Trembling At A High Altitude

It was no surprise to anyone that Li Teng (Li Teng) was so good to Ms. Song Qing (Aila).

Because Li Teng was Song Qing's bodyguard, being good to her was part of his job.

Moreover, washing and preparing the chicken and duck, Li Teng did all the work, so it wasn't excessive for him to receive more.

Richard didn't object, and neither did anyone else.

The most pitiful one was Zeka.

Because he had to pretend to have fainted from exhaustion, others only remembered to leave some chicken and duck meat for him after they had divided the rest.

So, they left him the chicken and duck butts, chicken and duck ribs.

"That's enough, time to wake up! If you don't, there will be nothing left in the pot!" Richard, after having eaten his fill, kicked Zeka who was lying on the ground.

"Hmm... Did I pass out?" Zeka had no choice but to wake up.

He was still running a fever and didn't have much appetite, but he knew he had to eat something.

Thus, he took the chicken and duck butts and ribs, which nobody else wanted from the pot, and started eating.

Seeing the leftovers everyone had left for him, Zeka deeply felt a certain humiliation.

He also began to hate Richard in his heart.

This Director Lin, who appeared so pitiable and kind in public.

But his true nature was so fierce and malicious.

Nevermind, for the sake of this job, just endure it.

He had a wife and children to support at home, a house and car to pay for; minor irritations could disrupt major plans.

What's wrong with chicken and duck butts? They're fattier and more filling!

What's wrong with chicken and duck ribs? As if he should disdain such good parts!

After some self-hypnosis, Zeka forcefully suppressed the feelings of humiliation and anger inside him.

After dinner, it had completely darkened outside.

The stone house had no electricity; they could only find a few candles.

Everyoen sat under the dim light of the candles, casually chatting.

"The yacht must have been driven away by Gemma, that woman! Ah... How could she do this? Only thinking of herself…" Richard began to slander Gemma.

"I also think the yacht must have been taken away by her, otherwise it wouldn't leave the dock for no reason," Zeka said, relieved to hear Richard say this.

"I heard your ex-wife was killed by a housekeeper?" Aila purposely brought up a topic for Richard.

"Yes! That was the most painful and darkest moment of my life..." Richard immediately began to act pitiful, performing the same act he did in front of the public.

Aila almost lost control of her emotions listening to his lies, and Li Teng had to remind her several times secretly to keep her anger in check.

Seeing this, Li Teng shook his head.

Women! Indeed, too emotional! It's obviously a wound you don't want to reopen, yet you deliberately choose to do so, Aila, what was the point in bringing up this topic?

...

It got dark early, and it was completely black by just after seven o'clock.

Because of the fatigue during the day, everyone started yawning.

There was not much to do at night, and it was inconvenient with too many people around.

So, after it got dark, the only option was to sleep.

The stone house had two side rooms, but each room had only one bed.

There were a total of four men and three women, seven people in all.

Moreover, each stone house was not very big; only one person could sleep on the bed, and at most, two people could sleep on the floor under the bed.

In the end, the distribution was such that the three women slept in one side room, Richard and Zeka slept in another side room, and Li Teng and Yang Shunli slept in the middle stone house.

"Senior, could there be any problem with this arrangement? Should someone keep watch at night? One of the tourists is a ghost, and it is supposed to kill one tourist every day..." After lying down, Yang Shunli whispered to Li Teng in a lowered voice.

"Are you a ghost?" Li Teng asked Yang Shunli.

"How could it be us four who came from the prison? It must be one of the three people with Director Lin," Yang Shunli said in a helpless tone.

"That's not easy to say; the rules only mention that one among the tourists is a ghost. We four are also considered tourists," Li Teng shook his head.

"Could it be that Mindo?" Yang Shunli was startled internally.

He, along with Li Teng and Aila, had already experienced a task together, knew each other well, but Mindo's background was unknown; could it be that the prison intentionally planted a ghost among them due to their recognition bias?

"It's possible, but not certain," Li Teng also had no clues for the time being.

"Those two women are in danger," Yang Shunli murmured softly.

"Even if Mindo is the ghost, it won't necessarily be those two women who are unlucky. Maybe the ghost, in order to hide itself, deliberately avoids killing the women around and chooses to kill a man instead?

