Chapter 78.2
Despite giving Li Xiao Yu a look, Gu Liang did not answer her questions immediately.
Li Xiao Yu did not understand the reason for his hesitation, but Yang Ye, who had been observing Gu Liang from the side, did.
— What these questions touched on was exceptionally salient, and they might decide the murderer’s motivation for killing.
And Gu Liang did not want to want to directly expose it at the start of the centralised discussion, which was why he ultimately chose to conceal it.
After a long moment, Gu Liang merely stated: “We can slowly discuss these details later. They’re not decisive factors.
“In conclusion, under the circ.u.mstances where there are no other brain holes, being in a dreamscape is the only tenable explanation.
“Moreover, I only had the courage to take the next step in affirming this brain hole after I heard the system mention ‘regret’ and ‘desire’ during the reading of the task.
“I believe that the mysterious man, should be the personification of the Duke himself inside the dream.
“With regards to the two wedding ceremonies being hosted in the Duke’s dream, one of them was to make up for his regret, the other was to fulfil his cherished desire.
“He wanted to partic.i.p.ate in the two wedding ceremonies and witness everything, which is why he entered the dream as well.”
Li Xiao Yu slapped the table hard. “I understand now. That murderer shattered his beautiful dream. He has no way of fulfilling his cherished desire, and he has no way to make up for his regret either!”
Li Xiao Yu released a sigh. “We have to solve the case as soon as possible then. Or else, we will trigger the Duke’s Wrath and we’ll be trapped in his dream…”
Gu Liang stopped for a moment before he continued to speak: “In any case, I believe that after the mysterious man – who is also the personification of the Duke – was killed in the dream, the dreamscape had already started to change. The special settings attached to our characters are slowly disappearing as we speak.
“For instance, when we were conducting our investigation today, Li Xiao Yu and I stood in the mirror together but neither of us had a mirror image. Since Li Xiao Yu is designed to be Aimeili’s reincarnation, she should be human. She also mentioned that when she previously looked in the mirror, the mirror still had her reflection. Therefore, at the beginning of this dreamscape, she was portrayed by the Duke perfectly. However, Li Xiao Yu has reverted back to the Duke’s characteristics right now, and she can no longer be reflected in mirrors.
“Lastly, it’s the same situation for the harpsichord. I’m clearly incapable of reading the music staff, but I could play that piece, because when we get to the bottom of this matter, I am part of the Duke’s dream. The people in his dream knew how to play the harpsichord because he personally knew how to play it.”
Truthfully speaking, there was still a point that Gu Liang did not say.
Which was the issue with the scar on his neck.
The Duke created this dreamscape for three important reasons.
Since Gu Liang and Yang Ye’s story was one of the reasons, it naturally had a great importance in the Duke’s dream.
It goes without saying that their depictions were very detailed from the very beginning.
This was done for the sake of restoring his and Aimeili’s story.
Hence, Gu Liang had to undergo a transformation period, and during said transformation period, he would have an hour of sharpened incisors, an hour without… All these details had been established by the Duke.
But after the mysterious man in the dreamscape died, the scar on Gu Liang’s neck directly disappeared; furthermore, he was clearly in human state but the mirror could not reflect him…
This implied that every meticulously designed character was slowly losing the traits that made them distinctive, and they were becoming closer to the Duke himself.
This actually suggested that, perhaps with the death of the mysterious man, problems had started to crop up in this dreamscape.
This included the oddities in the weather, the sudden snow, moon, and sun….
This conscientiously designed dreamscape seemed like it was beginning to collapse.
Having reached this conclusion, Gu Liang’s heart sank. Subsequently, he said: “Regardless of whether it is a dreamscape or some other setting, the story is meant to help everyone find the motivation for killing. In order to find the murderer, the most important thing is our timeline.
“I think, before we take it a step further to discuss the story background and the motivations for killing, it would be better if all of us talked about our timelines first.
“We were eating lunch together in the main hall this afternoon.
“At 12:30, everyone went their respective ways. That being said, between 12:30 and 5:00 in the evening when the corpses were discovered, what was everyone doing?”
* * *
Gu Liang flipped the notebook in front of him to a new page and wrote down every player’s name again, in preparation to sort out the timeline.
He was the first to speak: “Since I’ve already said so much, I’ll continue on then.
“My timeline was very simple. After I was done eating, I went back to my room to rest. From 1:30 to 2, I was in the back garden picking flowers, mainly the roses in the rose garden. When it was close to 2 o’ clock, I met the mysterious man. After conversing with him briefly, I saw Chief Mei and Sister Mei. Then I went back to my room and stayed there until 5 o’ clock.”
