The north-facing bedroom was assigned to Cheng Tingyu.
The bedroom was not large, with neat and delicate furniture inside. Against the wall stood a single bed covered with soft, snow-white sheets. There was an ordinary window on the wall, without any security features, which looked easy to break.
Cheng Tingyu's emotions were somewhat subtle.
Based on her experience reading various literary works, when arriving at an unfamiliar place, if the room's window is locked, it is likely that hostile forces will break in through the door at midnight. However, if the window can be opened, then the window might replace the bedroom door as the entry point for external enemies.
In summary, the likelihood of finding an absolutely safe house structure in a story is not very high; the specific probability depends on the writer's narrative approach.
Cheng Tingyu placed the candlestick by the bedside and received a box of matches from the two owners of the wooden house.
Xiao Jia and Xiao Yi stood at the door, smiling happily as they bid Cheng Tingyu goodnight: "Honored guest, we hope you have a pleasant dream." Then they considerately closed the door for her.
Cheng Tingyu sat on the edge of the bed, a strange feeling rising in his heart.
The clues within the copy were too few, and it seemed as if her heart was split in two. One half regretted not hanging the [Lucky Decision Coin] around her neck back then, thinking she might have had a prophetic dream; while the other half clearly realized that those thoughts were not her own will, but more likely the [Lucky Decision Coin] causing trouble while its owner's sanity value was low.
The white bed was very soft, holding an extraordinary allure for a weary traveler who had walked all day. After sitting for a while, Cheng Tingyu reluctantly stood up, blew out the candle, and drew the bedroom curtains.
The bedroom plunged into darkness.
Cheng Tingyu softly comforted herself, "Actually, I'm not very hungry either."
She really wanted to convince herself to stop recalling the sight and sound of the milk and bread from the afternoon, but as a non-curse word player, her words had no effect on herself.
The texture of the curtains was like cotton, and Cheng Tingyu pulled them casually. Moonlight streamed through the gaps in the drapes, falling onto the floor like a thin, silvery line.
Slowly, the long silver-white line on the ground began to shift.
The bedroom window was clearly closed, yet the chill of the night seeped in through every crevice. In the darkness, Cheng Tingyu sat motionless, his gaze never once leaving the floor.
Time is flowing.
She clearly hadn't fallen asleep, yet the plot continued to unfold slowly.
So, does that mean the following events will happen regardless of her state?
Cheng Tingyu's heart beat exactly fifty times in one minute. She listened to the sound of her own heartbeat, carefully gauging the level of exhaustion in her body.
The fatigue from the long journey clung to him like a shadow; Cheng Tingyu could feel his strength steadily waning.
Cheng Tingyu, although unable to use the abilities of an "appraiser," still had the enhanced vision in her right eye, allowing her to see everything in the room without the need for lighting. However, after standing up, she still walked to the table first and picked up the extinguished candlestick.
Her footsteps were very light, not making a sound the entire way.
There were no unusual occurrences in the room, so it could be assumed that the plot point causing time to continue flowing was not in the northern bedroom.
Cheng Tingyu turned around and walked towards the bedroom door.
Perhaps because it had been many years, there was actually a slight gap in the crack of the bedroom door.
Theoretically, the candlelight in the hallway would seep into the bedroom through the crack in the door, but from Cheng Tingyu's perspective, all he could see was darkness.
Perhaps it was because the night was so deep that Xiao Jia and Xiao Yi had already extinguished all the candles in the wooden house.
Cheng Tingyu walked to the bedroom door and quietly stopped. At this moment, she was only a step away from the crack in the door.
In order to grasp the situation outside the door, she slightly lowered herself.
Then, swiftly snuffing out the candle, he took the end of the candlestick with the pointed tip and thrust it fiercely through the crack in the door.
"——Aaaaaaah!!!"
A piercing woman's voice sounded from outside the door.
The bedroom door was slammed open from the inside, hitting Xiao Yi heavily before he had a chance to move away.
"Standing guard at the guest's bedroom door is indeed a very unusual way to treat a guest."
After entering the dungeon, Cheng Tingyu's physical condition had actually deteriorated, but some basic muscle memory remained. Concerned that Xiao Jia and Xiao Yi could team up against her, she took the initiative and pierced the eyeball that Xiao Jia had placed in the door crack.
