Xu Zhiyi was so startled that the tip of her pen nearly tore through the exam paper.
She hastily circled option B.
The bell rang, and the proctor began collecting papers from front to back right on schedule, also gathering the exam supplies with a perfectly normal, businesslike demeanor. The only difference, perhaps, was that she collected the accompanying stationery as well, sealing them into a document envelope.
Xu Zhiyi sat upright and waited, stealing glances at the few people in the front rows through her peripheral vision. As the teacher took their papers, the black shadowy outlines behind them—hands clamped over ears—began to gradually fade.
So it seemed that once the papers were handed in, the ghosts behind them would stop.
Still, the miserable state of those students made her suck in a cold breath. Their ears were nearly all swollen red and bruised purple, a truly wretched sight, with faint traces of blood—clearly the ghosts behind them carried a full ten-tenths of resentment.
She was trembling nervously, feeling both sympathy and fear for those students, when the boy in front turned around and flashed her a standard Pseudo-human smile.
Xu Zhiyi: "…"
She withdrew her superfluous sympathy and began to worry wholeheartedly about herself. Every second before handing in her paper was terrifying. Perhaps soon, this cold, clinging sensation that only gently enveloped her would surge up violently, shed its kind disguise, and inflict harsh punishment on her ears.
She pretended not to care, enduring the discomfort at her ears, while praying for the proctor to hurry over and collect her paper.
The teacher finally reached her desk.
It was almost over. Xu Zhiyi sat even straighter, her thick cotton coat unable to conceal the rigidity and tension in her body.
The paper was picked up.
But the sound of the teacher's departing footsteps never came.
In the dead silence, that kindly face paused beside her desk, the half-lifted paper rustling and swaying in the air.
She seemed to be checking her paper line by line, word by word.
…Had she chosen wrong?
Xu Zhiyi sat frozen, waiting. She had no experience whatsoever and couldn't tell at all whether she should look up, meet the teacher's eyes, and open her mouth to defend herself, or keep her head down and silently try to muddle through.
The slip of paper hidden in her sleeve seemed to have grown warm, burning and prickling against her arm. Xu Zhiyi couldn't tell if it was psychological, or if it was truly churning and struggling inside, trying to leap out and doom her.
Her desk was tapped twice with a firm knock.
Xu Zhiyi's mind went completely blank. Instinctively, she lowered her head—but the hands covering her ears caught her face, forcibly holding her head in place.
The motion wasn't particularly gentle. The soft flesh of her cheeks was pressed inward, and she could clearly feel the shape and length of the fingers.
His hands were even larger than Lin Yan's. With his palms pressed against her ear bones, his fingertips could brush faintly, almost imperceptibly, against the corner of her lips, scaring her into pressing her mouth tightly shut, terrified of accidentally biting something unclean.
He kept holding her face.
But at least… the proctor finally dragged her footsteps away.
After the paper was taken, the pressure on her face indeed faded by more than half. The hands became merely a light touch against her cheeks, serving the function of a mask.
"…"
Xu Zhiyi's suspended heart dropped a great deal. She also prepared herself—once the ghostly shadow behind her completely vanished, she would definitely scratch her ears and rub her face, shaking off all the cold, uncomfortable sensations clinging to her.
—The proctor had already moved on to the third group of students.
But those hands did not release her.
The last person's paper and supplies were also collected.
The proctor announced on the spot that everyone had received full marks, then, clutching two bulging file folders, her footsteps faded away down the corridor.
No student had been more seriously harmed because of their answer sheets. After the teacher left, most people in the examination room stood up, seemingly preparing to move on to the next location.
The student whose ears had been purple just a minute ago now had skin restored to its normal complexion, as if the ghostly shadow from moments before had been nothing but Xu Zhiyi's own illusion.
She remained seated, not moving for a long while.
A girl one row away slowly approached her, stopping beside her seat with a smile on her face. "Classmate Xu Zhiyi, aren't you going back to the dormitory?"
