S.C.I Mystery Series Volume 3 Chapter 22

Smiling Murder 21 - Testing the Waters

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When the music stopped, the bartender took out a brass bell and rang it a few times.

Everyone looked up at him and the bartender said, “The game is about to start, everybody, are you ready?”

The crowd nodded, they had all come for the game which was said to be fun. They all listened to the bartender say, “The rules of this game are very simple, all you have to do is complete a required task.”

“What kind of task?” Da Ding asked.

The bartender smiled slightly, “There are corpses hiding in a room in the back. You will all go in and whoever finds the most corpses is the winner. For evidence, you must bring the eyes of the corpses back here.”

The crowd couldn’t help but widen their eyes, and the bartender hurriedly laughed, “Don’t worry, they aren’t real human corpses, but rather artificial corpses, all plastic.”

The crowd breathed a sigh of relief as the bartender said, “Everyone has ten minutes to go in one by one, and you will leave after the ten minutes are done. You are not allowed to cheat by talking to each other.”

Everyone frowned as one man asked, “Wouldn’t the first one to go be the luckiest?”

“No,” The bartender laughed, “when someone leaves, someone inside will restore the bodies’ positions.”

The crowd all nodded, thinking it was feasible.

“Let’s draw lots to determine the order of entry.” The bartender brought over a large, clear glass bowl which contained a total of fifteen balls. The bartender carried the bowl and went over to people one by one, allowing the fifteen people participating to pick a ball.

Soon, it was Zhan Zhao’s turn.

Zhan Zhao suddenly pulled Bai Yutang and said, “Let’s not participate…”

Bai Yutang looked at Zhan Zhao and immediately said, “Uh… okay!!” After saying that, he said sorry to the bartender and tried to pull Zhan Zhao to leave.

“Ah, wait a minute.” The bartender hurriedly stopped them and said, “Uh, if there aren’t enough people, the game can’t continue. Since you are here, you might as well participate, it won’t take long anyway.”

Zhan Zhao looked at Bai Yutang and said, “You didn’t say it was this kind of game…”

Bai Yutang was a bit helpless, “I’ve heard people say that… it’s not bad here.”

“When you guys go in, you’ll find it very interesting indeed.” The bartender smiled meaningfully, then passed the clear glass bowl in his hand over to Zhan Zhao for him to pick.

Zhan Zhao hesitated for a moment, then reached out to pick a ball. Bai Yutang picked one as well.

When the bartender saw that all the lots had been drawn, he walked back to the bar and said, “Please unscrew the ball and look at the number inside.”

Everyone unscrewed their ball, only to see a slip of paper inside… Zhan Zhao looked at his number – 15. Bai Yutang’s number was 7.

Zhan Zhao frowned slightly, so that means he is the last to go in?

Bai Yutang locked eyes with him. Zhan Zhao seemed to show some resistance and acted like he didn’t really want to go in. Bai Yutang pulled him close and said, “It seems quite interesting, let’s do it before we leave, hmm?”

Zhan Zhao nodded worriedly, a little uneasy.

Bai Yutang asked him puzzledly, “You seem worried, is there something wrong?”

“It’s not that,” Zhan Zhao hurriedly shook his head, “I just feel strange.”

Bai Yutang nodded, and comfortingly stroked his back, “Don’t worry, it will be fine.”

Zhan Zhao smiled, his eyes a little misty and panicked, and his hands held his glass as he kept hiding his nervousness.

At the same time, Bai Yutang’s eyes turned slightly doubtful when he looked at him, and the two worked seamlessly together.

Then the game began.

The first one to go was Bai Jintang.

Bai Jintang stood up and walked to the door of the room specified by the bartender, who handed him a scalpel.

Bai Jintang took it in his hand and wanted to laugh a little, he was all too familiar with this kind of scalpel.

The bartender then opened the room and Bai Jintang walked in…

Ten minutes actually went by very quickly, but for the crowd waiting outside, it felt longer than normal.

It wasn’t long before Bai Jintang was seen walking out. He returned the knife to the bartender, but did not bring out any eyes.

The bartender frowned slightly. Looking at Bai Jintang, he asked, “Why didn’t you bring any out?”

Bai Jintang shrugged, “Boring.”

The bartender laughed helplessly, then asked Bai Jintang to go back to his original seat and to sit and wait.

Then came the turns of some people they didn’t know. A few went in but came out scared, and others went in and dug out an eye or two, but they all came out looking pale.

Soon, it was Gongsun’s turn.

Gongsun gladly got up, walked over to the bartender, took the scalpel, and went in…

Ten minutes later, he came out, and they saw Gongsun holding five or six eyeballs in his hand. The most interesting thing was that those eyeballs still had blood on them, and they looked as though they were real.

“The models are quite well made.” Gongsun couldn’t help but exclaim, “It’s just so realistic, no wonder so many people are afraid to try it out.”

“Oh?” The bartender asked Gongsun with a smile, “This gentleman seems to have had formal training?”

Gongsun nodded and bluntly said, “I’m a doctor.”

“Oh.” The bartender smiled and nodded in understanding. 

The next to go was Bai Yutang.

Zhan Zhao told Bai Yutang to be careful, and Bai Yutang nodded then walked into the room.

The bartender looked down at the clock as Zhan Zhao looked on with a worried and seemingly disturbed face as Bai Yutang entered the room.

The bartender then concentrated on recording everyone's scores in a book on the sidelines.

