Do Not Laugh! This Is a Horror Movie - Chapter 7

Fu Lanyu wasn’t asleep at all. Kiki’s rustling movements beside her didn’t escape her ears.

However, she had initially thought Kiki wanted to kill her, but it turned out Kiki wanted to kill Xiaohui.

Xiaohui was woken up, groggily turned her head, and suddenly felt her cheek a bit cold.

Touching it, she discovered the dagger resting right next to her pillow. She was greatly alarmed and instantly sobered up.

“What’s going on, Miss Fu?”

“Over here,” Fu Lanyu calmly replied, one hand still gripping Kiki’s neck. “It’s rare that you slept so well tonight. You were almost stabbed.”

Xiaohui immediately understood, a chill running down her spine. “…She tried to kill me?”

“She already killed one; she doesn’t care about killing a second.”

“Did she kill Wang Xin too?”

Kiki’s face was covered in tears, and she explained weakly, “Miss Fu, you misunderstood. I didn’t…”

“Didn’t?” Fu Lanyu said flatly.

“Before Wang Xin died, he was clutching a crystal button in his hand. Check if your sleeve is missing something.”

“…”

Kiki froze. That’s right, when she ambushed Wang Xin from behind last night, the struggling Wang Xin did indeed rip off her cufflink.

She only discovered this later, but by then the dagger was back on her table, and Wang Xin’s body had disappeared from the room.

She covered her sleeve with her jacket, thinking no one would notice this small detail, but everything was in Fu Lanyu’s control.

“You could find the murder weapon here and still dare to kill. It seems you’re not a novice; your act was quite convincing,” Fu Lanyu said.

“Why didn’t the Oscars give you an award?”

“…”

“Too bad you chose the wrong target and overestimated your own abilities.”

“Miss Fu!” Kiki saw she couldn’t hide it any longer and, fearing what Fu Lanyu might do to her, hastily spoke.

“Listen to me, we can actually cooperate—I’m Silver Tier 2, definitely higher level than this woman, and I have money. You can abandon her and help me win. We can even sign a long-term contract in the future!”

Xiaohui was startled upon hearing this. “Miss Fu, don’t listen to her! Although I haggled with you and paid less, we’ve developed a sort of revolutionary camaraderie. You can’t betray me now!”

Kiki argued righteously, “Miss Fu, a useless person like her, who only hopes to win by doing nothing, won’t live long even if she clears this level. Why waste time on her? You’d be better off choosing me. At least I dare to think and act; I can still be of some value to you.”

Fu Lanyu pondered for a moment, then turned to Xiaohui. “She has a point. If you only hope to win by doing nothing, you definitely won’t last long.”

Xiaohui: “?”

“But what does that have to do with me? I just need to fulfill the contract and guide her through the level. She walks the rest of the path herself; why should I worry?”

Fu Lanyu turned back to Kiki, her tone icy, sarcasm evident. “As for your ‘some value’—a joke. What value could a Silver Tier 2 have?”

“…”

“I’ll give you a ride.”

With that, Fu Lanyu swiftly grabbed the dagger from beside her pillow, reversed her grip on the hilt, and with lightning speed, her hand moved up and down.

The entire sequence of movements flowed like water. The sharp blade passed through the back of Kiki’s hand, instantly pinning it to the bed board.

Blood streamed down her sleeve and onto the floor.

“Ah—!!”

Intense pain struck, and Kiki, caught off guard, cried out in a breakdown. As she screamed, she seemed to realize something, her face turning ashen, and she hastily shut her mouth.

But it was too late; she had already violated the rule against loud noises. Fu Lanyu didn’t need to do anything herself; Kiki wouldn’t live past tonight.

“Get dressed, let’s go.”

Even though the room was dark, Xiaohui could feel that Fu Lanyu was getting out of bed and preparing to leave the room.

“Go? Where to?”

Fu Lanyu didn’t look back. “To clear the level.”

Clear the level? At this late hour, they could clear the level? Xiaohui didn’t understand, but she unconditionally trusted Fu Lanyu’s ability and immediately followed obediently.

