Chapter 1987

Click

The cold metal handle turned.

The moment the door opened, a suction force came from inside the room.

"Bang!"

Behind the dim desk, the curtain suddenly shrank. Before Lin An could even tense his muscles, he froze a split second later, slowly lowering the spear in his hand, his eyes staring blankly at the thing on the desk.

No problem, the disturbance just now was merely caused by air convection.

But seeing the thing on the desk truly startled Lin An.

"Camera...?"

In the dim room, only light seeped through the curtain gap; besides a desk and a camera, there was nothing else in the office.

Lin An took a deep breath, his gaze solemn as he walked toward the desk.

As soon as he picked up the camera, he immediately recognized it as the one from the photography studio.

"How could it be here...?"

Lin An frowned, his mind filled with doubt.

He couldn't help but look around, confirming the whole room was normal.

He clearly remembered the camera had fallen from the ceiling of the photography studio; logically, even if the instance reset, it should have reset to the studio.

"Could the camera's original position have been here? Did a ghost take the camera before Jiang Haochen? Then it appeared in the apartment and hid the camera in the studio?"

He couldn't understand what was going on.

Lin An frowned, instinctively pressing the camera's switch. As long as he could see if the photos inside matched his memory, he could confirm his guess.

However, no matter how Lin An pressed, the camera seemed broken, showing only a pitch-black screen that barely reflected his face.

"Broken? Unusable? Or is the mission not started, so the Props can't be used?"

Lin An froze, and before he could think further, the whole world seemed to freeze in an instant, then began to twist and spin at great speed!

His head felt like it would split.

Outside the apartment, Lin An struggled to hold his head, one hand gripping the camera to support himself as he stood up.

A pale system light shield appeared before him, as if dividing the apartment inside and outside into two worlds.

Straining to adapt to the intense discomfort, Lin An stared blankly around, instantly recognizing this as the apartment building where he had entered the mission.

By comparing the surroundings, Lin An could even see the window of the room he had entered just by looking up.

"Mission started...? Have I been sent back?"

"But how could it have sent me outside?"

Suppressing his doubts, Lin An suddenly grabbed the rebar beside his foot, warily scanning the surroundings.

Although he didn't know what was happening, he remembered Jinniu mentioning that before the mission started, a ghost had seemingly appeared outside the apartment!

Furthermore, according to his speculation from the psychiatric hospital, now that the mission has begun, that ghost should be on the way to the hospital!

Just a few seconds later, apart from the whooshing wind, Lin An felt nothing abnormal.

Is it that it hasn't appeared yet, or did I mess up the order?

For some reason, Lin An unexpectedly discovered that his safety countdown was also gone; the chaos and dizziness during transmission made it impossible for him to determine which second after the mission start he was at.

However, noticing that the apartment had no movement, he could barely judge that it was probably just the beginning.

According to the progress of the previous round, after entering the mission the troll would first fall down, and then after a simple gathering, everyone would look outward in batches.

I'm now outside; according to Big Eye, if only I retain my Memory, then it means Golden Bull and them should finish their discussion sooner. But.. not necessarily; if Gusman is unwanted, they might argue. But... probably irrelevant.

Recalling the details of the previous round, Lin An furrowed his brows, suddenly feeling somewhat hesitant.

After being transmitted outside the apartment, his preconceived plan was completely disrupted.

If he were still in the hospital, his best solution would be to immediately flee to the hospital outskirts, find Jiang Haochen, and then meet up with Zhang Tie and the others.

Now then...

"I'm rushing to the hospital now; I'm likely to encounter the camera ghost."

Because the camera is missing, that ghost's route is likely to have changed, but the route is definitely within this circle. Hiding and waiting would be fine; directly cutting across the district would undoubtedly have a high chance of running into it!

Should we settle the apartment first? Gusman seems to have hidden some clues; if I ignore him, he might not even make it to the workshop in time. By the time I turn back to look for him, I probably won't find him.

Moreover, without me... Qing Kai and the others could possibly be wiped out directly in the workshop, causing other problems?

First settle this place, warn them?

No wonder Lin An hesitated; the appearance of the camera disrupted his train of thought.

According to his original idea, he should have appeared directly inside the apartment, immediately found Gusman to complete the clues, and then rushed to the hospital to look for Jiang Haochen.

Of course, he could also directly bring Qing Kai and the others along. More people mean more strength; in the final stage he needs someone to die to draw the ghosts for him. Being ruthless, he might even need to use Qing Kai and the others as test subjects to see if his idea is correct.

But soon, as Lin An suddenly reached out to touch the light shield, a burst of light flashed and knocked him back; yet he still made a decision in his mind.

"Can't get in."

"Forget it, three minutes is enough for me to do a lot. Staying here isn't safe either!"

"The clue the troll saw is probably just that sentence; there couldn't be anything else. At that time he thought he was doomed, with no reason to hide it."

"I've been waiting for the light shield to disappear; not to mention wasting time, I can't even explain why I'm outside the light shield. I might... no, I will definitely be suspected of identity! Moreover, even if I mention the Props, Qing Kai and the others won't believe me; instead they'd develop greed. After all, I'm only Fourth Stage—who would believe I have an Overseer 'helping' me..."

His train of thought is clear.

Lin An took a deep breath, and he also didn't intend to waste time here.

He had already figured out what the hidden information Gusman concealed was about.

If nothing unexpected happens, Gusman's second fall was purely because that guy tried to wipe off that line of text and accidentally fell. So the first half of the information is fine; only the latter half was partially erased.

But just as Lin An was preparing to go to the hospital, suddenly, the screen of the camera in his hand lit up abruptly.

Huh?

Lin An was slightly stunned, subconsciously opening the camera photo.

After a few seconds, he frowned slightly, looking at the camera in his hand.

Only landscape photos remained; the subsequent photos were gone.

"Is it because I took the camera beforehand, so naturally there are no later photos in it?"

As if something had occurred to him, Lin An recalled Jinniu's words and, inexplicably, took a photo of the apartment entrance.

Click!

As the shutter pressed, a photo of the apartment appeared on the screen.

In the photo, there was nothing but the apartment, just like the photos he had seen before.

The next second, before Lin An could suddenly feel that something was wrong.

A slight but unusually clear sound of a window being pushed open rang out abruptly.

Lin An subconsciously looked up toward the direction the sound came from.

All he saw was a figure on the third floor of the apartment, extending its head to look around.

In an instant.

Lin An's body stiffened in place, as if he were in an ice cave, his blood rushing to his head with a buzzing sound.

No...!

No..!!!

How is this possible!?

The world spun, and in Lin An's eyes, the face protruding from the window was eerily familiar.

It was, his face.