Zhou Ziheng's words made Xia Xiqing begin to doubt the connection between the two rooms. He had previously simply thought that they were in the same group, but now it seemed that they were obviously not.
"Does your room have blue wallpaper, a bed, a black wardrobe, a small round table on a square carpet, a radio on the round table, and a walnut desk?"
Zhou Ziheng, who was in another room, gave a positive answer, "Yes, there is a laptop in the middle of the desk, a desk lamp with a white lampshade on the left, and three stacked books. There was nothing on the right side at first, but now there is a photo frame."
Xia Xiqing looked at his desk. The furnishings on it were exactly the same as Zhou Ziheng had described.
"Why don't you turn on your computer and try?" Xia Xiqing started up his laptop. After a short startup time, a line of words appeared on the screen.
"You need a password to enter."
Zhou Ziheng saw the same thing as himself.
"What's your user name?" Xia Xiqing asked, staring at the screen.
"love1023."
Sure enough, exactly the same.
There were too many doubts. Xia Xiqing sat back in his chair and shifted his eyes from the laptop interface to the photo frame. He had been focusing on other things and only then realized that the clothes of the couple in the photo were also blue and red.
He looked down at his dark blue shirt, and thinking of the other four people's outfits, he immediately understood the intentions of the production team. It was the same old routine as the previous show, playing the role of the person in the room.
But in this case, he and Zhou Ziheng both played the role of the male protagonist in the story. What was the purpose of this repetition? Thinking of this, all the unreasonable things that happened before emerged again.
After finding the password, he opened the drawer on his side first, and then Zhou Ziheng's side could be opened. He also placed the photo album on the upper right corner of the table first, and then Zhou Ziheng's photo album suddenly appeared.
This is to imply the order of the two people through these props!
"Zhou Ziheng," Xia Xiqing slid the mouse and looked at the time displayed in the lower left corner of the laptop's lock screen, "What time is it over there now?"
"13:10"
The blue light of the screen reflected on Xia Xiqing's pupils, and the glowing white numbers in the lower left corner stopped at 13:00 without a minute's error.
"I was ten minutes ahead of you..."
Is this a time-travel plot? Xia Xiqing immediately realized why the first book on the table was Chaos Studies, and connected it to the content of the male protagonist's diary.
Could it be that he traveled through time and space to rescue the heroine
Although this idea is big, it is not completely without basis. Xia Xiqing picked up the diary again. The cover was so old that it almost fell off. The cover also had no sense of design at all. There was only a big Arabic number 1. Xia Xiqing flipped through the diary again, and the content was still the same.
He decided to discuss the existing clues with Zhou Ziheng.
"Zhou Ziheng, I guess the plot is like this. We both play the male lead. Because his girlfriend died, the male lead felt guilty. Then, I don't know how he used time travel to go back to the time before his girlfriend had a heart attack. That's why there is a time difference between the two of us."
"So what you mean is that you were ten minutes earlier in time, so you traveled back to the time before your girlfriend died? But if that's the case, why is there a record of the heroine's death in your diary? Since you traveled back in time, the heroine should be able to be saved, right?"
Yes, this is a bug. The diary should be the male protagonist's memory archive. If it clearly states that the female protagonist died, it means that the female protagonist had already died at 13:00. The time point where they are now is the time point after the female protagonist died.
Xia Xiqing, whose train of thought was interrupted, frowned and pondered for a while, then walked to the round table with the radio on it. "This story can only be complete if the male and female protagonists' plots are unified. I think we should communicate with the other two people who play the female protagonists."
"Well. Let's stop for now." Zhou Ziheng suddenly seemed to remember something, "Then... should we arrange a time for the second connection? What if there are new clues?"
Zhou Ziheng didn't want to hang up with Xia Xiqing. He wanted to chat for a while longer, but he was also very clear that it would be impossible for the plot line to be complete if it went around in circles with the same character.
Xia Xiqing agreed readily, "Okay, then half an hour later." After that, he turned the blue knob to the bottom. There were two knobs next to it. Xia Xiqing still hadn't found the difference between the same characters, so he could only choose the nearest knob marked with 0 and turn it on.