Xu Zhiyi's face was pale. "I…"
The breath from her words fell onto the hands cupping her cheeks—warm and flustered—and her breathing grew rapid because the ghostly shadow behind her refused to leave. Her eyes were moist, and she looked utterly pitiful.
Pseudo-human students ahead, a ghostly shadow behind.
She hadn't even found her brother yet, and she was about to die in this eerie, superstitious school. Xu Zhiyi thought mournfully.
Just as she was composing her last words, the hands on her face suddenly loosened slightly.
Xu Zhiyi seized the opportunity immediately, shooting up from her chair in one swift motion. The sudden movement would have startled any normal person into a pause, but the girl beside her merely tilted her face up, her eyes tracking the direction of Xu Zhiyi's escape.
"Classmate Xu Zhiyi, wait for me!" she said with a friendly smile.
Xu Zhiyi, who had reached the classroom door, froze at the words. Without looking back, she sped up instantly.
But she had barely run a stretch down the corridor when she was forced to slam on the brakes.
Ahead, several middle school girls in school uniforms were waiting for her at the end of the stairwell, their faces still wearing those identical, flawless smiles.
"Classmate Xu Zhiyi, let's go back to the dormitory together."
They said in unison.
Xu Zhiyi turned her face. The girl who had come out of the classroom also opened her mouth, repeating the same friendly invitation.
"Classmate Xu Zhiyi."
"Let's go back to the dormitory together."
Social masks require constant practice.
When Xu Zhiyi was little, she had been very good at hiding her emotions—specifically, she wore the same expression for everything. She wouldn't curve her lips when happy, and she wouldn't shed tears when crying.
Later, after spending so much time with Lin Yan, happiness was happiness, and anger was anger. In front of him, she had regressed into a personality that wore every feeling on her face.
So now, as she was escorted by this group of pseudo-humans toward the dormitory building, she couldn't manage to keep up a fake smile at all. Amidst all those cheerful, carefree faces, her fear and sorrow stood out starkly.
She clearly didn't trust them.
But although they smiled with great warmth, they didn't truly care about her feelings at all. It seemed their only task was to bring her back to the dormitory, as if they had some kind of KPI agreement with the dorm matron.
The moment she stepped onto the stairs, head hanging listlessly, Xu Zhiyi was certain that something had lightly touched the top of her head.
"…"
Truly a stubborn ghost that wouldn't leave her alone.
She gritted her teeth.
These middle schoolers, at four-foot-nine or five-foot tall, certainly couldn't jump up to reach her five-foot-five head.
The one who touched her head could only be that dark shadow from the examination room. The contact had lasted less than two seconds, perhaps, but that chill seemed to have attached itself to her body, eerie and unsettling.
Wasn't this just saying, "I can take your head off whenever I want"?
Yet absurdly, amid such a threat, Xu Zhiyi actually experienced an illusion—perhaps the ghostly shadow was trying to soothe her.
Like Lin Yan would.
The chill lingering on her cheek had yet to dissipate. Xu Zhiyi's fingers hanging at her side curled slightly, but in the end, she didn't wipe it away.
She dawdled, slowing her steps, keeping an eye out for any useful information around her.
At the entrance of the first floor stood a plastic signboard, covered by a white sheet with black text listing exam regulations. Through the paper, one could faintly make out the words "Huamei Education" printed beneath.
【Exam Regulations】
No whispering;
No lowering of the head or similar actions that could be construed as cheating during the exam;
No prolonged eye contact with the proctor;
Ensure the integrity of the exam paper and stationery.
…
Grading Examiner: Hua Mei.
Urged toward the dormitory building, Xu Zhiyi could only skim these rules.
The teaching building held the usual midnight stillness.
In the empty school, only the conversation of the middle school girls beside her sounded like something out of a textbook.
Literally a textbook.
Exchanging names, discussing the weather, and on the vast playground, they began discussing how to get to the post office.
Having listened for so long, Xu Zhiyi grew numb. Occasionally they'd turn to ask her something, and her responses were listless—she never engaged in conversations exceeding two exchanges.
She mainly listened, her eyes quietly observing the places they passed, wondering where her brother's figure might be.
