Chapter 300: Ice Room Decryption (1)

Time flashed back to half an hour ago.

In another spatial layer.

Six Lin Xuans, four Big Gold Tooths, Ye Qian and two of her teammates, and four Four-Star Players who had previously failed Qiu Yinong's Judgment.

These twenty people lay haphazardly on the floor, and their positions were very strange.

They lay in a circle in the middle of the Secret Room, and in the center of the circle was a table.

Not long after.

The twenty people groggily woke up.

The six Lin Xuans stood together, the four Big Gold Tooths stood together, and the remaining ten were all members of the Four-Star Hunter Teams. Although they came from different spatial layers, right now, these ten people banded together as a group.

After recording the time, they began to survey the Secret Room. This was an...

It was roughly half the size of a football field.

The floor was made of ice.

There was a door, a glass door, but it was locked from the outside. In other words, there was no key inside the Secret Room. After all, the lock was on the outside, not the inside, so even if they had a key, they wouldn't be able to open it.

A set of rules was taped to the table:

[Ice Room Escape.]

[Task: 50%.]

[Item: Gun.]

[Time: 2 hours.]

[Failure Penalty: Obliteration.]

Immediately after, they looked at the Gun on the table. The magazine was very long, indicating it wasn't a Liar-Slayer, but a real Pistol.

No one rushed to grab the Gun.

After all.

This should be a Whisperer's Escape Room. Lin Xuan definitely knew the answer. If the Gun were an important item, it wouldn't just be sitting right here.

Apart from that, there was also a timer on the table. The time: [10:10].

The group observed it for a while and found that the timer didn't change at all.

They then crouched down and knocked on the ice floor. It was very thick. If they used the Prop Gun, it probably wouldn't pierce through the ice.

Following that, they looked around and found twelve three-meter-tall ice sculptures standing against the walls around the Secret Room. Judging by their appearances, these were ice sculptures of the twelve Chinese zodiac animals.

Aside from these, there was nothing else.

As it stood, there were two possible plans to escape the Secret Room.

Plan One: Break the door.

Plan Two: Break the ice.

However, the door was locked from the outside.

And the ice was extremely thick.

No matter how they looked at it, neither plan would work. Consequently, the twenty-one people all focused their gazes on the twelve zodiac ice sculptures.

'Wait! Twenty-one people?'

'Suppress Mental State!'

Almost simultaneously, they all chose to suppress their Mental States and counted the number of people again.

It was still twenty-one people!

Ye Qian frowned.

'This is a Whisperer's Escape Room, so it's impossible for it to store a player's skill.'

'In other words, one of us is a Phantom Image produced by some sort of item.'

Thinking of this, Ye Qian carefully swept her gaze across everyone's faces and finally locked onto...

Chen Ran!

'He wasn't here just now!'

'When did he appear?'

Seeing everyone looking over, Chen Ran fished out his Cigarette Case from his pocket with his right hand. Pinching it between his pinky and ring finger, he used his thumb to flick the lid open, pulled a Cigarette out with his mouth, shoved the Cigarette Case back into his pocket, and took out a Lighter to light it.

This entire series of actions was completed solely with his right hand; his left hand had remained buried in his pocket the whole time.

He took a deep drag of the Cigarette, meeting the scrutinizing gazes of the players present. "Yo, hello everyone."

Saying this, he walked over to the table and tapped his fingers lightly on the tabletop, making a sound. He then picked up the Prop Gun. "If you guys aren't taking it, then I won't be polite."

The crowd had kept frowning since he tapped the table. The fact that the table made a sound proved he was a physical entity, not a Phantom Image.

There were two possibilities:

Possibility One: This Chen Ran was real.

Possibility Two: Their consciousnesses had been brought here under the influence of an item, and this Chen Ran was manufactured by the item that brought them here.

As for a skill?

Lin Xuan's skill was of the spatial attribute. Although Big Gold Tooth's skill hadn't been exposed, it should be at least Ego-Tier, whereas skills that created Phantom Images were merely Id Tier. Moreover, they had all suppressed their Mental States, yet Chen Ran remained.

Therefore, a skill could be ruled out.

Ye Qian surveyed these twenty-one people.

'Wait! Twenty-one people? Counting me, doesn't that make twenty-two?'

'There's another extra person?'

Ye Qian quickly identified who the extra person was: Qiu Yinong.

'When did she appear?'

'It was just now, when we were all distracted by Chen Ran lighting his cigarette!'

Qiu Yinong mimicked Chen Ran, tapping lightly on the table to produce a sound.

Proving she was also a physical entity.

"Since that's the case, let's all tap the table and see who is a Phantom Image."

After Lin Xuan spoke, the six Lin Xuans walked up to the table one after another and tapped it lightly. All produced sounds, proving they were physical entities.

Following them, the rest of the players also tapped the table in turn. Without exception...

All were physical entities.

The twenty-three people looked at each other in dismay.

'Twenty-three people?'

At once, the crowd collectively turned to look at Gao Lan, who was standing at the back of the group.