As he thought, after turning it on, there was a noisy background sound. He sighed and stood up. He should have known that the signal communication was not so simple. Xia Xiqing only hoped that the two who played the role of "girlfriend" could communicate with the "boyfriend" as soon as possible and not let him wait too long.
He returned to the desk with the most clues. Xia Xiqing, who had been immersed in the plot setting, suddenly discovered that there seemed to be a strangely shaped shadow on the lampshade that lit up automatically.
It looked like a projection of a puzzle. He tried to take off the lampshade, but found it difficult, so he reached out to touch the incandescent light bulb hidden inside, and then he found that there was indeed a puzzle piece on it. Xia Xiqing turned his head and his eyes fell on the blank area behind the door, which seemed to be able to be spliced with the previous one. He turned the puzzle over and unexpectedly found a sentence written on the back.
The characters were so small that Xia Xiqing stared at the puzzle and tried hard to decipher them.
[You've been asking for my computer password, haven't you? I wrote it on the card.]
The computer password is on a greeting card
Xia Xiqing flipped over the greeting card and read the words on it again.
[The moment I met you was the beginning of the Big Bang. Every particle left me and rushed towards you. After that smallest moment, the universe was truly born.]
Apart from this text, the only number on the card was his birthday, October 23. His intuition told him that the password couldn't be that simple, especially since his birthday already appeared on the account. But Xia Xiqing tried it anyway, and it turned out to be wrong.
At this moment, the background noise of the radio suddenly stopped and a girl's voice was heard.
"Hello? Are you Ziheng or Xiqing?"
It was Ruan Xiao's voice, and the signal was finally connected. Xia Xiqing responded immediately, "I am Xia Xiqing, Ruan Xiao, to make a long story short, you should have known by now that you are playing the role of a girlfriend."
"Yeah, but besides me, Si Rui should be too."
"So you have been in contact with Si Rui just now?" Xia Xiqing found a pen and turned to the blank part of the diary, wanting to write down the useful information from Ruan Xiao's mouth. "Did you find anything, such as the time difference or the difference in identity?"
"How should I tell you?" Ruan Xiao seemed a little embarrassed. "Although I found a diary in the room with some events written on it, there are many doubts. I can't believe whether the events on it are true."
Xia Xiqing could tell that Ruan Xiao was a little panicked. To be honest, he was a little surprised. Ruan Xiao was always calm and smart, with clear thinking. Even she felt panicked, which meant that the plot this time was really difficult. "Tell me first, why can't you believe it?"
"Because the clues Si Rui found recorded completely different events from mine. This is very strange. If we were both 'girlfriends', shouldn't it be the same chain of events?"
I see. Xia Xiqing asked, "What if you are the 'female protagonists' from different time and space?"
Ruan Xiao was silent.
"I saw a book about Chaos in the room, which talked about the butterfly effect. When you make a choice and change at a certain point in time, it may affect a series of events that follow. If this script contains the hypothesis of parallel time and space, it actually makes sense that you have a different chain of events."
At this point, Xia Xiqing suddenly thought that if Ruan Xiao and himself were in the same time and space, the chain of events should overlap, especially the ending. This was a way for him to verify the matching degree of time and space.
"Ruan Xiao, what events are recorded in your diary?" Xia Xiqing thought of the existence of the killer in this game. In order to eliminate Ruan Xiao's defense against him, he said it himself first. "I recorded it in the form of a diary. I won't talk about the previous love process. Let's talk about what happened on May 20, 2019. The boyfriend and girlfriend quarreled, and the girlfriend went to the train station to go back to her parents' home out of anger. The male protagonist's phone was turned off, and the female protagonist died of a heart attack at the station."
"Sudden heart attack..."
"Well, this is what I wrote in my diary. What about you? What was your chain of events like?"
Ruan Xiao was silent for a while, then said, "It's similar to you. The heroine died in the end."
Xia Xiqing felt that Ruan Xiao's tone was a little off, but he couldn't describe what was wrong. Just when he felt strange, Ruan Xiao asked again, "Xiqing, based on the clues you have found now, has the male protagonist gone out?"
This question was asked without any context, and Xia Xiqing did not react to Ruan Xiao's implication. "I don't know, because I don't have enough clues right now. Maybe the male protagonist also left the house after turning off his phone."
