The entrance hall had already turned into a courtroom by the ti Deon and his team reached the ground floor. Though there was no judge, only a scared jury.
Deon’s gaze went to the corpse first. It was a man he vaguely rembered from earlier. He was in his mid-thirties, maybe—one of the quieter contestants who had stayed near the back of Joshua’s group and never said much.
His shirt had been soaked dark around the ribs, and one arm was twisted awkwardly beneath him from the way he had been dragged.
A long sar of blood stretched across the marble floor behind him, starting from the left corridor and ending at Joshua’s feet.
So he really did drag the body out...But being the politician that he is, why would Joshua do sothing like that? Doesn’t he know how that makes him look?
Though the question was imdiately answered by soone’s loud shout.
"I saw him!"
A woman near the entrance shouted, pointing a shaky finger at Joshua. Her face was pale, eyes wide enough that Deon could only see the whites from across the hall.
"I saw Joshua dragging him from the corridor! He had blood all over his hands!"
"I already told you," Joshua sighed into his hands. "I found him like this."
"Found him?!" soone else snapped. "Then why were you touching the body?!"
"Because if I left him hidden in the hallway, the first thing everyone would say is that I was hiding evidence!"
"And dragging him out makes you innocent?!"
"I was trying to show everyone what happened before soone else twisted the story!"
"You killed him for the Truth!"
"No, Joshua wouldn’t—"
"He was the one telling us to cooperate!"
"That doesn’t an anything!"
"He had blood on him!"
"Everyone, calm down!"
Nobody cald down.
If anything, Joshua saying the right things only made the hall worse. Earlier, that sa steady voice had pulled them back from killing each other. Now that he had failed to quench the flas, they only burned brighter.
Deon stopped just before he reached the body, so contestants backing off instinctively when they saw him co.
"Think?!" the spear user barked. "The Mansion Truth activated right after you dragged him out!"
"That proves soone died," Joshua said. "It does not prove who killed him."
"But you were there!"
"I found him."
"You keep saying that!"
"Because it is the truth!"
But as they were arguing with each other, Martin, the old fox, ca out of nowhere from behind Joshua’s back and pointed a finger toward Deon imdiately.
"What about their group?! Just a few hours ago, they were threatening to kill soone! Now they’ve actually gone and done it!"
Deon almost laughed at the accusation, but instead stayed calm and asked, "? You know our group was inside the Master Office the whole ti, right?"
"Were you?" Martin asked imdiately. "Because from what I rember, nobody can prove that every single one of you stayed inside! You might not have left, but what if you sent one of your people to do the dirty work!"
Several gazes moved his direction, but Deon could already tell that they didn’t land on him, but instead moved to the five behind him.
Hana stiffened under the weight of the gazes while Mina and Nami took a step closer to each other. Jin hid behind him while Vivian simply brushed back her hair without caring for any of the accusations.
Yet, the gesture only made things worse, as Martin imdiately pointed toward her as if he had just found salvation. "Her! She was gone!"
Vivian blinked once, placing a hand against her chest as if genuinely surprised. "?"
"I saw you," Martin said, voice growing stronger now that he had found sothing to bite. "You were walking alone near the left corridor earlier!"
"I was near several corridors." Vivian tilted her head. "This mansion has a lot of them."
"That’s where the body ca from!"
"And? You seem to need more concrete accusations."
"I walked around," she said lightly. "I opened a few doors. Looked at so paintings, got bored, and ca back."
"You expect us to believe that?"
"Nah, not really."
"But whether you believe or not doesn’t change anything," she continued. "Even if it was , what would you guys do about it?"
Everyone seed to stop at her words. And frankly, she was right. If they truly believed she was guilty, they would press on more. The only reason a revolt wasn’t happening right now—
Was solely based on the fact that she was part of Deon, the forr first-place contestant’s party.
Deon glanced at her expression, noticing the small smirk on her face. Maybe he was imagining it, but that smile...it was the sa one Vivian always wore when she knew she had gotten away with sothing.
Damn it...did she really kill soone after all? No, there’s no way. Vivian might be a scoundrel, but she wouldn’t do sothing as stupid as killing soone with no alibi.
Right?
"Tch..."
He looked away, turning to glance toward the corpse again. The man’s blood had already started drying against the red carpet, sinking into the fabric until it was hard to tell where one shade of red ended and the other began.
"Alright," Deon sighed. "This is spoiled milk now."
Hana’s head whipped toward him. "Deon..."
He ignored the hurt in her voice, keeping his eyes on the crowd instead. "You can keep crying over the spilled corpse if you want, but he’s dead. Unless one of you has a Card that can bring people back, standing here screaming isn’t going to change that."
Soone near the entrance looked disgusted. "Are you serious?"
"Yeah."
"He was murdered!"
"And if you don’t want to be as well after two days...We better get moving."
Martin imdiately seized onto the opening. "See?! Do you hear him? How can you people side with soone who’s protecting a murderer?! Because he’s also a murderer!"
"Ahh, you’re pissing off, old man."
Deon reached into his pocket, but instead of pulling out [Blade], he gripped on [Trip] instead. With just a single movent, Martin’s legs were swept under him by an invisible force, landing face-first into the ground.
"There," he said, forcing down a grin. "That’s a lot better."
"And now—"
He opened the blue panel again that had just been minimized due to all the chaos.
"Let’s see what you’re all about..."
[Open Mansion Truth]
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