Forces of Temptation

Chapter 54: Sand, sand, sand (19)

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Nan Zhou placed the sketchbook and charcoal pen on the fire hydrant next to him.

He leaned against the wide window glass, dialed the number, and put the phone lightly on his ear: "Brother Fang, come to me."

Jiang Fang over there pressed his ear and let out a light sigh of relief.

... It seems that he has let go of some burden in his heart.

The heavy burden of not speaking for the past 10 hours brushed Nan Zhou's ears softly like a feather through the radio waves, a little itchy.

Jiang Fang asked, "Where are you?"

Nan Zhou touched his ears: "This side of classroom 403."

Jiang Fang: "Aren't you looking for Xie Xiangyu?"

Nan Zhou: "Yeah. He's right next to me."

Xie Xiangyu: "…"

Before he could make a decent response, Nan Zhou temporarily moved the phone away from his ear.

He said to the direction of the shadow: "You can run."

"But if you don't join us, once Sun Guojing is successfully replaced, we will reshuffle the cards here, and you will be the next pick."

"You think carefully."

After he finished speaking, he put the phone to his ear again: "Brother Fang, you don't have to rush here, call Sun Guojing and the three back together. I'll wait for you."

After hanging up the phone, Nan Zhou looked up again and looked at the empty corridor.

The light and shadow of light and shade are very wonderful, revolving around things, changing the horizon, and dividing the corridor into obvious yin and yang sides.

It made him want to draw a sketch.

However, the shadow that was originally superimposed on his own shadow disappeared.

Xie Xiangyu did not respond to his words.

Nan Zhou has some regrets.

He thought, maybe he shouldn't be scared by the grass just now.

You should grab Xie Xiangyu's hair first, bump it against the wall next to him, and then talk to him.

But he quickly rejected the idea.

If you get hit and die, that's not good.

Fortunately, he was not worried that Xie Xiangyu would attack him.

In a state of alert, no one can do anything to him unless he wants to, unless it is a full moon.

As Nan Zhou walked to the stairway, he planned to open a new page of sketch paper, intending to copy the classroom map hanging on the stairway.

However, after taking a step, Nan Zhou stopped.

No writing could be seen on the blank paper.

But as he turned the page, his fingertips touched a subtle bump in the lower right corner.

… with words.

He stroked the surface of the paper and read the message on it with his fingertips.

If nothing else, the glyphs are pretty and unfamiliar.

Xie Xiangyu must be the only one who can stick to his body and leave such information that is difficult to identify with the naked eye.

The question is, when did Xie Xiangyu leave the message

Nan Zhou thought about it for a moment, and then gave a faint "ah".

…is when you keep your sketchpad and pen handy by the fire hydrant.

In addition to a string of phone numbers, there are two words.

Nan Zhou repeated those two words with his fingertips many times.

His long eyelashes blinked slightly, showing a slightly confused look.

In the next second, Nan Zhou stabbed, tore off the entire piece of sketch paper, and quickly rolled it into a ball and stuffed it into his pocket.

The tearing sound was loud, and it even formed a little echo in the empty and straight corridor.

When Jiang Fang and his party came to the fifth floor of the east, Nan Zhou was sitting in front of the maple tree and wrote the last few strokes to the sketchbook.

Everything was the same as before the three Sun Guojing left.

Nan Zhou shook his hand and handed the redrawn structural diagram of the building on the fifth floor of the east to the crowd.

He did not mention the painting that was torn up.

When it was circulated, Nan Zhou briefly described his findings.

When the sketchbook was handed over to Jiang Fang, Nan Zhou had almost let Sun Guojing and the others understand how to break the game.

Jiang Fang took a look at the jagged outline of the previous sketch paper that was barely torn through the gaps in the paper.

But he didn't turn it over, just slowly stroked the piece of paper with his fingertips.

His fingertips stopped for a while in the lower right corner of the paper, and then hung down naturally, as if he had never found this clue.

A group of people re-entered the east fifth floor and verified Nan Zhou's conjectures.

A weird space does exist on the fourth floor.

It does not exist in human vision.

Does not exist in the classroom map.

It is nonexistent existence.

And what Qi Tianyun thought that day was not wrong.

As long as they enter the correct "classroom" in the correct order at the correct time, there is a great possibility of a safe transition of this dungeon.

