Chapter 166: Red Maple Boarding School (3) “He is the Most Terrifying Eerie”

In an empty room of about one hundred square meters, twenty-seven players were either standing or sitting.

As time passed, they drifted apart intentionally or unintentionally, forming several small groups based on traits like gender, age, temperament, and guild affiliation—birds of a feather flocking together.

At this moment, they were all discussing their respective views on the instance.

“An hour and a half has passed already, why hasn’t the main quest appeared yet? Not only is there no main quest, there isn’t even a ghost in sight…”

“Is this instance glitched? Aside from Ms. Medina’s appearance at the very beginning, no significant plot has happened. This place is barren—no clues, no traps. Don’t tell me this is going to be a wilderness survival challenge.”

“Should we have followed those two guys down the corridor? But it doesn’t look right; it clearly leads to the confinement room. You only have to go there if you break the rules…”

“Let’s wait for them to come back from scouting. Anyway, everyone is here; it’s impossible for all twenty-seven of us to die together.”

If there were fewer than ten players in this instance, and the progress had stalled while a long corridor led to the unknown, then as long as someone like Chen Lidong stood up to propose it and led Zhou Datong away, the others—no matter how timid—would likely be persuaded by the ‘bellwether effect’ and follow them to explore the corridor.

But when the number of people reached over twenty, the bystander effect took over.

Chen Lidong and Zhou Datong carried too little weight. Those who were still timid or hesitant preferred to wait for the main group to make a unified decision. Seeing that no one else intended to move, they naturally weren’t willing to actively explore.

Even after becoming official players, most of them still maintained a passive attitude toward clearing instances.

They only moved when poked. Without ghosts chasing them from behind, they were happy to turtle up in a safe spot and shoot the breeze.

Three members of the Tingfeng Guild occupied a relatively quiet corner. Two men and one woman formed a semi-circle, whispering to each other, though they weren’t talking about the instance.

“I’ve just tried every contact method, and I can’t reach Brother Shuomeng at all. He’s either dead or not in this instance.” The first to speak was a middle-aged, decadent-looking man with semi-long hair and an artistic air; his drooping eyelids made him look like he hadn’t fully woken up. “Given his strength, I don’t think he’s dead…”

If a player who frequently browsed the forums were here, they would surely recognize this man as one of the veteran members of the Tingfeng Guild, ‘Jiang Junjue.’ He usually enjoyed posting poetry and prose threads on the forums and often high-profiledly attached selfies from various angles.

After solemnly finishing his deduction, Jiang Junjue shielded the light and slipped a white ring off his right middle finger, murmuring, “The three of us are all here. It seems the team-up rings developed by Jiuzhou aren’t ineffective… So, what’s the situation here?”

A young man wearing glasses lowered his voice. “Old Jiang, do you think there’s a player limit for this team-up? Maybe Jiuzhou didn’t test it themselves and is using us as guinea pigs?”

“…You might be onto something. Although I trust Fu Jue’s character, what if the people under him aren’t upright?”

“Don’t go slandering us now.” A young female voice sounded from behind the three, giving them a start.

The speaker was that female player from the Jiuzhou Guild. She looked to be under twenty, wearing a green T-shirt and mid-length shorts, looking quite casual.

At the moment, she shook the ring on her middle finger with a look of grievance. “Who knows what’s going on? Two of us entered together; it was agreed that I’d get used to the intensity of the official pool first, but now I’m the only one left…”

The three looked at each other. Jiang Junjue narrowed his eyes, swallowed the phrase ‘Why don’t you make any sound when you walk?’ and gave the female player from his own guild a meaningful look.

The female player understood and quickly smiled. “Little sister, we also lost someone and were just so anxious that we spoke without thinking. Since we’re missing one and you have no one to follow, why don’t we team up?”

“Oh, yes, please!” This was exactly what the girl wanted. She showed a somewhat pleasing smile. “My name is Zhang Yiyu. I’ll be counting on you three experts to look after me!”

…Zhang Yiyu joined the trio from the Tingfeng Guild as a member of Jiuzhou. She picked a dark corner to sit down, and her heart finally settled a bit.