"Okay." Ruan Xiao could be heard rummaging through something, and then she said, "There are two blue knobs and one red knob on my radio. Are you the opposite of me?"
"Yes, your red knob has a zero marked underneath it."
"You too." Ruan Xiao replied, "This should show that we are a perfect match."
"There is a 0 under our knob, but there is no mark under Zhou Ziheng and Shang Sirui's knobs. The program team probably made this distinction with the intention of matching them in pairs." But Xia Xiqing sensed the uncertainty in Ruan Xiao's words, otherwise she would not have used the expression "...that's right".
"What's the time in your room?" As soon as he asked this question, a noise came from the radio. Ruan Xiao unilaterally cut off the signal.
Why did she do that
Could it be that what he said made her suspicious? A real killer would not easily reveal all his information to the other party, because they could not tell which piece of information would expose their identity. Didn't Ruan Xiao understand this
Xia Xiqing felt strange. He walked to the radio and turned on Shang Sirui's button, but there was still a lot of noise. He then turned Zhou Ziheng's button.
"Are you there..." He muttered in a low voice, almost murmured to himself, but he didn't expect to receive a response.
"Yes." Zhou Ziheng's voice was decisive and steady.
Xia Xiqing was a little surprised, "Have you been waiting for me?"
"Half an hour has already passed." Zhou Ziheng paused and brought the topic back to the topic, "Did you get any news just now?"
"There's not much useful information." Xia Xiqing didn't plan to share Ruan Xiao's abnormality with Zhou Ziheng. The killer this time could be anyone except himself, including Zhou Ziheng. Now he was confused. If his words caused others to make a wrong judgment, the consequences of the vote would be disastrous.
“Is your notebook open?”
Zhou Ziheng's words reminded Xia Xiqing of the half-solved password. "No, they said the password was on the greeting card."
"You enter 1043."
As soon as he sat back in front of the computer, Xia Xiqing heard Zhou Ziheng directly say the notebook password. If it was someone else who said it, Xia Xiqing would still be skeptical, but what Zhou Ziheng said must have been verified and was extremely accurate.
Type these four numbers on the keyboard and press Enter. As expected, the password of the notebook is unlocked.
"Did you infer this based on the words on the greeting card?"
"Yes." Zhou Ziheng explained to him, "When I first saw this sentence, I felt that it must contain a clue. First, it compares the encounter to the Big Bang, and then it talks about the birth of the universe. When I think of it in relation to the second book on the desk, it seems to be related to the origin of the universe."
Xia Xiqing picked up the second book at hand and turned to page 610. "Is that so... Mr. Zhou, can you explain it to me?"
Hearing Xia Xiqing's light voice, which sounded like a spoiled child or even teasing, Zhou Ziheng cleared his throat and tried to explain the origin of the universe to him. "In fact, there are many different schools of thought in the physics community discussing the origin of the universe, and the Big Bang theory is one of the more widely accepted theories. Scientists divide the Big Bang into several stages, which I will not go into detail. There is a special stage, which is 10 to the negative 43th power seconds after the Big Bang. At this stage, the universe emerged from the background of quantum fluctuations and began to exist independently. Therefore, this time also became the time point when the universe was born."
So that's how it is.
In fact, while Zhou Ziheng was explaining, Xia Xiqing had already turned to the page of the Big Bang theory and found the line with the data.
However, Xia Xiqing couldn't help but curl his lips after listening to the popular science lecture. Whenever Zhou Ziheng talked about these scientific theories with extremely high thresholds, he seemed to have changed into a different person, no longer a popular star, nor the innocent and upright boy. He became rational and gentle, which made people feel impressed. This feeling may be the result of the natural awe of science, which transfers emotions from science to people who explain and explore science.
If it weren't for the fact that they were recording a show, Xia Xiqing really wanted to say something inappropriate to Zhou Ziheng.
[I'm already fantasizing about you having sex with me while you explain physics to me.]
The cold hypothesis light years away, the hot body temperature close enough to fit the skin. The two opposite "explosions" create an extremely fragrant nebula.
