Chapter 103.1: Xishan Residential Area (23)

The players were led by Xia Wuyan to tour almost the entire Xishan Kindergarten.

Because Xia Wuyan was with them, the players were all conscious of their “parent” status and didn’t make any unusual moves, for the most part.

However, they didn’t obtain any useful information either.

When the yellow-haired player finished the tour, he expressed a desire to take another look on their own.

Xia Wuyan didn’t refuse and wrote down his contact information on a piece of paper and handed it to Ruan Qing before leaving.

Ruan Qing: “...”

Ruan Qing looked at the piece of paper in his hand with an expressionless face, crumpled it up, and threw it into the nearby trash can.

Because it was daytime, the players paired up and prepared to investigate clues separately.

Naturally, Ruan Qing was in a group with the advanced male player.

Due to their recent tour, Ruan Qing had a rough idea of the layout of the entire kindergarten.

He led the advanced male player to bypass the surveillance and head towards the kindergarten’s surveillance room.

Ruan Qing remembered that Xia Wuyan had mentioned during the kindergarten introduction that there were surveillance cameras everywhere in the kindergarten, and parents could check on their children at any time.

There were people in the surveillance room at the moment, most likely the kindergarten’s security personnel, as they were wearing security uniforms.

And there were two of them.

If there was something suspicious about the surveillance, the security personnel would definitely not allow them to investigate it closely.

Ruan Qing had originally planned to lead the two security personnel away, but to his surprise, the advanced male player went in and knocked them out before they could react.

Not to mention calling for help. They didn’t even have a chance to get a good look at them.

Ruan Qing looked at the two unconscious individuals on the ground in silence. Having martial prowess was quite handy.

Ruan Qing didn’t waste any time and immediately accessed the surveillance footage, while the advanced male player stood guard to prevent anyone from approaching.

The Xishan Kindergarten indeed had a lot of surveillance cameras, with almost a hundred screens of various sizes.

Ruan Qing eliminated those in corners that were unlikely to be visited and some unimportant surveillance cameras.

In the end, he filtered down to only keep the footage from the classrooms, playground, and some places where children often stayed.

Because it seemed that the surveillance data was stored for quite a long time, Ruan Qing only reviewed the surveillance from the past ten days, with a particular focus on investigating the surveillance of Mrs. Ning’s child.

There didn’t appear to be anything unusual, and he didn’t find any problems anywhere. It seemed that the deaths of Mrs. Ning and her family had no connection to the kindergarten.

However, there was always a sense of discord.

Ruan Qing looked for a while and finally found what was wrong.

Apart from Mrs. Ning’s children, there was... one missing.

The child who always liked to pull other kids’ pigtails was gone.

Ruan Qing immediately retrieved information, found out the name of that child, and went to investigate what had happened.

This incident seemed to have made the news, and Ruan Qing easily found it.

A family of three died mysteriously, their blood seemingly drained by something, and the culprit had not been found to this day.

Just like Mrs. Ning’s family.

This child was highly likely to have also played the role of ‘Xiao Xi.’

Ruan Qing retrieved the surveillance footage of this child and compared it with Mrs. Ning’s child’s surveillance.

Still, no suspicious activities were found, mostly attending classes, having meals, playing games, and then going home after school.

Ruan Qing watched the footage carefully and paused it with a pensive look.

On the screen, the kindergarten teacher was rewarding the children with little red flowers.

It was normal for the kindergarten to reward well-behaved and obedient children with little red flowers, but it seemed... only these two children had received them?

Ruan Qing pulled up other surveillance footage and discovered that three children had received little red flowers.

Two of them had already died, and the third was the child from Zhou Qing and Yang Tianhao’s family...

Clearly, there was something wrong with these little red flowers.

Ruan Qing retrieved the video before the children received the little red flowers, wanting to see how these three had earned them.

All three had participated in a game.

Ruan Qing had just seen this game, but he hadn’t noticed anything unusual at the time.

Because this game wasn’t like the drawing from the picture book, with a group of children attacking one child or anything like that. Instead, it was a kind of melee game.

All the children would receive a small water gun filled with paint, and if they got stained with paint, they would be out until only one child remained.

And that child would receive the little red flower reward.

...It’s as if killing everyone becomes the final victor, earning a little red flower and the title of ‘Xiao Xi’.

Was this the role-playing game of ‘Xiao Xi’?

This was more like a selection...

Selecting targets for death.

But why would there be killers who kill their targets first?

The first child’s family was like this, and Mrs. Ning’s family of four was also the same, all with wounds to the chest.

Clearly, the chest wounds caused death, and then something must have sucked out their blood.

Ruan Qing’s eyes lowered in thought because... wasn’t that shadow strong enough yet?

It’s highly likely that’s the case; it seemed the shadow needed human blood to become stronger.

Perhaps initially, it wasn’t powerful enough to kill an ordinary person, and it even targeted children first.

