Chapter 282: For Zhang Yangqing, Who to Kill Doesn’t Really Matter
“That damn maid—why does she have to knock so loud? And this door is way too solid!”
South Korea’s Chosen One, Kim Jung-ki, cursed inwardly after being rudely awakened at dawn.
He mentally dragged the maid’s ancestors through the mud, going back eighteen generations.
But when he opened the door, he slapped on a bright smile and politely asked the maid to lead the way.
Today, though, Kim wasn’t as timid as yesterday. He had his guide dog as backup.
Holding onto the dog’s leash felt like clutching a lifeline.
After several rounds of fumbling around, he’d grown somewhat familiar with the path downstairs.
Breakfast was definitely on the menu. As a so-called noble in this world, the morning meal had to be lavish.
Just like yesterday, they could only eat what the young girl ate—absolutely nothing else.
Even if some dishes smelled incredibly tempting, the Chosen Ones didn’t dare touch them.
No one would gamble with their life over food.
The guide dogs, however, seemed to instinctively know what they could eat. The villa’s owner had apparently arranged special meals for them, which was rather considerate.
Even during mealtime, most Chosen Ones kept their dogs on a short leash, terrified of being separated from them.
Zhang Yangqing’s dog, on the other hand, was more free—or rather, more confused.
It couldn’t figure out why its owner not only refused to hold the leash but also moved down the stairs at an alarming speed.
The poor guide dog started doubting its own usefulness, wondering if it was even needed at all.
Still, being a loyal companion, it dutifully stayed close to Zhang Yangqing.
Breakfast was as extravagant as ever—course after course brought to the table.
They spent over an hour just finishing the meal.
After wiping his mouth with a napkin, the villa’s owner asked everyone to report on what they’d discovered the previous night.
In other words: had any of the guests found clues about the treasure?
You couldn’t just freeload and do nothing, right?
To prove they were useful, the guests started spinning tales with three parts truth and seven parts lies.
The gravelly-voiced old man claimed he’d found some hidden numbers in the paintings on the first-floor gallery. Once he deciphered them, he’d be able to locate where the key was hidden. Based on his assessment, the treasure might not even be inside the villa.
The raspy-voiced middle-aged man shared his own analysis: the weapons in the armory might correspond to certain mechanisms in the villa—as in, placing certain weapons in specific spots could trigger hidden items or special locations.
After he finished, the sultry-voiced older sister spoke up, her tone enticing.
“I think we should start by examining the old master’s personal belongings. Maybe there’s something there.”
At that point, the young girl chimed in: “Exactly. The owner has probably already searched everywhere we can access. So please, sir, open up some of the locked areas.”
Certain parts of the villa required keys to enter.
And only the villa’s owner had those keys.
The owner didn’t hesitate—just like he’d said last night, all he cared about was the treasure.
He agreed to the two women’s request on the spot and handed the keys to the head maid. Anyone who wanted to enter a locked room could simply ask her to escort them.
However, he added a warning: some rooms were dangerous. If anything happened, he wouldn’t be responsible.
Apparently, those rooms contained unstable items, which was why they’d been sealed off.
That was the villa owner’s final piece of advice.
Hearing this, any smart Chosen One wouldn’t get any bright ideas about those rooms.
Because those areas didn’t seem to be mentioned in the rules at all.
Today, the Chosen Ones had many choices and tasks laid out before them.
First came choosing sides. The rules had already hinted that making allies could improve survival odds.
Kim Jung-ki replayed the rule in his mind:
[Rule 12: Be aware—if you show friendliness to one guest, the others will become hostile toward you.]
“In that case, I should side with the strongest guest so they’ll protect me. But who is the strongest?”
That was Kim’s line of thinking—your average Chosen One’s instinct to cling to a powerful ally.
But Argentina’s Chosen One, Ramirez, thought differently—and he was just an ordinary participant, too.
Yes, this was the same Ramirez who’d attempted the hidden mission in “Desperate Journey” and failed.
As an SS-rank clearer, he’d been recruited into a supernatural faction and joined this horror tale.
Ramirez’s greatest strength was his unconventional playstyle.
He’d picked up quite a few tricks from repeatedly watching the Dragon Country celestial master in action.
