The RV was driving on a relatively flat dirt road.
“I didn’t expect that we would actually be in the same scene.”
"The allocation of personnel at the distribution center will not be strictly based on time." Fujii Yukiyin did not look at Lu Ning, but lowered his head and held a note pad to ponder something carefully. Lu Ning didn't care and continued to chat casually.
"You have something to do this morning, right? Do you have any idea about the current situation?"
"have."
"There are many things hidden in the town that seem strange but are accepted by people as a matter of course. I think the key points of your investigation are all here. However, there is still no specific information about what demons are, and their relationship with witches is also unknown. It’s still unclear.” Lu Ning said, “Now we don’t even have a clear idea of the goal of hunting.”
"Really?" Fujii Yukiyin finally raised her head, "Lu Ning, do you think so?"
"If I talk about personal secrets, I won't say much either." The corners of Lu Ning's lips raised slightly, "Just like you."
"You are definitely not an ordinary doctor." Fujii Yukine leaned on the seat and looked sideways. "This evaluation can be applied to any tourist. There is no accident, everyone has a certain purpose. 'Come to this town, and this purpose is also included as a secret among the tasks we want to complete."
"I'm equally convinced of that."
"So, this is not a hunting-based scene, the secret is the dominant one, and there may even be an element of confrontation in it. I almost smell the smell of a murder."
"Detective intuition?"
"You can think so."
At around two o'clock in the afternoon, everyone arrived at Baisha Lake.
The name was of course derived from the rare white sand beach surrounding the lake. Lu Ning parked the car near the beach and got down to grab a handful of sand. These sand grains are extremely fine, and there are no coarse particles in them. Even if you hold it in your hand, the sand will still flow out slowly along the fingers.
"What?" Fujii Yukine then got out of the car and asked when he saw Lu Ning standing on the beach.
"This can hardly be called sand anymore, it's closer to soil." Lu Ning shook off the white sand in his hands and clapped his hands, "This lake alone is very weird."
In the backyard of the lake house, Carl has set up a grill, Feng Hui and Peng Morong are breaking the meat purchased from the town in the early morning into small pieces suitable for barbecue, Sally, Luo Nan and Qiu Yiyun When arranging decorations, tableware and other objects in the dining room, living room and other places, Yiluo and Robert hung bells near the doors and windows and constantly checked the angles. Qu Siyuan and others helped the later people to place the bells. Things are unloaded from the car.
"Are you really here for an outing?" Lu Ning could only shake her head when she saw people preparing for a barbecue party inside.
"It's a night to spend anyway, a night to be nervous and a night to be relaxed and happy." Zhu You grinned, "Don't worry, everyone will keep their weapons."
"Welcome! The last members have arrived!" Sally was very happy to see Lu Ning and others, "How about I take you to see the hot springs?"
"I don't think it's a waste to pursue enjoyment in this environment..."
Before Fujii Yukine finished speaking, he was interrupted by Sugiyama Rio and Inahara Ayano. They happily followed Sally to the other corner of the room, and they seemed not to be worried at all.
"right here!"
Sally opened a sliding door with a proud look on her face. The heat inside immediately blurred Lu Ning's vision, but after she got used to it, she could see clearly what was going on inside.
This is an indoor hot spring, or the builder of the villa built a house and enclosed a hot spring inside the house. The room is very large, with a curtain separating the two sides, and there is a door on each side. Behind the door are the men's and women's changing rooms. The temperature of the hot spring water is a bit high, and a slight smell of sulfur permeates the air with the water vapor. Sometimes it has to be opened. Ventilation through windows can dissipate the heat inside.
Sugiyama and Inahara were obviously very happy to see this.
"I suggest that we soak for a while before having a barbecue at night. It won't waste much time anyway, and it might be safer during the day!" Sally suggested excitedly.
"I object." Fujii Yukine glanced at the surroundings, "The environment here is too closed. Once the most basic defense methods are gone, we will not even have any countermeasures when encountering danger."
