Paintings of Terror

Chapter 231: The Knives that Disappeared

Ke Xun flipped through the content of the four negatives one by one in his head. According to Mu Yiran, if the figure in the last picture was himself, then the content of the other negatives should be other people in this room: “The one where people were eating, it should be the scene when everyone was eating. I remember Koharu seemed to be at that spot and everyone fed it quite some food, so it looks like a lot.”

With such an explanation, there was not as much fear as before and he even had a sliver feeling of peculiar funniness.

Perhaps it was because of the sudden relaxation that Ke Xun actually felt sleepy. Hearing the sounds of Mu Yiran’s breathing beside him, he also seemed to be on the verge of falling asleep.

Everything in the dark room was silent, as if the only thing alive was the curling smoke in the corner.

This night seemed to be very, very long, so long that it made people feel that they had slept for seven days and seven nights.

When Du Lingyu opened her eyes, the room was no longer as dark as it was before going to bed, but gray with very dim light.

The room was still the same, with a high wooden ceiling, a large wooden cabinet attached to the wall, a large table, and a big bed which she was lying on.

She actually woke up alive. Du Lingyu secretly rejoiced, but at the same time vaguely hoped that everything would end soon, if she woke up in this terrifying room every day, she would probably die of mental torture sooner or later.

Not knowing how long she had slept, Du Lingyu felt her body was a little stiff, maybe it was because of the cold. Du Lingyu endured the stiffness and turned over. She felt that something was wrong with her surroundings, as if everything had fallen into an inexplicable and deathly stillness.

For no reason, Du Lingyu felt a sense of overwhelming panic, and didn’t even dare to move her gaze, so she let her eyes stay in the direction of the wooden cabinet in the room, where there was a faint smoke. Was it the incense Mu Yiran lit for timing? What time is it now? Was she still safe and sound in the world inside and outside the painting?

What Du Lingyu smelled was another kind of aroma, which was different from the previous one. Although it was also faint, there was something seductive in it, making people want to continue smelling it.

“Are you awake?” A voice rang out beside her. It was Fang Fei.

Du Lingyu felt that this voice was a kind of redemption for her. At this moment, she relaxed and sat up slowly: “That was a long sleep.”

“Get up, get ready to wash up, and have breakfast.” Fang Fei’s voice was slightly cold.

Du Lingyu felt something was wrong. Fang Fei was sleeping on her left side, why did this sound come from the right side? Du Lingyu subconsciously looked in the direction of the voice, and saw that Fang Fei was fully dressed, and she was sitting at a distance to her right.

“Have you finished washing up?” Du Lingyu’s eyes slowly moved from Fang Fei to her side, and she suddenly found Xi Shengnan lying motionless beside her — Xi Shengnan was lying without a sound. Her face was covered with a piece of fabric. She was not sleeping.

Du Lingyu was so surprised that she forgot to scream. She quickly left Xi Shengnan’s side. Judging by Fang Fei’s appearance, she was the one who covered Xi Shengnan’s face.

Du Lingyu admired Fang Fei’s calmness, and tried not to tremble at this time: “Wh-what’s going on here? Sister Xi…”

“Something happened to her.” Fang Fei seemed to be tasked with guarding the corpse. “They have already gone to get someone.”

It was only at this time that Du Lingyu thought of looking at the other companions. Only then did she realize that Cao Youning was the only one sleeping on the bed. Lu Heng and Mai Peng were also in the room at this time, standing on the edge of the bed with very unpleasant expressions.

Du Lingyu slowly moved to the side of the two companions, and said in a low voice: “Why don’t you wake everyone up, Cao Youning now…do you want to wake him up?”

Mai Peng: “Don’t, just now Lu Heng woke me up, I almost died.”

“What?”

“I can’t explain the feeling. It was like being pulled back from another world. My heart was so uncomfortable that it was about to jump out. It has already been a long time and I’m still not feeling well now.”

“Oh, let’s wait until he wakes up by himself…” Du Lingyu felt as if she was intentionally talking about irrelevant topics, because she was really afraid to talk about Xi Shengnan’s death, as if this “death” was a secret, as long as she covered her ears, closed her eyes and didn’t look or listen, she would be safe.

Du Lingyu suddenly remembered something: “Hey? Mai Peng, your voice, your voice has completely recovered? Have you recovered from your cold?”

It was obviously an extremely severe cold yesterday, yet it became fine today.

Lu Heng seemed to have just realized that, but at this moment he just looked at Mai Peng blankly and didn’t say anything. His eyes once again rested on Xi Shengnan’s body, and his eyes were filled with despair and dead silence.

Mai Peng: “I’m also surprised. My voice suddenly recovered, and my nose isn’t blocked anymore. However, my throat hurts so badly. It hurts like a knife.”

Du Lingyu was puzzled, but she couldn’t figure out why. Besides, the bigger thing on her mind was Xi Shengnan’s death. How did she die? What did she experience last night? They slept next to each other last night, did that mean that she brushed shoulders with death last night?

Du Lingyu felt chills all over her body, so cold that she was almost frozen.

“Where is it? This room?” There were noisy voices outside.

It was Ke Xun who opened the door: “Yes, we didn’t move anything after we found out, and kept it as it was.”

