Chapter 41.1 Throwing the Handkerchief
A boy in the crowd couldn’t help but protest: “Even if we are afraid of death, can you not scare us on purpose?!”
“Qin Wenbo, stop talking.” The only girl among the recorders tugged on his sleeve.
Qin Wenbo was still very unhappy and reluctantly endured it. Lin Banxia thought he looked like he should be in his twenties, which was the age when he is full of energy. He was the only one among the four recorders who did not show any timidity. It’s a pity that he seemed to have a bad temper and his expression had never relaxed.
Shen Junyan didn’t seem to hate him. She smiled with her eyes bent even when he yelled at her. She said, “Don’t be angry, kids. This is not meant to scare you, it’s just a reminder.”
Qin Wenbo had a calm expression and said nothing. His expression showed dissatisfaction written all over his face.
While talking, the group had already arrived at the location where the roller coaster accident occurred. Lin Banxia raised his head and saw a roller coaster track above his head. He had been in the amusement park before, so he naturally remembered that this track was broken, but now, it appeared in front of everyone in perfect condition. This change of scene clearly told everyone that the place they were in now was indeed not the Jiayue Amusement Park from earlier.
Unnoticed, a thick layer of fog appeared around them. In the fog, a scream sounded from far away. Lin Banxia looked up and saw a roller coaster rushing towards them in the distance, but in an instant, the extremely fast roller coaster was directly above them.
Everyone looked up after hearing the sound and looked at the roller coaster that suddenly arrived overhead. The moment it whizzed past, Ai Xinsheng , who was standing in the center of the crowd, suddenly felt a layer of mist-like water falling on his cheeks. At first, he thought it was the fog around them, but unexpectedly there were some things scattering from the speeding roller coaster.
These things fell on the ground, making a sticky and unpleasant sound. Ai Xinsheng lowered his head blankly, and saw some red minced meat among the messy bits and pieces… He wiped his cheeks and looked down at his hands, which were red and exuded the disgusting smell of blood.
Seeing this, Ai Xinsheng felt a little dizzy. His feet gave way and he fell to the ground awkwardly. His hand happened to touch those scattered pieces. This time, he was extremely sure that these things were indeed pieces of meat that were thrown away from the roller coaster like garbage.
“Fuck!!” Ai Xinsheng , who had just fallen to the ground, jumped up like a rabbit, shook the meat off his hands vigorously, and asked in a panic, “What is this? What is this?” He looked around and found that the faces of the recorders were all ugly, but the three monitors all had calm expressions, and there was even one person who squatted on the ground and studied it carefully. This person was Lin Banxia.
Lin Banxia did squat down. It was not because he wanted to see these pieces of meat, but because he noticed that there was a white thing mixed in the meat. This thing fell to the ground. He looked for it for a while and finally found it in the corner. He found it, however before he could straighten up and be happy, he noticed the people around him staring at him with strange eyes. Lin Banxia didn’t react for a while before realizing why these people were looking at him like this, and quickly explained: “I’m not a pervert, I just seemed to see something white falling down from above.”
“What?” Ai Xinsheng asked tremblingly.
“It’s a student ID card.” Lin Banxia turned to the front and read out the name on it, “Wang Ke…”
“It’s one of the lost students!” Ai Xinsheng immediately remembered, but unfortunately the smile on his face disappeared immediately before he could put it on, because he realized that in such a place, in such a way, finding the student ID was not a good thing.
“It seems like it’s gone.” Shen Junyan said from the side.
“Shh.” Song Qingluo suddenly made a silent gesture. Lin Banxia then remembered that Song Qingluo hadn’t spoken much since entering the amusement park. At this time, he had no intention of joining the discussion. Instead, he frowned slightly and kept his gaze next to them.
Lin Banxia followed his gaze and saw a loudspeaker mounted on a telephone pole. At this time, the loudspeaker was emitting a sizzling sound, which sounded very abrupt in the dead silence of the park.
Everyone fell silent, and the sound of static became more obvious, then the sound of static became stronger and stronger, and a song with a strange tune was played from the radio.
“Throw~throw~throw the handkerchief~throw it gently behind the child, don’t tell him~catch him quickly, catch him quickly~” The song was originally a children’s song that they heard when they were children, but gradually the melody began to twist and change, mixing with a strong sound of static, which made people feel more and more uncomfortable as they listened. Later, the melody had completely changed its form, and Lin Banxia could not understand what was being sung at all.
Ai Xinsheng collapsed a little when he heard this strange song: “Why are they singing ‘Throwing the handkerchief?’ What does this mean?”
