Paintings of Terror

These white fish aroused a familiar sense of horror among everyone.

“I never thought that you could eat those fish.” Wei Dong furrowed his eyebrows and instinctively stayed away from the oily paper bag emitting the smell of dried fish.

“They are edible. That fat uncle saw me hesitating and immediately ate a fish tail…” Luo Bu was still in shock when he recalled how the fat uncle ate the fish tail.

Everyone: “……”

Shao Ling asked, “Are all the fish in this world like this?”

Luo Bu: “These should be a special kind of fish found only in the Cold Night Inn. They are relatively precious ingredients… It is said that these fish are not only delicious but also have a powerful effect of warming the body and warding off the cold. Even if you venture out into the ice and snow outside, you won’t feel cold.”

“Cold Night Inn, how many inns are there in this place?” Cao Youning interjected. “Can someone educate me on the geography here?”

The task of explaining fell again on Qin Ci. “Actually, in our shared luggage, there are some maps and road guides that indicate there are four Inns in this world, which are commonly referred to as the ‘Four Inns of the Mortal World’ by the people here. These four Inn have significantly different climates due to the varying levels of illumination they receive.”

Cao Youning looked at Qin Ci with admiration, wondering when this person had become so well-versed in the basic topography of this world.

Qin Ci continued, “Based on our character setting, we all come from the Light Inn. That is supposed to be the brightest place among the four Inns. As for what the light sources are, I have no idea. I only know that the Light Inn is a place that people of other Inns aspire to go to. It’s often referred to as the ‘Abode Chosen by God’. Lantern Inn has a shorter daytime than the Light Inn, but it is ranked second among the Inns in terms of livability. The most important thing is that there are sufficient sources of fire here and they can use lanterns to illuminate the inside of the Inn.

“As for the third Inn, the Fluorite Inn, it is relatively darker and colder. There are no fire sources, and the people there rely on the unique fluorites found within the Inn for illumination, the same kind of fluorite we used in our homemade projector.”

“Lastly, there is the Cold Night Inn. According to the records, no one lives there. Although it is referred to as an Inn, no one built houses there. It is dark all year round and there is no light.”

Everyone listened attentively. Previously, they had only vague ideas about the four Inns, but today, after listening to Qin Ci’s explanation, they understood more about the distribution of these Inns in this world.

“But it looks like that fat uncle and his group seem to be particularly wanting to go to the Cold Night Inn. They said there is good stuff there.” Luo Bu interrupted, “he said these white fish are precious goods and are in high demand at other Inns. As for whether the Cold Night Inn holds any other secrets, he didn’t say.”

Mu Yiran asked, “Does he still have his eyes on Koharu?” 𝚋𝚎𝚍ｎ𝚘ｖ𝚎𝚕.𝚗𝚎𝚝

Luo Bu nodded: “He said only spirit dogs can bring people to the Cold Night Inn, and Koharu is a spirit dog.”

Koharu seemed to be quite interested in the phrase ‘spirit dog’. It stood straight on all fours with its eyes wide open, as if he was listening to a very important matter.

“He wants to collaborate?” Mu Yiran asked.

“As expected of my brother-in-law,” Luo Han gave a thumbs-up. “That’s his intention. He knows we definitely won’t lend Koharu to him, so he tried to come up with a plan to convince us to go together with them to the Cold Night Inn. He said it wouldn’t be a loss for us. There is good stuff in the Cold Night Inn.”

Ke Xun glanced at the good stuff on the table— the dried white fish— and believed that none of them had the appetite to eat them, so he temporarily put them away. “It’s getting late, and everyone is here. Let’s eat and talk at the same time.”

Mai Peng also added, “The film is almost ready. We can look at it in a little while.”

“Alright, let’s eat first,” Ke Xun had already set up the food.

However, Mai Peng said, “My throat is hurting too much. I really can’t eat.”

This caught Qin Ci’s attention: “Your throat hurts? Didn’t you already show obvious symptoms of a cold yesterday? Why is your throat hurting now?”

