# Chapter 163: Smiling Puppet
A "Temporarily Closed" sign was hung outside the restaurant. He went around to the side, pried the door open, and entered. Originally planning to go straight up to the third floor, he unexpectedly saw the puppet again on the first floor.
It was still the same one from yesterday, though its burned parts and the body sections that had been replaced with edge-piece components had all been swapped out for new round wooden blocks, with only the joints bearing traces of damage.
It was mopping the floor.
Xu Huo walked to the doorway and set down the things in his hands. The puppet immediately twisted its head around to "look" at him, its two slanted mouth lines pulling downward again. Then, without moving its head, it rotated its body one hundred and eighty degrees and charged at him, swinging the mop!
Xu Huo casually flicked out an extendable rod. The tip carried an electric current as it pushed the puppet back, then he dumped a sack of adhesive patches onto the floor. When the tech-enhanced adhesive patches hit the ground, the side not touching the floor automatically curled open, and one of them happened to catch one of the puppet's feet.
The puppet, more agile than a living person, slipped on the patch, crashed heavily to the ground, and its body parts scattered before sticking to several more adhesive patches!
The puppet, lacking the ability to think, didn't know to avoid things on the floor. As it struggled to get up, it tried to pull its wooden pieces back together, but the patch stuck to its foot slid frictionlessly sideways under pressure, causing it to fall apart into several segments again the moment it stood up.
Taking advantage of the gap before its body could reassemble, Xu Huo tossed a sticky net over it. The large net automatically contracted upon covering the puppet, trapping most of its body inside.
"Clack clack clack!" One wooden leg and one wooden hand were still frantically crawling back. The puppet toppled sideways, and upon realizing it couldn't shake off the adhesive patches on its body, two rows of metal blades suddenly jutted out from its torso. It rolled on the spot and actually sliced two gaping holes in the net!
Xu Huo pressed the remote control without changing expression. The mucus on the net's knots burst open, splattering like glue all over the puppet.
The puppet was oblivious to the mucus. It rolled around on the ground a couple of times—the net was cut open, but its own body was now a sticky mess. The leg and hand that had crawled over later were all stuck to its back, and it ended up curled face-down, looking like a pile of wooden tubes.
Despite this, it still glared at Xu Huo with an angry expression.
Xu Huo stepped closer. Just as he pulled out the extendable rod, the puppet's two slanted mouth lines suddenly shifted sideways, and a tiny black shadow shot out from the small hole revealed in the middle!
He reflexively swung the rod to knock it away. When the thing bounced off the wall and fell to the floor, he saw it was a black insect, somewhat resembling a wingless dragonfly. But upon landing, its body instantly turned into liquid, melting a hole the size of an egg in the ground in the blink of an eye!
His brow furrowed. Xu Huo took out a bottle of mucus and shoved it into the puppet's mouth, pouring the whole bottle in. The puppet gulped down a couple of swallows before its "mouth" fused with the bottle.
Even so, it showed no sign of stopping its attack. However, with its body all stuck together and a bottle clamped in its mouth, the way it kept smashing its head against the floor looked somewhat ridiculous.
Xu Huo reached out and straightened its two downward-slanting mouth lines. The puppet, which had been "twitching" moments before, immediately calmed down. At the same time, he received a game notification:
[Smiling Puppet: A puppet with a troubled fate.]
[Originally created as a cleaning puppet, it was also equipped with some guest reception and defense functions. When it smiles, it means the owner welcomes the guests entering the castle. When it is angry, it means the owner wishes to see the guests out. As one of the countless puppets in the castle, it devoted itself wholeheartedly to its duties.]
[However, being the lowest-grade puppet, it attracted no attention—and so it was stolen.]
[The one who stole it imprisoned it in different places, forcing it to do things it didn't want to do. Though its new owner is dead, it still cannot leave this place. The only thing it can do is reminisce about its original owner while cleaning.]
[If a kind-hearted person can send it home, the castle's owner will offer a generous reward. All you need to do is turn its mouth upward.]
Xu Huo's expression darkened slightly after reading the puppet's description.
As an item, this puppet's backstory was a bit too detailed. But it also confirmed one of his suspicions—the Bear Claw Restaurant had no owner.
Ignoring the puppet on the floor, he turned and headed upstairs.
The traces and bloodstains on the second floor of the restaurant had been cleaned up, and the guests on the third floor and above had also been cleared out. He went straight to the room where the girl in the white dress had stayed last night.
The scene here was completely different from what he had seen last night.
When he had opened the door yesterday, this had been a normal hotel room, not much different from the one he was staying in. But now, where the bed had been stood a large wooden cabinet, the wine cabinet and sofa had been replaced by a big desk, and the decorations on all four walls had been swapped for bookshelves.
This was not a bedroom—it was a study.
Moving the wooden cabinet aside revealed another staircase underneath. Sensor lights illuminated the path leading to a secret room, and a stench of decay rushed out.
In the center of the secret room lay a highly decomposed corpse.
The face was unrecognizable, but the head was separated from the body, and the hands and feet had also been severed, arranged separately as if part of some ritual. Dried bloodstains covered most of the floor, a testament to the gruesome manner of death.
Beside it was an overturned table. Among the scattered books was a list. Xu Huo picked it up and saw that from top to bottom, only the last two names had not been crossed out in red pen.
It matched the list Sun Jirou had mentioned—only two names remained. On the back of the list were contact methods for several shops.
They had indeed been killing according to the same list.
Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed a bit of white fur peeking out from behind a nearby bookshelf. He moved the shelf aside—it was a dead cat. Judging by its state of decomposition, it was about the same as the corpse.
The Bear Claw Restaurant didn't keep cats.
He pulled out the collar from the cat's body. On the bell hanging from it, a very small jade token pattern was engraved on the back.
"The same pattern." Not the drawing the girl in the white dress had given him, but the emblem of that mysterious organization from the internet.
Xu Huo gripped the bell and searched the secret room. Soon, in a hidden drawer beneath the table, he found a metal plate. Its pattern matched the one on the drawing.
Running his fingers over the metal plate, Xu Huo glanced at the hidden drawer, then at the rotting corpse on the floor. He put the metal plate away, picked up the cat's body, and walked out of the secret room.
The puppet downstairs lay quietly on the floor, showing no reaction to his return.
Xu Huo poured cleaning solution on the ground, dissolving some of the mucus before picking the puppet up and putting it into a cage. He placed the cat inside as well, covered the cage with a light-blocking cloth, and carried it out of the Bear Claw Restaurant.
Back at the engraving shop from earlier, less than an hour had passed. The craftsman didn't look up, simply tossing him a metal plate. "The thing you wanted."
Xu Huo took the plate and suddenly smiled. "How did you know it wasn't made of jade?"