Although the two major guilds, Jiuzhou and Tingfeng, had quite a bit of competition, their relationship was actually very good. They frequently shared intelligence and sent exchange personnel to each other—this was already an open secret among players.

Ultimately, while most people disagreed on minor details, in the grand scheme of things, they all wanted to clear the legendary ‘Final instance’ as soon as possible, shut down the Eerie Game, and stop the encroachment of eerie events into reality.

Cooperation was already the prevailing trend.

“No matter what, people can’t be scarier than ghosts, right?”

Zhang Yiyu muttered in her heart, recalling Ms. Medina’s figure again, a trace of bitterness in her heart.

After clearing the ‘Dialectical Game’ instance with an NE (Normal Ending), she had been detained by the Eerie Investigation Bureau for four years. During that time, because she had become an Eerie, she was never again actively pulled into instances by the Eerie Game.

Being sent into a instance after only a few days of slight training was something she inwardly rejected, but for the sake of her personal freedom, she could only agree.

Although Ning Xu said that after becoming an Eerie, she possessed immortality and could sense the location of highly dangerous Eeries, meaning she didn’t need to worry about survival, it wasn’t very helpful. Being afraid of ghosts was innate.

After reluctantly loading into the ‘Red Maple Boarding School’ instance, Zhang Yiyu was shocked to find that the ‘expert’ she was supposed to team up with had disappeared.

Before she could catch her breath, Ms. Medina appeared in the crowd, accompanied by lingering black smoke.

As a ‘Pseudo-human,’ Zhang Yiyu could see the danger levels of other Eeries. With just one glance, she saw rolling, writhing flesh and burn marks dripping with pus within the black smoke.

Her shock instantly turned into terror.

It was the dangerous instinct of an animal meeting its natural predator. She deeply realized that even if she was an Eerie, it didn’t mean she could run rampant in another Eerie’s territory.

Ghosts eat ghosts too, sob.

Zhang Yiyu had just escaped the dragon’s den only to enter the tiger’s lair; she felt her life was utterly bleak.

But things having come to this, she could only try her best to survive. Ideally, she would perform well and redeem herself through service so the Eerie Investigation Bureau would let her go.

A shuffling sound of footsteps came from deep within the corridor. It wasn’t loud, but Zhang Yiyu caught it keenly, and her limbs went cold for no reason.

A suffocating feeling arose spontaneously, as if an invisible air pressure was acting on her body, crushing her soul down inch by inch until she was prostrate on the ground.

The footsteps grew closer. Zhang Yiyu looked up at the Tingfeng members beside her; the three were still sighing over ‘Shuomeng’s’ disappearance, seemingly completely unaware of the approaching anomaly.

She scanned the other players; everyone was chatting amongst themselves, with no awareness of the approaching danger.

Could it be… an illusion?

Zhang Yiyu looked toward the corridor outside the door in confusion. She saw wisps of black aura lingering like ghostly shadows, connecting in the air into an uneven curtain that slowly drifted into the room.

The black aura seemed to be mixed with a few strands of golden vines, swaying and bobbing like they were floating on ocean waves, reflecting scarlet glints from certain angles.

Brilliant golden blood droplets seeped from the vines, suspended around like stars surrounding a moon. Every drop reflected a grotesque eye, tightly shut as if deep in a nightmare.

It’s an Eerie! A new Eerie!

Danger warnings pulsed frantically. Zhang Yiyu froze in place, the blood in her body seemingly turning to ice.

She watched fixedly as two figures walked into the room one after the other—it was Chen Lidong and Zhou Datong, who had left earlier.

They stepped on the massive black shadow projected onto the floor by the Eerie, oblivious to the danger behind them, and walked boldly into the center of the crowd, signaling for everyone to be quiet.

“We just took a turn at the end of the corridor. We only saw a confinement room and didn’t find the one who was punished earlier, but we did find an NPC.” After finishing his concise report, Chen Lidong turned and shouted, “47!”

The players were all stunned, truly failing to react to what this number meant.

Two seconds later, they saw a slender, light-brown-skinned youth walk in from outside the door.

He was tall and lean, wearing dusty short sleeves and long pants. The ugly style clearly belonged to the school uniform, sufficient to indicate his identity.

—He was a student of Red Maple Boarding School, the NPC Chen Lidong had mentioned.