Mai Peng couldn’t explain it himself. It was indeed a strange occurrence.

Qin Ci approached and asked Mai Peng to stand next to a lamp. “Open your mouth, let me have a look at your throat.”

To see clearly, Qin Ci turned on the flashlight on his phone and observed with a furrowed brow. “It’s really strange. Your tonsils are swollen, and there are some ulcers. Normally, this shouldn’t be what happens after a severe cold.”

Mai Peng cleared his throat and took a sip of water, feeling slightly better. “Yes, yes, I’ve never experienced a cold in this sequence before.”

“Sequence?” Qin Ci caught this word. “It seems like a reversed sequence.”

“Yes, my health is pretty good. A cold typically lasts three or four days. Usually, it’s a sore throat the first day, stuffy nose the second day, sneezing and a runny nose the third day, and by the fourth day, it’s mostly over.”

Qin Ci glanced at Mu Yiran, his expression extremely serious. “Mai Peng is right. That’s the normal sequence of a cold. I believe that in Mai Peng’s case, it is happening in reverse.”

“Happening in reverse?” Many people started to feel unsettled. Lu Heng was the first to speak up. “Could it be… time going backward?”

Right, a lot of people thought it that way. The time in this world was flowing backward.

“No wonder it’s called the Inn, and the time is so chaotic. In fact, the time here is going backward!” Cao Youning was extremely surprised that he even forgot to eat his food.

Zhu Haowen spoke calmly, “That is not logical.”

“What do you mean by logical?” Cao Youning retorted. “My beard is the evidence. When I first arrived here, it suddenly became unkempt and long, but this morning it became slightly shorter! Isn’t that evidence of time going backward?”

“No,” Zhu Haowen said expressionlessly, “If time is truly reversed, we wouldn’t be able to finish our conversations, move forward, or even eat our meal… Our actions and everything else would be in reverse.”

Everyone fell silent for a moment. Shao Ling spoke up, “He’s right. Time in this world isn’t completely flowing in reverse, but there are traces of it happening in certain places.”

Ke Xun had already pulled Mu Yiran to sit at the table: “Let’s eat first. The lights are about to go off. No one wants to eat in the dark. Once we’re full and energized, we can discuss further. We still have a lot to do. We can look at the newly developed films and study the four photos of the white fish. Let’s all sit and eat!”

It was not like they could fully understand what was going on with time, so everyone decided to sit down and have their meal.

As their meal approached its end, the lights went off.

Darkness brought about a familiar sense of panic, especially for the newcomers. After all, Xi Shengnan had indeed died just last night, and now her body was placed in a coffin, hanging outside in the cold.

Under the cold-toned lighting of the fluorites and the phones, everyone cleaned up the wooden table after the meal and set up the projector.

The viewing effect at night was indeed better. The image display was particularly bright on the dark wall.

As they were already familiar with operating it, Luo Bu and Wei Dong were once again responsible for moving the films in the projector. The two of them coordinated seamlessly and showed no more signs of shaky hands.

“This is Xiao Du’s film. It must contain some scenery from the outside world,” Wei Dong tried to lighten the atmosphere. “I wonder what the first photo captured.”

However, Du Lingyu remained silent, her eyes fixed on the screen without blinking. She knew very well that this was a brand-new roll of film, because she had cleared the storage in her camera in the real world and there would be no traces of the past captured within.

Arriving at this unfamiliar world like that, as if signifying some kind of farewell.

Mai Peng’s words triggered her panic. This roll only had a dozen or so pieces, where did the previous pieces of the film go? Could it be that the speculation about time going backwards is true? Did her past self use them? Then cut off and develop them? And then put the remaining pieces back into the camera?

“Brother-in-law! Brother Haowen! Brother Qin!” Luo Bu’s sudden exclamation snapped Du Lingyu out of her imagination, and she looked at the large display on the wall hurriedly…

The negative appeared slightly blurred, but it didn’t affect everyone from recognizing the people in it, as they were close to the camera, and they were familiar faces.

