Paintings of Terror

Chapter 118: Fearless Heresy

“If we destroy these machines, what do you think the consequences will be?” Wei Dong asked.

“I guess there will be a backlash,” Ke Xun answered.

“Isn’t modifying the photo considered a kind of destruction?” Wei Dong pointed in concern to the photo that Ke Xun had turned unrecognizable.

“It shouldn’t be counted,” Ke Xun said. “I haven’t changed its character. At best, I just put a layer on it, which can be wiped off with one rub. See.”

“Okay,” Wei Dong said. “I’m just worried about you. There are ways to deal with the other three laboratories, but it’s only this laboratory…”

“Listen, Dongzi, if I also become a vegetable, don’t hesitate to kill me directly. Don’t let me live in suffering,” Ke Xun said.

Saddened by this words, Wei Dong nodded absent-mindedly.

Ke Xun didn’t want to see Wei Dong feel sorry for him, so he got up and put the photos back in their original place. Then he moved next to Mu Yiran and watched him check the documents in his hands.

Mu Yiran tilted his head and glanced at him. “You seem to have discovered something?”

Ke Xun repeated the analysis he’d made moments ago and then asked, “What do you think these photos were used for?”

Mu Yiran put down the files in his hands, looked down thoughtfully for a moment, and finally said lightly. “If you don’t speculate about the experimental content and start from the photos themselves, how would you react when you see these photos?”

Ke Xun tilted his head to look at him, “You really wanted me to tell you?”

Mu Yiran didn’t answer, nor did he look at him. Instead, he just lowered his eyelids.

“I don’t have to tell you, you can guess,” Ke Xun said. “But the thing is, this is something that I may react to, but not necessarily the others, such as those with normal sexual orientations. Well…that doesn’t include those fujoshis.”

Mu Yiran suddenly raised his gaze and looked at him. “On the first night, Cai Xiaoyan, who is normal, went unscathed; on the second night, Qin Ci, who is normal, went unscathed; but Zhang Hanrui, who is a fujoshi, became a test subject.”

Ke Xun’s eyes flashed. “You mean, this laboratory experiment is aimed at homosexuals and fujoshis?”

“Or you can interpret fujoshis as a group of people that agrees with and endorses homosexuality,” Mu Yiran added. “We can further generalize that the experiment in this laboratory is aimed at a group of people with nonconforming sexual orientations. In the background of that era, this would fall under the category of ‘heresy’.”

“Then what about the heterosexuals who entered the painting? Wouldn’t they be unaffected by this laboratory?” Ke Xun said.

“In fact, isn’t Laboratory B equivalent to being ineffective right now?” Mu? Yiran said. “The painting would never give us a dead end, and the difficulty isn’t necessarily tailor-made for us or for others who enter the painting. If you’re lucky, you might pass without harm. If you’re unlucky, you might not even get through the first day. Remember what I told you when you first entered the painting? There will be BUGs. What does this mean?”

“It means that the painting isn’t tailor-made for us. It’s set in advance and the setting of the painting won’t allow it to change,” Ke Xun replied. “So every difficulty that we face will either be deadly or will allow us a narrow chance to live. It all depends on luck. Of course, for the most part, the difficulty is just enough to allow us to live by the skin of our teeth.”

Mu Yi nodded his head.

Ke Xun sighed, then he sighed again and chuckled. “Then we are very unfortunate. Why do you and I happen to be assigned to Laboratory D? It’s as if it’s by the painting’s design.”

Mu Yiran’s face became slightly stiff. He picked up the file in his hand and looked through it again.

Looking at him, Ke Xun leaned closer and spoke in a low voice, “Yiran, do you have anything you want to tell me?”

Without raising his gaze, Mu Yiran said indifferently, “What do you think I should tell you?”

Ke Xun unexpectedly took the flashlight from Mu Yiran’s hand and turned off the light. The section they were standing in abruptly plunged into darkness.

Ke Xun’s warm breath grazed across Mu Yiran’s ears and he whispered, “If we’re subjected to frontal lobotomy tonight, maybe tomorrow morning, we would never recognize each other again. Yiran, I think, life is short, especially for those like us who are caught in the painting. So, we should say what we want, do what we want while we’re alive, so that we will have no regrets when we die. If we miss our chances while the other is still here, we will really regret it for the rest of our lives.”

Mu Yiran was silent in the darkness. Ke Xun waited for him patiently. It was unknown how much time had passed, but just when Ke Xun was starting to feel sympathetic for him, secretly sighing that he shouldn’t have embarrassed him and was just about to look for a new topic, he heard Mu Yiran’s quiet voice. “Ke Xun.”

“Hmm?” Ke Xun was suddenly a little nervous. Just after he’d licked his dry lips, he sensed Mu Yiran’s hand come up from behind, and then…landed in the back of his head.

…Rubbing his messy hair like one would a dog, Mu Yiran gently said, “You talk too much. Hurry up.”