Seemingly unaccustomed to being watched by so many eyes, the youth lowered his eyes somewhat shyly and said softly, “My number is 47, which is also my name here. I was locked in the confinement room earlier because I made Ms. Medina angry and almost starved to death. Fortunately, these two kind people arrived in time and gave me food and water.”

As he spoke, he gave a grateful smile to Chen Lidong and Zhou Datong, looking for all the world like a good child who knew how to repay kindness.

The players kept their thoughts to themselves, having basically formed a judgment.

Ms. Medina was undoubtedly the big boss of this instance—capricious, keen on corporal punishment for students, and responsible for executing the cruel punishments for violating school rules.

And this NPC named ’47’ was likely an important plot character in the instance. Not only could he provide players with vital clues, but he could also serve as a scapegoat if necessary.

Qi Si was also unobtrusively observing the players.

From their positioning alone, it was clear that these players had roughly split into several camps; it was possible some knew each other in reality.

Among them were a few familiar faces, including veteran players who used their real names on the forums and were quite active.

A young girl in a light green T-shirt looked out of place; her outfit made her look like she was on vacation, quite casual and breezy, but her expression looked like she had just seen a ghost.

“I said from the start that sitting here doing nothing isn’t the way. There’s only this one corridor; if we don’t go this way, where else is there to go?” Chen Lidong gave a lecture before continuing, “We already know one school rule: you must wear a school uniform in the school. You’ve been here for so long; have you found any uniforms or anything like that?”

He unobtrusively skipped over the fact that he had obtained the ‘Philanthropist’ identity. After all, that identity looked like it would make it easier to survive until the end, and he might be seen as a thorn in the side by players with darker psyches.

The moment Chen Lidong spoke the school rule, the other players received a system prompt: 【Rules Updated】, verifying the authenticity of the school rule from the side.

Someone said worriedly, “Violating school rules probably gets you sent to the confinement room, right? The life or death of the last player sent in is still unknown…”

Someone else chuckled, not caring at all. “What’s there to fear? None of us are wearing uniforms; there’s safety in numbers. Besides, it didn’t say we have to be students.”

As they spoke, several pairs of eyes fell on Qi Si, who was standing by the door.

If they needed to find a school uniform, this NPC was wearing one.

An NPC’s life didn’t count as a life. If something really happened, they would just strip the NPC’s uniform and put it on themselves.

Zhang Yiyu had been staring intently at Qi Si since the moment he entered the door.

She saw clearly that those terrifying black vapors and golden vines were extending from this NPC.

The youth’s shadow twisted, disordered, blurred, and reconsolidated in her eyes. Countless pieces of information poured into her mind in the instant she looked, yet they could not be understood or perceived… It was a higher-dimensional existence beyond cognition, drifting outside the world. Even if it cast a gaze, it was merely the emotionless glance of a deity.

Death and disaster were merely the fate attached to His every move, just as a person turning over would not know or care about the survival of the microorganisms within… Could a seemingly ordinary NPC actually be the most important existence in this instance?

After her initial fear, Zhang Yiyu forced herself to calm down.

The NPC before her didn’t seem to have any hostility, and moreover, he might be the key to clearing the instance. She could see that he was not simple, which was her unique information advantage.

Fear was one thing, but if she didn’t try to make contact and earn some performance points, she felt she wouldn’t be satisfied… Qi Si noticed the girl’s gaze, turned his head toward her, and slightly curled his lips.

Zhang Yiyu saw countless scarlet eyes slowly open amidst the black smoke, casting cold and detached glances in all directions, as if in warning.

Sob, so scary. Performance points aren’t as important as my life; better stay far away… “Little sister, what’s wrong?” Jiang Junjue’s voice sounded behind her, and a hand gently patted Zhang Yiyu’s shoulder.

Zhang Yiyu snapped out of it and quickly moved her gaze elsewhere, her back already drenched in cold sweat.

The moment she lowered her head, she heard the system prompt sound coldly:

【Detected that you have witnessed an Evil God. Completing a rational identity for you】

【Identity ‘Witch’ has been loaded】

Immediately after, all players heard the system prompt:

【All special identities have been loaded. The instance officially begins】