When Xü Beijin picks up the newspaper, the viewers in the stream are still paying attention to the corridor team.
Selfish and Scapegoat have driven away.
These two have been on bad terms ever since the beginning. Despite all their arguing, though, they somehow ended up in a team. Quite the mysterious scene, it sure is.
The man in black is already near the parking lot now.
With both Lin Qin and Mu Jiashi stopped at the entrance to the corridor, the man in black raises the big machete in his arms while chuckling fiendishly; his steps are a bit quicker than before, too.
Mu Jiashi asks, slightly nervous, “dalao, how do we stop him?”
Lin Qin is now standing straight and, giving him a glance, asks, “how else?”
Mu Jiashi is looking at him all confused.
Lin Qin takes a step forward while the man in black is about to slash at them, and, through some inexplicable procedure that Mu Jiashi’s eyes couldn’t discern, Lin Qin has managed to dislodge the machete and taken it for himself!
Mu Jiashi “!”
Lin Qin, with the big machete in hand, pointing the blade right at the black mask of the man in black, orders with a frigid tone, “you’d better bloody stop there!”
The man in black “…”
Who is trying to kill who here? Oi!
Mu Jiashi is completely stupefied.
In the stream, after some mass barrage of exclamation marks and ellipses, one comment slowly trudges along going “i feel a bit sorry for the man in black…”
“even thru the mask u can also tell the man must be questioning life right now”
“Too bad he’s a mass murderer”
“he’s just a poor little lamb shocked by the dalao, so never show mercy!”
“btw, with that fighting power, wouldnt he just breeze thru all the nightmares? wouldnt the game balance be off then? whyd a player like that exist?”
“he feels almost like a bug, huh…”
Xü Beijin has been reading the newspaper in the meantime when he notices these, and after realising what happened, he also begins sighing.
As expected, there is no way he can even hold his own against such a Lin Qin in a brawl.
Nope, no way at all.
Maybe he should refuse, after all… No matter how rare, how valuable, how much he likes the drinks Lin Qin acquired for him, he would refuse…
While Xü Beijin is mulling over this, Ding Yi, currently on high alert inside the bedroom, can feel a chill down her spine.
Is her danger sense tingling?
She reflexively begins to recount her course of actions, trying to work out if she ever overlooked anything, or did anything that could cause catastrophe later on.
No matter how much she scoured her memories, though, the most risky thing she has done recently is the deal with Lin Qin.
If that’s the case, though, she’s gone so far now, and she can only keep going. She doesn’t want to be trapped in the bottom floor of the Tower forever, and besides…
When suddenly, another “number off!” blasts through their eardrums.
This time, it is asking for the fifth number.
They have already gone through one, two, seven and four. From the fifth number on, they know nothing at all.
Ding Yi almost subconsciously turns towards Laosan, even though she can’t see him at all, but he knows approximately where he is; right now, in Ding Yi’s mind, this timid man is already the second most reliable person in the Nightmare.
The most reliable of course being Mu Jiashi.
Yes, she knows him, of course, having introduced clients to him; in fact, she was informed almost as soon as Mu Jiashi returned from the higher floors.
Combine that with knowing that Mu Jiashi has actually chosen this Nightmare for his return run (TL: Implying what Mu Jiashi was speculating in the last chapter was partly wrong), and also that Lin Qin is in this Nightmare as well, convinced Ding Yi to gamble on this Nightmare in the end.
Other than that, given Ding Yi’s experience, she could certainly have also negotiated with Lin Qin in a much better manner and avoid angering him at all; she chose to provoke him instead, because, obviously…
She’s readying him for a Special End when he goes berserk in the future.
It can really be said that Ding Yi has armed herself to the teeth for this Nightmare. In fact, she has already laid out her plans for her business in the future with her subordinates, just in case. Though all she has done to ready herself makes her confident that she’ll at least achieve a Normal End or a Special End courtesy of Lin Qin in this Nightmare.
Ding Yi is thinking about this in the room, while Laosan also shouts a “three!” as per their previous plans to shout the same numbers as per their position, excluding those that are wrong, which will be tested with the first number that hasn’t been reported yet – this translates to three for the fifth number and six for the sixth number. As for whether that is going to work…
Laosan is waiting anxiously.
The next second——”a useless piece of trash that can’t even count properly can just go to hell!”
“Fuck!” Laosan cusses.
Everyone is tensed and fearful.
Yet, even after a while, the heavy breathing of all four of them is still the only sounds to be heard in the pitch black bedroom. That man with the big machete is nowhere to be found.
“He’s stopped…” Laosan murmurs, “that man in black… They managed to stop him!”
He is so elated he is almost dancing in place. He is glad he asked Mu Jiashi for help——While Ding Yi is also glad that she asked Lin Qin to help. As for which of their preparations worked best, they’ll probably only be able to find out the next time they meet them again.
Laosan calms back down quickly enough. He knows that while the man in black is stopped this time around, it doesn’t mean they will be able to keep him at bay every single time. That man in black will likely become more powerful over time as the Nightmare crumbles more and more later on.
