Wei Dong and Dong Dong's expressions changed simultaneously. Wei Dong stammered, "I don't really want to go to that kind of place..."
"I'll go," Ke Xun said. "Let's figure something out first, then you guys go to the caretaker's room, and I'll go to the slaughterhouse and food processing room."
Mu Yiran finally glanced at him and said calmly, "We can only go during the daytime when they're out for exercise. There won't be any cows on the lawn then, so they won't notice us outside. But the important problem is that the cows are likely all in the caretaker's room, and we'll be taking a huge risk if we want to get in."
"So what do you mean?" Qin Ci asked.
"Lure the cows out of the caretaker's room," Mu Yiran said. "I'll do that."
Given the urgency, Mu Yiran still divided the tasks for tomorrow's operation.
Qin Ci and Dong Dong were responsible for searching the caretaker's room, Ke Xun and Wei Dong were responsible for the slaughterhouse, and Mu Yiran and Zhu Haowen were responsible for the food processing room.
After agreeing on tomorrow's plan, everyone went to their respective corners and stopped talking.
Before tomorrow arrives, they must first undergo tonight's selection process. Perhaps after tonight, one or even several of the three groups will be missing. Plans never keep up with changes.
After eating, drinking, and relieving themselves, the people inside the painting stayed obediently in the corner of the cubicle. No one dared to come forward and cause trouble for the people outside the painting like those reckless youths from yesterday. Only Mo Mou occasionally glanced at Mu Yiran with a sinister look, seemingly plotting a coup.
Mu Yiran didn't look at him at all, only closing his eyes to rest. Ke Xun, however, stood in the corner, looking up.
These cubicles, to put it bluntly, were like pigsties in a pig farm, with pigs locked in one cubicle, surrounded on all sides, with an open roof for the pig farmer to feed them from above.
This "human enclosure" was also surrounded on all sides, with brick walls on two sides and the back wall of the entire farmhouse on the other, reaching all the way to the roof. Windows were embedded in the walls, and iron bars were embedded in the windows. On the other side was an iron gate, the upper part of which was also made of brick, flush with the brick walls on both sides. The lower part of the iron gate had a door, wide enough for one person to open and close, allowing people to enter and exit.
Ke Xun observed the surroundings, then walked to Mu Yiran's side and lowered his voice: "I feel this painting is different from the previous ones. The previous paintings were all supernatural, involving 'fields' or non-human forces, so we couldn't wander around at night. There were always various situations that restricted our movements, such as suffocation if we stepped out of the designated area. But this painting, I feel, is different."
Mu Yiran lowered his eyes, listening to him speak while thinking.
"The absolute rulers in this painting are animals, or in other words, the 'humans' in this world. Since they are 'humans' and it is they who choose our deaths, does that mean that they are the absolute power with the right to choose in this painting? Above them, is there no higher power to control our fate?"
As Ke Xun finished speaking, Mu Yiran raised his eyes, his gaze slightly narrowed.
"If they were 'people' in this world, it would mean they only have 'human' strength, not divine power, just like us in the real world. For animals, their advantages lie only in size, strength, height difference, and intelligence," Ke Xun continued. "But after all, this is a painting created by humans, so we can't make absolute substitutions. Therefore, we still possess human intelligence here, and we can still walk upright and free our hands. Here, the only difference between us and them is size, height, and strength. If those indescribable powers don't exist, wouldn't that prove…"
At this point, Ke Xun leaned close to Mu Yiran's ear and whispered, "In this painting, as long as there are no restrictions on personal freedom, we can also move around freely at night?"
Mu Yiran's long, slightly upturned eyelashes fluttered under Ke Xun's eyes. Ke Xun sat up straight and moved a few inches to the side.
Mu Yiran didn't notice his small movement, but simply moved her gaze around the partition, finally settling on the corner between the two walls.
"We can give it a try," he replied.
Ke Xun chuckled, scratched his nose with his fingertip, and added in a low voice, "Actually, I think there's another place I mentioned earlier that 'seems inaccessible but might actually be accessible,' besides the administrator's room, the slaughterhouse, and the food processing room."
Mu Yiran finally turned his gaze to his face.
The two were still quite close, so when they suddenly looked at each other, every detail on their faces was clearly visible.
Their eyes met abruptly, and Mu Yiran seemed caught off guard, quickly turning his head away.
Ke Xun also turned his head away, silently taking a deep breath before saying, "Outside the farm. Maybe we can go outside the farm too, as long as we find a way out."
"You're right," Mu Yiran said calmly.
After that, the two stopped talking and sat silently side by side.
Strangely but fortunately, until the giant bulls came to clean the enclosure and left the farmhouse, no bull came to choose who to kill.
"What's going on? Are we really going to have a vote tomorrow?" Wei Dong asked in surprise, leaning closer in a low voice.