He figured that if you didn’t think like a normal person, clearing the game became much easier.
Ramirez reasoned that normal people would latch onto the strongest person they could find. But was that really the right move?
One particular rule came to mind:
[Rule 11: If you feel your body is no longer your own, find a way to have the guide dog kill another guest—your body will be restored.]
If he were to play dirty, he’d still need to win over one guest.
The goal: make sure that when something went wrong, this guest could be sacrificed.
Because Rule 12 stated that siding with one guest would alienate the others.
And if they were hostile, they’d be on guard around him.
So the only guest he could actually kill would be the one he’d befriended.
Following this logic, he should pick the weakest person as his teammate.
That way, if trouble arose, he’d have an easy target.
The ideal approach would be to connect with a guest without anyone else noticing.
If no one caught him, then the others wouldn’t hold a grudge.
And he could continue interacting with everyone else.
Being blind, coordinating these separate meetings would require some serious time management.
In Ramirez’s eyes, every guest was fair game—even the villa owner.
Because after analyzing all the rules, one thing was clear: the rules never said the guests or the owner could be trusted. The only reliable ally was the guide dog.
But the Chosen Ones were blind, and the other guests hadn’t shown their hand. How could they tell who was strong and who was weak?
That called for clever tactics.
Didn’t they have guide dogs?
Since dogs were highly sensitive creatures, Ramirez used a simple method.
He carried his guide dog around and spoke with each guest—not acting overly friendly, just exchanging basic information.
Then he observed the dog’s reactions—its sounds and body language—to gauge each guest’s strength.
When Ramirez approached the gravelly-voiced old man, the dog clearly tried to pull away in fear. That meant the dog was no match for him—definitely a powerhouse.
Near the young girl and the sultry older sister, the dog showed roughly the same reaction: cautious but not overly agitated. That suggested the dog might be evenly matched with them, or at a slight disadvantage.
But when he got close to the raspy-voiced middle-aged man, the dog showed no reaction at all. That meant he was the only one the dog could actually take on.
So Ramirez decided to befriend the raspy-voiced man.
From the breakfast conversation, he’d gathered that this guest spent his time in the weaponry collection room. That’s where he could go to make contact.
The gravelly-voiced old man believed the gallery paintings held secrets, so he’d likely be there again today.
To get close to anyone, the Chosen Ones just needed to go to the right location and trigger the appropriate scene.
For the gravelly-voiced old man, flattery was key—praising the artworks and kissing up, even if they secretly found him insufferable.
Same for the raspy-voiced man: compliment his knowledge of weapons, pick up on what he likes through conversation, then lay the praise on thick to build goodwill.
And that breakfast chat this morning? Those seemingly casual exchanges contained surprisingly valuable intel.
Anyone not paying close attention or slow on the uptake would easily miss them.
One terrifying thing about Ramirez: once he entered a horror tale, he turned ice-cold.
He only cared about his own survival and eliminating anyone who stood in his way.
Right or wrong didn’t matter. All that counted was maximizing his odds of staying alive.
That way, clearing the game came naturally. He was just an ordinary Chosen One, after all—he mostly followed the standard script.
By this point in the tale, even most supernaturals were sticking to the beaten path.
Everyone had looked down on Gregori’s methods, yet now they were all mimicking his playstyle.
After all, the one person who dared to go off-script was beyond their ability to imitate.
For Zhang Yangqing, these two rules didn’t matter much. If trouble came for him, whichever guest happened to cross his path would be the unlucky one.
He didn’t need to pick the weakest—because in his eyes, they were all weak.
If he really went for it, it’d just be one hit per person.
And this morning, his interaction with the young girl seemed a little too “close,” making him a target of hostility from the other three.
He was the first Chosen One to get “exposed.”
Not that Zhang Yangqing had actively sought out the young girl—she was just annoyingly clingy.
She’d scooted her chair close to him, practically broadcasting their alliance to everyone in the room.
Then she chattered nonstop all morning.
Some people even suspected they’d done something shady last night to become so chummy.
Either way, Zhang Yangqing was now marked, making future actions more complicated.
Any other Chosen One would be panicking.
