Luo Yu was, of course, aware that something was wrong at the school.
As a player, her task was to uncover the source of that wrongness.
“So when the girl proactively approached her and brought up the matter herself, Luo Yu immediately sensed that this was likely an NPC stepping forward to provide information.”
“What is it?” Luo Yu glanced calmly at the name badge on the girl’s school uniform. “Liu Shuang, do you think there’s something strange about the school?”
Liu Shuang pointed at the two empty beds in the dorm room and lowered her voice. “It’s them. Their changes lately are just too extreme.”
Luo Yu had no idea who the other two people in the dorm were, but she could easily pretend to know.
She nodded solemnly. “That’s true.”
Then she began to probe. “What do you think is going on? Tell me.”
Liu Shuang leaned toward the door and glanced outside. After confirming that no one would be coming back anytime soon, she finally spoke.
“Do you remember what Li Yi used to be like?”
Li Yi was probably the name of one of their roommates.
Luo Yu was a player who had dropped into the game midway, so there was no way she could know what Li Yi used to be like.
Fortunately, Liu Shuang was not actually waiting for an answer. After mentioning it in passing, she continued talking on her own.
“Li Yi used to be a really good person. She often cleaned the dorm and helped everyone out with little things. But her grades were pretty bad, especially math. She failed all the time and was constantly scolded by the teachers…”
“One afternoon, I went back to the dorm to grab a book and saw Li Yi crying by herself. Later she complained to me, saying the teachers disliked her and the classmates were very cold toward her. She said she couldn’t hold on anymore and wanted to drop out.”
At this point, Liu Shuang’s hands suddenly began to tremble.
She took several deep breaths. Only after grabbing Luo Yu’s arm did she manage to steady herself.
Luo Yu could see clearly that Liu Shuang’s reaction was not driven by sympathy for Li Yi’s experience, but by fear, deep fear.
She looked as if she was about to cry, yet she still forced herself to continue.
“At the time, I comforted Li Yi a bit. I thought she was just under too much pressure and didn’t take it seriously. But later… Later Li Yi changed. She turned into what she is now!”
Liu Shuang’s voice rose with agitation. Then she seemed to realize something, shrinking her neck in fear and nervously looking around.
She lowered her voice again.
“Now Li Yi does nothing but study every day. When I try to talk to her, she ignores me. Sometimes I see her reading seriously one second, then the next second she looks up at me with this creepy smile on her face…”
“The other person in the dorm is the same. It’s like they’ve become completely different people. I… they… they haven’t gone crazy, have they?”
Luo Yu listened silently to everything Liu Shuang said.
Facing the emotionally agitated Liu Shuang, she gently patted the back of her hand in reassurance.
At the same time, she began organizing the information in her mind.
First, there were two abnormal people in her dorm.
Among them, Li Yi had been excluded by teachers and classmates due to poor academic performance, after which her personality changed drastically. She became obsessed with studying and occasionally behaved strangely.
Luo Yu’s own experiences at school over the past two days also confirmed that any player who did something detrimental to studying would be met with hostility from the teachers.
The teacher she encountered was a monster. Teachers from other classes might be the same.
Thinking in an even worse direction, perhaps all the teachers in the school were monsters.
Monsters disguised as teachers might be restricted by some limitation, preventing them from directly attacking students. However, they could persecute students by constantly suppressing them, stirring up emotional conflict within classes, and manipulating the overall atmosphere of the school.
As for the students who were targeted by them—
If they were players, based on Luo Yu’s experience from the previous night, they would most likely be eaten directly by the monsters.
If they were student NPCs, judging from Li Yi’s case, they would undergo drastic personality changes and become accomplices used by the monsters to persecute other students.
Why didn’t the monsters directly attack student NPCs?
After being targeted by monsters, why weren’t student NPCs killed, but instead merely changed in personality?
These two questions might be the key to uncovering the secrets of Qinggang High School.
However, before investigating those issues, an even more serious problem stood before Luo Yu and the other players.
That was how many students in the school had already been controlled by monsters, and how many normal students were still left.
Judging from the atmosphere in the classrooms and the unsettling behavior of students in the cafeteria, the answer to that question was probably not optimistic.
If this continued, before they even survived seven days, the students of this school would likely all become puppets of the monsters.
