Paintings of Terror

Chapter 204: Chicken

The heavy darkness was like dense smoke being drawn by a range hood.

When the dim light of dawn finally plunged into the central hall, the people who’d survived the long and terrifying darkness looked at each other in silence.

“Yu Long…” Fang Fei looked at the empty spot next to her, and after a while, tears slowly trickled down her cheeks.

“Xue Ge is gone.” Ke Xun went out, picked up the bamboo slip that Xue Ge had left on the deck, and showed it to everyone.

At first, no one cared about the slips, focusing on rejoicing over their survival and sighing over the dead. Then they all came over to take a look.

There was only one word written on the bamboo slips. The handwriting was a quick, barely legible scribble, and it was only composed of a few strokes. It took a long time for them to realize that it was the word “chicken” (鸡).

“…What does this mean?” Wei Dong looked at Mu Yiran and Shao Ling in confusion.

These two think tanks also couldn’t understand, and they each became lost in thought.

“We’ve told her in advance to write only the most critical things,” Zhu Haowen said. “Then this ‘chicken’ must be the most critical thing.”

“So, after lighting the rhinoceros horn last night, what Xue Ge saw was a chicken?” Wei Dong’s expression was one of complete absurdity. “This is too unacceptable? How can a chicken appear in this vast sea? Where did it come from? The sea?”

“Or, it could be something that starts with the word ‘chicken’,” Qin Ci thought out loud. “She just didn’t have time to write the word ‘chicken’ completely, so maybe the real thing is a phrase. For example, a cockscomb flower, or a feather duster, both of which are completely different from a chicken.”

“No, if that’s the case, she would have directly written the ‘flower’ character or the ‘duster’ character,” Zhu Haowern said as he used his fingers to write the words on his thigh. “This way, she would be able to write two key points in a shorter amount of time.”

“It depends on the situation,” Qin Ci said. “In a stressful or critical situation, people’s first reaction is to follow their usual habits. Plus, there’s not time to analyze how to write something in the shortest amount of time.”

Zhu Haowen thought about it and nodded. “That makes sense. So it seems that what Xue Ge saw last night is protbably something that starts with the character ‘chicken’.”

“Is there a chicken in the sea? It’s impossible that it’s a cockscomb flower or a feather duster,” Wei Dong said. “Or is it just a fish with the character ‘chicken’ in it? I don’t understand this at all. Who of you knows anything about fish?”

As he was talking, he suddenly saw Fang Fei, who had been in a silent daze next to him, stood up and walked outside.

Ke Xun stood up to stop her. He thought that the expression on her face wasn’t right.

“Where are you going?”

“Going into the sea.” She still had tears on her face, but her expression was calm. There was a sense of determination in that strange calmness. “I’m going to look for Yu Long’s body.”

Ke Xun didn’t try to stop her again and only said, “Remember to tie a rope around your waist.”

Although she would find nothing in the end, it was best to let her vent.

“What was your illusion last night?” Wei Dong looked at Fang Fei’s back a bit sorrowfully.

“I don’t want to mention it,” Ke Xun said, anger flashing across his eyes.

Wei Dong knew him better than anyone else and knew that the phantom last night had made him very upset.

He lowered his voice and said, “Thanks to the warning method that Mu Yiran proposed, otherwise I would really have been tricked last night. At first, there were many illusions that tried to confuse and entice me into leaving, and I survived through them. Later, it seemed that a long time had passed, and the illusion seemed to have gradually disappeared. After a long time, I heard Ke’er say, ‘It’s almost dawn, everything is okay.’ There were footsteps in the darkness, as if people were starting to move around. Haowen’er also said, ‘I’m going to the bathroom.’”

“In fact, I’d been holding my pee. At first, I wanted to go too, but when I thought about how the sky wasn’t completely bright yet, I decided to wait. Then I heard everyone talking, and Yu Long and Fang Fei began to quarrel. Yu Long might have gotten so angry that he hit his girlfriend…”

“The young couple kept making awkwardness, and I didn’t doubt it at all. Everything was so realistic. Fang Fei was beaten, and she fell directly at my feet. I subconsciously reached out to help her, and then ‘Ke’er’ became angry. What Ke’er looked down the most was men who beat women, and ‘he’ fought Yu Long.”

“Yu Long was fighting and cursing, and the cursing was so unpleasant that I couldn’t stand it anymore. Everything was so realistic that it triggered my own anger. I wanted to stand up and join the fight.”

“Fortunately, I had the brush in my hand. If I really did join the fight, I would first have to drop the brush, right? I was about to throw it aside, when I suddenly remembered something that happened when I was in school.”

“There was a little gangster near the school that often ran to our school to look for trouble. The object of their trouble was a mutual friend of Ke’er and I. Ke’er was going to help, and as I was about to follow, he pressed me back down and said, ‘That other person is a gangster. When you start, you have to go hard, not light or heavy. Don’t join us. Your hand holds a brush and you’ll use it in the future to earn money to support your family.”

“Thinking about this, I couldn’t let go of the brush in my hand. As I held the brush and gradually calmed down, I realized that I was probably still caught in an illusion. It still wasn’t bright yet, and even if it wasn’t an illusion and was real, I also decided to wait until I see the sky to relax my vigilance.”

