Deceitful Game

It turns out it was a title effect...

Only then did Chen Bingwen finally breathe a sigh of relief.

It seems to be some kind of title ability that can conceal one's identity.

He thought it was the transfer student who led them into a dead end... or some NPC who had to be voted out, or who absolutely could not be voted out.

Now that we can confirm that this is also a player, things become much simpler.

At that moment, the girl suddenly turned to Mingpo and asked, "Have you seen that transfer student? The one who calls herself Zhang Leyao!"

"We saw her too."

Mingpo nodded and calmly replied, "She's clearly connected to this incident, otherwise everyone wouldn't have been able to run into her. Now we need to consider a few things: First, is she the 'protagonist' whose desk was vandalized? What role did she play in this incident?"

"Secondly, it was just cheating on an exam, how could it cause such a big fuss? Even if it was a group cheating, it couldn't possibly lead to ghost stories. What happened afterward?"

"Third, what's the deal with that security guard? And what's the situation with that little girl?"

"These are all questions we need to figure out."

Mingpo said, looking at the [Lucky Survivor]: "There's one more question, Xiaofan—"

"If our previous experiences were the same, then we don't really have any information to exchange. So, after reaching the dead end, before entering this place... did you see any hallucinations?"

coming!

Upon hearing this, Chen Bingwen immediately perked up.

But the "lucky survivor" gave him an answer he absolutely did not want to hear.

"I was in what appeared to be a faculty office."

Gao Fan analyzed carefully: "I saw the teachers arguing fiercely about something... They were like huge shadows, untouchable. They also looked panicked. I blocked their line of sight with the table, avoiding all the people passing by and their line of sight, and finally escaped."

"I overheard their conversation and roughly understood the situation..."

"It seems to be Class 13 of the second year of high school. There was an unprecedented mass cheating incident since the school was founded. Everyone in the class participated in cheating, and it's very likely that it happened more than once. Only Yao Yao was clean."

"So I think...maybe it was transfer student Zhang Leyao who exposed this cheating."

He looked at Mingpo uncertainly as he spoke, "What do you think, Brother Xiao?"

"I found another piece of information. Piecing it together with yours... the truth becomes very clear."

Mingbo shook her head slightly: "I was in a girl's bedroom, and there was a laptop with a power-on password in front of me."

"I searched the room and found a small safe. But I couldn't find a possible combination."

"I tried entering the password a few times and luckily opened the safe."

"The password is 2048, which is the classroom door number that 'Zhang Leyao' mentioned earlier. Because there is a map in the office, I noticed that the teaching building only has four floors, and not only does each floor not have 48 classrooms, but the classrooms also do not have door numbers—the signs hanging on the classroom doors only show the class."

"Inside the safe, I found Zhang Leyao's medical records, her leave of absence certificate, and a USB drive. She suffers from severe depression and had been bullied at another school, forcing her to take a year off..."

Mingper recounted his experiences.

At that moment, Mingpo opened the safe and made a sound of doubt.

"Hmm... what's this?"

Because Mingpo happens to have that USB drive too.

That was a limited-edition item included with the first edition of The Legend of Sword and Fairy 5.

It looks like an ancient sword, handcrafted from pure copper, and engraved with the "Chinese Paladin 5" design.

That was around 2011.

Mingper remembers that there was a mark on the desk that read "November 11, 2011".

This indicates that the cheating incident occurred at least after November 2011, but not too late.

Mingpo tried to unlock the computer with all sorts of passwords.

He cracked the code on only the fourth try, using various seemingly "clues" as clues.

—The password is "yaoyao".

This is not because Mingpo was lucky.

Because the designers of this instance did a really good job of guiding players.

From the very beginning, the JumpScare of the ghostly little girl slapping her bloody handprints, which hinted at the details of the only leaky glass, it was clear to Mingbo that the person who designed this dungeon was most likely a game designer in his lifetime.

He has a very clear design concept, so most of the information he provides should be useful.

In other words, he only needs to look for the "most jarring things" to find clues.

The thinking of a smart person is actually easier to predict than that of a fool.

This is why Mingpo attacked the security guard.

This was not intended to display violence or intimidate Chen Bingwen... Of course, that was probably part of the reason.

But the real reason was that when Mingpo saw the second security guard, he realized that this security guard was actually a "one-of-a-kind" boss that everyone had to defeat.

If everyone's encounters involve the same security guard, then there must be a deeper meaning. Either this security guard is deeply involved in the incident, or he possesses some important tool.

Since Mingpo's security guard had been locked in the classroom, he could only use Chen Bingwen's security guard for the experiment.

The security guard was covered in blood, his limbs twisted, with only one protruding eyeball remaining. Sure enough, after that white, jade-like eyeball was gouged out, he immediately vanished.

This further solidified Mingpo's speculation—

All intelligence must have its purpose.

Since Zhang Leyao's personal belongings were in this safe, it's very likely that this computer also belongs to her.

Mingpo entered three passwords: "111111", "zhangleyao", and "leyao"... It opened when she got to the fourth one.

There wasn't even a five-times cooldown period!

After turning on the computer, Mingpo didn't find any useful information, so she simply plugged in the USB drive.

The laptop is difficult to use without a mouse.

However, Mingpu still found some very important information on the USB drive.

Mingpo said to the other three, "The files on that USB drive are a mess. But there are only three files whose modification date is after November 11, 2011."

"One is Zhang Leyao's personal profile... This is probably to make players who are unaware that 'this is her stuff' realize this."

"One is her diary. I won't recite the contents of the diary for you... The most important part is that she was framed by the whole class."

"And the third one..."

At this point, Mingper paused: "It's a PDF file... called 'Simple Black Magic.' The content on it was recently created, not one of those PDF files that's been around for a long time."

"And her last reading record automatically jumped to a ritual."

"It was a ritual of self-sacrifice, summoning demons, and seeking revenge."

Mingpo then looked at Chen Bingwen and said, "It seems that everyone is seeing different information. Perhaps piecing together the information from each of the four players' accounts is the only way to piece together the truth of this incident and find the real mastermind."

"You two, tell me too... what did you see at the time?"

...Should I say it too?

Upon hearing this, Chen Bingwen's heart stopped.

He can't say what he saw!