Chapter Ch118.2 - Giant
translator: xiin
editors: apricot & juurensha
“Did he discover something about us?” Vera frowned and asked.
Wu Jin took a deep breath, “It’s fine. At most, he’s on guard against us––we’ll try to avoid Wei Yan and head to the Royal Chapel.”
Scenes from the previous elimination matches flashed through Wu Jin’s mind. In the second round, he’d won by using the rules. In the third round, he and Wei Yan had shared the same fate on the altar of the tarot card instance. Wu Jin suddenly thought of how Wei Yan had said–– “We’ll fight again next time.”
After Wei Yan left, the two of them quickly headed towards the other side of the bookshelf.
The other side of the bookshelf was quite messy. Wei Yan had already taken away the books that held important clues, but Wu Jin still flipped through a few more books. Before leaving, he suddenly took out the notebook that the ghost had given them from inside his combat suit and carefully pressed it between the pages of a heavy, ancient book.
“Just in case.” Wu Jin explained.
The chief court painter, Lemoyne’s last painting, and the Royal Chapel with the funeral ceremony. The clues kept popping up, and it seemed that the entire store was only a fraction of a step away––between them and Wei Yan, one of them would have to start the decisive battle first.
Before that happened, he wanted to make sure his chips were safe.
The air in the Palace of Versailles at night was stagnant and still.
By the time the two of them left the library, the survival number on their wrist watches had dropped from 349 to 342. Most players were still choosing to save their strength and avoid losses before the final battle.
“Only 7 were eliminated.” Vera raised her brows.
Wu Jin nodded, “The reward for pa.s.sing and punishment for failure for the instances haven’t yet appeared. At present, there is a 1/3 chance of winning a green card instance, and 1/7 chance for blue cards. The program team won’t eliminate all the losers from an instance. The players are in a safe situation, so there’s no reason to start fighting.”
Vera smiled slightly, “There’s another way to win. As long as all the players in the same instance are eliminated––I mean, as long as their life-saving capsule pops up, then the team remaining will definitely be the winner of the instance.”
Wu Jin thought about it. It seemed that there wasn’t anyone with that style of play in the Crosson Show––
Vera snapped her fingers, “There is in the Hyacinth Show.”
Wu Jin’s eyes opened wide, “She––”
Vera: “Her name is Lan.”
One hour later, the early morning bell rang out.
The Royal Chapel was to the west of the Hercules Salon. The two of them repeatedly confirmed that Wei Yan had left the chapel before stepping into the darkness one after another.
The chapel was very much in use during Louis XIV’s reign and was then converted for Louis XV’s private use later on. The walls were covered with figures, from the King, to the Dauphin, to n.o.ble knights, as well as courtiers and outstanding contributors to the Palace of Versailles.
The chapel was dark and smelled of rosin. Wu Jin had to lift up a lamp and follow Vera to look for the painting. The candle light covered the faces in the oil paintings with a yellow tint, and the pupils painted in intense pigments made it seem like people were gazing back at the two holding the lantern.
Vera’s eyesight was excellent, and she soon called Wu Jin over.
On the wall facing Vera was a painting that was about half their height.
Royal chief painter. Lemoyne (1688-1737).
Wu Jin gave Vera a thumbs up, then went to study the portrait in the dim lighting. The man in the painting was about 30 years old. He was solemn and melancholy, and wore a simple robe.
“Hek2026; isn’t very happy.” Vera looked at it for a long time.
Vera couldn’t see anything else after looking at it for longer, so she simply shifted her gaze and looked around. It was possibly because the room was too dark, but the weak light cast an eerie glow on the portraits, making it seem as though everyone’s face was covered in a layer of blue.
The wide, long seats were arranged densely together, and the people crowded together within sight were all breathless. It seemed that the funeral ceremony had only just taken place a few days ago.
Vera was in a trance, and she vaguely felt like she could see countless faces sitting there in the rows of seats. They were full of silent grief, silent crying, or wild laughter.
She sneezed.
Seeing that Wu Jin was about to take off his combat jacket to give it to her, Vera quickly shook her head, “It’s just a little cold.”
Wu Jin nodded, then continued to fumble around one side of the frame, “The temperature here is really different from outside.”
Vera hesitated, “I mean… it’s like there are ghosts floating around. More than one, a lot of them. I seem to be able to see them.”
Wu Jin froze.
He followed Vera’s line of sight, but it was so dark that even the seats seemed indistinct.
“If you can see it, then it means they’re here.” Wu Jin spoke while Vera looked on in astonishment, “In the Trianon ghost incident, there were ghosts in the Palace of Versailles from one century in the past, and the two female teachers were both psychics. If this match is a recreation of the incident back then––”
Vera rubbed her gooseb.u.mps and moved a little closer to Wu Jin.
“The ghosts are 4D projections that shuttle between players.” Wu Jin used an extremely scientific tone for his a.n.a.lysis, “The emergence and control of these ‘ghosts’ is determined by one parameter––”
“The transparency of the projection.”
Vera was dazed.
“The cone cells can’t easily detect 4D projections in extremely bright or dim places, especially after the transparency of the ghosts has been deliberately reduced. By the piano during the day, and now, in the chapel, you’re the only one who can see it––them.”
“In this game, the ‘psychic’ abilities are easy to explain.” Wu Jin spread his hands, “A trainee who has better eyesight.”