Lin Banxia was a little surprised: “Do you understand?”
“Of course.” Ai Xinsheng was shaking like chaff, and the faces of the recorders next to him were as pale as paper, but the monitors seemed to be a little confused, “Can’t you hear it? The song on the radio is just repeating ‘Throwing the handkerchief!”
After he said this, he felt a little out of breath.
Lin Banxia was about to comfort him with a few words when another roller coaster passed over their heads. At the same time, the immature child’s voice on the radio said with a pleasant tone: “The game begins.”
The moment the words fell, everything around them became quiet, and thick fog filled the entire Jiayue Paradise. Suddenly, someone in the crowd screamed “There is a ghost among us, run away!” Then they ran into the thick fog. The recorders, whose nerves had been stretched to the limit, after hearing this shrill cry, ran around in a panic like frightened birds. Ai Xinsheng knew that this would definitely not work. He stretched out his hand to stop them, but found that in just a moment, everyone around him had disappeared, leaving him standing alone. Even Song Qingluo and Shen Junyan had left no trace. He immediately realized that something was wrong, but there was no one around him at this time.
Ai Xinsheng was stunned on the spot. He had no idea that things would develop like this. They were just recorders who knew nothing. Why were the two senior monitors Song Qingluo and Shen Junyan also missing? Ai Xinsheng mustered up the courage to take a few steps forward, but still saw no one, and couldn’t help but smile desperately.
The amusement park was huge, and it was still nighttime, so it was extremely difficult to find people there.
From the current clues, it seemed that all the dead people would be put on the roller coaster. Ai Xinsheng thought about it and decided to follow his past experience and search nearby. It would be best to find teammates he knew. He didn’t want to be alone in such a strange place. However, he took a few steps forward and heard a girl’s low sobs coming from the grass. Ai Xinsheng was a little confused. When he walked closer to the grass, he saw a girl huddled deep in the grass. She had lowered her head and was biting her fingers nervously. Before coming, Ai Xinsheng naturally took a good look at the students’ information. Although there were some differences between the photos and the people, he recognized her immediately as one of the seven missing students, a girl named Shen Qingyi.
“Shen Qingyi, is that you?” Ai Xinsheng hesitated and tentatively called her name.
Who would have thought that when Shen Qingyi heard his call, she jumped up from the ground like a frightened rabbit, her eyes wild, but even so, she covered her mouth tightly and did not scream.
“Are you okay?” Ai Xinsheng asked hurriedly, “I was sent by the school to find you.”
Shen Qingyi glanced at Ai Xinsheng with frightened eyes. Her eyes were full of suspicion. She obviously didn’t believe what Ai Xinsheng said. She said, “You, were you really sent by the school?”
“Yes.” Ai Xinsheng said helplessly, “If I were a bad person, what reason would I have to lie to you? Besides, in a place like this, what good can I gain by lying to you?!”
This was also true. There was no one around. If the person in front of her was really a bad person, then he would just do something to her. There was no need to explain.
After thinking about this, Shen Qingyi finally stopped trembling, but her face still looked ugly. She said, “Why did you come here… Once you come here, no one can get out.”
Ai Xinsheng said: “What happened?”
Shen Qingyi looked around and said nervously: “The two of us are too conspicuous here. We’d better hide in other safe places. I’ll talk to you slowly.”
Ai Xinsheng said: “Okay.”
What Shen Qingyi wanted to tell was naturally the story of the seven students who accidentally entered the amusement park.
***
When the sound of “hide and seek has begun” sounded, the fog around them suddenly thickened. The seven people who had originally planned to stay together discovered that there was suddenly one more person and a heated disagreement arose.
Wang Ke almost got into a fight with a boy because of this. The boy blamed Wang Ke and said that if Wang Ke had not made them come here to take risks, they would not have encountered such a thing. Wang Ke refused to accept it, and the two became more and more angry. When they were about to take action, Meng Meng reached out to stop them.
“Don’t cause internal strife at this time.” Meng Meng advised, “If you are still quarreling at this time, do you want to go out?”
“Shut up, Meng Meng.” The boy didn’t give Meng Meng face, “I don’t want to be with you, Rourou, let’s go. Let’s go together. Who knows whether they are humans or ghosts!”
The girl named Rourou, and this boy were lovers, and they trusted each other very much. They simply decided to break away from the rest of the group to avoid the non-human things in the team. Because of this incident, other people also had doubts in their hearts. Two boys had a particularly good relationship and decided to go together. As a result, the seven of them split into three pairs, and in the end only four were left: Wang Ke, Xiao Weiqi, Meng Meng and Shen Qingyi.
