Players, Please Board the Train

Chapter 346: The First Player to Die

"Screech—!" The iron chain tore through another curtain, gouging a trench in the wall before coiling around a standing cabinet and hurling it at Xu Huo!

"Bang!" Xu Huo raised his sword and cleaved the cabinet in two, saying, "You don't have to kill me. Why don't we sit down and talk?"

The Spider-Man ignored him completely. Another one of its walking legs dragged out a long whip, its movements so fluid it nearly swept across more than half the room.

Despite having the piano wire, the space left for Xu Huo to maneuver was still very small. He dodged the chains that lashed out one after another, flicked open the lighter, and ignited the curtain on the floor!

The Spider-Man seemed to fear the flames, immediately pulling back. Its central torso was now completely suspended in mid-air, with three walking legs protecting its front, while two others hooked the edges of the curtain, folding and tossing the burning fabric out the window.

Unfortunately, its firefighting speed couldn't keep up with the arson. The lighter clicked crisply, and the carpet on the floor also caught fire.

The Spider-Man spun its body, rapidly scaled the wall, and using its jumping advantage, pounced on Xu Huo!

Although the opponent was faster, Xu Huo, relying on the enhanced environmental processing ability from his Super Evolution and his items, could barely manage to hold his own. After dodging the spider leg's attack for the fifth time, he made a flying leap, tore down the remaining half of the massive curtain still hanging, threaded it with the piano wire, and directly threw it over the Spider-Man!

With a sharp "ding," a great fire erupted instantly, illuminating the dark room in a flash, only to be torn to shreds the next moment by the spider legs thrusting upwards.

Xu Huo was prepared. He smashed half his stockpile of alcohol in one go. The flames, following the splashing liquor, expanded in an instant. In that split second, the entire room became a sea of fire!He retreated to the window and looked back, only to see the Spider-Man plunge a pair of walking legs into its own chest. Immediately, the flames in the room extinguished. All the shattered items, including the carpet and the incompletely burned curtains, began to flow backwards as if time were rewinding—the cabinet that had been thrown out and smashed began to re-adhere in mid-air, the overturned sofa and table righted themselves back into position, and even the torn curtains gathered back towards the window!

The speed of the objects' restoration varied. Frowning, Xu Huo retreated onto the balcony. Unexpectedly, the Spider-Man also backed out of the room in this rewinding fashion, climbing upside down onto the roof while maintaining the reverse playback motion.

Xu Huo didn't follow it up. Instead, he swung his sword at the lamp that was in the process of restoring itself.

The lamp, which was almost repaired, had its process interrupted and immediately fell back to the ground, shattering again.

He glanced at the other items nearby, some already restored, some still in the process. It couldn't really be called restoration. The burned curtains couldn't be pieced back together;

they still fell to the ground missing corners and pieces. Those wooden cabinets that seemed restored were merely simple assemblies that would crumble at a touch.

In the time it took for two breaths, a scream pierced the night sky. He quickly pulled open the door and stepped out, just bumping into the Ma couple emerging from their room, propping up a phone.

Mrs. Ma, clinging to Mr. Ma's arm, said with schadenfreude, "Quite a commotion. Are you alright?"

Xu Huo swept a glance at her and headed first towards Fang Min's room—two players were already standing at that door, and other players walked over with them.

"What happened?" Liu Zhengping asked.

The one who had screamed earlier was a young maid. She stammered incoherently, "I went to the bathroom... saw a light on the second floor... and then I saw Miss Fang was in trouble... she was in her room!"

The maid was pointing at Wei Landeng, whose face was sickly pale.

Fleischer and Li Chao had been the ones standing at the door earlier. Now Liu Zhengping, You Qiwen, and Yu Shuai went over. They only needed one glance before their expressions changed.

"Holy shit!" Liu Zhengping instinctively turned his head away.

Xu Huo had already reached the doorway. Lifting his gaze, he took in the general situation inside the room.

Fang Min was dead. Not only dead, but she had died horribly.

There were no lights on in the room;

the illumination all came from the doorway. A beam of light stretched from the door to the large coffee table in the center of the room. Two clean, snow-white lower legs were neatly placed side by side there. The rest of her body was nowhere to be seen. The surrounding area was flooded with blood that hadn't yet congealed and fragments of internal organs. The stark contrast with the clean coffee table created a gruesome impact that was physically nauseating.

"Is that Fang Min?" Mrs. Ma craned her neck to look from behind.

"Someone's there!" Yu Shuai, who was inspecting the room, suddenly shouted. He raised his arm and made a gun-firing gesture towards outside the balcony. A bullet-sized hole silently appeared in the brick wall!

Fleischer was the first to rush onto the balcony. He looked left and right but shook his head. "There's nothing."

"I saw a pair of red eyes just now," Yu Shuai frowned. "I think I hit it."

"Hitting it doesn't necessarily mean it was injured," You Qiwen said after knocking the panicked maid unconscious and placing her in a corner. He stepped forward. "Confirmed it's Fang Min?"

"It's definitely her," Wei Landeng said. "Her calves were particularly beautiful, especially..."

"Symmetrical," Xu Huo finished the sentence.

The players inside and outside the room all looked up at him. Ignoring their gazes, Xu Huo walked straight to the balcony. Wearing the "Peeping Eye," he detected a few dark spots on the exterior wall, likely ash.

The Spider-Man had come to Fang Min's room after leaving his. It was probably also drawn by the maid's scream.

By now, You Qiwen and the others were already questioning Wei Landeng about the circumstances before and after she discovered Fang Min's death.

"I have a habit of staying up late. The power outage was taking too long to be restored, and with the commotion next door, I thought I'd come out and check. I didn't expect Fang Min's door to be ajar. I came in and saw this scene..." Wei Landeng's face showed distress as she averted her gaze. "I was just about to go notify you all when this maid came up silently."

Her explanation was full of holes.

Her reason for leaving her room could be considered plausible for now. But upon seeing the horrific state of Fang Min's room, shouldn't her first instinct have been to find the other players? Why linger in a potentially dangerous place?

The maid walked up behind her silently? Footsteps, the light from a handheld lamp—these would have alerted her. Unless this maid was also a player, but it was obvious to anyone with eyes that she wasn't.

Liu Zhengping asked bluntly, "Did you kill Fang Min?"

"It wasn't me," Wei Landeng's face darkened. "Believe it or not, that's what happened."

"Little girl, I think you'd better tell the truth," Mrs. Ma said with a bland, indifferent tone. "Unless you want to become everyone's enemy."

Fang Min had died too quickly and too brutally. The players couldn't possibly lower their guard against Wei Landeng, who was the most suspicious, and they might even kill her on the spot to eliminate a potential threat.

"She's not the only suspect," Xu Huo, who had already circled the room, spoke up. "From the maid's scream to when Mr. Ma, Mrs. Ma, and I came out of our rooms, there was a five-second interval. You three didn't come from your own rooms. There would have been enough time to kill someone and circle back."

He was referring to Liu Zhengping, You Qiwen, and Yu Shuai.

The others' gazes shifted to the three of them.

"That's right, I wasn't in my room," Yu Shuai spread his hands. "You can't pin this on me just because I went out. I saw a pair of red eyes just now."

"You're the only one who saw them," Fleischer stared at him.