Chapter 51
Chapter 51
In Luo Li’s and Rao Lin’s rooms, every mirror had likewise been covered.
The moment Ning Shuo and the others entered Luo Li’s room, Song Zhu was already waiting for them. “Rao Lin is still waiting in the room next door, in case you ended up going into that one.”
Ning Shuo tore off his mask while extending his right hand. “Thanks. We should be gathering soon.”
“Do you have time to change?”
“We do.”
A tingling itch spread through his hand, but it didn’t hurt. As Ning Shuo washed his face one-handed, he glanced down and saw only a faint, shimmering blue light.
When Ning Shuo had been browsing the Forum, there had been a post studying Song Zhu and Luo Li.
For no other reason than that, in the entire Zone F System, they were the only two with special abilities-abilities whose origins no one even knew.
As Song Zhu healed him, Ning Shuo noticed the “Z” on his wrist glowing faintly blue.
He asked, as if making casual conversation, “Has that mark always been there?”
Song Zhu’s hand paused for a moment. “Mm.”
Ning Wang did not need healing, so he was a little faster than Ning Shuo.
He helped Ning Shuo button his shirt. “Let’s go.”
They were even a bit faster than the King. Ning Shuo grew so bored waiting for the King that he simply leaned against Ning Wang and pretended to sleep, eager to pour a little more oil on the King’s already burning anger.
Now, looking at the King’s suspicious expression and his visibly darkening face, Ning Shuo feigned confusion. “King… why do you seem so certain that my hand is injured?”
Why? Wasn’t it because he had seen the puncture wound with his own eyes??
During dinner last night, he had observed every guest. Not a single one had been injured when they went out!
Ning Shuo said leisurely, “If we’re talking about someone with a hand injury, then yesterday, the Butler also seemed to have accidentally pricked his hand on a rose.”
The Butler, who had been standing to the side and coldly looking down on all the guests, froze. Clearly, he had not expected the fire to spread to him.
He subconsciously drew his hand back, and the movement only made him stand out more.
The King narrowed his eyes. “Take off your Gloves.”
At that moment, the King clearly had not realized that his previously ruddy complexion had begun to turn pale.
Ning Shuo looked thoughtful.
Malice, was it?
The Butler removed his Gloves.
There were indeed wounds on his hand.
But they were not fresh.
The Butler explained, “King, my injury came from being pricked while moving Soil yesterday.”
Of course Ning Shuo had seen the moment his hand was pricked bloody when he threw himself onto Zhang Qicheng’s corpse. That was also the reason Ning Shuo had used Disguise to become the Butler.
The King began to hesitate. Ning Shuo softly guided him again. “I remember… there were people with the title of Servant stationed at the staircase on the fourth floor. Did they not see who went up?”
Of course they had.
When the King returned to the study earlier, he had questioned them, and they had said it was the Butler.
And what he had seen in the mirror had also been the Butler.
It was just that, at the time, he had trusted his subordinate and believed it was a guest in disguise.
Yet now, there were injuries on the Butler’s hand as well.
The King narrowed his eyes and began considering the possibility that he had misjudged whether the wounds were fresh.
Just then, the person guarding the fourth-floor entrance hurried over and whispered a few words in the King’s ear.
The King’s expression changed abruptly, and he kicked the Butler squarely in the chest. “Fair! Since when was there any need to count the amount of Soil!?”
Fair panicked. “King! This subordinate never went to the fourth floor!”
The guarding Servant let out a cold snort. “Cipria and I both saw you!”
They had guarded the staircase for a long time. There were many people with the title of Servant whom they did not recognize, including the Manservant who followed the Butler.
But the Butler? Him, they absolutely recognized.
And once the King was angry, if the Butler’s position opened up, there was no telling if the Servant who had rendered great service would be promoted into it.
For example, him!
The way the King looked at Fair was already tinged with suspicion, so much so that he began thinking about why Fair would do such a thing.
Not why Fair would never do such a thing.
From the soil of mistrust, accusations took root. The sprouts of suspicion grew and grew.
In the end, he thought of the thing he had lost. He thought of the Sky God.
His expression turned cold. He drew the sword at his waist and, in front of everyone, drove it through the Butler’s chest.
As the Butler’s eyes flew wide in shock, the King thrust the blade in even deeper.
He bent down and whispered in Fair’s ear, “The secret of Sky City must never be known by a second person.”
Ning Shuo watched the farce unfold like an audience member. When blood sprayed out, he was just about to step aside when the person beside him pulled him behind them. “Careful.”
Ning Shuo smiled. “Ningning doesn’t think it’s dirty?”
“I’m standing far away. How would it splash on me?”
Ning Shuo smiled and looked at the back of the King’s neck.
The King himself probably could not tell that, as he indulged his selfish desires and revealed his malice, the healthy flush on his face had completely vanished.
A large patch of mottling had also appeared on the back of his neck.
Like… livor mortis.
…
The guests dispersed for the time being, and Ning Shuo and the others gathered in Luo Li’s room.
Song Zhu’s healing could only treat bleeding wounds. It could not do anything for things like fevers, let alone one caused by a Script Effect.
Looking at it that way, rather than healing, it was more accurate to call it wound repair.
After they gathered, Ning Shuo took out the Leather-bound Notebook.
The moment Song Zhu saw it, he said, “Special items obtained in other Scripts will drop from a Player’s Backpack after the Player dies. They won’t disappear with a reset after the Script resets, and NPCs can’t destroy them at will either.”
No wonder the King had hidden it instead of destroying it.
But…
Ning Shuo looked at Song Zhu.
He knew what it was after just one glance?
When Ning Wang heard the words “after the Player dies, they drop from the Backpack,” he thoughtfully glanced at Rao Lin.
Even with his headache, Rao Lin could tell what he was thinking and snapped, “Can you think of something better for once?”
Ning Wang smiled. “Of course, partner.”
On the first page of the Leather-bound Notebook was written: “Hello. I’m Zone A Player Nian Chao, codename Chao Sheng.”
“If you’re reading this Leather-bound Notebook, I should already be dead. In the Script, for the second time. Completely.”
“Haha, this item doesn’t seem to be of much use, but after thinking about it, if I record some information from the Scripts, then in the unlikely event I die, maybe it can help someone else.”
“I was a policeman while I was alive, after all.”
At the last line, Rao Lin’s pupils constricted, and his fingers clenched into fists.
Song Zhu keenly noticed the shift in his mood and took his hand in silent comfort.
A thick half of the Leather-bound Notebook had already been filled. It described the experiences of this young policeman named Nian Chao in many different Scripts, showing how he had gone from never having the habit of keeping a diary to writing in it every day.
His writing was deeply contradictory. It had the sense of someone both fighting with everything he had and completely resigned to it, creating the illusion that he wanted to live and wanted to die at the same time.
And… “while I was alive”?
Did “while I was alive” refer to dying in the Script… or reality?
And then there was “for the second time.”
Ning Shuo asked Rao Lin, “Players from Zone A… are they all people who died in reality?”
Or was this actually just an individual case?