Laosan is murmuring to himself, “if only we knew what the numbers were…”
Yet, the minute is fixed. However anxious or unwilling they are, they can only wait until time continues to tick along slowly.
This feeling, akin to waiting for one’s eventual death in the dark, is definitely not a good one.
Laosan takes a deep breath an says, “we’ll go with six for the sixth number.”
Ding Yi replies, “that fifth number just now…”
“Assuming the numbers don’t repeat, and three and five are both wrong, then the fifth number can only possibly be six, eight, nine or ten.”
“That range is small enough, but…” Ding Yi hesitantly continues, “what about the seventh number, then? Should we keep trying three, or…?”
“Let’s wait until after we see how six goes,” Laosan chuckles bitterly, “this is like the world’s most frustrating riddle.”
Ding Yi concurs, “yeah… And we have to bide as much time as we can. This run, we have to at least figure out how many numbers there are in total.”
Then the room falls into silence for a while.
Soon enough, another “number off!” hits them.
The sixth number.
Laosan takes a deep breath and says with a trembled tone, “six.”
He is so nervous that he can feel his body shaking. He has made a decision for once – He doesn’t know if it’s correct… When the fifth number wasn’t three, he was shaken greatly already.
The man in black was stopped then, but they might not be able to stop him every single…
Suddenly, he realises it’s all quiet around him… Quiet for too long.
Ding Yi asks, her tone equally shaky, “we’re… right?”
A moment later, Laosan yells out, “we’re right! The sixth number is six!”
He exhales heavily and can feel his whole body giving out after all that tension. His brain is just blanked out now. He is still in disbelief that they are correct.
“Then the seventh number…” Ding Yi gulps to make her parched throat a little more comfortable, before continuing, “what should we try for the seventh number?”
Laosan has calmed back down a little, starting to think after taking a few deep breaths, “the seventh one… We only have three, five, eight, nine and ten.”
“Six is gone… So, the fifth one would be either eight, nine or ten.”
Then suddenly, their gazes meet in the dark as they shout in unison, “three!”
Since the fifth number wasn’t three or five, then the possibility of the seventh one being three or five is now much greater; no guarantees, but it is at least much more likely than eight, nine or ten (TL: Because they don’t even know if the string of numbers is that long).
Between three and five, since they decided to go in numerical order, they’ll start with three.
One minute later, after another “number off!”, Laosan steels himself to shout, “three!”
Silence ensues.
“We’re right!”
He proclaims loudly, and being so excited, he directly embraced Ding Yi, only realising what he just did after they separated…
Not that he’s too concerned about their different genders, but more so that he could easily be accused of being a Carddealer for that.
With a wet blanket draped over him all at once, Laosan hesitantly and quietly explains, “sorry, I wasn’t…”
“That’s alright,” Ding Yi is smiling, even though nobody could see it in the dark; she then says, “let’s keep going.”
Laosan sighs in relief even though he’s still uncertain, but the excitement and ecstasy has faded for sure. He can feel a little frustration at the Nightmares and the Tower in general, and also, a deep-seated sense of hopelessness.
Yes, they’re almost done with the mysteries in this Nightmare.
Yet, who would help them solve the mysteries chaining them here?
He takes a deep breath and then says with a slightly more gravelly tone, “then, the eighth number…”
Meanwhile, in the stream, after Lin Qin took away the big machete from the man in black, they enter a standstill.
Or more like, the man in black and Mu Jiashi are both simply in shock. Lin Qin does a few practice swings and offers a compliment while nodding, “this is pretty good.”
Mu Jiashi & the man in black “…”
Xü Beijin then quietly moves the stream over to the pitch black bedroom and bore witness to the whole number guessing charade alongside the viewers.
The viewers seem underwhelmed, typing, “hey, looks like the counting isnt too hard either”
“If it’s merely non-repeating integers from one to ten, they can even try listing all possibilities and trying them out one by one, since it’s not many; they are definitely lucky though that they remembered how the little boy counted outside the Nightmare”
“makes sense, dalao, because if they didn’t know, everything’d really be up in the air”
“hey, even if there are all these unreliables here, there are also more reliable ppl here than the last it looks like”
“it remains to be seen whether the reliable people can carry the unreliable ones”
“so the 8th number…”
“Beibei! Beibei, any thoughts?”
Xü Beijin turns his attention to the comments when he sees his name floating across the comments, and gives the question some thought before answering, “the eighth number could now be five, eight, nine or ten, though according to what they discussed, they’ll probably pick eight.”
“Eh? Beibei, do you think the eighth number isn’t eight?”
“Probably not,” Xü Beijin shakes his head and explains, “you see, all seven numbers up to the seventh one were one, two, seven, four, unknown, six and three. There are four numbers, five, eight, nine and ten remaining. Do you notice something odd about them?”
“… ill admit im stupid”
“I’m so not suited for this game [cry emoji]”
“Beibei, you also noticed?”
“it’s the dalao! i knew it, the dalao has telepathic abilities with Beibei”
Xü Beijin couldn’t help but smile noticing that comment.
Then he explains, “the reason it’s strange, is that the three consecutive numbers from eight, nine and ten are still unassigned at this point, because there are only four potential numbers remaining.”
