Chapter 39.2
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A moment later.
In the one-on-one interrogation room, Yang Ye and Xun Feng were seated in direct confrontation.
Yang Ye said: “Let’s cut straight to the chase. What do you think of this case?”
Xun Feng overlapped his hands and placed them on the table as he stared at Yang Ye with a slight sense of oppression. “Before I answer you, I would like to ask you a question first.”
“Go ahead.”
“Why did you lie just now?”
Yang Ye’s eyebrows arched up.
Xun Feng stated: “There were two instances where you lied. The first time was when you said ‘knowing the curse does not mean that the person is the murderer, this case is definitely not that simple’; the second time was when Gu Liang was being asked about the exact contents of the spell, and you helped him complete the lie.”
Yang Ye adjusted his gla.s.ses. “Why did you a.s.sume that I was lying?”
Xun Feng: “Your gaze and actions were not consistent. Gu Liang was sitting on your right and you turned your head to the right to glance at him in both instances. However, as you were looking at him and before you even spoke, your left shoulder raised up and you unconsciously situated your palms towards the left as if you were reiterating the fact that you were telling the truth, but these actions exposed the guilt you felt instead.
“At that time, your brain was focused on completing the lie, which led to the loss of control over your body language, and caused your directional movements to display the opposite of your verbal intentions.”
It was also at this moment where Yang Ye could feel the professionalism that Xun Feng possessed as a psychologist.
It seemed like this particular quote genuinely rang true— love r.e.t.a.r.ds a person’s intelligence.
For the same reasons, Xun Feng was rather unprofessional in front of Gu Liang during their few encounters, and he would step on wherever the landmines were.
However, this instance had proven that he was still quite professional.
Yang Ye asked him: “That being said, you don’t rely on deductions when solving cases, but by observing who lied and who didn’t instead?”
Xun Feng: “Don’t prevaricate, what did the both of you talk about in private?”
Behind his gla.s.ses, Yang Ye’s eyes narrowed. Then, he said: “How about this, we’ll discuss the case itself first. Who do you suspect? Or perhaps, what do you think is the breach in this case?”
Xun Feng laid his palms flat on the table and tapped it a few times subconsciously. “First and foremost, how did School Senior Feng die? It is only under the premise where she dies by Beggar Ding that this spell can become a closed loop, thereby allowing it to tangibly exist.”
“She was killed by Beggar Ding. It was a crime of pa.s.sion.”
“I can concur with the crime of pa.s.sion, but why did Beggar Ding suddenly act against her? We can’t make baseless a.s.sumptions about the plot, like they suddenly got into a fight for example.”
“It’s not a baseless a.s.sumption. Beggar Ding killed her because of the sort of poison that [One Dream] is.”
Yang Ye explained: “The user will start experiencing hallucinations half an hour after the ingestion of the poison. Neighbour Liu died with a smile on his face after ingesting such a poison because he gave rise to the delusion where School Senior Feng married him. But think about it, the script never stated that the dream has to be a pleasant one.
“When Beggar Ding consumed the poison, he might have given rise to… a delusion where a monster approached him. Hence, in his befuddlement, he picked up a broken shard from the ground and killed said monster. In the instant before he died, however, he returned to his reverie and realised that the person he happened to kill was the School Senior Feng that he loved, which then led to the revelation of his pain and discontented death.
“I’ve had a detailed discussion with Li Xiao Yu regarding her own timeline. When she killed someone that night, her heart was unsettled so she kept a lookout of the coffin shop nearby. When it was about to be 10 o’ clock, she hurried back home, and it was at this moment where she walked past the small alley, and went in for the sake of giving Beggar Ding some money, only to be killed later. Beggar Ding consumed the poisoned at 9:30, half an hour later would make it 10 o’ clock, which coincides with the time where the dream takes effect. The timelines match up.”
“Sure, that’s reasonable. Since we’ve ascertained the fact that this is a closed loop of slaughter, I can begin to deduce who was the first person to die.”
Xun Feng said: “As you were summarising everyone’s slaughter just now, did you notice that in the entire timeline, there were two people who were more special?”