Unsure whether they might report the note hidden in her sleeve, Xu Zhiyi never found an opportunity to pull out the schedule and look at it.
Still, from their mechanical dialogue, she could vaguely extract some information—they needed to return to the dormitory to rest for half an hour before participating in the upcoming ghost-catch-human activity.
Xu Zhiyi had no interest whatsoever in such a terrifying-sounding physical game.
She wanted to find the school roster.
If Lin Yan was here too, he might be a student just like her, and perhaps his name would be recorded here.
As she buried herself in planning, the girl walking at the very back tugged at her companion's sleeve, smiling. "She doesn't laugh, she's not like us. Why should we bring her along?"
"She has hair and skin, and she can score full marks—she must be our companion," another girl said. "Besides, we've seen her face. Maybe she's just forgotten—"
In the security booth at the bottom of the student dormitory building, the last working power outlet had also been chewed to pieces.
The phone lying on the desk, clinging to life, flickered for a few more seconds. On the screen was a peaceful sleeping face, eyes closed, with thick, long lashes. Because the beautiful face took up so much of the frame, it was easy to overlook that she was lying in someone's embrace, a long black tie resting beside her head.
The other end of the charging cable was still being yanked downward. With a violent tug, the phone fell from the desk and hit the floor.
A gaunt Doberman stood on the screen, its eyes murky and bloodshot, broken wires tangled around its fangs, as if it would bite anything living it could see.
"Click."
The door to the security booth opened.
The Doberman looked up at the young man who had returned.
The young man closed the door, silently bending down. His slender hand was exposed beside the Doberman's teeth, blue-purple veins visible beneath the skin. He hadn't been dead long—a bite might still yield a hint of living flesh's freshness.
But animals have an instinct for detecting danger.
The Doberman retracted its teeth, its paws curling up in a fawning manner, as if it had somehow recovered some of its ability to read people from when it was alive.
The young man didn't spare it another glance. He simply found a few tissues and carefully wiped the dust-covered screen of his phone.
The Doberman wisely retreated to a corner, planning to stay quiet until the young man left. But peace lasted only a few minutes before the faint scent of fresh blood gradually drifted through the air.
This nearly instantly triggered every beastly instinct within the Doberman. It kicked off its hind legs and charged toward the door, its mouth already seeming to taste flesh and blood—just as it was about to burst through the doorway, it was effortlessly scooped up.
Its four legs flailed in shock and futility, thrashing wildly in the air.
The young man's expression was cold as he gripped the collar around its neck with one hand, lifting the forty-kilogram weight as if it were an empty paper bag. The Doberman tried to resist, but before it could even bare its teeth, a muzzle was snapped over its mouth with practiced ease—the whole process, including tying the knot, took only two or three seconds.
The Doberman: "…"
The young man grabbed it by the scruff of its neck and deftly wrapped the leash three times around a pillar in the room, completely cutting off any possibility of it attacking anyone.
The Doberman: "…"
When it looked up again, the young man who had tied it up had already vanished. By the window of the security booth appeared a beautiful, clean face, standing on tiptoe and peering inside with great curiosity.
One person and one dog locked eyes.
The Doberman: "…"
Xu Zhiyi: "…"
Her gaze quickly shifted away from the large dog with blood-red eyes. Terrifying. Good thing she hadn't just pushed the door open.
The security booth contained two small sofas used for resting, a long table, and various dusty everyday items scattered about. The only thing on the table that looked relatively new was a phone with a shattered screen.
Not exactly close, Xu Zhiyi squinted and took a few more looks. It felt very familiar somehow.
But there was a dog with glowing red eyes tied up in the room, one that clearly hadn't eaten in who knows how many days. Even if it looked securely restrained, who knew if it might suddenly lunge and dig through her skull like it was digging through dirt?
Just then, the girls who had insisted she return to the dorm with them began smilingly urging her to hurry back. Xu Zhiyi hesitated for a few seconds, then turned and headed toward the dormitory building.
