sbdcsierra Chapter 286 The Scapegoat
Chapter 286 The Scapegoat
Such coincidences might occur in the real world, but this is a dungeon world, and such a situation only means one thing—
The master and the crew-cut man knew each other.
[Fang Shuo: I heard from the master that all the villas here were developed by his relatives.]
[Fang Shuo: I specially saved one for my family.]
[Fang Shuo: Could it be that the crew-cut guy and the master are related?]
Fang Shuo's words brought a temporary silence to the group chat.
The man with the buzz cut spoke in the group chat a while later.
[Buzz Cut: That area was indeed developed into a villa resort by my relatives, so they reserved one for me to live in.]
[Buzz Cut: I think I vaguely remember the master you mentioned.]
The man with the buzz cut only said a couple of sentences in the group chat and didn't continue.
Yan Xun looked at his message in the group and thought, "He must have found new memories and is too guilty to speak."
Worried that they would discover his family's secrets through his few words and complete side quest 2 first, Crew Head chose to remain silent and not reveal any more clues.
But what if the master really is a relative of the man with the buzz cut?
Yan Xun suddenly felt that everything from the past could be traced back to something—
“The master knows how to steal someone’s luck,” Yan Xun said. “He helps someone steal someone else’s luck, but he needs to use some tools.”
"Xie Qingdu's distant relatives used to love sponsoring impoverished students." Yan Xun imagined that scene in his mind.
Would you throw away winter clothes or school supplies sent to you by a kind person who often helps you?
Moreover, the method that the master mentioned doesn't require the person to carry it with them at all; simply placing it nearby will help absorb bad luck.
Even so, the distant relatives were still not satisfied and hoped that someone could be their scapegoat and help them avoid disaster.
"But the master said that the person must have a special destiny, and ordinary people cannot do such a thing."
“Since Cun Tou is related to the master, perhaps he heard the master mention him at a family gathering or some other occasion.” Yan Xun then wrote and drew on paper and pen. “Let’s assume that when the school registration started, the master happened to meet Xie Qingdu, knew that the other party was the scapegoat, and also knew that the other party’s fate was special, so he told Cun Tou to be careful of Xie Qingdu.”
According to Du Yun, the previous ostracism by the crew-cut guy and others was only limited to locking Xie Qingdu out and deliberately causing trouble at the bar.
"His attitude was completely different when he found out later that Xie Qingdu was working in that place."
Although Lou Yanchuan had already guessed where Xie Qingdu was working, Yan Xun remembered that he had said he wouldn't tell anyone, so he didn't say it outright.
“Crunchy was a gambler. He had been drinking at the villa that night, so he impulsively killed Xie Qingdu. In addition, Xie Qingdu was already in poor health, and it is not impossible that he died accidentally after being abused by Crunchy.”
Yan Xun finally stopped scribbling on the paper.
"So for side mission 2, this is the truth about the crew-cut family."
"On the eve of graduation, the man with the buzz cut cruelly murdered Xie Qingdu."
“But there’s something strange, something I didn’t understand before.” Yan Xun looked at Lou Yanchuan. “This happened on the eve of graduation, and no matter how you look at it, the shirt and the muscular man are inextricably linked.”
"The muscular man chose to work at an amusement park after graduation, concealing the fact that he graduated from Yunshan University."
"The shirt got his graduation certificate but continued to interview with companies nonchalantly until he was found out and fired. He sent out resumes everywhere but couldn't get a single interview invitation."
"If their murder at the villa is exposed, Shirt will not only fail to get job interview invitations, but I think going to jail is the most likely outcome for him."
"The company only knows that he bullied his roommate when he was in school and that his roommate died as a result. They don't know what the crew cut guy was involved in."
"From graduation to when Shirt was fired from the company, at least a year passed," Yan Xun said.
"The reason why the shirt could be so confident and go to the interview with peace of mind is probably because he was sure that Xie Qingdu's body was not found, or that the other party's death would not be discovered."
"That place happens to be a villa resort area developed by my relative with the crew cut."
"The master with the buzz cut was also in that resort area that day."
"It seems that this master helped them cover up Xie Qingdu's whereabouts and dispose of Xie Qingdu's body."
Given that the other party is a relative of the crew-cut guy and a ruthless person who knows how to scheme to absorb people's luck, it's not surprising that he would do something like this.
Yan Xun then recalled the witchcraft he had discovered in the storage room—
The human head and limbs were cut off and buried in five different houses, which could both suppress evil spirits and prevent the corpses from rising from the dead and the evil spirits from taking revenge.
"The master said that to find a scapegoat, the other person's fate must also be very special."
"Is Xie Qingdu's destiny very special?"
"That's why that distant relative used him as a scapegoat, and after he died, his body was buried in six different places."
According to the methods mentioned in witchcraft, the head and limbs must be placed in specific positions, while the rest of the torso can only be placed in the center.
