Paintings of Terror

Chapter 117: Pictures that Burn the Eyes

“I don’t think we can find any clues here.” Qin Ci looked at everyone. “It’s probably better to go underground to look for clues. I also personally think that Laboratory D is the most likely place for the signature to appear.”

Zhu Haowen gave a small nod. “I think so too. Since the painting won’t give us a dead end, and the three laboratories AB and C have no documents for us to search for clues, the most likely place for the signature to appear is Laboratory D.”

“But how do we find it?” Xu Zhen clutched the swollen half of her face that had been hit by Qi Qiang. “Haven’t we already searched through it many times in the past two days? Is it possible that there is another floor underneath Laboratory D?”

“I don’t think this is possible,” Zhu Haowen said. “We still have a lot of documents in Laboratory D to look through.”

“Also, judging from the previous paintings, sometimes the signature would only appear later,” Ke Xun said. “It might need to be activated, such as through a certain behavior, reaching a certain place, or figuring out the intentions behind the painting. Only then would the signature appear.”

“So, there must be something we haven’t done, or behaviors we haven’t completed,” Zhu Haowen said.

“Then what do we do next?” Xu Zhen, who had been strong and determined to take a leadership role, finally gave up at this moment and completely pinned her hopes on these veteran members.

“Next, we’ll go down to get our number,” Qin Ci said calmly. “We’ll hurry up and search for clues in Laboratory D before dark.”

No one raised any objections. The numbers would remain the same regardless of whether they got it early or late, so they got up and headed toward the room with the iron fenced door.

Ke Xun had slept the entire morning. At this moment, his physical strength had increased by a lot. Zhang Hanrui, who had been lying on her back near the table, opened her eyes and stared vacantly at the roof. Gone was her usual vividness and vitality; now, she was half dead, only breathing.

Ke Xun took her phone out of her pocket and kept it with himself. It still had the last words she’d left for her parents.

Li Yaqing, who had drawn No. 1, cried as she grabbed her number card A. She’d already cried so much that she had no more tears to shed and so she was just making a keening sound in her throat.

Qin Ci, who was No. 2, also got the A card.

Next was Ke Xun, who got No. 3. However, he didn’t go forward to take his card. Instead, he said, “Dongzi, let’s switch.”

Regardless of whether it was Laboratory A or B, they were significantly easier to survive than Laboratory C or D.

Wei Dong was stunned, and shook his head. “No, you always let me go first before. This time, big brother will be the dad.”

“Haha.” Ke Xun looked at him with an indifferent expression. “You promoted yourself too prematurely. Like before, big brother can use force to make you take the number. Don’t waste time. Get the number.”

“Ke’er…” Wei Dong frowned, still resisting .

“This father, I want to die with my male god,” Ke Xun looked at him with a serious gaze. “Please let me.”

Wei Dong was taken aback. He looked at Mu Yiran, who was standing next to him.

Mu Yiran was looking at Ke Xun, and Wei Dong couldn’t tell what kind of look it was. He just felt that it was different than before. It seemed that something had changed between the two of them.

Wei Dong understood Ke Xun, and so he walked forward without saying another word and pressed the button on the number machine.

His number was a B.

Ke Xun’s brows finally relaxed. With the knockout technique, Laboratory B could be regarded as the most harmless of the four laboratories.

However, when Qi Qiang went to take his number next, he got the card starting with the letter C.

“Fuck!” Qi Qiang shouted angrily. He threw the number card on the ground and stomped on it hard with both feet.

Ke Xun’s face wasn’t very good either. This C card appeared early, which meant that Laboratory D would have more than just him and Mu Yiran.

Because of the format of its experiment, Laboratory C must have a total of four people at a time. At present, there were only three people total in Laboratory A and B. Except for these three and the four in Laboratory C, the remaining three would be in Laboratory D, which meant that the third from last, Zhu Haowen, would also be in Laboratory D.

Unlike the 50% mortality rate in Laboratory C, the nature of the experiment in Laboratory D was still uncertain, especially regarding the conditions of how people would die or become half-dead vegetative like Zhang Hanrui. The more unknown it was, the more fearful it was.

However, the three people who were assigned to Laboratory D displayed no fear on their faces, and they calmly took the stairs down to the underground experimental area.

Qi Qiang, who took the rear, stared gloomily at Ke Xun, who was carrying Zhang Hanrui on his back. Suddenly, his eyes flashed. He stooped to pick up his number card and followed them.

Before dark, everyone gathered in Laboratory D. Some were in charge of rummaging through documents, and some were in charge of searching every corner and every brick.

Ke Xun sat cross-legged in the corner, flipping through the stack of photos with his flashlight.

These photos were the same stack of photos he’d seen the first time he’d entered Laboratory D. The photos showed all kinds of handsome, elegant naked men, and there were even a lot of images displaying males engaging in papapa. There were no protective mosaic, and so the images were very frank, very revealing, and very proficient in arousing the blood of any gay guys.

“What are you looking at so seriously…?” Wei Dong walked over and glanced down, pretending to be the Monkey King, Wukong. But he was instantly blinded by the pornographic images. “Ahh, my eyes—my eyes—“

“Go away,” Ke Xun said without looking up.

“Fuck, what is this? You still have the heart to look at this stuff?!” Wei Dong felt as if his very close friend was finally letting his nerves get the best of him.

“What are you thinking?” Ke Xun raised his head and looked at him apathetically. “I think it’s weird that this pile of things would appear in such a place and on such an occasion. Maybe they might provide us with some clues. It’s just that their contents make it easy for people to ignore them.”