“It turned out that this illusion was really fucking cunning. Fortunately, I had the brush in my hand, otherwise I would have fallen last night. It made me hold back both fire and urine!”

Wei Dong stood up and looked at Ke Xun. “It should be alright if I go to the bathroom now.”

“Take me, Brother Dong!” Luo Bu’s voice came dully from the corner.

Wei Dong walked over to untie the rope for him.

Shao Ling raised his eyes to look at Mu Yiran. “The deceptiveness of the illusion is becoming more and more sophisticated. First, it confused us with an initial illusion, so that we thought it was the main thing. Once this illusion passed, we relaxed our vigilance, and it was this time that an even more bewildering illusion continued.”

“Did the illusion wake you from unconsciousness?” Mu Yiran asked.

Shao Ling looked down and said, “Yes.”

Obviously, the method of using loss of consciousness did not work.

“I don’t think the illusion each night is created and superimposed according to the five senses,” Mu Yiran added lightly.

Shao Ling raised his eyes and stared at him. This person once again denied the inference he’d made.

“Last night’s illusion didn’t specifically target the sense of smell and taste to create a plot, let alone vision.” Mu Yiran didn’t mind Shao Ling’s scrutinizing gaze. “And what is noteworthy is that, in the night before last, we experienced an illusion that disgusted us. It seems that what we experienced last night was an illusion that would make us lose control of our emotions. More precisely, it was an illusion that irritated us. Of course, this still needs to be determined once we have checked in with everyone else about their experience last night.”

“Mine was like this,” said Ke Xun, who sat next to him. “The illusion fabricated a plot that gave me the most uncontrollable anger.”

“It’s the same with mine,” Zhu Haowen added.

“Me too.” Qin Ci nodded.

“So, what is your inference?” Shao Ling looked at Mu Yiran. “The first night was trust, the second night was disgust, and the third night was anger?”

“No,” Mu Yiran said clearly and calmly. “The third night was anger, the second night was loathing, and the first night was love.”

Shao Long was startled. He was about to argue, but Mu Yiran did not give him the chance and directly continued, “Love, loathing, and anger. If you think about it, the power behind the scenes wasn’t creating the illusions based on our five senses but on our human emotions. People have seven emotions and six desires, the so-called seven emotions are joy, anger, sorrow, fear, love, hatred, and desire. As such, the next four nights will have illusions based on joy, sorrow, fear, and desire.”

“Humans are sentient animals. As long as they are normal and healthy, they will have emotions. As long as they have emotions, they will have mental weaknesses. As long as there are mental weaknesses, their thoughts and behavior might become affected by the illusions.”

“The illusion uses the seven emotions that humans possess in turn to find the weakest point. Those that are still alive aren’t alive due to spiritual strength. It was probably just because their weak point hadn’t been touched upon yet.”

“Perhaps we can carefully examine what our weaknesses are, what makes us happy, makes us lose control, makes us sorrowful…Only by acknowledging and facing our weaknesses will we be able to resist these attacks.”

When his voice fell, no one said anything. They all looked down, trying to explore the weakest point in their heart.

Mu Yiran’s gaze landed on the bamboo slips with the word “chicken” written on it, and he fell into deep thoughts once more.

“Then do you think the person who lights the rhino horn will die?” Shao Ling asked him.

“I’m not sure,” Mu Yiran looked at the place where Xue Ge had been standing last night. “To put it coldly, a person like Xue Ge, who had little life expectancy, it is unlikely that she will be unable to bear it, resulting in the loss of control. Of course, nothing is absolute. Maybe she…’disappeared’ due to emotional interference, maybe she ran into something she could not overcome, or maybe she had completely given up on surviving and so she allowed herself to be settled here.”

“So tonight,” Shao Ling looked at him and the others around him, “who will light the rhinoceros horn?”

“I’ll do it.”

The voice that answered was incredibly calm, as if the subject matter had nothing to do with death. The voice was Fang Fei’s, who was walking in through the door.

“Girl, the deceased is already dead. There’s no need to despise your own life because of this,” Qin Ci looked at her with pity. Yet, from beginning to end, she never revealed any fragility.

“Don’t get me wrong,” Fang Fei calmly said. “It’s not because of Yu Long. I just can’t bear to wait for death like this. This isn’t my character. I’m not afraid of death, otherwise I would not have chosen such a high risk hobby as being a diver. My life is full of unknowns, and I just can’t stand this feeling of being played on. Death is a part of nature, and my lifelong desire is to challenge death and nature.”

This brave and unyielding woman made the men present stare in awe. Luo Bu couldn’t help suggesting, “Isn’t there a knife in the kitchen? Sister, please take one tonight and knife that chicken. How about it?”

“If that’s the case, I’m afraid Fang Fei can’t be in the same room as us.” Shao Ling was still sensible and calm. “Otherwise, she might stab us under the influence of the illusion. Even if we’re not in the same room, because the illusion allows us to break through the constraint of space, the person at the bow can still accidentally injure the person at the stern.”