After they were done discussing the case, the three people in the resting lounge sank into a moment of silence.
As Li Xiao Yu stared at both of them, she slowly opened her mouth, “The three of us will be voting for Sister Mei. Between Su Lan and Chief Mei, we only need to persuade one person and the good people will be safe.”
Neither Yang Ye nor Gu Liang spoke for the time being.
Truth to be told, Li Xiao Yu could roughly guess why they were keeping their silence.
If they were going up against an evil person, they could directly expose their lies, or come together to confront him, like in the case of Principal Zha in Undying Town.
But their experience in the previous script told them that in their current phase, the murderer and accomplice might not necessarily be people who had committed great evil or wicked deeds. Moreover, they did not feel any animosity or grievances towards Sister Mei, and she was a lady…
Without a doubt, it was not going to be pleasant when they either chose to expose her directly during the centralised discussion or persuade someone to vote for her, especially under such conditions.
“In any case… If Sister Mei didn’t do anything evil, it’s actually possible that… she will be fine? She might turn into a NPC?”
Resting her chin on her hand, Li Xiao Yu released a soft sigh before she stood up. “I’ll go and probe Su Lan and Chief Mei for their opinions separately and talk to them.”
* * *
For a period of time that followed, Li Xiao Yu conversed with Su Lan and Chief Mei. The few of them quietly sorted out their reasonings but everyone was basically convinced that Sister Mei was the murderer.
When they carefully sorted through their timelines for the past two days, the reality was that the possibility of Sister Mei talking to Magnate Rong alone and propelling him into committing the murder did exist.
During this time, Gu Liang flipped through all the books from the Magician to reconfirm a point.
— “A dream created by a powerful dream creator can affect the people within a certain distance, thereby bringing their consciousness into the dream. They will possess their own memories but they will be under the dream creator’s influence and their actions will be affected by the dream creator’s motivation.
“But a living person entering the dream bears the possibility of awakening their self-awareness. Hence, a special reminder to dream creators is that, it is best to refrain from creating dreams where the living persons are concerned, or else it could cause the dreamscape to collapse, and give rise to unpredictable consequences. “
This would explain why the four living people, namely Actor Ming, Magnate Rong, Chief Mei, and Sister Mei, could enter the dream and have their own memories pertaining to reality, but have their later behaviour follow the stories that the Duke imagined for them and the other characters.
This also implied that their deductions were not wrong.
After they ruled out some of the people who were still living in reality, they were still left with Sister Mei and Chief Mei, and they could only choose Sister Mei.
The 5-hour long discussion time came to an end.
The system broadcast rang out: “Ding dong. It is currently 10 o’ clock at night exactly. We will be commencing the final vote casting for the case of《 Folding Ancient Castle 》and the reward settlement segment. Players, are you ready?
“With regards to the rewards from the first two segments, we will be settling them at the end. After all…. if everyone casts the wrong vote and five good people have to receive the death penalty, the rewards from the previous segments do not require settling anymore, hehe.
“That being said, let us begin with the final voting segment!
“Starting from the afternoon of November 11, everyone saw a person that they had never met before, let us address him as [Unknown Figure 2].
We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.
“Tonight at 5 o’ clock, [Unknown Figure 2] and Magnate Rong were found dead in the sunflower garden.
“Qtb lr atf bcis gfji wegvfgfg atja mjerfv atflg vfjatr? Uifjrf mjra sbeg nbaf klatlc bcf wlceaf!”
Xe Oljcu werfv lc tlr tfjga, atf rsrafw kjr gjatfg qjgalmeijg lc tbk la ogjwfv atf defralbc.
Coafg jii, atfs tjv vfafgwlcfv atja Fcxcbkc Mluegf 2, ktb atfs tjv qgfnlberis jvvgfrrfv jr atf wsrafglber wjc, kjr xliifv ys Zjucjaf Ebcu.
If the system merely said murderer, was the ‘murderer’ pointing towards the direct murder or the indirect murder? There was space for contention about this point.
If Magnate Rong’s name had shown up on the list of suspects, then they might have to choose two people— Sister Mei and Magnate Rong.
But the system mentioned “only”, and it completely eliminated the possibility of them allying and committing the crime.
After seeing that particular word, Gu Liang no longer hesitated and he tapped on the name of [Sister Mei].
The case details was hard to restore due to the need for brain holes and the possibility of double kills.
It was very difficult for the good people because it required the good people to analyse all the details and the reasonings clearly; it was also very difficult for the murderer because the murderer did not have a lot of space to play around with before the rest of the players fully made sense of their thoughts.
One minute later, the system immediately announced: “The voting has been completed. Woah— someone received 5 votes, which correspondingly means that there was another player with 1 vote.
“The person who has 1 vote is— Chief Mei.
“The person who has 5 vote is…. Quite regretfully, it is Sister Mei.”
“Is Sister Mei the real murderer in the《 Folding Ancient Castle 》case? Congratulations everyone, you have voted correctly!
“First and foremost, the rewards will be settled.
“Apart from the real murderer in this instance, every player has obtained 5 gold coins, and 3 chances to draw the reward cards, congratulations everyone!
“Additionally, there were 5 rounds of voting in total in the previous two segments in this scenario, and the voting rewards will be decided by the player’s voting choices. In every round of voting, players who voted correctly can obtain 1 reward card.”
Gu Liang made a quick count, there was a total of 4 voting rounds in the first segment, and there were four questions as well, to which he was correct for two; in the second segment, there was only one question, and he was correct.