“eh…”
“uh, i got the first part i guess”
“If ten numbers are required in total, from one to ten, (TL: And given some numbers are randomised), it is highly unlikely, statistically, for eight, nine and ten, all three consecutive numbers to still remain entirely unassigned by the seventh number”
Xü Beijin nods to concur, “this means that, for the fifth, eighth, ninth and tenth place to happen to exactly be the numbers five, eight, nine and ten, would approximately occur with a probability of…” he pauses only briefly before answering, “four percent.” (TL: Haven’t done the maths myself, but this is probably just calculating the likelihood that 5, 8, 9 and 10 just happen to be arranged in some random order in the 5th, 8th, 9th and 10th position)
“oh, ok, i see that probability is low”
“We know that the seven numbers prior were all jumbled up, so the fact that there are still three consecutive picks available by the eighth number is highly unlikely. This unlikeliness increased the more numbers they reported without having assigned eight, nine and ten at all.”
“… wait i still dont understand! so what if the fifth eighth ninth and tenth were 5 8 9 and 10, maybe 10 is the fifth and 5 8 and 9 for the eighth ninth and tenth positions respectively, that’s still jumbled right? it could just have been some rare case?”
Xü Beijin smiles to explain, “you’re correct, but since we are guessing, we would first consider situations that are most likely to occur, therefore…”
Before he could finish explaining, though, the pitch black room is filled with another wrathful “number off!”
The sudden hug with Ding Yi meant their thoughts were pretty chaotic for the minute. They didn’t think about the numbers all that much, so going with what they discussed, Laosan immediately says, “eight…”
The moment he spoke, Ding Yi reflexively yells out, “wait…”
Too bad, that the simple, single-syllable word has already jumped out of Laosan’s throat at that point.
The bedroom is all silent.
The moment the Missiontakers are about to celebrate…
That is when, back in the corridor, among the three people still in a standoff, the man in black suddenly makes a vicious chuckle and say, “a useless piece of trash that can’t even count properly…”
The next second, his form disappears!
Mu Jiashi mutters in shock, “how could this be…”
The man in black has teleported inside the pitch black bedroom again. His big machete, once taken by Lin Qin, is now also back in his hand. In the narrow, cramped space, he is slashing all around, making thrilled, uproarious laughter as he does so.
Laosan is barely holding onto consciousness from the pain.
When they didn’t even hear that “go to hell” remark, he was almost convinced the eighth number was eight! But… why did the man in black still appear?!
His emotions having been through such a rollercoaster, it is hard for him to keep calm. While howling in pain and clumsily trying to avoid the attacks from the man in black, he is also trying to work out what went wrong – It couldn’t be! It couldn’t have been?!
Laoda and Erge are both in even worse shape mentally, cursing at the other four Missiontakers already while still trying futilely to resist the big machete; however, the man in black can see them, but they can’t see him at all.
Slowly, the sounds grow quiet.
The thick, sickening scent of blood has again filled up this small, dark, empty room.
Yet, no one has died yet. This is an arduous torture through-and-through. The merciless psychotic murderer would not stop his slaughter just because they have fainted. In fact, how his victims stop resisting in a defenceless posture only seems to trigger his desire for bloodlust even more.
There is an even more gravelly, terrifying cackle and roar coming from his throat. He is almost inhuman at this point, resembling more an untamed, wild beast.
Ding Yi is biting her lips hard. She shrunk into a corner in the very beginning, so she had the lightest of injuries among them. Right now, she is still capable of reasoning.
Without a question, what summoned the man in black must have been because of them calling out a wrong number. Yet why did he appear so suddenly this time, without that sentence he would blurt out every time…
And this must have implied that Lin Qin failed to stop this man in black. That is simply inconceivable!
Ding Yi knows Lin Qin’s martial prowess all too well, that is why she now concludes that this must have been a scripted event – a punishment stemming from their previous, incorrect course of action, that cannot be resisted or thwarted.
So the reason is, what led to this scripted mass murder?
Is it simply because the eighth number was wrong…
Wait, eighth number?
A spark of brilliance flashes through Ding Yi’s mind as she shouts, “eight numbers! There are only eight numbers in total!”
One of the pieces of information they knew was that the little boy’s string of numbers was not exactly long. It was definitely less than ten numbers in total.
And this strange event occurring right at the eighth number can only imply that, in fact, they have already finished numbering off, haven’t they?
This scripted event only triggered because several of the numbers they yelled out were wrong. Therefore, at the end of the numbering sequence, the man in black would appear no matter what to commit his murder.
When Laosan hears what she just said, he realises what’s been going on.
He makes a weakened cough and tries to move his body a little to avoid the big machete, but he fails. He foregoes dodging altogether and tries his best to ignore the pain to focus on reasoning.
Eight numbers in total.
Yes, they only need to report eight numbers in total.
When the seventh number was confirmed, his mind has had a subtle sense of incongruence all along already. Ding Yi was trying to stop him from saying eight earlier too… Now, he finally gets it.
The chance that the three consecutive numbers of eight, nine and ten still being unassigned towards the end is too small!
