Chapter 96
Xiao Tangqiu froze for a moment, his heart beating wildly. Did Shen Yuan…
Remember?
“You…remember?” He immediately asked.
Shen Yuan stared into Xiao Tangqiu’s eyes, their eyes were dark and deep. After a moment, he asked, “…Remember what?”
Xiao Tangqiu’s heart sank. He thought that Shen Yuan had recovered his memory and remembered him, so that’s why he said that. Was it not so?
He felt very unwilling to let it go and asked tentatively, “Do you really remember nothing?”
Shen Yuan frowned, and he looked at Xiao Tangqiu coldly, “Do you still think I am that friend of yours?”
Xiao Tangqiu’s heart dropped further. He thought that Shen Yuan remembered him, remembered their friendship. Why did he speak that way if he didn’t remember?
“I’m officially telling you that I am not your friend,” Shen Yuan said coldly, “I am Shen Yuan, and I will always be Shen Yuan.”
Xiao Tangqiu bit his lip, “But… but…”
Of course, he would not blindly believe that Shen Yuan was Meng Xinghe just because of appearance. There were plenty of people in the world who looked like Meng Xinghe. The reason he thought Shen Yuan was Meng Xinghe was because Shen Yuan’s gestures gave him a feeling of deja vu. A feeling that no one other than Meng Xinghe had. And so there seemed to be a voice constantly telling him, “Shen Yuan is Meng Xinghe, Meng Xinghe is Shen Yuan.”
Shen Yuan expressionlessly spoke, “I am not him, and it is impossible to be him.”
Xiao Tangqiu couldn’t help but ask, “Didn’t you have amnesia before? Did you get the memory from before back?”
Shen Yuan was silent for a while, “…No.”
Seeing that Xiao Tangqiu looked excited and seemed to want to say something, he went on to say, “I indeed have amnesia and forgot a lot of things, but I will not forget my real ident.i.ty. I have always been Shen Yuan. I have never been the Meng Xinghe you speak of and had never known you, Xiao Tangqiu.”
Never knew him?
Xiao Tangqiu became upset. It was not something that Meng Xinghe would say to him…
If Shen Yuan was not Meng Xinghe, then who was Meng Xinghe? Did Meng Xinghe really die in the car accident seven years ago, disappearing from the world forever?
Seeing Xiao Tangqiu’s disappointed face, Shen Yuan pursed his lips and said, “Let’s go, we need to search the ship.”
Xiao Tangqiu was in a heavy mood but he knew that the task was important, so he nodded and wordlessly followed.
The cruise ship’s deck alone was the size of several playgrounds, and there was even a huge outdoor swimming pool. The two of them circled the deck but didn’t find anything.
The pool was full of clean and clear water, looking as if it was waiting for guests to enter the water at any moment now. But there was no one in the pool. The well dressed men and women just disappeared.
Inside the deck were hallways with restaurants and shopping areas. The halls and restaurants were also empty, the shelves in the shopping area were full of unmanned and abandoned goods.
The two spent a little time exploring the deck but found nothing special, so they went to the second floor.
On the second floor, there were interactive areas like the cinema, bars, barbecues, kiosks, and billiard rooms. The facilities in this area were all intact, but there was still no sign of guests.
Strange. Where did those guests go?
Maybe those guests were already long dead and all they saw earlier were ghosts?
Xiao Tangqiu was puzzled that this kind of canvas search uncovered nothing. It really made him feel powerless like punching on the cotton.
He sighed and sat down in front of the bar counter.
There were a few gla.s.ses of freshly poured alcohol on the counter from the vanished bartender and guests. As he was about to take a drink from the gla.s.s, he suddenly saw that one of the gla.s.ses had a neatly folded newspaper under it. This newspaper was folded to the size of a handkerchief and it was easy to mistake it as a patterned coaster without looking carefully.
Xiao Tangqiu quickly picked up the newspaper and unfolded it. After skipping some insignificant news, he noticed the headlines that almost covered the front page: “The maiden voyage of the top luxury cruise ship Angela!”
He quickly took a look at the picture, and as expected, the “top luxury cruise ship” in the picture was the cruise ship they were on now.
He took a closer look at the text description, but apart from knowing that the cruise ship was called the Angela, he didn’t get any more important information. At most, he knew that the pa.s.sengers on this cruise ship were mostly wealthy businessmen and politicians… But this kind of thing could be figured out even without thinking.
“What did you find?” Shen Yuan leaned over.