Following him, Chief Mei spoke: “Since I was mentioned, I’ll speak next.
“Early in the afternoon, didn’t the people who were going to get married leave and try out their outfits? Being the emcee, me and the two bridesmaids, Sister Mei and Traveller Meng, were in the main hall discussing the sequence for tonight and how we were going to decorate the main hall.
After we were done eating lunch, we went back to our respective rooms to rest. I agreed to meet Sister Mei at 2 o’ clock so we could go to the back garden to pick flowers and use them to decorate the venue. At approximately 1:55, we met at the main hall and then we went to the rose garden together, met you, and even saw the mysterious man from the distance. However, I didn’t manage to see what he looked like.
“At 2:30, Sister Mei and I went back to the main hall and continued decorating, which lasted until 3:40 since I went to the main lobby. There’s a lot of antiques there, no? I wanted to see if there was anything suitable for decorating a wedding ceremony. When I returned to the main hall, it was 4:30. When I returned, Sister Mei was still there but there were a lot more flowers. She probably made another trip to the back garden.”
Sister Mei spoke up at that moment: “I’ll follow and speak next then. The earlier part of my timeline is the same as Chief Mei’s. When he went to the main lobby to look for antiques at 3:40, I stayed in the main hall alone to continue decorating, and I finished using all my flowers at 3:50 so I went to the back garden again to pick more flowers. I returned to the main hall half an hour later at 4:20.”
Gu Liang asked: “When you went to the back garden, did you see anything?”
“No.” Sister Mei uttered, “But I didn’t go towards the sunflower garden, I stayed in the rose garden. And naturally, I didn’t hear any movements either.”
Li Xiao Yu interrupted, “Huh? Where’s the other bridesmaid? What about you Su Lan?”
Su Lan replied: “I didn’t follow them to pick flowers. I was resting inside my room. At 2:30 in the afternoon, I met that mysterious man inside my room. He was talking to himself while I ignored him as I was doing my hair and make-up. I went to the bathroom halfway through and he was gone by the time I came out.
“At 3 in the afternoon, I went to Princess Rose’s bedroom on the third floor to find a few evening gowns to use as bridesmaid dresses, and I helped Sister Mei pick one as well.
“After I was done selecting the clothes, I went to the main hall. At 4:10, I pa.s.sed by the main lobby and saw Chief Mei, and when I entered the main hall, I saw Sister Mei returning with the picked flowers.”
After hearing Su Lan’s narration, Gu Liang made a swift judgement.
There were a total of 6 players in this script, it was impossible for there to be 3 murderers at the same time.
Sister Mei and Chief Mei talked about their timeline first, Su Lan spoke last.
And the timeline Su Lan recounted could testify for Su Lan and Chief Mei.
Since that was the case, it meant that Chief Mei and Sister Mei should not be lying where these crucial points in time were concerned.
The person who spoke next was Li Xiao Yu. “My timeline was very simple. After I finished my meal, I went back to my room and rested until 3 o’ clock, which was when the mysterious man appeared in my room. He said a few sentences and then he disappeared. I continued to do my own hair and make-up. That lasted until 5 o’ clock where I remembered that I needed to make a flower bouquet so I went to the back garden and proceeded to find the two corpses.”
Yang Ye was the last to speak: “My timeline is even simpler. I ate lunch, rested up, met the mysterious man at 3:30, and I was told that someone died at 5 o’ clock. The end. From the afternoon to 5 o’ clock, I was in my room the entire time.”
* * *
After the six players issued their statements, no one spoke for a long moment.
Everyone had their heads lowered as they scrutinised every person’s timeline in an attempt to see if they could find a breakthrough.
After another period of time, Gu Liang opened a book and opened his mouth to say: “I was concealing a piece of information just now. But now that we’ve heard everyone’s timeline, I can say it.
“Inside the Eastern Magician’s book, one of the pages mentioned that a fantasy spell could create a dreamscape. But this dreamscape must be based on reality. For instance, if I met a person before I entered the dream, I can use his appearance to ‘create’ a person that is identical to him in the dream. It’s just that his memories will be designed by me.
“But the key here is that I can’t create a person I’ve never seen before out of nothingness in my dream.
“Which is why I previously said that it’s certainly possible that the Duke came back to life again and saw the three corpses on the southern road, before he decided to use their appearance as he was constructing his dreamscape. But of course, this is just a possibility.
“And therein lies the first question: some of us are among living, how did we manage to enter the dream? This might determine the murderer’s motivation to kill.”
Gu Liang paused before he continued, “The other and more imperative problem, which was also brought up by the Magician is that— In principle, no matter what the people in the dream encounter, they should not suffer from any damage.