Along the way, she kept searching for any traces Lin Yan might have left behind. Everything looked like a place her brother might have walked, as if his figure was everywhere—but she found no sign of anything resembling a marker.
The dormitory building was divided into Block A and Block B. Block A housed the female students and was five stories tall.
Xu Zhiyi didn't even need to bother figuring out where she lived. As soon as she entered the lobby, one of the girls took the initiative to look at her. "Student Xu Zhiyi, do you remember your dorm number?"
"…"
Before Xu Zhiyi could answer, she smiled again. "If you don't remember anything, how could you be one of us?"
Xu Zhiyi pulled at the corners of her mouth, offering a fake smile as her answer.
"It's Room 444." She lifted her face, staring directly at Xu Zhiyi, as if trying to catch every shift in her expression. "Xu Zhiyi, you live in Room 444, on the bed in position 4."
They wouldn't be rattled by numbers like these, but those imposters often got nervous over such information.
If Xu Zhiyi didn't smile—even if someone had once shown them her photo and told them she was one of them—they wouldn't let her into the dormitory.
The girl's gaze met a face with eyes curved up in a smile.
She blinked hard, making sure she wasn't seeing things.
Xu Zhiyi was genuinely happy.
And unlike the fake smiles she'd worn all along, her eyes shimmered brightly from the refracted light of the crystal chandelier, her lips curving uncontrollably upward, looking like someone who'd just discovered new hope in life.
The girl's smile widened too. Yes, this was what good students like them should look like.
"You really are one of us," she said, smiling. "Come upstairs with us."
"…"
Hearing this, Xu Zhiyi finally reined in some of the amusement in her eyes.
Of course she had reason to be happy.
Lin Yan's birthday was April fourth. The game had arranged for her to get a room with that exact number sequence—wasn't that a hint that her brother was here?
Even if not, because of Lin Yan, the number four held very lucky significance in her heart. Either way, it was an excellent omen.
The joy in Xu Zhiyi's eyes was utterly sincere. No matter how closely the middle schoolers around her examined her, they couldn't find a single flaw, and so they trusted her completely.
She was one of them now.
The dormitory was a four-person room. Xu Zhiyi stood at the door of Room 444, staring at the name list posted on it. Besides her own name, the other three names had all been crossed out with crooked horizontal lines—clearly indicating she would be next.
Before seeing this list, Xu Zhiyi had still harbored the beautiful fantasy of being assigned to the same room as Lin Yan, getting everything done in one go.
The good news, though, was that those girls' room numbers were worlds apart from hers. At least in the dormitory, she wouldn't run into the Smile Squad.
Xu Zhiyi gripped the doorknob, mentally preparing herself to face three grinning vengeful spirits lunging at her neck, and slowly pushed the door open with great caution.
A long table divided the room into two distinctly separate halves.
On the left side, like the dormitories in her memory, the bed and desk were piled with girls' personal belongings—messy but cozy. The air carried a faint sweet scent, a small fish-shaped mat reading "Welcome Back" lay on the floor, and little decorations showing a love for life were scattered everywhere.
Like a control group, the right side had the same items as the left, but everything was so neatly arranged it looked like it had just been deep-cleaned a minute ago. Bottles and jars, books and pens—all stored to absolute perfection.
The dormitory was a four-person room.
But there were eight beds here.
Both sides had a bed number four with her name on it. Xu Zhiyi's gaze went blank for a few seconds in the middle, then she headed for the tidy bed on the right.
…The left one looked far too much like a place where living people had stayed.
Taking over someone else's spot was never a good thing.
A dormitory code of conduct was posted on the back of the door.
No shoes on the bed;
No lingering or playing on the floor during rest hours.
The designated nap time was half an hour. Following the rules posted, Xu Zhiyi took off her shoes and placed them where she could grab them quickly to run, then spent a moment psyching herself up before lying down.
She pulled out the note from her sleeve.
It was actually just a study schedule dividing the time from 7:30 to 9:00 PM—half an hour of English, half an hour of math. It didn't look like a student's study plan at school at all, but rather… like self-directed scheduling at home.
At the very end of this schedule was a signature.