Fear and pain caused Kiki to lose her mind, especially upon hearing the words “clear the level.”

She simply gave up, screaming frantically, wanting to drag the two of them down with her.

“Where is the female ghost? Female ghost, come quickly! They’re going to clear the level—quick, kill them—!”

Fu Lanyu walked two steps, then turned back, ripped off a dirty pillowcase, and stuffed it into Kiki’s mouth.

Kiki: “…”

Footsteps receded, and the room door was closed again.

✵✵✵

Fu Lanyu led Xiaohui to the kitchen. The iron pot was still there, the meat inside had cooled, but it hadn’t turned back into a corpse. She picked up the iron pot and set it aside.

Xiaohui asked worriedly, “Miss Fu, what are we doing?”

“Looking for the keyhole.”

Sure enough, the white protrusion on the stove was still there, but the gelatinous substance that had sealed it had disappeared, revealing a strangely shaped keyhole.

Xiaohui watched as Fu Lanyu took a key from a pocket close to her body, utterly astonished.

“Where did you find this?”

“That room with the bloody handprint.”

Xiaohui recalled and couldn’t help but shiver. “You actually went in there.”

She was immensely glad she had found such powerful allies; otherwise, let alone finding clues, she wouldn’t even have had the courage to enter the kitchen late at night.

Fu Lanyu used the key to unlock the keyhole. She saw that the area beneath the stove was empty, resembling a small safe, hiding a white medicine bottle.

—The bridal gown is red, the poison is white.

This bottle of medicine was the poison sung about in the ballad, the one that poisoned the female protagonist in the backstory.

Fu Lanyu examined the bottle for a moment, then tossed it back with a flick of her wrist.

Xiaohui: “…Huh?”

Qiao Yunzheng had appeared at the kitchen doorway at some point and was raising his hand to steadily catch the medicine bottle.

He chuckled softly. “It seems everything is progressing smoothly.”

“When you came downstairs, did you hear anything from my room?”

“What do you mean?” His smile deepened. “Do you mean the sounds of meat being sliced piece by piece, like slaughtering a pig?”

Undoubtedly, Kiki in the room had violated the rules by screaming loudly and had just been dealt with by the female ghost.

Xiaohui tensed. “After the female ghost finishes killing, will it come downstairs to find us?”

Qiao Yunzheng’s tone was consistently low and gentle.

“Of course. Even if it doesn’t come downstairs, we’ll have to go upstairs. Otherwise, how would we kill it?”

“…”

Xiaohui huddled behind Fu Lanyu, trembling even more violently.

Fu Lanyu suddenly said, “That man surnamed Li is still alive.” She was referring to Li Chenguang.

Li Chenguang hadn’t appeared all day, and there had been no movement from him at night. If he was still alive, even if they killed the female ghost, the game couldn’t end.

“So, do we kill him first, or the female ghost?”

“Which one do you think is easier to kill?”

“Actually, neither is too difficult.”

While the two powerful players were discussing their chilling murder plans, rookie Xiaohui, who had been looking around, stiffened for a long moment.

Finally, she extended a finger and cautiously tugged at Fu Lanyu’s sleeve.

She whispered tremblingly, “Miss Fu, Mr. Qiao, no need to be too conflicted. These two… they’ve merged…”

“?”

Fu Lanyu followed her gaze and then understood her meaning.

Moonlight streamed in faintly from the window, illuminating the figure descending the stairs.

Li Chenguang was dressed in a vibrant red bridal gown, with peonies in his hair, his face thickly caked with makeup, dressed exactly like the woman in the picture frame.

He held a bloody human head under one arm; its long hair dangled from his armpit, revealing a pair of dark, empty eyes—it was his deceased girlfriend, Beibei.

“No one is getting out alive, hehehe… No one is getting out alive…”

His lips were painted with lipstick, and when he grinned, it was like a blood-filled maw. A sinister, hoarse laugh escaped his throat.

This bizarre yet somewhat comical scene left even someone as articulate as Fu Lanyu temporarily without suitable adjectives.

She was speechless for a moment, then suddenly sighed.

“Absolutely hideous.”

Qiao Yunzheng smiled. “Great minds think alike.”

