Ye Yanzhi furrowed his brows violently.
Xiao Yu was still smiling, looking up at Kou Dong.
“Well?” She hissed, “I told you this information; what are you waiting for? Why don’t you hurry up and go?”
Kou Dong squatted in front of her, not answering.
Xiao Yu’s voice sounded a bit anxious. She urged, “Why don’t you go? Do you still want to stay in this shi*thole?”
Before her words left her mouth, the child in front of her raised her face a little bit, and his hand tightly cupped her chin, not letting her gaze escape.
“Again,” Kou Dong said, “what’s in there?”
“……”
Xiao Yu was suddenly startled in her heart, and a chill rose from her back like ants crawling past. She didn’t expect that the person in front of her was extremely imposing; it was just that he had never shown it before.
Her voice subconsciously weakened a few points; her throat bobbed. “Xiao Shuang…”
“Tell the truth.”
Kou Dong’s grip became more forceful, whispering, “Remember, if you don’t speak properly, you’ll have a second round with the Woodman.”
Hearing the word woodman, Xiao Yu violently struggled up, eyes filled with resentment: “You don’t have the right! You… they won’t listen!”
Kou Dong said, “Really.”
The corner of his lips also showed a hint of smile. “You think they won’t listen?”
“……”
Xiao Yu was surprisingly speechless. She knew better than anyone else what her position was in the circus, and these members didn’t like her, much less value her, and looked at her as if she were a crude failure, which was why they wanted to make her anew.
But the person in front of her…
Xiao Yu remembered the burning gaze of those NPCs and actually developed some cynicism in her heart.
If this person spoke, would they listen?
Why?
They were both players; why would they listen?
Kou Dong’s grip grew tighter.
“You still won’t tell the truth?”
He wasn’t a rough person, but now he was really agitated by this little girl. He didn’t need to think about it, but he knew that in that room, he wouldn’t be able to bring out Xiao Shuang without any problems—maybe he would get himself ki*lled in there.
Ah Xue’s constant reminders sounded the alarm for Kou Dong; he had to guard against NPCs and also against the people in the copies.
Xiao Yu endured the pain and finally shouted, “I’ll talk, I’ll talk!”
With tears in her eyes and her speech broken, she cringed and said, “I actually don’t know what’s inside.”
When she finished speaking, fearing that Kou Dong wouldn’t believe her, she added, “It’s true! I only know that there is someone inside, and I heard a sound—but not the kind of sound of someone walking around; it was something rolling on the ground.”
Kou Dong asked, “What is it?”
Xiao Yu shook her head and replied in a small voice, “I don’t know.”
She swept a glance at this dim backstage and whispered, “But they are all scared.”
“They always say it’s too late; it’s too late; they haven’t found it yet.”
She gulped again, her pupils dilating slightly, as if remembering when she heard the words.
“When they say that, it’s like it’s not just us—even they, themselves, are going to die.”
Kou Dong sneered.
“So you want me to go in?”
Xiao Yu was dumbfounded, and only after a while did she argue forcefully, “But there’s a real possibility that it’s Xiao Shuang inside! I think it must be! If you guys want to leave, you definitely need to open the door to that room.”
Saying this, she probed and looked out again.
“But they won’t let anyone in. Why don’t you go in now, and I’ll let you in?”
Kou Dong stared at her intently, as if he had heard a ridiculous joke: “Why should I trust you?”
“If you go in, what harm can it do to me?” Xiao Yu perked up. “We’re all companions, and I want you to be luckier than me.”
That was a really beautiful thing to say. It seemed that in these days, the circus hadn’t only transformed her skin, but even her words and actions had been transformed. This didn’t seem like what the spoiled Xiao Yu said.
Facing her sincerity, Kou Dong remained silent for a while before finally answering, “Okay.”
He listened carefully; the performance outside was still going on. The lively theater and the underground audience’s cheers and applause were loud and clear, just like in a peaceful world.
None of the members had any intention of coming back in, so Kou Dong beckoned to Xiao Yu and led her to the door.
