Volume 1 Faith Chapter 11 Is it a devil or a god?
After Ma Zhenhua's death, the number of people has now become eleven. No matter whether the number of people in each tent tonight is two, three, or four, there will always be people left over, and this one or several people will inevitably die!
What's more, there will be one more unknown screening condition tonight. No one knows what kind of condition it is, no one knows whether they have triggered this condition inadvertently, and no one knows what else they should do.
The unknown and uncertainty have formed a huge layer of fear that weighs heavily on everyone's heart.
Today's daytime task is still to find the sacrifice specified by the middle-aged man.
After breakfast, Mu Yiran, Ke Xun and Wei Dong set off towards the north.
There are continuous mountains in the north, and the mountain tops are covered with snow. The sunlight refracted by the snow is particularly dazzling. However, Ke Xun observed carefully and found that this sunlight is actually the same as the first day he came here. It is not real sunlight. It has no source, it just covers the sky and the earth in a scattered manner.
The blue sky above my head was still deep and vast. Looking up, the deep sky seemed to be filled with something huge. It seemed even more crowded and heavy than on the first day, and the sky was closer to the ground.
Ke Xun was a little out of breath again.
This was something that made him feel particularly fucked up - he actually suffered from claustrophobia in the most empty and vast Ganxiong Plateau.
Ke Xun covered his mouth and nose with his hands, and his head began to throb with pain.
"Ke'er?" Wei Dong noticed that Ke Xun was acting strange and hurried over to help him up. "What's wrong? Morning sickness?"
Ke Xun: "...Fuck you, I will spit amniotic fluid all over your face."
"Look at this pale face," Wei Dong looked at Ke Xun's face and couldn't help but worry. He called out to Mu Yiran who was walking in front of him, "Boss, Ke'er seems to have altitude sickness."
Mu Yiran turned his head and took a look, then walked over, looked at Ke Xun's face, and said lightly: "Either stop and rest, or go back."
"You want to go by yourself?" Ke Xun looked at him.
"Time waits for no one." Mu Yiran said.
"I just need to relax for a while, give me two minutes." Ke Xun bent down and breathed lightly.
"I heard that people with altitude sickness need to breathe oxygen," Wei Dong said, "We don't have an oxygen tank right now, how about artificial oxygen transfusion?" As he said this, he glanced at Mu Yiran.
Mu Yiran looked at him coldly: "He doesn't have altitude sickness, it's a psychological problem that causes a physiological stress reaction, he just needs to adjust himself."
Then he turned around and continued walking forward.
"How heartless." Wei Dong whispered to Ke Xun.
"It's better than you being unreasonable," Ke Xun straightened up, "Stop making trouble."
"You're the one who spoiled me to be unreasonable. You should blame yourself." Wei Dong said, "What's your psychological problem? How did you get into a physical conflict?"
Ke Xun: "... God damn, this is a physiological stress response, can it be possible?"
Wei Dong: "So why did you have a physiological reaction?"
Ke Xun: “…Fuck.”
"Do you feel it?" Ke Xun pointed upwards, "that the sky and the earth are so close? And the sky is so opaque, like a piece of iron plate painted blue, pressing down hard."
Wei Dong looked up at the sky and shook his head hesitantly: "I don't have any feeling. The sky looks very high, but from the perspective of painting aesthetics, the painting is actually quite ordinary, without any sense of layering. It's like a flat layer of blue paint, and it's not evenly applied, with some darker and some lighter. I suspect it's a problem with the texture of the canvas."
"Really? I always feel like we are trapped in a very small space." Ke Xun stared at the sky and suddenly had an illusion that there was something outside the sky staring at him.
The two of them talked as they chased after Mu Yiran. He walked very fast, and although the mountain road was rugged, it did not affect his speed at all.
After turning a few peaks, there is another piece of gravel land. A small river flowing down from the snow-capped mountains meanders along the way, and the river bank is full of grass, trees and wild flowers.
"This is like a paradise on earth. There is no trace of horror at all," said Wei Dong.
"No," Ke Xun looked at the bright scenery in front of him, "I think it's scary."
"What's so scary?" Wei Dong asked.
"Violent horror." Ke Xun said, "Don't you think the colors of the scenery before your eyes are too vivid?"
"What's so strange about this? Everything is clear in pollution-free places," Wei Dong said. "Besides, this is a painting, so the vivid scenery may be because the original painting has vivid colors."
"But compared to the previous painting, this one is too obviously a painting," Ke Xun said. "To put it in my unprofessional terms, it feels like I overdid it, which makes the scenery look fake, whether it's the sky, the mountains, the river, or the rocks and weeds. They're all fake, so it's scary."
Wei Dong scratched his head: "Your fear point is really strange, I can't feel it."
While the two were talking, Mu Yiran slowed down his pace, even stopped, and bent down to study the plants by the river.