Ke Xun couldn't understand either. A vote required all the surviving outsiders to participate, but the men's and women's farmhouses were separated. Would there be a special scene where everyone was locked together before the vote?
Mu Yiran thought for a moment and asked Ke Xun, "Among those five women outside the scene, were any older?"
Ke Xun scratched his head, "I didn't look closely; my back was to them the whole time. Let me think."
Mu Yiran stopped talking and waited silently until Ke Xun spoke again, "Yes, I recalled their voices, and one of them sounded like she was in her forties or fifties."
Mu Yiran paused, then said in a deep voice, "Then perhaps tonight the giant bulls didn't fail to conduct a death selection, but simply didn't choose from the men's quarters."
"You mean...they chose women?" Wei Dong was both frightened and somewhat wistful.
"And it's very likely that older woman in her forties or fifties," Ke Xun understood Mu Yiran's meaning. "The younger women are kept for breeding, while the older women are no longer worth raising. They can't reproduce, and they can't be kept until they're too old to chew. So, when they're in their forties or fifties… slaughtering them is the limit they can wait for."
Everyone fell silent.
After the silence, they felt a sense of relief, knowing at least they were safe for the night.
It was past midnight, and the farmhouse was completely quiet. Apart from the occasional snore, no one could be heard talking anymore. The other people in the painting were fast asleep, and even Wei Dong and Zhu Haowen had begun to doze off. Mu Yiran, however, stood up silently at this moment.
Ke Xun, who had been watching him closely, also stood up and asked in a low voice, "What are you planning to do?"
Mu Yiran also lowered his voice and pointed to the angle between the two walls: "I've practiced rock climbing, and I want to try climbing up from here and see what's going on outside."
"I'll go with you," Ke Xun said without hesitation.
Mu Yiran glanced at him: "Don't be impulsive. This wall is too high. If you haven't practiced, you might slip and fall, or you might run out of energy and fall down. It's no joke."
Ke Xun smiled, "Don't underestimate me. Back in school, I dared to say my physical strength was second to none in the entire department. I haven't stopped training since graduation, so you don't need to worry about my stamina. As for whether I'll slip, that depends on you. You'll be in front, and I'll be behind. Wherever you grab, I'll grab. As long as you don't slip, I won't slip either."
Mu Yiran didn't say anything more. He knew that Ke Xun wouldn't compromise on this kind of thing, and he wouldn't let him take the risk alone.
He led him to the corner and quickly explained the rock climbing techniques to him in a low voice. Then he realized that Ke Xun truly deserved to be a physical education student. He really had an extraordinary talent for sports. He only needed to explain these techniques briefly, and Ke Xun immediately grasped them and could even apply them to other situations.
After explaining and giving a few more instructions, Mu Yiran woke the drowsy Qin Ci, whispered his plan, and asked Qin Ci to keep watch—mainly on the people inside the painting. If anyone woke up and discovered that he and Ke Xun were not in the cubicle, and they started making a fuss, attracting the giant bull, things would get serious. Mu Yiran told Qin
Ci to act according to the situation, and if all else failed, to knock them unconscious with a chop to the back of the neck.
Qin Ci was speechless for a moment.
Even as a doctor, he wouldn't dare to do a chop to the back of someone's neck so easily. He wasn't as daring as Ke Xun; a wrong strike could be fatal. He was a doctor, meant to save lives, not kill them. However, he also understood the importance of this matter. If he couldn't bring himself to do it, it would be the people outside the painting who would die. Therefore, he agreed.
When Mu Yiran was about to start climbing, Ke Xun regretted it.
He had to watch him climb to know where his handholds and footholds were.
But when he looked up, the scene before him completely threw him into disarray. This was... simply... ah...
At this moment, Ke Xun sincerely admired Mu Yiran.
This man was truly upright and composed in any situation, without doing anything unnecessary, without any superfluous thoughts, always ready to respond, and with an iron will.
Ke Xun silently sang the national anthem a few times in his heart, then solemnly followed along as he climbed.
Mu Yiran didn't climb very fast, accommodating Ke Xun's pace, and occasionally stopping to glance down to assess his ability to keep up.
Clearly, Ke Xun was extremely reliable in this regard. When he reached halfway up, Mu Yiran saw that Ke Xun's fingers, gripping the cracks between the bricks, remained steady, and he felt somewhat relieved, continuing to climb.
It took the two of them more than twenty minutes to finally climb to the top of the high wall. Standing atop the wall, they looked out over the entire farmhouse area. The tall, spacious houses, the two rows of neat partitions, and the huge brooms, tables, and chairs placed in the corners gave them a strange feeling of having entered a land of giants.
Using the moonlight streaming through the window, the two carefully examined the surroundings. Ke Xun spotted the exit first, pointing to a vent on the wall near the roof—large enough for a human to squeeze through!