"There must be some restrictions on the ghost in the rules, preventing it from killing at will; otherwise, we couldn't possibly get a pass from the ghost," Li Teng replied to Yang Shunli.

"So, what should we do now?" Fear showed on Yang Shunli's face.

Compared to his performance in the last task, Yang Shunli seemed to have moved on from the grief of losing his girlfriend and became more keen on survival.

"Let's take turns keeping watch. It's now just past seven o'clock, taking midnight as the boundary, I'll watch the first half of the night, and you watch the second half. I'll sleep from midnight to five o'clock. By five, you'll probably be extremely sleepy and need to catch up on sleep. Then I'll take over from you. Remember to keep the candle from going out," Li Teng made the arrangements.

"Why use midnight as the boundary? Wouldn't it be better around one or two in the morning..." Yang Shunli found Li Teng's arrangement somewhat odd.

"The ghost kills following a daily schedule, one person per day. I plan to wake you around eleven fifty. If the ghost hasn't killed anyone by then, it will have to act, and we'll switch shifts at that time, keeping both of us alert," Li Teng responded to Yang Shunli.

"Mm-hmm, that makes a lot of sense, and thank you for trusting me," Yang Shunli was completely convinced by Li Teng's arrangement. A senior is indeed a senior, thinking more deeply than they did.

Additionally, he felt that by arranging it this way, Li Teng had at least eliminated the possibility of him being the ghost.

However, what Yang Shunli didn't know was that Li Teng had already agreed with Aila earlier that he would watch the first half of the night and asked Aila to also keep an eye on Yang Shunli in the middle stone house during the latter half of the night.

Whether keeping watch was useful or not, it was at least a psychological comfort.

After everything was arranged, Yang Shunli lay down.

After lying down, Yang Shunli felt something wasn't quite right.

What if... Li Teng was the ghost?

The rules did not exclude this possibility!

If Li Teng was the ghost, he could easily kill him while he slept, and no one else would notice.

Soon, Yang Shunli thought of something else.

Even if he stayed awake, wouldn't it be equally easy for Li Teng to kill him and silence him before he could even make a sound?

Since that was the case, he might as well sleep.

Dying in his sleep might actually be the best release.

Yang Shunli did not believe he could complete all his sentences.

Moreover, even if he did complete all his sentences and returned to the Living World, life would be incredibly bleak without her.

He could never forget that moment.

The two of them, hand in hand, were about to reach the finish line when they realized only one could live to leave.

"You go! If you can return to the Living World, take care of my parents," Yang Shunli decided to sacrifice himself for his girlfriend, Dong Qi.

They actually didn't have time to dawdle, because the people behind were about to catch up.

"Alright! Let me kiss you one last time." Dong Qi tiptoed and kissed him on the forehead.

Then, she violently pushed him towards the finish line, while she ran back in the opposite direction, blocking the person who tried to rush over.

"Take care of my parents! Don't let my sacrifice be in vain!"

That was the last thing his girlfriend left him with.

He had wanted to sacrifice himself for his girlfriend, but unexpectedly, she was more resolute and fulfilled his fate with her actions.

Every time he recalled that scene, it pained him like a stab to the heart.

"I can't die, I have to survive, otherwise her sacrifice would be in vain! I must live and go back to take care of her parents..." Yang Shunli, lying on the ground of the stone house, had tears spilling from the corners of his eyes.

...

The first half of the night slowly came to an end.

It was time to change shifts.

Li Teng awoke Aila first, then Yang Shunli.

In the side room where the girls were, noise suddenly erupted as all three girls woke up.

A bit later, they walked out from the side room, saying they needed to go to the restroom together.

The rain outside had stopped, and the restroom was on the other side of the courtyard, so the three of them went together.

"Be careful, do you need me to accompany you?" Li Teng quietly asked Aila.

"You should wake him up as well, and both of you stand in the courtyard, make sure to stick together, and come to rescue us immediately if anything happens," Aila quietly responded to Li Teng.

"Okay."

After agreeing, Aila took Mindo and the female assistant to the yard, and they walked to the restroom on the other side of the courtyard.

Li Teng and Yang Shunli stood in the yard, watching towards the direction of the restroom.

"I slept through without any issues, so we can rule out the suspicion that you are a ghost," Yang Shunli said to Li Teng.

