"Don't give me that nonsense. We're in this mess, all that high-sounding platitudes and motivational platitudes is useless!" Wei Dong wiped his face, his cheeks flushed with a nervous red, staring at Ke Xun.
"Dongzi, calm down." Ke Xun noticed Wei Dong's sudden change in mood and reached out to grab his shoulder, only to be pushed away.
"Alright, I don't need your pity," Wei Dong knew he was emotionally collapsing, that he was speaking without thinking, but he couldn't stop himself. "Don't act like you're so positive and uplifting. Don't you really want to die? Have you never thought about giving up?
"Since your parents… look at the mess you've become! There's not even a decent piece of furniture in the house. You make do with whatever you eat, drink, and sleep. You don't care about money; you think you'll live for today, spend it however you want, and die when you run out. Am I right?
"What were you like before? What are you like now? Don't you have any self-awareness?
"You have no ties, so dying doesn't matter, but I fucking don't want to die!" "I have parents, I have a job, I'm not like you who's seen through the world and doesn't care about anything. I just want to live well, to live an ordinary life like before, I fucking..."
Wei Dong said, his voice nasal, covering his face and burying his head in his knees.
Ke Xun didn't speak, sitting motionless, his gaze fixed on the tattered blanket beneath him.
Mu Yiran didn't speak either; the only sound in the tent was Wei Dong's suppressed, heavy breathing.
This breathing continued for a long time, gradually becoming slow and long, the sound seeming to echo in the air, surrounding his body and even above his head.
Ke Xun grabbed the back of Wei Dong's neck and whispered in his ear, "Dongzi, be quiet." Wei
Dong suddenly stopped, frozen in Ke Xun's palm, not daring to move.
The snow outside the tent turned a ghastly white, and in the sky, which seemed several times lower than during the day, a large, thick, viscous mass slowly slid down to the ground, gradually transforming into eight thick arms, a torso, and a head. Two thick, bent legs landed on the ground and slowly took steps. "
Lie down," Mu Yiran gestured to Ke Xun, casually tucking the purple jasmine in her hand into her bosom.
The tent was cramped, and the three of them lay side by side. Everyone had to turn sideways, and it was incredibly cramped.
After pressing Wei Dong down to lie down, Ke Xun turned around, his back to Wei Dong, and faced Mu Yiran.
Mu Yiran, who was halfway down, paused upon seeing this, then turned around as well, leaving the back of his head for Ke Xun.
But as soon as he settled into his side, the guy behind him scrambled onto him, wrapping his arms around him tightly from behind. Mu Yiran stiffened, reaching out to grab Ke Xun's hand around his waist. With a sudden pull, Ke Xun broke out in a cold sweat from the pain.
"It's cramped, bear with it," Ke Xun whispered in his ear, "Dongzi's about to be squeezed out." "
After a long while, Mu Yiran finally managed to loosen his grip on his wrist.
Suddenly, his eyes caught sight of a few small purple jasmine blossoms peeking out from his arms, and his forehead veins throbbed.
This person was truly the most opportunistic and ruthless person he'd ever met, someone who would seize any opportunity to take advantage of others and climb onto the roof!
The giant shadow slowly walked to the tent where Sha Liu and Li Ziling were, and Qin Ci was the last person to join them. The giant shadow bent down beside their tent to examine it, its eight uncontrolled arms twisting and waving wildly.
After watching for a while, the giant shadow moved its legs and walked towards the tent of the family of three.
After observing for a long time, the giant shadow finally arrived at the tent where Ke Xun and the others were.
The huge black mass rumbled down on the tent roof, its heavy, drawn-out breathing seemingly right next to their ears. Ke Xun heard faint sounds of limbs rubbing together, followed by the scratching of fingernails against the tent skin."
"Did it choose this tent?"
Ke Xun felt Wei Dong's body trembling behind him, but he couldn't help him, nor could he help himself.
Perhaps it was because this was the second painting he had seen, giving him more experience and feeling about death, and making him more resilient and accustomed to fear. Or perhaps it was because Wei Dong's outburst of emotion had touched a raw nerve that Ke Xun had long avoided pondering deeply. Now, facing death, he was suddenly able to confront his truest self.
Ke Xun unexpectedly discovered that he wasn't so afraid of death after all.
However, Wei Dong was wrong; he was complacent and didn't... It was because he had lost the desire to live a good life; he simply had no more attachments or obsessions, and lived more freely and willfully.
He wasn't afraid of death, but he was also willing to try to live.
His faith wasn't in money, or perhaps he had no faith at all, or maybe, following his heart and doing as he pleased was his true faith.
The sound of fingernails scratching at the tent suddenly disappeared.
The giant shadow slowly moved away from overhead, walking towards the tent where Zhou Bin, Zhao Dan, and Ma Zhenhua were.
A shrill scream suddenly rang out, and the giant shadow straightened up, its head touching the sky, its feet firmly planted on the ground, several arms twisting and tangling, all reaching for the person struggling frantically in another hand.
