[Zhongyingmei] The clown is actually me

The capital of ghosts.

A few groups of green lights lit up in the darkness, like will-o'-the-wisps floating in the air, illuminating the "ghosts" sitting at the table.The ghosts are wrapped in black clothes like shrouds, with bone or metal masks of various shapes on their faces, and several eyes are illuminated by fluorescent lights in the dark.The head of the ghost has curly horns, and is covered with gorgeous metals and jewels. This is Ivikuru, one of the five royal families. It has been a key figure in the dynasty since the era of the former emperor, political All the affairs on the Internet are basically undertaken by him.

The ghost at the other end of the long table saluted respectfully, and said to him: "Master Iviruku, everything is going well, the three special ones dedicated to 'His' can be shipped at any time."

Iviruku held a bouquet of white Veda flowers in one hand: "Is that so,? It can be shipped,? Presumably 'He' will be very happy too. Ask the breeding supervisor to strengthen monitoring, but don't be careless,?" 'The royal meal is special."

"Yes." The last ghost hesitated for a while, "Excuse me, my lord,? How should we treat that one? He is now called..." His skinny fingers scratched on the portfolio,? Underneath the words, a string of inconspicuous English was found: "Mr. 'Jack Latorrie'?"

"He changed his name again? I remember he promised me,? He will use the last name for ten years,? Where is he now?"

Iviruku wore a hard mask, but the last ghost rarely saw a look called "helplessness" from the stiff bones. He consciously glimpsed the secrets of the big men, and beat him silently. A chill: "Grace Field Farm."

"Play house with the edible children again?"

"Yes."

Ivekuru sighed as if pointing: "In these years,? The time he has spent with humans has been longer than the time he has spent with us."

The last ghost did not dare to speak.

"Forget it, leave him alone, continue to communicate with him as before. No matter what he does, he can't stop the sacrifice. The 'most delicious human flesh' is the agreed price, 'ghost', 'human' and 'him', No one can fail."

The morning sun fell on the Grace? Field farm, cut into pieces like fish scales by the orphanage's wire windows.

"Ray—!" Emma jumped onto Lei's bed like a white rabbit, and rubbed against him with her soft face, "Are you still angry?"

Lei pushed her, didn't push her, and could only sigh: "No, I was emotional yesterday, I'm sorry. I thought about it again, and I agree with your proposal."

Emma looked at him for a while, her green eyes seemed to be looking into his heart: "It doesn't look like Ray."

Ray was silent.She continued: "Ray has always been a very stubborn person, as long as he disagrees, he will not change his opinion, and he rarely apologizes. Why is this?"

Ray made a gesture to interrupt him: "I talked to Mr. Jack last night and exchanged some information. It's time to get up now, and Mom will come soon. We'll talk after class."

Emma smiled and said, "Okay!"

The two separated, Lei put on white clothes, picked up a book by the bed, and walked into the dining room.Emma played with her younger brothers and sisters for a while, and left the bedroom behind him. As soon as she stepped out of the bedroom, Norman came out of the kitchen pushing a cart of soup cans. Emma posted it and said softly: "Ray's emotions No, he definitely talked about something with Mr. Jack yesterday, or should we ask Jack?"

"He won't say it. We don't have many chips in our hands. It's not worth exchanging these for simple clues."

At the time, Ray was talking about "you two," and he didn't count himself in.

"How to do?"

"Calm down, stabilize Lei first, and then conduct an investigation outside the wall." Norman said, "I told Dong and Gilda the truth yesterday, the sacrifice time is coming, whether it is mother or Jack, they will pay attention to the precious sacrifice products, younger children can escape their surveillance."

Dong was a boy, younger than Norman, but tall, athletic, and always tanned.Gilda, a quiet, sensitive girl, was born with poor eyesight and needed glasses to see clearly.

"Did you tell Dong about Kony?"

Dong is very close to Kony, and he always treats Kony as his little sister.When Kony was shipped out, he cried very sadly. Emma didn't choose to tell them the truth about the farm immediately, mainly because she was afraid that Dong would lose control of her emotions.

"Only part of it, I told them, 'Where we are sitting is the stronghold of the bad guys, and all the younger brothers and sisters were sold as slaves to the bad guys'. They accepted it very quickly, but Donghe... got emotional, I'm afraid Whatever he does on impulse, all I can tell him is that Kony is alive."

At a time like this, it's like walking a tightrope over an abyss, you can't make a mistake in one step.

Emma nodded, and she walked into the restaurant with her young sister in her arms, put on the brightest smile, and said loudly to everyone: "Good morning everyone!"

But at this moment, Isabella walked in with a pot of steaming soup. She still looked the same, with a white apron and a long black cotton dress like a mourning dress, and her jet-black hair coiled around her head. Finally, when Emma stared at her, an unspeakable emptiness instantly filled her chest, and she saw her own soul again, the young, transparent ghost of Emma, ​​following Isabel closely. Pulling back, staring at her with the same green eyes as hers, Emma heard the ghost of herself say, "Please..."