The eyes of the three elders were astonishingly bright, their eyes looking at Nan Zhou were no longer awkward, full of infinite gratitude and admiration.

Jiang Fang was very concerned about someone who was not present: "Where's Xie Xiangyu?"

Nan Zhou said, "He's gone."

Sun Guojing, who was originally smiling, couldn't help but become worried again: "This... I'm missing one person, what should I do?"

Nan Zhou said, "It doesn't matter. He will come."

Qi Tianyun's thoughts were quite lively. After being inspired by Nan Zhou, he immediately reacted.

"He originally wanted to kill people to disrupt the order, but after all, he can't guarantee that his method of passing the level is absolutely correct! Now there is a better way. If we really have fewer people and his method doesn't work, then he will also It's over! So he can only join us!"

Said, Qi Tianyun looked at Nan Zhou eagerly, obviously wanting to get a positive answer from him.

"No." Nan Zhou said ruthlessly, "I didn't think so."

Qi Tianyun: "…"

Nan Zhou said directly: "The copy will also take into account the situation of someone dying."

"If Sun Guojing dies, we will be completely missing one person. Could it be that as long as one player dies, the way to pass the level will be blocked? All the other players can only wait to die?"

"It's impossible for the game to have such an unbalanced setting."

"So, I don't think the impact will be very large. So I asked Brother Fang to find you and gather. As long as Xie Xiangyu can't find a chance to start, he can only follow our rhythm."

Having said that, Nan Zhou looked at Qi Tianyun: "But there is one thing, you are right."

"Unless he wants to trade his own death for our entire mission failure, he will definitely join us."

"Because he has only one person. No matter how convenient the movement is, no teammate can replace the order with him."

Thinking of his direct jump from the building last night, Nan Zhou added, "He cherishes his life."

Sun Guojing couldn't help but muttered, "But he still ran away."

Qi Tianyun patted Sun Guojing on the shoulder: "Old Sun, don't think about it. If you were him, would you dare to come and tell us to join us now?"

Sun Guojing: "..."

He thought of that little bastard who ran into their dormitory in the middle of the night and kept befriending his three brothers, but he came to look for clues, coaxed them to explore the way, and backstabbed them at a critical moment. , I hate it so much that my teeth are itchy.

If Xie Xiangyu was in front of him now, he would definitely hit his back molars into his throat.

Qi Tianyun continued: "...If I were him, I would definitely hide. After seven o'clock, the 'place' opens, and I will follow up secretly."

"Fuck." Sun Guojing said angrily, "As soon as we enter, we will immediately close the door for him!"

Nan Zhou was not very interested in venting and complaining about Sun Guojing and others.

He laid out their direction of action succinctly: "Now, just wait."

After repeated tests, the extra eight-step "non-existent" space is just right next to the 403 classroom.

As a result, classroom 403 was requisitioned again.

They have to wait here until seven o'clock in the evening.

Now, for them, all it takes is patience.

To pass the time, they decided to play Ludo.

But after taking out all the pieces, they realized they had lost the board.

Can't find it, can only give up.

In the end, they chose Dou Dizhu.

The stakes in each round are one meal.

Li Yinhang didn't know how to play, so he chose to watch the battle.

Luo Ge hadn't slept all night, but now he's relaxed, lying on the table and sleeping like a dead pig.

Although Sun Guojing and Qi Tianyun also hadn't slept all night, they were so excited that they couldn't sleep at all when they saw the vitality of the twists and turns.

Sun Guojing was nagging, this time, as soon as he goes out, he will go to the "Douzhuan Casino" in Zhijincheng to gamble. The best bet is a big one.

He gritted his teeth and said, "As long as you win, you don't have to die."

Jiang Fang and Nan Zhou looked at each other.

… That’s how the customers of “Douzhuan Casino” come.

After experiencing a struggle on the edge of life and death, everyone will be afraid and feel guilty.

Therefore, the more afraid and the more you want to escape, the more people will want to take shortcuts.

Even if the shortcut is a spider silk hanging on a cliff of Baizhang, a hunter's beast trap, and a fisher's bait, they will fight hard for the win of the "ten bets and nine losses". beat.

Nan Zhou reminded them: "Gamblers will lose."

"Hey." Sun Guojing said indifferently, "If I can survive this time, my fortune will be overwhelming."

Nan Zhou glanced at Jiang Fang: - Look at them.