This means that nine and ten probably weren’t part of the string in the first place. And they only had to assign the numbers from one to eight.
And now, only five and eight remained unassigned; the eighth number isn’t eight, so that can only mean…
The eighth one is five, and the fifth number is eight!
This makes the string one, two, seven, four, eight, six, three and five.
They know all of the numbers now! They just have to verify it once in the next run of the Nightmare!
Laosan is ecstatic again, and when death comes knocking at his door, he is thinking, perhaps, this is what they call the silver lining?
… Selfish and Scapegoat would beg to differ, however.
The moment the Nightmare restarted, they have an equally grim expression as they ask Mu Jiashi, “did you die in the last run?”
Mu Jiashi doesn’t understand why they’re asking, but shakes his head honestly.
Therefore, the both of them rush right for the door at the end of the corridor, and Selfish opens it right up, yelling angrily, “did you fucking do that on purpose?!”
The fresh light is almost blinding to the four Missiontakers in the pitch dark room, who are looking at them, almost in shock.
For once, Scapegoat is agreeing with Selfish to scold them, “we almost managed to dig up clues about this Nightmare!”
In the third run of the Nightmare, the bedroom team remained in the bedroom. Mu Jiashi and Lin Qin stopped the man in black, while Selfish and Scapegoat drove along the road to reach the service area they couldn’t explore in the first run.
Laosan’s lips are still trembling from the wave of emotions that have washed over him earlier. His brain processed the information they talked about just fine, though, and so he reflexively asks, “what did you find out?”
Selfish rolls his eyes at him, clearing not wanting to talk.
Scapegoat takes a deep breath to force himself to calm down before explaining, “we met a cashier there; I told him we were being chased by a man dressed in black who was trying to kill us, and he said, he knew who that man was.”
Mu Jiashi, who followed the duo into the room, immediately asks, “who is the black man?”
“Fuck! That’s where we were stuck at!” Scapegoat blurts out angrily, saying, “the last time we got to the service area, you died; this time we almost got some key information, and you died again. What the actual fuck, man?!”
Selfish coldly sneers, saying, “y’all kept dying and dying and dying, why wouldn’t you just die for good, then?!”
“Oh? Then why don’t you die in my place then?” Erge’s tone is frigid. He orders, “I’m talking about you! Go and die!”
Selfish’s face is all red.
Erge points his finger right at him, and says with a death glare, “stop fucking acting like some bitch here. Die, die, die… Tell that after you have fucking died to that once in this Nightmare!”
In a pitch-black bedroom, dying in fear and discombobulation, unaware who it even was that was killing them, and bleed their last in gore, in pain, in hopelessness, in a mortally wounded body…
Erge asks, “well? Are you ready to die then? Or are you not even brave enough to try it once?”
Selfish’s chest is rising and falling dramatically; he feels livid and insulted all over. He is mad, maddened by all these Missiontakers in this Nightmare, since a long time ago.
He yells out, “fine! You bunch of inept useless pieces of shit! Get out, all of you! Get out! I’ll do it!”
Erge is chuckling mockingly while he walks out of the dark bedroom.
Selfish knocks his shoulder past him when entering the bedroom.
“Erge…”
Laosan is calling out.
Erge stands to the side, crossing his arms in front of his chest, saying, “out, all of you. He can stay in there alone.”
Laoda follows suit without question. Laosan and Dingyi hesitate a little before walking outside as well.
Finally, the door to the pitch black bedroom is about to be shut, leaving Selfish alone inside.
Before the door goes shut, Laosan suddenly recalls and yells out, “remember! One two seven four eight six three five! One two seven four eight six three five!”
He repeats it twice loudly, and it looks like Selfish’s mouth is mumbling along.
The door shuts entirely.
Laosan seems to be lost for a few seconds before asking, “so now…”
Mu Jiashi seems to have finished thinking and heads for the corridor’s other end without hesitation. Everyone else follows.
Ding Yi approaches Lin Qin and quietly tells him where she stored the drinks and how to enter that house; the erstwhile owner of a house could set up how they want the door to be protected, from passwords to passphrases.
Lin Qin nods; he has memorised it.
A short while after the door to the bedroom has gone shut, the man in black has appeared out of nowhere again, chasing after them from the end of the corridor.
Meanwhile, that door leading to the car park outside is still wide open instead of disappearing outright like how it was in the second run. They can drive to the service area freely this time.
The Missiontakers are looking at each other, nonplussed, before turning to Erge.
They opened the door to the pitch black bedroom both times, so why is the door still wide open only this time? Is it really just because someone was still in the bedroom?
Well, yes… Though, why did Erge just trade places with Selfish so confidently? Did he know or guess something?
“I just felt like trying,” Erge shrugs to say, “alright, I’ve had enough of that stuffy black place, anyway. Let’s go somewhere else.”
Soon enough, the seven Missiontakers, aboard two cars, are speeding along the expressway to reach the service area.
As for Selfish, left behind, alone, inside the dark bedroom…
Nobody seems to care about him at all.
In the stream, the viewers have all been shocked by this turn of events.
“woah, what a way to get revenge and get out of danger at the same time!”