"What if I'm just deceiving you?" Li Teng laughed.

"If you were a ghost, killing me would be all too easy, no need for any schemes," Yang Shunli also laughed.

Although he was chatting with Yang Shunli, Li Teng was highly vigilant, constantly observing the activity around Aila and sensing that it was very likely that one of these three women was a ghost.

The phones might not have been working, but they still displayed the time.

The current time was already 11:58 p.m., almost midnight.

If a ghost wanted to kill a tourist, it had to make its move now.

...

However.

As time increasingly pressed closer to midnight, and eventually passed, the expected screams did not arise.

Aila, Mindo, and the female assistant walked back from the restroom side safely.

Li Teng and Yang Shunli in the courtyard didn't encounter any danger.

Li Teng quickly walked back into the stone house, using a candle to check the side room where Richard and Zeka were.

Both were soundly asleep, snoring heavily, and appeared to be quite alive, not dismembered by a ghost or anything of the sort.

"The one who was killed by a ghost on the first day, was it Gemma?" Yang Shunli quietly asked Li Teng.

"It can only be her," Li Teng frowned.

If it was Gemma, then who killed her?

Li Teng and Aila had left from Gemma's side, and everyone had returned to the stone house and never left again.

At that time, Gemma was still alive.

She just had a broken leg, and the weather wasn't too cold; even if she got soaked in the rain for a day, she wouldn't necessarily have died, right?

Moreover, the rule required that the ghost must kill one person each day.

If Gemma had died because of her broken leg in the rainy field, it couldn't be counted as the ghost's doing, could it?

But now, it was clear that the tourist who had died on the first day was Gemma.

After carefully recalling the details of the rules, Li Teng was almost certain of a major suspect.

If his guess was correct, he could start looking for the pass now.

Forget it, let's wait until the shift change at five o'clock to discuss it further.

...

When Li Teng woke up, it was already bright daylight.

Yang Shunli was leaning against the wall, struggling to keep his eyes open.

"What time is it? Why didn't you wake me up?" Li Teng quickly sat up.

"I saw that the senior was very tired and sleeping deeply, so I thought to let you sleep a bit longer; I can catch up on sleep during the day," Yang Shunli whispered a few words to Li Teng.

"What time is it now?" Li Teng asked again.

"It's six-thirty. It gets dark early on this island, but it also gets light early," Yang Shunli checked his phone.

"Alright, you sleep now; I'll keep watch," Li Teng looked around at the side rooms; apart from Aila, who was still holding on, everyone else was still asleep.

After Yang Shunli lay down, Li Teng quietly approached Aila.

"Alright, you sleep, I'll keep watch," Li Teng whispered to Aila.

"After a day and a night, do you have any clue who the ghost is?" Aila whispered to Li Teng.

"I have almost pinpointed someone, but I'm missing a piece of crucial evidence. Now is not the time to talk about this; others might be pretending to sleep. I'll find a chance to talk to you in detail during the day," Li Teng whispered a few sentences into Aila's ear.

"Okay," Aila didn't ask any more questions. She lay down, closed her eyes, and slowly fell asleep.

...

The second day on the island.

It was still raining.

The rain was slightly milder than yesterday.

Zeka had a fever all night and was lying on the ground today, utterly weak and unable to get up.

The feeding was still being handled by Li Teng.

The yard's chickens and ducks, with everyone eating the way they were, would be gone after one more meal.

Hearing Zeka on the ground mention that there were a lot of vegetables in the large vegetable garden at the back, enough to feed everyone for a few days.

Thus, everyone decided to go to the vegetable garden together to pick vegetables.

"I think we should not leave him here alone; someone needs to take care of him, or there'll be trouble," after discussing with Li Teng, Yang Shunli brought this up to everyone.

Zeka couldn't join everyone to the vegetable field; leaving him here would mean he was alone.

Then, the ghost could use him for today's killing task.

According to the analysis by Yang Shunli and Li Teng, if someone was unwilling to pick vegetables and volunteered to stay here to take care of Zeka, and then, if Zeka died, that person would very likely be the ghost.

"You guys go pick the vegetables; I'll stay here to take care of him," Richard said immediately after hearing Yang Shunli's words, without any hesitation.

Zeka's face immediately turned very ugly… Director Lin, you're staying? Then who is taking care of whom?