Thanks to the solid foundation they had built through diligent study, plus so last-minute cramming before the exams, when they walked out of the exam hall, Everly and Misha compared answers and felt they had done fairly well.
Once the exams were over, it was ti to pack up and go ho!
College students have long sumr vacations. After exams, many students don’t rush back to their hotowns, instead planning to go out and have fun with classmates and friends during the break.
The well-connected Misha received plenty of invitations—such as going on an adventure in the deep mountains, spending the sumr at a relative’s forest villa, exploring Yonah City’s famous haunted house, or even searching for traces of aliens… Every single one sounded unreliable, like sothing dangerous might happen at any mont and cost them their lives.
Misha rejected all of them.
If Everly wasn’t going, she wasn’t going either!
The two girls were eager to return ho. As soon as the holiday began, they boarded a plane and, just like during winter break, followed the transfer route of Concord → Gegha → Sunken. After a bumpy journey, they safely arrived back in Micano City.
Everly returned to the gas station, while Misha went back to her ho in Lemot Town.
After several months apart, Old John looked a bit more aged, but he was in good spirits.
Ever since his last visit to Tunumo Village, he had reconnected with his old comrade Karl. The two often chatted via video calls on their phones, discussing current events and complaining about the U.S. governnt. Karl had even switched to a touchscreen phone just for this.
Occasionally, like many elderly people, they would engage in so rather pointless bragging.
Karl boasted that his youngest daughter, Quilla, once shot and killed a wild bison with a single arrow. Not to be outdone, Old John claid that his granddaughter Everly was both strong and smart—she had once punched a mutated cockroach to death in a single blow. Hearing this, Karl couldn’t help but gape in astonishnt… The first ti Everly witnessed this kind of exchange, she was so shocked she almost spat out the milk in her mouth.
Well… who would’ve thought? The grandfather who had always seed calm and steady to her would, when chatting with a friend, close his eyes and brag so enthusiastically about his granddaughter just like any other old man.
Still, seeing the smile he couldn’t suppress during their video calls made her feel a sense of relief.
After Buddy left, Old John had been living alone and refused to adopt any more pets. Everly had always worried that he might feel lonely.
Now, with Karl—who shared so many common topics with him—to banter and argue with, Old John smiled more often, and she could worry a little less.
After staying at ho for a while, Everly took advantage of one of Old John’s trips into Micano City to buy daily necessities, and the two of them finally revisited the amusent park they hadn’t been able to fully enjoy last ti.
During winter break, their trip to the amusent park had barely begun before it was abruptly cut short by the sudden appearance of the Book of Death.
Later on, the environntalist who had planted explosives on the amusent park’s Ferris wheel was quickly arrested. During the investigation, the police discovered that shortly before the terrorist attack, a large sum of money from an unknown source had been deposited into his personal account.
“Maybe it was other mining companies that lost the bid to McMurkin, secretly stirring up trouble.”
“They were jealous that McMurkin secured the lithium mining rights, so they used environntal protection as a pretext to obstruct the company’s developnt… Compared to them, McMurkin clearly cares more about our lives—they even built an amusent park for our children!”
“Exactly. Ever since McMurkin moved in, there have been many more job opportunities in town, and everyone’s inco has increased…”
After the case details were made public, a wave of support for McMurkin quickly spread throughout the city.
People tend to follow the crowd. When everyone around them was praising McMurkin, even ordinary folks who initially felt indifferent toward the company—or were uneasy about lithium mining—gradually began to feel that perhaps having McMurkin handle the mining was better than letting other companies do it.
Over ti, the voices opposing mining and criticizing McMurkin weakened considerably.
Sure enough, after Everly had only been away for one sester, when she drove past the mining site again, the original construction area was gone. In its place stood a brand-new mining facility. Tall tal towers rose like steel giants in the wilderness, the roar of machinery echoed nonstop, and trucks loaded with ore moved back and forth—everything bustling with activity.
“Do you think it’s possible that the environntalist was actually hired by McMurkin themselves?” After hearing Old John’s account, Everly ca up with a rather grim but plausible suspicion.
