Xu Zhiyi had already felt that Lin Yan was having a hard time, and now that her gaze met his peach blossom eyes devoid of any smile, she felt even more heartbroken, convinced that her brother must have suffered inhuman torment.
The fact that he wasn't speaking now was definitely because he was reminded of those things, which was why he was so gloomy.
Her wrist was being squeezed painfully, but she had no intention of struggling at all. Instead, her body leaned closer to him, her forehead pressing against his shoulder, using the embrace to comfort him, while silently cursing the world that had hurt her brother.
Lin Yan looked down at her.
Her thick, dark hair cascaded like silk with a soft sheen, covering her fragile, thin back. Her neck was slender and warm, so easily grasped by his hand, capable of turning his sister, whose complexion had only recently regained some color, into a monster like him.
His appetite didn't disappear because of Xu Zhiyi's closeness; instead, it grew stronger.
As a monster, he could imagine how other monsters would feel upon seeing his sister—fragile and delicious, a tiny person alone in the Instance, with no one to rely on.
Lin Yan's palm rested on the back of Xu Zhiyi's neck, feeling her warm body temperature.
After his fingertips brushed against her skin twice.
He pulled her away from him with a blank expression.
"…Brother?"
Xu Zhiyi showed no trace of the fear one should feel after escaping danger; she only looked up at him in confusion, her eyes filled with disbelief at being pushed away. "Did I hurt your wound?"
The two stared at each other in silence for two or three seconds.
Lin Yan gently shook his head, his fingers squeezing her knuckles as he smiled. "Ghosts don't feel pain."
"Then—" Xu Zhiyi was about to reach into her pocket for a small snack when Lin Yan stopped her.
"Ghosts don't need to eat either. I currently have an urge to attack you—I almost bit your head off just now. Xu Zhiyi, let's not get this close for now."
Lin Yan said this frankly, in the same tone he'd use to remind her to bring an extra jacket when going out during the change of seasons.
Xu Zhiyi processed this blankly for a few seconds; her neck shrank back instinctively from danger faster than her brain could react. But even though her body understood the danger, her mind strongly refused to agree to stay away from him.
She swayed in place, pretending to step back, making an obviously fake gesture of distancing herself from him.
This opportunistic behavior was useless; Lin Yan's attitude was gentle but firm. Under Xu Zhiyi's extremely dissatisfied gaze, he let go of her, and the cold temperature disappeared from her side.
Xu Zhiyi didn't have time to get angry. Lin Yan, standing by the table, no longer embracing her, casually reached into the side pocket of her padded jacket, took out the needle and thread she'd been keeping for him, and softly instructed, "Let me mend the holes in your clothes. Sit still first, so you don't get pricked."
She looked down, seeing the cotton about to fall out in several places on her clothes, and obediently agreed, not moving anymore.
The needle and thread they'd found earlier only came in dark colors—black and red. Xu Zhiyi picked through them with a pained expression, ultimately choosing the latter.
White padded jacket, red silk thread.
It was a terribly mismatched color combination!
But there was no helping it—that was just the style of this place. Everything was in oppressive dark tones, all shrouded in ominous omens.
At least red and white looked somewhat trendy.
"I'll try to sew it as neatly as I can," Lin Yan said softly as he threaded the needle. "Remember to buy a new padded jacket when you get out. Don't wear this one anymore after you leave."
"I'm going out?" Xu Zhiyi caught the ominous keyword precisely and immediately tensed up. "What do you mean? Am I going alone to buy things?"
"Sorry, I misspoke. We'll go together. We can also pick up some new clothes for the New Year while we're at it. What do you think?"
Lin Yan smiled, his attention focused on the stitching in his hands, his tone relaxed.
Xu Zhiyi pressed her lips together and watched his movements.
It took her a long while before she managed to squeeze out a "Fine" from her throat.
She really disliked the way he spoke.
The two had only just reunited, yet there was a sense that a cold war was on the verge of breaking out.
But after the cotton-padded jacket had two holes mended, Xu Zhiyi couldn't help but break the silence, her voice faintly betraying a hint of unease: "Lin Yan… we're going home together, right?"
"Mm."
"Then it's settled. Once you finish mending the jacket, we'll go out together." Xu Zhiyi stared intently at Lin Yan's face, not letting any expression that might suggest he was trying to deceive her slip by. "It's not too far from home… is it?"
Xu Zhiyi hadn't always been such a clingy little sister.
The first year Lin Yan went to university was also the first year they couldn't walk to and from school together.
The university was over two hours away from home—not too far, but a round trip in a single day would take up most of the time.
Before he left, Lin Yan and Xu Zhiyi had discussed it in advance—he couldn't come back frequently. Even without his supervision and company, she needed to remember to study hard.
It would be a good chance to cultivate her independence.
That was what both of them had thought.
