Tian Yang forced a bitter smile, a smile that seemed to tinged with tears, and pulled his phone from his pocket. "You don't need to comfort me... I know I can't get out..."
Ke Xun didn't respond, only saying, "Keep recording. Qin Ci and the others are back. I'll go get some food," and walked away.
Qin Ci, Wei Dong, and Luo Jin returned with food and water, along with a few rabbits. Wei Dong said, "There are two large creatures in the trap, I don't know if they're deer or roe deer. I was worried you wouldn't have enough time to deal with them, so I only brought rabbits."
"Okay, you two come help," Ke Xun called to Wei Dong and Luo Jin. Fang Fei, seeing this, also volunteered to help.
Qin Ci walked to He Tang, who was still unconscious, squatted down, and touched her forehead, his brows furrowing.
Zhu Haowen followed him and asked in a low voice, "How is it? Is it the same as Xiao Kai's situation?"
Qin Ci nodded slightly, a hint of confusion on his face. "I can't figure out the reason. He Tang didn't have any black blood on her, so how was she 'chosen'?"
"How do you think Xiao Kai was chosen?" Zhu Haowen asked.
Qin Ci said, "I've been thinking about Xiao Kai's problem all day. At first, I thought he had malaria, which is transmitted through blood by mosquito bites. This condition develops very quickly, and a person's body temperature will rise sharply in a short time.
"But it turns out it wasn't malaria, or even a disease. It might just be the way the painting designed for death. If that's the case, then it's hard to say why Xiao Kai was chosen. Similarly, the reason why Tian Yang and He Tang were chosen might also have nothing to do with the black blood.
"But I don't understand, to put it bluntly... if they're going to die, why make them have a fever before they die? Isn't that redundant?"
"Could it be because the three of them are relatively weak, and this death selection was based on physical strength from low to high?" Zhu Haowen offered a suggestion.
"But Xiao Kai seems to be in good physical condition," Qin Ci said. "When I wiped him down with alcohol, I noticed he must be someone who exercises regularly, quite like Xiao Ke."
Zhu Haowen paused for a moment, then said, "If the death screening criteria aren't based on physical condition, then it might be related to the infrasound that Yi Ran mentioned."
"Perhaps," Qin Ci couldn't be sure either.
Zhu Haowen turned to look at Tian Yang, who was speaking softly into his phone, so he didn't disturb him. Before it got completely dark, he and Mu Yi Ran and Shao Ling quickly looked through the books they had found in the houses.
Qin Ci, however, called Wu You and Gu Qingqing over and said, "I want to figure out the cause of He Tang's illness. I need to examine her body, and I might need your help. The main thing is to check if there are any wounds or unusual spots on her body."
Wu You and Gu Qingqing nodded quickly.
Qin Ci greeted everyone, carried He Tang on his back, and led the two to the prepared house.
By the time Ke Xun, Wei Dong, and Luo Yi had finished roasting the rabbit, it was already dark. The group prepared to move inside, but Tian Yang was still intermittently unconscious and too weak to stand.
Ke Xun made a stretcher out of bedsheets and branches, and together with Wei Dong, carried Tian Yang, carefully wrapping his hands in cloth to avoid touching him.
The books they hadn't yet looked at were also moved into the room.
Once inside, they locked the door from the inside, sealed the gaps with a raincoat, and then lit a makeshift oil lamp they had made from cooking oil and flammable materials on the wall. A dim, yellowish light illuminated the room, barely enough to see.
With the help of Wu You and Gu Qingqing, Qin Ci had already given He Tang a full-body checkup. His expression was grave as he told everyone, "He Tang also has a mosquito bite on her body. I think this is the main reason for her illness, just like Xiao Kai. The mosquito likely carried a virus that serves as a death screening criterion—everyone must be careful!"
"Damn…mosquitoes are impossible to avoid!" Luo Yu quickly hugged himself tightly, looking around frantically.
"If all else fails, let's all put on our raincoats now. It'll be hot, but at least it'll protect us from mosquito bites," Shao Ling said.
Everyone put on their raincoats. In such sweltering heat, being confined in a nearly airtight room and wearing non-breathable raincoats, they all looked like they'd just been pulled out of the water within two minutes.
Tian Yang suddenly woke up, weakly looking at everyone in the room, and said to Ke Xun, "Ke'er... give me one too..."
Seeing everyone looking at him, Tian Yang forced a smile, "Or... you can... put me... outside the door... that's fine... or... give me a raincoat... so that... so that when I die... my blood won't splatter on you..."
Everyone's mood and expression were equally somber. Ke Xun still handed a raincoat to Tian Yang: "Do you need help?"
Tian Yang shook his head weakly, struggling to sit up halfway, putting on the raincoat. After putting it on, he gasped for breath, leaned against the wall beside him, looked up at the dim light above, and pointed with trembling hands to a stack of books next to Ke Xun: "Give me a few... I can... I can still help... read..."
"You should rest, eat something." Ke Xun handed him some rabbit meat, but Tian Yang still insisted on reading, so Ke Xun casually picked up a book for him.
He Tang was still unconscious, waking up two or three times, either crying out in pain, terrified and crying, or falling unconscious again.
