Chapter 193 Naught Vivian 07

Chapter 193 Naught Vivian 07

Brown had thoroughly sorted out his thoughts and analyzed with a pale face:

"I guess that terrifying monster must be hiding in the hundredth room."

Bluebeard deliberately left an ambiguous note and then left the villa to make whoever read the note doubt its meaning.

The newlywed wife, cautious and meticulous, would certainly conduct a thorough search of the entire villa to figure out which painting her duke husband wanted. She would undoubtedly end up focusing on the hundredth room, just like Brown and Qin Fei did after checking all the other rooms.

"If I really opened the hundredth door, there would be no good outcome," Brown swallowed, his eyelids twitching wildly. "But..."

But not finding any trace of the last door was also not a solution!

Finding the oil painting was merely a task set by Bluebeard; Brown hadn't forgotten that at the beginning of the strange tale, he heard an off-screen voice stating the necessary conditions for clearing the tale.

He needed to complete the entire story.

Now that they had seen through Bluebeard's conspiracy, if they avoided that dangerous door and hid somewhere in the villa or even escaped far away, they could temporarily save their lives.

But this wouldn't end the strange tale.

Brown couldn't help but show a troubled expression.

"And these two sentences," he waved the notebook in his hand. "What do they mean?"

To open the door, yet not to open the door.

Qin Fei lowered his eyes, scanning the notebook: "These two sentences were found on the frame of Bluebeard's wife's painting. Could they be considered a hint from them to the successors?"

Brown was stunned: "...Could it be that Bluebeard's previous wives split into two factions? One faction wants to save people, while the other has turned dark and wants to kill, hence giving two contradictory hints?"

Qin Fei shook his head, drawing a line under the missing part of the first hint.

"Do not ■■■■■ open that door!"

"Only Bluebeard and the thing behind the hundredth door could have made such a hint in the villa, where no one has been for years," said Qin Fei.

Both parties were suspects, but the possibility of Bluebeard doing it was small.

As an ordinary human living in a fairy tale world, Bluebeard could come and go freely within the villa.

He could continuously marry, return freely, leave freely, and push all the risks of facing the monster onto those unfortunate women.

If Bluebeard had discovered this hint, he could have erased all the reminders or even replaced the painting with a new one. There was no reason for him to stop at just this point.

Qin Fei's words were like lightning, breaking through the fog in Brown's mind.

"Bluebeard is free, but the monster behind the door is not."

Brown muttered to himself.

The monster's movements within the villa must be limited; otherwise, Bluebeard wouldn't need to go through so much trouble each time to lead people to it.

Brown believed that perhaps the monster couldn't leave the door on its own.

But the monster had strange energy that could affect the villa—it wasn't hard to guess, after all, it was a monster, and it had to have some supernatural abilities.

"Don't you feel that this villa is eerie?" Brown clicked his tongue. "I always feel something is watching me from behind when I'm inside."

When in the second-floor bedroom, the watcher might be one of the paintings hanging on the wall.

But what about when he wasn't in the bedroom?

In the hall, kitchen, dining room, and bathroom.

There were no paintings hung there.

"It must be the monster watching us!" Brown felt Mr. Lyle was his lucky star. Although it seemed he was doing all the analysis, all the important clues were found by Mr. Lyle.

"The latter hint is complete, but the former is incomplete. That means we need to open that door, but not casually. We need some prerequisites to ensure our safety when opening it," the maid said calmly.

"As for those prerequisites, they're actually not hard to guess," a clear and smooth voice flowed through the dark villa corridor, like a beautiful melody.

Brown: "????"

Are you okay???

The NPC's voice trembled: "You guessed it again??"

How can you guess everything?

Brown was mentally dazed. He felt that what grew on Lyle's neck was a brain, while what grew on him... might be a cabbage.

"Every time Bluebeard marries a wife, she dies unexpectedly, and he remarries. Do you see any pattern?" the clever player pointed out to the confused NPC.

Brown hesitated: "...Only one person dies each time?"

"Bingo!" The maid snapped her fingers, smiling and patting Brown's head as if patting a puppy. "Exactly."

They were extremely close, and Brown could even smell the faint scent of soap from the person opposite him.

That face, so close, was stunningly beautiful. Even though Brown had no interest in men or Qin Fei himself, he still couldn't help but blush.

The NPC blushed and pushed Qin Fei slightly: "Oh, don't get so close."

Fei: "…"

"Cough." Qin Fei took half a step back. "So, do you understand what we need to do now?"

Brown's focus returned to the main issue, and he nodded solemnly.

The monster killed someone every so often.

If they couldn't stop these killings, how could they save themselves? In fact, the answer had been revealed to them from the very beginning.

Since sacrificing one person each time appeased the monster's desires,

they needed to choose the best candidate from their side.

It couldn't be Brown.

Nor could it be Qin Fei.

That left only Bluebeard.

"The missing part of the hint in the framed picture might be—"

"Don't open that door when Bluebeard is not around!"

Although they didn't know what method Bluebeard used, it was clear that he had reached some kind of agreement with the monster.

The monster knew that as long as Bluebeard was alive, it would have a continuous supply of food, which is why it erased the hint on the frame.

The monster didn't want the potential victims to resist Bluebeard, but this didn't mean Bluebeard was safe in the villa. If he were on the same absolute footing as the monster, he wouldn't fear it at all.

But Bluebeard was clearly afraid.

Just like in the raven's song, Bluebeard was also among the potential victims. As long as they could lure Bluebeard to the door—

Brown sighed softly, "In the end, the most crucial point is to find the door first."

Without finding the door, all their analysis would be for nothing.

Qin Fei nodded in agreement.

