Paintings of Terror

Chapter 70: An Upright Gay

Wei Dong’s eyes were red and swollen as he threw himself towards Ke Xun and thwacked him on the head: “You’re okay?! F*ck, you’re alright?! That’s f*cking great! Awesome, very awesome! You-you’re fine, haha- perfectly fine!”

“Calm down, stay cool, easy.” Ke Xun broke free from his arms and patted Wei Dong’s shoulder, “I’m alright, so put all that love and consideration back in your chest, you cry so damn ugly.”

“F*ck, who the f*ck was I crying for!” Wei Dong wiped away the tears that were once again uncontrollably falling down his face, walking to the side, afraid that Ke Xun would continue talking nonsense.

Ke Xun looked towards Mu Yiran who had been watching him this whole time before his lips curved into a smile.

Mu Yiran looked away, then moved back after a pause: “Where did they take you?”

Ke Xun’s smile dropped from his face, hesitantly answering: “It was…. A gay man’s hell?”

Perhaps because the events of that day were too turbulent and stimulating, adding onto the fact that he couldn’t sleep well last night, Ke Xun sat down as he used a cold compress on his injuries from the fight with Mo Mou and unknowingly fell asleep.

He was awakened by a bottle of Coke, and after opening his eyes, found that a large cow was once again handing dinner.

In light of Yuan Yuan being chosen yesterday, the few outsiders weren’t in the mood to eat at the moment, scared that they would accidentally become fat and become the next pig up for slaughter.

Ke Xun rubbed his still injured nose, sat up and leaned against the wall, before noticing Wei Dong looking at him with complicated eyes.

“I heard you were dragged to breed?” Wei Dong asked in a weird tone.

Ke Xun figured that Dong Dong that bastard had already been interrogated by everyone, and couldn’t help but look in his direction, watching him sit there tiredly while slowly eating chocolate.

Wei Dong leaned in and lowered his voice: “I can tell his legs are quite weak when he walks, I’m afraid he was already squeezed dry.”

Ke Xun: “Hehe, men are all pig trotters who can’t control their lower bodies.”

Wei Dong asked him: “What about you? You didn’t lose your virginity right?”

Ke Xun stuck out a leg to kick him: “You’re slandering an upright gay man okay?”

Wei Dong: “Your dictionary doesn’t have the word “straight” in it.”

Ke Xun glanced around for a second, and feeling like something was wrong, asked Wei Dong: “Why does it feel like our compartment switched out a few NPCs?”

“No shit,” Wei Dong answered, “You didn’t happen to see a familiar face?”

Ke Xun cast his gaze on the few NPCs who were snatching up food, and was surprised to see Mo Mou among them.

“Why is he here?”

“They just swapped some people out.” Wei Dong said, “The big cow took the previous NPCs to another compartment and brought over stronger-looking guys. But what’s awesome is that when they saw our big shot here they were honest and obedient, not even daring to go up and grab food just now. They asked him to pick first, and only then did they have the guts to come up and eat. Isn’t this the so-called might of being a leader?”

Ke Xun nodded: “Yes, the chief chicken in the flock has the priority in choosing food and mates.”

“…..” Wei Dong looked at Mu Yiran, who was sitting on the other side, with a complicated expression. “If I were a chicken, I probably would envy him. By the way, there’s one more thing…. That guy Bi Jing was taken by the giant bull to another compartment, I don’t know the reason why.”

“Maybe it’s because he’s too skinny.” Zhu Haowen, who had been sitting to the side, began talking with a few macadamia nuts in hand.

“Why do you say that?” Wei Dong asked hurriedly.

“The people were divided into groups.” Zhu Haowen pointed to the people in the compartment, “We’re all young and strong men. If you look closely, the NPCs are also very good in figure and appearance, like what that middle-aged uncle said, ‘a good breed’.”

“So it’s classified by excellent, good, medium, inferior, and poor?” Wei Dong realized and was taken aback, “F*ck, they wouldn’t try and start using the knife on our compartment would they?”

Ke Xun looked at him like he was mentally challenged, “When you raise livestock, would you eat the strong and young ones first? Or would you eat the old and infertile ones?”

Wei Dong scratched his head: “But what about Yuan Yuan yesterday?”

Ke Xun continued to eye him disdainfully: “Would you use an old cow or a small fat cow for hotpot?” Although this was a bit disrespectful to Yuan Yuan, it was obviously the case.

Wei Dong’s eyes brightened: “That means, it’s very likely that we won’t be picked again right?”

Ke Xun shook his head: “The rules of the painting are that someone has to die everyday, and depending on the nature of this painting, there shouldn’t be an opportunity for us to vote on who dies. So even if we aren’t fat cows, we will definitely be forced under the umbrella of dying one per night. You have to understand that we aren’t the only strong ‘livestock’ in the farm, there’s plenty of other options. It also can’t be said that there’s too many of us, but it also can’t be said that there are too few of us, therefore someone will definitely die tonight.”