Xiaohui’s panicked voice cut in, “He’s coming! He’s coming, he’s coming!”

Li Chenguang, holding the human head, came closer and closer.

As the distance shortened, his voice gradually changed, pitching higher and sounding more and more like a woman’s. He began to sing like a broken record.

“Mother, watch over my red bridal gown, don’t let me die too, too soon…”

“Mother, watch over my red bridal gown, don’t let me die too, too soon…”

They truly had merged.

“When a person is mentally disturbed and fragile, they are most susceptible to being possessed by ghosts, what we commonly call ‘ghost possession’,” Fu Lanyu said, patting Xiaohui’s shoulder with earnest words.

“So you must strive to become a person with firm willpower and free from low-level interests, so you won’t become like him.”

Xiaohui: “?”

Sis, is this really the right time for a moral lecture?

But she didn’t complain; she didn’t have time to complain, because Li Chenguang… or rather, the female ghost, was already closing in on her.

Li Chenguang raised his hand and threw the bloody head from under his armpit at her. The scene was comparable to a slow-motion close-up in a horror movie.

…Though this was already a real-life horror movie.

“Aiyaya—!!”

Xiaohui fell back on her bottom, letting out a shriek. Fu Lanyu spun around abruptly. “Why are you screaming?!”

No loud noises. In moments of fear, people often forgot the rules.

Li Chenguang laughed grotesquely, and a sharp boning knife suddenly appeared in his hand.

That was the tool used to punish players; the tall man, the bespectacled man, and just now Kiki, had all died by this sharp knife. Xiaohui was terrified.

“Miss Fu, help me!”

No sooner said than done, Fu Lanyu kicked Li Chenguang in the chest, and then, seizing the moment he staggered two steps, she decisively twisted the hand holding the knife.

At the same time, Qiao Yunzheng closed in, his left hand gripping Li Chenguang’s neck, his right hand grabbing his hair, then raising his knee and forcefully thrusting it up—

With a soft crack of bone, Li Chenguang’s head was forcefully bent ninety degrees backward by him.

Fu Lanyu kicked away the boning knife and, with a flick of her wrist, pulled out the white medicine bottle they had just found from Qiao Yunzheng’s pocket.

She flicked open the cap with her thumb and thrust the medicine bottle directly into Li Chenguang’s mouth.

Qiao Yunzheng delivered a chop to Li Chenguang’s throat, forcing him to swallow the entire bottle of poison.

The two had not made any prior arrangements but simply cooperated naturally, with a tacit understanding as if they had worked together countless times.

The bottle of poison was like a searing fire in his guts, making Li Chenguang scream in agony. His voice continuously switched between a man’s and a woman’s, each sound shrill, making one’s skin crawl.

Of course, the only one whose skin crawled was Xiaohui; the other two remained quite calm.

Xiaohui realized she had narrowly escaped death and couldn’t help but shrink further into the corner.

She asked incredulously, “This… this is it?”

“What else?” Fu Lanyu said. “You’re not satisfied? Want an encore?”

“…”

Xiaohui dared not speak anymore. She thought that perhaps in the eyes of the powerful, such low-level games were no different from playing a single-player game, completely insignificant.

What difficulty could there be?

She honestly squatted in a corner, watching with Fu Lanyu and Qiao Yunzheng as Li Chenguang gradually stopped struggling, his limbs twisted, his body stiffening inch by inch.

After a long while, a viscous stream of blood slowly flowed out from beneath Li Chenguang, until it seeped into the ground.

Perhaps it was an illusion, but the moonlight outside the window seemed brighter.

Suddenly, Fu Lanyu spoke. “The time should be up.”

Qiao Yunzheng smiled in response. “Yes. Before we clear it, would you mind telling me your address?”

“…Why?”

“After returning to the real world, I need to know where to find you.”

“If you’re really that capable, you’ll find me if you look.”

Before her words finished, the pendant around Fu Lanyu’s neck suddenly lit up, followed by the faint sound of water drops falling into a glass container.

Level cleared, reward received.

She looked up, and into her vision appeared that all-too-familiar, dazzling white light.