(unedited)
Words: 2701
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There was a time limit of a week to complete this room. This was already an excessive amount of time compared to the last room Li Yan was in. Another apparent difference was the day cycle. Before, Li Yan only experienced the night, but now he could experience the full 24 hours.
He watched out the window of the guest room as night fully set in. Pomegranate behind him was sound asleep, not exhibiting the behavior of an experienced player at all. Blice, the evil cat, had finally settled down around Li Yan’s neck like a scarf. They seemed to have made themselves at home there.
It felt long.
Being in a room where he had to go through both day and night dragged on infinitely. He couldn’t fall asleep at all. He heard shuffling and assumed it was Pomegranate getting up.
Pomegranate woke up and looked over to see his mysterious teammate’s cousin wearing a new black furry scarf with two heads and tails.
“...” Certainly an odd fellow. He had thought it before but still thinks it now. Only a weird person could be related to an even weirder one.
He didn’t question his roommate's new pet, instead got up to stand next to him. “What are you looking at?”
“The time.” Li Yan answered simply. He felt more relaxed around this teammate ever since he learned of his relation to Li Bao. He was not necessarily anxious for the man to not see his cat either so he left Blice lying on his neck. Not like they would have moved anyways.
“Ah Li Bao did mention a bit about your last room. How unfortunate.” The man remarked, stretching.
He started to make movements as if he was about to go out on a stroll and Li Yan quickly questioned him. “Going to investigate, wanna come?” Was the only answer he received.
Li Yan nodded without hesitation. It wasn’t like he could sleep anyways. The two men walked out of the room and met with a very silly cousin who was clumsily escaping with two tails.
“Oh you guys are here too!” Li Bao smiled with Lola and Elise behind her. “We sleep right there.” Pomegranate pointed to the room across from theirs. “Well why aren’t you sleeping then?” Li Bao asked. Pomegranate no longer wished to argue with her.
“What’s around your neck?” Li Bao asked, suddenly curious about her cousin’s new accessory. Li Yan forgot about the cat again. He gave an internal sigh. “Nothing, just a pet.” He gave up trying to hide the living being. It was probably better to make it known anyways.
“Cute! Lemme see….pleasee….” Li Bao crept up silently to the animal wrapped around his neck, but before she could get closer the cat meowed and jumped away back into Li Yan’s room.
“Aw, kitty.” Li Bao wanted to cry. She chased the cat inside and left the others outside the room looking at each other. Lola also felt an itch in her hands for the supernatural looking cat and gave the rest a hesitant glance before racing in. Of course, the others didn’t want to be left out so they all followed.
“Ah. It went under the bed.” Li Bao gave an upset squeak before giving up. She was currently on her knees glancing at the cat’s two heads under the bed, so as she was about to lift herself up she noticed a strange mark on the wall by the bedframe. It was quite hidden, but once bending down it was easy to see.
“Hey come here.” Li Bao motioned and the group all came over to her. “Do you see that?” She pointed at the wall. Behind the bed frame and nightstand there was a substance looking like black powder on the wall. She reached out her hand to touch it and the tips of her fingers were faintly darker.
“Ash…” She frowned. “Go check our room.”
Li Yan quickly caught onto what his cousin wanted and Pomegranate did the same. They both headed to the girls room and bent down by their beds to see the same patches on the wall. “A fire perhaps?” Li Bao asked. She had also followed behind them. Li Yan nodded. “A fire that has already happened or has yet to happen?” He questioned aloud.
Li Bao looked around the room in other places with Pomegranate, leaving the two newbies clueless. “Should we also look?” Elise asked. “If you want.” Li Bao answered.
Lola didn’t quite like the attitudes of the people she had met so far. They felt too cold. She just wanted to have fun in this new dimension, but it seemed no one else shared her sentiments. Even the other amateur Elise was cold to her! It made her feel quite inferior towards the others. She inched over to the good looking Li Yan, wanting to strike up a conversation with him instead.
“Isn’t she quite rude?” Lola gossiped. Li Yan just gave her a glance and went back to searching. He wasn’t interested in trying to talk bad about his cousin in front of her face. Considering the ability to upgrade their physical abilities, there was no doubt a hearing upgrade.
“She’s quite normal.” Li Yan answered, seeing that Lola was expecting an answer. “If anything I’d think the bug crawling up your leg is quite rude.”
