The official show was at seven in the evening, and after all the media interviews were done, it was already four in the afternoon.
There were still three hours left before the show.
Mu Zi and several other people in the large lounge started preparing, Ji Jian suddenly remembered: “How come the pianist didn’t come?”
Mu Zi paused.
As far as she could remember, she had followed the pianist, Yu Rui and Feng Huai into an old practice room, after which she had no recollection of anything else.
No one responded to Ji Jian’s words.
Ji Jian could only scratch his neck, he casually grabbed a newspaper and put it over his face, pretending to take a nap.
[This player is a bit naive 23333]
[TN: 23333 — LOL]
[From the moment he revealed his game identity, I knew he was a sweetie-pie.]
[He’s never been robbed of a quest node before.]
[Brother, I advise you not to meet him, you might get scared.]
Mu Zi turned to Zhang Xiaofeng.
She knew that Tan Lin was a player because they had met in a previous game, and this time Tan Lin hadn’t changed his appearance much through the system, so it was easy to recognize him.
As for Ji Jian, he was a typical newbie player, she had long since realized it.
For Zhang Xiaofeng, she hadn’t been sure whether the other was a player or an NPC, until the media interview just now, when she realized that the other was also an NPC.
However, all NPCs basically had hidden side quests on them.
Mu Zi recalled, before her memory went off, it should have been the night before when she entered that old performance hall, and Zhang Xiaofeng stumbled over the steps and bumped into her.
At that time, she was looking at the reliefs of the beasts on the wall, which were so vivid and beautiful that they could be called masterpieces of art.
She was hit by Zhang Xiaofeng, stumbled and hit the art piece.
After …… Mu Zi froze, then tried to recall, but she didn’t have any impression.
Mu Zi was pretty sure that her quest panel, which up until now had only a lone mainline quest, couldn’t explain the abnormality that had happened to her at all.
She pursed her lips, guessing that this was perhaps a pre-plot need before triggering the side quests, and that she hadn’t caught that more crucial trigger point yet.
Mu Zi walked up to Zhang Xiaofeng and tried to find clues to trigger the side quest through chatting.
“So you’re a student of Mr. Fang Wenmei, I really didn’t think that the trumpet in your hand was a relic of Mr. Fang once.” Mu Zi spoke softly, “That last performance of Mr. Fang Wenmei was wonderful.”
Zhang Xiaofeng looked up at Mu Zi, “Oh thank you. Your teacher was equally wonderful.”
Mu Zi was a bit confused, her teacher?
“Your drum, her owner and my teacher are also old friends.” Zhang Xiaofeng also looked at Mu Zi in confusion, “Didn’t you inherit your drum from your teacher?”
Mu Zi thought to herself how would she know, the character cards were not that detailed.
She perfunctorily said, “No, she’s been with me since I started learning, the origin is something I never thought to understand.”
“Oh. You’re lucky then, her previous owner was also a world-renowned master.” Zhang Xiaofeng said, “Just like Feng Huai’s cello and my trumpet.”
Mu Zi got a little spark in her mind, but didn’t catch that moment of inspiration.
Her drums, Feng Huai’s cello, Zhang Xiaofeng’s trumpet ……
Yu Rui and Feng Huai were on the other side of the lounge.
Feng Huai heard Zhang Xiaofeng and Mu Zi’s conversation and whispered to Yu Rui, “Up to this point in the game, every setting and every part of the game has its own significance, and since that’s the case, it’s not possible for our player identities to be just a decoration.”
“The instruments in the hands of several of us are the instruments of the performers who died in that show, things that accompanied them for most of their lives.” Feng Huai said, he paused, raised his eyes to Yu Rui, and softly asked rhetorically, “Then isn’t it possible that it’s also the medium that their ghosts are tied to?”
“If so, then what in the bodies of Ji Jian, Tan Lin, and you is connected to the dead performers in that show?”
“Those performers all belong to the Philharmonic Orchestra, and the previous head of the orchestra participated in their next opening performance. “Yu Rui said in a deep voice,” After the previous head of the orchestra passed away, ‘I’ took over this position and brought you, taking over,
That was the last performance of the Sife Opera House before it fell and was moved to a new location.”
“The last orchestra director passed away too? When?” Feng Huai’s eyes lit up.