Ke Xun: “…”

After returning the flashlight to Mu Yiran, Ke Xun walked around and caught a glimpse of Wei Dong staring at his black cell phone with a gloomy face. “The power’s running out… I’ll have to bring a power bank next time I enter a painting…”

Ke Xun stretched his hand into his pocket and touched his cell phone, which was already dead. He suddenly remembered something and turned to walk back to Mu Yiran. He said, “I think there’s something very strange. I verbally unified the four of us last night, telling us when to let go. But it didn’t take long for us to be gagged. After that, we relied on the timer on my phone. There was something as bright as a mobile screen in front of us, but why didn’t those ‘researchers’ stop it like they gagged me? Why did they leave the phone all the way until it ran out of battery? If I had my phone plugged into a power bank and used it until dawn in one go, it would be considered cheating. But why wasn’t it banned?”

Mu Yiran raised his head to look at him, and nodded slightly, “This is indeed a bit strange.”

“Could it be that these things can’t see the light?” Ke Xun wondered.

“That shouldn’t be the reason.” With his chin, Mu Yiran gestured to the projector on the table. “If they can’t see the light, they wouldn’t be able to use the equipment.”

“Is it because the background of this painting is from a long time ago, when there were no mobile phones, so these things don’t recognize mobile phones?” Ke Xun said.

Mu Yiran thought about it briefly. “This may be one of the reasons, but I also have another speculation about it.”

Ke Xun said, “Tell me.”

Mu Yiran said, “In this research institute, all the research projects are related to people. To sum it up with an appropriate term, it’s people-oriented. They study the most primitive, authentic and natural things about people, not about industrial products, technological products, and other products created and transformed by humans. So can we infer that these things are only sensitive to humans, and are not interested in other non-human materials except the laboratory’s own equipment.”

“If that’s the case,” Ke Xun’s eyes lit up, and Mu Yiran stared at him intently, “I suddenly have an idea. Dr. Qin, come here!”

Qin Ci came over. “Have you found it?”

Ke Xun took Qin Ci’s shoulders and pulled him closer. Lowering his voice, he said, “Tonight, you’ll suffer a noise attack in Laboratory A. Yiran and I just speculated that these things may not be sensitive to technological products, so I thought about something that can maybe help you withstand the noise. I just don’t know if it will really work.”

After speaking, he took out a pair of earphones from his pocket and stuffed them into Qin Ci’s hand. “My earphones are very soundproof. Do you have music on your phone?”

Qin Ci looked at him with admiration. “Xiao Ke, your mind is turning faster and faster. There are a few songs on my phone, all of which are slow-paced music.”

“That’s perfect,” Ke Xun said, “I don’t know if it can block the noise, but even if it couldn’t, as long as there’s music in the middle, it can buffer the harsh and monotonous sound. If those things are not sensitive to technological products, they shouldn’t stop you from playing music. Do you have a lot of battery life left?”

Qin Ci pulled out his phone and took a look. “There’s still 70% left. If I only listen to music, it shouldn’t consume the battery too quickly.”

“If it doesn’t work, you let Deng Guang and the others use it,” Ke Xun said.

Qin Ci nodded. “For the sake of safety, I had better make some preparations. The girl surnamed Li may also need to make more preparations.”

After Qin Ci left to fiddle with his phone, Ke Xun looked at Mu Yiran again. “I have another idea. Since those things aren’t sensitive to technological products, let’s make a video with the phone’s camera through the night. Maybe we can capture something. What do you think?”

Mu Yiran nodded his head.

Ke Xun reached out to him. “Lend me your phone.”

Mu Yiran took it out, unlocked it, and handed it to him. Ke Xun pulled up the camera and took a video of the situation in the experimental lab. Similar to the first day, there were several gray figures in the room with withered and shriveled faces, dull, emotionless eyes, and mouth like black holes. Their arms were stretched out, five fingers bent, as if struggling against or trying to escape something.

“Do you think these ‘people’ are victims of the failed experiments mentioned in the log?” Ke Xun asked.

“Yes,” Mu Yiran said.

“You said that these ‘people’ were the victims of the failed experiments mentioned in the experiment log?” Ke Xun said.

“Yes.” Mu sighed, “I compared the numbers on their clothes with the test subject numbers mentioned in the log. Some of them matched but there were also some that weren’t mentioned in the log. However, I think these people should all probably be test subjects.”

Ke Xun took a picture for a while and suddenly said, “I’m going to the toilet.” He strode out of the laboratory.

Mu Yiran put down the papers in his hand and looked thoughtfully at a certain place in the darkness. Suddenly, he heard Zhu Haowen’s voice came from beside him, “Homosexuality was considered a mental illness in the past.”

“So they detached the frontal lobe in an attempt to cure these ‘mentally ill’ patients,” Mu Yiran continued indifferently.

“Could it be that the painter was an anti-gay person?” Zhu Haowen said. “That’s why he painted Laboratory D in the most detailed way so as to express his aversion to homosexuals.”

“Or he might be homosexual,” Mu Yiran said. “And he painted this to expose and criticize what was happening.”

“But I think that, due to the background era of this painting, it’s impossible for homosexuals to speak out so brazenly for their own kind. Only those who are rebellious would dare paint something like this,” Zhu Haowen said.

“In any age, there’s no shortage of fearless heresy.” Mu Yiran watched as Ke Xun stepped in through the door, and the corners of his mouth lifted slightly.