Past twelve was the quietest stretch of the whole day at Qingkong, so the moment the girl let loose a scream at the top of her lungs, the sound carried clean across the tree-lined path opposite the teaching building — and stood a very good chance of reaching the ears of the night-patrol gatekeeper.
The girl's reaction was within Fang Tian's expectations.
Heat's on — scram!
Fang Tian didn't hesitate; he took to his heels.
This was exactly his plan — to slip away while she was at her most frightened and rattled.
Normally, a girl who runs into a suspicious character in the middle of the night naturally wants to shake him off as fast as she can.
Each goes their separate way; nobody owes anybody.
He'd resorted to this less-than-ideal scheme because Fang Tian knew that if he'd gone along with her deductions just now, she'd have turned the campus legends of Qingkong upside down — and if she stirred up trouble, it would drag his own ability to see ghosts and monsters out into the open along with it.
Getting caught red-handed by Senior was one thing, beyond his control; but he had no intention of casually sharing his secret of seeing ghosts and monsters with anyone else.
Before he'd run more than a few steps, though, Fang Tian heard footsteps behind him.
He glanced back and was startled into a shudder — the girl was chasing after him, the DSLR tripod hoisted high. He finally realized his plan had one fatal flaw.
For instance: even while wearing a backpack and brandishing a tripod, the girl was still faster than him.
"Stop right there! Where do you think you're running!"
She yelled as she ran, the look in her eyes declaring her resolve — she had no intention of borrowing the gatekeeper's help; she meant to deal with this suspicious character Fang Tian with her own two hands.
Damn this Stamina-3!
A quick assessment was enough for Fang Tian to drop the idea of fleeing all the way back to the dorm. This was a simple pursuit problem: with his stamina, there was a 99% chance the girl would catch him along the way.
If he had one virtue, it was an exceptional willingness to face his own shortcomings squarely.
When the other party was clearly faster, running in a straight line was suicide. So, in his desperation, Fang Tian wheeled around and charged straight into a building not far from the teaching block.
The girl in hot pursuit pulled up short before the building, plainly taken aback. She lifted her head to the few large red characters hung up high, hesitated a good while, then gritted her teeth and chased in after him.
That pause bought Fang Tian no small breathing room.
The good news was, this building had plenty of "students" in it — semi-transparent upperclassmen bustling between the various rooms.
As he barged in, some kind of system message seemed to pop up, but Fang Tian had no mind to read it just then. With the help of the "beauty filter," these translucent seniors became his last straw to clutch at.
"Seniors, someone's trying to beat me up — give me a hand!"
Fang Tian shouted as he ran, the distance between him and the girl shrinking at a visible pace.
For the first time he realized that seeing ghosts had its upsides too — at the very least, in a moment of crisis, he didn't have to fight alone.
The 3 points of Favorability he'd earned from completing the quest played a key role as well. No sooner had he reached the entrance than a gallant senior, unable to stand idly by, came to his aid.
"Easy now, follow me."
The senior pointed him a clear way out and took the lead running downstairs.
Fang Tian heard the girl come crashing into the building and could only quicken his pace to follow.
He figured it had to be at least 1,000 meters from the teaching building to here — for someone with a Stamina of only 3, this was probably his limit.
After following the senior into a dimly lit room, he slumped against a cabinet, utterly spent. Mercifully, the girl's footsteps had already faded, leaving only the sound of his own gasping in the whole corridor.
Once he'd calmed a little, sorrow welled up in Fang Tian despite himself.
He'd clearly come to do a good deed — so how had he ended up chased through the streets like some villain?
He was certain there couldn't be a single freshman in the world more luckless than him.
"Relax. That girl chasing you shouldn't be able to make it here."
Though the senior's body was semi-transparent like the other ghosts, he had pulled over a chair and sat down right in front of Fang Tian, plain as you please.
"Thanks, Senior."
The senior flashed Fang Tian a sunny smile. "My name's Feng Jie. You're worn out, aren't you? There's a bed right over there — go lie down and rest a while."
For some reason, the instant Fang Tian heard the name Feng Jie and the words that followed, something struck him as off.
By the light filtering in from outside the door, he could just make out the bed's outline. It sat dead center in the room, big enough for only one person to lie on. There were no sheets or bedding on it — instead it gave off a cold, metallic sheen.
The sweetness in Fang Tian's throat faded, but the faint smell of blood still curled around the tip of his nose; in fact, after resting a while, the odor was more pronounced than when he'd first come in.
"By the way, why was that little junior chasing you so hard in the dead of night? I think I heard her shouting 'pervert' the whole way."
"That's obviously a misunderstanding."
"Oh? So it's a misunderstanding." Feng Jie raised an eyebrow, his harmless smile sending a chill through Fang Tian's heart. "Well, if it's a misunderstanding, you can just explain it clearly and be done with it, can't you?"
"Some things aren't so easy to explain."
Sensing something was off, Fang Tian had already begun plotting his escape. First he stole a glance at the door handle beside him, then his eyes settled on the light switch near it.
Both the strange smell in the room and the "single bed" sitting dead center stirred up some unpleasant associations.
Feng Jie seemed to catch Fang Tian's intent to hit the switch, and abruptly said, "I'd advise you not to do that. You might just walk away with a lasting trauma."
Crap — Brother Jie's making his move!
Feng Jie's words all but confirmed the ominous premonition in Fang Tian's heart. Even as he warily kept his guard up, he quietly called up the system message that had popped up when he'd charged into the building.
『New quest available: "Basement Level 3 of Building C" (Difficulty: E-rank). One of the Seven Wonders of Qingkong University — a third basement level that appears only at certain moments. What will you discover down there?』
『Quest objective: explore Basement Level 3 of Building C.』
『Warning: this quest's difficulty far exceeds your Appreciator level. Please choose with caution.』
In this moment, Fang Tian couldn't help recalling the regulation the girl had read off her phone screen not long ago:
"Qingkong University regulations, Article 21: non-clinical-medicine students may not enter Building C at night."
If the girl hadn't lied, then this was a warning written plainly into the school's own rules.
By now Feng Jie had risen to his feet at some point. His right hand rummaged in his pocket for a moment and came out with a pair of medical rubber gloves, which he pulled on; then, in the darkness, he groped out a gleaming scalpel.
"The night is long. Anything you'd like to say, Junior, you can take your time with once you're lying down."
Feng Jie fitted on a medical mask, hiding his increasingly ghastly smile. It was a thoroughly familiar getup. Fang Tian was now certain the thing in the center of the room was no single bed at all — it was a dissection table.
"I'll be taking my leave!"
Fang Tian didn't hesitate a heartbeat longer; he yanked the door open and bolted.