The image of that man was turning blurry and twisted, until it finally become someone else.

Qin Yang!

It was Qin Yang!

Su Bai’s throat tightened and his lips dried. When the list merged into the desk, he slowly closed his eyes.

“What’s wrong?”

The woman beside him asked with a little surprise.

That was annoying. Why wasn’t she killed in the earlier rounds since she was so warm-hearted and caring and nosy?

Su Bai waved his hand to show he was alright.

But his head and eyes were hurting badly.

Then, when he touched his cheek, he felt something sticky. It was blood.

He was shocked. Suddenly he felt so absurd. Was that the consequence for figuring out the rules of this game?

Just then, when Su Bai was trying to wipe off the blood from his face, it suddenly became extremely quiet. He looked around and found no one in his scarlet sight. He was the only one in this meeting room.

Was it over?

Was he back to his own game from that one?

Su Bai shook his head. He was still dizzy when he staggered into the dining room. Some people were already there, including Xu Zhenzhen.

They didn’t seem to be curious about Su Bai being covered in blood because they themselves were covered in wounds and blood too. Apparently, unlike Su Bai who spent little time in that scene, they had run into some serous trouble.

Su Bai took a bottle of water, washed off the blood and let out a deep breath. Suddenly, a strong feeling of helplessness hit him. He had figured out something that no one else knew, but would he be able to survive the next round of voting in the next morning?

He sat on a chair without picking up anything to eat, his mind filled with all kinds of thoughts and guesses.

Suddenly, he thought of the human skin he found in Chen Yixin’s room, and Qin Yang who stood out again and again like Su Bai himself.

His mind was exploding with too many clues, having no source or ending.

More and more people were showing up; most of them must have just left the scene. But when Su Bai shed off his emotions, he immediately realized that something was wrong.

Without relief or casualness, everyone was eating in silence.

Su Bai felt confused, but did’t know whom to ask because he seemed to have no friend here.

Quietly, he walked to Xu Zhenzhen and Liu Tao. They were not sitting together but were quite close to each other. He sat besides them and asked bluntly, “What happened?”

They were never friends, so Su Bai didn’t even care whether they would like to answer him or not. He even put on a cold look as if he would start hurting them while they hurt him back as he did with Chen Yixin if they dared to turn him down.

Xu Zhenzhen hummed but answered: “Someone died.”

Liu Tao stared at Su Bai with confusion: “Su Bai, why were you not with us in that scene?”

Su Bai picked up the untouched milk in front of Xu Zhenzhen and took a sip: “I went to somewhere special.”

He had no intention to hid anything. There was no need to lie because no one would believe him even if he told them the truth.

Xu Zhenzhen and Liu Tao were thinking that Su Bai must have gained something in that scene but didn’t show much envy.

“Qin Yang’s dead.” Liu Tao said.

Qin Yang?

He was dead?

Surprise flashed through Su Bai’s eyes.

“Yeah, he’s dead. Hit by a falling rock. Died just in front of us.”

Xu Zhenzhen threw her hands, “Can you believe that? So absurd! Hit by a rock in the head and died with his brain splashing about.”

Su Bai fell silent. Suddenly he understood why everyone was so upset after leaving that scene. They must have been convinced that no one would die in a scene no matter how dangerous it was, and Dreadful Radio would bring them back no matter what happened. Even if they were going to die, they had to die in the meeting room.

But now, Qin Yang was killed right in front of them in a scene by an ordinary rock. It kind of destroyed their fantasy that players would not die in a scene. If Qian Lan didn’t accelerate everyone in the water in the first scene, someone might have drowned. Or if Su Bai didn’t break their restriction with his shotgun in the second scene, someone might have died because of poison or physical damage.

It looked like the voting no longer had any privilege of bringing death.

Xu Zhenzhen looked at Su Bai but didn’t care about him drinking her milk, just put a donut into her mouth, took a piece of tissue paper to clean her hand and then walked off.

Liu Tao nipped his two fingers towards Su Bai.

This time, Su Bai didn’t humiliate him like last time. He tossed over two cigarette and lit another one for himself.

The two of them just sat there smoking.

Then Liu Tao stamped the butt on the floor and left.

After both Xu Zhenzhen and Liu Tao had disappeared, Su Bai slightly narrowed his eyes.

Qin Yang…

Did he really die in the scene?

Was he really killed by an ordinary rock in front of everyone except for Su Bai?

Su Bai doubted that. A psychopath who was almost as kinky as himself and could watch Chen Yixin be beaten into pieces by her own whip could be simply killed like that?

All of a sudden, Su Bai remembered the list he saw in another game. Qin Yang was on that list, but he seemed to have a different face.

Damn it. What the hell did that mean? What was the rule?

Qin Yang’s death was too weird.

“No,” Su Bai took a deep breath as if he just yawned, but his eyes shone. “Qin Yang shouldn’t have died in the scene. He must have been voted dead in the other game. That’s why his identity in this game was erased with such an easy excuse.”

Su Bai remembered his first experience task. The white-collar lady was stabbed to death, but the cop found her killed by a heart attack.

All this was just Dreadful Radio Game’s tricks.

But how could the numbers add up?

Twenty people in that game, twenty people in this game; how could one person suddenly appear here and suddenly appear on the other side? Wouldn’t that affect the participants’ number?

What was the game rule about the participants’ number?

Su Bai had played this kind of “killing game” before. Of course, it wasn’t like the murders in his Murder Club, just ordinary board role-playing games like Kill the Wolf or Close Your Eyes When It’s Dark[1]. In those games, some characters with hidden occupation could go out and do something when it was “dark”.

Maybe such a special treat had somehow dropped on him so he could suddenly enter another game?

Or maybe the one who had it was dead? Then the special treat or hidden occupation chose randomly picked another player, and it happened to be him?

Like… Chen Yixin?

Su Bai remembered the human skin found in her room. What was that for?

Besides, there was one more thing that Su Bai was concerned about: Qin Yang was killed, so… would the voting continue with one person already dead?

If the voting continued, Su Bai would be in danger and might end up like Chen Yixin.

He thought about that human skin again. He had an instinct that this piece of human skin mattered a lot if Chen Yixin really was the last one able to travel between the two games.

He took a bottle of wine and went back to his room. Some people were talking in the corridor. After all these days they had spent with one another, some of them had formed their own group. Even though it might not be that obvious, they did seem to be much closer.

They stopped talking when they saw Su Bai. One of them, a man with long hair, stretched out his hand to Su Bai and asked for a cigarette. Su Bai took the remaining half pack of cigarette in his pocket and gave it to the man. He smiled and said that was terrific.

Su Bai didn’t bother replying to him with “if that’s really terrific you shouldn’t vote for me tomorrow.” Everyone here was good at living with a mask. Su Bai knew they were gathering up on purpose, and one of them looked really unwilling as if he was forced to join them. But this was none of Su Bai’s business. He didn’t have time for this, though he had nothing to do for now.

Back in his room, Su Bai lay on his bed, cracked the bottle open and gulped. Gradually, he felt sleepy. He didn’t try to stay awake, because it would be luxurious to have some cozy sleep at this point.

He felt a little itchy when he was sleeping but didn’t mind at all. But when he finally woke up after a nice nap, he suddenly realized that he was covered in something sticky.

He felt his own body and found it was…

… a layer of worn human skin.

—————————————

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Board role-playing games: a kind of strategy game played with cards or other tools. Kill the Werewolf and Close Your Eyes When It’s Dark are two games that used to be very popular among young people.