"Don't ask me. I don't know what's going on either. I just felt a wave of dizziness, and then I appeared here." Compared to the previous two god-tier scammers, Gao Lan talked a bit more.

Now this was interesting.

Everyone began to ponder.

'Theoretically speaking, all twenty-three of us are physical entities. If the Whisperer's Escape Room disappears right now, the normal Instance it is covering will be revealed.'

'However, according to the Instance mechanics, a normal Instance of this type only accommodates 20 people.'

'Three people would be obliterated.'

'Therefore, within an Instance, the maximum capacity of a Whisperer's Escape Room is also 20 people. Otherwise, a skill like Lin Xuan's would be invincible.'

'The three extra people must have been created by some special item.'

'Since it's not an Id Tier skill but objectively existing Phantom Images, the First Realm of Lingtai cannot negate the existence of these three illusions.'

'But just now, all twenty-three of us tapped the table and we were all physical entities, which means our consciousnesses were brought here.'

'This is not the real world!'

'Of course, the best method is to use the Distance-Free Technique to test these three people.'

Thinking of this, Ye Qian and her three teammates all looked at the three newcomers.

However, the three of them seemed to have been prepared and completely avoided eye contact.

"Rather than investigating our identities, why don't you guys think about how to solve the Secret Room?" Chen Ran offered a helpful reminder. "Didn't you guys notice that the numbers changed?"

As he spoke, he pointed at the timer.

According to Common Sense, the object on the table was indeed a timer. But it was common knowledge that in a Whisperer's Escape Room, the most unreliable thing...

Was Common Sense.

Therefore, Chen Ran only mentioned 'numbers' instead of calling it a timer. He was using Avoidance of Lying, which matched the conversational logic of a real player.

They saw that the timer had changed to:

[10:13]

"Say, is there a possibility that this isn't a timer, but a..."

"Scoreboard?"

"Like the instruments used to record the scores of both sides during a basketball game."

Ye Qian's teammate, Xiao Zhe, suddenly chimed in.

"How so?" Lin Xuan asked.

Xiao Zhe glanced at Ye Qian. Seeing her nod, he then explained, "First, the rules pasted on the table state [Task: 50%]. This is ambiguous. Does it mean the task progress is already 50% complete, or that we need to reach 50% progress to complete the task?"

"Second, the numbers. Previously the numbers were [10:10], but now they've changed to..."

"[10:13]."

"But what if we view 50% as 1/2..."

Ye Qian caught on. "You mean to say, as long as we reach [10:20], we will have completed the rule's..."

"[Task: 50%]?"

"Yeah, it's just my guess, but we have to figure out..." He didn't know how to phrase it, fearing he might tell a lie, so he simply pointed a finger at Chen Ran's trio.

Meaning: We have to figure out the pattern of their appearances.

"I disagree with your viewpoint. According to you, didn't the previous [10:10] imply that among the initial 20 people, only 10 are real?" Chen Ran voiced his rebuttal.

He was right. Three extra people appeared, and the latter number [10] turned into [13]. This meant the three people who appeared later were of the same category as these ten. Consequently, these [10] people should also have been manufactured.

Following this logic, did it mean only the first [10] represented the real number of people?

Was it possible?

It was!

But how could they verify it?

If that were the case, the ten real people would have to expend a massive amount of mental energy using the Distance-Free Technique, investigating them one by one to determine who was real and who was fake.

But right now, no one knew who was real and who was fake.

Using the Distance-Free Technique to investigate them was unrealistic.

Being unable to investigate meant that in this Secret Room, no one's words could be trusted. A Chain of Suspicion would form, and everyone could potentially be a Phantom Image trying to trick you into telling a lie.

At the same time, according to this theory, 10 out of the initial 20 people were fake, and there was absolutely no pattern to the appearance of Chen Ran's trio compared to the appearance of the previous 10.

In that case.

The path of finding a pattern was unfeasible.

"I actually think that instead of completing the 50% through uncertain variables, it's better to complete it through controllable variables." Gao Lan's words made everyone frown.

What were uncertain variables?

People appearing without a pattern.

What were controllable variables?

Killing people!

Simply put, [10:10] could be viewed as two numbers. The extra people appearing in the Secret Room dictated the change in the second number [10], whereas the players could use Lie-Judgment to kill people to dictate the change in the first number [10].

Therefore, it wouldn't necessarily have to be [10:20].

It could be...

[9:18]

[8:16]

[7:14]

In other words, if one more person appeared, making it [10:14], they could use Lie-Judgment to kill three people...

Resulting in [7:14].

Completing the 50%!

However, there was still another problem: the rules taped to the table...

Were they real rules, or fake rules?

A Whisperer's Escape Room was littered with Common Sense traps. Before the puzzle was unraveled, no one knew which clue was a Common Sense trap!

Furthermore...

It was cold, very cold, extremely cold.

They all took out jackets from their bags and put them on. If this dragged on, they would either freeze to death or suffocate.