"You lied!"
"You lied!"
Two shots rang out. Two Geng Haos fell stiffly to the ground, no longer breathing.
Two Chen Rans remained. One leaned against the wall, while the other sat on the desk. They both held their guns, index fingers rhythmically tapping against the barrels as if lost in thought.
Chen Ran B spoke first. "Are you choosing the First Study or the second?"
Chen Ran C pondered for a mont. "I think I will take the First Study. It is easier to pull off a deception there."
With that, Chen Ran C stubbed out his cigarette and turned toward the First Study. As he reached the door, he paused to think, then bent down and hoisted one of the corpses onto his shoulder.
"If the newly generated Geng Hao is a clone of a previous one—aning one of the two we just killed—and both of them told a lie, then the new Geng Hao will spawn with a pre-existing lie attached to him. I need you to do sothing. You should know what it is, right?"
"OK!"
...
Chen Ran D and Geng Hao D appeared in the First Secret Room. They curiously surveyed their surroundings and realized that this was...
The First Dungeon Chamber!
It was the Study Room of the first chamber, though there was no Hourglass here, and no Glass Beads...
However, right at that mont, the Secret Room plunged into darkness without warning.
In the pitch black, their eyes widened instantly. They went on high alert, their minds racing with countless questions.
'There is soone else in the Secret Room!'
'And this person is a Player!'
'From the Novice Instance until now, every Secret Room has had ambient light without a visible source. This design prevents Players from turning off light switches to fake the activation of a Liar Hunter Skill.'
'Therefore, for the Secret Room to suddenly go dark, soone must have used a Liar Hunter Skill!'
With this realization, both n instinctively reached for the Liar-Slayers at their waists.
After all, using a Liar Hunter Skill required sacrificing an opportunity for Judgnt. In other words, soone had definitely told a lie.
Soon after.
The light in the Study Room returned. The sight before them made their pupils shrink sharply—an additional Geng Hao and another Chen Ran had appeared in the room.
The extra Geng Hao lay on the ground, his head pierced by a bullet, dead beyond any doubt.
The two Chen Rans looked at each other, first in shock, then in absolute disbelief.
"Who are you?"
"Who are you?"
They both froze for a second before continuing in unison.
"I am Chen Ran. Who are you?"
"I am Chen Ran. Who are you?"
Imdiately after, as if realizing sothing at the exact sa mont, both turned to look at Geng Hao.
One of the Chen Rans spoke coldly. "You are Geng Hao, right? Do not tell this is your Liar Hunter Skill?"
Geng Hao D quickly waved his hands in denial. "No, no, this is not my Liar Hunter Skill!"
"How will you prove that? Unless you imdiately use your Liar Hunter Skill right here and now!"
The two Chen Rans glared at him coldly. If he successfully activated his skill, it would prove that his previous statent, "this is not my Liar Hunter Skill," was a lie.
If he failed to activate his skill, it would prove that his previous statent, "this is not my Liar Hunter Skill," was the truth.
Geng Hao D retorted in dissatisfaction, "Why should I have to prove my innocence?"
One of the Chen Rans sneered. "You saw the information on the door earlier, didn't you? The difficulty of this Secret Room is 'Extre.' Do you really think you can clear this stage relying solely on your own deduction skills?"
Geng Hao D's face turned livid.
'To encounter sothing this bizarre the mont we enter the Secret Room... it just shows how incredibly difficult this place is.'
'Furthermore.'
'I am absolutely certain that I haven't told a single lie—not just in this Secret Room, but throughout the entire Instance. Which ans it is physically impossible for to activate my Liar Hunter Skill.'
Having reached this conclusion.
"Fine." With that, he raised his Liar-Slayer and aid the muzzle at the ceiling.
"Liar-Slayer: Three Steps Forward, Two Steps Back!"
