The Hand of Confession – Chapter 216

Volume 7: Days of Stargazing at the Inn

Snake Game

There’s a problem with our room! Please, please let me in!

Lou Jingmo’s expression turned serious. She hurriedly asked, “What kind of long strip?”

Shen Maomao had a flash of inspiration¹ and blurted out, “It’s that arm!!”

Lou Jingmo pushed open the main door. “Let’s go remind him.”

The three of them arrived at the door to Tang Song and his companion’s room and knocked.

The door opened a crack, and a head poked out from inside. It was Tang Song.

Shen Maomao said, “Is Van Gogh in? There’s something on his back!”

Van Gogh’s voice came from behind him. “What thing?”

“It’s that severed arm! It’s stuck to the back of your clothes!”

The main door was opened halfway, but Tang Song had no intention of inviting the three of them in to talk. Van Gogh, behind him, didn’t come out either. Instead, he immediately took off his short-sleeved shirt, held it, and shook it twice, but nothing fell out.

Tang Song was a bit skeptical about the truth of her words. He said, “An arm should be quite heavy, right? Van Gogh, did you feel anything?”

Van Gogh shook his head.

Tang Song looked at Shen Maomao again. “Could it be that you saw wrong?”

Shen Maomao said expressionlessly, “Believe it or not, anyway, both my eyes are 5.0 vision².” After saying that, she pulled Lou Jingmo and turned to leave.

Tang Song quickly reached out to stop them. “I didn’t mean anything else. We’ll check the room. Thank you for specially notifying us.”

Shen Maomao’s voice was devoid of any fluctuation. “Oh, you’re welcome.”

The three of them returned to their room. Shen Maomao’s heart was filled with anger from having her kind reminder questioned. Tang Song clearly didn’t believe her and even suspected she had ulterior motives; otherwise, he wouldn’t have even refused to let her in the door.

Although she knew in her heart that there was nothing wrong with them acting this way—in a game world, one cannot be too careful in guarding against others—emotionally, she found it a bit hard to accept.

She thought she had already adapted to this game, but in reality, she was still far from it.

The lights in the room were turned off. Shen Maomao lay in bed, her mind a chaotic jumble of thoughts.

She thought she could compare the current situation to a transaction. She was afraid others would cheat her, and since she was sure she would definitely deliver the goods, she demanded payment first. But the other party thought the same way and demanded the goods first. Thus, their desires conflicted, and the transaction couldn’t proceed…

But the current situation was that she was delivering the goods for free, and people were still afraid she had poisoned the goods.

Damn it. Although she wasn’t very angry, having her enthusiasm questioned like this, young as she was, she still felt a sense of lingering dissatisfaction.

Just then, Lou Jingmo, who was behind her, suddenly said, “There’s a prop in the game that can lure ghosts to other people’s rooms.”

Shen Maomao was stunned. She turned over in her quilt, using the moonlight that seeped past the curtains to observe Lou Jingmo’s expression.

Lou-jie’s breathing was even, her eyes tightly closed. That light, airy sentence just now seemed like something she had said in her sleep.

But Shen Maomao understood that she was trying to enlighten her, afraid she would get bogged down in overthinking it³.

She couldn’t help but curl her lips into a smile and squeezed herself into Lou Jingmo’s embrace, almost snuggling her entire body into her arms.

Lou Jingmo frowned slightly but made no other movement.

Cuddled together, Shen Maomao’s sense of security skyrocketed. She closed her eyes and soon felt a wave of drowsiness.

In a state between sleep and wakefulness, something warm and soft pressed against her forehead. She opened her mouth and let out a big yawn, her head tilted, and her breathing became heavier.

Lou Jingmo’s stiff body gradually relaxed. She raised her hand, pulled the soft body in her arms a little closer, and then rested her chin on Shen Maomao’s head, falling asleep in this exceptionally intimate posture.

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“Knock, knock, knock!”

The knocking sound rang out abruptly. Lou Jingmo’s eyes snapped open with a “shua”, all traces of sleepiness gone. She looked towards the room door, as if seeing the person outside through the door panel.

“Help!” the person outside said. “I’m Tang Song!”

In the darkness, Shen Maomao and Golden Retriever also opened their eyes at the same time and sat up silently from the bed.

A sliver of light from the edge of the curtain shone on the foot of the bed. Shen Maomao gently raised her arm, rubbed her eyes, then pointed to the door, made an opening gesture, and mouthed to Lou Jingmo: Open it?

Meanwhile, Tang Song at the door said anxiously, “There’s a problem with our room! Please, please let me in! Van Gogh has gone crazy! I can’t hold him for long, he’s about to chase after me!”

Shen Maomao shivered.

If this Tang Song outside was real, then they probably hadn’t found that severed arm after they went back.

She had already reminded them. Who in their right mind⁴ would open the door at a time like this?!

The person asking Lou Jingmo whether to open the door sat motionless on the bed, showing no intention of moving at all.

At first, Lou Jingmo thought she had softened, but seeing this situation, she immediately understood. So, she waved her hand at her and mouthed widely: Don’t open.

The knocking became more urgent, eventually turning into pounding. Tang Song’s voice, tinged with tears, came from outside: “Help! Save me! I’m begging you—Ah! Aaaah!!!!” Halfway through his words, it turned into a scream, a scream filled with immense fear that made Shen Maomao’s blood run cold.

