Chapter 0622 – The Strangest Opponent
Chen Ge re-read the message sent by Li Zheng, and the tone and use of punctuation was indeed not quite the same as Li Zheng’s usual.
The text message said that the monster fictionalized by Jia Ming was good at disguise and voice change, which meant that he was able to simulate Li Zheng’s voice, but Chen Ge could only have Li Zheng contact himself by text message because he happened to be inconvenient to answer the phone in the hearse, which should have been something that the other party did not think of before they made the call.
”The one who sent me a text message shouldn’t really be Jia Ming, right?”
The moment this thought appeared it spread like poisonous grass in Chen Ge’s heart, and he broke out in a cold sweat.
His finger hovered over the top of the screen for a long time before Chen Ge sent a message back to Li Zheng: “Don’t worry, I’m staying in New Century Paradise tonight, I’m not going anywhere.”
”En, I’m just informing you that that guy hates you with a passion, and he’s now wanted by us all over the city, so he’ll probably go looking for you. Just stay in Paradise, I’ll arrange for someone to, later on, go squat near Paradise.”
”Tough on you guys.”
”Allowing him to escape was originally our dereliction of duty, there’s nothing to be thankful for, tonight you mustn’t run around, once you leave the New World Paradise, we don’t dare to guarantee your safety.”
”Understood.” After Chen Ge gave an affirmative reply, Li Zheng did not send Chen Ge any more messages, as if the purpose had already been accomplished.
”It always feels weird.” Chen Ge took his cell phone, he couldn’t care less about the feelings of the other passengers, and directly dialed Team Yan’s number, wanting to seek confirmation of what Li Zheng had just said.
Close to the early morning, Team Yan still answered Chen Ge’s call, which could be seen how much he valued Chen Ge.
From Team Yan, Chen Ge learned that Li Zheng had not lied and that Jia Ming had indeed escaped.
Hanging up the phone, Chen Ge still felt that something wasn’t quite right: “Is it possible that the shadow ran away from Jia Ming and attached itself to Li Zheng?”
If that was the case, it would be even more troublesome.
”Jia Ming told a story in the hospital that he saw Shadow and Jiang Long in the middle of the villa, when Jiang Long fell to his knees covered in blood, and Shadow stood next to him with a knife. This scene is very interesting, associating Jiang Long’s neighbor’s dog has just been killed, so is it possible to deduce that the murderer who killed the neighbor’s dog is Jiang Long? A real estate business owner has no reason at all to go and kill the dog, obviously this is forced by The Shadow, he is slowly wearing down Jiang Long’s will. From this it can be seen that if the shadow wants to possess and manipulate, there should be some limitations, the weaker one’s own will is, the easier it is to get it.”
”Li Zheng is a frontline police officer, it’s difficult for the shadow to control him, but it’s not completely impossible.” Li Zheng’s text message gave Chen Ge a wake up call, the shadow had already escaped, he couldn’t trust anyone tonight: “Boo had said that the next time I went to Liwan Town my life would be in danger, now I just entered the eastern suburbs and something happened to Jia Ming who was under police guard, this is too much of a coincidence, isn’t it?”
Chen Ge was about to put away his cell phone when the screen lit up once again, this time it was Fan Cong calling.
”You’re quite busy with business.” The doctor held back a glance, signaling Chen Ge to keep his voice down, making a scene in this place wouldn’t do him any good.
”There’s only a few people in my cell phone communications in total, so who knows what’s going on with them today?” Chen Ge took out his headphones and plugged them in before picking up the phone.
”Boss Chen! The game I got through! I got it! I finally got it!”
”Speak slowly, lower your voice, I can hear you.” Chen Ge lowered his voice, the commotion from his side was indeed a bit loud.
”I used the archive point you left behind to keep trying, and discovered eleven side quests, and these eleven quests corresponded to eleven murder scenes, representing eleven human lives. I used my life to explore, advancing the game’s progress little by little, and finally I got through all eleven branch lines.” Fan Cong’s voice was unusually excited.
”Eleven branch quests?” The number eleven Chen Ge had just seen on Li Zheng’s text message that Jia Ming had told eleven stories to the police in order to deal with the police’s scrutiny.
Many of the scenes in Boo’s game were realistic, as if they had happened in reality.
Chen Ge suspected that the eleven missions that Fan Cong had played through were the eleven real murder cases that Jia Ming had told the police.