She'd eat at the cafeteria for lunch, and before coming home in the evening, she'd have dinner at the auntie's place downstairs. Lin Yan would transfer seven hundred yuan to the auntie every month as a care fee.
The arrangement was well thought out, and Xu Zhiyi showed no dissatisfaction with it. During video calls with Lin Yan, she was obedient and cooperative. The practice problems and corrections she sent over for him to check were done well, maintaining a reassuring level of self-discipline.
But five days into the semester, on Friday evening, having left the fast-paced school life behind, she was alone at home when her longing for her brother surged—at this time, they would usually be studying together at home.
Xu Zhiyi had washed up and gotten into bed early, curling up under the covers, reciting classical poetry to distract herself and lull herself to sleep. Lin Yan couldn't be by her side forever—she'd come to understand that clearly a long time ago.
She hadn't even started crying yet.
Click.
The sound of a key turning in the front door lock rang out. Xu Zhiyi held her breath, thinking this was a dream born from missing her brother too much.
But soon, familiar footsteps steadily approached her bedroom. After two soft knocks—tap, tap—he drew closer and closer, his footsteps quickening.
The blanket covering her head was pulled back.
The bedroom was dark. Xu Zhiyi could only make out Lin Yan's rough silhouette. She propped herself up, trying to speak casually and naturally, but her voice came out with a hint of a sob: "Why are you back?"
Lin Yan raised his hand to cover her eyes, gently pressing her back down onto the bed, and sat down beside her. "I came home to grab something. Go back to sleep. I'll make you breakfast tomorrow morning."
Xu Zhiyi thought that weekend was just a one-off, but the next Friday, and the Friday after that… Lin Yan rushed home every time.
If he had fewer classes, he'd come home even earlier and stay longer.
That so-called "cultivating her independence" plan was never mentioned again by anyone.
Lin Yan said that she was too young and needed proper care. In high school, she needed her older brother; in college, she still did… No matter how old she grew, she would always be the younger one.
Under such indulgence, Xu Zhiyi had no choice but to be a clingy little sister.
It was all her brother's fault.
Just like now—she had finally seen Lin Yan again after losing and regaining him, so there was no way she would let go.
Even if his words and actions were laced with an unsettling sense of uncertainty.
"If the front door doesn't work, we'll climb over the wall… If this place isn't far from home, we'll take a cab back…"
Xu Zhiyi waited eagerly for Lin Yan to nod in agreement. If climbing the wall didn't work, they could try other methods; if none of those worked either, he still had to promise her first.
"How did your reading of those notes go?" Lin Yan suddenly asked.
Xu Zhiyi's face instantly flooded with guilt.
After getting the notes, all her thoughts had been on how she and the shadow version of Lin Yan would live together in the future—how could she have paid attention to those meaningless, trivial scribbles? Now that Lin Yan was testing her on the spot, she lowered her head in shame, indirectly admitting her lack of diligence.
"You haven't answered me yet!" Xu Zhiyi suddenly remembered that she was the one in the right, and her voice rose by an octave.
"When you came here, didn't the system introduce the rules to you?" Lin Yan's tone gradually turned serious. "You can only leave after completing the hint task within the survival period. Xu Zhiyi, have you figured out the task for this Instance?"
Xu Zhiyi was flustered by the question, but she held her ground and straightened up. "Of course! Those students said there's a ghost-catch-human activity here—my task is to not get caught by the ghost! So the two of us should hide first, and after the activity ends, we can go out and head home together…"
The tear in the cotton-padded jacket on one side of her body had been patched up more or less. Red thread wound crookedly across the white fabric, nowhere near the neat stitching Lin Yan had promised.
Lin Yan leaned down, bit off the long red thread, and lowered his eyes to start sewing the other side.
"What am I right now?"
"…" Xu Zhiyi was baffled. "My brother?"
Lin Yan smiled gently, his fingers lightly grasping her wrist, then letting go, repeating the motion twice.
If the task was to not get caught by the ghost, then she had already failed for nearly an hour. Realizing this, Xu Zhiyi awkwardly lowered her head and muttered, "You don't count…"
But Lin Yan's attitude made it clear that if she couldn't figure out her own task, he wouldn't budge on agreeing to leave with her.
With no other choice, Xu Zhiyi took out the notes from her pocket and finally read them carefully instead of skimming.
The opening of one of the events was a boy named "Xiaoman," whose handwriting flew across the page as he passed a note to his deskmate to complain, seemingly commenting on a new transfer student in their class.
—His grades are fake, he's all sanctimonious, his mannerisms are unbearably affected, and his smile is downright nauseating.
His deskmate replied, Don't be mad, Xiaoman—isn't it also because you look the way you do?
"Xiaoman" got even angrier!
He wrote that the disgusting guy even imitated his movements.