“Didn’t you say that it might be used by the staff in their leisure time?” Wei Dong asked.

“If that person really wants to have this kind of pastime, then why not just bring a yellow book?” Ke Xun said. “The photos are conspicuous and can be easily seen. Isn’t this person afraid of being discovered by his colleagues? And we all overlooked one point. Even with how much more open society is now, true homosexuals would never dare take such things to work so blatantly, let alone in a conservative era. To do so would be tantamount to taking the initiative to make others regard him as an outcast.”

“Eh?! That makes sense!” Wei Dong was surprised, “Why haven’t we thought of it before?!”

“It’s not surprising. After all, straight guys have never been in this kind of position and so you wouldn’t be able to appreciate the psychology of people like us.” Ke Xun held up a photo and illuminated it with a flashlight, trying to see through something.

Li Yaqing was sitting next to him, and when she saw the picture, she let out a surprised cry.

Ke Xun quickly put his hands down and turned to look at her. “I’m sorry. This is burning your eyes. Sister, you go over there. Stay away. This isn’t suitable for children.”

“No…,” Li Yaqing said hoarsely, and then bit her lip in hesitation and embarrassment.

“Do you have something to say?” Ke Xun turned the pile of photos in his hand face down, and looked at Li Yaqing.

Maybe it was because Ke Xun’s bright eyes made it easy for others to relax their guards, or perhaps, the attributes of his being gay made it easy for the opposite sex to view him as bestie material. Li Yaqing finally pursed her lips and told him in a low voice, “The picture just now, I’ve seen it before…”

Ke Xun was surprised at her answer. “Really? How could you have seen this kind of photo before?”

After he spoke, he turned the photo over and looked at Li Yaqing again. “Do you mind checking again?”

“It’s fine. Let me take a look.” Li Yaqing took the photo and looked at it carefully. Handing it back to Ke Xun, she said, “I was right. It’s exactly this photo. There’s a heart-shaped birthmark above the man’s belly button so it shouldn’t be that I mistook this for a different photo.”

“Can I ask where you met this person?” Ke Xun asked.

“I haven’t seen this person in reality. I just saw a photo, which is exactly the same as this one.” Li Yaqing became a little embarrassed. “You know…We’re all fujoshis…Sometimes we go to that kind of website…You know, that kind…”

“Gay website, understood.” Ke Xun nodded.

“Mmn…there are many pictures like this on that website…” Li Yaqing tried to act as natural as possible. “This photo is one of them. The reason why I remembered this photo was because of the birthmark above his belly button. At that time, Hanrui also joked about this heart-shaped birthmark, saying…saying that if the Xiao Gong was the first to see this birthmark…he would be the first to react…”

“Ah-hem.” Ke Xun tightened his grip on the photo. “So you remember clearly that this person is the same person as the one in the photo you saw before?”

“Yes, it’s him.” Li Yaqing nodded.

Ke Xun touched his chin and thoughtfully said, “Many of the pictures on those gay websites are aggregated from various websites. Anyone who looks handsome, has a good figure, is sexy, or wears revealing, provocative clothing will be added to the website. Of course, many of them were uploaded by users. But why does this photo appear in this research institute as well as on a gay website? Is there a correlation between the two?”

Li Yaqing didn’t know, so she had to remain silent.

It was unknown when Zhu Haowen had come to stand next to him. Suddenly, he asked Li Yaqing, “Which website did you see this photo on? Tell me the website’s name.

Li Yaqing froze for a moment, and quickly answered him, “The website is easy to remember. It’s XXX.GAYJJ…”

Ke Xun: “…”

Wei Dong: “…”

Zhu Haowen expressionlessly said, “I see. This website is one of the best maintained and most regulated gay websites out there. But at the same time, it still couldn’t avoid infringing on people’s rights and allowing many unethical pictures in it. The team collected from various channels, including old newspapers, magazines, celebrity shots, and these images will be scanned into the website for people to appreciate.”

Ke Xun looked at him strangely.

Wei Dong suddenly said, “So, the picture these girls saw on the website was actually scanned in, and this one is the original. But what does this have to do with the current situation?”

Ke Xun retracted his gaze, and told Wei Dong. “It’s related. This at least proves that this pile of photos weren’t taken of real people here. Looking at the quality of this photo, it’s likely to be a copy.”

“Let me take a look!” Wei Dong quickly stretched out his hand. Ignoring whether the picture was unpleasant to the eyes or not, he carefully observed every pixel on the photo with the light of the phone. “Yes! This is a copy! Damn, I knew it. See, there’s a shadow in the upper left corner. This is because the photo was copied from some pornographic magazine. And if the photo was older, there would be undulations or wrinkles due to dampness or folding, resulting in shadows in these places. Looking at the pixels, this is definitely a copy and not a live shot.”

“So, isn’t it weird?” Ke Xun said. “They’re researchers at a research institute, why would they want to make a copy of this photo and keep it in the laboratory? If it’s a personal pastime, then it’s quite blatant. Therefore, putting it here must be a deliberate act with a certain purpose behind it.”

“What is the purpose?” After Wei Dong asked this question, he began to think deeply about it.

“I think,” Ke Xun picked up an oil-based pen that he’d pulled out of the drawer, “this stack of photos is likely to be related to the ET exam mentioned in the research log. But no matter what, let’s take precautions first.”

After saying that, he made a few strokes and the naked man in the photo suddenly wore black body-building pants.

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