”The towns in Boo’s game are modeled after Liwan Town, so it seems that these eleven murders should all be related to Liwan Town.” After pondering for a moment, Chen Ge asked in a low voice, “After completing these eleven side quests, did you get any hints? Or rewards or anything like that?”
”What I’m about to say is exactly this, after completing the eleven branch lines, the computer screen began to bleed, and the original gray and black paintings changed once again, with all the buildings turning blood red. The keyboard and mouse failed at the same time, the game interface lost control of Boo, she stood in the game waving at me outside the screen, literally, at that moment I even felt like she was going to drag and drop me into the middle of the game.”
”Get to the point, what happened after that?”
”She started moving on her own, into the middle of some blood red building, that’s when a line in blood appeared at the bottom of the screen – mom might be here.” Van Cong took a sip of water, he was still not calmed.
”What are the characteristics of that building?” Chen Ge immediately pursued.
”The shape is ordinary, nothing special, but there is a poster of an amusement park plastered on the building’s exterior wall. Boss Chen, this is the most important point I was going to tell you!” Fan Cong took a deep breath, “The amusement park on that poster should be the New Century Paradise, and I found your haunted house on there.”
”You found my haunted house on that poster?” Chen Ge spoke out directly.
”Yeah, I don’t know what this signifies, but I think the person who made this game might know you, and this should be a super egg.” Fan Cong sounded excited.
”Now that the park no longer uses posters for publicity, the exterior decoration of my haunted house hasn’t changed in the past few years, it’s possible that the poster you saw was left behind by my parents.” What Chen Ge said, only he could understand, he really didn’t expect to find clues left behind by his parents in the Boo game.
After rethinking what Fan Cong said one more time, and after all the side quests were played through, Boo entered the middle of a special building, and she left behind a sentence that her mom might be in this building.
Whether or not Boo had found her mom, Chen Ge didn’t know, but he realized that there was a high possibility that his parents had entered that building again.
”Did they leave that clue on purpose, or was this poster a trap designed by the shadow?” Because the shadow’s ability was so special that it could disguise itself as almost anyone, Chen Ge suddenly opened his mouth and spoke to Fan Cong after a short period of thinking, “What brand is your family’s electric car?”
”Ah? Lovebird, what’s wrong?” Fan Cong was on the rise, having stayed up for several days to finally beat the game, and desperately wanted to find someone to share the joy, he simply did not expect Chen Ge to ask such a question, and subconsciously answered.
”It’s fine.” Chen Ge sighed in relief, Fan Cong should not be a shadow impersonator, what he said was the truth: “Did anything happen after Boo entered that red house?”
”I don’t know, the game interface is stuck here, I’ve restarted several times and it’s still like this, I think this should be the pass ending. Boo, who is searching for his mother, steps into the depths of the nightmare, and eventually finds the room where his mother might have stayed in the city infested with homicidal maniacs and severe ghosts, and the game wraps up here, giving people infinite reverie.” Fan Cong had been playing this game continuously for over a month, and he had played it with such emotion that it was as if he had gone through it himself.
”You really treat it as a game? Just keep an honest eye on the computer tonight, and if anything unusual happens, call me immediately.” Chen Ge felt like a lot of things were crammed together, and he was forced to keep moving forward, “You stay safe, something big might happen in Liwan Town tonight, don’t leave your house no matter what.”
Chen Ge looked at the weird and scary passengers on bus 104, all these “people” were going to enter Liwan in the end.
”Don’t worry, I’ll guard Boo today and report to you as soon as there’s a situation.” Just as Fan Cong finished his sentence, a knock came from the microphone, “Boss Chen, someone on your side is knocking on the door?”
”I’m outside, there are no room doors around, the sound is coming from your side.” Chen Ge narrowed his eyes, “Don’t go over there, and don’t hang up.”
”It’s the sound from my side, but it sounds like it’s coming from your side to me?” Fan Cong’s voice was no longer excited and carried a few moments of doubt and uncertainty.
The knocking on the phone became clearer, Chen Ge held his breath in order to hear it a little more clearly, Fan Cong also held his breath, he was completely shocked.
”Don’t mess with me, I’m a good guy.” The sound of a chair being pushed came from the other side of the phone, Fan Cong seemed to hide on the bed, but his doing so had no effect on the knocking at all.
Chen Ge heard very clearly, that knocking sound at the very beginning should have been the living room door, and slowly turned into knocking on the bedroom door, as if something had come into his house, and that thing was slowly approaching.