When Xü Beijin picks up the newspaper, the viewers in the stream are still paying attention to the corridor team.
Selfish and Scapegoat have driven away.
These two have been on bad terms ever since the beginning. Despite all their arguing, though, they somehow ended up in a team. Quite the mysterious scene, it sure is.
The man in black is already near the parking lot now.
With both Lin Qin and Mu Jiashi stopped at the entrance to the corridor, the man in black raises the big machete in his arms while chuckling fiendishly; his steps are a bit quicker than before, too.
Mu Jiashi asks, slightly nervous, “dalao, how do we stop him?”
Lin Qin is now standing straight and, giving him a glance, asks, “how else?”
Mu Jiashi is looking at him all confused.
Lin Qin takes a step forward while the man in black is about to slash at them, and, through some inexplicable procedure that Mu Jiashi’s eyes couldn’t discern, Lin Qin has managed to dislodge the machete and taken it for himself!
Mu Jiashi “!”
Lin Qin, with the big machete in hand, pointing the blade right at the black mask of the man in black, orders with a frigid tone, “you’d better bloody stop there!”
The man in black “…”
Who is trying to kill who here? Oi!
Mu Jiashi is completely stupefied.
In the stream, after some mass barrage of exclamation marks and ellipses, one comment slowly trudges along going “i feel a bit sorry for the man in black…”
“even thru the mask u can also tell the man must be questioning life right now”
“Too bad he’s a mass murderer”
“he’s just a poor little lamb shocked by the dalao, so never show mercy!”
“btw, with that fighting power, wouldnt he just breeze thru all the nightmares? wouldnt the game balance be off then? whyd a player like that exist?”
“he feels almost like a bug, huh…”
Xü Beijin has been reading the newspaper in the meantime when he notices these, and after realising what happened, he also begins sighing.
As expected, there is no way he can even hold his own against such a Lin Qin in a brawl.
Nope, no way at all.
Maybe he should refuse, after all… No matter how rare, how valuable, how much he likes the drinks Lin Qin acquired for him, he would refuse…
While Xü Beijin is mulling over this, Ding Yi, currently on high alert inside the bedroom, can feel a chill down her spine.
Is her danger sense tingling?
She reflexively begins to recount her course of actions, trying to work out if she ever overlooked anything, or did anything that could cause catastrophe later on.
No matter how much she scoured her memories, though, the most risky thing she has done recently is the deal with Lin Qin.
If that’s the case, though, she’s gone so far now, and she can only keep going. She doesn’t want to be trapped in the bottom floor of the Tower forever, and besides…
When suddenly, another “number off!” blasts through their eardrums.
This time, it is asking for the fifth number.
They have already gone through one, two, seven and four. From the fifth number on, they know nothing at all.
Ding Yi almost subconsciously turns towards Laosan, even though she can’t see him at all, but he knows approximately where he is; right now, in Ding Yi’s mind, this timid man is already the second most reliable person in the Nightmare.
The most reliable of course being Mu Jiashi.
Yes, she knows him, of course, having introduced clients to him; in fact, she was informed almost as soon as Mu Jiashi returned from the higher floors.
Combine that with knowing that Mu Jiashi has actually chosen this Nightmare for his return run (TL: Implying what Mu Jiashi was speculating in the last chapter was partly wrong), and also that Lin Qin is in this Nightmare as well, convinced Ding Yi to gamble on this Nightmare in the end.
Other than that, given Ding Yi’s experience, she could certainly have also negotiated with Lin Qin in a much better manner and avoid angering him at all; she chose to provoke him instead, because, obviously…
She’s readying him for a Special End when he goes berserk in the future.
It can really be said that Ding Yi has armed herself to the teeth for this Nightmare. In fact, she has already laid out her plans for her business in the future with her subordinates, just in case. Though all she has done to ready herself makes her confident that she’ll at least achieve a Normal End or a Special End courtesy of Lin Qin in this Nightmare.
Ding Yi is thinking about this in the room, while Laosan also shouts a “three!” as per their previous plans to shout the same numbers as per their position, excluding those that are wrong, which will be tested with the first number that hasn’t been reported yet – this translates to three for the fifth number and six for the sixth number. As for whether that is going to work…
Laosan is waiting anxiously.
The next second——”a useless piece of trash that can’t even count properly can just go to hell!”
“Fuck!” Laosan cusses.
Everyone is tensed and fearful.
Yet, even after a while, the heavy breathing of all four of them is still the only sounds to be heard in the pitch black bedroom. That man with the big machete is nowhere to be found.
“He’s stopped…” Laosan murmurs, “that man in black… They managed to stop him!”
He is so elated he is almost dancing in place. He is glad he asked Mu Jiashi for help——While Ding Yi is also glad that she asked Lin Qin to help. As for which of their preparations worked best, they’ll probably only be able to find out the next time they meet them again.
Laosan calms back down quickly enough. He knows that while the man in black is stopped this time around, it doesn’t mean they will be able to keep him at bay every single time. That man in black will likely become more powerful over time as the Nightmare crumbles more and more later on.
