Chapter 14 : Death of the Minority, Cleared

How does it feel to be fooled by the truth?

The instant “Wolf” said those words, Raccoon felt her entire body tremble uncontrollably.

He said it! He knew everything!

“Don’t believe him! He’s a monster!”

Raccoon screamed at the other two with all her strength, her voice filled with fear she could not hide. “He—”

The giant sword crashed down!

Blood splattered everywhere.

Watching Raccoon, who had been so clear-eyed and innocent just one minute ago, whose gaze toward “Wolf” had been filled with trust and dependence, suddenly go mad in the next moment—hysterically attacking “Wolf” as though she had been possessed—Lin Ya and Chen Bingwen could not stop a chill from rising in their hearts.

It was the fear of watching something incomprehensible and indescribable happen right before their eyes.

“How fragile.”

Ming Po sighed. “You couldn’t even maintain a clear sense of self. Just like that, you were washed clean.

Even if you obtained extra memories, so what?”

“…Extra memories?”

Hearing this, Chen Bingwen froze for a moment, then widened his eyes. “Could it be—”

“Obviously, she suddenly gained a portion of extra memories… from another possibility.”

Ming Po looked at him, his pupils calm and without the slightest ripple. “The things that happened in that timeline of ‘Escape the Sheep Pen.’”

Looking at the two people who still could not understand, Ming Po smiled. “What, you still don’t get it?

Fine, I’ll explain from the beginning… may I, Host?”

“Of course.”

The black cat, which had been sitting motionlessly on the table, finally moved.

It slowly walked to Ming Po’s side and jumped onto his lap.

The black cat said lazily, “Anyway, the ‘final exam’ is already over now. I’ll give you some time. I’ll announce the ‘holiday homework’ after you finish explaining—hey, since you’ve got nothing to do, pet me.”

Ming Po readily complied.

While stroking the black cat in his arms, he said leisurely, “This matter begins with the person who suddenly attacked me.

Not long after he escaped, he saw me.

At the time, I was standing in front of a cemetery, looking at the gravestones, and I didn’t know why I was there. But when he saw me, he suddenly became extremely terrified.

I sensed his fear, so I looked over.”

Ming Po spoke devil-like words in an extremely casual manner. “I’m especially familiar with that scent… Mm, never mind that.

In any case, I was certain I didn’t know him. But he knew me.

Perhaps because he saw that I had no other reaction, his fear suddenly turned into hatred mixed with vengeance. He wanted to attack me, but I easily knocked him down. He was so fragile that it almost made me laugh.

That fellow’s nonsense isn’t worth mentioning anymore. But there was one sentence I remembered especially clearly

He said that even if I killed him, it would be useless. He said something about me being unable to enter the safe house, that his future self definitely still had chips in hand, and that he could still rewrite the ending. Stupid things like that.”

At this point, Ming Po lowered his eyes slightly and revealed a serene smile. “Oh, chips? What chips?

If his future self had chips, why would killing his current self be useless? He feared death, yet was inexplicably fearless… just like a player in a Soulslike game, ‘afraid of dying, yet also not afraid of dying.’

So I dragged him along and searched my way over here. When we got near this house, his reaction became very intense. So I had no choice but to deal with him here.

With just one kick, he died immediately.”

When Ming Po said this, he sighed with regret and emotion.

“It was neither ruptured internal organs nor cardiac arrest. It was more like some kind of curse.”

After that, didn’t I meet you, Miss Rabbit?”

After saying this, a smile appeared on Ming Po’s face again.

Hearing this, Lin Ya and Chen Bingwen wished they could revive that idiot and kill him again.

If you wanted to go out and court death, fine, but why did you drag the boss right to our doorstep too?!

Ming Po looked toward Lin Ya.

“I’ve heard that in one version of vampire stories, if they are not invited by the owner, they cannot enter someone else’s home. Perhaps I was something similar at that moment. Thank you for inviting me in, otherwise I’m afraid I would have remained blocked outside the door.”