At this moment, the two of them had completely lost their previous enthusiasm, their faces now twisted with a murderous ferocity.
——That is the ferocity of the living.
Cheng Tingyu gazed at the two people at the door, smiling faintly, "Why are you surprised? You clearly knew I wasn't asleep."
Upon hearing that Cheng Tingyu had arrived, a trace of undisguisable astonishment flashed across Xiao Yi's face.
Seeing the other person's expression, Cheng Tingyu knew that he had probably guessed part of the game rules correctly.
After she entered the room, the two of them had been crouching outside, waiting for the right moment to act.
Cheng Tingyu had a hypothesis: if he were to fall asleep, the plot would immediately jump to the moment when Xiao Jia and Xiao Yi decided it was time to take action.
But if Cheng Tingyu hadn't fallen asleep, whether the two sides would have a conflict, and when the conflict would occur, would all become unknown variables. It is precisely because of this that time within the scenario would slowly move forward.
The current situation differs somewhat from the time-jumping scenario during the meal..
At present, the clues are insufficient. Cheng Tingyu deduced that dining was a predetermined and inevitable event, while the nighttime conflict was related to the characters' own improvisations.
Besides that, she had also been pondering the significance of the little cabin to herself.
First of all, it shouldn't be for supplies. Cheng Tingyu wasn't originally hungry, nor did she feel any fatigue. The reason she ended up with this series of debuffs was because she overheard Xiao Jia and the other person's conversation.
During the subsequent meal, Xiao Jia and Xiao Yi displayed such bizarre eating postures that any participant with even a bit of vigilance would find hard to ignore.
Cheng Tingyu felt that the other party was not hoping for her to regain her strength, but rather doing everything possible to weaken the guest's condition.
So, before the moment of falling asleep, Cheng Tingyu took up the candlestick.
——Although there were also farming tools behind the house, they were too conspicuous to be used as weapons.
When she entered the bedroom, Cheng Tingyu was still unsure if anything would happen next, until she noticed that time was continuously advancing.
This means that the plot of the story has already begun.
She couldn't see the light outside through the crack in the door, not because Xiao Jia and the other person had extinguished the candle in the room, but because they had never left, their bodies firmly blocking the light from the corridor.
Cheng Tingyu flicked the blood off the candlestick and said unhurriedly, "The scene of seeing the enemy's eyes through the crack in the door has appeared in many literary works. I think it's time to add some novelty to the subsequent plot."
Xiao Yi took a step back, assuming a defensive stance, his expression filled with shock.
He no longer looked like an AI at all, and hurriedly said, "You haven't eaten anything, nor have you slept. You must be both tired and sleepy now..."
Cheng Tingyu was indeed not in a good state, but she hadn't lost her basic judgment: "If you were completely confident, you wouldn't have first tried to weaken my condition before making a move. After all, a traveler capable of long journeys is always more formidable than two kids staying at home."
After she finished speaking, she suddenly paused.
At the same time, Xiao Yi's face turned ashen.
Cheng Tingyu still felt hungry and exhausted, yet his weakened physical condition had clearly improved somewhat.
She moved her wrist, seemingly lost in thought: "I see... The words here possess power."
So, after deciding that he should be stronger, this became a fact in the story.
Cheng Tingyu's combat skills were not particularly outstanding. At least when facing scavengers, she would decisively choose to flee. However, her earlier analysis was correct. Xiao Jia and Xiao Yi would do everything they could to weaken their guests' condition before making a move, causing them to become suspicious and unable to eat or sleep peacefully. This was precisely because they lacked confidence in their combat abilities.
And as for Cheng Tingyu herself, she could at least rely on her own combat prowess to fool the inspection team, making them believe she was a flesh-and-blood player.
Xiao Yi was not her match. Originally, with Xiao Jia included, the two of them actually had the power to fight. However, after Xiao Jia's eyes were severely injured by a sharp weapon, his combat ability was greatly diminished due to the chaos and intense pain, almost rendering him out of the fight.
"Thud!"