In their community, the only place to put a torso is in a white house.
It is located precisely at the center of these five corners.
“The reason Cun Tou really went crazy was because he knew Xie Qingdu was still working there…” Yan Xun looked at Lou Yanchuan, “I feel that more than the bad luck that made him lose money, what Cun Tou was really afraid of was something he couldn’t say.”
"The master said Xie Qingdu's fate is special, and that book also mentions that this is a spell specifically for suppressing evil spirits." Lou Yanchuan pondered, "Could it be that Xie Qingdu's fate is so special that he will definitely become an evil spirit after death, and a great evil spirit at that, which is why the crew-cut guy is afraid?"
"Then he still dared to kill Xie Qingdu?"
"Is this the kind of situation where if Xie Qingdu is even slightly unwell, he would kneel down and beg Xie Qingdu to go to the hospital, as if he were afraid that Xie Qingdu might accidentally die?"
"Does the place where he works also require some small handicrafts?" Lou Yanchuan asked.
Yan Xun: "..."
"Yes." Splitting paper money, folding gold and silver ingots, and chiseling copper coins should all be considered small handicrafts, Yan Xun thought.
It's quite remarkable that Lou Yanchuan went to the trouble of changing the keywords.
“He told me that he would indeed help the company’s people with some manual work,” Yan Xun said.
Xie Qingdu told him personally that he usually helps fold gold ingots and carve paper coins.
"I've heard that some people are destined to be cursed, and once they get involved in these businesses, they not only clash with others, but they also lose control of certain things," Lou Yanchuan said.
"Since he's that relative's scapegoat."
"Perhaps what that relative fears most is that he comes into contact with this kind of thing."
"Once he comes into contact with these things, the substitution spell might be destroyed by the baleful aura on his body."
Lou Yanchuan said, "Since Shuangshuang said that uncle smelled terrible, it seems that the spell has already lost its power."
"He couldn't think of a solution, so he had to ask your grandmother for help."
“Since Crew Head was able to get some information from his uncle, he must have known about the half-dead state of the person in the sanatorium,” Lou Yanchuan said. “The fear of death and the pain of being possessed by witchcraft made him decide to kill this monster.”
“In his eyes, Xie Qingdu is not a human being, but the embodiment of malevolent energy and evil spirits.” Lou Yanchuan revealed a somewhat hypocritical smile. “Killing a monster and a non-human being may not require him to make any difficult decisions.”
……
The man with the buzz cut was restless in his bedroom.
They even frequently peeked out to see if the bamboo pole outside had returned.
He paced back and forth in the room, finally sending a message to Du Yun—
[Buzz Cut: Can I stay at your place for one night?]
Upon seeing this message, Du Yun immediately took a screenshot and sent it to Yan Xun.
[Du Yun: Brother, look!]
[Du Yun: What does he mean by that?]
Yan Xun was also surprised that the crew-cut man was so impatient. He turned his screen towards Lou Yanchuan.
Lou Yanchuan looked at the message Du Yun had sent and said, "The little brother you took in is quite loyal."
"It seems that the crew-cut guy has remembered something," Yan Xun said.
"Otherwise, I wouldn't have wanted to spend the night at Du Yun's place."
At this time, Bamboo Pole was still working at the convenience store, and Shirt and Muscle Man had not yet reacted, proving that they had not yet "remembered" what happened at the lakeside villa.
Yan Xun sent a message to Du Yun.
[Yan Xun: You said yes, but while you're at it, ask him why he wants to live at your house.]
Du Yun received it instantly.
Then he went back to his buzz cut.
The crew-cut man was unaware that Du Yun had joined forces with Yan Xun. Upon seeing Du Yun's reply, he felt slightly relieved.
[Buzz Cut: Thanks, bro.]
[Buzz cut: I'm coming right away.]
The man with the buzz cut grabbed his phone and headed for the door, but unexpectedly ran into the man in the shirt in the hallway.
The man in the shirt asked, puzzled, "Are you going out?"
"Yeah, I'm going out for a walk," the man with the buzz cut replied dismissively.
"Shall we go for a walk at this hour?" The man in the shirt looked out the window; the streetlights had come on, and it was completely dark outside.
He didn't understand what was so great about going out for a walk.
However, he didn't come to this instance to solve any puzzles; he just wanted to get through the 15 days.
So when the man with the buzz cut said that, the man in the shirt didn't take it seriously, but just reminded him, "Then remember not to leave for too long, you can't be away from home for more than 36 hours."
The crew-cut man cursed the dungeon in his heart as he thought about the 36-hour rule.
He had no idea why he was so unlucky to draw this kind of dungeon character.
He looked at the calm-faced man in the shirt and knew that the other man probably didn't know anything yet, which made him feel a sense of superiority. "Yeah, I remember. Don't worry, I'll be back in 36 hours."
