Chapter 206: Younger Cousin’s Instance (Part 2)
The male and female students had to split up to return to their respective dormitories.
Quite clearly, tonight was destined not to be peaceful.
Bai Cha thought for a moment, locating a small window on the live stream interface.
There was indeed a search function on the homepage.
She searched for Lin Zhenyang.
Oh, there were actually people with the same name.
Fortunately, each name was followed by their rank, so she wouldn’t mistake him for someone else. If there really were someone with the exact same name at the exact same rank, that would be pretty interesting.
A viewer couldn’t enter two stream interfaces simultaneously.
However, she was in an internet cafe.
At 10 points an hour, she could watch an hour of streaming.
She spent another 10 points to boot up an adjacent computer.
That way, she could watch two live streams at the same time.
Xu Shengsheng and a few female students had already arrived downstairs at the dormitory building.
At this late hour, the dormitory doors were naturally locked tight.
Calling the dorm manager would clearly be unwise.
The girls exchanged glances with one another.
“Let’s climb over from that side…”
The sharp tips at the top of the fence in one spot had broken off.
None of the girls were particularly adept at climbing over walls.
Stepping into the dormitory building, only the emergency lights remained lit inside.
They had already learned their assigned rooms during the day. Xu Shengsheng shared a room with one girl, while the other two girls stayed in the adjacent room.
There were only four female players in this instance in total.
And the Pen Fairy had been tailing them all along.
The girls crept carefully up the stairs.
Bai Cha watched as the Pen Fairy gradually closed the distance to Xu Shengsheng.
Xu Shengsheng felt her body growing somewhat heavy as well.
Yet she didn’t overthink it.
She simply wanted to return to her room as quickly as possible.
They were on the third floor, and the other two female roommates in the dormitory had long fallen asleep.
The two of them crept back inside with utmost caution, getting into their respective beds.
Up to this point, Xu Shengsheng still didn’t seem to realize the underlying issue.
Bai Cha tapped her fingers gently on the desk.
After a moment’s hesitation, she refrained from sending a warning.
Even if she sent a warning, Xu Shengsheng wouldn’t necessarily see it. Furthermore, with her carelessly overlooking the anomaly, the Pen Fairy was visibly unable to resist making extra moves.
It pressed its weight straight down on top of her.
Xu Shengsheng felt a heavy pressure over her body, yet she assumed it was likely due to the blanket, which felt damp and clammy.
In the end, she chose to ignore it, closing her eyes to sleep.
The Pen Fairy leaned its face close to hers, examining her carefully for a brief moment, before crawling off her body and shifting toward the other girl.
The moment that girl felt a weight settle over her body, she realized something was amiss.
Because the entire blanket had turned icy cold, feeling as though water could be wrung out of it.
When she had first laid down, the blanket might not have been particularly plush, but it certainly hadn’t felt like this.
Her eyes were squeezed shut, yet owing to sheer terror, her eyeballs could be seen rolling frantically beneath her eyelids.
The Pen Fairy leaned its face straight toward hers, its hair trailing across her face strand by strand.
That girl was a recruit.
Fear drove her to make a fatal mistake: she opened her eyes.
A face covered in blood instantly materialized right before her eyes.
Opening her mouth, the girl tried to scream, only to discover she couldn’t move or make a sound at all.
She watched with wide, helpless eyes as the Pen Fairy grabbed her hand, pulled her to her feet, and led her silently out of the dormitory.
Pondering for a brief second, Bai Cha switched the stream channel on the adjacent computer over to this girl.
She recalled that during the self-introductions, this girl seemed to be named Li Xuan.
Without knowing when, the dormitory building had turned pitch-black, and the main entrance of the dormitory had swung wide open—yet it looked thoroughly dilapidated, covered in heavy rust.
Li Xuan was dragged straight to the rooftop of that teaching building.
Terrified, she wanted to scream for help, yet remained utterly incapable of uttering a sound from start to finish.
She was then pushed straight off the rooftop.
With a dull, heavy thud, her head hit the ground first, her posture twisting contortedly.
Silence fell entirely afterward.
Yet Li Xuan’s live stream didn’t shut down.
Bai Cha enabled fast-forwarding, skipping straight through the night.
In both camera views, Xu Shengsheng and Li Xuan woke up almost simultaneously.
