Compared to the others, Lin Yu trusted Xia Yue more.
To be precise, among the current six people, the person Lin Yu thought least likely to be a Werewolf was obviously the somewhat silly-looking Chen Zhuo.
Xia Yue, with her delicate appearance, probably ranked second!
Still, Lin Yu couldn't completely trust Xia Yue either.
Just as Xia Yue didn't seem to fully trust him either.
Moreover, to maintain his "confident and arrogant detective" persona, it wouldn't be appropriate for him to start rummaging around in front of Xia Yue.
Yet Lin Yu actually had something specific he wanted to find!
"The letter mentioned there are chests in the castle, divided into human chests and werewolf chests..."
Lin Yu began searching the engineering room, hoping to find any chests there.
According to the letter, human chests should contain "supplies" and "items" that would greatly assist the human faction.
If he could find a chest and obtain something useful from it, Lin Yu would feel much more confident.
After a quick search around, Lin Yu found that while the engineering room looked messy with scattered items...
Those random objects were completely useless.
But Lin Yu couldn't say he found nothing at all.
The smell of incomplete diesel combustion from the generator permeating the air, the constantly blaring alarm ringing in his ears, and the choking clouds of ancient dust stirred up from rummaging through the piles gave Lin Yu a thoroughly dizzying and unpleasant experience.
"Already wasted two minutes... No, can't keep wasting time in this room!"
Lin Yu opened the engineering room door.
Stepping outside, he immediately felt refreshed.
Then he focused on the room opposite the stairwell.
"That door looks pretty big," Lin Yu muttered to himself.
The castle had two staircases in total - one was a spiral staircase in the center spanning all three floors, the other was a zigzag staircase at the edge.
With the castle's enormous size, the second floor alone had over a dozen different rooms or hidden chambers.
Pushed for time, Lin Yu could only choose the nearest option.
This was also why they had to split up - the castle was simply too large. If they all stuck together running back and forth, even with planned routes, it would inevitably become too hectic and leave little room for error.
Approaching the large door, Lin Yu could now read the room name on the placard:
"Kitchen."
Without hesitation, Lin Yu pushed open the kitchen door.
Upon entering, he immediately caught a faint whiff of something foul.
"Damn, how long has this kitchen gone without cleaning?" Lin Yu wrinkled his nose involuntarily. "No wonder there's a 'clean the kitchen' task later on the schedule."
"But who knows what traps might trigger or dangers might appear if we don't clean it..."
The kitchen walls bore dark red stains that looked like long-dried blood.
The floor had even more bloodstains and was extremely filthy.
The countertops held not just chunks of raw meat but even hanging severed limbs!
Seeing this, Lin Yu felt a chill run down his spine.
Especially those withered, twisted limbs - somewhat human-like but not quite enough.
It was enough to give him the "Happy Valley Effect" (a Chinese internet term for extreme disgust).
"Why's the kitchen like this? Nobody dealing with these severed limbs and flesh? The castle owner must have some seriously twisted tastes..."
"Living in such a huge place but can't afford a cleaner? At least hire a hygienic chef then."
Suppressing his nausea, Lin Yu moved closer to examine the limbs.
Covered in bloodstains and partially decomposed, it was hard for Lin Yu to determine what creature they came from.
From afar they looked somewhat humanoid, but up close the resemblance faded.
Not wanting to linger, Lin Yu quickly left the kitchen.
However, upon exiting he discovered a brown chest placed in an alcove right next to the kitchen.
"A chest! A brown chest!" Lin Yu felt a surge of excitement.
The letter had mentioned that red chests belonged to werewolves...
As a human, he probably couldn't open werewolf chests.
But this brown chest meant it was one humans could open!
Lin Yu approached and flipped the chest's latch. As if recognizing him, the latch clicked open.
Inside was a neatly packaged loaf of bread and a bottle of water.
"Food... Seems whoever left the chest knew that after seeing that disgusting kitchen, there'd be no edible food in this castle."
Lin Yu took the bread, tore open the packaging, and quickly devoured it with the water.
After eating his fill, he returned to the engineering room.
He didn't want to reveal to Xia Yue that he'd opened a human chest. Even though human was the good identity... There was one crucial point - the two werewolves likely didn't know each other's identities.
The letter had hinted at this too:
"A werewolf's disguise can often fool even their own kind."
In other words, in this game, werewolves wouldn't know who their teammate was either.
Thus, Lin Yu had no need to prove his "human" identity by opening chests.
It wouldn't benefit him - if Xia Yue was a werewolf, she wouldn't make a move before confirming whether he was her teammate or not.
"But why hasn't Xia Yue returned yet?"
Time was running dangerously short.
Lin Yu had been mentally counting the time - Xia Yue had now been gone for about eight minutes, over two minutes longer than his estimated five and a half.
This made completing their tasks even more urgent.
If Xia Yue didn't return soon, they might not finish in time.
"Did something happen to her?"
Lin Yu was starting to debate whether he should go downstairs to look for her.
But before he could decide...
BANG!
The engineering room door swung open.
A breathless Xia Yue appeared in the doorway, holding a small bucket of lubricating oil.
Her hair was disheveled, sweat beaded on her forehead, and her white coat was dirty.
Xia Yue quickly approached, apologizing profusely: "Sorry... The lubricant was placed quite high up. It took some effort to retrieve it."
As she got closer, Lin Yu noticed her flushed cheeks and how she kept fanning herself by pulling at her round-necked shirt beneath the white coat - a rather pitiable sight.
Lin Yu instinctively wanted to comfort her, but immediately remembered...
His current persona was that of a cold, arrogant "detective."
Thus, method actor Lin Yu instantly slipped into character, merely snorting coldly.
"Fine, didn't take too long."
With that, he took the lubricant, expertly located the generator's lubrication point, and easily completed the task.