”Don’t panic! You open the video and point the camera at the room door, I’ll watch it for you.” Chen Ge was also anxious in his heart, he hadn’t arrived in Liwan Town yet, so he couldn’t help Fan Cong even if he wanted to.
”Okay, okay.” Fan Cong’s voice stuttered a little as he fiddled with his cell phone, that knocking sound was getting louder and louder, and before he could turn on the camera, Fan Cong’s screams suddenly came out from the other side of the phone, “Brother! Help me! The house! He’s coming in!”
The scream was followed by a struggle, and the cabinets and chairs seemed to have been overturned.
The knocking on the door also became more and more urgent, until after ten seconds or so, the knocking suddenly disappeared, and the other side of the phone was frighteningly quiet.
”Fan Cong?”
Chen Ge inquired in a low voice, but no one responded on the other side of the phone, and after a few more seconds, the sound of slippers running on the ground came out of the microphone, followed by Fan Da De’s exclamation of shock: “Xiao Cong? Fan Cong!”
Through Fan Da De’s voice, Chen Ge could already be sure that something had happened to Fan Cong, and he shouted at the phone to attract Fan Da De’s attention.
”Hello? Boss Chen? Was Little Cong on the phone with you just now?”
”Is Fan Cong injured? Can you still talk? Did you give him the phone?” Chen Ge was a little worried about the chubby geek.
”He’s not in the house! The living room door and bedroom door are both open, and he seemed to have run out just now!” Fan Daode’s words were like a bomb, causing Chen Ge’s heart to tremble violently.
”No longer in the house?” Chen Ge immediately thought of Shadow: “How did he do it to Fan Cong? How did he find Fan Cong?”
”Did you let him out?” Fan Da De calmed down after receiving Chen Ge’s call, in his opinion this haunted house owner, who was much younger than himself, was very reliable, and many problems could be easily solved with his help.
”Something ran into your house just now, it might be a fugitive murderer called Jia Ming, I suggest you call the police right away and report truthfully to the police, in addition check the places in your house where you can hide people, and make sure to protect yourself before the police come.” Chen Ge spoke in a serious tone.
”Fugitive murderer? Why would he come to my house? How did Xiao Cong provoke him!” Fan Da De panicked, his voice was loud.
”I’ll be right there, all you can do now is call the police and protect yourself.”
”Okay, I’ll call the police.”
Fan Da De hung up the phone, Chen Ge looked at the cell phone screen and slowly clenched his fists.
The other party had unexpectedly taken Fan Cong right in the middle of his call, and this time, the enemy made Chen Ge feel tricky.
”The ever-approaching knocking sound, is it the Shadow himself, or are there other ghosts and monsters also involved?” Chen Ge put away his cell phone and clasped his hands together, he hung his head low to recall the voice on the phone just now, his eyes suddenly widened as he thought, “It’s a bit strange, there’s something wrong with the tone of the last words Fan Cong said before he was taken away, it seems like someone covered his mouth, he was struggling to shout out in a very short period of time.”
Chen Ge took out a pen and paper from his backpack and wrote down the last words that Fan Cong shouted.
”Brother, help me, the house, he’s coming in.”
Four incoherent words and phrases, at first glance, it sounded like Fan Cong suddenly encountered danger and asked for help from his brother, who also lived in the house, but if he thought differently, if his second sentence, that save me, was not shouted to his own brother, but rather to Chen Ge, the meaning of the entire sentence would be completely different.
”Could it be that as soon as Fan Cong opened the door, he saw his brother standing outside the door, but the brother he saw was different from his usual brother, very abnormal, perhaps holding a knife in his hand. In this case, he alarmed his brother, and then rushed to me on the phone to ask for help, the last house and he came in is very understandable, that abnormal brother into the bedroom to control him.”
The same sentence would mean something completely different simply by changing the person to whom help was sought.
”Could it be that Shadow escaped the hospital and possessed Fan Da De? Then what about Li Zheng and Jia Ming just now?” Chen Ge felt his sweaty hairs stand up as he was unsettled, “Hopefully, I’m overthinking it.”
If Fan Da De was possessed by a shadow, then the place where Fan Cong lived at this time must be full of killing opportunities, and he had set up a deadly situation just waiting for Chen Ge to throw himself into the net.
”Should we go save him?” Chen Ge’s gaze swept towards the other passengers in the car, and he narrowed his eyes as he had an idea in his heart.