to explain.
But the Witch answered, “The appearance of a ghost is what they wish to present. Generally, ones that aren’t strong can only maintain the appearance they have after their death.”
Once the Student heard the Witch’s explanation, he believed her immediately and obediently didn’t speak again.
After this interlude, Gu Yian continued, “The little girl summoned a demon, obtained power from the demon, and after killing hundreds of people she turned from a victim into a real demon. After I got the security log, she realized I was planning to find her and hid herself.”
Gu Yian’s tone was very calm.
“This is what we need to do now. Find her, and then kill her.”
