Chapter 676: The Unspeakable
Until evening, Yi Pei stayed here without returning to her own room.
During that time, Xu Huo remained seated by the window, observing the situation outside through a gap in the drawn curtain.
There wasn't much to see outside, really. The hotel sat at the end of a fork in the county road, and a few more steps forward led to bare, flat roads on both sides, with the woods further in the distance.
Across from the main entrance were a few households doing business, and they shut their doors as soon as it got dark.
There was a streetlamp in front of the hotel, with the next one about twenty meters away. Now that night had just fallen, the area between the lamps was already hard to make out clearly, and no one was moving about.
The locals had long since closed their doors one after another, and the players wandering outside had also returned to the hotel.
As the night deepened, fog gradually began to form outside.
Yi Pei sat near the door, and after waiting quietly for two hours, she finally couldn't help but say, "It's almost midnight, isn't it? You probably can't see anything outside now."
Xu Huo shook his head at her, signaling her not to speak.
About three minutes later, someone knocked on his door.
Yi Pei stood up immediately and instinctively looked at Xu Huo. He walked over to the door, stopped her from checking the peephole, and holding the "Silent Figure," asked, "Who is it?"
"It's me." The manager's voice came from outside the door. "I'm here to collect the payment."
Xu Huo stood behind the door and smiled silently. "How do you prove your identity?"
There was a pause outside. "What more do I need to prove? Can't you just look?"
Yi Pei thought it was her turn, so she leaned forward slightly. But before her hand could even touch the peephole cover, Xu Huo suddenly yanked the door open and dragged the manager inside!
The shock on the manager's face instantly turned to terror. Unfortunately, when he looked back, the door had already closed silently, and Yi Pei was standing in front of it, blocking his escape.
"What do you two want?" the manager said, blustering with false courage. "You already caused me trouble during the day. Are you just going to keep at it endlessly?!"
"Relax." Xu Huo didn't seem as impatient as he had during the day. Instead of using force, he let go. "I just want to ask you a few simple questions."
"I don't know anything!" The manager told Yi Pei to get out of the way. "Or else I'll call for help!"
"If I were you, I wouldn't shout." Xu Huo said from behind him. "If other players found out that you're the one knocking on doors at night, you definitely wouldn't survive."
The manager's face twitched, and he tried to play dumb and muddle through, but Yi Pei grabbed him by the back of the neck and shoved him toward the peephole. "In that case, why don't you take a look?"
She made as if to open the peephole, but the manager had already reflexively shut his eyes the moment she pressed him toward it, shouting, "I'm from Si Fang Palace City! I'm protected by the divine! If you dare treat me like this, you will die! And those people from today too! All of you will die!"
"Crack!" Yi Pei snapped his shoulder bone with one hand. After he finished screaming, she said, "Call on the god you worship to save you then."
The manager's face was covered in sweat, trembling like a leaf. But he didn't back down verbally, repeatedly muttering words like "divine" and "punishment."
Xu Huo signaled Yi Pei to let him go, then looked at the man who had collapsed to his knees from weak legs. "The people of Si Fang Palace City are extremely secretive about the god they worship. This probably isn't just a matter of being timid or fearing death."
"You worship a god yourselves, but you don't dare look at it, and you're afraid of mirrors. This god most likely has something to do with eyes."
"You don't have to tell the truth. I'll ask, and you nod or shake your head."
The manager huddled against the door, clutching his arm. "I don't know anything. Don't ask me..."
Xu Huo lifted his head up, stared at his face, and said, "Besides the visiting tourists, quite a few locals of Si Fang Palace City have died too."
"So even without tourists, people still go missing here."
"Whether it's locals or outsiders, everyone becomes a target. Better to have outsiders die than your own people. You trick guests into your homes and hotels just so they can see the divine statue and die in your place, isn't that right!"
The manager's pupils contracted, his face changing colors several times in succession.
Xu Huo sneered at the sight and directly dragged the man into the bathroom, slamming his head—covered by a towel—against the mirror with just enough force to crack the surface without shattering it.
"Stop! Stop!" The manager screamed in panic.
"Is the divine statue behind the mirror?" Xu Huo pressed down harder.
The manager didn't dare open his eyes, begging for mercy nonstop.
Xu Huo's gaze darkened, and he reached to pull the towel away. The manager felt his movement, lifted his eyelids, and then his eyeballs darted wildly. "I'll die, I'll die, I'll die, I'll die...!"
Within a few short seconds, veins bulged on his forehead, bloodshot vessels crawled across his eyeballs, and his gaze went rigid and fixed straight ahead. Then a terrified expression spread across his face, and he suddenly broke free from Xu Huo's grip and charged headfirst into the wall!
Xu Huo naturally wouldn't let him die that easily. He knocked the man unconscious and laid him down.
Though the unconscious manager had blood on his face, he looked more normal than he had moments ago.
Yi Pei couldn't hide her surprise. "Locals aren't allowed to speak the truth about it... No wonder those people couldn't spit out anything useful even when they died at players' hands."
"I didn't expect this god to be so powerful. Now I'm actually a bit curious about what the divine statue looks like."
As she spoke, she actually started walking toward the mirror on her own.
"What are you doing?" Xu Huo quickly slapped her hand away.
Yi Pei paused. "I'm just curious. Besides, don't you also want to know what this so-called god really is?"
"The situation is different now." Xu Huo said in a low voice.
The danger level of the god worshipped in Si Fang Palace City exceeded his expectations.
The guesthouse required travelers to stay in rooms alone. This was actually a form of self-protection for the locals—they were definitely no match for players. If more than one person stayed in a room, there was a chance that one would be afflicted while the other wasn't. As long as someone survived, the locals would never get off easy. But a lone player, even if they disappeared, wouldn't immediately bring trouble to their doorstep.
Of course, this was also a way to avoid the divine statue. Just like the players staying at the hotel, a single person would vanish without a trace after being afflicted, without affecting more people.
The hotel was arranged differently. Besides the peephole, the mirrors and reliefs could potentially afflict several players at once.
It sounded impossible—if "seeing" the divine statue was what triggered the instance's killing condition, then simply "not looking" should suffice. You could close your eyes or avert your gaze. Even in the same room, it shouldn't be too hard to avoid.
But there was a problem here: does simply "closing your eyes" or "averting your gaze" really mean you "don't see" the divine statue?
It wasn't about seeing in the literal sense. Or rather, the statue itself could draw your gaze, and merely being exposed to the same space might satisfy the condition of "seeing." It worked on the same principle as items.
You Jun and Wei Xian were in the same room—the former disappeared while the latter was unharmed. It couldn't be ruled out that Wei Xian had a high-level item, but if there was something in the room that couldn't be seen by two people at once, the only candidate was the peephole.
(End of Chapter)