Reviewer: Hua Mei.
It was the same person.
Xu Zhiyi tucked the schedule back into her sleeve. She wasn't sleepy—couldn't possibly be sleepy. She lay with her eyes open, staring at the underside of the bunk above her, contemplating whether she should act like a pervert and break into the boys' dormitory.
This four-person room took up about the same space as the rented room in the urban village where she and Lin Yan used to live. Just one room, with a curtain hanging between the two beds. When she washed up, her shoulder would bump into him.
By the time she reached her first year of high school, Lin Yan had saved up several years' worth of scholarships and tutoring money, and he moved them to their current home.
He patted her head to comfort her, his attitude unusually resolute—a single room with one bed was simply too inconvenient. Even if she wasn't happy about it, they couldn't live like that forever.
Xu Zhiyi got her own room and quickly discovered the benefits of having a private bedroom. She could secretly read with the light on at night, and as long as she turned the lamp down low enough, Lin Yan wouldn't notice.
Low footsteps sounded in the hallway.
Xu Zhiyi's eyelashes trembled, and before she was even conscious of it, her eyes had already closed. The objects around her that she had considered normal were deteriorating, dust and cobwebs spreading at an alarming rate.
A putrid smell drifted through the room. If you smelled it long enough, the stench of decay would infect your lungs.
The bedboard above her head was now covered in threatening words—telling her to get up, to get out of here, to stop trying to replace the real person.
The dormitory door was knocked twice.
Xu Zhiyi didn't move.
Maybe it was one of her three roommates, maybe it was the dorm supervisor coming to enforce the student code of conduct… But none of them would be someone she knew.
Back home, she used to hear this sound all the time—it was Lin Yan coming to catch her not sleeping.
He would push open the door, put the little nightlight she'd tucked by her pillow back in its place, take away the book she thought she'd hidden so well, and finally pat her head and tuck in her blanket.
Now, beside her bed, there was only a cold monster.
Xu Zhiyi's mental breakdown didn't save the room from decay. The vicious words on the bedboard twisted into thin, tangled patterns, and eyes opened in the gaps, blinking.
There was no light, as if the world had gone dark and she was the only one left in it.
On the ceiling, an old fan turned slowly overhead. A blurry figure hung from a rope attached to it, and there was a faint dripping sound in the air, seeping into the floorboards.
A shriveled head slowly emerged from the upper bunk—no hair, a long neck bending and dangling over the side of the bed, staring at Xu Zhiyi.
Two eyeless eyeballs rolled back and forth, looking like they might fall to the ground at any moment.
Xu Zhiyi slowly lifted one eyelid halfway and looked up at the bedboard above. Tears helped shield some of the visual impact, but she could still vaguely see those blinking eyes staring back at her with ill intent.
They glared at her with eyes wide as if about to split.
She cried until red bloomed around her eyes, looking utterly pitiful—a scream or a breakdown should have come at any second. But she quietly met the gaze of those many eyes for a moment, rubbed the corners of her eyes, and continued crying in silence.
In truth, Xu Zhiyi's emotions were indeed on the verge of collapse right now, but she was crying because she remembered her brother, and so she became utterly focused.
When her heart was filled with thoughts of her brother, nothing else could disturb her.
No matter how terrifying the thing was, it couldn't compare to the terror of her brother not being by her side.
All her tears were reserved for Lin Yan, so of course she had no time to spare for this spiritual pollution.
The gaunt head on the upper bunk continued shifting toward her direction, nearly reaching above the bed when the door suddenly let out a creak.
It turned its face sideways, only then casting its gaze toward the dark figure standing outside the dormitory door—he seemed to have been standing there for quite a while.
That long, withered hand reached out toward him, extending an invitation for a shared hunt.
A few seconds later, a head rolled across the floor.
The sound finally caught Xu Zhiyi's attention. She blinked her sore, tired eyes, propped herself up halfway, and looked toward the open dormitory door.
A pitch-black ghostly phantom stood outside the door.
Its features were blurred, impossible to discern anyone's characteristics.