"He" shouldn't be at school at all!
The teacher had been fooled by him, which was why he was allowed to stay.
At the end of the note, "Xiaoman" wrote that he would definitely take advantage of this "ghost-catch-human" activity to find a way to drive him out.
These notes involved seven or eight different people, but the content of the conversations was highly consistent—each protagonist had a hated enemy they wanted to drive out of school during this Ghost-catch-human activity.
It wasn't the traditional many-against-one bullying.
Each person had their own unique target of hatred.
These targets included both males and females, all described with the same set of adjectives: "fake smiles," "imitators," "superfluous people"…
It was hard to say about the others, but at least the first two descriptions—Xu Zhiyi found it difficult not to associate them with the people she had encountered in the examination room.
However, whether it was "Xiaoman" and the others, or those perfect students in the examination room, they all had quite good relationships with the teachers.
Now, with two groups of people, it was clear that one side consisted of fake students.
At this point, Xu Zhiyi deduced what she believed to be the task: during this Ghost-catch-human activity, make the teachers realize which side were the fakes.
Now the matter became very simple.
Students who harbored resentment were, of course, more real than those with smiles plastered on their faces.
All she had to do now was find where to submit the answer.
Xu Zhiyi's reasoning fell on Lin Yan's ears as a series of incomprehensible "hissing" sounds.
Just as when he was a shadow figure he could only write twisted characters to communicate with her, now as a human, because he knew the underlying logic of the Instance, he was equally bound by its many restrictions and couldn't help her as freely as he wished.
But since he couldn't hear her, perhaps it meant her direction in solving the puzzle was correct.
Lin Yan wasn't sure how many of the Instance's rules Xu Zhiyi had figured out by now.
Players could communicate freely with other players.
Only between NPCs and players did varying degrees of text and voice garble occur.
Those who had died had no possibility of leaving the Instance.
He would never be able to fulfill his promise to Xu Zhiyi—to go home with her.
Lin Yan sewed the final stitch on the cotton-padded jacket, his expression betraying nothing unusual, and smiled. "Alright, then let's follow your deduced task and complete it."
Because of this, Xu Zhiyi completely failed to notice the brief vacuum in their communication. She simply jumped off the table, pinching her cotton-padded jacket and spinning around joyfully.
It was still quite pretty.
After all, it was a Lin Yan original.
But just as they were about to leave the art classroom, a small new conflict erupted between them.
Mainly because Lin Yan's attitude was poor.
"I want to bite you even more now than I did just now," he actually said something like that, dodging her hand as she reached for him. "Don't get too close to me."
This made Xu Zhiyi so angry that she pressed even closer against him.
Lin Yan gave a helpless smile and explained softly, "I'm a ghost now. Seeing you is like you seeing your favorite white peach boba milk tea—it's hard to resist taking a bite."
That was Xu Zhiyi's favorite little drink, and with that analogy, she could indeed empathize. She looked as if she might withdraw her hand and walk properly.
But just two seconds later, she retracted her act of being a sensible younger sister.
"Can't you just restrain yourself for my sake?" Xu Zhiyi became completely unreasonable, yet spoke sweetly as she took his hand. "Brother, I don't want to be apart from you right now."
Lin Yan looked at her in silence.
The next second, he pressed her against the wall, brought his lips close to her neck, and suddenly lost all humanity and reason.
Xu Zhiyi's heart was racing wildly, her whole body trembling with fear, her eyes squeezed shut in terror—yet her body leaned into the challenge, showing no intention of pulling away from him.
For a long moment, she felt no pain at her neck.
Nor did the back of her head hit the wall—it was cushioned properly by Lin Yan's palm.
…This was hardly the behavior of someone out of control!
Xu Zhiyi snapped her eyes open with fierce indignation, and sure enough, saw Lin Yan curving his lips into a gentle smile at her, clearly having scared her on purpose.
"…………"
Seeing her face fall, Lin Yan made a slow-motion feint of biting her again, which so infuriated her that she shoved his face away with her hand, then grabbed hold of his hand, refusing to let him use such an excuse to leave.
Lin Yan squeezed her hand: "Better keep your distance from me, Zhizhi."
Xu Zhiyi began pretending to be deaf.
But Lin Yan was clearly far stronger than her, and faster too—he could easily keep a leisurely distance between them like a cat toying with a mouse. When she sped up, he sped up; when she slowed, he slowed—both keeping her safe and evading her at the same time.
Seeing that Lin Yan was truly about to let go, in her desperation, Xu Zhiyi shouted, "I have an idea!"
"Oh?" Lin Yan raised an eyebrow.
"I remember, at the security booth downstairs in the girls' dormitory, there's a Doberman…" Xu Zhiyi obediently lowered her head, mumbling out words that showed little respect for her elder brother, "It seems to be wearing a muzzle."