Chapter 29

Chapter 29

Bai Fuling tapped the newspaper in his hand to access it, quickly scanning from top to bottom.

Yesterday's victim was named a certain Sun. Bai Fuling figured it was probably the [Sun Zhiming] noted on the library access card—an employee of the town library.

The reason for arresting Mr. Chen was his recent harassment of the library, and the fact that the last victim had traces of a glow-in-the-dark ink on the body, developed by Mr. Chen's company but not yet on the market.

From Mr. Chen's home, the police found the murder weapon hidden deep in a storage room. Although it had been cleaned, traces of blood were still detected. Additionally, some personal items of the previous victims were also discovered.

The police also learned that Mr. Chen had searched for keywords like hallucinations, mental stress, and drugs over the past few months. They speculated that the Crescent Scythe Murder Case was a result of Mr. Chen's unstable mental state leading to indiscriminate murder.

Why "speculated"? Because when the police arrived, Mr. Chen tried to flee, unfortunately got into a car accident, and died on the spot. The police had no way of knowing his true motive.

That's too convenient, Bai Fuling thought. As everyone knows, in games and movies, those who die without leaving evidence are usually not the real culprits.

Besides, he still had unused clues—Guan Jiayue's key and the colored paperclips. Both were clues that hadn't been utilized yet. After all, in RPG games, nothing is useless. Every item takes up memory space.

Bai Fuling looked over the newspaper again and decided to add the library to his list of places to investigate. The victim worked at the library, and Mr. Chen's last contact was also with the library. Perhaps there were more clues to uncover there.

He casually tucked the newspaper away into his backpack.

Liao Zhiqiu had no interest in the news on the newspaper, but he deliberately waited for Bai Fuling to finish reading before speaking up: "Let's go."

Pang Chengyu asked, "...Are we really going inside?" A tangled mess of lines appeared above his head, betraying his hesitation.

This wasn't the first time Pang Chengyu had expressed such reluctance. Bai Fuling keenly picked up on a plot thread.

—The golden-haired NPC wouldn't sprout black tangled lines when the player jumped off buildings, rummaged through trash cans, harvested grass to plant vegetables, or swallowed plates and ate Cat Sticks. So why would he sprout them just because the player was passing by a mental hospital?

That must mean there was something here that the golden-haired NPC cared about!

"What's wrong with you?" Bai Fuling turned to him and asked, "Do you need any help?"

Now was the classic player interaction question time—prompting the NPC about whether he needed assistance.

"Ah, no," Pang Chengyu paused, "I don't need any help."

"Oh." Bai Fuling seamlessly changed his question, "Then do you have anything you want to talk about?"

Since the NPC didn't need help, it wasn't a new quest but supplementary backstory. In such cases, all you needed to do was keep clicking the screen to listen to the NPC's story.

"..." Pang Chengyu fell silent for a moment before replying, "No, never mind, it's nothing." He took two steps forward, "Let's go to Maple Leaf Lake now, and then we can leave."

What did that mean? The NPC was leaving the player hanging? Bai Fuling raised an eyebrow. This half-spoken, half-withheld state was the most frustrating. People played games to have fun—how could they be left feeling uncomfortable like this in the middle of things?

OK, since the NPC wouldn't say it, the player would just explore on his own.

Bai Fuling controlled his character to turn around and decisively headed toward the mental hospital building.

After all, the [Cat's Secret] quest had already been accepted, and the next location was set as Maple Leaf Lake. So, it was no big deal if the player went somewhere else in the meantime—just don't forget to return to this quest point. There was plenty of time in the day.

In RPG games, it's common for players to wander off to another location in the middle of a quest. After all, players want to investigate everything they see.

Seeing Bai Fuling suddenly make a sharp ninety-degree turn and charge toward the ward building without looking back, Pang Chengyu was stunned for half a second before stretching out his arm and chasing after Bai Fuling for a couple of steps: "Hey, wait, wait—that's the hospital!"

The raincoat-clad figure not far away screeched to a halt and stopped.

But before Pang Chengyu could sigh in relief, he saw the transfer student reach out and lift the lid of the trash can by the entrance.

Pang Chengyu: "...!!"

Ahhh, no—that's medical waste!

Fortunately, the transfer student didn't take anything out. He just stared into the trash can for a couple of seconds before walking away, looking utterly disappointed.

Okay, he didn't touch it. Pang Chengyu let out a sigh of relief. It seemed the transfer student wasn't trying to enter the hospital but just wanted to rummage through the trash can... It was only human nature to check things out when passing by. Understandable.

Come to think of it, the entrance to the Third Mental Hospital's inpatient building would have guards posted who wouldn't just let anyone without an appointment in. The transfer student probably knew this bit of common sense, so there was really no need to worry about him barging in.

Seeing a security guard approach from a distance to stop him, Pang Chengyu finally relaxed. He couldn't help but glance sideways at Liao Zhiqiu: "Why didn't you help me call out to stop him?"

Compared to Pang Chengyu, Liao Zhiqiu was far calmer. Still wearing that same listless look, his eyes with heavy dark circles lifted to watch Bai Fuling walk away as he slowly said, "If the kitten wants to go play, let him play first. We can wait."

