CH 77

Chapter 77: Castle Cry (IV)

He was safe already.

Qi Leren breathed a sigh of relief, leaned against the wall and rested for a while. This time, he didn’t start killing, which was good news. He is afraid that the Seed of Slaughter would get out of control so frequently that, even if he had holy water that could suppress the demon’s power, he wouldn’t last long.

He didn’t know where Dr. Lu went. Qi Leren, who had finished his rest, didn’t see Dr. Lu after looking around nearby. On the first floor, there was only the corridor that suddenly caught fire when they first came in. Qi Leren felt that Dr. Lu’s caution wouldn’t lead him to the dangerous place. He suspected that he had gone to the second floor, so he also went up. When he passed the oil painting hanging on the wall, he stopped and glanced at it again. The lady in the painting smiled sweetly, unable to see the shadow of her own madness. Qi Leren sighed in his heart and turned and continued to go up.

At the moment he turned around, he seemed to catch a glimpse of the portrait splashed with red paint, and the beautiful face of the mistress was covered with a shadow, even the happy smile on her lips suddenly distorted. Qi Leren jerked back and stared straight at the portrait. The light source from the chandelier in the hall lit up the oil painting, and the lady in the painting still looked happy, as if the image he saw in that moment had just been his illusion.

However, Qi Leren wouldn’t naively think that this was really just an illusion caused by light. In this dangerous place, any abnormality was a sign, implying possible danger. It seemed that the mistress of the castle really wasn’t a simple person.

On the second floor, the corridor was dark. Qi Leren turned on the flashlight and looked for the switch. After turning it on, it was brightly lit.

Where he was now should be the so-called “inner world”, which was very similar to the real world, but it was not the real world. It was more like the castle before the fire, and everything was still as it was before it was burned, but this seemingly normal appearance hid fatal danger, such as the moving armor, and there were more anomalies that had not been noticed.

Quiet all around, Qi Leren tried to open the door to the rooms on the second floor, but every door was locked. He tried to challenge the firmness of the door panel and door lock, but did not dare to make too much noise, and finally had to give up. It was the kind of situation from horror games where a wire would be needed to fix all the locks. Qi Leren thought emotionally that the only room he could enter now was the big room connected to the corridor at the end, with a grand piano in the middle of the room. Qi Leren looked around and made sure it didn’t look like a place where monsters could live.

Where on earth has Dr. Lu gone? If he wasn’t on the second floor, did he go to the third floor? But it wasn’t long after Dr. Lu ran out of the room that he caught up, so he wouldn’t have been far behind. Qi Leren frowned as he thought and turned back to the first floor.

Maybe Dr. Lu was desperate, forgot about the fire, and ran into the corridor on the other side.

When he came down the stairs, Qi Leren took another look at the oil painting. This time, this oil painting didn’t show any abnormality and just quietly hung there, accepting his eyes.

“Bong-bong-” came two bells, and Qi Leren just stood in front of the big clock and watched the time reach two in the morning.

The light was dispelled by darkness with the bell, becoming dim. When the bell stopped, Qi Leren had returned to the darkness, and there was an old smell in his nasal cavity. He turned on the flashlight and the light shone on the big clock, just at two o'clock.

It seems that he will switch between the outer world and the inner world every hour. Now it was the outer world.

The light of the flashlight moved upwards, and the portrait had been burnt down, and only the copper frame could be seen hanging on the wall alone.

So are we going to the second floor or the first floor now? Qi Leren hesitated and went back to the second floor. He suspected that the doors that could not be opened might be opened after returning to the outer world.

Stepping on the creaking wooden boards, Qi Leren was a little worried, for fear that the wooden floor would break if he was careless. If there was no cement interlayer under it, he would fall directly to the first floor. Fortunately, the floor is still giving face, although the sound was creepy, but the firmness was not comforting. Standing in front of the wooden door, Qi Leren twisted the door handle, but the door was still locked. He kicked the unyielding door, and the wooden door banged with the impact - it did not move.

Qi Leren didn’t know whether he should despair for his own strength or their game settings.