“What should we do?” Shen Qingyi was delicate and frail. She was holding back her tears and said, “I’m so scared.”
“Don’t be afraid, there is nothing to be afraid of.” Xiao Weiqi said, “I know you all, so you are definitely not a ghost. Let’s just stay together and wait until dawn.”
He comforted her reluctantly, and no one dared to pour cold water on them. However, deep down in their hearts, they all asked a question… Will innocence shine?
“Let’s find a place to sit and wait.” Meng Meng said, “I just walked so far, my legs are a little sore.”
“I know there is a carousel next to the rollercoaster.” Wang Ke said, “Let’s go there and wait.”
“Okay, okay.” Shen Qingyi agreed. She has been to this park before, but she was a little afraid of heights and dared not ride most of the exciting rides. Her favorite was the carousel here, so she thought that going there was at least safer than staying next to the roller coaster.
The four of them headed towards the carousel, and everyone was quiet along the way. Shen Qingyi lowered her head and fiddled with her mobile phone and dialed all the numbers she could. However, the miracle did not happen. She could not contact any of the numbers on her mobile phone.
Not far away was the merry-go-round that was parked quietly. Compared with the bustling park during the day, they stood quietly on the disk at this time, looking a bit stiff and gloomy. There was no music on at the merry-go-round. At first glance, it didn’t look like a child’s toy, but more like a prop from a horror movie.
Xiao Weiqi was the boldest and walked in first, followed by Wang Ke, Meng Meng and Shen Qingyi. Shen Qingyi was indeed a little tired, so she found a wooden horse, climbed on it, and leaned on it in frustration: “Are we just going to wait like this?? What does what was said on the radio just now mean? Why can’t I understand? ”
“Could it be a prank?” Xiao Weiqi asked, “I don’t understand what they mean by throwing a handkerchief.”
“Yes.” Shen Qingyi said, “Meng Meng, what do you think?”
“Me?” Meng Meng had her back to them and was sitting on top of the merry-go-round. She was wearing a long skirt today, so it was not suitable for her to sit with her legs, so she sat with her legs together and faced the outside. She said while gently shaking her legs, “I feel that everything the radio says is a reminder, which may be helpful to us.”
“Hey, what’s the tip? Can you tell me?” Xiao Weiqi asked.
“I can’t tell,” Meng Meng said. “It sounds like the rules of a game. In horror stories like this, the conditions for survival are usually hidden in the prompts.”
“What rules can there be for throwing a handkerchief?” Wang Ke muttered, “Isn’t it just a childish game that we played when we were children[1.]?” He raised his hand and looked at the time, “It’s only nine o’clock now… when will it be dawn?”
As soon as this was mentioned, everyone became frustrated. In order to distract themselves, Shen Qingyi simply opened a game and started playing. As she was playing enthusiastically, Meng Meng who was sitting in front suddenly screamed, scaring her almost to death. Her phone fell to the ground.
“Meng Meng, what are you screaming for?” Shen Qingyi said in horror, covering her chest.
“No, it’s okay, I seem to have seen something wrong.” Meng Meng said.
“Did you see something wrong?” Shen Qingyi asked suspiciously, “What did you see wrongly?”
Meng Meng fell silent. She bent over slightly, as if she felt uncomfortable somewhere. Shen Qingyi felt a little strange, and just as she was about to ask in detail, she saw Meng Meng jump off the carousel she was sitting on.
“Wang Ke.” Meng Meng walked straight to Wang Ke, patted him tenderly and said, “Wang Ke, how on earth did you think of leading us in?”
“It was Xiao Weiqi.” Wang Ke said unhappily, “It was him who suggested coming to play, so I went to my uncle to ask for the key.”
“You can’t blame me. How could I know that you would really find the key?” Xiao Weiqi refused to take the blame and argued back.
Seeing that the two were about to quarrel again, Meng Meng suddenly said: “Stop fighting, stop fighting. I have to go to the toilet over there, do any of you want to go?”
“I’m afraid.” Shen Qingyi said weakly.
Translator’s comments:
- Throwing the handkerchief is a game that I have never played, but I found a video from a preschool performance showing the song and game. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V8ilXJ6fLwI
If possible please consider supporting me on Patreon or Ko-fi. I will be working on a stockpile for Patreon where you can read advanced chapters for as little as $3 a month. Alternatively, I will release an extra chapter for every Ko-fi donation I receive. It might not be on that exact day, but it will be released within the week.
