Volume 2 - CH 29.1

When Xü Beijin picks up the newspaper, the viewers in the stream are still paying attention to the corridor team.

Selfish and Scapegoat have driven away.

These two have been on bad terms ever since the beginning. Despite all their arguing, though, they somehow ended up in a team. Quite the mysterious scene, it sure is.

The man in black is already near the parking lot now.

With both Lin Qin and Mu Jiashi stopped at the entrance to the corridor, the man in black raises the big machete in his arms while chuckling fiendishly; his steps are a bit quicker than before, too.

Mu Jiashi asks, slightly nervous, “dalao, how do we stop him?”

Lin Qin is now standing straight and, giving him a glance, asks, “how else?”

Mu Jiashi is looking at him all confused.

Lin Qin takes a step forward while the man in black is about to slash at them, and, through some inexplicable procedure that Mu Jiashi’s eyes couldn’t discern, Lin Qin has managed to dislodge the machete and taken it for himself!

Mu Jiashi “!”

Lin Qin, with the big machete in hand, pointing the blade right at the black mask of the man in black, orders with a frigid tone, “you’d better bloody stop there!”

The man in black “…”

Who is trying to kill who here? Oi!

Mu Jiashi is completely stupefied.

In the stream, after some mass barrage of exclamation marks and ellipses, one comment slowly trudges along going “i feel a bit sorry for the man in black…”

“even thru the mask u can also tell the man must be questioning life right now”

“Too bad he’s a mass murderer”

“he’s just a poor little lamb shocked by the dalao, so never show mercy!”

“btw, with that fighting power, wouldnt he just breeze thru all the nightmares? wouldnt the game balance be off then? whyd a player like that exist?”

“he feels almost like a bug, huh…”

Xü Beijin has been reading the newspaper in the meantime when he notices these, and after realising what happened, he also begins sighing.

As expected, there is no way he can even hold his own against such a Lin Qin in a brawl.

Nope, no way at all.

Maybe he should refuse, after all… No matter how rare, how valuable, how much he likes the drinks Lin Qin acquired for him, he would refuse…

While Xü Beijin is mulling over this, Ding Yi, currently on high alert inside the bedroom, can feel a chill down her spine.

Is her danger sense tingling?

She reflexively begins to recount her course of actions, trying to work out if she ever overlooked anything, or did anything that could cause catastrophe later on.

No matter how much she scoured her memories, though, the most risky thing she has done recently is the deal with Lin Qin.

If that’s the case, though, she’s gone so far now, and she can only keep going. She doesn’t want to be trapped in the bottom floor of the Tower forever, and besides…

When suddenly, another “number off!” blasts through their eardrums.

This time, it is asking for the fifth number.

They have already gone through one, two, seven and four. From the fifth number on, they know nothing at all.

Ding Yi almost subconsciously turns towards Laosan, even though she can’t see him at all, but he knows approximately where he is; right now, in Ding Yi’s mind, this timid man is already the second most reliable person in the Nightmare.

The most reliable of course being Mu Jiashi.

Yes, she knows him, of course, having introduced clients to him; in fact, she was informed almost as soon as Mu Jiashi returned from the higher floors.

Combine that with knowing that Mu Jiashi has actually chosen this Nightmare for his return run (TL: Implying what Mu Jiashi was speculating in the last chapter was partly wrong), and also that Lin Qin is in this Nightmare as well, convinced Ding Yi to gamble on this Nightmare in the end.

Other than that, given Ding Yi’s experience, she could certainly have also negotiated with Lin Qin in a much better manner and avoid angering him at all; she chose to provoke him instead, because, obviously…

She’s readying him for a Special End when he goes berserk in the future.

It can really be said that Ding Yi has armed herself to the teeth for this Nightmare. In fact, she has already laid out her plans for her business in the future with her subordinates, just in case. Though all she has done to ready herself makes her confident that she’ll at least achieve a Normal End or a Special End courtesy of Lin Qin in this Nightmare.

Ding Yi is thinking about this in the room, while Laosan also shouts a “three!” as per their previous plans to shout the same numbers as per their position, excluding those that are wrong, which will be tested with the first number that hasn’t been reported yet – this translates to three for the fifth number and six for the sixth number. As for whether that is going to work…

Laosan is waiting anxiously.

