Chapter 1024: Special Magnetic Field
Seeing that he had stopped talking, Xu Huo withdrew his gaze and said to the others, "Pick one person every hour to go upstairs with me for an inspection."
"Could it be that if you don't follow the instructions on the note, there won't be a next note?" the Glasses-wearing Man spoke up again.
Xu Huo glanced at him. "Since the clearance method has been proven to be a 'look at the picture, find the book' game, the possibility you mentioned goes against the direction of clearing the instance and most likely doesn't exist. Besides, this isn't a particularly difficult instance. If you're careful enough, you'll notice that the pictures and the book contents correspond."
In fact, the information needed to clear the instance was almost laid out in plain sight. It just depended on whether the players were meticulous enough.
But as the Glasses-wearing Man had said earlier, if they tried every possible clearance method and failed, someone would eventually turn their attention to the items in the villa. The question was how many people would still be alive by then, or whether the instance time limit would have run out.
No one refuted his statement. Although they had been completely lost earlier, judging by the results, this instance was indeed very simple. They had never done such an easy instance—just matching pictures to books.
"Then does the instance name have any other meaning?" Ding Xiang couldn't help but ask. "Clearing it is one thing, but if you want a high rating, you should figure out what 'The Last One' refers to, right? It can't just be the last note exchanged, can it?"
The others turned to look at him as well, but Xu Huo raised an eyebrow. "What's that got to do with me?"
The group froze.
"Haha!" Chi Minghong slapped his thigh and laughed. "We're just hitching a ride to clear the instance, so don't overthink it. Better rely on ourselves. Think hard—maybe we can figure out what 'The Last One' really means before we find the notes."
"Still, there's something I find strange," Zhou Yuanzhu said. "Why are all the pictures on the notes circled?"
"That might be related to 'The Last One,'" the Local Zone Player said. "In this 'look at the picture, find the book' game, the pictures might have a fixed number or correspond to something specific, hence the circles."
"How long has Snow White's Villa been an instance site?" Liang Zong asked.
"I'm not sure about that," the Local Zone Player replied. "When I looked up information, I didn't find any records about this place being an instance. The villa hasn't been abandoned for long, and government staff even came to inspect it. At least a year ago, it definitely wasn't an instance site."
"Then that doesn't add up," the Lip Piercing Player interjected. "Many of the circle patterns in the rooms were covered up, and the place was still being rented out afterward. That means there were already a lot of strange deaths happening while it was still available for rent."
"Snow White's Villa did have quite a few tenants die," Chi Minghong thought for a moment. "Online, people said it was a paranormal event. The government also investigated, claiming there was a special magnetic field here. As for the tenants' deaths, most people said it was the work of players."
That made perfect sense. Compared to other places in Snow City, Snow White's Villa was remote and inconvenient to reach. Most people living there were either poor or didn't need much social interaction. It wouldn't be unusual for a few players to target the place.
But the pictures on the instance notes matching the traces in the villa gave it a different meaning. Perhaps matching the notes to the books could clear the instance, but to get a high rating, they would need to put effort into other aspects.
"How about we go check those rooms again?" Zhou Yuanzhu suggested.
The other players had the same idea and looked to Xu Huo for his opinion.
Xu Huo had no objections and calmly followed behind them.
The creation of an instance involved multiple factors. Based on the clearance method just now, the instance's origin seemed positive—a simple game suitable for children. But that didn't mean all the elements in the villa were related to the original owner, Jin Li. In his view, if the entire instance was just a children's game built on misleading foundations, it wouldn't have the conditions to exist at all.
So this instance should have another core.
But for instances like the "Seventeenth Hospital" he held, the background and clearance tasks had to be closely tied to the site and the instance itself. Otherwise, the logic of the instance's existence wouldn't hold. If those death circles were the key to the instance, the final clearance should also be related to them. Yet the "look at the picture, find the book" method worked smoothly, meaning the game still played a dominant role. Unless the instance holder had exploited a loophole to lower the difficulty.
Snow White's Villa clearly had no holder.
Could it be related to the special magnetic field here?
The villa itself didn't qualify as an instance site. Did the magnetic field cause it to form into an instance?
Why did Dr. Zhang choose to live here?
He followed the scientific path. The murder methods in the villa, which were full of religious overtones, probably weren't his doing. He wouldn't have lived here just to conduct human experiments.
The gene potion he gave to Luo Changren was likely just a side project. The potion data left in his office included both new and old records. His main focus was still on Dr. Wu and the Perfect Evolution Potion. He had also opened a lab before, which must have been in Snow City and was quite popular. Living here made even less sense.
If he wanted to keep a low profile, he shouldn't have made his lab famous. Since it was famous, choosing Snow White's Villa was even more incongruous.
Therefore, there must be a specific reason that drove him to choose this place.
Xu Huo looked around the villa.
The main structure of the villa was old, lacking the technological feel of other buildings in Snow City. It seemed to deliberately avoid metal materials. The walls were mostly made of stone, with no gaps inside. Some of the partitions were likely added by later tenants. The whole building looked like an ordinary old house.
The only thing worth mentioning was the special magnetic field environment here.
It seemed the magnetic field was the key.
The "Seventeenth Hospital" was also born because the original hospital was a spiritually polluted site with a unique spatial existence. Snow White's Villa should meet the same condition.
A slight difference was that if someone had been conducting evil rituals here, that would be more likely to become the instance's content than a children's game—perhaps this instance had already been born long ago, just not triggered frequently.
This would also explain why the villa's tenants couldn't stay for more than three years. As for the circles on the walls, they might have been made by other players who came here.
"Maybe she just drew them casually?" Chi Minghong was talking to the others. "Coincidence is possible too."
"Coincidence in an instance? Do you believe that?" Ding Xiang retorted.
Chi Minghong's logic was simple: "This is a game for kids. Are you trying to find logic in a child's mind?"
Xu Huo thought that made sense. Children's thinking was unpredictable. Who would have thought that a child who liked drawing dead characters would grow up to create warm, healing children's picture books?
But the reason Dr. Zhang chose this place was worth digging into.
Without waiting for the other players to finish checking the rooms, he said, "I'm going to take a look on the first floor."
(Chapter End)