“But there is one exception, which is that under the condition where their heart gets wounded— if the heart of any person inside the dream is wounded, they will immediately die in the dream, which will stimulate the brain of the dream creator.
“Naturally, after the dream creator’s brain receives the stimulation from the death of a character, they can reconstruct the character again and allow him to live again in the dream. But the Magician advises the dream creator against such actions. Because doing so will throw the narrative logic inside the dreamscape into chaos, and it’s impossible to predict the string of consequences that would be catalysed. For example, the dream creator might become submerged in their heavy and repeating dreamscape, completely stripped of their ability to regain consciousness.”
Gu Liang closed the book, saying, “That’s basically how it works. If there are no exceptions, then this is all the information pertaining to dreams that can be found in this book that spans more than a thousand pages. If everyone feels like it’s not enough, we can look for more together.”
“I think it’s enough.”
Chief Mei was the one who said those words.
He suddenly stood up, making it apparent that he was a little agitated. “I understand why you’re bringing up these two questions. The first question concerns the principle of the dreamscape construction, which will help us think of the motivation to kill. But I think the second question is more important right now.
“The Magician’s excerpt is pointing towards two things. Firstly, once a person in the dream is stabbed in the heart, they will immediately die in the dream, which means that the special const.i.tution for vampires doesn’t exist. No matter what ident.i.ty everyone believes themselves to be in this dream, as long as their heart is pierced with the cross, they will die immediately, and there is no 3 to 5 hour restriction before death occurs.
“Secondly, the people in the dream won’t truly get injured. This implies that even if they were to fall from higher elevation, their bodies will not receive any damage! He will only appear to be dead in the dream once his heart is pierced, and if the Duke doesn’t reconstruct that person in the dream again, he will not revive.
“This can explain why the deceased didn’t incur any damage on his body or the back of head after he was stabbed to death in Yang Ye’s room and later pushed off the balcony on the sixth floor.”
Chief Mei could not hold back from telling Yang Ye: “The suspicions on you are truly heavy.
“You were the last person to see the mysterious man. Your balcony, the ground on the first floor facing and surrounding your balcony, and the road leading to the sunflowers, all have traces of blood. How are you going to explain this? Even if Magnate Rong wasn’t killed by you, it’s highly likely that you killed the mysterious man at least. You killed him, pushed him off the sixth floor, and then went downstairs, followed the cl.u.s.ters of brushes and brought him all the way to the sunflower garden.”
“Before I answer this question, I want to ask the others a question. Xiao Yu, and Su Lan—”
Yang Ye’s gaze swept past the two of them as he asked: “Both of you met the mysterious man inside your room, right?”
The two ladies nodded and Yang Ye followed up with another question: “He appeared in your room out of thin air, right?”
“Yes.” Li Xiao Yu replied, “I suddenly saw him when I looked back.”
Su Lan nodded her head as well. “He suddenly appeared, yes. My door was closed.”
“That’s how it should be.”
Yang Ye took out the room card that Li Xiao Yu found in the underbrush and said: “This card and the bloodstains were both found in the vicinity of the ground floor that was directly facing my room on the sixth floor. But when the mysterious man entered our rooms, he didn’t need to use this card. It’s obvious that this card doesn’t belong to him. Therefore, the situation where I killed him and pushed him downstairs, which led to the card dropping from his body, doesn’t exist.”
Chief Mei said: “This card could have dropped from your body.”
Yang Ye: “This card is the all-purpose card from Butler Hao’s room. If I wanted to kill the mysterious man, can I ask which room he stayed in, such that it would require me to use this card in order to kill him? I don’t even know who he is.”
Chief Mei said: “Then you took this card because you wanted to kill Magnate Rong.”
Yang Ye refuted: “So you’re saying that after I killed Magnate Rong, I threw his corpse onto the ground floor that was directly facing my balcony and carried it to the sunflower garden, all of the sake of clearing my own suspicion? Is that it?”
Chief Mei: “Naturally. Since the sunflower garden was the place where we discovered the corpses, it’s incredibly hard for us to find other traces. Even the bloodstains there are minimal is best. We couldn’t have made the mental a.s.sociation to your balcony, and we couldn’t have antic.i.p.ated that there would be blood on the ground floor around the periphery of the ancient castle facing your balcony. You clearly moved his corpse for the sake of covering the real scene of the crime.”
Yang Ye chuckled, and the notes of laughter sounded extremely confident. “That would imply that I definitely killed Magnate Rong in my room right? Otherwise, had I killed Magnate Rong in his own room, I don’t need to conceal the first crime scene at all; I can directly throw the card inside his room, and that would ensure that anyone could have taken the room card to go into his bedroom to kill him, right? There’s absolutely no need for me to go through all that ha.s.sle.”
