Chapter 5  

Right at that moment, a sequence of cards appeared in Song Qingxiao’s mind. The sudden appearance of the cards made the hairs on Song Qingxiao’s back stand on end. Her guard and wariness reached new heights. She could hear the girl on her team shriek in terror, which was proof that she was not the only one who had received the prompt.

“Stop screaming!” snapped the short, fat, middle-aged man harshly. There was no telling what sort of dangers were hidden in this area. Their surroundings were unnaturally quiet. The girl’s scream appeared both shrill and a little creepy under these circumstances.

The others had rejected the short and fat, middle-aged man because of his appearance. That was why he was forced to be in a group with Song Qingxiao and the girl. He was extremely displeased about it. The sudden and strange occurrence made his temper worse.

“I’m scared! I want to go home…”

The girl’s voice was tearful, and she sounded extremely pitiful. However, it was clear that the middle-aged man had also received quite a shock. As soon as he heard her words, he scolded her.

“Of course, we all want to go home! However, we have no idea what’s going on, nor do we know what kind of dangers are out there. Do you have a death wish? Are you trying to get us killed faster by making such a racket?”

The word ‘death’ being uttered in a place like that made a chill go down the girl’s spine and even that of the middle-aged man. Song Qingxiao ignored the conversation of the two people beside her. Her attention was fully drawn toward the cards in her mind.

The sequence consisted of cards that were all a picture on a black background with red stripes. Three cards formed a row, and there were three rows in total. She felt a sense of oppression just by looking at those cards.

Song Qingxiao did her best to ignore the chill in her heart. She observed the pictures on the cards and pondered hard, but she still could not figure out the meaning behind them. However, she did notice that there were a total of nine cards.

There were nine people in the ‘Trial of God’ test space. The number of cards matched the number of people. She wondered if there was any connection between the two. The terrible sensation grew stronger. She could still hear that middle-aged man beside her scolding away.

She could not figure the meaning behind the number of cards. Song Qingxiao did not know what they needed to do to leave this test space. Her palms were sweaty. They felt cold and clammy. The bloodstains on her palm became a little sticky from being mixed with her sweat.

The situation brought up the memory of the moment when she was killed. She felt extremely unsafe, especially in her environment. She subconsciously reached out her hand to touch her neck where she had been stabbed. In the next second, she heard a voice in her mind.

“You have selected an item.”

Song QIngxiao was startled by the voice. When she came to her senses, she noticed that she held something in her hand. She gripped it tightly and felt a sharp pain in her palm.

She licked her dry lips and lowered her head to see that she was holding a dagger that was the length of a palm. The blade was as thin as a silkworm’s wing. When she rotated her hand under the dim light of the fog, a silver gleam reflected off the side of the dagger.

The middle-aged man did not appear to notice her reaction and continued to rage at that sobbing girl. Song Qingxiao could not comprehend where the dagger came from. However, it was a good thing to have it under those circumstances. She could protect herself.

Even though she was unsure how useful the dagger would be in the mysterious space, she still slipped the dagger discreetly inside the cuff of her sleeve. She concealed it by folding her sleeves.

As Song Qingxiao did that, the fog surrounding them seemed to be dissipating at a speed that the human eye could notice. The space started to brighten up, and she could clearly see the figures of the short, fat, middle-aged man and the girl.

“I’m truly unlucky to end up with pieces of trash like the both of you.” The man seemed to be using the excuse of scolding the girl to express his terror. The girl did not dare to say a word. After he had raged at her for a good while, he began to grow tired and stopped to say, “This ghastly place is truly strange.”

He shrugged and was about to continue speaking when the girl shrieked once again.

“Do you want to die?” The middle-aged man’s tightly wound-up feelings seemed to have reached a breaking point. He raised his fist and looked ready to strike. The girl could only shrink back.

However, the middle-aged man did not end up hitting her. It was not because he had suddenly regained some semblance of rationality. Instead, it was because as soon as he raised his fist to strike that girl, Song Qingxiao noticed that a corded computer mouse had appeared in his clenched fist! “What the hell is going on?”

The black cord of the mouse was still swinging. The short and fat man looked horrified, as though he was holding onto the world’s scariest object. His hand shook violently as he tossed the mouse in his hand and clasped his head with both hands.

“I…”

The girl reached out her hand, and a phone with a pink rabbit cover appeared in her hand. She said with a terrified look on her face, “This is my phone, but I… I definitely put it in my pocket.”

She looked at Song Qingxiao with tears in her eyes and said, “I don’t know why it appeared in my hand.”

When she saw the pitiful appearance of the girl who was clearly terrified out of her mind, Song Qingxiao took several deep breaths and forced herself to calm down before she said, “When you entered this place, did you take it out?”

The girl looked like she had just seen a ghost. She was about to imitate the middle-aged man’s actions and drop the phone in her hands. When she heard Song Qingxiao’s question, she quickly shook her head and said, “No.”

The girl’s teeth were chattering non-stop, making a soft clicking sound. The thick fog had dispersed, and under the dim light, Song Qingxiao could notice that the girl’s facial muscles were twitching abnormally. It was apparent that she was beyond terrified.

“Earlier, when the doctor mentioned that his phone had lost its signal, I took my phone out to have a look. I’m very sure that I put it back into my pocket.” The girl spoke up to that point and added another sentence, “No, I was playing with my phone before I entered this space…”

Her words reminded Song Qingxiao of the dagger that she had hidden in her sleeve. The short and fat, middle-aged man seemed to have also recalled something. He said, “That’s right! Before I entered this place, I was holding my mouse.”

Their words proved that the items they selected were possibly the last things they held or were in contact with right before entering the space.

Song Qingxiao’s pupils widened in surprise. Her right arm reached for the dagger concealed in her left sleeve. If her guess was correct, the dagger she had obtained was likely to be the weapon that that stranger had used to kill her!

Once the middle-aged man had made the connection about the origin of these objects, he looked a little calmer as he asked, “You got your phone, I got my mouse. Hey, what did you get?”

He turned his head to look at Song Qingxiao. She lowered her eyes and shook her head.

“I didn’t get anything.”

She kept the presence of the dagger a secret.