"...don't kill mom.

"What I exchanged with Jack last night was 'what is the ghost'." After class, Ray got together with Norman and others.

"'ghost'?"

"Well, Jack told me ghosts aren't a monster," Ray said.

The life called "ghost" by humans is a creature similar to bacteria.Different from mature animals and plants, the genetic genes of cells are transmitted horizontally. The proliferation of bacteria uses the resources of the environment to replicate themselves infinitely. During the replication process, it is inevitable that the genes of other bacteria will be mixed. This is the genetic mutation in biology. This kind of genetic mutation not only occurs between the same race, but also has the exchange of genetic information across races. The "evolution" of ghosts is very similar to them.

Ghosts evolve by eating.

As long as they eat the food, they can absorb the genetic information in the food, so as to obtain the traits of the thing.For example, ghosts who often eat fish will become fish-like, those whose diet is worms will become worms, and those who prey on wild animals will become wild beasts.Therefore, it can be said that ghosts have various forms, and there are no completely fixed characteristics.

No one knows when they started eating people.

But one thing is certain, only eating people can give them wisdom, and a healthy brain can give them high intelligence. They began to create their own language and culture, and finally formed a "ghost" society that is very similar to human beings.

Of course, the high-speed evolution does not bring all the benefits. Its side effect is that if the "ghosts" do not eat people, they will not be able to maintain their intelligence and form similar to humans, and they will completely degenerate into beasts that cannot think. The "ghost" society calls these ghosts who have lost their intelligence and only instinct is "wild species". In the ghost dynasty, one of the punishments for treason is "relegation to wild species".

"That is to say, ghosts have to eat people. If they don't consume a large amount of healthy brains, they will lose their intelligence." After hearing what Lei said, Norman touched his chin and thought for a while, "Is there any way to maintain wisdom without eating people?" ghost?"

Ray shook his head. "I asked, but Jack said 'You're paying for this, and then there's premium content,' so I didn't get an answer."

"What do you offer in exchange?"

"Some sheepdogs as moms, watching friends get shipped...mood."

Emma suddenly rushed forward and hugged him tightly.The girl's arms were as tender as a lily branch, tightly hugging the skinny black-haired boy. Emma hugged him and said, "You have worked hard all these years, Ray."

Lei froze for a moment, then patted Emma on the shoulder: "It's okay, Emma. Everything will end, and we can finally escape."

Norman pondered for a moment: "Regarding this issue, Jack's attitude has already explained it."

"Hmm." Ray pushed Emma away and nodded, "He said 'the front is paid content', which means that the answer is most likely not 'no', there are ghosts in this world who can think without eating people, He may even know the identities of those ghosts, and the number of those ghosts must be very small, if there is no need for large-scale existence of human-eating ghosts, there is no need for the existence of 'mass production farms'."

"Wait a minute." Emma interrupted their conversation, "Ray, why don't you ask what's going on outside the wall?"

Indeed, whether it is the origin of the two worlds or the existence of ghosts, these are things that these edible children in cages cannot prove or falsify, and they are not very helpful to their escape plan. What they need most now is not this, but information about the "cage" in which they are raised, and how to break the cage.

Ray and Norman exchanged glances and nodded to each other: "We have an idea. I want to know what a ghost is, and I want to know who Jack is. If we can really know who he is, then this secret will become a piece of paper. Hole card, we can use this to exchange quite important information with him."

"Eh?"

"Emma, ​​do you still remember that Jack skipped your surveillance, went straight back to the room, and caught me on the spot. I asked my brother and sister, but no one saw him coming out of the library. The only explanation was He walked through the back door next to the library, and then climbed up to the second floor by grabbing the water pipe, but there were no signs of damage to the windows in the corridor on the second floor, and there were no footprints on the walls. If it wasn’t for his incomprehensible rock-climbing ability, then The most likely explanation is that..."

Emma murmured: "...he flew up."

"Yes, he doesn't eat with us, because his food can't be seen by us at all. The edible children in the refrigerator are not sacrifices to 'Him', but his food. Wear clothes that are obviously out of season in hot weather The reason why he doesn’t sweat, and doesn’t cover himself with a quilt when the weather is cold, is that he doesn’t care about these at all.” Norman said calmly, “The combination of these details only points to the most likely answer: he is not human at all, and It's a ghost."

Emma was stunned, and what came to her mind at this moment turned out to be Jack's face.That handsome, pale, three-dimensional English face, a human face as perfect as a marble statue in an art book, was now as sinister as a mask made of countless pieces of dead skin.

No matter how you look at it, Jack's appearance is undoubtedly human, with human body weight, human limbs, human facial features, human body... But what is hidden under this human skin is very likely to be a ghost.

Ray looked at Emma: "Under this assumption, the question before us is: How many people did Jack eat to obtain what he maintains?"