Chapter 174: Red Maple Boarding School (11) “No One Shall Sleep”

“47, 47…”

In the darkness, vague whispers sounded from above, the speed of speech increasing rapidly until they sounded like they were calling Qi Si’s real name.

Qi Si lay flat and still with his eyes closed, intending not to respond, but the sound was relentless. Initially, it only echoed from the upper bunk, but soon it was right next to his ear, blowing wisps of cold air.

Qi Si subtly covered the Pocket Watch of Fate beside his pillow with his hand and slowly opened his eyes.

After “lights out,” there was no light in the entire world. He had assumed he wouldn’t be able to see anything without reflection, but as soon as he opened his eyes, he locked gazes with a human face.

The base of the face’s neck was hooked over the edge of the upper bunk’s railing, the head hanging down dramatically. Its unevenly colored black and gray skin easily brought to mind traditional ink wash paintings.

Its face was bumpy and uneven, as if water was about to drip off it, and its hollow eyes stared intently at Qi Si.

After realizing Qi Si was looking back, it mournfully whispered, “You lying Bad Kid, you killed us, you killed all of us…”

Qi Si glanced at the rule on the system interface that read, “Night chats are forbidden in the dorm room after lights out,” and pressed his lips together, remaining silent.

The face was relentless, still chattering endlessly with the same old clichés that Qi Si had grown tired of hearing ten years ago.

He stared at the upper bunk’s bed board, endlessly complaining in his mind: Don’t ghosts get punished for breaking the rules? That’s such a double standard… After waiting a while longer and seeing no further action from the face, Qi Si shifted his body, maintaining his grip on the Pocket Watch of Fate, and stretched his head to look toward Chen Lidong’s bed.

That area was a pitch black that seemed capable of swallowing everything; nothing could be seen, as if nothing had ever existed there.

Highly saturated black painted the entire world, and only the outlines of the ghosts were clearly visible.

Chen Lidong made no sound from beginning to end. It was unclear whether he couldn’t hear the ghost’s whispers or if he simply dared not speak.

Soft breathing sounded from the right. Qi Si rolled over and saw that someone was lying in the previously empty bed, having appeared at some unknown time.

That person was as thin as a mummy, yet their head was perfectly round, and their neck was twisted ninety degrees. They, too, were staring wide-eyed at Qi Si.

Qi Si silently stared back at the ghost for two seconds. Seeing that the ghost also had no intention of moving, he simply turned his back and closed his eyes again.

It was known that twenty-nine players were divided into ten rooms, and since each room had five beds, there were bound to be empty beds.

It could now be inferred that the scare factor at night lay in ghosts appearing in the empty beds. He certainly wasn’t the only one encountering this situation, so it shouldn’t be a guaranteed death scenario.

Even if something were to happen, there was still Chen Lidong sleeping in the upper bunk in the room.

By comparison, since he was sleeping in the lower bunk, he should definitely be able to run faster than Chen Lidong.

“Tap, tap, tap…”

A light, floating humming sound echoed from the far end of the corridor, interspersed with footsteps that approached steadily at the same rhythm. It wasn’t loud, but it was very clear.

Light gradually seeped in through the crack under the door. As the footsteps and humming approached, the light intensified from dim to blazing white within a few seconds.

The moment the brightness reached its peak, the footsteps stopped, followed immediately by the sound of the doorknob turning.

The door was pushed open from the outside, and the strong beam of a flashlight shone directly onto Qi Si’s face, lingering for a long time.

Even through his eyelids, he could feel the blinding glare of the light. Qi Si kept his eyes closed, intensely focusing on the text on the system interface, keeping his eyeballs perfectly still.

Seemingly convinced that he was asleep, the strong light finally moved away, swept around the room, and then reversed direction and retreated.

With a “click,” the door closed.

The light “shuffling” footsteps faded into the distance, paused in front of the next door, and repeated the process of pushing it open.

Qi Si silently lifted his eyelids.

Using the faint light seeping through the crack under the door, he glanced at the Pocket Watch of Fate.

The hour hand pointed to 12, and the minute hand had just passed one mark past the hour.

What he had just experienced was undoubtedly the room inspection mentioned in the rules. The first inspection was over, leaving only the one at 4:00 AM… Qi Si turned over again and looked at the opposite bed.

Under the dim light, the ghost that had been there was gone, leaving behind an empty iron bed board.

