Klasse 0 der 10

Kapitel 44

Yang Zheng let out a sob, and his body immediately tensed up. The household registration police officer on the other side was not to be outdone, his hands hanging at his sides clenched into fists, the veins on the back of his hands bulging.

But Yang Zheng was still pulled away by Yang Mei. Although Yang Mei also hated the household registration policeman, she knew that the most important thing now was to find a way to leave this place.

So Yang Zheng and Yang Mei walked slowly ahead, while the household registration policeman, with his head down, followed closely behind them like a lingering, wronged ghost, keeping a distance of three steps between them, until the two people in front went into a room and closed the door.

Only Ma Nan and the old man remained in the room. Ma Nan stared at the old man for a while, and the old man picked up the newspaper from the ground and looked at it intently, as if there was something on it that attracted him.

Ma Nan had an idea and stepped forward to snatch the newspaper from the old man's hand. The old man looked very angry, but looked at Ma Nan timidly, like a child facing a stronger adult, daring not to speak his anger.

So, Ma Nan saw the article in the evening paper. He was interested in what kind of ancient tortures the murderers—the Ba people who had brought him here—would use to kill him. He was also interested in what professions they would target next. But regardless, he already knew that the next victim would be someone in this room. Because there was already a victim here who hadn't been mentioned in the newspaper.

His mood grew heavy; the Ba people's actions were becoming increasingly unpredictable. Initially, they killed people only to show them to others via the internet and CDs; now, by abducting him here, their purpose was clearly to make him witness these people's deaths firsthand.

But why did they do that?

As he left the old man's room, he closed the door behind him. Although he wasn't worried about his own safety, he knew that a bloodbath was about to erupt there; he just didn't know who would be next. He considered telling everyone, but that would only increase the suspicion of the already wary individuals. Murderers in movies and novels often exploit this suspicion to find an opportunity to commit their crimes.

Manan walked along the outer corridor. He already knew that the corridor was circular, with rooms spaced at intervals on the outer ring. Now, he decided to walk around the circular corridor to see what was so strange about it.

He had just passed two doors when he saw Zhao Sihai and Liu Hongzhong coming towards him.

"This is fucking unbelievable, someone actually built a house like this." Zhao Sihai muttered, and when he saw Ma Nan, his voice rose even higher, "This whole thing is like a running track, you'll never reach the end in your entire life."

Ma Nan suddenly had a thought and asked, "Are all the curves in this corridor the same?"

Zhao Sihai gave him a strange look but didn't say anything. Liu Hongzhong chimed in, "That's right, they're all the same."

Ma Nan thought that if the corridor had the same curvature, it would be a perfect circle. The rooms were all on one side of the outer ring, and they weren't connected; rather, they were separated by a distance.

Something was about to pop into his head, and Ma Nan's expression turned serious.

"How many rooms are there in total?" he asked loudly.

"I don't know," Liu Hongzhong replied.

"What are you thinking about?" Zhao Sihai noticed Ma Nan's unusual expression.

"You two stand here by the door and don't move," Ma Nan said, then without explaining, he strode forward, his steps swift as the wind. Zhao Sihai and Liu Hongzhong exchanged glances, then Zhao Sihai followed. Liu Hongzhong also wanted to leave, but Zhao Sihai grabbed him and said, "Listen to him, don't move. He wants to count how many rooms there are, so someone needs to guard this place, otherwise he'll never finish counting."

Liu Hongzhong immediately understood and nodded repeatedly.

Ma Nan and Zhao Sihai ran one after the other along the circular corridor. Halfway there, they saw a police officer leaning against the wall, his eyes fixed on a door in front of him. The two ran past him, and the officer glanced up, as if trying to figure out their intentions. Finally, he followed them down the corridor.

After circling around for about ten minutes, Ma Nan returned to the door where Liu Hongzhong was standing. He was slightly out of breath but didn't say anything.

"Dude, what did you find?" Zhao Sihai asked, patting Ma Nan on the shoulder.

“Eight rooms,” Ma Nan said in a low voice.

"Is there something wrong with eight rooms?" Zhao Sihai asked anxiously. Liu Hongzhong and the household registration police officer next to him also looked at Ma Nan's face, waiting for him to give an answer.

"This circular corridor is a perfect circle, with eight rooms on the outside and roughly the same distance between them. If you were to draw a floor plan of it, what would it look like?"