“Crack… crack…” It sounded like someone snapping a tree branch, or perhaps a piece of bone. Tang Song’s screams stopped abruptly, turning into weak moans. Something was panting heavily outside their door, like some kind of huge beast, or a crazed man…

The abnormal sounds continued for a few minutes, then gradually subsided into silence. Shen Maomao hugged Lou Jingmo, impressively only trembling three times throughout the ordeal.

Lou Jingmo still didn’t make a sound, just gestured with her hand to lie down.

The three of them silently crawled back under the covers. Shen Maomao covered her hands and feet with the quilt and finally didn’t feel as scared as before.

However, after experiencing such an incident, she found herself unable to sleep.

She fumbled around and found her phone on the nightstand, dimmed the screen to its lowest setting, opened the Snake game she was about to beat, and began her happy gaming journey.

Time always passes quickly when playing games. Soon, she reached the final level. Afraid that lying down would make it inconvenient to operate, Shen Maomao paused the game, carefully sat up, then placed both hands on her phone and, fully concentrated, tapped start.

The little green snake on the screen twisted its body in an S-shape, constantly moving forward, forward, forward, swallowing all the red apples. Its body grew longer and longer, eventually becoming a giant green python that devoured all the monsters and enemies and rushed back to its cave.

A string of English letters appeared on the screen, thanking her for clearing all the levels.

Shen Maomao let out a long sigh of relief, feeling a sense of lightness and clarity throughout her body.

The English words “Thanks for your playing” disappeared from the screen. Just as she was about to exit the game and go to sleep, a line of white text suddenly popped up on the dark screen—Congratulations on being the first to achieve: You’re Really Something Else⁵, Reward: One lottery draw chance~

Shen Maomao: “…” What’s wrong with being something else! Aren’t phones for playing! Can’t I play a game when I’m bored?! If you don’t want people to play, why install games on the phone?! Isn’t this inciting crime?! Isn’t this entrapment⁶?!

A flashy, ornate lottery wheel popped up. The wheel was divided into twenty equal segments of different colors, each with a few small words written on it. She leaned closer and saw things like “Not alone on the path of clearing stages,” “Give me an external force, and I’ll give you an explosion,” and “I can beat a cow to death~”—that sort of incomprehensible yet impressive stuff.

What is this stuff?

Shen Maomao’s mind was filled with immense confusion, a bemused smile on her face. She continued to look, and her gaze suddenly froze.

One of the sections read: “I can burn everything, my name is Andre.”

Shen Maomao: “??!!!” F#ck!!

She carefully read the contents of this flashy lottery wheel, which looked like something out of a ‘one slash deals 99 damage’ game ad⁷, one more time. A shocking guess gradually formed in her mind.

This “Not alone on the path of clearing stages,” was it a team-up prop? This “Give me an external force, and I’ll give you an explosion,” was it the small explosive ball Golden Retriever often used?

And that “I can beat a cow to death~,” could it refer to a prop that increases strength?

As for Andre…

That’s a card! Andre the Skyfire, one of the Twelve Cards, isn’t he the one who can burn everything! Previously, in that monkey village, she had seen that so-and-so—she forgot their name—use it! Its power was top-notch, directly burning the boss to death.

Shen Maomao was so shocked she couldn’t speak, only able to maintain a jaw-dropped expression as she frantically shook Lou Jingmo.

Lou Jingmo was successfully shaken awake. With a dark expression, she sat up and whispered, “What are you doing?!”

Her tone was so fierce it sounded like she could grab a knife and murder her in the next second.

Shen Maomao weakly handed her the phone. “Lou-jie, look…”

Lou Jingmo frowned, took the phone, glanced at it, and was also stunned for a moment. “This is…”

Shen Maomao nodded frantically.

“I didn’t expect the props in this instance would be obtained this way,” Lou Jingmo said. “You draw.”

Shen Maomao shook her head frantically. “No way, my luck is terrible, I’ll definitely not draw the card!”

“My luck is also terrible.”

“No! You were able to meet such a cute girl like me, you must be the luckiest person in the world.”

Lou Jingmo: “???”

Anyway, Shen Maomao glanced at Golden Retriever, who was sleeping soundly, and solemnly pushed the phone towards Lou Jingmo again. “Go on, draw. I won’t blame you if you don’t get it.”

With a one-in-twenty chance, for someone like her who had never even won an “another bottle⁸” prize, the probability of drawing it was absolutely 0.

Lou Jingmo didn’t believe her nonsense. “Solve your own problems.” After saying that, she flopped back onto the bed and ignored her.

Shen Maomao could only rely on her own efforts. Closing her eyes, she tapped to start the lottery draw.

The wheel began to spin, the various colors blurring together, eventually becoming a large patch of black. After spinning for a dozen or so seconds, its speed finally slowed, allowing one to see clearly what words were written on it.

Shen Maomao wished she could press her eyes against the screen, watching with rapt attention as the pointer moved bit by bit, frantically cheering it on in her heart.

Go! Go! You can do it!

In the end, it stopped far away from Andre, pointing to a square that read “Go, Pikachu!”

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