But as the light completely vanished and the world returned to darkness, the eerie humanoid shape reappeared, maintaining its previous posture and silently staring ahead.

‘Do ghosts only appear in the dark? Or… can they only be seen in the dark?’

Qi Si made random guesses, closed his eyes, and meditated to induce sleep.

He didn’t find sharing a room with ghosts frightening. When he was little, he often grabbed various ghosts to talk to them or played chaotic pranks, causing the number of ghosts around his apartment building to steadily decrease.

Even though he was past his most annoying age, he still wasn’t particularly wary of ordinary ghosts.

Relatively speaking, when ghosts clearly couldn’t cause harm, having insufficient rest at night and affecting the next day’s actions was far more lethal.

In the silence, Qi Si smoothed out his thoughts inch by inch, drawing his breath long and slow. Suddenly, he felt a chill.

There were no quilts or mattresses in the dorm room. He had initially thought the climate was tropical and he could manage, but unexpectedly, the temperature around him dropped rapidly after nightfall to a level that made his body uncomfortable, causing him to shiver involuntarily.

Hopefully, the instance doesn’t have a cold/flu mechanic… Qi Si yawned, listlessly curling himself into a ball, yet sleep entirely evaded him.

A strange sense of isolation coiled around him like a vine. Although his body was utterly exhausted, his mind was abnormally clear.

His active thoughts jumped around in futile contemplation, projecting bizarre, meaningless images at the bottom of his mind, making him feel completely irritable.

Despite this, he still tried his best to even out and slow his breathing, feigning a drowsy state, as if he were about to fall asleep at any moment.

His breathing grew lighter and lighter until it was almost inaudible, suggesting a peaceful sleep in the quiet, with even his dreams appearing serene.

In the upper bunk, Chen Lidong tossed and turned, unable to fall asleep.

He heard Qi Si turn over twice in the lower bunk before falling silent, which further confirmed his suspicion.

His inability to sleep must have been due to the instance mechanism.

The rules didn’t state that players had to stay in the dorm room at night, and the four-hour gap between the two scheduled room inspections practically advertised that players could cause trouble during this period.

Furthermore, the NPCs quickly falling asleep after the inspection provided him with convenience—he didn’t have to worry about being reported.

Chen Lidong lay there for another ten minutes. Only after confirming that Qi Si was truly sound asleep did he roll over and climb down.

The rickety ladder, long overdue for repair, issued a series of creaking sounds when he stepped on it.

His body stiffened, and he immediately stopped moving, looking toward Qi Si while hanging onto the ladder.

In the pitch black where he couldn’t see his own hand, he naturally saw nothing.

Fortunately, Qi Si’s breathing remained steady, showing no sign of waking up.

Chen Lidong dared not delay. He quickly got off the bed, slipped on his sneakers, and tiptoed toward the door.

Yes, he wanted to go out and investigate at night.

In the past, he definitely wouldn’t have risked himself like this, but this was his last assessment instance. If he didn’t rack up performance points now, it would be too late; the Sera Guild would not want a useless person.

Furthermore, under the mechanism of being unable to sleep, there was a good chance that other players would also develop the idea of exploring. If he was too slow, he would fall into a disadvantage in terms of information.

Chen Lidong never entered the Eerie Game for himself, but for his wife.

The woman who married him when he was poor, and who stood by him even when he was locked up by the Security Bureau, collapsed just after he had finally paid off his loans and truly owned his own house and car.

The night before his wife fell down the stairs and went to the hospital, they were excitedly planning their first family trip. The next day, the doctor handed him a diagnosis sheet for late-stage brain cancer.

The terminal illness was incurable; the Eerie Game was the only salvation.

Chen Lidong knew his wife couldn’t wait much longer. Only by quickly becoming a formal member of the Sera Guild could he borrow points internally to save his wife’s life.

He had also heard that the points lent to him would be life-buying money, but what did that matter?

He had no choice but to push forward relentlessly.

Chen Lidong looked back once more, confirmed there was nothing unusual in the room, then gently turned the doorknob and stepped out.

He turned around and closed the door again, then felt his way through the darkness toward the stairwell.

Inside the room, Qi Si listened to Chen Lidong’s footsteps gradually fading, silently counting the seconds in his heart.

After counting for another ten minutes, certain that Chen Lidong had gone far away, he got out of bed and slipped out the door without a sound.

