Kaleidoscope of Death

Lin Qiushi carried Ruan Baijie on his back, while the rest of the group split up into three to carry the heavy timber on their backs.

The road was slippery in the snow, so everyone walked extra carefully.

Xiong Lac held an oil lamp in front to clear the way, greeting everyone to take their time.

Originally, the snow was only falling in stars, however, as they walked back, the snow suddenly became heavy, like goose feathers, drifting all over the sky.

Ruan Baijie wasn't heavy, Lin Qiushi carried her quite easily, he kept his head down and carefully watched the road underneath him, walking forward step by step.

The wind was getting louder and louder, even to the point of being a bit harsh, the falling snowflakes blocked most of Lin Qiushi's vision, he began to have some trouble seeing the people in front of him.

This feeling was very bad, Lin Qiushi's footsteps slightly paused and was about to stop, but then he heard Ruan Baijie's voice in his ears, she said, "Don't stop, keep walking."

Lin Qiushi had no choice but to continue forward at the words.

However, the further he went, the more he felt that something was wrong, at first Lin Qiushi thought that it was too cold and he was confused by the cold, but as the road got further away, he finally noticed the source of the offense.

It was too light, the person behind him was too light, as if he was already weightless, Lin Qiushi swallowed and tried to send his back up a bit.

---It really wasn't his illusion, the person lying on his back was light, like paper mache, and although the form was there, it was weightless. A thin layer of sweat rose on Lin Qiushi's forehead as he called out, "Bai Jie."

There was no voice.

"Bai Jie." Lin Qiushi continued to call.

"What's wrong?" Ruan Baijie pressed her face to Lin Qiushi's neck, her face cold and her skin wet and soft, giving Lin Qiushi a bad association, and said, "What did you call me for."

"Nothing." Lin Qiushi said, "Just asking if you're cold."

"I'm not cold." Ruan Baijie said, "It's not cold at all."

Lin Qiushi didn't dare to stop, he had been walking with his head buried, but now he raised his eyes to observe his surroundings, but he found himself far away from the people in front of him.

In the midst of the snow, he could only vaguely see the fuzzy oil lamp in front of him and a few back shadows walking in the blizzard, and what he was carrying on his back didn't seem to be Ruan Baijie, but something else.

Lin Qiushi slightly bit his teeth.

"You're shivering." The thing on his back had the same voice as Ruan Baijie's, and she said softly, softly, "Are you cold?"

"Fine." Lin Qiushi said, "It's just a little cold."

"Do you want to go somewhere where it's not cold?" She asked this, "A warm place, where it won't snow or get dark."

Lin Qiushi wondered if he should ask what place it was next, but he didn't want to ask that question at all, so he simply remained silent.

"Why aren't you talking?" She said.

"Because I'm thinking." Lin Qiushi replied dryly.

She asked, "What's on your mind?"

Lin Qiushi stopped in his tracks for a moment and said loudly, "I'm thinking of how to throw you off!" With that, he instantly scattered his hand and then, without looking back, raced towards the front.

Apparently his choice was the right one, because after he scattered his hands, he didn't hear the sound of any heavy object hitting the ground - that thing was definitely not a person.

Lin Qiushi pulled out and raced, grabbing the gap to look behind him. The glance almost gave him a heart attack. The only thing he saw was the thing he had thrown down, its body lying lifelessly on the snow while its neck grew longer and longer, stretching all the way towards the direction he was running wildly, its head covered in black hair rubbing against the snow, tilting its head to chase after him, "Why did you leave me behind, don't you like me the most?"

Lin Qiushi said angrily, "I fucking love your head-"

Increasingly long head: "..."

Lin Qiushi didn't dare to stop his own pace, only wanting to quickly catch up with his partner in front of him. But to his despair, no matter how fast he ran, the silhouettes and lights in front of him didn't get any closer, as if he was chasing a mirage in his dreams.

The thing behind him, however, was getting closer and closer to him.

It was over, and as the thing was about to catch up to him, Lin Qiushi's heart was overflowing with despair. However, at that moment, his feet seemed to trip over something and his entire body fell heavily to the ground.

