Global Collapse

Chapter 427 Abstract Artists
The terrifying female ghost hovered behind the fortune teller.

The fortune teller glanced at the female ghost, then turned back to stare nervously at the referee in front of him, wondering when the man with the whistle in his mouth would disappear.

Meanwhile, the moon had already run off quickly, and the diviner could no longer see her.

Dangerous times always seem to drag on endlessly.

The fortune teller stared intently at the referee before her. She wasn't sure when she could continue running forward, and the syrup Gu Mian had given her could only stop the ghost for half a minute. She could even hear an invisible clock ticking in her mind, constantly reminding her that time was passing.

Fortunately, the referee didn't last long. A few seconds after Mingyue's figure disappeared, the fortune teller saw the figure of the man in the black short-sleeved shirt in front of her begin to become transparent. Then she found that she could continue to move forward.

Without hesitation, the fortune teller quickly ran forward like a madman.

Meanwhile, the fat man, who was no longer being chased by the ghost, had already reunited with Chu Changge.

The two were sitting in a taxi, heading towards the staff dormitory where Gu Mian and the fat man lived.

The fat man, sitting in the back seat, looked at Chu Changge beside him with some confusion: "Brother Chu, why are we going to our staff dormitory? Aren't we going to meet up with the doctors and the others now?"

“It wouldn’t make much difference for Gu Mian even if we went there, but there might be some clues in your staff dormitory…” Chu Changge said, glancing at the driver ahead, seemingly considering whether talking about ghosts directly would make him seem like a lunatic.

Although the fat man felt that going to the staff dormitory was pointless, he still obediently followed Chu Changge to the dormitory building.

"Did you bring your keys?" Chu Changge stepped into the dark stairwell.

The fat guy behind him nodded: "I brought it, but there should be people in the dorm now."

“Actually, I have a guess,” Chu Changge said as he went up the stairs. “The ghost in this instance is constantly moving, trying to escape the instance’s control. So, the ghost won’t kill people easily when the players are not in the instance, because it is not sure if it has successfully hidden its identity with the help of the corpse. If it has really hidden its identity, killing people is likely to expose it, and all its previous efforts will be in vain.”

The fat man had already arrived at the door and was taking out a key: "So, ghosts don't kill people outside of dungeons. They just wander around wearing a corpse. Then, when they find that the dungeon has teleported players to their vicinity, they know that they failed to hide last time, so they start killing people to find a body they can control?"

The fat man inserted the key into the lock and turned it to open the door.

The door was pushed open a crack, and the room was quite dark as the lights were off.

The person inside seems to be asleep...

Just as the fat man opened his mouth to say something, he suddenly smelled a faint stench.

The smell wafted out from the crack in front of me; it smelled like the stench of some rotting animal.

The fat man held his breath. Was it a rotting corpse?

Chu Changge, however, seemed oblivious to the smell. With a calm expression, he pushed open the door, touched the wall, and with a "snap," turned on the dormitory chandelier.

The four beds in the room were empty.

Only a pale arm protruded from under the bed, as if the murderer who hid the body forgot to tuck the hand under the bed.

It seems the odor is coming from here.

The fat man swallowed hard and followed Chu Changge over, squatting down. After mentally preparing himself, he reached out and lifted the bed sheet. A stench hit him. The fat man squinted and looked inside, only to see a man lying under the bed. Although he was good-looking, he was just a not-so-bad-looking corpse.

"It's Liu Jie!" The fat man recognized the man instantly. "The doctor's colleague who sold his body, he was still alive this morning, how come he smells so bad?"

At this point, he suddenly realized something: "Actually, Liu Jie died a long time ago, and it's a ghost using his corpse?"

Chu Changge nodded: "Some customers in the coffee shop said that Gu Mian and her colleagues would not easily give their contact information to customers, but two of Gu Mian's business cards were found at the residence of the deceased Wang Xin. That can only mean that someone took Gu Mian's business card and deliberately put it in the deceased's hand."