Laosan is murmuring to himself, “if only we knew what the numbers were…”
Yet, the minute is fixed. However anxious or unwilling they are, they can only wait until time continues to tick along slowly.
This feeling, akin to waiting for one’s eventual death in the dark, is definitely not a good one.
Laosan takes a deep breath an says, “we’ll go with six for the sixth number.”
Ding Yi replies, “that fifth number just now…”
“Assuming the numbers don’t repeat, and three and five are both wrong, then the fifth number can only possibly be six, eight, nine or ten.”
“That range is small enough, but…” Ding Yi hesitantly continues, “what about the seventh number, then? Should we keep trying three, or…?”
“Let’s wait until after we see how six goes,” Laosan chuckles bitterly, “this is like the world’s most frustrating riddle.”
Ding Yi concurs, “yeah… And we have to bide as much time as we can. This run, we have to at least figure out how many numbers there are in total.”
Then the room falls into silence for a while.
Soon enough, another “number off!” hits them.
The sixth number.
Laosan takes a deep breath and says with a trembled tone, “six.”
He is so nervous that he can feel his body shaking. He has made a decision for once – He doesn’t know if it’s correct… When the fifth number wasn’t three, he was shaken greatly already.
The man in black was stopped then, but they might not be able to stop him every single…
Suddenly, he realises it’s all quiet around him… Quiet for too long.
Ding Yi asks, her tone equally shaky, “we’re… right?”
A moment later, Laosan yells out, “we’re right! The sixth number is six!”
He exhales heavily and can feel his whole body giving out after all that tension. His brain is just blanked out now. He is still in disbelief that they are correct.
“Then the seventh number…” Ding Yi gulps to make her parched throat a little more comfortable, before continuing, “what should we try for the seventh number?”
Laosan has calmed back down a little, starting to think after taking a few deep breaths, “the seventh one… We only have three, five, eight, nine and ten.”
“Six is gone… So, the fifth one would be either eight, nine or ten.”
Then suddenly, their gazes meet in the dark as they shout in unison, “three!”
Since the fifth number wasn’t three or five, then the possibility of the seventh one being three or five is now much greater; no guarantees, but it is at least much more likely than eight, nine or ten (TL: Because they don’t even know if the string of numbers is that long).
Between three and five, since they decided to go in numerical order, they’ll start with three.
One minute later, after another “number off!”, Laosan steels himself to shout, “three!”
Silence ensues.
“We’re right!”
He proclaims loudly, and being so excited, he directly embraced Ding Yi, only realising what he just did after they separated…
Not that he’s too concerned about their different genders, but more so that he could easily be accused of being a Carddealer for that.
With a wet blanket draped over him all at once, Laosan hesitantly and quietly explains, “sorry, I wasn’t…”
“That’s alright,” Ding Yi is smiling, even though nobody could see it in the dark; she then says, “let’s keep going.”
Laosan sighs in relief even though he’s still uncertain, but the excitement and ecstasy has faded for sure. He can feel a little frustration at the Nightmares and the Tower in general, and also, a deep-seated sense of hopelessness.
Yes, they’re almost done with the mysteries in this Nightmare.
Yet, who would help them solve the mysteries chaining them here?
He takes a deep breath and then says with a slightly more gravelly tone, “then, the eighth number…”
Meanwhile, in the stream, after Lin Qin took away the big machete from the man in black, they enter a standstill.
Or more like, the man in black and Mu Jiashi are both simply in shock. Lin Qin does a few practice swings and offers a compliment while nodding, “this is pretty good.”
Mu Jiashi & the man in black “…”
Xü Beijin then quietly moves the stream over to the pitch black bedroom and bore witness to the whole number guessing charade alongside the viewers.
The viewers seem underwhelmed, typing, “hey, looks like the counting isnt too hard either”
“If it’s merely non-repeating integers from one to ten, they can even try listing all possibilities and trying them out one by one, since it’s not many; they are definitely lucky though that they remembered how the little boy counted outside the Nightmare”
“makes sense, dalao, because if they didn’t know, everything’d really be up in the air”
“hey, even if there are all these unreliables here, there are also more reliable ppl here than the last it looks like”
“it remains to be seen whether the reliable people can carry the unreliable ones”
“so the 8th number…”
“Beibei! Beibei, any thoughts?”
Xü Beijin turns his attention to the comments when he sees his name floating across the comments, and gives the question some thought before answering, “the eighth number could now be five, eight, nine or ten, though according to what they discussed, they’ll probably pick eight.”
“Eh? Beibei, do you think the eighth number isn’t eight?”
“Probably not,” Xü Beijin shakes his head and explains, “you see, all seven numbers up to the seventh one were one, two, seven, four, unknown, six and three. There are four numbers, five, eight, nine and ten remaining. Do you notice something odd about them?”
“… ill admit im stupid”
“I’m so not suited for this game [cry emoji]”
“Beibei, you also noticed?”
“it’s the dalao! i knew it, the dalao has telepathic abilities with Beibei”
Xü Beijin couldn’t help but smile noticing that comment.
Then he explains, “the reason it’s strange, is that the three consecutive numbers from eight, nine and ten are still unassigned at this point, because there are only four potential numbers remaining.”