Xiao Tangqiu silently handed the newspaper to Shen Yuan. Shen Yuan glanced down and said coldly, “Don’t understand.” After he finished speaking, he looked up at Xiao Tangqiu, the words “please explain” on his face.
Xiao Tangqiu subconsciously felt a little amused but soon became solemn again. Finally, he sorted out his emotions and calmly explained to Shen Yuan, “This cruise ship is called Angela…”
Shen Yuan frowned slightly, “Angela?”
Xiao Tangqiu went through the newspaper again, but still couldn’t find any valuable news, so he put the newspaper away, “Let’s look elsewhere.”
They went to search other places but they still couldn’t find anything meaningful or valuable. Time pa.s.sed bit by bit, and when it was time to gather up, they returned to the deck.
Someone else had already arrived. Tang Mianmian saw Xiao Tangqiu from a distance and immediately waved to him and greeted him, “Qiuqiu! Have you found any important clues?”
Xiao Tangqiu shook his head, “I only found one thing.”
He told Tang Mianmian about the newspaper. Tang Mianmian suddenly widened his eyes, “What! You said this cruise ship is called Angela?!”
Xiao Tangqiu frowned slightly, “What? What did you find?”
Tang Mianmian immediately took out a magazine, “This seems to be a gossip magazine. I found it in a guest room. My English is not very good, but I can still recognize a few words. It seems that there is something about the Angela written on it, something about a curse, and sinking or something.”
Xiao Tangqiu quickly picked it up and opened it. It was a magazine article introducing the Angela, but it was different from the newspaper’s official att.i.tude. This gossip magazine was written from the perspective of gossipping. All the records were gossips with a mysterious tone.
“This article says that on the Angela’s maiden voyage, a mysterious cursed treasure would appear. It is said that in the past few hundred years, this cursed treasure would always mysteriously appear on a sailing ship. Once this mysterious treasure appears, the ship will meet disaster because of the curse brought by the treasure like hitting an iceberg or sinking forever. There are no exceptions or survivors…”
Tang Mianmian stroked his chin, “A cursed treasure?”
Xiao Tangqiu nodded, “This article says that this cursed treasure will appear on the Angela’s first voyage, and the Angela will definitely fall into disaster because of the curse of the treasure, so it advised everyone not to board the ship. .”
Tang Mianmian spread his hands, “Reality proves that no one believed the words of the article’s author.”
No matter how terrifying the article is, there were still so many pa.s.sengers on the Angela.
Xiao Tangqiu shrugged, “Most people wouldn’t believe in this kind of thing. It will actually arouse more people’s curiosity and make them want to verify it personally. I dare say that the guest from the room where you got this magazine had this mentality when boarding the ship.”
Duan Hongzhen scoffed, “If you seek die, you won’t die.”
Xiao Tangqiu smiled, “If the protagonists in horror movies and horror games followed this truth, then all horror movies and horror games would be over as soon as they start.”
Although they still don’t know what happened on the Angela, it was obviously nothing good. Where did all the pa.s.sengers disappear to?
Tang Mianmian stroked his chin, “According to that, the Angela will definitely sink in the end?”
“Maybe. Either way, we must be mentally prepared for this,” Xiao Tangqiu nodded, “But don’t worry, Shen Yuan and I just saw that the lifeboats on the Angela are still there. Even if the cruise ship sinks, we can escape in a lifeboat.”
Tang Mianmian breathed a sigh of relief, “That’s good.”
At this point, Fei You and Zhang Zuo also returned. The two of them were pale and panicked. As soon as they saw Xiao Tangqiu and others, they immediately shouted, “It’s not good! We saw something really strange on the third and fourth floor guest rooms!”
“What?” Xiao Tangqiu asked immediately.
Fei You, “There is no one in the rooms on the third and fourth floors, but we found half of a severed hand in the bathtub in one of the rooms…”
“Half of a severed hand?” Tang Mianmian was very puzzled, “You didn’t see anyone, but there was half of a severed hand?”
“Although I say severed hand… it should be a prosthesis,” Zhang Zuo calmed down a bit, “but judging from the state of the prosthesis, it should have just been on a human body not long ago. But somehow, the person went missing and the prosthesis stayed.”
Xiao Tangqiu felt a chill down his back. A man with a prosthetic limb disappeared, leaving only the prosthetic behind?
At this moment, Fei You suddenly yelled, “Wait! Where’s the food on the table from before?”
Xiao Tangqiu looked back and saw that the sumptuous food that filled more than a dozen tables earlier had disappeared. Although they ate some at the beginning, more than half was left. Just in the time when they explored the cruise ship, all the food vanished?