At this point, Ming Po looked thoughtful. “That unlucky little guy outside the door and Raccoon should both have been people I spared. They were too ordinary. Even their deaths had nothing novel about them.

And after they won, they gained the authority to use chips… so at the first opportunity, they tried to modify their own past. It seems they intended to give me a harsh one.

Unfortunately, they weren’t smart enough. They ignored the fact that once they obtained extra information, their own course of action would also change. The fellow who ran away was a bit more foolish, while Raccoon was somewhat smarter… she delayed the time at which she received the information.

It’s just a pity—this game, ‘Death of the Minority,’ had not even lasted twenty minutes at most. Yet she seems to have spent at least over an hour in another game. That portion of real memories flooded in and directly destroyed her cognition. She completely confused which part was real and which part was illusion; which part was the present, and which part was a future she could no longer return to.”

At this point, Ming Po looked deeply at the two of them. “Since I can tell you two this much and still have not disappeared or died… I’m afraid the modifications of Time Chips have limitations too. Otherwise, you definitely would have come back from the future to kill me.”

“Hahaha, how could we…”

Lin Ya laughed awkwardly.

“Of course,” Ming Po said lightly, “it’s also possible that you no longer have that kind of future.”

“You don’t need to worry too much. Chips cannot take immediate effect on Deceivers without physical bodies,” the black cat suddenly spoke. “Deceivers have already jumped out of the timeline, even if they are only Red Copper of Hours level. Unless you choose to revive and voluntarily give up your identity as a Deceiver… otherwise, even if someone tries to use Time Chips to kill you from an even older past, they cannot erase the current you from the game.

Not until that segment of time completely collapses and the timeline is reset. Only then can those modifications to Deceivers take effect in sync.”

“So those are the rules…”

Ming Po looked thoughtful. “Then I can relax. I was worried that every time I won a round of the game, someone from the future would rewrite the result.”

“It’s very hard,” the black cat said with an unconcerned smile. “It’s not like only one person is modifying things. As for the game you won… whether that game will even exist in the next cycle, and whether you’ll still be playing with these people, are both uncertain. Sending outdated or incorrect information is worse than sending nothing.”

“That’s true.”

Ming Po nodded in agreement. “At least Bear and Butterfly had both never seen me before, and they didn’t have those ‘memories from their previous life.’”

Otherwise, it would have been impossible for them to be so lacking in caution toward him, or to tell those stories full of holes and heavy with purpose.

“Do you want to know what happened?”

Ming Po looked at the two of them and said lightly, “Dog and Fish’s behavior was very easy to predict… Miss Rabbit, surely you noticed it too?”

Lin Ya subconsciously held her breath. This person had not even forgotten to observe her while scheming against the others!

“Dog had typical manic symptoms caused by fear, didn’t he?”

Ming Po smiled and extended his hand, inviting the lady beside him to answer like a true gentleman.

“…Yes.” Lin Ya slumped weakly in her seat, no longer even in the mood to pay attention to Fox beside her.

“I only needed to induce Dog’s violent behavior and make everyone fear him. The more afraid people are of being directly attacked, the more they hate this kind of uncontrollable violence.”

“Fear brings choice.” Ming Po began lecturing on his own like an irresponsible teacher. “Dog could not possibly live.”

“As for Fish, he trusted numbers too much. Those dazzling numbers actually reflected a certain kind of… weakness in him.

He openly pushed to eliminate the narrator and tried to seize the right to speak through that. If it worked, Fish would rely on his right to speak afterward and actively push to eliminate others. If it failed, he could use the majority vote he had gathered to eliminate the minority who opposed him. But why should I let him have his way?”

Ming Po smiled. “When I pointed out that Fish’s behavior was equivalent to betrayal, it meant that ‘I will not stand on Fish’s side.’

Old Bear was very smart. He noticed that, so he directly slapped on a label and used an extreme situation to incite the fools who might—well, perhaps definitely—exist among us.