“‘I’ took over the director position in 2010, so he should have passed away around that time as well.”
Feng Huai frowned slightly, “That doesn’t match the time of death of the other performers.”
“Perhaps this is another story.” Yu Rui said, narrowing his eyes slightly as he looked over at Ji Jian.
Feng Huai looked along and saw Ji Jian leaning his back against a chair, his face covered with an old newspaper.
“Newspaper?” Feng Huai asked in a low voice.
Yu Rui answered, got up and walked over, picking up the newspaper on Ji Jian’s face.
The newspaper was of the day from a certain day ten years ago, right along with the other newspapers that were originally placed on the magazine rack.
“On August 3, 2010, the leader of the Philharmonic Orchestra, Xu Zhiming, was found dead in his home with multiple wounds and his heart missing. The world was shocked.”
The article was accompanied by a photo of the death scene below.
It must be said that the scale of tolerance ten years ago was so great that such a photo was allowed to be published in the newspaper –
A man collapsed on the floor with his upper body na-ked, the tiles covered in dark-colored blood, and even a lot of it splattered onto the walls in all directions.
A large bloody hole had been gouged out of his chest, and where his heart should have been had been hollowed out, not to mention a fist-sized bronze statue of a man that belonged to one of the world’s top ten orchestras had been shoved into it for recognition.
The tiny bronze figure had a subtle smile on its face, covered in blood.
In addition to an obviously fatal wound in his chest, the man had a deep ring of strangulation marks around the neck of his feet, almost breaking his legs.
The wrist of his right hand was even almost cut in two, with only a bit of tendon left attached.
“My god, how hated …… this man must be,” Ji Jian exclaimed softly, he heard Yu Rui read out and curiously came over to see it, and at a glance, he saw the gruesome accompanying picture and couldn’t help but shiver.
Yu Rui looked at Feng Huai and gently clicked on the right hand on the picture, “Does it look familiar?”
Feng Huai lowered his eyes, the pianist also had such a wound on his wrist.
“That’s why it makes sense that the time of his death doesn’t match up with that of the other performing artists.” Feng Huai said in a low voice.
Ji Jian was a little confused as he listened, “What are you guys talking about?”
Feng Huai wasn’t interested in giving an explanation, and Yu Rui was even more reticent to speak.
Mu Zi, on the contrary, listened on the side and vaguely guessed a little bit, she glanced at Ji Jian, but didn’t intend to share anything.
Just then, the door to the lounge was pushed open.
The financier Luo Haonan came in through the door, followed by an assistant.
He looked at Mu Zi and the others with a smile, “Ah, so all the teachers are here, that’s great, let’s get ready to go backstage and wait for the show.”
As he said that, he walked in and naturally swept his gaze over the old newspapers that were spread out.
They saw Luo Haonan’s face steeply change, he violently grabbing the newspaper, his expression became extremely ugly, and he asked his assistant with a low growl, “How did it appear here?!”
The assistant hurriedly ran in and collected the newspaper, “We clearly checked ……”
“Enough!” Luo Haonan interrupted the assistant’s explanation, he took a deep breath and changed his expression, turning to Mu Zi and the others, “Let’s go backstage.”
“By the way, Head Yu Rui, I have something I want to talk to you about, do you mind going with me first?” After he finished speaking, his face didn’t look good as he took the lead and walked out.
Yu Rui raised an eyebrow and looked at Feng Huai, “I’ll go over first, see you backstage.”
“Take care of yourself.” Feng Huai pursed his lips, and not long after Yu Rui left, he also went out of the lounge.
He still remembered the narrow staff lounge in the long corridor, and planned to go back and take a closer look.
Ji Jian and Zhang Xiaofeng left the lounge one after the other, greeting Mu Zi before leaving, “Sister Mu Zi, are you leaving?”
“I’ll wait and touch up my makeup.” Mu Zi swept a glance at the magazine rack and said casually.
After Mu Zi was the only one left in the lounge, she carefully closed the lounge door and locked it, then quickly walked over to the magazine rack and took down all the newspapers on it.
She quickly flipped through them one by one, and slowly, the temperature of her palms became cold-
“On November 29, 2004, a remodeling project at the Sifr Opera House collapsed, dozens of workers at the site were crushed, and the workers’ families staged a banner protest demanding compensation. In the end, the court sentenced the defendant investor, Luo, to pay half a million yuan each to the families of the dead workers.”