The body of Xiao Yi, who was trying to escape, flew up and crashed onto the floor, face down, almost flattened. Cheng Tingyu stepped on his back, rendering him immobile
Xiao Yi was struggling, but soon he had no strength left to struggle. His nose was already broken, and the bones in his body made unbearable creaking sounds.
Cheng Tingyu murmured to himself, "This is also a way of verification."
When under attack, Xiao Jia and Xiao Yi could no longer maintain their disguise as NPCs. Generally, participants who had just entered the instance wouldn't act against Xiao Jia and Xiao Yi without first figuring out their identities, except for those whose behavior was already quite abnormal.
It is precisely because of this that Cheng Tingyu feels his current mental state is quite normal.
She chose to take the initiative only after noticing the anomaly in the copy.
The injured Xiaojia, with his left eye hurt, wobbled to his feet. Taking advantage of Cheng Tingyu's distraction, he quietly moved towards the end of the corridor.
Their judgment was wrong. The one who came in today was not prey to be easily hunted, but rather the most terrifying hunter.
"Please wait a moment."
"..."
Xiao Jia heard the young man's voice coming from behind. His words were still polite, but it was clear he was looking at Xiao Yi on the ground. However, the pitch-black eye on his right side moved in a different direction from the other, like a snake watching a frog, fixing on Xiao Jia who wanted to escape.
There was a momentary blank in my mind.
For some reason, Xiao Jia felt a spine-chilling sense of horror. However, just as she mustered the courage to take another look, the young man's eyes returned to normal.
She kept her eyes on Xiao Yi, only glancing at Xiao Jia with the corner of her eye, as if everything Xiao Jia had just seen was merely an illusion born out of excessive fear.
Cheng Tingyu casually turned the blood-stained candlestick in his hand and said with a hint of helplessness, "I can't control two people at the same time right now, so you'd better not wander around."
"..."
Already feeling fear, Xiao Jia was momentarily bewildered, completely unable to understand why Cheng Tingyu would directly tell her not to wander off.
The two sides were clearly in a hostile relationship. Since the opponent couldn't control both people at the same time, wasn't it a perfect opportunity for the other side to escape? So why reveal it?
However, soon, a thought that made her shiver slightly emerged in Xiaojia's mind. She stared at Cheng Tingyu, then uncontrollably glanced at the blood-stained candlestick in his hand, and then nodded somewhat stiffly.
——She always felt that if she or Xiao Yi made any sudden movements, the other party would stab their heads with the candlestick.
Cheng Tingyu curved his lips: "This is just fine."
"Although it's already very late, since no one seems to have any intention of resting, I have a few questions to ask.
"The first question, why are you here?"
From the behavior of the two and the progression of time, Cheng Tingyu was completely certain that they were not NPCs of the cabin, but participants who had entered the instance before him.
Hearing the enemy's question, Xiao Jia and Xiao Yi almost simultaneously opened their mouths to speak. Xiao Yi, with his face pressed against the floor, found it more difficult to open his mouth, reminiscent of a fish blowing bubbles on a chopping board.
However, they didn't have time to explain the situation before they were immediately interrupted.
Cheng Tingyu made a silencing gesture: "Don't make a sound, just write it down where you are."
Little Jia understood that the other party was trying to prevent them from colluding, but: "We don't have pen and paper."
Cheng Tingyu kindly reminded, "The wood's texture isn't particularly hard."
Little Jia was shocked: "You want us to write on the floor with our fingernails?"
Cheng Tingyu thought for a moment and gently said, "The only parts of the human body harder than nails are bones and teeth. If you find nails inconvenient, I can also help you pull out a tooth."
Xiao Jia froze. She hesitated for a moment, then squatted down, trying her best to ignore the pain in her body. Using her fingertips, she dipped into the blood on her face and began writing on the floor.
Cheng Tingyu did not speak up to stop it; as long as the goal could be achieved, she didn't really care about the other party's writing style.
Soon, Xiao Jia and Xiao Yi gave their answers one after the other. The distance between them was not close, at least ensuring that they couldn't see the words beside each other. However, Cheng Tingyu's right eye had the visual enhancement brought by the secret pupil, allowing him to clearly discern what Xiao Jia had written.