Yang Ye asked: “Which two?”
Xun Feng said: “Princ.i.p.al Zha and Neighbour Liu.”
Yang Ye: “How are they special?”
Xun Feng: “In the two rounds of the slaughter, it looks like a cycle of death at a glance. No one knows from whom it starts and from whom it ends. But if you were to reconstruct the time where the impulse to kill arises, or perhaps it’s more accurate to say… from the time where the homicide was enacted, the entire case’s timeline will become clear to us.
“From the respective perspectives of everyone else for their established modus operandi, it occurs on 8th of August, but only Princ.i.p.al Zha and Neighbour Liu are on the 7th of August.”
When Yang Ye returned to the small town after visiting his relatives in the “village”, the time then was 8 August at night.
In this scenario, only Yang Ye’s time remained accurate.
Therefore, all the time a.s.sumptions used Yang Ye as a basis.
That night, on August 8, Yang Ye had dug out Gu Liang’s corpse in his backyard and encountered Gu Liang himself.
Gu Liang told Yang Ye, his time was 7 August at night.
In accordance with the script settings, they deduced that Gu Liang had already died once then, which led to his time flowing back by 24 hours.
After one night, the normal time flowed to the 9th of August.
But for Gu Liang, his time was the 8th of August.
That morning at 6 o’ clock, Gu Liang went to the Secondary School to kill the running Princ.i.p.al Zha.
But in reality, that was already the second time Gu Liang murdered Princ.i.p.al Zha.
After being killed a second time, Princ.i.p.al Zha’s time flowed back to the 7th of August.
And when School Senior Feng went to find Princ.i.p.al Zha at 10 o’ clock that morning, Princ.i.p.al Zha brought up the calligraphy compet.i.tion to her, saying that the calligraphy compet.i.tion was five days later. But in School Senior Feng’s script, it was stated that the calligraphy compet.i.tion was four days later.
This also proved that both of their timelines were not consistent with the others.
By that time, Princ.i.p.al Zha had been killed twice, and School Senior Feng had been killed once, so her time was on 8 August.
When nighttime came around, School Senior Feng used the poisoned barbeque to kill Neighbour Liu, BBQ Li gave the remaining poisoned barbeque to Beggar Ding in the pa.s.sing… These two homicides, from the murderer’s perspective, all happened on the 8th of August.
But Princ.i.p.al Zha was different.
From Princ.i.p.al Zha’s perspective, his killing of BBQ Li occurred on the 7th of August.
And Neighbour Liu was the same.
Owing to the consumption of the poisoned barbeque, the poison had caused his death at 8 o’ clock that night. His corpse was hidden in the coffin shop but he resurrected at home. At that juncture, his time was on the 7th of August.
On that day, he borrowed the excuse of wine and business talk to invite Gu Liang to his home, and used his tie to strangle him to death.
When he planned the murder, it was the 7th of August from his perspective.
Xun Feng looked at Yang Ye and said: “When Princ.i.p.al Zha released the gas to kill BBQ Li, it was the 7th of August, 10 at night, from his point of view. And Neighbour Liu, who is also me, acted earlier than him by some time, and he acted on 7 August, 9 o’ clock at night.
“Therefore, the Neighbour Liu I played, was the earliest to act on their motivation to kill. The Boss Meng that Gu Liang acted as, was correspondingly the first person to die. The starting point of this closed loop was on the 7th of August, 9 at night.”
Yang Ye knocked his index finger on the table several times before he spoke in a detective-like manner: “But this does not stop issues from cropping up. If you killed Gu Liang on the 7th of August, his time should flow back to 6 August according to the settings. When I met him, the date displayed for him was the 8th of August, which signifies that he was killed on the 8th of August.”
“That presents two possibilities. One, Gu Liang knew the entire story from the start, which allowed him to fabricate his own timeline and lie to you then. Two, the spell has some kind of special condition attached; for example, the first person who dies, who is concurrently the trigger of the spell, will not experience time resets on his person.”
When Xun Feng said that, Yang Ye’s heart could not help but squeeze— Xun Feng had guessed correctly.
