Chapter Fifty-Seven: The Real Murderer Appears

Inside the locked room, six people stared at each other in utter bewilderment. Aunt Zhou was still livestreaming on her phone, intending to rely on her viewers to help answer the question, but even they were stumped, proclaiming that this was a question only an insider could answer.

Bai Qingming glanced at the previously arrogant male assistant, silently took two steps back, and was joined by Dumb Girl and Aunt Zhou, who retreated to his side as well.

At that moment, the eyes of all five people were fixed on the male assistant, who was now completely speechless.

At first, he had thought this was a freebie, assuming the question was about guessing Xiaoming’s sister’s age. But as soon as the question was asked, he was thrown for a loop.

What is Xiaoming’s sister’s name?

How was he supposed to know Xiaoming’s sister’s name? Xiaohong, Xiaoli, Xiaohua? Damn it, who even is Xiaoming? Would you dare step forward? Damn! What kind of idiotic question was this?

His mind swarmed with question marks.

He looked at the NPC posing the question, his gaze full of grievance, while inwardly burning with curiosity as to whether the questioner was toying with him on purpose.

This question made no sense at all.

“So, who among you will answer my question?” the NPC urged.

To be honest, he was just a wage worker tasked with asking questions; the questions themselves were set by the boss.

Five minutes had already passed, and in another five minutes, the murderer would appear.

“Hurry up and answer—why are you just standing there? Isn’t this your area of expertise?” Wang Dada prodded the male assistant.

The assistant’s face turned red with frustration.

He went over the question again in his mind, analyzing it carefully, trying every method he knew to decrypt it, even rearranging the words to see if he could find a clue.

But it was all for nothing.

It didn’t make sense! The assistant fell silent for a moment, feeling as though his intelligence had been insulted. But on second thought, since this question had been placed here, it must serve a purpose, and the answer couldn’t be too difficult—unless the boss had deliberately set it up this way to prevent players from finding clues, which would only be reasonable if the boss was an idiot.

Two more minutes slipped by. The assistant was sweating profusely, but still persisted in his reasoning.

To be honest, it was only at this moment that he realized how different this escape room was. He had been showing off before, but now he was stumped.

In the end, the assistant gritted his teeth, glanced at the NPC’s red clothing, and gave his answer.

“Xiaoming’s sister is named Xiaohong.”

“Incorrect. Xiaoming’s sister should be called Xiaobai,” the NPC said, shaking his head.

“Why?” everyone exclaimed in confusion.

Faced with their questioning, the NPC was also at a loss. Who was he supposed to ask? The answer was simply set that way; he didn’t know either.

In fact, the clue given in this room was the color white, a crucial hint for finding the next escape room. Regardless of whether the players got it right or not, the NPC would reveal the answer, essentially handing it to them for free.

After all, in every game, you’re given something at the start to guide you. As for why the question was so ridiculous…

It turned out the male assistant’s earlier feeling was right on the mark—the boss had set this question just to mess with the players.

Why ask a serious question when you can ask a silly one? It’s all just for fun.

Before the NPC could explain further, the male assistant suddenly spoke up.

“I get it now!”

Everyone looked at him, seeing a look of sudden enlightenment on his face.

“What did you figure out?” Bai Qingming couldn’t help but ask.

“Haha, I know why the answer is Xiaobai!”

“The real point of this answer is to give us the clue ‘white.’ As for why it’s white and not another color, that’s easy.”

“Because in this kind of scenario, white represents hope!” the male assistant declared excitedly, as though he had finally grasped the logic of the game.

Everyone was momentarily stunned by his words.

In Aunt Zhou’s livestream, the viewers went wild in the comments.

“I get it now, too!”

“No way, can you really explain it like this?”

“Just force it to make sense, huh?”

“To be honest, that explanation actually sounds pretty reasonable.”

…

At the same time, the background music in the scene suddenly changed, shifting from slow and oppressive to urgent and fast-paced.

This was to alert the players that the murderer was about to appear and start chasing them.

“Everyone, let’s get moving! Keep an eye out for anything white—that could be the key to finding the second escape room,” someone urged.

Even though they knew the murderer wasn’t real, the change in music made Dumb Girl and Aunt Zhou, the two women, nervous.

The group wound their way through the maze’s twists and turns.

Before long, following the white clue, the male assistant found the second escape room.

The door opened to reveal an empty, pitch-black room with the lights off.

“Is anyone there?” Wang Dada called out, but received no answer.

“What’s going on? Is nobody here?” everyone exclaimed in surprise.

What happened to the NPC? Could it be they had a stomachache and went to the bathroom?

…

At that very moment, a crowd had gathered outside the escape room venue, curious about the commotion.

A squad of special forces officers, fully armed, had surrounded the building, and a security cordon was slowly being set up, as if a major incident had occurred.

What Bai Qingming didn’t know was that, just after they’d entered the escape room scenario, a shocking event had unfolded outside.

Not long ago, three murderers had come to the venue and been apprehended by Bai Qingming and Brother Wang working together. But just yesterday, through relentless effort, one of those murderers managed to escape from prison.

After breaking out, the killer was bent on taking revenge on Bai Qingming. By chance, he learned of Bai’s whereabouts from Aunt Zhou’s livestream and rushed over.

And somehow, the murderer managed to slip past the haunted house staff and sneak into the very game scenario where Bai Qingming and the others were playing.

Fortunately, the scenario was a maze, and the murderer, not the brightest, got lost inside and didn’t encounter anyone, so no staff were harmed.

Meanwhile, the special forces outside had finally tracked down the murderer and were preparing to apprehend him.

Because there were many staff members inside, the officers did not act rashly.

Just moments before, the haunted house boss had notified his staff via walkie-talkie.

At that point, the staff member playing the role of the murderer was about to enter the scene, while Bai Qingming and his group had just left the first escape room and missed him.

The escape room owner didn’t have Bai Qingming or the others’ phone numbers, so he couldn’t reach them and could only worry helplessly.

Now, all the staff had evacuated from inside.

Within the “Knock Knock” game scenario, besides Bai Qingming’s group of six, only the real murderer remained!

The worst part was that those inside were completely unaware of any of this.

…