Chapter 11

(The Death Penalty Begins; what crime did Gu Liang commit?)

Quietly, Gu Liang helped Yang Ye wrap up his injury before tying a knot.

When he was knotting it, he used a decent amount of strength, and the resulting pain made Yang Ye scrunch his eyebrows together instantaneously.

After doing everything he could, Gu Liang went back to his seat to sit down. “Why do you care if it’s designed for male or female, we’re making do with what we have to stem the blood and it’s served its purpose. You’re contending with this at this point in time? Don’t disdain the pink colour, it suits you quite well.”

Yang Ye thought in his heart, Since when was I disdaining the colour.

I just feel like you’re putting your girlfriend’s scarf on my wound, but that doesn’t seem to be the case.

Very quickly, however, Yang Ye realised that if he were to say that out loud, that truly was not the case.

He was bent.

But Gu Liang was a straight man.

He could not apply his logic to Gu Liang.

Therefore, Yang Ye chose to shut up.

Gu Liang closed his eyes for a while. When he opened them again to glance at Yang Ye, he discovered that his expression still looked a touch awkward.

According to Gu Liang’s recollection, his maternal aunt had wrapped that scarf around him before he went to work in the morning, because she noticed that the days were getting colder.

And Gu Liang, upon noticing that the scarf was pink after he left the house, chose to take it down and put it in his pocket.

Fine, he had to admit that he held some dislike for the colour.

But it shouldn’t be as bad for Yang Ye, right? He was merely trying to stem the blood flow.

However, that did not mean that Gu Liang wanted to give an explanation.

Since his maternal aunt gave him the scarf, it technically belonged to him.

A man having a pink scarf seemed kind of weird.

Mn, not explaining.

What followed was a long and slow period of waiting.

During said period, Son Bai refused to spare Gu Liang and he continued to let loose a torrent of abuse from beginning to end. While Gu Liang remained as unmoved as a mountain, Yang Ye could not continue listening, so he directly balled up a huge wad of tissue paper and shoved it into Son Bai’s mouth.

An hour later, the broadcast prompted: “The centralised discussion has come to an end, the voting segment will commence next. NPCs, please issue the voting card. Since Maid Liu is a NPC, she has no voting rights, may the remaining four players finish casting your votes within thirty seconds.”

Once it was done with the announcement, four men in black entered in single file and they walked up to the four people separately to issue four cards.

The back of the card was exactly the same as their character cards.

When Gu Liang held up the card in front of him, he realised what was different about this particular card’s surface.

This time around, the card surface had the head portraits of four people— Maid Liu, Brother Bai, Lawyer Zhang, and Son Bai.

The Detective Girlfriend Huang and Deceased Boss Bai were not present.

This card resembled an iPad slightly due to its touchscreen feature, except it was lighter and thinner.

Without any hesitation, Gu Liang tapped on Son Bai, and Son Bai’s portrait darkened instantaneously.

Son Bai’s hands were still tied up and he could not vote, but the men in black at the side seemed to have no intention to cater to him.

Son Bai’s entire body trembled. Refusing to admit defeat, he raised his head resentfully and used his mouth to flip open the card and tapped on a head portrait with his nose.

Gu Liang did not have to see it to know that he had voted for himself.

Three minutes later.

System Broadcast: “Right now, the case of《 Death of Boss Bai 》has formally come to an end. The following is an announcement concerning the voting results. Two players have zero votes, and they are Maid Liu and Brother Bai. Can you guess, between the remaining Lawyer Zhang and Son Bai, who has received the most votes?”

Still trying to play with your sister’s suspense at this juncture?

Gu Liang’s eyebrows furrowed.

After a brief moment, the broadcast said: “Following, I will announce that Lawyer Zhang has 1 vote while Son Bai has 3 votes. Son Bai is the murderer being voted out in the case. So, is he the real murderer?”

Do you want to interrupt the announcement with a commercial as well?

Gu Liang restrained the urge to roll his eyes. At long last, he heard the system declare: “Following, it is announced that the detective has guided everyone to find the right answer! It is true that Son Bai is the case’s real murderer, congratulations everyone! The rewards and settling of accounts segment is up next.”

There were rewards?

“The murderer will be receiving his death penalty soon. For the remaining normal players, each person will be awarded one gold coin, and the detective will be awarded an additional gold coin exclusively. However, because no one stopped the player from running out selfishly at the beginning and watched her send herself to her death, thus leaving the system with no choice but to bring out a NPC to help the players play the game, everyone will have one gold coin deducted due to the wastage of system resources.”

Of course, despite accompanying someone to run around the entire day, I have nothing to show for it. Gu Liang thought internally.

“Since this is an introduction level script, the rewards are not substantial. When everyone has the chance to experience scripts with higher levels of difficulty, the amount of rewards will proportionally increase with the difficulty. Players can even earn the Amnesty Card, Equal Wealth card, so on and so forth, and extra props. Hope everyone will enjoy the game!”

“Since we are at the end of the game, let us see the real faces of Boss Bai and Son Bai! Let us see what crimes they have previously committed. Their crimes will be carved into the epitaphs for all those that come after to spurn!”

Once the broadcasted voice landed, the wall that was facing the conference table in the centralised discussion room suddenly lit up.

Like it was playing a movie, that light broadcasted all of Boss Bai and Son Bai’s dealings in the course of their life.

Naturally, their curriculum vitae was in literal writing and broadcasted narration, for the screen did not display any other images apart from the pair’s photographs.

“Boss Bai, real name Liu Jun, 48 years old, a professor in the Law Faculty of Pingnan University. He raped numerous female students ranging from the ages of 18 to 25, and stopped them from reporting it to the police by threatening their academic degrees and dissertation results. Two of his victims have committed suicide. A sinner, you have finally gone to hell this day.

“Son Bai, real name Li Jun Jie, 17 years old, abuser of more than ten stray cats. An 80-year-old lady witnessed him cutting up the limbs of a cat from her balcony and tried to mediate the situation, but Li Jun Jie proceeded to push her off the balcony, making her fall to her death. A sinner, all the wrongs you have done unto others will be done onto yourself. Accept your punishment!”

The light screen was pushed down and the wall face opened on its own.

There was another room behind the wall and it had a huge cage. A giant feline, roughly five persons tall, prowled in the cage, fangs bared and claws brandished. It gazed at the Son Bai acting Li Jun Jie with greedy eyes, as if it wanted to swallow him into its stomach.

“No! Impossible! No way! Don’t!”

Li Jun Jie screamed and shouted in terror. In a moment’s work, his pants were wet because he really pissed himself in fear.

But his struggling was completely useless; two men in black went forward to open the cage while the other two hauled him up forcefully and threw him inside the cage.

The drool at the corners of the giant cat’s mouth dripped onto Li Jun Jie’s face, causing Li Jun Jie to keel over to cover his mouth and spit it out.

In the next second, the cat lifted its paw and stepped on his spine directly. Its claws followed by swiping down which tore him into shreds.

The cage closed. The wall was raised once more. The four men in black retreated.

With an ashen complexion, Brother Bai lied down on the table and started dry heaving.

Gu Liang took a few deep breaths to suppress the myriad of emotions churning inside him. Eventually, he clenched his eyes shut again, forcing himself to remain calm.

Meanwhile, Yang Ye tilted his head to look at Gu Liang from the side.

His gaze was quite sombre, and it was tinted with some searching intent.

— If every player in this game had committed a crime, what crime did Gu Liang commit?

T/N: *looks through all the previous scarf comments and shows visible confusion*