"Miss Detective, cleaning is an essential thing for girls~" Sally raised her eyebrows and smiled.
"If you persuade everyone to use the hot springs like this, I will doubt your intentions. In addition, cleaning is completely unnecessary for me, even if it is not necessary for these fourteen days..."
"Miss Fujii! Please don't say such horrible words!" Inahara Ayano quickly stopped Fujii Yukine's words.
"I'll come back later, and you can continue the debate." Lu Ning laughed while making excuses to leave the bath, walked out and began to familiarize herself with the environment in the entire villa.
The lake house clearly doesn’t fit the definition of “small.” Its overall structure is an "F" shape. Although it has only one floor, there is a basement in the side yard. After entering from the door, you can see people preparing for barbecue in the front yard through the corridor. Take the first right turn and walk to the end of the restaurant. On the north side of the corridor leading to the restaurant is a row of four smaller rooms. The large room consists of the living room, auxiliary bedroom, master bedroom and study room in order, followed by a small bathroom. There are three large floor-to-ceiling windows on the south side of this corridor, of which a door is opened in the middle of the front two to facilitate people in the front yard to return to the room.
If you don't turn, the end of this corridor is the back door. On the left hand side is a row of guest rooms. The four guest rooms are separated by a laundry room. One of the two doors in the laundry room connects to the corridor and the other leads to the side. There is also a bathroom in the courtyard, but it must be entered from the laundry room.
The corridor leading to the hot spring is slightly opposite to the front yard corridor. On the south side are three larger guest rooms. After the bathroom, there is a door leading to the backyard. On the north side are three sets of floor-to-ceiling windows, but outside the windows are tall From the courtyard wall, you can see the dense forest behind the house from the top of the wall.
In addition to the main building part, the backyard has a storage room where necessary items such as food and fuel are kept. There is also a tool room in the side yard, where there is no shortage of maintenance tools, carpentry tools, etc. The basement goes down from there. Currently, it is just piled with wood, iron sheets and other debris, nothing special.
After finishing the tour, Lu Ning returned to the front yard. By this time Carl had grilled some meat for lunch, and everyone here was clearly happy.
Lu Ning took a simple burger made of barbecue, lettuce and bread from Carl, and was slightly surprised: "I didn't expect you to have such skills."
"You wouldn't question a cowboy's ability to grill, would you?" Carl raised his hat proudly and continued to look after the grill. Lu Ning walked around the wide front yard and found that there was a small swimming pool in the corner of the yard.
"The owner here really knows how to enjoy it, right?" Robert came over, "In times like this, it takes a lot of energy to take care of a swimming pool in this place, but..."
The water in the swimming pool was already turbid. The cleaning tasks here obviously did not include this, and the people who came here to clean did not clean it. But even so, it was easy for Lu Ning to see something strange.
"Just muddy."
"Yes, there is no moss growing, and there are no disgusting aquatic creatures. The water here is so clean that it becomes clear after settling for a period of time." Robert walked to the corner of the swimming pool and picked up a glass bottle, which contained the separated clear water. Two layers of turbid water.
"But we already knew something was wrong here."
Lu Ning stretched out her hand and stroked twice in the swimming pool, stirring up a small vortex in the water. The turbidity in the water quickly spread to the surroundings along with the vortex, but overall it seemed to be stagnant in the water.
"Then why doesn't sedimentation occur in this pool?"
At this moment, a burst of laughter came from the direction of the hot spring in a backyard. It was probably Sally who convinced more people. It sounded very lively over there now.
However, Fujii Yukine quickly walked out of the door from the dining room to the courtyard, obviously not getting involved with them, and judging by the time, she probably also turned the entire house in a circle.
"Fujii, you can try Carl's barbecue, it tastes quite good." Asama Seitaro tried to persuade her.
"No, I have to make some preparations, and I've eaten." Fujii glanced at the people in the front yard, "Have you people who come here decided on the rooms you want to stay in?"
"There are not enough beds here, but every room is carpeted. I think it's okay to lay the floor." Karl pointed at the room in the glass window with his thumb, "Robert and I sleep in the living room, so we can be more vigilant. As for the You should probably ask others which one they chose.”
