Chapter 229 - 228: Peach is Dead? The Killer is Blake Young?

Chapter 229: Chapter 228: Peach is Dead? The Killer is Blake Young?

"Help!"

Claire Lawson and Peach were hiding behind an inflatable toy in a corner. It should have been a safe spot, but a masked man found them...

"Peach!"

At the critical moment, Peach pushed Claire Lawson aside and fell into a pool of blood.

"Peach..." Claire Lawson sobbed, crying out her name.

By the time Asher, Felix Foster, and I scrambled over, Peach was already on the brink of death.

She was spitting up blood. A chainsaw had slashed open her abdomen, and blood was gushing out relentlessly...

It was a gory scene.

"It was her!" Claire Lawson cried, pointing at Erin Whittaker off to the side. "She’s in league with those masked men! She deliberately led them over here!"

Claire Lawson sobbed as she accused Erin Whittaker.

Erin Whittaker froze for a moment, standing rooted to the spot as if she didn’t know how to explain. "It’s not..."

Before she could say more, Felix Foster lost control and shoved her away, his eyes glinting with murder.

Julian Fletcher frowned, reaching out to steady Erin Whittaker, his gaze scrutinizing.

Everyone suspected Erin Whittaker. Everyone blamed her.

"On the sixteenth floor, you deliberately went missing to lure Cece away. Now you’ve gotten Peach killed. You’re so vile! I bet you’re the one who’s in league with the murderers!" Madeline Quinn said angrily.

"That’s right, I saw her talking to the masked men..." Howard Finch added, pointing nervously at Erin Whittaker.

The few other survivors also turned on Erin Whittaker.

Erin Whittaker’s brow furrowed, her expression hardening, but she offered no explanation.

I stared coldly at Erin Whittaker, then glanced at Claire Lawson, who was sobbing over Peach. I stepped forward to check Peach’s injuries.

"Next... the Battle Royale... begins." The eerie voice crackled from the speakers again as the ground began to shake violently.

Starting from the corner, every single floor tile began to move, rolling toward us like a wave.

"Run!" Howard Finch screamed, taking off first.

The other remaining people from the orphanage followed him, running for their lives.

But more masked men were waiting for them on the other side.

It seemed like death was the only outcome.

"Claire Lawson! Let’s go!" The mechanism was about to reach them, but Claire Lawson was still clinging to Peach, sobbing.

Peach’s face was a frightening shade of pale. From the looks of her injuries... she wasn’t going to make it.

"Charlie..." Peach’s eyes were vacant as she murmured his name. "Your sister... was wrong."

"I didn’t... protect you."

"Charlie..."

Felix Foster’s hands clenched until his knuckles turned white. He rushed over and grabbed Claire Lawson. "We have to go!"

Just as Felix Foster reached to lift Peach, the floor suddenly gave way.

Peach plummeted into the darkness below.

The wave from the mechanism rushed past. I pulled Asher and Felix Foster, and we leaped over the rolling tiles.

Felix Foster stood on the floor as it sealed shut, his expression complex.

Claire Lawson was still crying. Peach’s body was trapped beneath the floor...

Until we could escape and get the police to cordon off this area, we couldn’t retrieve Peach’s body.

"Help!"

Over on the other side, Howard Finch and his group were still being slaughtered. The masked men killed without pause as the five or six people scattered in every direction.

I watched the wave-like mechanism closely. Only the section of floor beneath the roller coaster remained still.

"The exit’s over there!" I shouted to the others.

Everyone followed my lead and ran toward the roller coaster.

"Help me!" Howard Finch screamed, shoving the person next to him toward a masked man as he ran over to us alone.

He was just that selfish. A person like him would never change.

His companion was pushed away to block a chainsaw, yet he ran over, completely untroubled, wanting to escape with us.

"Get this open."

Asher and Zeke Shaw began to pry at the floorboards while the rest of us leaned against the roller coaster, exhausted and dejected.

"In such a hurry to leave? Why not play a little longer?" The eerie voice pulsed through the room again. The entire floor opened up. Aside from those of us who had made it under the roller coaster, everyone else fell into the traps below and was swallowed up as the floor sealed again.

Now... the only ones left alive were me, Erin Whittaker, Lucas Grant, Julian Fletcher, Zeke Shaw, Madeline Quinn, Claire Lawson, Felix Foster... Howard Finch, a guy named Tim Zane who’d been hiding under the roller coaster the whole time, and the unconscious masked man Zeke Shaw had dragged in with him.