By then, the monsters would probably no longer have any reservations and would directly go after the players.
Uncovering the secrets of Qinggang High School or surviving seven days…
Just as Sun Heng had said, surviving seven days was a trap set by the game. If all the players chose to hide and endure instead of actively exploring the secrets of Qinggang High School—
Then as the number of normal students dwindled and the monsters’ actions became increasingly unrestrained, every single player would eventually die in the monsters’ mouths.
A bead of cold sweat rolled down from Luo Yu’s temple.
Only at this moment did she truly realize how sinister this game was.
“It’s not just Li Yi…” Luo Yu murmured.
Liu Shuang, who had been silent for a long time beside her, suddenly froze and echoed softly, “Yeah… our class too. A lot of people at school have become abnormal…”
The situation was grim. She will discuss it with the other players tomorrow.
Luo Yu sighed and was about to climb into bed when Liu Shuang grabbed her sleeve.
“Hey, Luo Yu. Actually… I’ve discovered something.” Liu Shuang’s eyes darted around nervously. “Come with me. I’ll show you.”
“It’s already very late.” Luo Yu wanted the information as well, but she also knew that wandering around at night violated school rules. “How about tomorrow—”
But Liu Shuang ignored her protest and dragged her toward the dorm exit.
Luo Yu struggled, but surprisingly, she couldn’t break free.
Frowning, she had no choice but to follow behind Liu Shuang.
At the same time, the short male player who had left the group was chatting enthusiastically with the fat player.
“Brother Fat, I really owe you one. Without you, I honestly wouldn’t know what to do!”
The fat player laughed. “It’s nothing. We newbie players should help each other out.”
The short man was deeply moved. As they climbed the stairs, he sighed. “You have no idea how scared I was when I saw the monster eating someone. Talking with you helped me calm down.”
“Small stuff.” The fat player stared at him with a smile. “We’re almost there. Let’s hurry.”
“Alright, alright.” The short man quickened his pace, still flattering him as they walked. “Brother Fat, you really know what you’re doing. Bold and capable. You deliberately mixed in with Sun Heng’s group to gather intel, and you didn’t forget about us newbie brothers either.”
At first, the short man had been wary when he met the fat player. In his eyes, the fat player was Sun Heng’s lackey, and approaching him couldn’t possibly mean anything good.
Unexpectedly, the fat player wasn’t as obedient as he looked. On the surface, he followed Sun Heng’s orders, but secretly he had his own plans.
For example, this time he sought out the short man because he had found a place suspected to be the game’s exit and was specifically bringing him along to take a look.
Naturally, the short man agreed immediately.
If the exit was real, he could leave the game early. If it was fake, at worst he would just waste a trip.
After all, the fat player said the exit was on the rooftop of the dormitory building, and he had already confirmed that going to the rooftop did not violate school rules.
They finally climbed onto the rooftop.
The short man looked around but didn’t see anything unusual.
“Brother Fat, where’s the exit?”
Could the fat player have lied to him? But what would the fat player gain from that?
The fat player didn’t answer.
The short man saw him staring straight at him, a strange smile spreading across his face. That smile sent a chill through his heart, reminding him of the monster in the classroom that had eaten the freckled woman.
“Brother Fat, what are you—” The short man took a step back.
The fat player shifted aside, revealing another figure standing behind him.
“No! That’s not right! Why is she here? She’s supposed to—”
“You’re not… you’re not the fat player…”
A short, sharp scream rang out on the rooftop. The short man collapsed onto the ground and stopped breathing.
On the other side, at the female dormitory building. Liu Shuang pulled Luo Yu into the first-floor lobby.
“Where are you going?” The dorm supervisor stopped them.
Liu Shuang slowly raised her head and smiled at the supervisor, silently mouthing two words: Prey.
The dorm supervisor’s gaze darkened. She smiled as well.
“Is your roommate suddenly sick? Fine, I’ll make an exception and let you go out. The school infirmary isn’t far. Go quickly and come back quickly.”
“Oh right, sign in before you go.” The supervisor took out a thick register and looked past Liu Shuang at the person behind her. “This student, your name is—”
She stopped mid-sentence when she finally saw Luo Yu’s face clearly under the dim light.
Wait…
This… this is—
She trembled in fear, and the register fell to the floor.