Since that was the case, including the final segment, he had obtained 5 gold coins this time around, and he could draw 6 reward cards.
Furthermore, Gu Liang realised that his side task was actually a trick played by the system from the beginning to the end.
From the very beginning, he had assumed that the system would ask the secondary question of ‘who was bitten by a vampire’ at the very least, but as reality would prove it, no one was truly a vampire, so the question itself was not tenable.
As for the last question in the first segment which asked them to select the vampires, even if Gu Liang voted for Magnate Rong, Yang Ye, and Su Lan, he was afraid that the answer would still be wrong. Because the truth was that vampires did not exist at all; everyone was just a figure inside the Duke’s dream.
After the men in black allowed the players to draw their reward cards and issued their gold coins, the system broadcast sounded once more.
By this stage, everyone was well-aware of the fact that the system was going to announce the real murderer’s death penalty.
Once the broadcast ended, one of the walls in the centralised discussion room lit up as per usual, thus displaying Sister Mei’s curriculum vitae.
“Sister Mei, real name Wang Li, 29 years old, XX pharmaceutical researcher. Crime Coefficient Score: 320, does not meet the criteria for death penalty; corresponding mandatory years of service: 200 years.”
The screen darkened and separated, but unlike the past, it did not display all sorts of terrifying punishments.
The men in black brought Sister Mei inside and no one knew what was going to happen next.
But having to serve 200 years, what did that suggest?
Could humans live for that long?
Gu Liang furrowed his brows and looked towards Yang Ye subconsciously.
Yang Ye extended a hand towards him. Before Gu Liang could give a response, he had already lost consciousness.
Before Gu Liang lost his consciousness completely, he only heard a short broadcast— “The sun has finally risen. What should have passed, shall pass. You should awaken from your dreams. After waking up, all of you will be ushering in a month of downtime. Let us meet next time!”
* * *
Dreams, they end.
Gu Liang woke up abruptly and he sat up from his bed.
Subsequently, he realised that he had returned to Actor Ming’s room.
He stood up and pulled open the curtains. The sunlight outside was piercing to the eye.
Having thought of something, Gu Liang went to the bathroom to take a peek— there were no bats.
Then, he pushed open the door. There were no bloodied and dead rats that were killed by the bats.
Gu Liang scrunched his eyebrows together and he ran into Scumbag Yu’s room swiftly.
Similar to when he departed from the ancient castle that night by the commercial car, his room door was not locked so Gu Liang managed to push it open easily.
He stepped into the room. There was not a single inhabitant inside.
Gu Liang felt a sudden chill run down his back.
He pressed the elevator. He inspected every floor from top to bottom— but from the fifth to the second floor, all of it had been sealed.
Gu Liang could only go to the first-floor lobby.
There were no keys to open the steel door, no white bones, no antiques…
There was nary a trace of crossovers.
— The ancient castle had reverted back to the appearance it had when he arrived here on the first day.
Gu Liang stood in the large hall that was so empty it could induce panic in people for a full minute. Immediately after, he strode through the lobby and main hall swiftly until he reached the back kitchen and found the oil and a large quantity of alcohol.
He returned to the sixth floor and poured oil and alcohol onto the corridor and the various wooden furniture in every opened room.
Once he was done with everything, Gu Liang went to the water valve in the terrace and destroyed it, thoroughly breaking the fire prevention sprinkler system in the entire ancient castle.
Lastly, Gu Liang decided to go outside to take a look.
When he attempted to push open the main doors after he reached the ancient castle’s lobby, he tried it twice but he did not manage to open the door.
After coming to senses, he noticed that he was struggling because his hands were shaking badly.
Once he pushed open the doors with much difficulty, he was confronted with the eye-piercing sunlight, and Gu Liang saw that ostentatiously red and shining sports car at a glance.
Winding around the sports car, he cut through the courtyard and arrived in front of the large steel gates.
As he was walking through the steel gates, Gu Liang took in a mouthful of air. He forged ahead, going south until he reached the southern road. From the distance, he could see a commercial car that had been turned over and three corpses that were lying in a pool of blood.
The crimson reds from the blood were particularly piercing under the sunlight, and it was so sharp that Gu Liang’s eyes started souring and throbbing a little.
Gu Liang stopped moving, unable to take another step forward in that moment.
Scumbag Yu had died in reality.
And the story of Actor Ming and Earl William meeting and having a love affair, was a huge dream that was fabricated by someone else out of nothingness.
Presently, he had awoken from the dream, and the Earl was gone.
Then… What about Yang Ye?
He… Was he gone from now on, just like Scumbag Yu in reality?
Just when Gu Liang was about to step forward, a thick fog suddenly appeared in front of him, stopping him from going any closer.
Following closely, a sedan and two men in black appeared from the thick fog.
Gu Liang stared at them fixedly, his gaze as cold as ice.
( ㅇㅅㅇ )
Why didn’t he see Chief Mei, his alive buddy?
Thanks for the chapter!
Why is he alone? Where did everyone go? And why was he gonna burn the castle down?
thanks for the chapter! <3
In one of the previous arcs, since a setting was burnt the players were moved to another location to rest for their downtime, so by burning down the castle he’ll have to be moved to the next closest location for his month downtime which might be where the others are if they aren’t all dead, and since this isn’t in the middle of a game he shouldn’t be sent to the black room for breaking rules for doing it.
Stay tuned for Thursday’s update xD
Ой, ой, ой! Осторожно, ЛянЛян!
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OwO!!