“Hurry up,” Xiao Yu urged. “If you don’t hurry up, they’ll be done with the show!”
Kou Dong had agreed with her on a code word. If he successfully opened that door and entered the room, he’d make two cat calls. If not, he’d bark like a dog.
This wasn’t a difficult task; Xiao Yu noted it. She carefully observed the direction over there as she watched the child sneak out in front of her. But now she was in the backstage, and the big-headed doll tied her rope to the leg of the chair. She really couldn’t walk far, so she could only listen hard and guess where Kou Dong was now.
The first sound that came to her ears was a gentle, door-opening sound.
Most of the doors in the circus were in disrepair; although they still looked grand, when they were closed or opened, the already-aged parts inside would make a creaking sound.
Xiao Yu’s heart gave a sharp start.
He went in.
She raised her head and looked around, remembering the words the big-headed doll had just whispered in her ear as he left.
“Let him make a mistake and then tell us.”
As he said this, the big-headed doll’s face wore a wry grin. His pointed, thin palm slapped her head.
“If you can’t do it right…”
He shook his waist, where a cloth bag hung. Xiao Yu knew what was inside, and she shuddered, not even wanting to think about how the boy would be treated if he made a mistake and was caught; she repeatedly and impatiently assured the Big Headed Doll, “I’ll be able to do it right! Don’t make me choose the Woodman; I’ll be able to fool him.”
She had to do it for herself.
One had to help themselves.
After abandoning the so-called conscience for the first time, it would be much easier to abandon it for the second time. Xiao Yu clenched her teeth, and when she heard the sound of the wooden door touching the edge, she was sure it was Kou Dong who had closed the door and stepped into the last room.
She couldn’t wait to call out.
“Someone! Someone!” She shouted, “He’s gone in!”
The noisy gongs and drums in front of her stopped abruptly, and then the big-headed doll’s head, which was two times as big as an ordinary person’s, appeared in front of her. Behind him, other people came out one after another, all standing in front.
The big-headed doll leapt down from the stage and asked, “Where is he?”
Xiao Yu pointed out to him, “The last room! I asked him to go into the last room.”
Hearing the words “the last room,” the big-headed doll’s face changed for a moment, as if he were hesitant. After a few seconds, the desire for the child still overpowered the fear, and he hard-heartedly strode in the direction of the last room.
After standing in front of the door, he raised his hand, slightly paused, and finally still knocked three times, respectfully saying, “Mr….”.
A voice came from inside, faintly ringing out, “Speak.”
The voice didn’t sound old, more like a teenager who was thirteen or fourteen years old. However, it was like the big-headed doll saw a ghost. He shivered and lowered his voice. “I want to ask, has anyone broken into the room and disturbed your rest?”
After saying this sentence, he stood with bated breath and hung his hands in front of the door.
It was only after half a day that he heard a voice from the door reply, “No.”
The big-headed doll’s face changed furiously.
No?
He couldn’t believe it. Xiao Yu also raised his head, looking surprised.
“How can it be?” She was afraid that the Big Headed Doll would blame her for lying and eagerly said, “I heard it clearly—he did open the door to the room; he must be in there!”
The Big Headed Doll’s face sank, and he kicked her, his voice grim.
“You tricked me?”
“I… I didn’t!” Xiao Yu hurriedly defended herself; suddenly, as if she thought of something, she pointed at the door of the room and said, “He’s the one who lied; he didn’t tell the truth! Either that, or he didn’t see him.”
The big-headed doll didn’t listen to this at all and had already started shaking up the cloth bag. Xiao Yu looked at the cloth bag and lost all her senses. She didn’t know where the courage came from, but she suddenly threw herself forward and forcefully knocked the door open.
“He’s in there; I’ll pull him out now!”
She said this, raising her head.
“He’s in here…”
Her voice suddenly lurched, surprisingly, as if it had stuck hard in her throat, and her jaw dropped as she stared in front of her.
White mist filled the air, and it took some effort to vaguely distinguish the contours inside. The room was filled with lights, swaying in the smoke, with words written on them in bright red cinnabar. She couldn’t see clearly, but that little cinnabar pierced her eye through the mist.