"Tachikawa and I live in the small guest room closest to the entrance." Seitaro Asama followed.
"No." Fujii Yukine said immediately.
"What's wrong?" Xue Fengchun looked at her impatiently, "Don't say you want to break up and reorganize."
"There must be at least three people in each room together."
After hearing this, Karl said "Oh" with interest.
"Tch, I thought you had any insight, just this kind of preventive measure that everyone knows about?" Xue Fengchun snorted coldly, "Don't think about it, the four of us brothers must be in the same place."
"Not just you, everyone must ensure that the room combination is at least the same as last night." Fujii Yukine directly reported the number of people in everyone's room yesterday, "Four people from Qu Siyuan, one person from Asayama, one person from Tachikawa, me and There are three people from Sushan and Inahara, one from Sally, four from Luo Nan, Yu Guiting, Feng Hui and Peng Morong, one from Carl, one from Robert, one from Lu Ning, three from Yiluo, Professor Shen and Ye Chuqing, and Zhu You One person, Qiu Yiyun." She pointed at Xia Xinhe and his wife, who had been silent in the corner, "Except for the two of them, none of us were in the same room last night, and it will still be the same today."
"I understand your worries, but even if sleeping excludes two people from being alone together, it will still happen at other times, right?"
"When I tell this, everyone will be alert. I am just minimizing the risk. Mr. Karl should also agree to this approach, right?"
Karl smiled: "Of course I don't mind. We must increase the safety factor. In this case, Asayama and Tachikawa, how about you move into our living room?"
"sure."
"I have no objection."
Only then did Fujii Yukine leave the front yard with satisfaction.
"Huh, what are you putting on?" Xue Fengchun couldn't help but spit, "She started to point fingers just because she was a detective, and she looked at each of us suspiciously! Who does she think she is?"
"Okay, okay, second brother, it's for safety's sake." Pan Haishu advised.
Soon, the girls who had soaked in the hot springs there came back to the front yard laughing and chatting, and continued to help tidy up the house. Both the beds and the floor needed to be remade. People who had finished adjusting the grill outside quickly returned to the house to help. At this time, Sally and Luo Nan also replaced the candlesticks in the dining room with brand new candles. , everyone brought flashlights, so lighting shouldn’t be a big problem.
When Lu Ning and Zhu You decorated a guest room in the hot spring corridor together, they accidentally looked out the window.
"Is there... a wall outside?"
She walked to the window and found that the window was indeed facing a wall. The lighting here was not very good. When she poked her head out, she could see another window diagonally opposite. Through the window, she could see Qianshan who was laying the floor in the living room. Seitaro and Ryo Tachikawa.
"Mr. Asayama." She greeted.
"Oh, Doctor Lu, I didn't expect that there is a slit between the two rooms." Asayama Seitaro heard the sound and walked to the window.
Lu Ning looked up again. There was a narrow "alley" between the two rows of accommodation rooms. It was barely wide enough for two people to pass side by side. Such an extremely close distance also made it difficult for sunlight to shine into the house, and it also made it difficult for the sun to shine into the house. The house seemed much gloomier.
"This design is really not good." Lu Ning complained, "I looked out of the window, hoping to see the yard or the scenery outside."
"Dr. Lu has never lived in an apartment, has he?" Asama Seitaro smiled.
"No, what?"
"This is often the case with individual rooms in apartments in densely populated areas."
"But the housing here obviously has nothing to do with density."
After all, everyone knew they were always going to stay here for one night, or no more than that.
As the work came to an end and the sun began to set, countless birds flew across the sky, making a sound of flapping wings. Carl lit the fire in the grill, reigniting the light in the soon-to-be-dark lake house.
"It's seven o'clock."
Shen Lishu took his pocket watch and paid attention to the time. Everyone watched the sun sinking below the forest and lake with its afterglow, and the relaxed expressions on everyone's faces softened.
The most difficult night is about to begin.