But Zhang Yangqing couldn’t care less. He straight-up ignored the glares coming his way.
Kill one, kill three—what difference did it make? Don’t poke the bear, or you’ll all go down together.
After breakfast, the villa owner and the other guests filed out of the dining hall.
The Chosen Ones set off according to their own plans.
Some went to cozy up to their chosen allies.
Some headed to the first-floor gallery, others to the second-floor weaponry room.
The more cautious ones decided not to make enemies just yet and went looking for other clues first.
Sidney, the paladin from Noodle Country, had rested overnight and cleared the mental clutter from his head. Now he could analyze the rules and intel properly again.
Which also proved that this muscle-bound hunk didn’t exactly have a large brain capacity.
Yesterday, he’d pinpointed four key elements: [Fire], [Book], [Maid], and [Head Chef].
Today, he needed to gather all the relevant information within a limited timeframe.
No need to start a fire just yet—he had no idea what it was for, and it’d be reckless to set one off for fun.
That left three targets. He needed to decide which to tackle first.
Since there was no rush to use fire, the head chef could wait.
One special rule concerned the maids:
[Rule 14: True maids obey the villa’s master without question, no matter what the master commands.]
Sidney sensed this rule hinted at two things:
First, find and contact the real maids. Perhaps they knew something useful.
Second, identify any fake maids in disguise. Maybe they held secrets about the villa owner.
After all, the true maids would never betray their master’s confidences.
But figuring out whether a maid was secretly defying the owner required triggering specific events—not something he could just decide to do on a whim.
Sidney also had no authority over the villa owner.
So for now, his best bet was to go read a book.
After breakfast, he asked a maid about the library and learned it was on the third floor.
He asked her to take him there, then led his guide dog along.
The dog was still new to the villa and unfamiliar with the layout.
According to the maid, the library was enormous—dozens of bookshelves.
Dedicated maids dusted the shelves regularly, and other guests occasionally popped in to browse.
Apparently, the collection came from all over the world.
Sidney had found the books—but there was a dangerous rule attached:
[Rule 10: You are blind. Do not ever let anyone see you reading. That is very dangerous.]
Sidney wondered: Did reading cause some physical abnormality?
Or did it open him up to attacks from others?
Either way, the rule was clear—he had to follow it.
That’s what Gregori had drilled into him.
So how could he read without getting caught?
Maybe he needed a hidden corner in the library?
Or perhaps he should wait for a time when no one else was around?
Or simply take a book back to his room?
Sidney suspected a major pitfall here.
Even glancing at a book’s cover counted as “reading.”
And while carrying a book out, you might accidentally glimpse it.
Maybe just entering the library counted as reading.
Since he was blind, he couldn’t tell if someone was watching him.
So Sidney hesitated at the library entrance.
Eventually, he came up with a workaround: he had the maid wrap the book in cloth, then took it back to his room.
That way, he wouldn’t see it at all.
Zhang Yangqing would have been baffled by how complicated Sidney was making this.
From someone used to bossing others around, the solution was simple.
Zhang Yangqing just had a maid place several books outside his door, then told her to leave.
If that didn’t work, he could have the maid give the books to his guide dog, and have the dog carry them in his mouth.
That way, no one would see him “reading.”
And hadn’t an earlier rule said the only safe place was inside the room?
If you didn’t want to be seen, your own room was the best option.
Once the door closed, there was only a dog in there.
And a dog doesn’t count as a “person,” right?
After breakfast, Zhang Yangqing returned to his room to wait.
Soon enough, there was a knock at the door.
The maid had delivered the books.
He told her to leave, then had his dog bring the books inside.
The guide dog was remarkably smart and seemed to understand human speech.
Once the door was shut, the dog rested quietly by the door—and Zhang Yangqing was quite pleased.
A well-behaved dog like that was hard to come by.
And with that thought, the dog’s chances of surviving this round looked pretty good.
Because in Zhang Yangqing’s book, anything useful was worth keeping.
Sitting on the guest room sofa, he opened the books the maid had brought.
The rules said “books”—it probably didn’t matter which one.
As soon as he opened one, he understood why the rule had warned him.