Fang Fei, Wu You, and Gu Qingqing helped her put on a raincoat... though it seemed heartless.
Everyone forced themselves to eat meat to replenish their strength under these circumstances, while continuing to search for clues, frantically flipping through the books beside them in the dim light.
Until Tian Yang began vomiting and convulsing.
Scenes of Xiao Kai's death yesterday flashed through everyone's minds; the black, sticky, asphalt-like blood he vomited was like tangible nightmares.
Wu You's tears welled up instantly, unsure whether they were from fear, pity for Tian Yang, or despair stemming from a shared experience.
She bit her lip hard, trying not to cry out, and hid behind Fang Fei, not wanting her emotions to affect everyone, or... Tian Yang.
Gu Qingqing, standing to the side, covered the upper half of her face with the hood of her raincoat and the lower half with the front, her whole body huddled inside, trembling uncontrollably.
Luo Yu silently wiped away his tears, intending to hide behind Ke Xun like Wu You, but then heard Tian Yang, who had finally stopped vomiting, weakly call out, "Ke'er..."
Ke Xun stepped forward, stopping a short distance away, and crouched down to look at him. "Speak," he said, "I'm listening."
Tian Yang struggled to sit against the wall, his trembling hands taking the thick A4-sized notebook Ke Xun had just given him. It was more of a neatly stacked pile of papers held together by several large clips on the side, making it easy to flip through like a book.
The cover, hand-added by its owner, was made of kraft paper, with a string of foreign words written on it, followed by parentheses containing (XXXX—).
XXXX consists of four blurred numbers, followed by a space after the dash, all in handwriting.
"This is a collection of papers..." Tian Yang breathed heavily, panting, occasionally gagging, still struggling to speak, "It must have been printed out and bound together by the owner of this book... ugh—cough... Although all the dates inside are blurred... there are a few articles that I remember very well...
"I studied Hebrew in college, a less commonly taught language, and all the papers in this book—ugh—are in Hebrew." As supplementary reading material, I tried...translating a few articles from it...
"Ugh—I just...looked at it, and the content is exactly the same as what I've read. These papers...were borrowed from our foreign teacher back then. He got them after returning to his country during the holidays...the latest papers from a certain journal. During those years in university, every year when he came back from abroad—ugh—ugh—cough cough—he would bring back some of the latest papers published that year...for us to see.
"The order in which the papers I've seen in this bound volume are arranged seems to be...according to the order of their publication dates, from front to back, and...the papers tucked in the last few pages are ones I've translated before...
"What I mean by this is, cough cough—ugh—if...if the owner of this bound volume...has been adding new content chronologically, then...up to the date of this last paper, is it...the year these people had their accident?"
"You…look, the parentheses on the cover clearly indicate—ugh—it's…the start and end dates of this paper, so…the date of the last paper should be the year the incident happened. The dash…is empty, which means…the process of adding new—ugh—new—ugh—new papers to the bound volume was…interrupted during a continuous process…
If that's the case, then I…then I might…maybe I can determine the exact year of their incident, I don't know…cough cough cough…I don't know if it will…help in finding the signature…"
"Of course," Ke Xun said, his tone heavy but extremely certain, "Tell me the year."
Tian Yang suddenly convulsed violently, vomiting out of his mouth. Ke Xun was squatting in front of him. In that instant, Ke Xun heard Mu Yiran shout sharply from not far behind him: "Get out of the way!"
Ke Xun's reaction was never slow. The moment Tian Yang convulsed, he had already rolled to the side to avoid it, almost in sync with Mu Yiran's voice, and ultimately dodged the vomit that Tian Yang spat out in time.
Tian Yang vomited so violently that he couldn't even catch his breath, let alone speak. What he vomited up was all the rabbit meat he had just eaten and the plant juice he had drunk. Among these undigested bits of meat, the green plant juice was mixed with more and more, thicker and thicker, dark red blood.
"Tian Yang! Hold on!" Wei Dong shouted hoarsely, "We'll find the autograph soon! As long as we leave the painting, all the harm we suffered inside will disappear—you must hold on! We'll find the autograph soon!"
Tian Yang swayed uncontrollably, vomiting uncontrollably. He struggled to lift his head slightly, two streams of blood sliding down his face like tears of heart-wrenching pain from lingering attachment. Blood frothed from his nostrils and flowed into his mouth, while what he vomited was thick, black, tar-like blood clots: "...gurgle...gulp..."
His face, like Xiao Kai's from last night, hung loosely on his skull. He had lost all the human expressions he once possessed. In his last second as a human being in this world, all he could do was stare intently at the person he once knew best, his two bloodshot, bulging eyes.
He had abandoned this person like a coward, running away alone.
And now, when he finally wanted to bid this person a brave smile at the end of his life, he found that he had lost all expression.
Author's Note:
Tian Yang: ...Can I finish saying the main point before I die...?
Ke Xun: --Can he finish saying the main point before he dies!
Everyone: --Can he finish saying the main point before he dies!
Readers: --Can he finish saying the main point before he dies!
Author (not very bright): Don't...don't worry...the main point won't be forgotten...it's coming...