Chapter 1 The Thinking Didn't Last Long

Rumble rumble.

The sound of bricks rubbing against each other echoed in the tunnel once more.

Li Ang grabbed the water cup and plastic pipe from the ground, rushed to the wall panel, and pressed the red button.

As expected, just like the letter said,

After pressing the button, the inner door of Room C opened with a response.

Li Ang hurriedly stood inside the circle, waiting for the outer door to open—this time, the door opened much slower, as if a snail was crawling.

The moment the door opened just enough for one person to pass through, Li Ang couldn't wait to rush out of the room.

The instant he poked his head out into the corridor,

He only saw a figure wearing strange clothing, entering the door of the adjacent Room D, and disappearing.

"Stop right there!"

Li Ang sprinted to the front of Room D's door, reaching out to bang on it, but there was no response.

"Damn it."

He could feel his body temperature rising due to the emotional fluctuations. "You're hiding inside the room, right? I'll see where you can run."

The red button could only activate the water supply system for a certain period of time, and once missed, there would be no second chance.

Li Ang ran to Room A and turned on the faucet,

But he only heard a buzzing sound coming from the faucet, with no water flowing out.

A flash of inspiration struck him. He picked up the plastic pipe, twisted it into a U-shape, and tried to connect the pipe between the sink drain and the sewer pipe on the ground.

Due to the gloves being too clumsy and his limbs being weak, such a simple action took a lot of time.

He barely managed to install the pipe and burst out of the door, rushing towards the door of Room D, only to hear the rumble rumble sound for the third time.

The location was still the stone wall next to Room F.

When Li Ang sprinted over, the scene he saw was a man clad in rubber clothing, carrying a deformed monster on his back, disappearing behind the slowly closing stone wall.

The monster had only a basic human outline left.

In the approximate location of its head, a large amount of constantly twisting green hair grew, obscuring most of its body.

Some unidentifiable fragments of cloth remained on its body.

Its pale and slender hands and feet were bent and twisted towards the back in a posture that even acrobats couldn't achieve.

Just looking at it made one feel pain.

[Mustn't let me be found, mustn't let me be found]

A line of semi-transparent text suddenly appeared in his vision.

Li Ang watched as the stone wall automatically closed, instantly realizing that

His title skill, [Secret Excavator], had taken effect,

Directly displaying the secrets that the target he was gazing at deep in their heart did not want the outside world to know.

"...What I saw was the secret of the deformed monster,

Or the secret of the person wearing the same clothes as me..."

Li Ang gritted his teeth tightly. He really wanted to hammer the wall and question them, but the time for the water supply system was slipping away bit by bit.

Step.

His feet stomped on the ground as Li Ang ran back to the doorway of Room D.

He placed the gilded cup engraved with the characters 5L on the empty space on the left side of the shrine inside the door.

Click.

The size of the 5L cup fit perfectly into the empty space. The shrine platform sank slightly, and then the sound of water flowing came from Room A.

Water flowed out of the faucet, followed the plastic U-shaped pipe, and entered the sewer pipe.

It meandered along the pipeline, and finally poured into the groove at the top of the shrine at the door of Room D, turning the shrine itself into a reservoir.

"Use the 5L and 3L cups to get 4L of water..."

Li Ang muttered to himself, turning the handle on the left side of the shrine to let the water flow into the 5L cup.

After filling it, he closed the water flow and used the water in the 5L cup to fill the empty 3L cup.

Then he emptied all the water in the 3L cup.

He poured the remaining 2L of water in the 5L cup into the 3L cup.

Then he refilled the 5L cup.

He used part of the water in the 5L cup to pour into the 3L cup until it was full—since the 3L cup already had 2L of water in it before, the 5L cup could only pour out 1L of water.

The moment Li Ang finally poured out all the water in the 3L cup, the sound of water flowing in Room A stopped right on time.

The time limit was up.

The water left in the shrine was still...

4L.

The outer door of Room D slowly opened, and Li Ang rushed straight in without hesitation, stepping on the footprint pattern and entering the room.

The room was empty. There was a square metal plate, one meter on each side, on the ceiling.

There were only two items on the floor: an envelope and a calendar.

Li Ang tore open the envelope, took out the letter paper, and the content on it was:

"Hello, Morgan,

When you open this letter, the time should be 9:45 PM.

I believe you should have seen something in the tunnel just now that made you feel frightened, uneasy, and at a loss.

Even though you don't remember anything anymore,

That scene still makes you tremble from your soul.

You are confused.

You should be confused.

However, before revealing the final mystery, please listen carefully."

Without any warning, crying sounded from the ceiling.

It was the man's crying.

He cried like a beast in sorrow, kneeling and constantly pounding the floor with his fists, "Why, why, why..."

"I'm sorry, Father,"

A clear voice sounded, sounding somewhat strained, "I... I have tried my best to stop Mother... But..."

"..."

The man sat there blankly, for a long time, before slowly saying, "Alice, who diverted you and Tris away at 9:15?"

The girl's voice was silent for a moment, "...It was you."

"At 9:40, who took Siri away?"

"...It was you."

The girl took a deep breath, "Although it sounds unbelievable, that person's face, voice, fingerprints, irises, and all other physiological characteristics are exactly the same as yours."

"Then," the man asked in a low voice, "His... left and right hands?"

The girl called Alice was stunned for a moment, and when she reacted, she said in a deep voice, "As normal as yours."

"...I understand."

The man took a deep breath, "He did it. He deliberately lied to deceive me, giving me false hope,

Trapped me in the tunnel,

Took away my daughter, killed my wife...

I'm going down into the well to find him..."

Footsteps ran out the door one after another. Li Ang stood in place and waited for a moment, but did not wait for any changes.

"..."

Li Ang lowered his eyes, silent.

The chaotic conversations heard upstairs in each room,

The strange figure that always appeared but was always missed,

The deformed monster seen in the tunnel...

All the factors gathered in his mind, gradually piecing together the rough outline of the story.

He picked up the calendar that was placed with the envelope.

The calendar was made of white cardboard and had a very ordinary style.

On the left was a landscape painting,

On the right was the date.

Above the date were weekday marks labeled sun, mon, tue, wed, thu, fri, sat.

The January and February pages had been torn off.

On the first few dates of the March calendar, there were notes written in red ink.