"Fuck!" Lin Qiushi fell and even gnawed on a good mouthful of snow, but the action made him feel something pull away from his body, and then he felt someone pick him up right out of the snow.

"Lin Qiushi, Lin Qiushi, are you okay, am I that heavy?" It was Ruan Baijie's voice.

Lin Qiushi managed to get up from the ground and turned his head, seeing the girl who was squatting next to him and poking his cheek with her finger.

And Xiong Lac was the one who picked Lin Qiushi up from the snow, and he said, "Is everything alright?"

Lin Qiushi let out a long breath: "I thought I was fucking dead."

Ruan Baijie tilted her head: "Why?"

Lin Qiushi briefly talked about what had just happened, saying that it was good that he had tripped at the end, or else he might have gotten cold.

"Oh." Ruan Baijie said, "I said why did you fall, I thought I was too heavy."

Lin Qiushi: "It's okay, it's not particularly heavy."

Ruan Baijie curled her lips.

Xiong Lacquer: "Hurry up and get up, they're all going to walk down the slope, it's going to be dark and we need to hurry."

Lin Qiushi nodded, feeling a little pain in his knee as he climbed up, probably because he hurt it when he fell on the ground earlier. But he didn't mention it, instead he followed Xiong Lacquer and the others to continue walking, he originally wanted to carry Ruan Baijie, but in the end, Ruan Baijie refused, saying that Lin Qiushi was too skinny to be carried by him to giggle his chest.

Lin Qiushi asked in a ghostly whisper after hearing, "Do you have breasts..." he felt Ruan Baijie's chest was flat when he was carrying Ruan Baijie just now, and there was no softness at all.

Ruan Baijie got angry when she heard Lin Qiushi's words and said angrily, "Fine, fine, you have big boobs you say it first!"

Lin Qiushi: "........"

The three of them quickened their pace, trying to catch up with the people in front of them, but just then, Lin Qiushi heard a miserable scream.

"Did you guys hear that?" Lin Qiushi asked, and he feared it was a hallucination of his as well.

"Heard that." Bear Paint turned black, "Hurry up, something's wrong."

The three of them ran straight away, but when they reached the front, they saw a horrific scene.

Two of the three people who were carrying the wood were dead, their bodies were directly smashed in half by the wood, and the most terrifying thing was that although their bodies were broken, they were still conscious, their mouths were bleeding, and they couldn't stop screaming and begging for help.

The remaining one, on the other hand, was slumped on the ground, his crotch wet, his mouth collapsing and wailing, "Help - help -"

"What's going on! What the hell is going on!" Bear Paint asked.

Curtis said, "They were walking down the road, but then suddenly they all let go and the wood slid right down, hitting the two men in front of them on the waist."

Before Bearpaint could speak, the remaining survivor got up from the ground and started running all the way, crying, "There's a ghost, help, there's a ghost-"

Before the crowd could react, they watched him run wildly and disappear into the snow curtain.

And the two people left on the ground were dying, their eyes cut off.

"What to do..." the woman in the team cried, wailing incessantly, "Are we all going to die here."

Bearpaint's beard was covered with snowflakes and he sighed, but he looked as calm as could be said, "Let's go, let's carry the wood back first."

This wood smashed people to death, who dared to carry it, everyone refused to move, in the end it was Lin Qiushi who took the initiative to come out and carry the blood-soaked wood together with Xiong Lacquer.

Everyone was silent on the way back, but luckily no more accidents happened.

The two of them first sent the wood to the carpenter. The old man of the carpenter wasn't surprised at all to see the blood on the wood and didn't even ask a question, only reminding them in a mute voice, "Two more are missing."

Xiong Lacquer and Lin Qiushi didn't say anything and turned around to go back to their residence.

The wood smashing down was really strange, something was definitely up to something. Lin Qiushi felt that he had dodged another bullet, he looked at the fire in front of him, dazed, his entire body in a dazed state.

Ruan Baijie sat next to him and suddenly said, "I want to eat noodles yeah."

"Mm." Lin Qiushi said, "I'll rest for a while."

Ruan Baijie said, "What's wrong with you, are you tired?"

"No, I was just thinking about what the meaning of my appearance in this world was." Lin Qiushi said, "I was living in my old place, but suddenly one day I walked out of my house and found twelve iron doors appearing in the hallway, and then I opened one of them..."

