Chapter 725: Chapter 725: Showdown
Hearing Han Fei’s voice, the fugitive’s complexion changed, his eyes flickered with confusion and incomprehension, but it was only the ti it took to turn around, and all his expressions returned to normal.
The two did not have further exchanges, and Han Fei had already walked ahead to the middle of the corridor. He did not stand with others and also kept a certain distance from his wife.
“The water won’t reach the second floor for a while, you co with first,” the innkeeper, knowing his life was not long for this world, gestured for the waiter to help him back to his room.
“Is there sothing you can’t say in front of us that you have to do behind our backs? Are you running a black shop here? From beginning to end, it’s all you leading the show?” The Magician’s eyes had no pity or sympathy; seeing the old man’s health deteriorating, his deanor gradually relaxed, seemingly only afraid of the old man among everyone present.
“I’m old and don’t have much ti left, there are so things I’d like to say to my family.” The old man urged the waiter to follow him into the room, but Kuangxiao was coincidentally standing at the doorway of the innkeeper’s room, and he seed to have no intention of moving aside.
“The injury on your neck is severe, it needs urgent treatnt, and I’ve played a Doctor before, learned so ergency surgical knowledge.” Kuangxiao leaned against the door fra, “I can save you.”
“No need.” Compared to the Magician and the fugitive, the person the old man feared more was Kuangxiao; seeing the other’s handso, smiling face always unleashed a chill deep within him.
“Is there anything more important than your own life?” Kuangxiao still did not move aside, “The inn should have ergency tools, or at the very least find so clean cloth strips to co over, let help you stop the bleeding.”
“You’ve been wary of us all along, are you worried about the killer? Or is there an unspeakable secret hidden in your room?” The Magician had also walked over, he looked at so of the paintings on the wall, “According to the information about what the killer stuffed into the back of the victim’s head, everyone in the inn is a guest, but, you claim to be the innkeeper, which is very strange.”
“At least this proves I am not the killer.” The innkeeper’s injuries could no longer be delayed, blood flowing from his neck downward, looking extrely terrifying.
“Maybe you’re just the first tourist who entered the inn, and you’ve made this place your ho, claiming to be the master here, but in reality, you’re just a thief! Maybe the killer who murdered the original innkeeper is you!” The Magician’s voice wasn’t loud, but the content of his words inevitably led others to think more.
In this inn with ‘heart’ in its na, every guest has a surface identity and a true identity.
The officer, who outwardly maintains order and justice, thought of killing everyone to save himself when faced with danger, he might actually be the fugitive.
Kuangxiao needs no further explanation, at first glance more cheerful than anyone, but once truly known, how terrifying that cheerfulness is.
Innkeeper, Magician, including Han Fei, it’s the sa for everyone.
People only show others the side they want to be seen, the deeper darkness and lancholy are buried at the bottom of their hearts, only exposed when life and death are at stake.
“Among us, there are two people who might be the murderers. Before the vote is completed, no one thinks of sneaking out of sight.” The Magician did not know what the innkeeper intended to say to the waiter in private, and the innkeeper was not going to tell everyone what he was prepared to say, so the best thing to do at this ti was for everyone not to listen, letting the secret rot in the innkeeper’s heart, or more accurately, in his body.
The violent wind beat against the window panes. Cracks as wide as a finger opened in the ceiling of the inn, and black rain poured into the room.
The first floor of the inn had already begun to accumulate water. The black rain was viscous and murky, like the depressive lives of so guests, stifling to the point of suffocation.
The inn located at the center of the labyrinth shook in the storm, on the verge of collapsing at any mont. This house seed to hold a special significance for the entire Paradise, its collapse would also signify the end of sothing.
“Let’s continue with the vote,” said the usually quiet waiter, seemingly to reassure the innkeeper.
“No problem, but before we vote, I want to say sothing.” The middle-aged screenwriter leaned against the corridor wall, sitting on the floor, he pointed at the wound on his chest, “I vaguely saw the person who tried to kill .”
As soon as he said the killer was seen, everyone turned their attention to him.
“Who is it?”
“His face is quite distinctive, different from the rest of us. I need them to remove all their masks before I can make a judgnt.” The middle-aged screenwriter pointed towards Han Fei and the waiter inside the room wearing masks.
The focus, initially on the innkeeper, shifted to Han Fei and the waiter.