He gave up and returned to the semi-open room with the piano. Unlike the inner world, everything was covered with dust, old and decayed. There was no bright moonlight outside the window of the outer world. Instead, rain was pattering against the ground, and from time to time a burst of lightning lit up. Then there was a dull sound of thunder from far and near, creating a gloomy and foreboding atmosphere. Even a person like Qi Leren who had a good psychological state felt unnerved.

The flashlight shone on the piano cover, and there seemed to be something there.

Qi Leren stepped forward and took a closer look. It was a dog collar made of metal. He held a dagger in his right hand, so he had to put down the flashlight in his left to pick up the collar. There were flower reliefs and a string of words on it. The system automatically translated it: To my favorite Redmond.

“Redmond?” Qi Leren murmured the name in a low voice, and his mind drew a picture of the big dog held by the lady. He forgot whether there was a collar around the dog’s neck, but it probably belonged to that dog.

[Rain-Day Laundry: At present, the remaining sensing times are 1/3.]

Qi Leren immediately took a step back and turned to stare at the door, but the flashlight on the piano was turned toward himself. He was so shaken that he couldn’t see what was in the corridor outside the door.

In the darkness of the corridor ahead, there seemed to be the sound of a whimper, and it was like a beast snoring and groaning, which was particularly strange in this horrible castle.

Had the wolf gotten inside? Or…

The hair on Qi Leren’s neck began to stand up. He realized that there must be something there… He retreated slowly and cautiously, because the light source of the flashlight was facing his eyes, which was too bright and harsh. It was like he was standing on a stage with a spotlight on him. The audience hidden in the dark looked at him with various eyes, but they were not kind eyes.

“Crunch-” A wooden board on the floor that had become loosened after the fire was trampled under Qi Leren’s feet, and there was a creak of protest.

[Rain-Day Laundry: At present, the remaining sensing times are 0/3, and the cooling countdown is 23:59:59.]

Qi Leren’s pupils shrink with a jerk. Danger, danger ahead! The primary fighting skills caused Qi Leren to roll forward without thinking, and at the next moment came the sound of a beast pouncing behind him. Something landed where he had stood just now!

Qi Leren crouched on the ground. This time, he avoided the harsh flashlight light source. He could finally see the place illuminated by the flashlight - a hound was standing there, looking as if it had just crawled out of the magma of hell, and slowly turned to look at him. All of its fur had been burned, and its blackened and bloody body was particularly horrible in the light. It growled in a low voice with twisted teeth, and its teeth dripped with viscous reddish liquid.

Dog collar, Redmond?

Qi Leren immediately remembered the collar he had just found on the piano and the dog in the portrait. Was this dog…

Even it was burned to death?

The hound’s throat purred like broken bellows. The back of Qi Leren’s neck was aching again. He gritted his teeth and tried to restrain himself from losing his mind. He would rather ride it out. Although the S/L skill was still cooling, Dr. Lu is here, so long as he wasn’t seriously injured, he could be healed.

But before that… Qi Leren took out “Lovely Rations” as quietly as possible and threw a piece of it passed the dog.

It moved! The hound lowered itself, ignored the rations, and swooped down with a jerk. The rations had no appeal to this creature that was no longer a living thing! Qi Leren jumped aside quickly, rolling and crawling to avoid the hound’s attack, and the wooden board under his feet was overwhelmed and broke, and one of his feet became stuck in the floor.

Qi Leren looked at the ground carefully while he still could. The ground of this semi-open room was not solid, and there was no cement interlayer under the wooden boards, which were fragile from having been burned in the fire. He moved his left foot in disbelief, which was stuck in the wooden boards, and there was no contact with any sort of crawl space under it. There was only the first floor!

The hound growled and rushed at him excitedly. Qi Leren, whose left foot was stuck and could not move, was about to die. With a cry catching in his throat, he used his quick wits to stamp down with his right foot, and his whole person sand down - his right foot had stamped through the decaying wood, and the fragile floor under his feet let out a huge crack. A small piece of flooring centered on him collapsed, and he fell.