The next second——”a useless piece of trash that can’t even count properly can just go to hell!”

“Fuck!” Laosan cusses.

Everyone is tensed and fearful.

Yet, even after a while, the heavy breathing of all four of them is still the only sounds to be heard in the pitch black bedroom. That man with the big machete is nowhere to be found.

“He’s stopped…” Laosan murmurs, “that man in black… They managed to stop him!”

He is so elated he is almost dancing in place. He is glad he asked Mu Jiashi for help——While Ding Yi is also glad that she asked Lin Qin to help. As for which of their preparations worked best, they’ll probably only be able to find out the next time they meet them again.

Laosan calms back down quickly enough. He knows that while the man in black is stopped this time around, it doesn’t mean they will be able to keep him at bay every single time. That man in black will likely become more powerful over time as the Nightmare crumbles more and more later on.

Laosan is murmuring to himself, “if only we knew what the numbers were…”

Yet, the minute is fixed. However anxious or unwilling they are, they can only wait until time continues to tick along slowly.

This feeling, akin to waiting for one’s eventual death in the dark, is definitely not a good one.

Laosan takes a deep breath an says, “we’ll go with six for the sixth number.”

Ding Yi replies, “that fifth number just now…”

“Assuming the numbers don’t repeat, and three and five are both wrong, then the fifth number can only possibly be six, eight, nine or ten.”

“That range is small enough, but…” Ding Yi hesitantly continues, “what about the seventh number, then? Should we keep trying three, or…?”

“Let’s wait until after we see how six goes,” Laosan chuckles bitterly, “this is like the world’s most frustrating riddle.”

Ding Yi concurs, “yeah… And we have to bide as much time as we can. This run, we have to at least figure out how many numbers there are in total.”

Then the room falls into silence for a while.

Soon enough, another “number off!” hits them.

The sixth number.

Laosan takes a deep breath and says with a trembled tone, “six.”

He is so nervous that he can feel his body shaking. He has made a decision for once – He doesn’t know if it’s correct… When the fifth number wasn’t three, he was shaken greatly already.

The man in black was stopped then, but they might not be able to stop him every single…

Suddenly, he realises it’s all quiet around him… Quiet for too long.

Ding Yi asks, her tone equally shaky, “we’re… right?”

A moment later, Laosan yells out, “we’re right! The sixth number is six!”

He exhales heavily and can feel his whole body giving out after all that tension. His brain is just blanked out now. He is still in disbelief that they are correct.

“Then the seventh number…” Ding Yi gulps to make her parched throat a little more comfortable, before continuing, “what should we try for the seventh number?”

Laosan has calmed back down a little, starting to think after taking a few deep breaths, “the seventh one… We only have three, five, eight, nine and ten.”

“Six is gone… So, the fifth one would be either eight, nine or ten.”

Then suddenly, their gazes meet in the dark as they shout in unison, “three!”

Since the fifth number wasn’t three or five, then the possibility of the seventh one being three or five is now much greater; no guarantees, but it is at least much more likely than eight, nine or ten (TL: Because they don’t even know if the string of numbers is that long).

Between three and five, since they decided to go in numerical order, they’ll start with three.

One minute later, after another “number off!”, Laosan steels himself to shout, “three!”

Silence ensues.

“We’re right!”

He proclaims loudly, and being so excited, he directly embraced Ding Yi, only realising what he just did after they separated…

Not that he’s too concerned about their different genders, but more so that he could easily be accused of being a Carddealer for that.

With a wet blanket draped over him all at once, Laosan hesitantly and quietly explains, “sorry, I wasn’t…”

“That’s alright,” Ding Yi is smiling, even though nobody could see it in the dark; she then says, “let’s keep going.”

Laosan sighs in relief even though he’s still uncertain, but the excitement and ecstasy has faded for sure. He can feel a little frustration at the Nightmares and the Tower in general, and also, a deep-seated sense of hopelessness.

Yes, they’re almost done with the mysteries in this Nightmare.