“eh…”
“uh, i got the first part i guess”
“If ten numbers are required in total, from one to ten, (TL: And given some numbers are randomised), it is highly unlikely, statistically, for eight, nine and ten, all three consecutive numbers to still remain entirely unassigned by the seventh number”
Xü Beijin nods to concur, “this means that, for the fifth, eighth, ninth and tenth place to happen to exactly be the numbers five, eight, nine and ten, would approximately occur with a probability of…” he pauses only briefly before answering, “four percent.” (TL: Haven’t done the maths myself, but this is probably just calculating the likelihood that 5, 8, 9 and 10 just happen to be arranged in some random order in the 5th, 8th, 9th and 10th position)
“oh, ok, i see that probability is low”
“We know that the seven numbers prior were all jumbled up, so the fact that there are still three consecutive picks available by the eighth number is highly unlikely. This unlikeliness increased the more numbers they reported without having assigned eight, nine and ten at all.”
“… wait i still dont understand! so what if the fifth eighth ninth and tenth were 5 8 9 and 10, maybe 10 is the fifth and 5 8 and 9 for the eighth ninth and tenth positions respectively, that’s still jumbled right? it could just have been some rare case?”
Xü Beijin smiles to explain, “you’re correct, but since we are guessing, we would first consider situations that are most likely to occur, therefore…”
Before he could finish explaining, though, the pitch black room is filled with another wrathful “number off!”
The sudden hug with Ding Yi meant their thoughts were pretty chaotic for the minute. They didn’t think about the numbers all that much, so going with what they discussed, Laosan immediately says, “eight…”
The moment he spoke, Ding Yi reflexively yells out, “wait…”
Too bad, that the simple, single-syllable word has already jumped out of Laosan’s throat at that point.
The bedroom is all silent.
The moment the Missiontakers are about to celebrate…
That is when, back in the corridor, among the three people still in a standoff, the man in black suddenly makes a vicious chuckle and say, “a useless piece of trash that can’t even count properly…”
The next second, his form disappears!
Mu Jiashi mutters in shock, “how could this be…”
The man in black has teleported inside the pitch black bedroom again. His big machete, once taken by Lin Qin, is now also back in his hand. In the narrow, cramped space, he is slashing all around, making thrilled, uproarious laughter as he does so.
Laosan is barely holding onto consciousness from the pain.
When they didn’t even hear that “go to hell” remark, he was almost convinced the eighth number was eight! But… why did the man in black still appear?!
His emotions having been through such a rollercoaster, it is hard for him to keep calm. While howling in pain and clumsily trying to avoid the attacks from the man in black, he is also trying to work out what went wrong – It couldn’t be! It couldn’t have been?!
Laoda and Erge are both in even worse shape mentally, cursing at the other four Missiontakers already while still trying futilely to resist the big machete; however, the man in black can see them, but they can’t see him at all.
Slowly, the sounds grow quiet.
The thick, sickening scent of blood has again filled up this small, dark, empty room.
Yet, no one has died yet. This is an arduous torture through-and-through. The merciless psychotic murderer would not stop his slaughter just because they have fainted. In fact, how his victims stop resisting in a defenceless posture only seems to trigger his desire for bloodlust even more.
There is an even more gravelly, terrifying cackle and roar coming from his throat. He is almost inhuman at this point, resembling more an untamed, wild beast.
Ding Yi is biting her lips hard. She shrunk into a corner in the very beginning, so she had the lightest of injuries among them. Right now, she is still capable of reasoning.
Without a question, what summoned the man in black must have been because of them calling out a wrong number. Yet why did he appear so suddenly this time, without that sentence he would blurt out every time…
And this must have implied that Lin Qin failed to stop this man in black. That is simply inconceivable!
Ding Yi knows Lin Qin’s martial prowess all too well, that is why she now concludes that this must have been a scripted event – a punishment stemming from their previous, incorrect course of action, that cannot be resisted or thwarted.
So the reason is, what led to this scripted mass murder?
Is it simply because the eighth number was wrong…
Wait, eighth number?
A spark of brilliance flashes through Ding Yi’s mind as she shouts, “eight numbers! There are only eight numbers in total!”
One of the pieces of information they knew was that the little boy’s string of numbers was not exactly long. It was definitely less than ten numbers in total.
And this strange event occurring right at the eighth number can only imply that, in fact, they have already finished numbering off, haven’t they?
This scripted event only triggered because several of the numbers they yelled out were wrong. Therefore, at the end of the numbering sequence, the man in black would appear no matter what to commit his murder.
When Laosan hears what she just said, he realises what’s been going on.
He makes a weakened cough and tries to move his body a little to avoid the big machete, but he fails. He foregoes dodging altogether and tries his best to ignore the pain to focus on reasoning.
Eight numbers in total.
Yes, they only need to report eight numbers in total.
When the seventh number was confirmed, his mind has had a subtle sense of incongruence all along already. Ding Yi was trying to stop him from saying eight earlier too… Now, he finally gets it.
The chance that the three consecutive numbers of eight, nine and ten still being unassigned towards the end is too small!