He had originally intended to gather clues at night, as the office was an important location, and Ms. Medina would likely be guarding it during the day, making detailed searching impossible—he could only search at night.

However, in his original plan, risky nighttime actions should have been postponed until the next day, waiting for some reckless newbie to test the waters first.

But after realizing that he, like Chen Lidong, couldn’t sleep, he quickly understood that the inability to sleep at night was not accidental; it might be one of the instance’s settings.

If people couldn’t sleep, many would certainly go out to gather evidence, just like Chen Lidong.

If he gave up on acting when everyone else was moving, he would lose the advantage of initiative and suffer a huge loss.

And since someone else was paving the way, the risk of acting didn’t seem so high… The corridor wasn’t completely dark like the dorm room; faint light scattered in the void, softly illuminating the outlines of the surroundings.

Qi Si put the Human Skin Mask back into his inventory, using his original face as he walked toward the stairwell.

In the hallway, wisps of bloody scent wafted out from behind an iron door, signaling a warning of death.

Qi Si paused his steps and glanced curiously in the direction of the smell, but couldn’t see anything through the door.

Considering that prying open the door to watch the show wasn’t worth the effort, he shook his head, feeling bored, and continued walking… In Dorm Room 4, Jiang Junjue sat on the edge of his bed, smoking a cigarette, staring blankly at the tragically dead corpse on the floor.

The deceased player was named Sun Lin, a free player with no guild background. After being assigned to the same dorm room as Jiang Junjue, he had spoken many flattering words, essentially hoping to use Jiang Junjue to join the Tingfeng Guild.

Jiang Junjue had played dumb and brushed him off. Although he was slightly annoyed at being pestered, he didn’t particularly hate the other party’s actions.

Jiang Junjue had seen many people like Sun Lin—those who lacked strength and the courage to seek improvement, only wanting to rely on a major guild and live day by day.

There was nothing wrong with that. Who didn’t want to survive?

When faced with survival, no matter how glib or how willfully subservient one might become, no one could guarantee they wouldn’t display such an ugly state in the future. What right did anyone have to mock others?

Jiang Junjue had always been friendly, so Sun Lin naively believed he had established a rapport just by exchanging a few pleasantries before lights out.

If nothing unexpected happened, they would have gone their separate ways and never seen each other again after clearing this instance.

But an accident occurred.

After lights out, the image of a ghost appeared on the empty bed.

Sun Lin, in the upper bunk, seemed to hear something and screamed in terror.

“I didn’t break any rules! I didn’t do anything! Don’t come near me!” he roared in defense.

Jiang Junjue listened silently, his heart sinking, knowing: this person was finished.

Sure enough, Sun Lin climbed over the railing and fell from the upper bunk with a loud “bang.”

The scent of blood exploded. Jiang Junjue put on his night vision goggles and saw Sun Lin lying on the ground with twisted limbs, convulsing in pain.

Even so, he didn’t die immediately.

After noticing Jiang Junjue was watching him, Sun Lin laboriously crawled toward Jiang Junjue, extending a bloody hand and begging Jiang Junjue to save him.

Jiang Junjue remained silent, merely taking a small step back to convey his refusal.

Cracks of blood appeared all over Sun Lin’s body, as if something deeply buried inside him was trying to burst out.

Clusters of small, golden-yellow flowers bloomed from his blood vessels, then quickly shed their petals, covering his blood-soaked body.

Upon realizing that Jiang Junjue had no intention of helping, Sun Lin’s pleas turned into curses directed at the one who refused to intervene.

He was still crying for help, but having lost the object of his appeal, he let out a howl of instinctive unwillingness to die, begging the heavens or the gods for a miracle, and fully voicing his fear and pain.

Jiang Junjue calmly observed Sun Lin’s death throes, watching yellow butterflies emerge from his blood vessels, flutter for a few seconds, and then die, falling alongside the flower petals.

He watched Sun Lin’s struggles subside into tranquility, listened as his screams fell into silence, pulled a cigarette from his pocket, and lit it.

Clusters of yellow flowers bloomed from death, then turned into grave soil, burying the corpse. Life fell silent amid the curling smoke, leaving only prolonged stillness.

Jiang Junjue took a drag from the cigarette in his mouth, having made no sound from beginning to end.

He actually had ways to save Sun Lin. He possessed many life-saving items, including substitutes and healing aids, all of which he could have used.

But he had no obligation to save a stranger, especially one who held no value.

Items were expensive, and human lives were worthless.