Chapter 47: Chang Street Slaughterhouse
Besides this Rat Zodiac man, three more people arrived one after another and exchanged information with Lu Jinzhao and Wei Ling, but only one of them immediately chose to stop the transaction after hearing Lu Jinzhao’s question.
“She probably reacted to it, right?”
Wei Ling watched that person leave and said, “But this way, we’re missing one person’s information. Is that okay?”
Lu Jinzhao shook her head: “That’s not the key point.”
Although more information from others was naturally better, the information they had already obtained was enough to deal with what might happen next on this platform.
“Our luck is good; the zodiac signs on the meat tickets aren’t hard to handle. The trouble is the others.”
Wei Ling naturally understood what Lu Jinzhao meant.
After figuring out that the key point was the Twelve Zodiac Animals, she immediately connected everything.
12 people corresponding to 12 meat tickets engraved with different zodiac signs; they needed to offer the correct animal to the butcher every day. Today it was rat—what about tomorrow?
Tomorrow it would most likely be another one from the Twelve Zodiac Animals.
So, what to do when the correct animal was one that didn’t exist in reality?
For example, dragon.
At that time, would the Dragon Zodiac passenger be that correct animal?
They were also required every day to bring meat back home, which indirectly gathered all surviving passengers here every day, and the purpose was obvious.
In Wei Ling’s view, this platform was indeed simpler than Loss of Control. The method of ghost killing and the malice of the platform mission were obvious; the greatest difficulty they faced was not even from the ghosts’ pursuit and kill, but how to kill people and avoid being killed.
Compared to what zodiac signs were on other passengers’ meat tickets, the first thing they needed to do was to hide their own zodiac signs well!
Lu Jinzhao had probably thought of all this almost as soon as she saw her meat ticket, right?
That’s why she unhesitatingly took her away from the door instead of exchanging information, and deliberately took the rat and went in together with her to confuse the audience and not expose more information to the others present.
Sure enough, she had made the right choice.
Thinking of this, Wei Ling quietly approached Lu Jinzhao and asked softly, “So what is your zodiac sign? Mine is snake.”
She thought that since they were already tied together, it was beneficial for them to know each other’s zodiac signs; when the butcher demanded that animal on the day, they could better cover for each other.
Lu Jinzhao confirmed that this platform was really very simple, even simpler than Summon Ghosts for her, and she was in a pretty good mood, so she said to Wei Ling, “Guess. Hint: it’s also an animal that grows horns on its head.”
“Sheep?”
Lu Jinzhao nodded.
Seeing this, Wei Ling smiled and said, “You’re actually a little sheep? Doesn’t seem like it at all.”
Hearing this, Lu Jinzhao felt it a bit subtle. Wei Ling saying “little sheep” made her think of the little sheep she had raised and the parchment still in her pocket, but she didn’t say much.
Fortunately, Wei Ling was just teasing and didn’t plan to keep using that joking name.
When the two returned downstairs, there were clearly a few fewer people in the crowd.
It seemed some had entered the main building.
Lu Jinzhao hid her guessed thoughts very well, and the other small group that had also guessed the truth tacitly didn’t speak up to remind the others who hadn’t realized the problem yet.
Both sides harbored their own ulterior motives, and the remaining people who weren’t smart enough and hadn’t joined either group were treated as cannon fodder.
Lu Jinzhao thought that perhaps they were also guessing that completing this platform mission wouldn’t require 12 days.
Just like in Summon Ghosts, where she figured out in her review that killing other passengers early could reduce the mission difficulty, maybe it would work here too.
If the passenger of a certain zodiac sign that must be submitted died early, and the mission had no corresponding executor, would it skip directly?
At least, on a Class C platform, Lu Jinzhao didn’t think there would be a situation where the executor of that condition disappeared and the condition randomly rotated to someone else.
This platform was simple in that inferring its truth was very straightforward, but its essence was extremely cruel and bloody.
In this mission, people would definitely die.
And the number wouldn’t be small.
Once again, Lu Jinzhao felt the undisguised malice from the platform and the train.
This was absolutely not the so-called “evolution” and “selection” that some people on the forum had guessed; she didn’t agree with that speculation, but what the train’s existence was and what meaning it had, she still didn’t know.
Compared to such distant matters, what she cared more about now was
Wei Ling had completed today’s mission; as long as she killed all the other passengers tomorrow, she could probably achieve single-player clearance.
And there were definitely more than just her who could think of this.
Wei Ling wouldn’t do it, but that didn’t mean others wouldn’t.
The only thing Lu Jinzhao was looking forward to now was that the animal the butcher needed tomorrow would be “ox.”
Passengers who had already completed their missions wouldn’t conflict with it.
She just didn’t know if there was anyone on this platform who had thought of this and really planned to do it.
While she was pondering, that Rat Zodiac passenger who had exchanged information with her talked a few words with her companion, then walked into the main building with a conflicted expression.
Lu Jinzhao and Wei Ling just glanced indifferently a few times; neither spoke to stop her.
They didn’t know what she said to her companion, but this “companion” would inevitably become an object of their vigilance.
“This is good too.”
Lu Jinzhao heard Wei Ling beside her say with a sigh in her words.
She felt a bit dazed; Wei Ling had experienced more platforms than her, and she had only gone through two platforms, yet she already felt intense change and indifference growing in her heart.
And Wei Ling, who had experienced even more, had obviously changed a lot too, just more slowly than her.
From her brief interactions with Wei Ling in reality, she had heard the other say things like needing to ask for leave from school to go home and help thresh wheat; she had been a good child, and perhaps still was.
But inside the platform, she could no longer be considered a good person.
What about herself?
Naturally, she couldn’t be considered one either.
“How should we get the meat?” The doubt from the person beside interrupted Lu Jinzhao’s thoughts.
She turned her head and saw that the one asking was the companion of that Rat Zodiac man.
His question was normal, but the timing was too delicate.
That person had just gone in, and he immediately asked this question.
“This guy definitely knows already, right?” Wei Ling whispered beside her.
Lu Jinzhao nodded slightly. With her affirmation, Wei Ling looked at that person with an even more subtle expression.
“It should be from there, right?”
Someone pointed to a window next to the main building’s main entrance.
That window was square, not high, about at chest level, currently closed from the inside, and below the window was an iron table.
“It looks like the meat will be thrown out from here.”
As soon as his words fell, with a bang, the window was opened from the inside.
Then came several consecutive sounds of meat colliding with iron—many pieces of fresh red flesh and blood cut into chunks were thrown out from the window.
That meat looked very fresh.
Clear texture, bright red color.
It’s just a pity.
“Looks like someone died.” Wei Ling sighed.
And what Lu Jinzhao thought was that the Rabbit Zodiac person had escaped a disaster.
Who was Rabbit Zodiac?
Was it the rat’s companion?
The one who lured him to his death.