Because the guide dog in the room started barking furiously—as if it had seen something that enraged it.
A dark, ominous energy oozed from the book, beginning to seep into Zhang Yangqing’s body.
Though he couldn’t see it, he could smell a strange odor wafting toward him.
It felt like some kind of buff that only activated for blind people.
Even after he closed the book, his body still felt off.
Zhang Yangqing touched his own arm—the skin felt different. Not like normal human skin at all.
And more importantly, that sensation wasn’t unique to him. Every Chosen One had felt it before—it was exactly like the texture of that head in their rooms.
“I see. So that’s how it works.”
At that moment, everything clicked—he connected the scattered clues and rules.
[Rule 11: If you feel your body is no longer your own, find a way to have the guide dog kill another guest—your body will be restored.]
Every book in this villa seemed to trigger a supernatural event only when opened by someone with the “blind” class.
Clearly, anyone who’d opened a book had activated this rule.
“If you feel your body is no longer your own”—this tied back to the earlier line: “It’s different from you, yet the same as you.”
The rule was essentially telling you: you need to find a body for that head!
It didn’t have to be the head’s original body—a fresh one would do.
At this stage, no Chosen One would be foolish enough to sacrifice their own body for that head, right?
So they had to find a way to kill a guest—just as the rules implied.
Then, open the book over the corpse, let the body mutate, and finally attach the head.
If they pulled that off, the former owner’s letter would be fully decoded.
As for what came next, they’d have to wait for that head to reanimate and reveal more information.
If anyone saw a Chosen One opening a book, they’d sense something was off.
They might even chop off the Chosen One’s head and use the body for their own purposes.
That’s why the rule warned them not to read in front of others.
Once they’d pieced everything together, the Chosen Ones could start making their moves.
Those who hadn’t picked a target needed to find one immediately.
Killing wasn’t simple, though—they had to be strong enough, and they also had to lure the target into their room. A blind person couldn’t exactly drag a body all the way back from somewhere else.
The plan for the next few days: before the other guests cracked the treasure mystery, they had to earn someone’s trust, make them let their guard down, and convince them to enter their room.
That was what the rules were hinting at.
To be safe, they could even take steps to weaken their target beforehand.
The rules didn’t spell it out, but experienced Chosen Ones would think of it: poison, contamination—things like that.
Rule 15 hinted that the head chef would be the key to their success.
Chefs could start fires and slip poison into food.
As for finding contamination sources, they could ask the old butler.
He’d already proven he could recognize contamination in the dog, and the dog must have been contaminated inside the villa’s grounds.
Anyone following that train of thought could deduce there was a contamination source nearby.
Those who’d experienced contamination before knew that it drastically reduced combat ability, leaving a person weakened and vulnerable.
Unscrupulous Chosen Ones would definitely exploit this.
Even if they’d never been contaminated themselves, experts from every country had gathered intel on it—it was easy to figure out.
The remaining rules still lacked enough intel or hadn’t been triggered by key events yet.
So for now, those would have to wait.
With their plans set, the Chosen Ones straightened their clothes, grabbed their guide dogs, and headed out.
For those who’d already started cozying up to guests earlier, this stage was tricky.
If they’d befriended the gravelly-voiced old man, the difficulty spiked.
Without a contamination source or poison, killing such a strong guest would be nearly impossible.
Even for those targeting the raspy-voiced middle-aged man, it was safer to make some preparations first to ensure their guide dog wouldn’t fail.
Admittedly, this round gave supernaturals a big advantage—even if they couldn’t necessarily overpower the guests, at least they could defend themselves.
At this point, the only person Zhang Yangqing could easily invite into his room was the young girl.
The other guests had clearly shown him hostility.
Getting them to come over was basically impossible—and Zhang Yangqing had no interest in groveling.
But that young girl was his tool. If he killed her, who’d do the chores?
Besides, she was human—he could use her to test which food was safe.
If she died, he’d be in a tough spot.
If anything, he might even need to keep her alive.
No sensible Chosen One would target her.
Other participants didn’t have the luxury of choosing—they had to go after the easiest kill.
But for Zhang Yangqing? Who to kill didn’t matter.
Once he set his sights on someone, they were as good as dead!