Wei Dong wilted and sighed: “Even though during the day this painting seems like the easiest one we’ve faced so far, it’s actually the one we have the least power in. Facing the enormous gap in strength against the giant bull, there’s no way we can resist or run away. This is just… waiting to die, completely powerless.”

“We have to hurry and find the signature.” Ke Xun said.

“How are we supposed to find it here? We even looked for it on the lawn outside. Aside from these two locations, where else can we go?” Wei Dong answered miserably.

Ke Xun got up, walked over to where Mu Yiran was sitting, squatted down and tilted his head to look at him: “Male god, do you have any clues about the signature? It’s very likely that the cows will come again tonight.”

Mu Yiran’s eyes fell on the ground in front of him: “If you want to find the signature, you must first decipher the artist’s intentions, and then analyze the content of the painting.”

“These surrealist painters are all some combination of half-crazy and half-genius,” Ke Xun said. “First of all, I’m not crazy, and second, I’m not a genius. So the psychology and intentions of these people are the most difficult to understand for me.”

“Actually, this one is fairly easy to understand,” Qin Ci chimed in. “Since the name of the painting is 【Animal Word】, it’s clear that animals are the masters of the planet designed by the painter. Meanwhile, humans have replaced the roles and ranks of animals in reality, resulting in a great overturn of status.”

“What I’m curious about is that since people have become the lowest level animals in this painting, then what is the artist’s impression of himself?” Ke Xun responded, “Does he also see himself as some kind of bottom feeder, or does he think of himself as a high-level being? If it’s the former, since humans don’t have any dignity in the painting to the point where they don’t even deserve to have names, what right does he have to leave his signature on the painting? If it’s the latter, then this person is super narrow-minded; other humans are livestock but he himself is a superior being? Whatever, he’s the artist, so let’s not bicker about his viewpoints. However in that case, what kind of animal would he be? A noble panda? A lion king?”

Wei Dong nodded: “That’s a good question.”

“For some animal conservationists,” Mu Yiran said, “Humans are inferior to animals in their minds.”

“Humans are selfish, negative, and cruel, they are indeed inferior to animals.” Zhu Haowen, who had been following along for some time, spoke up.

“Classmate Zhu, Hao Wen’er,” Ke Xun brought his hands together, “The subject of human nature is too complicated. If we continue to discuss it here, we wouldn’t even be able to finish the first page after seven days. The first task now is to find the signature. Everyone, let’s brainstorm and speak quickly.”

Mu Yiran was already too lazy to correct the title Ke Xun gave him anymore, and continued to ignore him, speaking as he pondered: “According to our past experiences, the signature won’t appear in places beyond reach. The location of the signature should only be within the defined area that we are able to go. . We need to think in reverse, if there’s no possibility of there being a signature in places we can’t reach, that means…..”

“ -Some places that seem to be out of reach for us can actually be accessed!” Ke Xun continued, “That makes sense! We didn’t expect that once we thought about the issue in reverse, there’ll be unexpected answers. No wonder you’re a big shot, your thinking is much more in depth than ours.”

Everyone: “……”

Qin Ci said: “Xiao Mu’s conjecture makes sense. The locations we can currently go to at the moment are one, the compartments, and two, the lawn outside.”

He continued: “The lawn encompasses a very large area, and Xiao Mu and I have already observed it from a higher vantage point during the day. Neither the terrain itself nor the texture of the turf can form the pattern of the seal or the signature, so the lawn can be excluded.”

“Regarding the compartments, it definitely can’t be in the one we’re currently occupying, and it’s unlikely to be in the other rooms, that would be meaningless. The walkway outside of the cubicles as well as the entire farmhouse is also not likely, due to the fact that as long as we look up and search around, we have a clear view of everything. If the signature was here, it would be too easy to find.”

“These are the only two places that we go between daily. If these two places don’t hold the signature, that means it must be elsewhere. Although it seems like there aren’t any other locations, according to Xiao Mu’s theory, it’s likely that there’s a place that we missed because we originally thought it was impossible and didn’t try.”

“What we are looking for now is this kind of place. It’s a location that’s likely to have a signature, and it’s also reachable with our abilities. Let’s think together, what place meets these conditions?”

Ke Xun: “The administrator’s office? We can technically go there but that would require…. Cough, you know. It’s just that I was carried there when I went, and there’s no way to go without supervision. If we want to try, we can only think of a way to sneak in, but it’ll be quite dangerous given that there are so many cows inside.”

Dong Dong also coughed: “And there’s…. Also the farmhouse on the women’s side, we could go….”

“No,” Mu Yiran glanced at him. “It’s no use going there, it would be the same as the male farmhouse. If both the farmhouse and the lawn aren’t possible, then going there would be a waste of time as well. That’s why I believe the administrator’s office is one of the better possibilities. In addition, I think there should be both a slaughter room and a food processing room nearby.”

—

A: It’d be kind of funny if the signature was inside the hotpot pot or something