Yet, who would help them solve the mysteries chaining them here?

He takes a deep breath and then says with a slightly more gravelly tone, “then, the eighth number…”

Meanwhile, in the stream, after Lin Qin took away the big machete from the man in black, they enter a standstill.

Or more like, the man in black and Mu Jiashi are both simply in shock. Lin Qin does a few practice swings and offers a compliment while nodding, “this is pretty good.”

Mu Jiashi & the man in black “…”

Xü Beijin then quietly moves the stream over to the pitch black bedroom and bore witness to the whole number guessing charade alongside the viewers.

The viewers seem underwhelmed, typing, “hey, looks like the counting isnt too hard either”

“If it’s merely non-repeating integers from one to ten, they can even try listing all possibilities and trying them out one by one, since it’s not many; they are definitely lucky though that they remembered how the little boy counted outside the Nightmare”

“makes sense, dalao, because if they didn’t know, everything’d really be up in the air”

“hey, even if there are all these unreliables here, there are also more reliable ppl here than the last it looks like”

“it remains to be seen whether the reliable people can carry the unreliable ones”

“so the 8th number…”

“Beibei! Beibei, any thoughts?”

Xü Beijin turns his attention to the comments when he sees his name floating across the comments, and gives the question some thought before answering, “the eighth number could now be five, eight, nine or ten, though according to what they discussed, they’ll probably pick eight.”

“Eh? Beibei, do you think the eighth number isn’t eight?”

“Probably not,” Xü Beijin shakes his head and explains, “you see, all seven numbers up to the seventh one were one, two, seven, four, unknown, six and three. There are four numbers, five, eight, nine and ten remaining. Do you notice something odd about them?”

“… ill admit im stupid”

“I’m so not suited for this game [cry emoji]”

“Beibei, you also noticed?”

“it’s the dalao! i knew it, the dalao has telepathic abilities with Beibei”

Xü Beijin couldn’t help but smile noticing that comment.

Then he explains, “the reason it’s strange, is that the three consecutive numbers from eight, nine and ten are still unassigned at this point, because there are only four potential numbers remaining.”

“eh…”

“uh, i got the first part i guess”

“If ten numbers are required in total, from one to ten, (TL: And given some numbers are randomised), it is highly unlikely, statistically, for eight, nine and ten, all three consecutive numbers to still remain entirely unassigned by the seventh number”

Xü Beijin nods to concur, “this means that, for the fifth, eighth, ninth and tenth place to happen to exactly be the numbers five, eight, nine and ten, would approximately occur with a probability of…” he pauses only briefly before answering, “four percent.” (TL: Haven’t done the maths myself, but this is probably just calculating the likelihood that 5, 8, 9 and 10 just happen to be arranged in some random order in the 5th, 8th, 9th and 10th position)

“oh, ok, i see that probability is low”

“We know that the seven numbers prior were all jumbled up, so the fact that there are still three consecutive picks available by the eighth number is highly unlikely. This unlikeliness increased the more numbers they reported without having assigned eight, nine and ten at all.”

“… wait i still dont understand! so what if the fifth eighth ninth and tenth were 5 8 9 and 10, maybe 10 is the fifth and 5 8 and 9 for the eighth ninth and tenth positions respectively, that’s still jumbled right? it could just have been some rare case?”

Xü Beijin smiles to explain, “you’re correct, but since we are guessing, we would first consider situations that are most likely to occur, therefore…”

Before he could finish explaining, though, the pitch black room is filled with another wrathful “number off!”

The sudden hug with Ding Yi meant their thoughts were pretty chaotic for the minute. They didn’t think about the numbers all that much, so going with what they discussed, Laosan immediately says, “eight…”

The moment he spoke, Ding Yi reflexively yells out, “wait…”

Too bad, that the simple, single-syllable word has already jumped out of Laosan’s throat at that point.

The bedroom is all silent.

The moment the Missiontakers are about to celebrate…

That is when, back in the corridor, among the three people still in a standoff, the man in black suddenly makes a vicious chuckle and say, “a useless piece of trash that can’t even count properly…”

The next second, his form disappears!

Mu Jiashi mutters in shock, “how could this be…”