Lola thought he was joking, but truly when she looked down there was indeed a big roach on her leg! She gave out a quick scream and started to fail until the bug finally flew off into some unknown area.
She was right about this group, they were too cold! She wanted to complain.
Clearly aggrieved, Lola sat on the bed rubbing her bug infected leg with the bed sheets. Elise looked at her bed being vandalized but said nothing in sympathy. She was also terrified of bugs. She planned to secretly switch their bedding later.
“It seems the stains are randomly placed.” Li Yan finally said as he was done looking around. “I don’t think the clue is from the placement. It’s probably trying to show that a fire was present at some point.”
“I agree.” Li Bao nodded. “But the issue is figuring out when.” She gave a frown. “Also how will this relate to a murder? Would the culprit be a fire?”
“You can’t eliminate the possibility of weapons that create fire. What if they burned them to death?” Li Yan added to her confusion innocently. Li Bao just groaned. “So vague! Even the instructions with the police call were vague.”
“Do we get one chance? Or can we share one chance across all of us? One option would leave us at a dead end but the other would give us all multiple chances.” Although Li Bao stated that, she knew that no one would be willing to risk their chance of escape to try it.
“Maybe we are overthinking things?” Lola suddenly spoke up. “What if it’s just the wife who killed her husband due to infidelity?”
“I overheard Madam Fiona earlier. I don’t think it was her. She mentioned that she never got the password to a safe. She’s the least likely at the moment.” Li Yan spoke. He explained how he followed his cat and overheard the situation across the mansion. The others thoughtfully took in the information and tried to decipher extra clues.
“So Felix and Madam Fiona might have had an affair?” Li Bao suggested. “Or at least they are accomplices.”
“Ok leaving out Madam Fiona, what if it was Felix?” Li Bao thought over that but then sighed. “But even if we know who it is we still need a motive and method.”
“The method was arsenic, the motive is love, and the killer is Felix. Simple if you ask me.” Lola bragged.
“Ah! Thank you.” Li Bao beamed at Lola. “You just reminded me of another issue. The method.”
“The method was clearly arsenic poisoning, so why do we still need to find out?” Li Bao asked.
“It means that others will be killed in different ways and we have to name them all.” Li Yan frowned, also noticing the issue.
“This might be an issue.” Pomegranate sighed. “The longer we stay the harder it will get.”
They all sat in silence to think about the information, making Lola feel a little impatient. “Are we going to go explore the mansion yet?”
The group agreed with her and got up while she happily led the way. It was the middle of night, so there was not much activity around the mansion except a few servants who the group unskillfully avoided.
“Maybe we should split up. It’s very inconvenient like this.” Li Bao complained. “I’ll go with Li Yan, you go with those two.” Like the good teammate she was, she threw the two novices onto her fellow team member. Pomegranate wanted to complain, but she had already dragged Li Yan away.
“I’m so tired of taking care of newbies.” She complained. “Sometimes I want a break too, you know? I followed you to hang out with my cousin, not babysit.”
Li Yan listened to his cousin’s complaints while also carefully avoiding possible noise machines. It was a shame the biggest noise was from a cousin following behind him.
“Who’s there?” A voice called out. It was a young and youthful voice, but it had a deep sounding malice in it.
Li Yan and Li Bao quieted down and quickly tried to jump into a nearby room but it was unfortunately locked. All the rooms nearby were inaccessible, so they had no choice but to pile behind a decorative table in the hallway.
It was completely pitch black minus the light coming from candles on the wall, giving off an eerie glow. Since Li Bao was talking before he didn’t get a chance to appreciate the unsettling atmosphere the mansion gave off at night.
During the day, the mansion seemed like it was a beautiful dream. Pristine and bright, but at night it looked like a palace of dread. The casual sounds of soft breathing could be heard behind him and in front of him was the sound of harsh footsteps.
The only possible options for this voice was Gael or Lawrence. Li Yan led towards the idea that it was Lawrence considering the boy's devilish stare during dinner.
“Helloooo?” The boy’s voice sounded calm and unhurried. When met with silence, he was not discouraged. “Would you like to play a game?” The empty halls just gave the sound of a breeze but the boy still smiled in the dark.
As he turned the corner Li Yan could see that it was indeed Lawrence. The kid held a small lantern as he walked down the halls in a casual manner.
“Found you.” He pointed slowly at Li Yan, his small pale hand looked sickly under the moonlight from the windows and the glow of the lantern.