However, sothing bizarre and terrifying happened next. His Liar-Slayer suddenly slipped from his grasp as if it no longer belonged to him, dropping uncontrollably to the floor with a sharp clack.
Geng Hao D's pupils trembled violently. He snapped his head up to stare at the two Chen Rans, slowly shuffling his feet to put so distance between himself and them.
'Under normal circumstances, trying to use a Liar Hunter Skill when no one has lied simply ans the trigger won't pull. But now...'
'The Liar-Slayer actually fell out of my hands!'
'It feels exactly like being hit with a "Silence" skill in a video ga.'
'I rember Chen Ran saying that his Liar Hunter Skill prohibits anyone else from using their own Liar Hunter Skills for one hour!'
'It is Chen Ran!'
'That Liar Hunter Skill earlier... Chen Ran must have been the one who used it!!!'
Just as he opened his mouth to speak.
He saw one of the two Chen Rans shoot him a cold sneer. The man swiftly raised his gun, aid it directly at him, and declared:
"You lied."
Bang! A bullet shot out, striking him dead center between the eyebrows.
Even in death, Geng Hao D couldn't understand when exactly he had ever told a lie!
Chen Ran C holstered his gun, only to turn and find Chen Ran D pointing his own muzzle right back at him.
"What is the aning of this?" Chen Ran C asked.
Chen Ran D spoke with an odd tone. "Since you were able to speak the Judgnt Command and successfully executed the Judgnt, it proves that you truly exist in this Study Room at this very mont."
"Not only that, but you are completely identical to . This makes things very interesting."
"First of all, from what I know, failing to use a skill is not judged as telling a lie."
"There are two possibilities for Geng Hao failing to use his skill. One, it was a genuine failure. Two, he was banned from using skills by Eternal Kingdom."
"One: a genuine failure. This would an that Geng Hao truly had never told a lie."
"However, you just judged him to death, which proves he definitely did tell a lie earlier."
"This creates a contradiction. Therefore, the first possibility can be completely ruled out."
"Two: he had told a lie earlier, and the only reason he couldn't use his skill just now was because..."
"When the Secret Room went dark a mont ago, it was because you activated your Liar Hunter Skill. Naly..."
"Eternal Kingdom!"
"Eternal Kingdom forbade him from using a Liar Hunter Skill, which is why his gun fell!"
Upon hearing this, Chen Ran C's face went ashen. His body subconsciously shifted backward. Swallowing hard, he tried to argue his way out. "Your deduction has obvious flaws!"
"Using Eternal Kingdom requires sacrificing one chance for a Guaranteed Judgnt. Since you are also , you should know perfectly well that I am not the type of person to sabotage myself by telling a lie just to set a trap for soone else."
Chen Ran D said nothing. Instead, he simply pointed a finger at Geng Hao C's corpse on the floor.
"True," he said indifferently. "You aren't the type to doom yourself to screw over soone else, but the fact remains that you definitely used your Liar Hunter Skill."
"Which proves you sacrificed a chance for a Guaranteed Judgnt. This opportunity could not have co from the Geng Hao who just died. After all, you executed him with Judgnt just now, which ans you didn't give up your chance to judge him."
"As for the Geng Hao who died earlier, his Judgnt opportunity vanished the mont he died. It is impossible for you to have sacrificed your chance to judge him either."
"To sum it all up, there is one and only one possibility. During your battle of wits with the very first Geng Hao who died, you accidentally allowed him to trick you into telling a lie, and you tricked him into telling one as well. The two of you had a shootout, and he died."
The color drained entirely from Chen Ran C's face, leaving him deathly pale. He raised a trembling index finger and pointed it at Chen Ran D. "You!!..."
"You cannot kill ! You are Chen Ran! And I am Chen Ran too!"
"Aren't you afraid that killing might bring so horrible curse down upon yourself?!"
Chen Ran D couldn't be bothered to waste any more words on him. Staring right at him, he enunciated every single syllable clearly:
"You. Lied."
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