Vera: “……”
Wu Jin comforted her, “It’s a talent.”
Vera nodded, the young woman’s shoulders finally relaxing as she quietly held up the lamp for Wu Jin.
At this time, Wu Jin’s eyes flickered, and his fingers touched the mechanism that was hidden within the frame––
Vera quickly held up the light for Wu Jin.
Wu Jin bent down and studied it for a long time. He lifted up the scattered strands of hair that blocked his vision, his eyebrows solemn, his fingers fast and precise.
There was a click.
The simple mechanism opened.
The candlelight cast a warm halo of light on one side of the youth’s cheek. The straight bridge of his nose and his pale lips were cast in the shadows of his profile.
“Alright.” Wu Jin got up on one knee in front of the painting.
Vera covered her cheeks and nodded absently.
The two of them pushed open the frame, immediately revealing the dark pa.s.sage in the wall.
Wu Jin took up the lamp. “I’ll go in and take a look.”
Vera immediately slapped her chest and expressed that she’d guard the exit for Wu Jin.
Two floating cameras immediately followed Wu Jin down the dark path.
The Crosson Show’s live stream room.
The scrolling comments had definitely heated up after two minutes of close-ups of Little Witch.
“My serious son is so good looking!! My son looks so handsome playing with toys in kindergarten!”
“Little Witch, don’t investigate anymore! Run quickly––behind you––”
Ying Xiangxiang laughed and made a ‘shh’ gesture as she looked over at Blood Pigeon, “In this match, how is our Contestant Wei Yan performing?”
Blood Pigeon nodded. “Pretty good.” He then added, “Very good. Contestant Wei Yan has made a lot of progress in comparison to the previous few games, especially since the second elimination match. This is exactly what I want to see. A human-shaped weapon that pays attention to strategy while also making use of his own advantages or even other people’s advantages.”
The camera shifted.
Outside the Royal Chapel of Versailles, Wei Yan quietly looked at the gate where Little Witch and Vera were, and disappeared from the camera’s view in the next moment.
Inside the chapel.
The dark path behind the picture frame didn’t lead far, and Wu Jin could see the end after two meters.
Wu Jin’s vision hadn’t yet been completely restored. He could only see that there was a dark wall at the end of the secret pa.s.sage, and there was a frame on the wall, but the canvas was blank––
Or, it could be that it was there waiting for the contestants to fill in what was missing.
There was a creak beneath his feet.
Wu Jin seemed to have kicked something. He crouched down and reached for the small box fixed to the bottom of the frame.
A locked pa.s.sword box.
Wu Jin’s eyes went wide with surprise.
Coded locks rarely existed in the 17th and 18th centuries, and they were easy to crack. However, the lock box beneath the picture frame was tamper-proof, and it seemed that the program team had perfectly fused the precision of modern materials with medieval techniques to create a locked box that couldn’t be opened by force.
The pa.s.sword was eight letters.
Wu Jin finally took one last glance at everything and left the secret pa.s.sage so that Vera could go in and take a look. The young woman nodded, but the moment that Vera was about to accept the lantern, Wu Jin suddenly raised his head.
Vera’s eyes were filled with inquiry.
Wu Jin gestured for Vera to stop and listen carefully, but the chapel was as quiet as ever.
A few minutes later, Vera came out of the secret pa.s.sage.
“We have to find a painting and an 8-letter code.” Wu Jin spoke in a low voice, “The hint for the painting is in the notebook––the last painting of Lemoyne’s life,
Vera nodded, then suddenly added, “170x140cm. The frame’s inner diameter. The painting we’re looking for must be these dimensions.”
Wu Jin was pleasantly as he looked at Vera.
The female contestant chuckled. Vera was a senior trainee of Azure People’s Entertainment and was more experienced with compet.i.tions and capturing details than Wu Jin was.
Without further delay, the two of them headed straight to the entrance of the chapel. Wu Jin was concentrating on his a.n.a.lysis, “The painter stabbed himself nine times before he died. The clue for the code box should be either his obsession, the truth, or his cause of death. I’m more inclined towards cause of death––”
Wu Jin reached out and pushed open the gate to the chapel and was about to step outside.
He heard a very subtle sound on the other side of the door, like the friction of cloth or the slow pa.s.sing of metal through the cold air.
His back chilled slightly, his intuition giving him a fierce warning as reason and intuition clashed.
Wu Jin knew that his hearing was very good, but it had never been this good.
It was impossible for him to catch such a small sound through a door when the other party was deliberately hiding themselves. It wasn’t as though he had a genetically modified human’s hearing––
However, the scene from the bookshelf a few hours ago flashed through his mind.
At the time, his auditory intuition had made a judgement closer to the truth than his reason had.
It was like his hearing had undergone a very unscientific, qualitative change under stress during a single trip to Floating City after the fourth elimination match and before the fifth one––
Wu Jin no longer hesitated and turned around to signal to Vera to prepare for battle.
Vera froze almost imperceptibly, then drew out her sword.
Wu Jin gripped the hilt of his sword at the same time. The weapons the two of them had came from the huge number of armored figures in the Palace of Versailles. Even though they didn’t have the same advanced equipment that the ghost warrior had, it was enough to deal with an attack from other players.
Wu Jin kicked the gate open.
Wei Yan’s sword flashed as it sliced over!