Chief Mei abruptly understood something and he frowned.
Yang Ye laughed as he added, “Since I could have only killed him in my room, that can only suggest that I found an excuse to meet Magnate Rong in my room before I acted.
“Since that’s the case, why do I need to use the all-purpose room card?”
Yang Ye’s index finger knocked on the table surface once.
“Hence, it isn’t possible for me to kill the mysterious man in my room and shove him downstairs, and it’s not possible that I killed Magnate Rong.”
At this juncture, Gu Liang closed the notebook in front of him, held it, and then stood up. “Yang Ye, move, let’s have a one-on-one.”
* * *
After being the NPC actor for the roles of Maid Liu, Boyfriend Feng and many more, the Yun Xuan of today had also changed into a full length white robe.
Presently, she was standing in front of a small mountain as she was holding onto tea with both hands.
However, she was not holding the tea steadily and the liquid was shaking constantly because her arms were trembling.
As she stared at the mountain in front of her, she became increasingly terrified.
Two hours ago, she saw Ming Yue walk into the centre of that mountain.
Back then, the mountain had been split apart, like a sharp hatchet had cleaved open the mountain from the top.
Ming Yue had walked into the centre before the cleaved mountain started to close, thereby squas.h.i.+ng his entire body.
Two hours later, this mountain was beginning to split open again.
After another long moment, Ming Yue walked out from the middle.
When he eventually stopped in front of her, Yun Xuan could clearly see that cold sweat was pouring down from his forehead.
Yun Xuan was frightened into lowering her head immediately, and she did not dare to look at him.
Ming Yue, however, laughed when he saw Yun Xuan’s complexion.
He accepted the tea that Yun Xuan was offering with both hands, took a sip of it, and placed it back on the tray.
“What is there to be afraid of? It’s once every month. You’ll be seeing it frequently from now on.”
While Ming Yue said those words in a careless manner, he continued to forge ahead, “When I just arrived here, I had to do this everyday.”
Yun Xuan did not dare to speak, only following in his footsteps silently.
Ming Yue asked her: “Have you prepared the things I asked for?”
“Yes.” Yun Xuan mumbled.
Ming Yue questioned: “What are you being afraid of? Do you find that the scene of my punishment is scary, or are you afraid that I’ll take my anger out on you?”
How could Yun Xuan possibly dare to utter a word? Hence, she refused to even give a word of answer.
Ming Yue seemed to find this rather meaningless, so he stopped asking.
Upon entering the room, he noted that the brush, ink, paper, and inkslab he wanted was already prepared by Yun Xuan.
Ming Yue went forward to sit on the cus.h.i.+on before he picked up the brush to begin writing characters. “Thanks. After suffering from the punishment, practicing calligraphy can allow your heart to regain its calm. It’s a good method to cultivate your moral character and psyche. Or else, I might continue to think about how I can retaliate against society.”
Yun Xuan did not have the courage to reply. Instead, she merely poured a hot cup of tea and placed it at the side of his table.
Then, she saw the two rows of characters that Ming Yue wrote.
“There are swallowed sobs when death is the cause of parting, but life has its sorrowful partings again and again.”
“An old friend enters my dream, proof of my longing memory.”
Entering his dream?
Yun Xuan could not help but think:
— Was he pointing towards the story of the Folding Ancient Castle, or… Was he remembering himself with emotion?
Translator’s Note: The two rows of characters that Ming Yue wrote is from the poem ‘Dreaming of Li Bai’ (梦李白) by Du Fu (杜甫), which was a poem that Du Fu composed when his fellow Tang Dynasty Poet Li Bai was exiled to Ye Lang. It is a two part poem: the first part elaborates on his mental state when he dreams of Li Bai for the first time, expressing his concerns about his friend’s life and death; the second part writes about the image of Li Bai that he saw in his dream, expressing his sympathy to an old friend for the tragedy he encountered.
Both lines that Ming Yue writes (1) 死别已吞声，生别常恻恻 and (2) 故人入我梦，明我长相忆, are from the first part of the poem. The first line talks about how the sorrow and pain from being parted forever by death will eventually fade, whereas partings in life are oftentimes so painful that it makes a person wish that they were dead. The second line, in saying that ‘an old friend enters my dream, proof of my longing memory’, tries to express that ‘you must know that you occupy my thoughts hard and bitterly, which is why you have finally come to see me in my dream’.
(Additionally, Li Bai lived quite an interesting life, and his most famous poems were written while he was drunk. Do search him up when you have the time~ )