“On June 3, 2005, as the reconstruction of the Sife Opera House entered its final stages, several performing artists of the Philharmonic Orchestra jointly questioned that the reconstruction of the Opera House was contrary to the nature of art, a statement that caused a major setback to the much-anticipated reconstruction project.”
“On July 15, 2005, the reconstruction of the Sife Opera House was completed, and Philharmonic Orchestra Director Xu Zhiming joined many of the orchestra’s artists to send his blessings and preview a number of heavyweight artists who would appear at the first performance, the previous questioning and rumors of disagreements were brought up again and came into the spotlight.”
“On July 19, 2005, the day of the first performance after the reconstruction of the Sife Opera House ended regretfully with the accidental death of the talented pianist Seger. It was reported that pianist Seger fell to his death into the construction building when he stepped over the guardrail and walked from the inside side of the guardrail with the crowd jammed.”
“On July 21, 2005, conductor Nolan was found hanging from the dome of the Opera House in what forensics determined to be a sui-cide.”
“On July 23, 2005, trumpeter Feng Wenjian was found accidentally locked in the opera house’s built-in cafeteria freezer, and was tragically dead when he was rescued. This was investigated as human negligence, and the staff involved is under investigation.”
“On July 24, 2005, tenor Luno was performing his second show at the Sife Opera House when he accidentally drank scalding hot water handed to him by an assistant during a break, severely scalding his vocal cords and rendering him unable to produce a sound. He was found dead of suicide in his caretaker’s room the next day.”
“On July 29, 2005, it was revealed that drummer Xu Wenru had disappeared, reportedly last seen ten days earlier performing at the Sife Opera House, and no one has been able to reach her since.”
“……”
Mu Zi’s fingers were shaking so much she couldn’t hold the paper, she sucked in a breath, couldn’t hold the paper any longer, and ran out of the break room in a panic.
There were literally no survivors.
None of those performers who had been involved in the first performance after the reconstruction had survived, all of them had either died or disappeared in the month afterward, and no one had ever found them again.
And now the pianist and Tan Lin were gone too.
Mu Zi felt creeped out and goosebumps rose all over her body.
In the previous copies of the game she had been involved in, it was at best just a puzzle to decipher, but this time, it looked like they were going to be made to repeat those once strange deaths as well.
Mu Zi ran backstage to the performance hall in shock.
Ji Jian, Zhang Xiaofeng and Feng Huai were all there, and they saw her rushing in with a pale face, as if she had seen a ghost.
Ji Jian was startled: “What’s wrong?!”
“Dead, dead …… They’re all dead!” Mu Zi emotionally let out a low cry.
Feng Huai narrowed his eyes, it was something that he and Yu Rui had discovered earlier.
He let out a soft “tsk”, this player, her reaction was a bit slow, and her mindset wasn’t too good either.
[Pfft, contempt from a newcomer?]
[Don’t speak, the configuration is the same, the background is also similar, an opening ceremony, a closing ceremony, it’s too immersive]
[If you die in the game, you’re really dead too, right?]
Ji Jian was stunned by Mu Zi’s yelling.
But he wasn’t given much time to react, and soon a staff member ran to remind them, “Teachers, get ready, the first scene is the big ensemble.”
After saying that, they saw the countdown hanging behind the curtain flashing up – 3, 2, 1!
The huge, thick curtains on both sides slowly pulled open.
Mu Zi and the others were forced to stand at the center of the stage, and below the stage was a packed audience.
Applause rang out.
Everyone found themselves uncontrollably entering the performance.
When the rhythm reached the most exciting part, Mu Zi’s hands shook so much that she could barely hold the drumsticks, and they flew out after the next note.
At the same time, there was a sudden noise from above her head.
With a clang, a black shadow slammed down on the stage, right next to Ji Jian’s feet.
Ji Jian was startled and looked down.
It was the investor.
Luo Haonan had a horrified expression on his face, and his eyes were left with only two pitch-black holes.
His mouth was full of blood, wide open in pain, but his tongue was missing from his mouth.
A person full of flustered words, pull out their tongue and make them speechless.
–Anonymous