"No—please—let me go—I don't want to die—" Ma Zhenhua's heart-wrenching voice seemed to come from a body ripped open, and in the next instant, the giant shadow's hand gripped his scalp and gently tore it.
Ke Xun closed his eyes; Ma Zhenhua's screams, like those of a wild beast or a vengeful ghost, almost pierced his eardrums.
The screams continued for a while, gradually weakening and disappearing.
That night, no one else died.
Perhaps because he had barely slept the previous night, or perhaps because the circumstances of Ma Zhenhua's death had pushed his nerves to the limit and left him exhausted, Ke Xun actually fell asleep in the latter half of the night. When he opened his eyes, it was already dawn. Mu Yiran was no longer in the tent, and Wei Dong was fast asleep beside him.
Ke Xun got up and crawled out of the tent, seeing Mu Yiran standing there motionless in the morning light, staring at Zhou Bin's tent.
Ke Xun walked over and followed his gaze, seeing a large, bloodied, mangled human figure curled up on the ground not far from that tent.
It was Ma Zhenhua, his skin peeled off while he was still alive.
"What happened?! Wasn't there a sacrifice for protection? Why are people still dying?!" Zhou Bin, who had crawled out of the tent, collapsed to the ground, clutching his head in despair.
Qin Ci turned around and blocked the two girls' view, preventing them from looking in that direction. The Geng family of three hadn't even come out of their tents.
"This time, the method of death is different," Ke Xun said, turning his gaze to Mu Yiran. "It seems these sacrifices aren't working, and the giant shadow's selection of people doesn't seem to have much to do with how many people are in each tent."
"The number of people in the tent is only the first trigger condition for death," Mu Yiran said thoughtfully. "Only when this condition cannot be met will a second condition be used for selection." "
What do you think this second condition might be? Could it be related to the type of sacrifice?" Ke Xun asked, also pondering.
"Maybe," Mu Yiran said.
"I don't know if it's just my imagination," Ke Xun said, "but I feel that the giant shadow last night was bigger than the one the night before."
"Are you sure?" Mu Yiran looked at him.
Ke Xun thought carefully for a moment and nodded, "I'm sure, and I'm absolutely certain it's not because of the distance of the light causing the size difference; it definitely looks bigger and taller than it did the night before last."
Mu Yiran lowered his eyes in thought, and Ke Xun didn't disturb him. He went back to the tent, picked up Wei Dong, and when he came out of the tent again, Ma Zhenhua's blood-soaked corpse had already been covered by Qin Ci with a tattered blanket.
"The skin was peeled off very cleanly and neatly," Qin Ci was speaking softly to Mu Yiran in the large tent, "without a trace of residue, it was peeled off in one piece. I suspect that, like the previous painting, something dictates the different ways we people die."
"Could it be because of the different offerings?" Sha Liu interjected from the side.
"But that doesn't explain why only Ma Zhenhua died last night," Qin Ci said.
"Perhaps it's because Ma Zhenhua didn't prepare the sacrificial offerings himself like we did." Zhou Bin, having recovered from his morning breakdown, was comforting his still terrified girlfriend. "He was in a constant state of panic, cowardly and timid. Yesterday, when we were preparing all the meat, he didn't lift a finger to help; he was just trembling."
"That makes sense," Qin Ci nodded slightly. "It seems that, apart from him, all of us at least tried to find the sacrificial offerings."
"So, if the rest of us personally obtained the sacrificial offerings, no one else will die tonight?" Sha Liu asked.
Qin Ci didn't answer, only lowered his eyes in thought.
Mu Yiran pondered for a moment and said, "The rules of death in this painting are clearly different from the previous one. If the previous painting determined the manner of death by categorization, this painting, I think, might use a system of overall selection based on whether certain conditions are met.
The painting has set death selection conditions here. Once someone meets a certain condition, that person is selected. But if no one meets that condition, the painting will quickly use a second condition to select us.
And so on, the conditions become increasingly stringent, and our chances of avoiding death become lower and lower. This also means that there won't be a situation where no one dies on any given night in this painting."
The people who had experienced the previous painting exchanged knowing glances.
Qin Ci pondered, "So, the selection criterion for the first night is someone alone in a tent, and the selection criterion for the second night is someone who hasn't personally prepared the offering."
"No," Mu Yiran looked at him, "I think these two conditions are cumulative. The condition for the first night is someone alone in a tent. If there are still people alone on the second night, this condition still applies. But if no one is alone, then a second selection criterion will immediately appear, while the first condition still exists. Therefore, the selected people will be either 'people alone' or 'people who haven't personally prepared the offering.' Regardless of which condition is met, they will be selected."
Qin Ci's gaze darkened, "So, these conditions increase and accumulate with each night. On the third night, a new selection criterion will appear, joining the first two conditions for a death selection?"
Everyone was shocked.
What did this mean? It meant that the limit on the number of people in each tent hadn't been removed and remained in place.