Jiang Fang understood, smiled and handed the shuffled cards forward: "Let's draw cards then?"

As long as it's a game that is related to cards, Jiang Fang can get started with any weird gameplay.

Not to mention this popular card game.

He didn't play a thousand, didn't cheat, used the most orderly way of playing, and only played ten cards, and Sun Guojing's thoughts of going to the casino and turning into a gambling god to win a happy game vanished.

Nan Zhou had never played this kind of card game before.

He is more serious in his attitude, flexible in his mind, and understandable at one point.

If you lose, your luck is too bad.

After several hands in a row, what he drew was either a small card, or a garbage card that could not be connected into a straight or a pair at all. One was missing from the east and one was leaked from the west.

After the cards in other people's hands are finished, he still has a lot of cards in his hand.

… The game experience can’t be said to be extremely bad, basically it can’t be said to be.

Nan Zhou's competitive spirit was also stimulated a little bit.

But his luck was really bad.

Finally, when he got the twelfth deck of cards, Nan Zhou pursed his lips and carefully arranged and combined the cards in his hand.

Jiang Fang, who grabbed the landlord, held the four twos and two kings in his hand, and asked Nanzhou with a smile, "Is the card good?"

Nan Zhou stared at the face of the card with a very cautious expression: "Well."

After a few rounds of miscellaneous cards, Nan Zhou played a three-band-one.

In his hand he had the four threes that he finally drew, a very small bomb.

There is also a straight.

Play a straight and he wins.

Both Sun Guojing and Qi Tianyun, who had held a bad hand with their heads down, said they couldn't afford it.

It was Jiang Fang's turn.

He glanced at Nan Zhou's slightly bent lips, and the corners of his mouth curled up happily.

Jiang Fang has always been very accurate at counting cards.

He could even guess what cards Nan Zhou had and how he planned to play the cards next.

So Jiang Fang played his card: "Three with one. Three twos with one two."

Nan Zhou's eyes lit up slightly when he heard "Three Belts and One".

He logically fired four "bombs" of three.

All three said they were sorry.

Nan Zhou played a straight and finally won the game.

There was no expression on his face, but he was happy in his heart.

Jiang Fang directly mixed the cards in his hand with the cards he had already played, smiled gracefully at Nan Zhou, and blinked his eyes.

Seeing him like this, Nan Zhou felt a little itchy again and wanted to play with his eyelashes.

Sun Guojing and Qi Tianyun hadn't slept all night, and they lost their heads again. In addition, Jiang Fang's tone was so reasonable that they didn't realize that there was anything wrong with the sleazy operation of three twos and one two.

Sun Guojing threw the card in his hand and was about to say something when he suddenly shouted, and the whole person bounced off the ground and stood up, gasping for breath.

Qi Tianyun, who tied his feet with ropes, was almost dragged to the ground by him.

Nan Zhou looked up: "What's wrong?"

ap;n--gt;gt;

bsp; Sun Guojing's eyes were all red, and the muscles in his throat were so convulsed that he couldn't speak at all.

After a long while, he choked up and said, "...You guys, did you hear it?"

"I heard… "

Sun Guojing's whole body was used to make a sound.

His tall figure slowly shivered and softened.

"The eighth sound..."

"The rustling..."

"The second to last..."

The expressions of everyone who had pieced together valid information from his broken and broken words changed drastically.

Li Yinhang immediately grabbed his phone and checked the time.

It is now 12:30 noon.

At seven o'clock in the evening, there are six and a half hours left.

A terrified gurgling sound came from Sun Guojing's throat.

He covered his ears, trying to resist the constant rustling.

"here we go again… "

"It doesn't want me to live..."

Qi Tianyun grabbed his shoulder, gritted his teeth and comforted him: "Old Sun! Calm down! Wait until seven! Wait until seven and everything will be fine!"

Sun Guojing's pale lips trembled violently.

Cold teeth and hot lips touched together, making him feel cold all over.

He murmured, "...Am I still waiting for it?"

Can't play cards anymore.

Sun Guojing sat next to the two brothers without saying a word.

The closer to seven o'clock, the more serious Sun Guojing's anxiety became.

After the thumb nail was bitten by him, he began to pick the barb on his thumb frequently.

Even if you get blood dripping, you can't stop.

Almost every minute, he glanced at the clock.