Back at the cellar, the letter he read wrote in a clear and succinct manner that the first person who died would immediately revive. Afterwards, the spell would take effect, thus triggering the subsequent homicides.
It also meant that the deceased would only experience a 24 hour time reversal starting from the second dead person.
There was a total of five hours for the discussion this time around.
Between the three remaining players – namely Princ.i.p.al Zha, Liu Ran, and Li Xiao Yu – they might not react as fast as Xun Feng.
But they had enough time to organise their thoughts.
Furthermore, the fact that Xun Feng could guess the special condition in the curse also meant that the others could slowly guess it out.
Towards the murderer, this scenario was… in all honesty, too unfriendly.
In the next second, Xun Feng abruptly thought of something and he tossed another question at Yang Ye: “What did you say just now? The School Senior Feng that Li Xiao Yu played, hid in the vicinity of the coffin shop, and only left at 10 o’ clock?”
Yang Ye heaved a sigh. “Yes. If she recorded down the events of her first day, she will realise that there’s a discrepancy in Gu Liang’s timeline in those two days.”
“In the first day cycle, Gu Liang left through his backdoor at 9, walked around the coffin shop to get to the main street, and saw BBQ Li giving Beggar Ding the poisoned barbeque. But in the second cycle, which was also last night, he did not leave the shop. Because his character knew that the cycle would end. I witnessed the entire proceeding.”
In these two rounds, the character of School Senior Feng was hiding in the vicinity of the coffin shop, which allowed her to witness everything.
“The fact that Gu Liang’s timeline was not consistent in the two rounds, was seen by you, was seen by Li Xiao Yu, and Liu Ran, who acted as BBQ Li, might have seen it too.”
Xun Feng continued, “BBQ Li was also hiding in the vicinity as well. Since he managed to see School Senior Feng in her act of poisoning and then find Princ.i.p.al Zha to extort him, it goes without saying that he could see the situation at the coffin shop. The fact that Gu Liang left his shop on the first day and stayed in his shop on the second might be common knowledge to him.”
Yang Ye nodded his head.”There’s no fault in that. Liu Ran, this person… when I met him in our first scenario, it might be a combination of factors – like the deceased being his older brother, and that he was not adapted to the game – which led to his performance being rather stiff and inarticulate. But from what I can perceive now, he’s keeping silent to hide his inadequacies. He’s quite shrewd.”
Xun Feng could not resist remarking: “The circ.u.mstances are too unfavourable for Gu Liang. ‘The person who dies first is the trigger of the curse’, this was what the system declared from the very beginning. Gu Liang was the very first to die. Even if the people outside haven’t grasped this point, they’ll realise it soon.
“Moreover, the only person who has any direct a.s.sociation to witchcraft is Gu Liang alone. Why everyone was dying and living again, how the spell can be broken, is only known by him.
“This script is one star; because the preceding plot and setting were more brain burning, the clues that were given to us were incredibly direct for the sake of balancing and lowering the difficulty. The spell clue, Li Xiao Yu and Liu Ran’s timeline… All of these work against Gu Liang.”
“In the face of these given facts, it doesn’t matter if they can’t ascertain the fact that School Senior Feng’s death was caused by Beggar Ding, or that they don’t know how Beggar Ding died… it’s not important, they can only give Gu Liang their vote because there is no one who holds greater suspicion than Gu Liang.”
Due to the vexation he was feeling in his heart, Xun Feng could not help but blurt out a litany of words in one breath.
In this period of time, Yang Ye was constantly observing him in silence.
Then, after Xun Feng was done with his rant, Yang Ye burst into abrupt laughter.
“Why are you laughing?” Xun Feng asked.
Yang Ye replied, “I’m laughing because your a.n.a.lysis holds a lot of credence. I could repeat your speech to everyone word for word, and they would vote for Gu Liang.”
“What do you mean by that? You were routing me?” Xun Feng stood up instantaneously, complexion tinged green.
During their search for evidence, Yang Ye had helped Gu Liang conceal the clues in a conspicuous and deliberate fas.h.i.+on.
And in the centralised discussion room just now, he had offered a few lies, which were evidently for the purposes of helping Gu Liang.