Because Li Xuan let out a blood-curdling shriek, bolting upright in bed and scaring Xu Shengsheng into sitting up abruptly as well.
The other two NPC roommates reacted the same way, looking at the screaming girl in a blend of daze and complete confusion.
“What’s wrong with you?”
Li Xuan breathed heavily, drenched in cold sweat, lingering terror shining deep in her eyes—that sensation of impending death had been far too overwhelmingly real.
Keeping her head lowered, she felt all over her body.
She wasn’t dead?
Li Xuan broke into uncontrollable tears on the spot.
Afterward, the players gathered, exchanging glances upon learning about Li Xuan’s ordeal from last night.
The rank of this instance wasn’t particularly high, so it hadn’t reached the point of killing players right at the start.
Yet Li Xuan’s overall state today looked thoroughly terrible.
Barring any surprises, if she experienced it once or twice more, she might truly lose her life.
“Let’s look into the case from back then during the day today,” suggested the male player who claimed to have played a few games before.
The group held no objections, naturally.
Their run was a plot-investigation instance; as long as they uncovered the truth behind the story, they could clear it.
Lin Zhenyang cast a glance at Xu Shengsheng. In truth, he had felt yesterday that this girl bore a slight resemblance to Bai Cha—primarily in the eyes.
Xu Shengsheng had kept quiet and maintained an ultra-low profile all along, firmly remembering Bai Cha’s advice to lay low and survive without showing off.
In Lin Zhenyang’s eyes, she was a recruit just like himself.
Thus, he invited Xu Shengsheng to investigate together.
Xu Shengsheng looked at him and agreed.
The players essentially dispersed in different directions.
Li Xuan tagged along with Xu Shengsheng and her group as well.
“Do you have a place in mind to start investigating?” Xu Shengsheng looked toward Lin Zhenyang.
Lin Zhenyang hesitated briefly before saying, “Head to that teaching building?”
In horror films, didn’t the location where the event occurred always hold traces or information to trace back?
Xu Shengsheng: “…”
“I want to go ask the principal, though.”
Lin Zhenyang froze.
“That works too? But will the principal talk? Oh right, as for the club president from yesterday, I didn’t see him around today.”
Lin Zhenyang recalled something.
He wasn’t sure if the others had noticed, but he had specifically checked which dormitory the club president stayed in last night.
When he woke up this morning, he went over to take a look, only to discover that the door to that dormitory room was padlocked from the outside, complete with a sealed paper strip stamped over it.
This made it hard not to overthink things—the president had likely acted deliberately.
Xu Shengsheng uttered not a word, silently pulling out a copy of 5-Year College Entrance Exam, 3-Year Mock Exams alongside a pen.
The study guide had been a gift from Bai Cha, serving as an item as well.
The pen, naturally, was that fountain pen.
With the study guide in hand, she ought to be able to summon a virtually endless stream of shadow snakes, provided she protected herself first.
Still, holding a Golden Bell Shield item in her possession, she faced no major peril either.
Lin Zhenyang stared at her item, opening his mouth as if to say something, yet holding back.
He hadn’t unlocked his inventory system yet, whereas Xu Shengsheng had just crafted a fake gesture, pretending to pull the thick study guide out from beneath her oversized jacket.
Xu Shengsheng’s caution and prudence exceeded Bai Cha’s expectations by a fair margin.
She indeed acted carefree at times, yet that wasn’t necessarily a bad thing—otherwise, the one dragged away last night would have been Xu Shengsheng.
Upon arriving at the principal’s office, the principal proved surprisingly willing to recount the events of that year to them.
“That girl… she committed suicide for love. Her boyfriend wanted to break up with her, so in a moment of impulse, she took her own life.”
“Why did her boyfriend want to break up with her?” Lin Zhenyang asked.
The Pen Fairy was a fierce ghost now; if she hadn’t suffered severe trauma or agony, how could she possibly have transformed into a creature like that?
The principal pushed up his glasses, letting out a helpless sigh.
“How would I know? Word has it that it was just typical relationship drama. Her family even came to the school and extorted a huge sum of money out of us.”
The principal shook his head.
Xu Shengsheng knitted her brows instinctively.
No matter how carefree she was, she could sense that this principal harbored anomalies as well.
