Rainy Night Theater (21)

Everyone stepped out of their dormitories and gathered around Fu Liu.

In Fu Liu's hand were three vials of poison. Aside from his own, the other two clearly belonged to the other two Madmen.

All three vials were completely intact, with no signs of having been used.

“Fuck! How did this happen?” The muscular man kicked the wall in frustration, unable to hold back a curse.

“So you're saying that besides the one the little brat used to commit suicide, none of the other poisons have been used? Then where did the poison that killed those two come from? We've been played!”

“It seems a third party really does exist, which means we all need to be honest with each other.” As Fu Yan spoke, he slowly pulled a handgun from his pocket. “I'll lay my cards on the table. I belong to the Citizen faction. I'm the police officer.”

“Trading sincerity for sincerity? Count me in.” Sun Hao leaned against the wall, looking at the gun in Fu Yan's hand with a slight expression of relief. “I'll lay my cards on the table too. I'm a Madman.”

Sun Hao truly felt relieved. He hated losing, but he really couldn't think of any other way to lead the Madmen to victory. Laying their cards on the table and cooperating was actually a good thing.

He paused, glanced at the crowd, and continued, “The remaining Madman won't step forward.”

“After all, we don't know if you guys will change your minds halfway through and decide to just kill us Madmen to end the game.”

“I'm stepping forward to show sincerity, hoping we can work together to find the third party. He's staying hidden as a safety measure, to prevent all of us Madmen from being targeted.”

Fu Yan nodded, raising no objection. “Understandable.”

“Um, I'm not finished yet. Is there a possibility that it's not just the worker and Liu Siwei? Maybe the one who killed Liu Shanxi and Wu Tong wasn't a Madman either, but that same third party outside of our groups?” Bai Ci chimed in.

“This third party has been acting from the shadows, escalating our conflicts just to make us kill each other.”

Regardless of whether the deaths of Liu Shanxi and Wu Tong were actually the work of the third party, for the sake of unity between the Citizen and Madman factions, this blame had to be pinned on them. Even if it was a scapegoat, they had to make it stick.

Hearing this, everyone fell into deep thought.

Bai Ci's words were not without merit. From Wang Er's death, to Liu Shanxi's, and then to Liu Siwei's and Wu Tong's, every single death had intensified the friction among them, sowing mutual suspicion and hostility.

This didn't look like a simple case of internal discord among the Madmen; it felt more like someone was deliberately orchestrating it from behind the scenes.

“Now that the existence of a third party has been confirmed, we can't afford to doubt each other anymore. We must unite, find clues about this third party, and end this game,” Fu Yan concluded, seizing the opportunity.

“My suggestion is that we split into two teams again.” Fu Yan looked at the crowd and said calmly, “One team will consist of me, Zheng Ba, Bai Jiu, and Fu Liu. The other team will be Cheng Xi, Sun Hao, and Qi Lixin.”

“This grouping ensures that both teams have Citizens and Madmen, while also preventing anyone from being left alone. From what we've seen, those who end up alone are the easiest targets for the third party.”

Everyone nodded in agreement with Fu Yan's suggestion.

After the recent deaths, they all understood that acting alone was too dangerous. Only by sticking together could they increase their chances of survival.

Once the teams were decided, they immediately set out to search different areas for clues.

Fu Yan's team chose the right corridor, while the other team went to the left, focusing primarily on searching places they hadn't visited before.

After passing through the kitchen and hospital scenes, Bai Ci's group arrived at the prison scene.

Unlike the other scenes, this place was dark and damp, the air thick with the scent of decay and blood. Rows of empty cells lined up neatly, their iron bars rusted and, in some places, broken.

“Baby, if it were you, where would you hide something in a scene like this?” Bai Ci asked in a conversational tone.

Fu Liu didn't take the question too seriously either. Without much thought, he replied offhandedly, “If I were hiding something, I'd probably put it somewhere no one would want to touch. Like under those skeletons, or that blood-stained patch over there.”

After a bit of idle chatter, the two split up to search.

Beneath a skeleton in the innermost cell, Bai Ci discovered a rusted iron box.

Because the box was so heavily rusted, the gears of the combination lock wouldn't budge at all.

Bai Ci looked at the box, then at a sharp, broken iron bar nearby. She grabbed the box and smashed it against the bar.

Having been a DM for so long, she knew plenty of tricks for breaking props. She had witnessed them firsthand and knew from experience what worked.

Once, twice, three times... After seven or eight strikes, the lock popped open.

Opening the iron box, she found a yellowed booklet inside. It looked very similar to the game record book they had found in the study, but the pages were thinner and the handwriting was much messier.

The noise of Bai Ci smashing the box had already drawn the attention of the other three people in the scene.

The moment the box was opened, everyone gathered around without Bai Ci even needing to call them over.

This booklet was also a game log. Unlike the one in the study, this one recorded the number of deaths, times of death, and causes of death for every single round.

But just like the one in the study, the record for the Ninth Round was burned, leaving behind only a charred, blackened ring.

“Oh, look here.” Bai Ci pointed to a spot in the Tenth Round log. “This black spot shouldn't be an ink stain, right?”

It read: “No. 3, Day 2, executed by ■■■.”

“It's not an ink stain,” Fu Yan said with certainty. “The shape is too neat. This isn't a scribble to cover up a mistake; it's redaction, meant to hide the identity of the executioner.”

“Is that this damn third party?” Even Zheng Ba figured it out instantly, let alone everyone else.

“Yes. And if you look closely, there's a pattern to when these black boxes appear,” Fu Yan prompted further.

He had no intention of testing the NPCs, so after giving his hint, he immediately went on to explain.

“The black boxes only started appearing after the Ninth Round. In every round's record since then, there are always one or two people whose cause of death is listed as a black-box execution.”

“Furthermore, these black-box executions mostly occur during the early stages of the game, with only a few happening in the mid stages.”

“And if you look at the death toll and causes of death before and after the black boxes started appearing, ever since these black-box executions began, the progress of each round has sped up significantly. Games that originally took several phases to end now wrap up in just one or two rounds.”

“In other words, all of the black box's actions can be attributed to a single purpose: accelerating the progress of the game.”