Therefore, under the premise where he knew that Yang Ye was helping Gu Liang, Xun Feng had concentrated on giving a serious a.n.a.lysis, and he did not hold anything back.
But the current circ.u.mstances proved that this was not the case.
Yang Ye was inveigling him for information?
Ire peaking, Xun Face stepped forward in large strides and pulled up Yang Ye’s lapels. “It doesn’t matter, there’s still a lot of time for discussion. I will find a way to refute you. And for the final voting, I will not vote for Gu Liang either. If someone absolutely has to die, the person who will die is you, not him.”
Yang Ye smirked, and his smile was incredibly light and easy at that moment. “Seeing as to how you’re genuinely angry, I can set my mind at ease.”
Xun Feng released his lapels slowly. “What do you mean?”
Yang Ye patted on his shoulder to gesture for him to sit down. Subsequently, he uttered, “I’d like to apologise, I accidentally overheard from a corner wall. Your confession failed, and I was worried that your love would give rise to hate, which would in turn, lead you to casting your vote for Gu Liang to retaliate against him, yeah? I was testing to see if you were speaking the truth, don’t mind. Sit. Let’s have a proper conversation.”
Xun Feng: “…………”
Yang Ye poured a cup of water for Xun Feng before he sat back in his original seat again. “I’ve determined how we’re going to tell this story. Let’s complete the lie together, how about it?”
Xun Feng scrutinised him quietly. After a moment, he said: “Sure. But before we devise the story, I have something I want to ask you too.”
“Feel free to ask.”
“The reason I told him those things last night wasn’t really because my real feelings seeped through the cracks; I merely wanted to make up for one of the regrets in my heart.
“While I was living in the real world, I’ve thought about it numerous times, what would happen if I confessed? There was a 99.9% probability that I would be rejected, but what if there was that 0.1% chance where he agreed to it?
“And lo and behold, we encountered a setting where ‘you would lose your memory after being killed’ in this scenario. Since I knew that he would forget this matter, I seized the opportunity to ask him the question, wanting to see him destroy the 0.1% possibility personally, and allow myself to give up that vestige of hope completely.
“As antic.i.p.ated, he rejected it. I can finally be realistic without those flights of fancy, and also give up completely. To begin with, I never had any expectations that I could get together with him…
“But I do treat him as a friend. I’ve known him for many years. Giving him my a.s.sistance is something that couldn’t possibly be more normal. However, what about you?
“What are you doing this for? Are you truly trying to help him? After all this is a… match that ends in his death or yours. From the moment you met him up until now, are you casually leading him along, or are you genuinely interested in him? And why should I believe that you’re legitimately trying to help him?”
* * *
In the main hall of the centralised discussion room.
After Yang Ye and Xun Feng entered the interrogation room, the thick and heavy door sealed itself off immediately.
With such measures in place, the people outside could not hear anything, no matter what was said inside.
Turning his head back, Gu Liang glanced at Princ.i.p.al Zha expressionlessly, who was still trussed up and mouth stuffed. Subsequently, his gaze drifted towards Liu Ran and Li Xiao Yu’s person.
There was some hesitation in Liu Ran’s gaze, as if he was suspecting Gu Liang because of Princ.i.p.al Zha’s words. Hence, even though he initially harboured the intention to converse with Gu Liang to help him organise his thoughts, he was afraid that Gu Liang would deceive him.
On the other hand, Li Xiao Yu did not possess such doubts as she picked up her notebook and situated herself next to Gu Liang. “Shall we organise the timeline together? First of all, we ought to figure out the actual sequence of the events in the timeline, right?
“Although Yang Ye spoke about the incidents in a sequential order, there’s something wrong with the sequential order…. as for where the problem is, I haven’t thought it through, but there’s definitely a problem with it…”
Gu Liang nodded. “Mn. You’re right on that count. I’ll organise it with you.”
“Let me think where we should begin in the sequence…” Li Xiao Yu used her pen to write down all the character’s names on a blank piece of paper. But when she saw Gu Liang, Yang Ye and Xun Feng’s name, her train of thought veered off course, and it was unknown what she was thinking about.