"...No, this isn't a place where you can just 'play'!" Pang Chengyu retorted, "And what's with this '[kitten]' nickname? The transfer student has a name, you know. He's called—"

Pang Chengyu was about to say it but got stuck on the transfer student's actual name.

Wait... [Fresh Cabbage] didn't sound like a proper name either! What was the difference between that and '[kitten]'? Just the difference between a plant and an animal?

Pang Chengyu twitched the corner of his mouth, coughed twice, exhaled, and ultimately skipped the topic. Straightening his expression, he said, "Anyway, you can't talk about Classmate Bai like that. How can you—well, how can you say he's going to play?"

"Where is the transfer student going to play? You don't understand. If the transfer student is doing this, there must be a reason!"

Although Pang Chengyu didn't know why the transfer student was approaching the ward building either, he still put on a show of absolute confidence.

He turned to look at Bai Fuling again.

In front of the ward building. Seeing the security guard NPC approach, Bai Fuling instinctively controlled his character to sidestep, but the security guard NPC still came forward.

So Bai Fuling kept dodging to the side, but the guard kept closing in.

...Huh, this was like one of those little games, [If you touch me, I'll marry you]. Was the quest [Enter the lobby while avoiding the guard]?

Okay, got it. Bai Fuling perked up and sat straight to play. He controlled his character to twist left and right, starting a circling game with the security guard NPC!

After five minutes of going around in circles, it was the guard who spoke first: "Enough! What exactly are you trying to do?!"

"The game's over?" Bai Fuling stopped.

Guard: "What... You think I'm playing a game with you?!"

Bai Fuling: "Haha, he even retorts. So smart." He couldn't help but remark.

A rising red bar appeared above the guard's head. Bai Fuling inwardly clicked his tongue: An NPC that got red-tempered when it couldn't win—such a sore loser.

But he didn't plan to waste time on a random NPC, so he didn't interact further and kept walking forward.

"Stop! Do you have an appointment for visitation?"

A pop-up window vibrated onto the screen. Bai Fuling paused slightly.

An appointment? What was that? Bai Fuling frowned, not recalling any related plot hints before.

He thought for two seconds, then gave up.

An appointment was just one way to enter a location. As long as you thought broadly and dared boldly, players could go wherever they wanted.

Except for invisible walls, nothing could stop a player!

So Bai Fuling and the security guard NPC locked eyes for two seconds, paused for a beat, and then bolted forward!

"Hey!" The guard reacted swiftly, lunging to grab him, but it was like catching a ghost—he felt his hand close on the corner of the raincoat, but it came up empty.

Fortunately, the main gate was kept locked, so the intruder couldn’t get in. The guard looked up.

Sure enough, the raincoat-clad weirdo was blocked by the automatically locking gate.

The weirdo paused, reached inside the raincoat, and whipped out an axe.

...Where did that axe come from?! How could an axe be hidden under a raincoat?! The guard was utterly stunned and immediately retreated to the security booth, grabbing a riot baton.

"Unauthorized entry is prohibited! The gate is bulletproof glass. If you attempt to break in again, I’ll have to use force!" the guard shouted in warning.

The raincoat-clad weirdo stuffed the axe back into the raincoat.

The guard thought: It seems this person knows when to quit.

The next second, he saw the weirdo turn 90 degrees and make a dash for the water pipe on the side of the building.

The black-haired youth, wearing an angel halo, clung to the white water pipe like an agile monkey, scrambling up floor by floor—first floor, second floor, third floor, fourth floor—until he finally reached the eighth floor!

The guard looked up at Bai Fuling climbing the pipe. All he could see was a bright yellow dot, leaving him momentarily dumbfounded.

...Wait, hold on—how did he climb that?? Spider-Man?!

Bai Fuling just kept mashing the [Climb Up] button, scaling relentlessly to the top. When he finally reached the eighth-floor rooftop, he even felt it was a bit of a letdown.

This building was still too short. If given the chance, he’d like to climb a hundred-story building—that would be truly fun.

Bai Fuling controlled the pixel character, hoisting himself over onto the rooftop. Now, he had officially entered this psychiatric hospital from the highest point.

Down below, Liao Zhiqiu looked up and saw Bai Fuling climbing. The corners of his lips quirked up in a faint, amused smile.

Sure enough, kittens love high places. He just climbed right up.

Pang Chengyu’s expression shifted through a range of emotions—from shock to confusion to dawning understanding, before finally settling into a kind of resolve: ...Ah, the transfer student must have his reasons for doing this.

Probably to personally investigate the local psychiatric patients, gaining firsthand experience to better fight back against the school that's driving us insane! Yes, that must be it!

The two of them gazed up at the bright yellow raincoat-clad figure overhead, each feeling reassured in their own way.

Only the guard, after a moment of stunned silence, made the choice any normal person would.

He grabbed the phone in the security booth and hit the emergency call button.

"Attention, all units! Attention, all units! A psychiatric patient has broken into the psychiatric hospital!!!"

Author’s Note:

Security Guard: We prepared to stop psychiatric patients from escaping, but we never expected one to break in.