Every second time passed, it was like an ant crawled over him.

It's half past five.

It's six o'clock.

It's a quarter past six...

Sun Guojing prayed silently.

He reflected on all the wrong things he had done in his life.

He prayed in his mind all the gods he knew.

He hoped that seven o'clock would come earlier.

Under Sun Guojing's nervous stare, the clock finally reluctantly pointed to 6:50.

Ten minutes left!

Sun Guojing's teeth were sore and soft, and he was sweating like a pulp, and tears welled up from the corners of his eyes.

The torment and waiting like hell is coming to an end...

Seven minutes left!

Five minutes left!

Four minutes!

Finally, Sun Guojing couldn't bear it any longer.

He suddenly stood up and grabbed Qi Tianyun's shoulder by his side: "Let's wait in the corridor!!"

But the moment he blurted out—

"sand-"

The screeching sound of death sounded deep in Sun Guojing's eardrums.

As if afraid that he could not hear clearly enough, the voice repeated playfully again.

"sand-"

Next, Sun Guojing watched his hand pass over Qi Tianyun's shoulder.

Qi Tianyun was staring at the countdown on the phone.

Several ropes connecting him to Qi Tianyun and Luo Ge all fell off his hands and feet.

Sun Guojing stood blankly on the spot and grabbed Qi Tianyun's shoulder several times.

He can still stand on the ground.

But the rope could not hold him.

He couldn't hold anything else.

He couldn't touch anything that would allow him to communicate with other people.

After being stunned for a few seconds, a white shadow appeared in Sun Guojing's peripheral vision.

Sun Guojing turned his head to look, his pupils suddenly tightened.

He screamed and stepped back quickly.

—Sun Guojing finally understood why Zuo Jiaming was running away.

Because at the moment when the ninth rustling sounded, he saw a monster sticking its head out from the entrance of Classroom 403.

It was an indescribable object.

Innumerable, indistinguishable snow-white human figures, arched on the ground, entangled into a huge, disgusting strip.

It seemed to be countless souls who had disappeared silently in this world, twisting together without end and crawling on the ground.

Countless human-shaped legs and hands rubbed against the ground, dragging the centipede-like body, making uninterrupted fine noises.

rustle.

rustle.

rustle.

Like a cry of malice.

Like a call from the underworld.

Like the almost cursed whisper after Zuo Jiaming's death message:

"—I went."

"Sun Guojing, when are you coming?"

Sun Guojing screamed and ran to the back of classroom 403.

The snow-white monster was unhurried, with its soft and flexible legs rubbing against each other, climbing up the steps like a chrysalis, and rustling towards Sun Guojing.

The other five were doing their own thing.

They couldn't see what Sun Guojing was facing at all.

In the desperate situation of being unable to rely on others, Sun Guojing burst out with an astonishing desire to survive.

He suddenly jumped onto the table, narrowly avoiding a human hand that was grabbing towards him in the air, stepping on the stepped table with a loud noise, dashing all the way down, raising his legs over the wriggling white water on the ground. A monster rushed out of classroom 403!

The only thing that could confirm that Sun Guojing existed in this world was the sensor lights on the corridor.

With the last glimmer of hope and hope, Sun Guojing turned right and ran towards the location of the non-existent space estimated before they entered classroom 403.

However, Sun Guojing's hope, like a little light on a match, was suddenly blown out by the wind.

… it was just a dark wall there.

There is no door! There is no door!

Sun Guojing turned his head to look at Classroom 403, cold sweat dripping wildly down his popliteal fossa.

The monster has moved and crawled out from the door of 403, filling the entire corridor, and slowly coming towards him.

sand-

sand-

Sun Guojing was heartbroken, strode towards the window at the end of the corridor, without slowing down, he broke through the glass and jumped straight from the fourth floor!

Last time he was head down.

This time, he hoped that he could land smoothly.

please, save me, save me—

Everyone is fine, please help me...

Nan Zhou was not looking at the time.

He has been staring at Sun Guojing.

But he himself didn't know when he ran away from God.

It seems that Sun Guojing has always been there and has not moved.

It was also like... He was just staring at a blank space from beginning to end.

Until the sensor light outside the door lit up for no reason, Nan Zhou looked up, his expression condensed.

Jiang Fang, who had been doing the same thing with him, also found something.