“This person was the last one to enter, and he has been wearing a mask the whole ti, which is indeed very suspicious.” The innkeeper tried to pin the bla on Han Fei; the others didn’t care who was targeted, as long as it wasn’t them.
“Should I take off the mask?” Han Fei’s hoarse voice ca from beneath the mask: “My face was disfigured by soone, I wear the mask because I’m afraid of scaring people.”
“I rember the killer’s facial features; just let see, and I will definitely recognize him.” The screenwriter stood with Kuangxiao and the fugitive; the three of them seed to have ford a group.
“Facial features? Then the person you saw definitely wasn’t .” Han Fei’s hands touched the edge of the mask, and as he slowly exerted force, blood trickled down his chin.
As he lifted the mask, several people in the room gasped in shock.
Underneath the smiling mask was a face blurred with blood; he had no facial features, his cheeks seed fused with the mask, and one couldn’t make out any contours at all.
“The killer isn’t .” Han Fei held his mask, one side pure white, the other completely soaked with blood.
The screenwriter stared at Han Fei’s disfigured face for a long ti; he seed to be struggling with his thoughts before he finally shook his head: “The killer definitely isn’t him; it must be soone else.”
For the sake of removing the mask, Han Fei tore his wounds open again. Seeing his pitiable state, the waiter seemingly had no reason not to remove his mask.
After a mont of hesitation, the waiter also removed his mask. The person was indeed F.
Mingling among the players, replacing all of Han Fei’s resources, possessing the sa Level and Ability as Han Fei, F referred to himself as a player.
The other people showed no unusual reaction when they saw F. Only the wife’s gaze changed, “Fu Sheng…”
F avoided Fu Yi’s wife’s gaze, acting like a stranger.
“Exactly, I saw it clearly! The killer is him!” The screenwriter pointed at F, his face pale but his tone very assertive.
“Impossible! He has always been by my side, you are slandering him!” The innkeeper, himself on death’s door, still defended the waiter.
“I saw it clearly, it certainly is him!” The middle-aged screenwriter insisted.
“It seems it’s just as I suspected; the innkeeper and the waiter are the killers. They killed the inn’s real owner and these two thieves set up this situation.” The Magician was aggressive: “You two might as well stop pretending to be innocent, tell us if there is any way to escape?”
Aside from the middle-aged woman, everyone else had already ford an alliance against the innkeeper and his family.
Throughout the process, Han Fei said nothing further. He held the mask, turning to glance at his wife.
If the innkeeper died, would his wife cast her vote for Fu Sheng, or for him?
The congealed blood scab broke again, and Han Fei felt tired. He sat at the entrance of the corridor, watching the rapidly rising water level.
“The waiter had no reason to kill the screenwriter, and they were far apart, with a police officer in between. If the murderer wasn’t the waiter, why would the screenwriter still accuse him?”
“The most likely scenario is that the glass fragnts were actually stabbed into their own chests by Kuangxiao or the screenwriter themselves, wanting to fra soone with it.”
Han Fei recalled the tone of the screenwriter, feeling that Kuangxiao and the screenwriter did this specifically to target him, but the screenwriter didn’t completely follow Kuangxiao’s intentions, which led the target to focus on F, who also wore a mask.
“When the chandelier fell, he went to the counter to help everyone find the light—he simply didn’t have ti to commit the cri. The real murderer is soone else! Don’t be fooled!” The innkeeper tried to explain, but no one cared about his words; a death was needed to delay everyone else’s demise, and they needed a grandiose reason to kill.
Seeing everyone’s gaze, the innkeeper despaired. After his death, the waiter would likely be next.
“All right, since you don’t believe…” The old man grasped the waiter’s arm, whispering a few words into his ear at a very low volu; the waiter’s face changed slightly, apparently completely taken by surprise by this revelation.
While the waiter was still in shock, the innkeeper laboriously began to write the waiter’s na in blood, and while doing so, he looked at the other guests: “Only he and I know the secret of this choice now. Vote, if I die and he doesn’t survive till the end, all of you will have to be buried with !”
“A threat? Not a bad performance?” Most people didn’t believe the innkeeper’s words, but Han Fei and Kuangxiao kept staring at the waiter’s face, trying to discern sothing.
“You have the ans in your hands to let soone live, but don’t turn that chance into a noose around your own neck.” The innkeeper put his vote into the Black Box, wanting to vote quickly while he was still lucid, to help the waiter survive a few more rounds.