The rest of the masked men had also died in the mastermind’s trap.

"Oh dear, I seem to have gotten a little carried away." The creepy voice, layered over the amusement park music, let out an unsettling laugh.

"He can see us through the monitors and send people up. He must have his own private passage. We need to find him, or he’ll keep toying with us." I frowned, looking up at the camera on the ceiling.

’Controlling a game through monitors... He’s a complete lunatic...’

"Mmmph..." Suddenly, the masked man regained consciousness. He whimpered and struggled, trying to speak, but his mouth had been sewn shut. Every movement caused blood to seep from the stitches.

Claire Lawson and Madeline Quinn looked away in fear. Erin Whittaker also instinctively averted her gaze. It was a truly gruesome sight.

I stepped forward, held the masked man down, and used my knife to cut the stitches on his mouth.

"He... he’s on this floor... The madman..." the man cried in terror, pointing to where they had emerged. "There’s... a control room there. He’s inside."

Asher and Zeke Shaw pried open a floor panel, revealing a passage leading down to the fourteenth floor.

"Be careful..." Zeke Shaw grabbed Asher, stopping him from rushing down impulsively.

I glanced at Asher, then ripped a strap off the masked man’s uniform and tied my hair up high. "You guys go down first. I’m going to pay our madman a visit."

’If I don’t take him out, the rest of the way will be even harder.’

"I’ll go with you!" Julian Fletcher grabbed my arm anxiously. "It’s too dangerous."

I instinctively looked toward Asher. He was watching me, his expression tense. He wanted to come with me, too.

"Two people would be too obvious a target." I shook off Julian Fletcher’s hand and picked up a knife from the floor.

I glanced at the camera in the northwest corner.

"You can’t go alone," Zeke Shaw also tried to stop me.

"My guess is the person hiding in the control room has limited combat ability," I said, looking at Asher.

The two of us... we never seemed to need words to understand each other.

’Because he knows my guesses are never wrong.’

"Let’s go down. We’ll create the illusion that we’ve all left to give her cover." Asher grabbed the still-dazed Felix Foster, then looked at me again. "I already disabled the camera in the northwest corner a moment ago."

The corners of my mouth lifted into a smile. ’That’s my Asher...’

’It’s like he knew exactly what I was planning and cleared the path for me ahead of time.’

Julian Fletcher watched me with a complex expression, looking like he wanted to say something but ultimately closing his mouth with a hint of dejection.

"Hah..." Erin Whittaker laughed sarcastically. "No matter how much you try to be like her, you’ll never be Cecilia Caldwell..."

"Stop with the backhanded comments! You’re a vicious bitch! Why aren’t you dead yet!" Madeline Quinn shrieked, losing control as she glared at Erin Whittaker. "If it weren’t for you, Peach wouldn’t have died!"

Claire Lawson also stared at Erin Whittaker with hatred. "You’re the one who deserves to die..."

Erin Whittaker glanced at me, seemingly dropping her facade, and laughed mockingly at herself. "You’ve won. This is what you wanted to see, isn’t it? To make me a public enemy, the target of everyone’s suspicion. To make me experience the same pain Cecilia Caldwell went through, to be distrusted and slandered..."

I frowned. ’Could it be that she wasn’t behind it?’

"Let’s go! Don’t waste time," Asher urged with a frown.

Zeke Shaw patted my shoulder. "Stay safe. We’ll wait for you below."

Under the cover of the others heading down, I quickly slipped into the camera’s blind spot.

’I’d like to see for myself just who is hiding behind those monitors.’

I felt my way along the wall, used my knife to disable the electronic lock on a panel, and slipped inside the moment it slid open.

Inside was a relatively short hallway. The moment I entered, the lights all flashed on.

It was as if he knew I was coming.

I kicked open the control room door and cautiously eyed the person sitting in front of the bank of monitors.

He wasn’t much of a threat, physically. Just one person...

He was in a wheelchair, his legs missing.

He had to be Blake Young, the boy from the orphanage who was pushed off the roller coaster all those years ago.

He turned his wheelchair to face me and smiled. "Long time no see... Cece."

My heart suddenly tightened. I watched him warily.

"Back then, you asked me where I’d put the escape exit. I hadn’t figured it out yet, so I never got to answer you..."

"Do you know why I designed the escape exit to be under the roller coaster?" Blake Young asked with a smile.

My heart suddenly began to race, and my fingers tightened around the knife.

’What is he trying to say? Is he implying I designed this so-called slaughter-park?’