Old John didn’t dismiss her idea as absurd.
“Maybe… After all, in the long run, McMurkin is undoubtedly the biggest beneficiary,” he said.
As ordinary people, there was no way for them to uncover the truth. The only thing certain was that, from then on, McMurkin had firmly established itself in the area.
“Didn’t Tunumo Village suffer a lot before because of the uranium mine upstream? Even though the lithium mine is more than sixty kiloters away from the gas station, you should still be careful, Grandpa. If the Ferris wheel incident really was McMurkin’s doing, a company with such poor ethics—one that stops at nothing for profit—could easily cause more trouble.”
“Mm, I’ll be careful.”
Old John nodded seriously.
Regardless of what they thought of McMurkin, the amusent park itself was still quite enjoyable.
Everly experienced the amusent park three tis in total—once with Old John, later again with Rebecca when she went to restock supplies, and then a third ti with Misha after she grew bored staying in the small town and moved to the gas station to hang out with Everly. The two of them even drove into the city together for another trip to the park.
By the ti they had completed all three visits, Everly’s vacation had co to an end.
This ti, her return to university still followed the Gilosha → Concord route.
Thinking of their friend in Tunumo Village, the three of them deliberately set off a few days early and detoured to the village, staying there for two days.
After a sester away, the village had undergone a noticeable transformation.
In the past, the local Indigenous residents had decorated their hos fairly modestly—just a few animal-tooth ornants hanging on windows or eaves, and small painted totems here and there.
But after the village began developing tourism around the museum, they quickly realized that, aside from so unpleasant white visitors who carried prejudice and stereotypes against Indigenous and Black people, there were also white tourists who were genuinely curious about Indigenous culture.
From then on, the Winton people began heavily decorating their hos with various Indigenous cultural elents. Totem poles were erected all the way from the entrance of the village to the far end, aiming to create a fully imrsive “Winton-style” village that would give first-ti visitors a strong cultural impact.
After several months of experintation, the results were surprisingly good. Previously, the souvenir shop’s best-selling items were limited to Chupacabra figures and bizarre animal curiosities. Now, small Indigenous-style crafts such as flutes, feather necklaces, and dreamcatchers were also in short supply.
Beyond the souvenir shops, the increase in tourists had also led to the opening of two hotels, three restaurants, a small supermarket, and an auto repair shop.
Of course, the biggest change was the reservation itself.
As planned, the Indigenous people built a “Chupacabra Museum” near the entrance of the reservation. The museum housed a total of 45 exhibits, including the Chupacabra corpse itself, along with various other grotesque animal specins collected through different ans.
To attract more tourists, the villagers used the Chupacabra corpse as a centerpiece and drew on their imagination, combining elents of Indigenous legends to fabricate a chilling, suspense-filled story. The level of detail and eerie atmosphere was so elaborate that, if it were adapted into a show like Into Science, it could probably fill seven or eight episodes.
Even Everly—soone who had personally experienced countless horror films—found herself montarily stunned while reading it. Any paranormal enthusiasts who ca across it would likely be scared out of their minds.
But precisely this kind of horror-driven curiosity was what most attracted fans of the supernatural. It was easy to imagine that the museum would remain popular for quite a long ti.
After finishing the museum tour, Everly thought she had seen all the village’s new changes. But when she looked up, she noticed another wooden signpost pointing deeper into the reservation.
Following the sign, she arrived at a massive area enclosed by tall wooden walls—
The villagers had sohow, without any formal guidance, built a large-scale live-action escape room ga centered around “Escaping the Chupacabra”!
The escape room’s storyline was based on the sa terrifying narrative compiled in the museum, created collectively by the entire village.
Participants who signed up would draw roles at random, such as Indigenous villager, white rancher, police officer, or cleric, and receive special abilities or items depending on their identity.