Actually, Qin Fei had more to say. Even if they found the door, luring Bluebeard there would still be a significant challenge.

Bluebeard wasn't stupid; tricking him wouldn't work.

No matter what reasons or excuses they came up with, once Bluebeard realized he was being led closer to danger, he would certainly catch on.

Given the nature of the scenario, Qin Fei guessed that Bluebeard was likely an extremely powerful combat boss.

With just the two of them, they probably wouldn't last ten moves against him.

The final result… would likely be getting crushed and thrown to the monster behind the door.

Tsk.

The maid thought sadly that their situation was truly dire.

If only the door could move, it would make things much easier…

In a flash of insight, Qin Fei suddenly understood something.

Door, moving.

Moving!

"Actually," Qin Fei said suddenly, "our previous line of thinking was flawed."

They had been influenced by the original fairy tale.

If the last door in the villa was so hard to find, did Bluebeard's deceased wives really search for it as diligently as they did?

The story of the Princess and the Pea deviated so much from the original, and the same could be true for Bluebeard's story.

Those who died in the villa and became the monster's prey didn't have the task of completing the legend.

Their most important task was to find the painting.

To find the most special painting, the one that was clearly Bluebeard's favorite.

"The painting isn't hidden behind the door; the painting itself is the hundredth door," Qin Fei stated decisively.

Only this way could Bluebeard ensure that everyone he wanted to sacrifice would touch that door.

Qin Fei looked up at the villa, at the windows nailed shut.

In fact, this was quite unnecessary.

If Bluebeard merely wanted to block out the light for the monster in the villa, he could have simply drawn all the curtains for the same effect.

Sealing the window glass served another, more important purpose.

—To completely eliminate the reflection on the window glass.

Qin Fei recalled the song the raven sang again.

"Do not knock on that door!"

"Do not look into that mirror!"

"Duke Bluebeard watches you in the dark, oh, watching you!"

"Is there a mirror in this villa?" Qin Fei asked.

Brown's eyes suddenly widened. "It seems there really isn't one?"

He had been in the villa for more than a day now, and as a human with normal physiological needs, Brown had used the bathroom several times during the strange tale.

But when he recalled, he did not remember seeing any mirrors in the bathrooms.

Now even the windows were sealed...

"In many Western stories, demons can live within mirrors. Wherever there are mirrors, demons can move freely."

Qin Fei said.

The reason Bluebeard sealed all the things that could be called "mirrors" in the villa was to block the monsters' path of movement.

"There is no painting on the second floor that depicts a mirror," Qin Fei thought. "There must be something you missed on the third and fourth floors."

The sky outside had completely darkened, and it was past nine o'clock at night, leaving little time for the two of them.

The player and NPC ran upstairs one after the other.

Once they determined their search target, progress suddenly sped up significantly. Before long, Brown indeed found a still life painting in a room on the third floor. This painting depicted the only "mirror" in the entire villa.

In the painting, a table in front of the mirror held an honor medal.

Next to the medal was a ribbon, on which a line of text was written:

"A gift from the king to his most beloved noble, Duke Bluebeard."

Brown stood in front of the painting and slapped his head hard.

"I understand! I am not a native of the fairy tale world, so I didn't feel anything when I saw this painting. But for others in the fairy tale world, this painting symbolizing royal authority and favor would undoubtedly be the most cherished item among all of Duke Bluebeard's wealth."

When Bluebeard assigned the task of "finding his favorite painting" to his former wives, the women left footprints in various corners of the villa, ultimately stopping in front of this painting.

"If I'm not mistaken," a sharp glint flashed in Qin Fei's eyes, "behind this painting is the only true mirror in the entire villa."

Anyone who attempted to remove the painting from the wall and transfer it to the dining room downstairs inevitably looked into the mirror during the process.

Their fate was predictable.

"Should we take the mirror down and move it to the hall to ensure Bluebeard can see his treasure as soon as he enters the house?" Brown rubbed his hands together, wondering how to proceed...

Qin Fei did not think this was a problem.

With a wave of his hand, the player directed the NPC: "Go to the bedroom on the second floor and get some sheets!"

"Make sure they're pure black," he added.

...

At the moment the midnight bell struck twelve, the sound of hooves came from the road directly opposite the villa's main gate.

The sky was overcast with dark clouds, and the wind howled fiercely. Crows took flight, forming swirling black vortexes of feathers in the air.

A towering, mountain-like figure rode atop the horse.

Boom—boom!

The horse, unable to bear the weight, let out a dying neigh, but fortunately, the destination was near.

"Whoa—"

Bluebeard reined in the horse, dismounted, and walked step by step toward the tightly closed villa door.

His brows were tightly furrowed, his bloodshot eyes filled with tension, and he breathed heavily.

Slowly, he pushed open the door.

Fortunately, no one greeted him, and everything inside the villa seemed normal, with no lights lit in the hall.

Things should have progressed smoothly, and Bluebeard breathed a sigh of relief.

He did not notice that the hall today was unusually dark, like a sheet of iron, where nothing could be seen.

Bluebeard took a step forward, and the door slowly closed behind him.

Suddenly, there was a thud as the heavy leather boots on his feet kicked something, producing a strange muffled sound.

Bluebeard paused and looked up.

In the next instant, a piece of cloth slid down in front of him, and a flash of light blinded Bluebeard's eyes. The wall lamps on both sides of the hall ignited with dim firelight. In the yellow glow, Bluebeard saw his face.

A huge mirror.

Placed right in front of him.

The image in the mirror was clear and detailed.

"Ah! Ah!!!!!!"

Duke Bluebeard's eyes seemed glued to the mirror as he opened his mouth and let out a loud scream!