Chapter 329: The Formalized Process and Result (4)

Chen Ran's eyes flickered with changing expressions. If what the youth said was true, he was glad he had chosen the right target. The higher Lin Xuan's value was, the more beneficial it would be for him. But up until now, he still hadn't deduced the weaknesses of Lin Xuan's other skills.

"Got an answer?" Seeing him look at the scene again, the youth asked.

"Qiu Hua A is Lin Xuan. Qiu Hua D and Ye Qian C are both mice. The rest are..."

"All the Five-Star Youth!"

"Your deduction process?" the youth asked again.

Chen Ran shrugged. "I deduced it based on what you just said. Since Lin Xuan can cross Star Ratings to kill people and there's no upper limit, then there's only one possibility..."

"I kill myself!"

"Simply put, letting high-star players fight against themselves. And Lin Xuan's skill just happens to be able to achieve this."

"In other words, among the eight people, there are multiple Five-Star Youths. But because this Secret Room is very special and everyone can transform into each other, the eight people possess Wallfacer attributes. None of them know each other's true identities. In this way, he can perfectly achieve 'I kill myself.'"

"Therefore, he would transfer the true cats into a space with only true cats. Then Qiu Hua D and Ye Qian C who came up from the first floor can only be mice. Among the mice, the strongest ones who could appear on the first floor are either me or Big Gold Tooth. Lin Xuan doesn't know Big Gold Tooth's exact strength. I think Qiu Hua D and Ye Qian C are one Chen Ran and one Big Gold Tooth."

"Just now, in the scene, Qiu Hua A was constantly guiding the topic. That means he is a variable who wants to guide the topic towards the result he wants, indicating that he is Lin Xuan."

"But Lin Xuan was caught many times and cannot appear on the second floor. Logically speaking, Qiu Hua A couldn't possibly be Lin Xuan. However, since among the six spaces there are spaces with faster time flows, there are also spaces with slower time flows. This Lin Xuan should be a Lin Xuan from another space who has never been caught by the cats."

The youth lit a Cigarette, both surprised by Chen Ran's insight and secretly lamenting that Chen Ran suffered from a lack of experience.

"Qiu Hua A is not Lin Xuan. Your deduction regarding Qiu Hua A made an unknown anti-common-sense error."

"Your earlier deductions are correct, but there is no direct evidence for Qiu Hua A's identity. Therefore, you were merely basing it on reasonable deduction. This is the confinement of common sense. And what players above Three-Star compete in is anti-common-sense. Thus, in unknown situations without evidence, the more reasonable the deduction, the more likely it is to be wrong. You must remember this point, otherwise in this instance, when you finally face off against the Five-Star Youth..."

"You will lose very miserably!"

Chen Ran froze for a moment, turned his head to look at the youth with an odd expression: "No, bro, the layout in the scene is your handiwork. Don't tell me that even with you personally stepping in, you can't kill the youth?"

After saying this, Chen Ran felt a headache coming on. He thought he could coast to a win in this instance, but he didn't expect that according to the youth's meaning, the Five-Star Youth...

Could actually survive until the very end?

He took out his Cigarette Case and Lighter, but strangely, the Lighter wouldn't light.

Seeing this, the youth threw his own Lighter to him. After Chen Ran lit up, he was about to conveniently pocket it.

The next moment, the Lighter turned into specks of starlight and disappeared from his hand, eventually converging in the youth's hand and reforming into the Lighter.

'Damned Distance-Free Technique!'

The youth gave Chen Ran a look of disdain. Obviously, every smoker would equally disdain people who tried to pocket their lighters.

"First: I have no obligation to help you guys deal with the Five-Star Youth."

"Second: The Five-Star Youth has already made the first move. It will be very hard to kill him."

"Third: My layout is to guide you in understanding the flaws of the Supreme Perfect Enlightenment Heart Cultivation, not to kill the Five-Star Youth."

"What was the first move?" Chen Ran grasped the key point in the youth's words.

"On the first floor, after the Five-Star Youth finished using his skill, did none of you look up at the ceiling of the 18th floor? There has been a book floating there the whole time. You guys didn't see it?" the youth said gleefully.

Chen Ran frowned.

He couldn't help but recall that in the third bedroom of the first Secret Room in the instance, the Five-Star Youth had used his skill, but what appeared was only an empty bookstore with no books.

'According to the rules, this Secret Room cannot be overwritten, so...'

'In the very beginning, after the Five-Star Youth used his skill on the first floor, the bookstore didn't appear, but the book appeared?'

'A book is the carrier of text and images, the carrier of knowledge, and even more so the carrier of civilization. But at its core, it is... a record!'

'I have a bad feeling about this.'

'Could his skill be recording the skills that have already been used?'

'It shouldn't be that simple.'

"How is it? Did you fall for an anti-common-sense trap?" the youth asked jokingly.

Chen Ran took a deep drag of his cigarette. Even in Distance-Free Technique, he felt his back drenched in cold sweat. Suddenly he remembered that the scene in Distance-Free Technique was the youth reflecting the real world, restoring it one-to-one. He walked to the stairs and looked up at the ceiling of the 18th floor.

The ceiling was white paint, and he didn't see a floating book. But soon, Chen Ran noticed that right in the middle of the 18th floor's ceiling, the color of a certain area was slightly whiter than the rest. Looking closely again...

After a long time, he was finally certain that it was a book, a book clinging to the ceiling, and its cover was completely white.

'Let me straighten this out. In the third bedroom of the first instance, the Five-Star Youth used his skill 【Forbidden Bookstore】.'

'The 【Forbidden Bookstore】 covered the soon-to-explode Secret Room and saved me.'

'But at that time, in the bookstore, there were only bookshelves and no books. I remember I even asked out of curiosity: Can Ghost Whisperers' skills be used only partially?'

'In other words, at that time, I should have deduced that the bookstore and the books can appear separately.'

'And in this Secret Room, when the first floor was seen through by the mice, the Five-Star Youth used his skill. But because it was mentioned in the rules: The Secret Room cannot be overwritten...'

'Therefore, we instinctively assumed that the Five-Star Youth could use his skill, but it wouldn't produce any effects.'

'I was careless!'

'Which means, after Eternal Kingdom ended, not only did Lin Xuan stealthily use a skill, but the Five-Star Youth also stealthily used a skill.'

'The key is, we have absolutely no idea what exact effects the Five-Star Youth's skill has.'

'This layout might just crash and burn.'

After Chen Ran digested the logical deductions inside and his own mistakes caused by being played by various anti-common-sense tactics, he asked:

"Who is Qiu Hua A?"

The youth didn't answer. Instead, he snapped his fingers, and the originally still scene started moving again. The youth chuckled lightly:

"No rush. Let's keep watching and analyze as we watch."

For some reason, Chen Ran actually felt like he was taking an online course, and it was the kind of online course tutored one-on-one by a gold-medal lecturer.