"What does it look like?" Zhao Sihai drew on the ground with his foot, still a little confused.

The police officer in charge of household registration suddenly pulled a small notebook and a pen from his pocket, drew on it for a while, tore it off, and handed it to Zhao Sihai. Zhao Sihai took it and looked at it, then suddenly realized: "It looks like a gear."

Ma Nan and Liu Hongzhong also leaned over and saw that the paper indeed contained a floor plan of the corridor and rooms.

■

Ma Nan had only a vague idea in his mind before, but now that he saw the picture, he had no more doubts. However, he didn't know how to tell these people what he had thought of.

“There must be a way out here. If we can get in, we can get out too,” Zhao Sihai shouted. “Have you figured out a way out? Don’t keep this from everyone.”

Ma Nan shook his head: "What I'm thinking about has nothing to do with the way out."

Zhao Sihai rolled his eyes in anger, and Liu Hongzhong and the household registration officer lost interest as well. First, the household registration officer turned and left, then Zhao Sihai glared at Ma Nan and left as well. As soon as he left, Liu Hongzhong immediately followed him eagerly.

Ma Nan looked around helplessly, thought for a moment, and then went into the nearest room.

Upon entering, he instinctively closed the door, then carefully examined the entire room. The room was rectangular, with walls and floor made of blue bricks, but the outer door was an iron door with a bolt from the inside. The room felt spacious; besides a bed, there was only a television set hanging from a bracket on the ceiling in the corner. There was also a slightly ajar door on one side, leading to a toilet and faucet—clearly a small bathroom. The bathroom walls were covered in marble, with carvings of flowers, birds, fish, and insects on the stones.

Ma Nan came out of the bathroom and suddenly noticed something next to the TV. He looked closely and realized it was a camera.

The Ba people captured these people and brought them here, but they are hiding in the shadows and watching them. What exactly do they want to do?

Ma Nan sat on the edge of the bed, taking several deep breaths. He needed some time to calm down. He felt a chill run through him, and his body trembled. He felt a deep, restless energy, and his breath was heavy with sleep. He needed to calm himself down. He needed to relax and recharge.

The circular corridor and the rooms on the outer ring touched him. When he saw the floor plan, he guessed that the place was actually built according to the Bagua diagram.

Building according to the Bagua diagram is nothing unusual; as long as you have money, it's not surprising that you can build a house in any shape. However, at this moment, Ma Nan couldn't help but connect it with the pattern he saw on the Star Platform.

Last night, on the Starry Sky Terrace, by the light of a flashlight, he saw in the mural Zhu Rong, the fire god with a beast's face and a human body, riding on two dragons. His father, Ba Rong, seemed to have a particular fondness for this fire god, always using him to symbolize something. Last time, on Xie Dongcheng's red jade tablet, Zhu Rong held aloft a bone representing a hammer of wind and thunder; this time, in the mural, Zhu Rong held up a strange symbol with both hands.

Ma Nan immediately recognized the symbol as an eight-pointed star pattern.

The octagonal star pattern first appeared in Neolithic pottery decorations, and pottery with this pattern has been unearthed at many sites, including Daxi, Dawenkou, and Qingliangang. Later, after relevant experts examined an unearthed jade tablet, it was finally determined that it was actually the original Bagua (Eight Trigrams) pattern, and its four-sided and four-cornered characteristics represented the four seasons and eight solar terms.

On the Star Platform, Ma Nan recognized the image immediately and knew its meaning, but he didn't understand what it meant if it was indeed a clue left by Ba Rong related to the sacred objects of the Ba people.

Now, the Ba people brought him here, and when he discovered that this place was built according to the Bagua diagram, he immediately thought of its relationship with the eight-pointed star pattern on the Star Platform.

However, if the eight-pointed star pattern refers to this place, then his initial idea would be completely overturned.

He originally thought that the Ba people had found Chu Yan and obtained the clues left by Ba Rong, but they couldn't understand them and needed to use him to decipher them. That's why he went to such great lengths, first sending chrysanthemums, then Xuan Huang, and then creating a secret room so that he could discover the chrysanthemum painting and lead him to the Star Platform.

But if the Ba people already know the secret of the Flame Chrysanthemum pattern, then all this would be meaningless.