Of course, that didn’t mean Bear stood on my side. He was merely using me to strike Fish, to prevent Fish from obtaining the right to speak. From the moment I interpreted his story as murder in the first round, it meant I was trying to suppress him, so we were actually in a neutral-to-hostile relationship. But my group—plus Rabbit—and his group were both hostile toward Fish.

However, as I further pressured Fish, he no longer dared confirm just how far Bear would help him, so he could only vote with me. And for the sake of his survival probability, he would deliberately lower his own credibility and display an attitude of being ‘left speechless,’ thereby increasing the probability of others opposing him.

It’s like… a competitive player who knows he most likely cannot win, so he simply bets against himself off the field, then plays even worse. So at that time, Fish would definitely run… he was too used to changing votes. He was not the type who would stand his ground until death.”

It looked like Ming Po had gambled his life, but in truth, he had been almost certain of victory back then.

When he saw Fish begin accusing him of being on the host’s side, he already knew Fish’s strategy.

But Bear and Butterfly, on the other hand, did not know.

The two of them were in the same group and already had tacit understanding… perhaps even an alliance. This could be seen from the fact that every round, they tied their votes, and neither had ever opposed the other. When Bear was attacked by Dog, Bear immediately fell silent, while Butterfly began attacking Dog.

It was only when Bear could not resist joining Ming Po’s attack on Fish that Butterfly looked at Bear in astonishment.

As if she had never expected Bear to suddenly stand up and help Wolf!

And at that time, Bear also immediately realized he had done something wrong, so after that, he stopped speaking. After all, what he wanted was to suppress Fish, not to make Wolf famous.

“Judging from that personality, Liu Jianguo definitely wasn’t his real name either.”

Ming Po said mockingly, “Most likely, it was the name of some enemy of his… He was planning to kill with a borrowed knife.”

He even wanted to save the chip needed to kill his enemy himself. That showed he was an excessively frugal person.

That meant his investment strategy was most likely conservative… in other words, he hated going all-in.

“So I deliberately advocated gambling and made myself look impulsive and lacking in brains. However, at that moment, because ‘Fish’ had brought too much data in his initial appearance, when people later disliked him, they also disliked that kind of rationality along with him and categorized it as conspiracy and trickery. My all-in, on the other hand, looked even more brainless… Thus, that dislike became my aid.”

Ming Po said with a smile, “The aid of those not intelligent enough.”

“…Indeed,” Lin Ya nodded in agreement. “Most people are binary creatures. It’s either this or that.”

“And you, Lawyer Chen, were in another situation.”

As he spoke, Ming Po looked toward Chen Bingwen.

“When I first approached you, you grabbed my hand and questioned my identity. That means you’re fairly bold, sharp in observation, and very confident. But after the game began, you almost never spoke. The few things you occasionally said were completely lacking in substance… this means you did not want to stand in the spotlight, nor did you want to be noticed by everyone.

In other words, you preferred voting from a relatively safe place rather than standing under everyone’s eyes and being voted on.”

He said meaningfully, “When it was your turn to be narrator, it was the same… You almost handed the entire authority to set the question over to me. Although part of that was an expression of loyalty, another part was because you are not used to becoming the center of attention.

So I judged that you needed to find someone to attach yourself to. When I realized this, I threw out the idea that ‘Old Bear’s story might be murder.’ Later, I firmly stood beside Rabbit… all of that was to make you feel that I was sufficiently reliable.

Therefore, under my control, the three influential small groups at that time were Bear, Fish, and myself… you could only choose me.”

Seeing Chen Bingwen’s horrified expression, Ming Po narrowed his eyes. “As for Raccoon, that was very simple too

Your judgment was actually correct, Lawyer Chen. You said this game does not recruit only intelligent people, and I agree… if there truly was a pure, innocent female university student with clear eyes, then she would indeed be a sharp weapon. But the problem is

For someone like that, her sin was in Seat 11, second only to Dog. President Mo, whose dark history you carried in your pocket, was only Seat 6.”