Soon, the ten minutes were up. Bai Yutang walked out and gave the bartender the knife in his hand, along with a whole lot of eyeballs… But his OCD tendencies of cleanliness were still quite severe. He held them all out in a napkin with a look of disgust on his face, and it was clear how much of a depressing experience this was for him.

Bai Yutang brought out a very large number of eyeballs, which showed that he had found many corpses.

Zhan Zhao took a quick glance and the bartender counted eight eyes, which meant that four fake corpses had been found. However, Zhan Zhao reckoned that Bai Yutang probably held back so that his strong expertise would not arouse suspicion.

Of course, he was absolutely sure that there was video surveillance of whatever was going on inside.

After Bai Yutang came out and returned to Zhan Zhao’s side, Zhan Zhao raised his eyes to look at him, and the bartender smiled at the two of them, “No cheating is allowed.”

Bai Yutang smiled and stroked Zhan Zhao’s head, “It’s alright, no need to be nervous.”

Zhan Zhao breathed a sigh of relief and continued to sit there and wait.

After that, the others went in one by one, and finally, it was Zhan Zhao’s turn.

Zhan Zhao stood up, walked to the door, took the scalpel handed over by the bartender, and pushed the door open to enter the room.

After entering the room, Zhan Zhao froze as he saw that it was far from the chaos he imagined…It was not like a haunted house, which would have been a good place to hide a body, nor was it an amusement park…

Instead, it was just a long hallway with walls on both sides, and along the walls were square drawers, all with handles on them, but the key was that each drawer was identical… It was obvious that you couldn’t open them all in ten minutes.

Zhan Zhao suddenly understood why Bai Jintang did not take out a single eye, he was probably too lazy to find them.

Gongsun and Bai Yutang must have opened the drawers one by one. Gongsun probably enjoyed digging out the corpses’ eyes, so he was a bit slow, but he was professional enough, and Bai Yutang was simply just quick… The others were all slower than those two, which is normal.

These were the thoughts of Zhan Zhao as he walked. He didn't show much excitement, he just walked in slowly and looked around somewhat cluelessly.

At this time, suddenly… a voice came from above, saying, “There are corpses in all of the drawers in the middle.”

Zhan Zhao froze, and then, looking around, he heard the voice come from a loudspeaker in the corner, “Hurry up or time will run out.”

Zhan Zhao heard that the voice was very gentle and did not have an eerie feeling to it, so he walked over, reached out, and gently opened a drawer…

Looking inside, Zhan Zhao just frowned… he showed all of the emotions a normal person would have… and acted a little more cowardly, taking a step backwards in fear and dropping the scalpel in his hand to the ground.

This action… elicited a light laugh from the man.

Zhan Zhao reached out and picked up the scalpel, then walked over to the corpse again… The corpse was made too much like the real thing. Zhan Zhao reached out and poked it, and it's hard, rubbery texture revealed that it was indeed a fake corpse.

Zhan Zhao reached out and frowned as he went to dig into the corpse’s eyes… and when the scalpel was stabbed into the eye socket… blood flowed out.

Looking at the crimson blood, Zhan Zhao’s mood changed. He became progressively more impatient, and the movements of his hands became harder and harder. Eventually, his entire mood was lifted and he started to get agitated. His movements became frantic, as if he was addicted to desperately cutting the corpse and watching the blood flow out.

Just as he started having fun… suddenly, he heard the sound of ‘bang bang bang bang’ ring out.

Zhan Zhao jerked his head up, and the grim expression on his face froze.

At the same time, the sound of laughter was heard, “Having a good time? Ah, time’s up.”

Zhan Zhao stared at the bloody corpse in front of him for a long time. Suddenly, he threw away the scalpel in his hand and retreated to the other side of the room with a frightened look on his face. Looking at his hands and arms that were full of blood… Zhan Zhao ran out in a panic.

At the door, Bai Yutang and the others were waiting anxiously when they saw Zhan Zhao bang the door open and rush out of the bar without even looking at the crowd.

Bai Yutang was shocked and hurriedly chased after him… The crowd looked at each other in disbelief, not knowing what happened.

The bartender smiled faintly, bowing his head and taking notes. Putting the pen and paper down onto the bar, he said, “Today’s game is over, and everyone will be informed of the final result.”

The crowd all got up and left, though they were still full of suspicion.

Zhan Zhao ran a long way away and finally turned to the corner and got into Bai Yutang’s car. Bai Yutang caught up to him and hurriedly got into the car, “Cat, is everything alright?”

Zhan Zhao blinked at him and laughed, “What are you so nervous about, I was acting.”

“...” Bai Yutang sighed in relief, “I was scared to death.”

Zhan Zhao smiled, “What? Doubting my professionalism, huh?”

Bai Yutang frowned at the sight of the blood on Zhan Zhao’s hands, “Still laughing? We’re going home to wash up!”  After saying that, he started the car and drove Zhan Zhao home.

Zhan Zhao sat in the passenger seat and didn’t look unusual. Bai Yutang looked at him and said, “You don’t have to put on a smile for me if you’re not happy, I understand.”

Zhan Zhao was stunned, then, nodding with a bitter smile, he lowered his head and let out a long sigh, “It was really hard.”

‿︵‿︵ʚ˚̣̣̣͙ɞ・❉・ ʚ˚̣̣̣͙ɞ‿︵‿︵

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Translator Notes

Someone give Zhan Zhao an Oscar! He even fooled Bai Yutang with his acting!

Please feel free to comment any mistakes I made so I can improve and do better as I go through the book.

Translated: August 30, 2021