The most likely person to take Gu Mian's business card is his roommate.

“Having survived for so long under Liu Jie’s identity, he must have left some clues,” Chu Changge said, standing up and looking at Liu Jie’s bed. “Perhaps he recorded what he knew in some form, although the possibility is not very high.”

The fat man understood: "So we're here to find clues."

He moved quickly, and before Chu Changge could give any instructions, he began to search the corpse in front of him: "Important things are of course carried with you... but he doesn't seem to have anything on him." At this point, the fat man stood up again and searched the bed in front of him: "If I were to hide something, I'd hide it under the mattress or in the pillow. I used to hide my allowance there, although my dad still found out and gave me a good beating..."

At this moment, Chu Changge stood in front of a locked cabinet: "This should be the cabinet that Liu Jie uses."

The fat man, having found nothing, turned around and saw a small, bright yellow lock hanging on the cabinet, the kind you can buy for five yuan at a convenience store.

The fat man had done this kind of lock picking many times before. He immediately started fiddling with the five-yuan lock, and after a short while, the lock clicked open.

The two opened the cabinet.

There weren't many things in the closet, just a few pieces of clothing stacked there as a symbolic gesture.

Chu Changge reached out and lifted the clothes, finding an A4 sheet of paper at the very bottom of the stack.

"What is this?" The fat man looked at the thing Chu Changge pulled out with a puzzled expression. Of course, he recognized A4 paper.

However, this piece of paper was covered with writing in black ballpoint pen.

Upon closer inspection, it appears that what's on it isn't text, but rather a drawing.

The entire sheet of paper was filled with a strange little shape—a circle, with a large "大" (big) below it.

"Are they little figures?" The fat man immediately recognized the drawings that filled the entire sheet of paper. "This guy has nothing better to do than draw little figures and then, like a lunatic, hides them in his cabinet?"

The entire sheet of paper was covered with tiny figures.

Despite the extremely rudimentary lines, the fat man still felt a chill run down his spine looking at the densely packed little figures.

What does this have to do with dungeons?

At this moment, Chu Changge looked at the fat man: "This thing can't be taken out of the instance. Where's your camera? Take a picture of it."

He was referring to the fat man's special item, a "strange camera," which could capture images of invisible ghosts, but could only be used once a day.

Of course, you can also use it to take selfies or landscape photos, so the fat man took out his own camera and turned it on.

The first photo in the album was Gu Mian's handsome face, with a ghostly face jumping out of the window behind him. It was the assassin's face, but it had been neatly placed on Gu Mian's bedside table not long ago, and would never be seen again.

The fat man raised his camera and snapped a picture of the paper in Chu Changge's hand. Of course, nothing out of the ordinary happened; everything in the photo appeared normal.

He looked at the camera screen: "He really is a master of abstract art..."

At this moment, the fortune teller, who was running wildly in the dark, saw the shopping mall ahead. She was overjoyed and tried her best to run forward.

The fortune teller, whose speed had doubled, had caught up with Mingyue. The two were now almost side by side. Although the ghost behind them was delayed by half a minute, it eventually caught up and was less than three meters away from them.

The fortune teller was about 100 meters away from the mall entrance, and there was no way he could get there before being caught by the ghost.

By this time, Mingyue's strength was almost completely exhausted. She was still trying her best to run forward, but she didn't know when she could stop, and she felt somewhat desperate.

The fortune teller has a clear goal: the business world ahead. Therefore, their steps are much more powerful.

Panting, Mingyue looked at the person next to her, somewhat surprised by her boundless energy: "If this continues, we'll definitely be caught by the ghost. We should split up and run now; it's better for one to die than two."

The fortune teller didn't even turn his head: "That's not what you said when you stopped me earlier."

She spoke as she ran forward quickly.

Mingyue suddenly grabbed the fortune teller's clothes: "Wait for me."

Thank you to the leader of the alliance, Qinglaifeng.

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(End of this chapter)