This means that nine and ten probably weren’t part of the string in the first place. And they only had to assign the numbers from one to eight.
And now, only five and eight remained unassigned; the eighth number isn’t eight, so that can only mean…
The eighth one is five, and the fifth number is eight!
This makes the string one, two, seven, four, eight, six, three and five.
They know all of the numbers now! They just have to verify it once in the next run of the Nightmare!
Laosan is ecstatic again, and when death comes knocking at his door, he is thinking, perhaps, this is what they call the silver lining?
… Selfish and Scapegoat would beg to differ, however.
The moment the Nightmare restarted, they have an equally grim expression as they ask Mu Jiashi, “did you die in the last run?”
Mu Jiashi doesn’t understand why they’re asking, but shakes his head honestly.
Therefore, the both of them rush right for the door at the end of the corridor, and Selfish opens it right up, yelling angrily, “did you fucking do that on purpose?!”
The fresh light is almost blinding to the four Missiontakers in the pitch dark room, who are looking at them, almost in shock.
For once, Scapegoat is agreeing with Selfish to scold them, “we almost managed to dig up clues about this Nightmare!”
In the third run of the Nightmare, the bedroom team remained in the bedroom. Mu Jiashi and Lin Qin stopped the man in black, while Selfish and Scapegoat drove along the road to reach the service area they couldn’t explore in the first run.
Laosan’s lips are still trembling from the wave of emotions that have washed over him earlier. His brain processed the information they talked about just fine, though, and so he reflexively asks, “what did you find out?”
Selfish rolls his eyes at him, clearing not wanting to talk.
Scapegoat takes a deep breath to force himself to calm down before explaining, “we met a cashier there; I told him we were being chased by a man dressed in black who was trying to kill us, and he said, he knew who that man was.”
Mu Jiashi, who followed the duo into the room, immediately asks, “who is the black man?”
“Fuck! That’s where we were stuck at!” Scapegoat blurts out angrily, saying, “the last time we got to the service area, you died; this time we almost got some key information, and you died again. What the actual fuck, man?!”
Selfish coldly sneers, saying, “y’all kept dying and dying and dying, why wouldn’t you just die for good, then?!”
“Oh? Then why don’t you die in my place then?” Erge’s tone is frigid. He orders, “I’m talking about you! Go and die!”
Selfish’s face is all red.
Erge points his finger right at him, and says with a death glare, “stop fucking acting like some bitch here. Die, die, die… Tell that after you have fucking died to that once in this Nightmare!”
In a pitch-black bedroom, dying in fear and discombobulation, unaware who it even was that was killing them, and bleed their last in gore, in pain, in hopelessness, in a mortally wounded body…
Erge asks, “well? Are you ready to die then? Or are you not even brave enough to try it once?”
Selfish’s chest is rising and falling dramatically; he feels livid and insulted all over. He is mad, maddened by all these Missiontakers in this Nightmare, since a long time ago.
He yells out, “fine! You bunch of inept useless pieces of shit! Get out, all of you! Get out! I’ll do it!”
Erge is chuckling mockingly while he walks out of the dark bedroom.
Selfish knocks his shoulder past him when entering the bedroom.
“Erge…”
Laosan is calling out.
Erge stands to the side, crossing his arms in front of his chest, saying, “out, all of you. He can stay in there alone.”
Laoda follows suit without question. Laosan and Dingyi hesitate a little before walking outside as well.
Finally, the door to the pitch black bedroom is about to be shut, leaving Selfish alone inside.
Before the door goes shut, Laosan suddenly recalls and yells out, “remember! One two seven four eight six three five! One two seven four eight six three five!”
He repeats it twice loudly, and it looks like Selfish’s mouth is mumbling along.
The door shuts entirely.
Laosan seems to be lost for a few seconds before asking, “so now…”
Mu Jiashi seems to have finished thinking and heads for the corridor’s other end without hesitation. Everyone else follows.
Ding Yi approaches Lin Qin and quietly tells him where she stored the drinks and how to enter that house; the erstwhile owner of a house could set up how they want the door to be protected, from passwords to passphrases.
Lin Qin nods; he has memorised it.
A short while after the door to the bedroom has gone shut, the man in black has appeared out of nowhere again, chasing after them from the end of the corridor.
Meanwhile, that door leading to the car park outside is still wide open instead of disappearing outright like how it was in the second run. They can drive to the service area freely this time.
The Missiontakers are looking at each other, nonplussed, before turning to Erge.
They opened the door to the pitch black bedroom both times, so why is the door still wide open only this time? Is it really just because someone was still in the bedroom?
Well, yes… Though, why did Erge just trade places with Selfish so confidently? Did he know or guess something?
“I just felt like trying,” Erge shrugs to say, “alright, I’ve had enough of that stuffy black place, anyway. Let’s go somewhere else.”
Soon enough, the seven Missiontakers, aboard two cars, are speeding along the expressway to reach the service area.
As for Selfish, left behind, alone, inside the dark bedroom…
Nobody seems to care about him at all.
In the stream, the viewers have all been shocked by this turn of events.
“woah, what a way to get revenge and get out of danger at the same time!”