“Because I didn’t know what would be captured, I couldn’t judge the distance or the focus. I could only choose the commonly used aperture settings based on the shutter speed,” Mai Peng explained to everyone. “Following Brother Mu’s advice, I maximized the use of a slow speed. Since there’s no tripod here, I had to stabilize the camera on the table to ensure stability.”

Ke Xun glanced at the image and felt an inexplicable discomfort in his heart. It was as if his heart had contracted into a cold, hard mass, and it would take him a long time to recover.

Ke Xun heard Zhu Haowen’s slightly hoarse voice asking, “What shutter speed did you use?”

Mai Peng explained, “We aimed for the slowest speed, so I used the bulb mode.”

“What is the bulb mode?”

“That’s a manual shutter. When the speed exceeds thirty seconds, you can choose the bulb mode setting, which allows for complete manual control. As long as you keep your finger on it, you can maintain the exposure for several minutes.” Mai Peng explained. “Strangely, this camera’s shutter speed becomes difficult to use at slower speeds after 1/2 second. It seemed to be malfunctioning, so I had no choice but to choose the bulb mode setting. The manual exposure time was approximately ten seconds.”

Cao Youning chimed in, “Without a shutter release cable and a tripod, capturing a photo like this in ten seconds is already quite extraordinary. We calculated that it might capture something from quite a few hours ago. But if we assume it’s in exponential increments, it’s also possible that it captured something from a few days ago.”

The screen trembled slightly, and it was Wei Dong’s hand trembling. “I’m sorry, I’m feeling a bit…I can’t handle it. Looking at this photo makes me feel uncomfortable. I don’t know why.”

Since the camera was fixed on the table, it captured the scene from the table to the cabinet. There were four people in the photo. Qin Ci stood by the table. His facial features were vaguely discernible but blurred. Even then, it was possible to tell that he was in a bad mood. Further away was Mu Yiran, standing alone. Because only his profile view was captured, it was difficult to see his expression. Yet, even from this blurry silhouette, one could sense a strong aura that seemed to condense the entire atmosphere of the Inn. Furthest away was Luo Bu, standing beside the cabinet, seemingly engaged in a struggle with someone, but most of that person’s body was out of the frame, making it impossible to identify who it was.

“That person is me,” Wei Dong said.

“Brother Dong, how did you…”

“It is me. It’s my sixth sense.”

Luo Bu asked, “But why would we be fighting…”

“I don’t know. Maybe something serious had happened…” Wei Dong tried to free himself from the depressing emotions.

The focal point of the negative was on the face of Zhu Haowen, who was the closest to the camera. He was sitting by the table and his face was the clearest. He was crying.

Zhu Haowen was crying expressionlessly.

Everyone tried to guess the story behind this photo, but they dared to not guess beyond a certain point.

Finally, Fang Fei broke the silence. “Clearly, this is not something that happened a few hours or even a dozen hours ago. It should be several days ago, or even longer.”

“But at that time, we hadn’t arrived yet…” Du Lingyu said.

“Time is chaotic, luckily we can still capture it with the cameras,” Fang Fei said. “There must have been something significant that had happened at that time.”

Although they couldn’t imagine the specific events, the people in the photo losing their composure had already caused uneasiness among everyone.

As they instinctively looked towards Mu Yiran to seek comfort, they discovered that he had somehow positioned himself in the farthest corner from the projector display, as if unwilling or afraid to continue looking at the photo.

In the darkness, someone lightly clapped their hands, and eventually, everyone’s gaze settled on Ke Xun’s face.

“Although we don’t know what catastrophic event is happening in the photo, it belongs to another time and is unrelated to our present moment,” Ke Xun’s voice was reassuring and brought comfort. “But just in case, just in case that time is indeed going backwards, and that if we are forced to relive the past, at least we still have a choice.”

“What choice?” asked Du Lingyu.

“Before that terrible event happens, we find the signature and get out,” Ke Xun replied. “The past and the future are all illusions. They provide us clues, not facts.”