Li Bao wanted to curse. It was not a good idea to go out and explore at night. Especially on their first night, it was a mistake on her part. She was getting ready to pull an item out of her inventory, but Li Yan stood up before she had time.
“You found me.” He simply walked up to the little boy in a fearless manner. It seemed after the first room her cousin got even more courage than before. She quickly reminded herself to invite him to train his physical abilities when they got back. She must make her cousin super strong to match his equally strong appearance.
“Oh, it’s you.” The boy smiled looking up at Li Yan. Li Bao felt beads of sweat falling down her back rapidly but also got up behind her cousin to look at the boy.
“Hello…umm child.” Li Bao smiled awkwardly. The boy gave her an uninterested glance before his gaze fell back upon Li Yan with a small spark.
“Let’s play?” His head tilted to the side, almost forming a complete ninety degree angle. Li Bao wanted to snap that kid’s head back in place to stop scaring her, but she was too cowardly to act on that idea. She hurriedly got her livestream interface up to help calm her down. Her secret to controlling her fear was obviously the internet of the other world! Seeing all the bullshit comments she slowly becomes less affected by the room’s atmosphere.
Small white button down shirt with black pants and leather shoes, Lawrence was dressed formally. Black gloves were over his hands carrying the lantern while the other was not covered at all and hung by his side. Even at dinner he never looked out of order. His eyes were a mystical shade of blue and his skin was pale and sickly.
“What game?” Li Yan asked. “I don’t know many.”
Lawrence held up three of his fingers. “Regular childhood games.” The boy explained. “Rock paper scissors first.”
Li Bao silently urged her cousin to go. It was known in the family her cousin had a bit of a lucky streak.
“Hold my lantern please.” The boy smiled and handed the lantern to Li Bao who thoughtfully did not want to hold it.
“I have really bad strength. I can’t even hold a plate.” She sighed. “A shame, apologies young master.” The boy looked at her blankly before setting the lantern on the table nearby.
She saw that the table had gained a black stain around the bottom and felt her eye twitch. Truly, a childish trap to be offered.
“Shall we start?” Li Yan offered. Lawrence nodded. Li Yan started to make the hand motions with Lawrence who counted down from three.
“On go, best of three.” The boy said, glancing at Lawrence.
“One.”
Li Yan’s hand fell on his palm in a fist as he thought about what symbol to pull.
“Two.”
Li Yan’s eyes fell to the boy who couldn’t have been over sixteen in age and his glove covered hand.
“Three.”
Li Yan decided to go with scissors.
“Go!”
Lawrence held out his hand and it was rock. Li Yan also held out his hand as the symbol to paper. Lawrence was a bit baffled and looked at Li Yan accusingly. Li Yan just gave him a polite smile.
“A slip of the mind changes the result.” Li Yan commented offhandedly.
He didn’t actually mean to change his answer last second, but a sudden impulse came over him to do it so he followed.
“Next.” Lawrence was a bit grumpy at his loss and some of his prior gentleness turned hostile.
“One.”
Li Yan was bored.
“Two.”
Li Yan picked rock.
“Three.”
Li Yan actually wanted to do paper.
“Go!”
Li Yan randomly released rock, but unlike what was expected Lawrence smirked and let out his hands in the shape of a gun.
“Ah. A cheater.”
“Just playing by my own rules.” Lawrence smiled. “Bang! Bang!” He acted like he shot Li Yan, but luckily Li Yan upgraded his fitness and dodged in time because real bullets came out of the boy’s fingers.
“Out of ammo, how lucky.” Lawrence sneered. Li Yan just gave another polite smile.
“...” Lawrence felt he had met someone who acted more fake than he did.
“What’s the next game?” Li Yan asked. Li Bao gave a bit of an accusing look towards Lawrence in hopes this was a game she could contribute to.
“Tag.” Lawrence smiled. “Why don’t we invite some more friends too?”
Suddenly, the halls around them dispersed and their vision became foggy. They seemed to have been taken to a separate space by Lawrence. Li Bao frowned. “This isn’t an ideal situation.”
“I might have been more shocked to be happy in this situation.” Li Yan commented, which Li Bao smartly ignored.
The group who decided to separate became one at this moment. From the fog Li Yan saw three bodies arise like the dead. Li Bao looked at them and hit one to test it out but only heard the sound of Pomegranate complaining.
“He really did bring more friends!” Li Bao smiled. “What an honest kid.”
~~~
