Chapter 530 Solving the Puzzle

Chapter 530: The Puzzle

"Have you experienced anything unusual with your bodies since entering the game?" Chi Yan's voice sounded in the corridor, his tone steady, but his gaze sharp as it fell on Tian Yue and Feng Xuelan, as if scrutinizing their reactions.

"No..." Tian Yue instinctively gave a negative answer, her tone categorical, as if she had never even considered the question. However, as soon as the words left her mouth, her brow furrowed slightly, and a flicker of hesitation appeared in her eyes, as if something wrong was surfacing from the depths of her mind.

She turned to look at Feng Xuelan, her gaze growing intent, her words carrying a hint of uncertainty: "Wait, Xuelan, just now you..."

Feng Xuelan was momentarily stunned, then, as if something clicked, her eyes suddenly cleared, revealing an expression of sudden realization.

"What's wrong?" Chi Yan's gaze swept between them, as if catching some detail.

Feng Xuelan drew a shallow breath, as if organizing her thoughts, before speaking slowly: "Since entering this game, the things I say have been... coming out on their own."

"Along the way, I couldn't help but say many things I didn't want to say... things I would never normally say. Thinking about it carefully, could this be the physical issue that happened to me?" Her expression was complex, mingling confusion with a sense of almost relieved relaxation, as if she had finally found a reasonable explanation to attribute those words that shouldn't have been spoken.

"Possibly." Chi Yan thought for a moment. "Counting Feng Xuelan, at least three out of our six have experienced physical issues. The rest of us might have too, just haven't discovered them yet."

Tian Yue's brow was tightly furrowed, clearly having realized something was wrong, and she asked with great confusion: "What exactly is going on? Didn't the game even start yet?"

Chi Yan exhaled slowly: "Actually, I don't really understand either. But—"

He turned slightly, his gaze falling on the woman beside him, then said: "Miss Xie seems to know some things."

After saying this, Chi Yan walked to Jie Ying's side and waved a hand to get her attention.

Jie Ying had originally been standing a bit farther away, motionless, as if immersed in her own world, seemingly detached from everything around her. But upon receiving Chi Yan's signal, she finally broke her motionless stance, casting a brief glance at Tian Yue and the others.

The woman's gaze remained indifferent and aloof, carrying a chill, almost emotionless calm.

However, her gaze didn't linger on Tian Yue and the others for long. She soon averted her gaze, turned, and continued walking forward.

"Let's talk as we walk. Thirty minutes isn't very long." Jie Ying's voice was as cold as the impression she gave.

Her footsteps echoed in the quiet corridor, with a steady, rhythmic pace.

"If I'm not mistaken..." Jie Ying said word by word, "from the moment we entered the game, No. 666 Hospital has already done something to us."

As Jie Ying spoke, the others remained silent, the air seeming to solidify within the sound of her voice.

No one interrupted. On one hand, they knew Jie Ying had lost her hearing; even if they said something, she couldn't hear it. On the other hand, they also understood that what Jie Ying was going to say was inevitably closely related to this game.

Jie Ying's voice was calm, almost cold: "I have a friend who once entered No. 666 Hospital."

"He once told me some things about No. 666 Hospital." Jie Ying continued, her steps steady, her balance unaffected by her lost hearing. "No. 666 Hospital consists of the main hospital and other department buildings. 'Neonatology' should be one part of it."

"But that's not the main point." Jie Ying paused, as if giving everyone a moment to digest.

Jie Ying came to a stop. She turned to look at the other players, her expression calm as she said: "Once you step into No. 666 Hospital, whether you have completed the hospitalization procedures or not, you must abide by one rule. That is—"

Her lips parted slightly, her voice clear and cold: "Rule One: No. 666 Hospital does not admit healthy patients."

For players meeting for the first time, reading expressions was extremely valuable. It not only let them gauge their current emotions but could even be used to infer their personalities, whether they acted steadily, and so on.

After studying everyone's faces, Jie Ying's gaze lingered on Su Bai for a few more seconds before withdrawing.

Jie Ying resumed walking forward, her voice still calm: "So... even someone with all limbs intact, appearing completely free of illness, will develop physical problems after entering No. 666 Hospital."

"Some go deaf, some go blind, some become paralyzed." Her tone was as if merely describing some established rule, without any extra sentiment. "Hearing that, you might think people like me who've gone deaf, or that guy there who's lost his sight, got the worst of it."

Jie Ying faintly curled the corner of her lips, as if negating some naivety.

"Then you are wrong."

She stopped again and looked back, saying to the other players word by word, seriously: "Those illnesses not apparent on the surface might be more terrifying than our obvious disabilities. Even if a person appears perfectly intact, they might have some undetectable terminal illness constantly worsening, spreading, and proliferating within their body. It's even possible that before the Eerie Entities make a move, they themselves might not hold on."

The air fell completely silent after these words.

The bright-as-daylight lighting in the corridor cast a cold light. The sound of everyone's footsteps still echoed in the corridor, but some people's moods had grown somewhat heavy.

"Even by the rules of the real world, one must first become a patient to complete hospitalization procedures, right? So it's normal for Rule One to take effect at this time. After all, things like the thirty-minute safe period were just guesses players made based on their own experience from start to finish. This nightmare game might have started long ago."

When Jie Ying reached this point, she stopped walking again.

However, this time, Jie Ying wasn't stopping to say something to the others, but because they had arrived at the location of the nurse's station.

This corridor didn't deliberately hide the nurse's station. It was located in a recessed area of the hallway, like an open space specifically set up by the hospital for management convenience. The white counter was clean and tidy, looking no different from an ordinary hospital ward, even appearing somewhat overly "normal."

Opposite the nurse's station, two young men were sitting against the wall, seemingly players who had found the nurse's station before them.