He abruptly stood up, and his voice suddenly became urgent: "...Where is Sun Guojing?"

Hearing this, a group of people suddenly rioted.

Luo Ge and Qi Tianyun stared at the rope that fell off at some point, and their faces turned ashen.

They ran out of classroom 403 back and forth, only to find that a door was opened at an unknown time next to 403.

It was a normal classroom door.

There is a warm light inside.

The door was left open, and a silent invitation was issued in the corridor.

… Please.

Please enter the urn.

On Friday night last week, Hu Li, who arrived first and didn't have the key, was bewitched by this.

Nan Zhou walked quickly to the door.

There was no sign on the door, nothing to prove its function.

Just a nameless little classroom that shouldn't exist.

He saw the scene inside the door at a glance.

Inside the door is a small empty room with no tables and chairs, about 8 or 9 meters long and 6 or 7 meters wide.

There are still traces of carnival in it.

A few drink bottles were thrown in the corner.

The ground was littered with chili crumbs left over from the barbecue, and mottled sugar stains formed by spilled beverages.

…and a Ludo board lying quietly under a table.

When he grasped the door handle of the non-existent door, a cool chill penetrated through his palm and twisted straight into Nan Zhou's mind like a blade.

They were standing on the torso, hands and feet of those snow-white human bodies that stretched out from the door in threads and cobwebs.

Everyone can't see it, and Nanzhou can't see it either.

Qi Tianyun pulled a Luo Pavilion and said in a trembling voice, "Let's go in! Old Sun is still alive!!"

Jiang Fang dragged Qi Tianyun's hand: "It's no help."

Qi Tianyun was furious: "You're fucking helpless!"

Jiang Fang was not annoyed, and asked, "Why did he disappear?"

With this reminder, Qi Tianyun's face turned pale at the moment of epiphany.

... Sun Guojing, I heard the ninth rustling!

Even if they went in now, he was completely entangled by that force.

… really… no help…

When Qi Tianyun and Luo Ge both sat on the ground, their eyes were sluggish, Sun Guojing's screams sounded silently all the way from the stairwell.

He was reduced to prey caught in cobwebs.

Shining fangs are about to bite at it.

Nan Zhou was still standing in front of the door, holding the icy-biting handrail of the door, pushing and pulling repeatedly, as if he was experimenting with something.

He closed the door.

The light source inside disappeared instantly.

The crack of the door was pitch black, and no light could see through.

He opened the door again.

Inside the door, the warm light of goose-yellow came out again.

It was as if this classroom existed by attaching to this door that appeared out of nowhere.

… No one knew what Nan Zhou was thinking.

Everyone could not guess Nan Zhou's heart, nor could they hear or see the death situation that Sun Guojing was facing right now.

All they could see was that the originally silent voice-activated lights lit up in front of them one by one from the other side of the stairwell.

Yinbai's hands and feet rolled like clouds, pulling its prey contentedly and closing in on the door.

Just when Sun Guojing's feet were only half a meter away from the door, Nan Zhou, who was clutching the door handle, suddenly lifted his foot and kicked the door hard.

At the moment when a piercing crack sounded—

"Recycling." Nan Zhou said clearly, "... I said, item recycling."

The door that was half-fallen by his kick gave off an unusual tremor, and suddenly disappeared in front of everyone's eyes.

… as abruptly as it appeared.

The snow-white monster also stopped moving in shock, let out a monstrous scream, pulled away from Sun Guojing's feet, and disappeared.

Sun Guojing stepped on the edge of the wall of the door just now with one foot, trying his best to do the final resistance gesture.

But the huge pulling force on the feet disappeared in the next moment.

Sun Guojing lay softly on the ground, his eyes dripping with sweat, and he saw again Qi Tianyun and Luo Ge, whom he thought he would never see again.

However, when Qi Tianyun and Luo Ge met him, who was lying on the ground in embarrassment, their expressions were even more astonished than his.

"…Old Sun? How do you—"

Sun Guojing didn't have time to think about what happened, so he jumped straight into the arms of the two brothers and wept bitterly.

At this time, the long-silent game system prompt sound also sounded in Nan Zhou's mind.

"Congratulations to player Nanzhou—"

"Congratulations-"

"Congratulations—"

Looking at the door-like object that was entangled and decorated with white human-like objects, the item system got stuck again.

... what the hell is this? ? :,