Nguyen Baijie listened quietly.

"Then it appeared here." Lin Qiushi said, "The iron gate just means fear and torture?"

Ruan Baijie smiled at the news and she said, "I think it's pointless to think about it now, but maybe this experience isn't torture."

Lin Qiushi: "Then what is it?"

"Perhaps." Ruan Baijie looked gentle, "It means new life."

Lin Qiushi knitted his brows.

Only the two of them were left in the living room at this time, and everyone else had gone back to their rooms to rest. After what had happened today, everyone was feeling exhausted, so Bear Lacquer decided to repair for an hour before discussing what to do next. Saying what to do, everyone actually knew in their hearts that if they wanted to get out of here early, they should still go cut down the tree, even if something even more horrible might happen the next time they did.

"Go." Ruan Baijie, "I'm hungry."

Lin Qiushi stood up and went to the kitchen.

Ruan Baijie looked at his back and gave a meaningless smile.

The noodles tasted good, and after the two of them finished eating, everyone was almost rested. So they gathered in the living room again and started discussing the road afterwards.

"They should have been nightmared on the way down." Zhang Zishuang, a member of the group who was calmer than the others, said, "I saw two people in front of me stop in their tracks."

"There are a thousand strange ways to die here, so don't even care how they died." Xiong Lacquer said nonchalantly, "The question now is the conditions of death."

Whether it was cutting down a tree, or carrying a log, or traveling in the snow, all could be conditions for a ghost to kill.

"Rule it out," Curt said, "Cut down the tree everyone, but only the three of them carried the wood."

"Then why is it okay for me and Bear Paint to carry the wood?" Lin Qiushi asked.

"There are two possibilities, one is carrying trees, and the second is that there are other conditions." Xiong Lacquer said, "Because there's a limit to the number of ghosts that can kill every day, it's impossible to kill us all in one go." That's why he had the courage to carry that wood back with Lin Qiushi.

"But how do we verify it?" Curt asked.

"Why validate it." Nguyen Baijie played with her hair and said, very ungraciously, "Just avoid these conditions, won't you, and none of us can afford the cost of failed validation."

"Oh." Curt responded indifferently. Her attitude towards Ruan Baijie hadn't been too good, she had always been lovingly indifferent on weekdays, and yes, Ruan Baijie, a pretty and occasionally fond of making a girl, would always be less popular with people of the same sex sometimes.

"Then we won't let anyone carry the tree tomorrow." Xiong Lacquer said, "Let's get a tool and haul the wood down the hill."

The others agreed.

"What about the one that got away?" Another question was asked, in fear of the emotionally distraught teammate, "Just leave him alone?"

"How do you manage?" Teammate Zhang Zishuang, "Look at the sky outside, it's going to be dark soon, and it's hard to say what will happen after dark, so you're going to take your life to find it?"

Everyone fell silent, sort of agreeing with him.

In a world like this, where everyone's life was not guaranteed, it was already a great luxury to survive, let alone go save someone else's life.

"Let's go, rest early, we still have to continue tomorrow." Xiong Lacquer said and stood up to go back to his room.

Ruan Baijie, however, looked at the weather outside and said, "I don't know if the snow will stop tomorrow."

It turned out to be a self-fulfilling prophecy.

It had been snowing all night, and there was no intention of stopping in the morning.

About the time someone died yesterday, nothing horrible happened last night and everyone managed to make it through the night again.

There was so much snow that it became difficult to even get out of the house, let alone cut down trees and bring them back in such a blizzard. However, compared to the bad weather, it was clear that those ghosts in the dark were more frightening, so even though the weather was bad, no one offered a day's delay from start to finish.

Silent morning, silent departure, everyone seemed to have lost the ability to talk because of what happened yesterday.

The only one who stays in shape is Nguyen Baijie, who walks in the snow, humming a song, as if this trip is just an inadequate tour.

The author has something to say: Lin Qiushi: Why do you like eating noodles so much.

Ruan Baijie: No ah, I just like to eat your bottom.

Lin Qiushi: Huh?

Nguyen Baijie: Oh, it's the next noodle.