People always say that men who work in art are sexy, but why does Xia Xiqing feel that men who work in science are truly sexy
Perhaps, extreme rationality and extreme sensibility are, on some level, the same thing.
"What's wrong? Is it untied?"
"Oh, it's open." Xia Xiqing responded, and thought of his previous fantasy, he couldn't help but laugh at himself. The desktop of his computer was still the photo taken on the beach.
Suddenly, he saw a folder on the desktop named [2 Memory Archive]
He opened the folder in confusion and found an exe executable program in it. Xia Xiqing clicked on the run button with the mentality of giving it a try, but he did not expect the computer screen to go black.
“… My computer screen is black.” Just like everyone who encounters a black screen on their computer, Xia Xiqing subconsciously pressed the power button, and when there was no response, he closed the laptop screen with a snap.
At this moment, he suddenly discovered that there was a number - 2 - pasted on the cover of the notebook.
He quickly thought of the diary he had just read, and there was a number 1 on the cover. These numbers must have a suggestive relationship.
"Is it okay now? Why is the screen black?"
Xia Xiqing opened his laptop again and found that the computer seemed to have restarted.
"Wait a moment, I'll re-enter the password."
Just as he had entered the four numbers 1043 and was about to hit the Enter key, he suddenly discovered something unusual and his finger stopped in mid-air.
The time on the laptop lock screen has changed. To be precise, it has gone back to 12:30.
This was all so strange. What did the time going backwards mean? Xia Xiqing pressed Enter. The desktop was the same as it was a few minutes ago. However, when he opened the folder named [2 Memory Archive], he found a new txt file with a sentence written inside.
[We've been together for so long, but she still doesn't believe me. She keeps bombarding me with phone calls. It's totally unreasonable. I want to be alone and quiet, and no one should bother me.]
The cursor stopped at the last word. Xia Xiqing suddenly realized that not only was the time advanced, but the boyfriend at this time had not received any notification of his girlfriend's death!
He stared at the name of the folder for a long time without saying anything. The clue marked with number 2 and the clue marked with number 1 are not the same event, and the events are also different.
Ruan Xiao also revealed a piece of information just now. Shang Sirui and her chain of events are not the same, that is to say, the clues in their hands are not the same number!
"Did your previous diary also have numbers on the cover?"
Zhou Ziheng hummed, "There are also numbers on the laptop."
It is true.
According to this reasoning, by finding clues with the same number and integrating the memory archives of the hero and heroine, we can get the complete plot line.
However, Ruan Xiao's attitude was unclear. Xia Xiqing didn't want to risk giving out his clues easily, so he thought of Shang Sirui, who he hadn't contacted yet. Logically speaking, Shang Sirui had been a killer once, so it was unlikely that he would be an undercover agent again. But nothing is absolute, especially for such a perverted program group.
In any case, he must communicate with Shang Sirui.
"Ziheng."
Every time Xia Xiqing called him like that, Zhou Ziheng felt a little uncomfortable, but also indescribably happy, as if he was being flattered. He couldn't help but soften his tone when answering, "Well, what's wrong?"
"I may have to disconnect our signal temporarily. I want to go find Shang Sirui. Is that okay?" In fact, Xia Xiqing did not need to ask Zhou Ziheng for consent. He could have disconnected it directly, but this would affect his image as a little angel in the show. Secondly... For some reason, he really felt that doing so would be a bit unfair to Zhou Ziheng.
Zhou Ziheng's voice changed. The previous gentleness disappeared and became heavy and dull.
"What's wrong with that? It's not the first time."
The author has something to say: Director: Two handsome guys, there is a limit to your flirting. Zhou Ziheng, can you be more jealous
It was really not easy for Xia Xiqing to win this round. The only way to transmit information between each other was by phone. They couldn't see the clues from other rooms. It didn't matter if they couldn't get others to tell them anything, and even if they did, it might not be true.
ps: I modified the previous chapter, which is the labels of the two knobs of the same color on the radio. I wrote p and n before. I didn’t think of any suitable ones at the time, so I chose these two, but I found that I misled you and led your thinking astray (to put it bluntly, it’s not a simple past and now) 233 So I cancelled the letter labels. Now there are two knobs of the same color, one marked with 0 and the other without anything, to distinguish them.