Chapter 1: The Empty Room
An old tungsten lightbulb hung from a black wire in the center of the room, flickering with a dim, murky glow.
A tranquil atmosphere, like ink dripping into clear water, was spreading and diffusing through the room.
In the very center of the room stood a large round table, looking battered and worn. On the table sat a small mantel clock with intricate patterns, ticking away.
Seated around the table were ten people of varying appearances, their clothes somewhat shabby, their faces stained with dust.
Some were slumped over the table, others leaned back in their chairs, all fast asleep.
Standing silently beside these ten people was a man wearing a goat-head mask and a black suit.
His eyes peered out from the worn goat-head mask, studying the ten individuals with keen interest.
The clock on the table chimed. The minute hand and hour hand both pointed to "twelve."
From somewhere far beyond the room came the low sound of bells.
At the same moment, the ten men and women seated around the round table slowly began to awaken.
As they gradually regained consciousness, they first looked around in confusion, then glanced at each other with bewilderment.
No one seemed to remember how they had come to be here.
"Good morning, the nine of you," the Goat Head spoke first. "I'm delighted to meet you here. You have been sleeping before me for twelve hours."
This man's attire was truly eerie, startling everyone under the dim light.
His mask appeared to be made from a real goat's head, much of its hair yellowed and blackened, matted and tangled together.
Two hollows had been cut out where the goat mask's eyes should be, revealing his shrewd, cunning eyes.
His every move exuded not only the unique musky smell of a goat but also a faint, rotting odor.
A man with tattooed arms froze for a few seconds before finally realizing how unreasonable the situation was. He asked the Goat Head hesitantly, "You... who are you?"
"I believe you all have the same question, so allow me to introduce myself to the nine of you." The Goat Head waved his hands happily, clearly having prepared his answer long ago.
A young man named Qi Xia sat farthest from the Goat Head. He quickly surveyed the room, and after a moment, his expression turned serious.
Strange. This room was far too strange.
There was no door. All four walls were solid.
In other words, the room's walls, ceiling, and floor were all sealed shut, with only a table placed in the center.
So how had they gotten here?
Had they been brought in first, and then the walls were built afterward?
Qi Xia looked around again. The floor, walls, and ceiling all had crisscrossing lines, dividing the surfaces and floor into many large squares.
Another thing that bothered Qi Xia was what the Goat Head had said: "the nine of you."
No matter how you counted, there were ten people sitting around the round table. Including the Goat Head himself, there were eleven people in the room.
What did "the nine of you" mean?
He reached into his pocket and found, as expected, that his phone had already been taken.
"There's no need to introduce yourself to us," a cold female voice said to the Goat Head. "I advise you to stop what you're doing immediately. I suspect you've held us captive for more than twenty-four hours, which constitutes 'unlawful detention.' Every word you say from now on will be recorded and used as incriminating evidence against you."
As she spoke, she rubbed the dust off her arm with distaste, as if she hated being dirty more than being imprisoned.
The cold woman's words did wake everyone up a bit. Whoever this was, daring to kidnap ten people alone had already crossed the line of the law.
"Wait..." A middle-aged man in a white lab coat interrupted everyone's train of thought. He looked slowly at the cold woman and asked, "We just woke up. How do you know we've been imprisoned for 'twenty-four hours'?"
His tone was calm and steady, but it hit the nail on the head.
The cold woman pointed unhurriedly at the clock on the table and replied, "The clock here points to twelve o'clock. But I have a habit of staying up late. The last time I looked at my watch at home, it was already twelve o'clock. That means we've been imprisoned for at least twelve hours."
After speaking, she pointed to the walls around them and continued, "You should have noticed by now: there's no door in this room. That means this person went to a lot of trouble to get us in here. He said we've been asleep for twelve hours, and now the clock is pointing to twelve again, which means at least two full rotations have passed. So I suspect it's been 'more than twenty-four hours.' Any problem with that?"
The man in the white coat listened to her answer, gave her a cold look, and still had doubt in his eyes.
After all, in this environment, this woman was far too calm.
Would a normal person, faced with a kidnapping, calmly say something like that?
At that moment, a sturdy young man in a black T-shirt asked, "Goat Head, why are there ten people here, but you said there are nine?"
The Goat Head remained silent, not answering immediately.
"F*ck your whole family," the tattooed man cursed. "I don't care how many people are here, you bastard..." He braced himself against the table and tried to stand up, only to find his legs weak and useless. He could only continue to point at the Goat Head and say, "I'm warning you, pal, you better wise up. You have no idea how serious the consequences are of messing with me. I will fucking kill you."
At these words, the expressions of the men at the table gradually hardened. At a time like this, they really needed someone to take the lead. If they could subdue the Goat Head together, the situation would still be under control.
But everyone found that their legs were completely powerless, as if they had been injected with something.
So the tattooed man could only threaten the Goat Head with words, shouting and cursing loudly.
Qi Xia didn't speak. He stroked his chin slightly, staring at the clock on the table, lost in thought.
Things didn't seem as simple as he had imagined.
He knew that the Goat Head had said "nine participants." If there were ten people here, it could only mean that one of them was not a participant.
Then who was he?
There were six men and four women sitting in this room. Could one of them be the "kidnapper"?
The Goat Head stopped talking and slowly walked over to Qi Xia, stopping behind a young man.
Everyone followed his gaze and saw that this young man was different from everyone else in the room. His face was also dirty, but it was brimming with a blissful smile.
The Goat Head slowly raised his hand and placed it on the back of the young man's head.
The young man's smile grew even more eerie. He looked at everyone with excitement, as if he already knew what was coming.
There was a dull thud.
The Goat Head slammed the young man's head hard against the table.
A pinkish-white substance, like spilled paint, spread horizontally across the table in an instant. Drops of blood splattered onto everyone's faces.
The young man's skull had been smashed to pieces on the table.
From outside the room, a distant bell tolled again.
Qi Xia was very close to the deceased. He felt some unidentified object stick to his face—warm, sticky.
He considered himself to have strong psychological fortitude, but even he began to tremble.
The woman sitting to the right of the deceased stared blankly for three seconds, then her face contorted and she let out a piercing scream.
That scream shattered everyone's psychological defenses.
To be able to smash the hardest bone of a human skull on a table with his bare hands—was that Goat Head even "human" anymore?
How could his frail body unleash such tremendous power?
The Goat Head spoke slowly, "The reason I prepared ten people was to use one to make the rest of you quiet down."