As he spoke, he walked around the shirt and went downstairs.
Unexpectedly, when I opened the door, I bumped into a bamboo pole that had come in from outside.
The moment he saw that tall, thin figure, the man with the buzz cut trembled slightly.
Especially since the other person was standing on the corridor outside the door, the darkness outside seemed to blend into him.
The motion-sensor lights in the corridor seemed to be broken. Even though the bamboo pole was standing there, it didn't react at all, which startled the crew-cut man who suddenly opened the door.
The noise of opening the door was probably a bit too loud, because the motion-sensor lights on the ceiling of the corridor finally turned on, allowing the crew-cut man to see the shape of the bamboo pole.
Bamboo pole was still wearing those familiar clothes that had been washed until they were almost white.
Upon seeing the crew-cut man, he simply stood there blankly, seemingly waiting for him to leave first.
Feeling guilty and scared, the man with the buzz cut didn't dare to look him in the eye and could only move away from him from the other side.
"Are you going out so late?" Bamboo Pole suddenly asked.
"Ah, um," the crew-cut man mumbled. In the past, he would have said "None of your business," but the sudden recollection of the memory made him a little afraid of the bamboo pole in front of him. He could only make a vague response as if he had lost the ability to speak.
The shirt-wearing man followed behind the man with the buzz cut. He was a little surprised to see the bamboo pole. "Didn't you go to work at the convenience store?"
"Yes, I'm not feeling well, so I came back first," said Bamboo Pole.
"If you're not feeling well, then take a rest," Shirt asked. "You're really putting in a lot of work." Even an NPC shouldn't be this extravagant, Shirt thought to himself. Working at the market during the day and then at the convenience store at night, he'd have to turn on the lights even if Ultraman came.
Where do you feel unwell?
"My neck and body hurt a bit." Bamboo Pole touched his neck and limbs, "It hurts like I've been chopped off."
Upon hearing this, the man with the buzz cut was even more frightened, turning into a quail.
They were afraid that the bamboo pole in front of them would suddenly mutate.
He didn't care whether he was acting too awkwardly, and turned around and ran towards Du Yun's house, leaving the man in the shirt standing at the door completely bewildered.
"So urgent?" the shirt-wearing man asked, puzzled. "What could he possibly want at Du Yun's house?"
"It can't be a discovery..."
The man in the shirt wondered if he had discovered a secret in his home, then remembered that the person next to him was an NPC.
Although the NPCs didn't react much to keywords like "quest" and "dungeon," there was no guarantee that something wouldn't go wrong... Thinking of this, Shirt swallowed the rest of his sentence and just chuckled.
"What did you find?" Bamboo Pole asked curiously, seemingly oblivious to Shirt's hesitation.
“It’s nothing,” the shirt said. “He’s just a bit of a loner.”
"He's probably at Du Yun's house playing games," the man in the shirt casually offered an excuse. "Aren't you coming in?"
"Didn't you say you weren't feeling well?"
Bamboo Pole nodded and followed Shirt back home.
"I'm just going to make something quick and easy to eat," the shirt-wearing man said, having found instant noodles in the kitchen. "What do you want to eat?"
“I’m not hungry.” Bamboo pole followed beside shirt.
"I ate something else last night."
"By the way," Shirt said while cooking instant noodles, "did you see the messages they posted in the group chat?"
"Did you work at Anxin Nursing Home before?"
“Anxin Sanatorium?” Bamboo Pole repeated the name, as if recalling something.
After a long pause, he said to the shirt, "I have a distant relative who lives here, and I visit him sometimes."
"That's quite a coincidence. Duan Songen also worked here for a period of time before."
The man in the shirt turned around and said, "Maybe you two have met before."
"Take a look at the messages in the group chat."
Upon hearing this, Zhu Gan opened his phone and immediately saw the group photo of Duan Songen and other staff members in the group chat.
He stared at the group photo for a long time. "I might have seen them before."
"There are very few people this young in the nursing home."
He switched the voice messages in the group chat, and looking at the master's keywords, Xie Qingdu felt uneasy.
However, he couldn't find a reason to feel uncomfortable. When he saw Duan Songen's photo, his emotions were like black water that overwhelmed him.
Especially after learning that the master might be related to the crew-cut man.
A surge of hatred welled up within him, a desire to hang them on iron hooks and slowly torture them to death.
This is not good, Xie Qingdu quickly told himself.
It was because he had too much malevolent energy and was always thinking about other things that his adoptive parents met with misfortune... He must listen to his uncle and suppress his anger to recuperate.
Even if it's trash like a crew cut, there's no need to get entangled with him. The more you deal with such a despicable person, the more energetic he becomes.
Xie Qingdu kept hearing his uncle's admonitions in his mind, and he silently recited the mantra his uncle taught him to eliminate distracting thoughts, trying his best to stay away from those negative emotions.