Putting down her pen, she scratched the table surface with her fingers before she asked: “That, this is purely out of curiosity, okay, that Doctor Xun Feng, does he… does he…”
Gu Liang was confused. “Does he what?”
Li Xiao Yu observed Gu Liang’s visage with much caution, but she still voiced her question in the end: “Does he like you?”
Gu Liang: ?
Upon noticing his expression, Li Xiao Yu explained in a hurry: “I was merely asking. I just felt that… Forget it, I’m not, I didn’t, I don’t feel that way…”
Gu Liang stood up and headed towards the resting lounge that the scenario had specially provided. “Come, let’s go to my resting lounge to talk.”
“Huh?” With an expression which conveyed that her need for gossip had been satisfied, she kept pace with him in quick, small steps. It was apparent that gossip was more important than solving the case with the maternal aunt smile she was wearing.
A few seconds later, in the resting lounge.
Gu Liang twisted open a bottle of mineral water and drank it before he asked Li Xiao Yu: “Why would you feel that way?”
“It was just a feeling. When we were at Xiaoyao Sect… didn’t you fall into the water? He was quite anxious because of it. And afterwards, you probably talked to him at your place, right? I happened to b.u.mp into him when he was leaving, and he looked rather desolate… I thought, it was definitely related to you. Furthermore, you have a good relations.h.i.+p with Yang Ye, and he has some conflict with Yang Ye as well… When all is said and done, all the various factors point towards the fact that he likes you.”
Gu Liang: “You’re quite knowledgeable about these, aren’t you, little lady?”
“Ahem, I’ve never eaten pork, but I’ve seen a lot of pigs running.” Li Xiao Yu replied.
Gu Liang eyed her before he shook his head. “It’s not what you think. I don’t think he has such feelings for me. You can take ten thousand steps back, but if a person were to constantly regard you with a sympathetic and compa.s.sionate gaze, you would have no way of becoming lovers. The relations.h.i.+p is not equal.”
Li Xiao Yu blinked her eyes, both cognizant and confused. “I roughly… roughly get it.”
“Mn. Let’s not talk about this first.” Gu Liang peered at her, “I called you over because I have something I want to tell you regarding the case.”
“Oh, that’s true, speaking of the case, I happen to have questions I’d like to ask you.”
Li Xiao Yu said: “Before I died last night, I made a record in my journal. It wrote that, I noticed that something was awry. It concerned you.”
“What was the issue?” Gu Liang asked her.
“Your timeline is a little strange. After I killed Neighbour Liu and hid the corpse, I kept a constant lookout of the coffin shop because I felt unsettled. Later, I noted that your room lights were turned on, so I hid behind a tree that was close to your backyard. I lingered around until 10 o’ clock before I went home. And as I was going home, I was killed.”
“And then?” Gu Liang queried.
Li Xiao Yu stated: “Yesterday, I wrote in my journal that from 9 to 10 o’ clock, no one exited the coffin shop. However, as I was searching for evidence today, I flipped forward and realised that before I was killed on the first day, I was quite astute in the sense that I made a record in the journal as well. Guess what you did? The journal wrote that, at 9:30, you walked out from the backyard and took to the streets outside.”
“Yes. I did go out. I saw BBQ Li giving Beggar Ding the poisoned barbeque.”
“Why didn’t you go out last night then? The contention here is that you didn’t leave your coffin shop doors in the second round of the cycle.”
Having asked that question, Li Xiao Yu opened a bottle of mineral water and drank a large mouthful.
Subsequently after, she put down the mineral water, and took out her book and pen.
Boss Gu Liang was bound to give an a.n.a.lytical speech that was as fierce as a tiger, which was why Li Xiao Yu planned to record it down with extreme a.s.siduity, as if she was listening to a lecture in cla.s.s.
However, Li Xiao Yu did not expect that when Gu Liang concluded his first line of speech, she would spit out all the water in her mouth, and then topple the mineral water bottle that she hadn’t capped properly, thus drenching the table surface, pen and notebook instantaneously.
“You… What did you say?”
Li Xiao Yu gawped at him inconceivably.