Chapter 82: Horror Live Stream (Nineteen)
"What?" Si Chen Shao reflexively asked. With that gleaming silver blade pointed at him, his heart immediately rose into his throat. The girl's clicking footsteps grew louder, and Si Chen Shao's eyes involuntarily fixed on the figure advancing forward.
"You didn't complete this task for me..." The girl's voice was sharp and piercing, yet hoarse from what seemed like a long time without speaking. "You betrayed my feelings, betrayed my devotion... You must all be punished."
Everyone's attention focused on the girl with the blade, which meant they could all see how her hand suddenly shifted as she spoke—she was mustering her strength.
The broadsword began to rise slightly, its sharp edge seemingly about to descend at any moment.
"Wait, who is it that you wanted us to find?" The girl's face overlapped with a photograph in his memory, and Si Chen Shao realized with a start that the person standing before him was that mentally unstable killer who had been committed to the asylum.
"My beloved..."
The girl's terrifyingly black pupils fixed on Si Chen Shao, filled with intense madness and fury, like a volcano on the verge of eruption. The trembling of her hands—caused by who knows what emotions—made it clear that she was extremely unstable at the moment.
"No... it wasn't you that I asked." The blade extended toward Si Chen Shao, its sharp edge pausing just in front of his neck. The girl tilted her head, examining him with unfocused eyes, then shook her head and僵硬地 pulled the blade back.
A scalp-numbing sensation spread all the way to his heart. Si Chen Shao felt all words catch in his throat. The moment he exhaled in relief, he saw the previously sluggish girl suddenly spin around, raising the broadsword high overhead.
—CLANG.
A flash of silver light streaked across his vision. Si Chen Shao watched in stunned horror as the girl swung the blade toward Liang Xuan. A round object tumbled across the floor.
Warm, fresh blood sprayed across Si Chen Shao's face. He stared blankly at Liang Xuan's unclosed eyes lying on the ground. They should have been beautiful eyes, but with their owner having widened them in terror, they appeared utterly eerie and horrified.
"It's you!" The girl laughed, the white teeth beneath her blood-red lips becoming even more conspicuous. Perhaps it was due to her heavy makeup, but instead of looking demure when she smiled, she sent chills down everyone's spine. "Indeed, venting it out feels much better."
"Besides her... there's also..." The girl's voice seemed to change. Her hands trembled again, but it was completely different from before—because an irrepressible excitement appeared in her eyes. "You..."
Her slender finger pointed at Qi An.
"You must... also be punished." The girl's wide-open mouth closed, and beneath the stunned gazes of everyone else, she revealed what could only be called an elegant smile. "I loved that person so, so much. But... he's not by my side. I can't sleep at night. I think of him every midnight. I'm so lonely, truly so lonely, like the world has lost all its color. I'm so tired..."
The girl's eyes drooped slightly. She seemed to sink into some sort of mournful emotion, and her pitch-black, vacant eyes briefly showed something rare—feeling. "Do you understand this sensation?"
"...Me?" The youth under the girl's gaze looked at her helplessly, his long lashes fluttering continuously. Under the lights, such an expression radiated a delicate vulnerability.
"...I need someone to accompany me through the night." The girl's gaze was unexpectedly gentle, and when she suddenly reached for Qi An's hand, it was tender to the extreme. Yet her voice carried an unyielding firmness. "Since none of you found that person, then you... stay with me."
All the lights in the room blazed on. Outside the windows, the sky had already turned completely dark. Qi An lowered his gaze slightly to look at the hand he was being held by. It was a very delicate hand, just like any pampered young lady—fair, smooth skin, soft as if without bone.
This hand should have been the one being held, but now it was holding the young man, and moreover... trembling.
Slightly trembling, as if reflecting some hidden and unbearable emotion of its owner.
Qi An pulled his gaze back and walked quietly with the girl through the silent corridor.
There were significant doubts about this case.
In the girl's diary, she really had been to the mental hospital, and she had also been discharged.
The diary mentioned that when the girl went to see the male teacher, she had harmed him in a moment of emotional outburst because she believed he had deceived her.
This matched what Ke Han had recounted and the scene that had been reenacted earlier.
The only question was, why... would the crime scene be in this room?
According to the clues Si Chen Shao had found, the girl's father had spent a fortune to have her committed to the mental hospital and had also sold off the family property. This room was very likely already sold. Even if it hadn't been sold, the male teacher shouldn't have been living here. There were no more students for him to teach here. Without any connection to the girl, he was merely a hired tutor.
Although the male teacher appeared to have committed no obvious crime, simply from the fact that he had turned the girl into a killer, forcing her to bear the label of a murderer and enter a mental institution—separating her from himself—the girl's father would never have allowed him to continue living here.
The girl had mentioned multiple times that the male teacher had deceived her. The diary also described how, when she went full of anticipation, she heard others calling him 'Doctor.' Remembering the psychology book he had seen in Wen Weichi's room, Qi An couldn't help but narrow his eyes.
Wen Weichi...
He should be the biggest mystery in this entire case.
The door that had been closed opened on its own without anyone pushing it. The girl casually tossed aside the broadsword, then placed Qi An's hand in front of her and covered it with her other hand.
"This is my lady's chamber. I haven't let anyone in here before." The girl smiled sweetly. "Are you hungry? Shall I prepare something for you?"
"May I ask you a question?" Qi An glanced at the room filled with pink decorations.
"Of course." The girl nodded with a smile, her current appearance exactly like that of a young girl in the prime of youth.
"You have a son." Qi An deliberated for a moment, asking in a tone impossible to discern. "I want to know, what is his name?"
Zhang Zhaoqi definitely had a purpose in mentioning this matter.
He seemed to want to remind him of something.
"Why would you suddenly ask that?" The girl's downcast eyes seemed to darken slightly, but her voice remained gentle. "His name is... Ke Han."
"None of that matters." The girl's upturned face was delicate as a blooming flower. "What matters is, we should rest now. It's already very late."
Qi An furrowed his brows, a deep contemplative look flickering across his eyes.
In truth, more important than uncovering the truth of the case, he needed to find where that person actually was.
...
"You're just letting Qi An go off with that girl like that?" Si Chen Shao looked at Zhang Zhaoqi and Ke Han sitting calmly with a look of utter disbelief.
"...He'll be fine." Ke Han smiled faintly. Suddenly, something like a flash of blue light glinted in his eyes.
"Internet guy, what's wrong with your computer! I was gaming perfectly fine, how did it suddenly jump to a livestream room?"
"Xiao Li, come look at this! My computer seems to have broken!"
For some reason, everyone's computer suddenly popped open a livestream room.