She heard a chilling movement and whirled, perhaps out of fear or perhaps because, after being made into a sheep, her body was never as coordinated as it had been earlier.
She stumbled forward, hitting the corner of the table hard in the mist.
Something slammed down from a high place and landed right beside her feet.
Xiao Yu glanced down and then started screaming out of control.
The thing was four-square, slender, and black. There was a name written on it in golden script, as well as the year of birth.
It was a dead person’s tablet.
Looking at the room again, it wasn’t a room—it was clearly an altar!
Xiao Yu gasped violently, and in an instant, her heart was half-attacked by fear, so she was busy trying to back away. Her eyes widened, and she saw a slender hand in the white mist.
The hand slowly approached the ground, picked up the tablet on the ground, and placed it in her arms.
“Scared, right?”
That person’s voice was soft.
Xiao Yu was slightly relieved, thinking that the other person was easier to talk to than she had imagined, and she opened her mouth to apologize. But when she looked at the scene in front of her, she couldn’t spit out the words she had prepared.
It wasn’t directed at her.
That person was sitting in a wooden wheelchair, his hand gently patting the tablets in a way that looked like he was coaxing a child younger than him.
He was talking to the tablet.
He had a handsome face. His skin was extremely white—a cold, not-so-good kind of white—and at this moment, his brows were furrowed, and if one ignored the fact that he was holding a dead person’s tablet in his hands, this image could surprisingly be called pleasing to the eye.
It was just that he only possessed the complete upper half of his body. From the thighs downwards, the trouser legs suddenly collapsed, and there was nothing left in there; it was empty.
Xiao Yu had seen quite a few people with missing arms and legs in the circus, but none of them could bring her such a strong sense of oppression as this one in front of her. Just ignoring the urge to run away exhausted her entire body.
Her lips trembled a little, then she tilted her head and pleaded, “I didn’t mean it, you…”
The teenager was trapped in the wooden wheelchair and didn’t look up at her.
“Take it down.” He said it faintly, rubbing the tablet cherishingly.
“She soiled Nui Nui.”
Xiao Yu sat violently on the ground, her face ashen.
The cloth bag shook, but her attention was stolen by another figure.
Kou Dong had appeared in the doorway at some point, standing right behind the Beauty Snake and looking at her as well.
“……”
Xiao Yu’s heart was filled with disbelief. She moved her lips and said with difficulty, “How did you run out?”
“What do you mean?”
Kou Dong replied.
“I simply didn’t go in.”
He wasn’t a fool. In fact, how many fools could there be in this world?
Having already been fooled once by Xiao Yu, how could he be fooled a second time?
From the very beginning, Kou Dong had no intention of walking through that door himself.
But he had to know what was inside the door.
What if it was really Xiao Shuang?
In this case, he chose to gamble that Xiao Yu would go and tip off the ghosts. Once she succeeded in tipping them off, in order to find him out and punish him properly, these NPCs might break into the room and personally open the door, revealing to him the person hiding inside.
There was indeed a person inside.
Xiao Yu: “You didn’t believe me?!”
Kou Dong looked at her and seemed to find it funny.
“Do you think there is still something trustworthy about you to me?”
He had run out of trust long ago, okay?
Xiao Yu was dumbfounded for a moment. Only then did she realize that the person in front of her had actually lost trust in her from the very beginning; no wonder he agreed so easily.
She thought that she had fooled him.
Who knew she was the one who was truly deceived?
For a moment, both indignation and shame surged through her heart. Xiao Yu pursed her lips; she couldn’t even say a word.
Since he didn’t enter this room, the ghosts had no reason to directly lay hands on him and could only watch him walk over.
At the same time, the sound of a wheelchair reeling suddenly sounded in the room.
Kou Dong looked over and met the eyes of the boy in the wheelchair.
That kind of gaze gave him a start, and he suddenly remembered what he had heard Beggar say.
“You look a lot like that man.”
“If he sees you, he will go mad.”