In addition to the few veteran members, there was also a middle-aged man who looked like an official. His expression was very calm, and he slowly approached the bed. When he saw Fang Fei, he nodded slightly: “Master Shaman.”

Fang Fei had no choice but to nod in return and cast her eyes on Xi Shengnan’s body: “Everyone was asleep, and no one had heard anything. She just…”

“I heard she died of poisoning?” The official had already walked to the front of the bed.

Fang Fei nodded and lifted the cloth towel covering Xi Shengnan’s face with her own hands.

Du Lingyu closed her eyes subconsciously, but she heard Fang Fei’s voice very clearly in her ears: “Because the face is completely black and blue, and the seven orifices were bleeding black blood, so we deduced that it is poisoning.”

Du Lingyu shivered for a moment. Although she didn’t see it with her own eyes, “the face is black and blue, and the seven orifices were bleeding” was enough to make up for it. She was afraid and sad in her heart — Sister Xi left everyone forever like this…

The official seemed to observe for a while, and then said after a long time: “It looks like she really was poisoned. Does she have any enemies in the Lantern Inn?”

“Absolutely not!” Lu Heng’s voice was a little emotional, “She just came here, and she doesn’t even know anyone here.”

“So, what about you people?”

“No! We have no reason to kill her at all!” Lu Heng’s voice was almost crying, “Shengnan is like an intimate older sister to us. We won’t do that kind of thing…”

The official’s voice was cold and heartless: “Can I take a closer look?”

“Please go ahead.” That seemed to be Fang Fei.

After a long time, until the lights in the room suddenly lit up, Du Lingyu couldn’t help but open her eyes and look elsewhere. Only then did she realize that the lantern-lighter from yesterday came in and lit every gauze lantern.

“Old Jing, come and take a look.” The official greeted the lantern-lighter.

The lantern-lighter walked over with steady steps, and was not alarmed when he saw the dead body on the bed: ” Inn Officer, anything for me to do?”

“Look at the hairpin on the deceased’s body. Isn’t that the one Xiayu lost?” Said the officer.

This sentence obviously caused dissatisfaction among many people, especially Lu Heng: “We came here in those outfits! Shengnan has always been wearing this hairpin! Shengnan does not take other people’s things!”

The lantern-lighter took the hairpin handed over by the officer, and carefully identified it: “It is indeed Xiayu’s. The jewelry of the Chu family is all marked. There is a word Chu engraved on the inside of this jade hairpin. No other family can imitate it.”

The official, also known as the “Inn Officer” as mentioned by the lantern-lighter, said: “We need to check her other jewelry.”

No one expected that things would develop like this, but judging from the current situation, stopping them might not be the best choice.

So, they had to offer Xi Shengnan’s bag. Fortunately, the developing tank and photography-related things inside had been put into the public cabinet.

The Inn Officer soon found the jewelry box in the bag. He opened it and examined the jewelries under the light: “Most of these jewelries are marked with the word ‘Chu’. There is another box here. What is this box for?”

The Inn Officer found another small and long box with a strange shape. When he opened it, he found some knives inside.

“Sister Xi brought them from outside… from outside of the Lantern Inn! These have nothing to do with the Chu family.” Du Lingyu couldn’t help explaining that this box contained Xi Shengnan’s ceramic knives brought in from the outside world, which turned into metal knives by the painting by “default”.

The Inn Officer remained unmoved and carefully checked the knives in the box one by one: “Why are there two missing? There are obviously grooves for knives, but no knives.”

This… It was hard for Lu Heng to explain. The two knives were likely not recognized by the painting and did not appear.

Shao Ling, at the side, was surprised: Xi Shengnan did not tell everyone about this matter. At that time, she only mentioned a few words about the ceramic knives, but she did not publicly disclose anything about the two missing knives, at least not to everyone.

In the world of paintings, there were very few things that disappeared because they could not be recognized. Even the most taboo thing in this world: time — everyone’s phone was only missing phone functionalities and timing capabilities like clocks and calendars, but at least it could illuminate. At least it still retained the appearance of a phone. Even the most taboo watch didn’t disappear but had become an ornament such as a bracelet.

It was absolutely abnormal that two knives were missing from a set of knives, and no one knew about it.

Mai Peng’s voice was a little weak, and he explained to a few veteran members in a low voice: “At that time, Sister Xi said that something was missing, two new-styled knives were missing. We felt that it was probably because the painting didn’t recognize…”

The Inn Officer’s voice became more and more serious: “These knives have the word ‘Xi’ on them. The dead woman’s surname is Xi?”

Mai Peng still remembered the original appearance of this set of props. It was a resin box containing a set of ceramic knives. Xi Shengnan wrote the word “Xi” on the resin box.

Qin Ci answered the Inn Officer’s words: “Yes, our companion’s surname is indeed Xi. Excuse me, sir, is there any problem with this matter?”

The Inn Officer’s words spread to everyone’s ears word by word: “Xiayu was stabbed to death by knives, and she was stabbed many times all over her body. In the end, two knives were still in her body, and they were engraved with the word ‘Xi’.”

Perhaps it was because things turned around so quickly that people were caught off guard. No one said anything, only doubts grew.

The lantern-lighter spoke slowly: “Master Shaman was right. The murderer is a woman, and this woman will have retribution.”