Ming Po said meaningfully, “Judging from your reactions, you’ve probably already guessed that she was some kind of dangerous-sports streamer. Either motorcycles, extreme sports, or parkour. And since the muscles on her body were obviously insufficient, and she was not especially good at chatting, she was most likely a motorcycle streamer.

What major sin can a motorcycle streamer commit? If she really committed some big case, then all of you would definitely know her identity already… in that case, she would not be ‘Jasmine-chan from Yinfu,’ but ‘Jasmine-chan from C-Site.’

When her position already made it impossible for her to have the appeal to lead a team, openly revealing her past would have been a form of honesty, especially once we knew the seating order was sin. But she delayed and never said it. That means either it would embarrass her… or she herself actually didn’t know where her sin came from.”

“Looking at it this way,” the mouth on the black cat’s neck suddenly spoke in a deep and powerful voice like a certain card-game president, “the only thing you didn’t anticipate was the result of the third round, correct?”

“Ah, yes.”

Ming Po smiled. “I had to leave myself some entertainment. If I made everything completely clear, wouldn’t that be not stimulating at all?

It’s clearly a dark game where our existence is at stake… but it feels a bit too small-scale. Are there any games that are more exciting and more dangerous?”

“Oh?”

The mouth hanging from the black cat’s necklace chuckled. “So impatient?

“Very well… Then I’ll send you back to rest first.

With three survivors remaining, you have already reached the maximum reward. Your chips are enough to participate in an advancement ritual… My suggestion is not to spend them randomly, and prioritize advancement. After rising to the first rank of ‘False Gold of Days,’ whether it’s a game of confrontation against others, a game of exploration and puzzle-solving, or a cooperative clear game, the clear reward will all use ‘one day’ as the minimum unit.”

“Host, you’re being so good to us,” Lin Ya hesitated slightly. “Do you want… no, I mean, do you need us to do something?”

“I have no use for you right now. When you have the chance to upgrade to the level of ‘Clear Lead of Weeks,’ I will naturally come uninvited.”

The black cat said finally, “Oh, right. Let us exchange names…

You may call me ‘Ink.’ As for you, I suggest you’d best think of titles as well, or prepare your own masks. This is experience from those who came before you. In future games, no one will prepare masks for you…”

As the black cat spoke, its body turned into a mass of ink and sank into the round table.

Immediately afterward, the masks of the three survivors once again melted into chips and flew back into their respective bodies. Their bodies were also slowly dragged downward by pitch-black ink, sinking into the ground.

An intense sense of dizziness surged up together with a feeling of peace. As he slowly sank, Ming Po gradually closed his eyes.

And between sleep and waking, he sensed a string of information:

[Death of the Minority has been cleared.]

[Host: Ink (Balance—Silver)]

[Difficulty: 12 Hours]

[Number of clears: 3]

[No additional rules or hidden missions triggered. No special worldbuilding puzzle solved.]

[Deceiver identity obtained. Current authority: Red Copper of Hours.]

[Reward obtained: Time Chip—False Gold of Days (1)]

[Time Chips can be split downward, but cannot be synthesized upward.]

[Evaluation in progress…]

[Based on current highest authority level, title obtained: Werewolf.]

[Werewolf (Slaughter—Red Copper)]

[Equipped effect: Physical regeneration increased. Permanent state obtained: Wound Healing (Slow).]

[Active effect: Temporarily lose rationality and gain a significant increase in physical regeneration, explosive power, and reaction speed for ten seconds. During the duration, the effect rapidly declines. If a kill is completed during the effect, the duration can be refreshed.]

[Title acquisition condition: Directly or indirectly kill three people in a qualifying match or revival match.]

[Title branch advancement conditions: In a multiplayer game, directly or indirectly kill all Deceivers except yourself / in a multiplayer game, directly kill three Deceivers / in three consecutive games, directly or indirectly kill three people.]

[“—Welcome back, Ming Po.”]

(End of Chapter)