Indigenous villagers could use vine ropes to temporarily restrain the monster; ranchers had guns capable of injuring it—and even killing other players, though that was discouraged since it could lead to a bad ending; police officers started with special clues and could use “law enforcent” to forcibly obtain information or weapons from villagers and ranchers; clerics had protective shields and could attempt to recruit followers to increase their power level…
Each identity ca with its own main exploration route. However, as long as players followed the hints step by step and did not ignore the rules or act recklessly, everyone—regardless of role—would eventually be guided by the clues to a lush, living banyan tree.
In front of the banyan tree stood an altar, with freshly slaughtered livestock placed nearby.
Following the instructions obtained earlier, players were ant to place the animal carcasses on the altar and kneel in sincere prayer. When two conditions were t—(1) the white rancher had not attacked any Indigenous villagers, and (2) at least one Indigenous villager was still alive—the “Tree God” would appear before them and engage the pursuing Chupacabra in a three-hundred-round battle, creating an opportunity for everyone to escape.
Of course, both the sacred tree and the Chupacabra were played by villagers in costus. It was obvious at a glance that they were fake. But as long as the puzzle-solving process was engaging enough and the combat scenes were exciting enough, players of the escape room didn’t mind this at all—in fact, expecting a real monster in an imrsive escape-room scenario would be the real sign of sothing wrong with your head.
At present, visitor numbers were still relatively low, so the large-scale escape room in the reservation only ran one session per day, with a maximum of twelve participants per session, priced at 100 US dollars per person.
It was expensive, sure—but co on, this group of Winton people used real livestock blood for special effects, all NPCs were real actors, and even the sacrificial animals were genuine. Could any other escape room achieve that level of commitnt?!
Because both the narrative and horror atmosphere were so well crafted, players who tried it generally had a very good experience. So people even ford teams specifically to replay it multiple tis, building strategy groups that stayed on-site for extended periods just to unlock different endings.
After a period of word-of-mouth spread, the live-action escape room in Tunumo Village had already gained a strong reputation within the community, receiving many booking calls every day.
What puzzled outsiders was that even though reservations were booked up a month in advance—and a clear opportunity for profit was right in front of them—the villagers still refused to increase the number of daily sessions.
“Why? Isn’t it better to make more money?” Misha asked dumbly after hearing the villagers’ explanation.
Quilla narrowed her eyes and broke into a satisfied grin.
“Because the Sacred Tree can only eat one al a day at most. Any more than that, and it simply can’t handle it.”
—Yes, exactly.
The real purpose of hosting this live-action escape room wasn’t even making money. That was secondary. The main goal was to find a reasonable and legitimate way to offer sacrifices to the Sacred Tree.
The mining site upstream of the river couldn’t be relocated in the short term, and the villagers were constantly living alongside pollution. They relied heavily on the Sacred Tree’s purification abilities, which ant they needed to regularly conduct rituals to offer sacrifices and replenish the energy the tree consud during purification.
In the past, when the reservation wasn’t open to the public, they could carry out these rituals in secret without attracting attention. But now, in order to improve living standards, the reservation had built a museum, and with tourists coming and going, the risk of exposing the rituals had increased.
At that mont, it was so “brilliant” villager who, inspired by the increasingly popular imrsive escape rooms outside, proposed: why not build an escape room centered around the Sacred Tree?
That way, both the Sacred Tree and the altar could be explained away as “set pieces.” Even the sacrificial rituals could be carried out by the players themselves, and the livestock used for offerings would be paid for by the participants…
When the revised plan was finally presented on the priest’s table, everyone was shocked by how genius it was.
Who says Indigenous people lack economic sense? They were simply long suppressed and discriminated against by white society, denied the space to express it. In reality, they were extrely business-savvy.
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Author’s Note:
The Tunumo Village escape room is quite “hellish,” because the white ranchers’ guns can both kill Indigenous villagers and damage monsters. If they kill all Indigenous player characters, it leads to a bad ending and the Sacred Tree cannot appear.
If, at the ritual site, a white player has killed Indigenous villagers but so Indigenous players remain alive, the Sacred Tree will first eliminate the white players, then fight the Chupacabra.
If the cleric successfully recruits five or more followers, they can even summon the President of the United States (not a joke).
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