After the killer killed someone, the shadow could gain blood and become stronger until it’s strong enough to not need the killer’s help anymore.

Clearly, both the little red flower and the shadow were crucial.

It’s highly likely that someone at Xishan Kindergarten was nurturing that shadow with human blood, and that person was most likely Xia Wuyan.

After all, his physique would only attract weirdos; anyone who wouldn’t mind him being a 50-year-old fat guy was clearly not normal.

Ruan Qing continued to check the surveillance, wanting to see if there were any other suspicious areas.

There were just too many surveillance cameras, and most of the videos were meaningless everyday occurrences; even if someone else were to watch them, they probably wouldn’t find any clues.

But Ruan Qing had an excellent memory; he didn’t forget the surveillance he had seen and the paths he had walked.

He noticed something strange - most places in Xishan Kindergarten had surveillance. Even the slightly remote small forest had one or two cameras.

However, there was one place... without surveillance.

That was the building where Xia Wuyan’s office was located, a building that didn’t seem to have any children entering.

No, it wasn’t without surveillance; when Ruan Qing went there, he clearly saw a camera. But there was no surveillance footage of that building anywhere.

Clearly, the surveillance camera wasn’t linked to the surveillance room here, but somewhere else.

There must be something wrong with that building, and perhaps it had an inseparable connection with that shadow.

Ruan Qing had already spent quite some time in the surveillance room; staying longer would surely arouse suspicion.

Ruan Qing hypnotized the two people on the ground, making them forget being knocked out. Then he deleted the surveillance footage of their intrusion into the surveillance room.

Afterward, the two of them left there.

Just as Ruan Qing and the advanced male player were preparing to go to Xia Wuyan’s office building, they encountered other players who had gathered on the way.

Ruan Qing looked at several people, each holding a small red flower, and his pupils contracted slightly. His steps slowed down, but he returned to normal the next moment.

At the same time, the players also noticed Ruan Qing and the advanced male player and walked toward them with calm expressions.

Apart from the players, the female teacher who had been following Xia Wuyan before was also present, holding two small red flowers in her hand.

After walking up to Ruan Qing and the advanced male player, the female teacher revealed a gentle smile and handed over the small red flowers. “Mr. Li, these are from our kindergarten...”

However, before the female teacher could finish speaking, someone took the flowers from her hand.

The female teacher turned slightly unhappy and looked at the person who took her flower, only to meet Xia Wuyan’s indifferent gaze.

The female teacher widened her eyes and instinctively took a step back, seemingly somewhat frightened.

After she stepped back, she realized, “Xia, Teacher Xia?”

“Why are you here?”

Xia Wuyan casually glanced at the female teacher, and with a magical wave of his hand, he transformed the small red flowers into a beautiful red rose.

Xia Wuyan didn’t pay attention to the female teacher but instead looked at Ruan Qing, gracefully handing over the rose and revealing a faint smile. “Mr. Li, I hope that every bouquet of flowers in your life will be given to you by me.”

Ruan Qing: “...”

Other players: “...?”

Xia Wuyan’s words were quite straightforward in expressing his intentions to Ruan Qing. Although it was expressed as a hope, his tone was filled with certainty and dominance.

In the midst of romance and elegance, there was a hint of dominance, and Xia Wuyan himself was incredibly handsome. It was probably difficult for anyone to refuse such a confession.

However, no one in there felt that this was romantic.

The players beside them stared in shock, their faces filled with disbelief.

They had witnessed love at first sight before, but this was different.

In this endless game, where every day was uncertain, most people lacked a sense of morality. Those who got together at the drop of a hat were not uncommon.

But “love at first sight,” to put it plainly, was all about being attracted to someone’s appearance.

Up until today, that’s what they all thought, but now...

Players looked at the not-so-attractive chubby guy next to them, and then at the handsome and delicate Xia Wuyan. For a moment, they didn’t know what expression to put on.

But perhaps... this was... true love.

Though players wanted to convince themselves that it was true love, they couldn’t fully convince themselves.

After all, they had just heard their conversation.

The chubby guy was the father of several children and was even fifty years old.

Although they knew that the chubby guy was just talking nonsense, Xia Wuyan probably didn’t know!

The audience in the livestream room was also quite puzzled.

[Even a pervert like me thinks Teacher Xia is a bit too much.]

[I heard some people have fetishes; maybe Teacher Xia is one of them?]

[But that doesn’t make sense. During the first round, his taste was perfectly fine.]

Other players and the audience in the livestream room couldn’t quite understand.

The advanced male player looked at the rose in Xia Wuyan’s hand, and his eyes grew cold.

Ruan Qing stared at the rose in front of him for a moment, his voice hoarse as he spoke, “Teacher Xia, please don’t joke around.”

“Wasn’t it Mr. Li who joked around first?” Xia Wuyan smiled and looked at Ruan Qing, slowly responding with a hint of playfulness. “Fifty years old?”

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