The black rain flooded the first floor of the inn, and the third round ended very quickly, with no one dead.
After the police officer’s death, the fugitive t with Kuangxiao, deciding to follow Kuangxiao’s earlier suggestion to give his vote to the screenwriter, hoping Kuangxiao would return the favor so the three of them could survive.
With no deaths, the black rain grew heavier, and the cracks in the roof spread, allowing a large amount of water to pour directly into the inn from the top, slowly deepening the water puddling on the first floor.
“Keep voting.” The innkeeper persisted with the voting, his arms trembling more violently as blood flowed from a wound on his neck, and he was visibly struggling for breath.
The fourth round of voting was deliberately prolonged by the Magician and the screenwriter; their gaze at the innkeeper wasn’t like looking at a person, but more like they were observing a Sacrificial Offering.
The waiter hurried to stop the bleeding for the innkeeper, but it was of little use; the old man was already very ill.
The fourth round of voting ended, and still, no one in the inn had died; by this ti, the black water had risen to the stairs, and the sofas they had once sat on were soaked, and the body lying flat on the dining table slowly floated up, its arms swept aside as if standing in Hell with arms open, waiting for the others to join it.
The torrential rain brutally assaulted the inn, the building swayed, and collapse seed just a mont away.
“Continue!” The innkeeper, as if rallying with his last breath, placed the waiter’s na into the Black Box and wobbled towards the Magician, leaning on the walls.
Under everyone’s watch, he grabbed the Magician’s clothes and whispered a few words.
“Don’t misunderstand, he didn’t tell anything.” The Magician explained to those around him, but no one believed what he said.
After the old man spoke those words, he seed too exhausted to walk back.
What puzzled Han Fei was that the waiter, who was supposed to be on the old man’s side, didn’t co to help; instead, he was hesitating with a pen in hand, pausing when writing his na.
“There’s a problem…”
The fifth round of voting had ended, and Han Fei felt sothing was amiss, so he moved closer to his wife.
Strangely, as soon as he moved, the half-dead old man struggled to move his body.
“What does he want to do?”
The critically ill old man, with his neck cut, posed no threat, but Han Fei suddenly rembered the waiter’s hesitation while writing nas earlier.
That mont of hesitation was captured by Han Fei, and a guess popped into his mind.
“Could it be that the old man knew he was going to die, so he deliberately didn’t let the waiter write his own na? He wants to use the few seconds when the black mist erges from his body to kill soone inside the room!”
Right when Han Fei thought of this, the dying old man’s skin cracked open, and mist seeped out of his mouth and nose, charging at Han Fei like a monster!
“Is his target ?”
The old man seed to know that Han Fei’s wife was Fu Sheng’s mother, and only by killing Han Fei would his wife not hesitate and wholeheartedly help Fu Sheng.
He knew he was going to die, but he wanted to use his death to secure a chance for Fu Sheng to live.
The black mist devoured everything, making it impossible to escape once touched.
Facing the sudden attack of the old man, fortunately, Han Fei had prepared earlier, and he quickly moved backward.
The old man struggled in the black mist noticeably longer than the Building Chief. Realizing that killing Han Fei was hopeless, he imdiately lunged at the mute girl.
For Fu Sheng, the optimal solution was to kill Han Fei, to allow mother and son to recognize each other; the next best was to kill the girl, forcing the Magician to cooperate with Fu Sheng.
The black mist gnawed at the heart and lungs, and the kind and gentle old man now resembled a ferocious Evil Ghost, his hands corroded by the mist reaching for the girl.
The terrified child desperately dodged, but she was already standing at the edge of the fence.
“You dying allows more people to live, he is the most suitable choice.” The hand from the black mist touched the girl, but in the next mont, sothing unexpected happened.
Han Fei, who had already dodged, charged over, and as the girl was about to be enveloped by the old man’s black mist, he risked being devoured by the black mist himself to pull the girl aside.
In just a few seconds, the old man was completely swallowed by the black mist. He let out a resentful roar and disappeared inside the Black Box.
Han Fei, still shaken, held the girl, instinctively checking her arm that had touched the black mist, and all this was witnessed by the middle-aged screenwriter.
Many people saw the little girl as rely a key, but only one young Building Chief had treated her like a true child.
Staring at that bloody, unrecognizable face, the middle-aged screenwriter had already made his judgnt.
“The girl has the sa face as Little Eight, his earliest friend; he would not stand by and watch the child being killed in front of him.”
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