Chapter 4
I began to study the mission rules carefully.
Find out the Phantom. For me, it was an easy win.
My ability guide actually has a special section made just for situations like this.
[Chapter 4, Section 3, Supplementary Clause: Whenever Felix steps into a mismatched information showdown, he automatically unlocks the ability to visualize logical connections. Any lie, disguise, or malicious guess aimed at Felix will have its logic and source lit up right before his eyes.]
That was to say, I could see right through who the Phantom was, who was lying, and who was just acting.
Tonight would be a sleepless night.
As night settled in, darkness swallowed the castle. Inside, the silence was absolute. Only the storm outside battered the windows, wind and rain swirling in the gloom.
I leaned against the cold wall of the storage room, my eyes closed.
On my retina, a web of glowing lines unfolded, mapping out the entire castle.
Sixty-one points of light, each marking a survivor, were spread throughout various rooms.
Among them, one point of light stood out, a vivid scarlet, unlike all the others.
I found it. The red dot was in an attic on the third floor.
Number 27, a man who was always silent, blending into the background, almost invisible. He was the 'Phantom', Kael Voss.
Just then, the red dot moved.
He left the room quietly, hugging the walls like a gecko as he crept toward a room on the second floor.
That was where a lone girl lived.
Should I make a move? No, not yet.
Exposing him now wouldn't help me at all. Instead, it would expose my ability.
What I wanted to do was to make use of him.
I made a subtle gesture in the air.
Another rule in his ability guide was activated.
[Supplementary Clause 211: By burning off 1% of his calories, Felix could fine-tune the physical state of any non-living object within 300 feet, with a tiny margin of error.]
On the stairs from the attic to the second floor, the internal fibers of a once-sturdy wooden board shifted ever so slightly, so subtly no one would notice.
Kael was quick and nimble, slipping down the stairs step by step without making any sound.
But the moment he stepped onto the board I'd subtly tweaked, the noise ripped through the dead quiet of the night, loud enough to make anyone jump.
"Who?" On the second floor, Jett's door was kicked open, and a burst of fire lit up the entire hallway.
Kael's expression twisted in shock. He didn't expect that he would be exposed. He melted into the shadows in an instant.
Jett lunged, but his hands closed on nothing but air, only to see a blurry black shadow.
"There's an intruder!" he shouted.
The whole castle was on high alert in an instant.
Everyone burst out of their rooms, staring at Jett, suspicion and confusion written all over their faces.
"Jett, what happened?" someone asked.
"I saw a black shadow just now! It had to be the 'Phantom', he wanted to sneak up on me!" Jett shouted, his voice shaking with anger and fear.
One of his lackeys immediately pointed toward the basement where I was staying. He said, "It must have come from the basement. That waste is the most suspicious."
Without hesitation, Jett kicked open my door.
I was leaning against the wall, staring at them with a groggy, half-asleep look of innocence.
"What are you doing?" I blinked and asked.
Jett jabbed his finger right at my face and shouted, "Keep pretending! Go on! Was that you just now? What were you trying to do?"
I shrugged and replied, "I've been here all the time, and I've never left."
The live chat was split down the middle.
[It must be Number 44. He's the most suspicious one.]
[Seriously? He's just trash. No way he's got the guts or skills for this.]
[I don't think it's him. He doesn't look like the kind of guy who'd pull something like this.]
At this moment, the calmest girl in the room, Thea Hale, Number 17, stepped forward.
She pointed at the stairs and said, "The sound came from upstairs. And check out the basement door. It's full of dust, not a single sign it's been opened."
Everyone checked it, and sure enough, she was spot on.
Jett's face instantly went purple with embarrassment.
His carefully planned frame-up got wrecked in a single line.
Not bad. Thea's got some real skills.
I glanced at her, and she was already staring at me, her eyes filled with scrutiny and just a hint of suspicion.
She didn't believe I was trash.
Meanwhile, the real 'Phantom', Kael, was holed up in the shadows on the third floor, still rattled from his close call.
He didn't know that his every move was under my watch.
With just a flick of my finger, I could turn him into the center of attention or make him Jett's worst nightmare.
In this cat-and-mouse game, I was neither a cat nor a mouse.
I was the one who made the rules.
The commotion on the first night frightened everyone.
By daylight, everyone gathered in the main hall, suspicious and tense, scanning each other for any sign that might reveal the 'Phantom'.