"Your boyfriend seems to like flowers and plants very much." Wei Dong said.
Ke Xun touched his chin and was about to speak, but when he looked up, he saw a few figures swaying in the distance along the way they came.
After looking carefully for a while, I found that it was Qin Ci with Sha Liu and Li Ziling, followed by Zhou Bin and Zhao Dan, and finally the Geng family's three members, all coming in this direction.
"It looks like this group of people are planning to follow us." Wei Dong said.
"No, I want to follow Mu Yiran." Ke Xun raised the corner of his lips, "Excellent people will be followed wherever they go."
Mu Yiran was studying flowers and plants. Qin Ci and others had already walked up to him and greeted him. Qin Ci asked, "Xiao Mu, you have walked all the way here. Have you found any clues?"
The others all stared at Mu Yiran.
Now, every suspected clue will be regarded as a life-saving straw by everyone, and they will try desperately to grasp it.
Seeing that Mu Yiran didn't speak in time, Zhou Bin walked up to him and stared at him: "I advise you not to be selfish. Only if we work together can we leave here as soon as possible. I believe you don't like people like Ma Zhenhua. None of us likes him. You must know why. Ma Zhenhua is too selfish. Selfish people will be abandoned by most people sooner or later. I don't think you want to be the one who is abandoned. The tents will be redistributed tonight. Your decision is related to whether you can be protected by others. I hope you will think it over carefully."
Ke Xun laughed when he heard this: "It seems like you are the most selfless person. I just don't know if it was nice to have human flesh all to yourself last night. Did you feel sorry for your own kind or for the fox to feel sad when you saw the 'selfish' Ma Zhenhua being dragged out and skinned?"
Zhou Bin's face trembled when he heard this. He rushed towards Ke Xun with clenched fists, but Ke Xun dodged easily and held Zhou Bin's arm with his hand: "Your girlfriend is here, I'll give you some face, but I also have something to say in advance: please be polite to others in the future. No one owes you anything, and your threats are insignificant. People will only protect capable people, not those who only speak harshly."
The flesh on Zhou Bin's face trembled even more violently, but Ke Xun was able to hold his arm immobile with just one hand, and he knew that he was no match for him.
After Ke Xun let go of his hand, Zhou Bin did not pester him anymore. He just stared at him with a sullen face, then stared at Mu Yiran, gritted his teeth and said, "Okay, although my words just now were harsh, the truth is there. If anyone has any ideas or clues, please speak up. It's useless to keep them hidden and only you know them. You can indeed do nothing, but sometimes inaction is equivalent to counteraction. Not helping someone in danger is equivalent to assisting in murder, don't you agree?"
Li Ziling nodded subconsciously, and the others remained silent.
Mu Yiran finally spoke, his voice cold: "I really didn't intend to tell you, because the clues I deduced may not save people, but may harm them. But since you think it's good for you to tell it, then I can meet your request. But I said it before, what I said is just an objective inference based on the facts. I can't guarantee that it is correct, and I am not responsible for your lives. How to judge and deduce is up to you to decide."
"Okay," Zhou Bin sneered, "I accept your disclaimer."
"You can also choose not to listen." Ke Xun looked at him with a wry smile.
"Tell me about it," Qin Ci said, "Everyone has their own opinions. This is just for reference. The decision is still made by the individual."
"Then let's talk while we walk." Mu Yiran didn't stop and walked north.
A group of people followed around and listened to Mu Yiran say: "My first guess is that the thing that picked out people from among us and killed every night is the devil in the belief of a certain faction of the Satya religion."
Qin Ci nodded: "I also have doubts about this. Since that person asked us to prepare sacrificial supplies, and judging from last night, at least all those who prepared the sacrifices themselves escaped death, this shows that the sacrifices we prepared are useful and correct. And judging from the types of sacrifices, such as human flesh, male sperm and female blood, they are all evil, which proves the essence of this thing. It is not a decent god or Buddha, but a demon or ghost."
Mu Yiran continued, "The Satā religion has several major branches and several minor branches. Each faction has different doctrines and gods. I am not sure which branch this thing belongs to. But if it is really a demon god, usually in the scriptures and records of some branches of the Satā religion, the things used to worship angry gods and demon gods are indeed somewhat evil and even bloody. So, could the Dom, Gala, and Dangka, whose meanings we do not understand, be similar things?"
Everyone suddenly realized it, and Zhou Bin couldn't help but interrupt: "Even if we know that they are evil things, we don't know what they specifically refer to."
The father of the Geng family suddenly said, "I also have a clue, I don't know if it's correct. About that thing with eight arms... When my family traveled abroad last year, we saw it in the local Suota Temple. I couldn't remember what it was called, but when we talked about the angry evil spirit just now, I suddenly remembered it. It seems to be called... Black Corpse Heaven."
