Thanks @Renea for the Kofi.
Yuying University
Chapter 469: Corpse
!!!
At the sight, Wen Jianyan jolted, a layer of cold sweat shooting up his spine.
He abruptly pulled his hand back, moving the dead man’s eyeball away from his face. It took a full few seconds before his vision gradually returned to normal from the vivid red.
In his gradually normalizing field of vision, he saw…
Inside the mirror, behind him, several blurry figures had appeared at some unknown time. These shadows stood ramrod straight, shoulder to shoulder, hand in hand, standing motionless behind him.
The hairs on Wen Jianyan’s body stood on end. He whipped his head around.
There was no one behind him.
The hall was empty, cold, and deathly silent. He could only hear his own incomparably ragged breathing.
Not far away, the confused voices of Brother Hu and A-Bao sounded out: “What’s wrong?”
Wen Jianyan didn’t answer immediately.
He took a deep breath, his heart still pounding wildly. After taking a few seconds to calm down, he slowly shifted his gaze, letting it fall once more on the mirror not far away.
Without the vision from the dead man’s eyeball, everything seemed to have returned to normal.
The dim, desolate hall, the huge, dusty mirror, the pitch-black security office.
Wen Jianyan looked into the depths of the mirror.
That strange, blood-red face had disappeared. Through the filthy mirror surface, he could only see his own blurry reflection, standing motionless in the mirror, seemingly looking back at himself.
There were no other shadows, only him.
Beside him, Brother Hu craned his neck over, looking quizzically in the direction of Wen Jianyan’s gaze.
But he too found nothing.
“Little brother, what did you see? Why do you look so pale?”
Wen Jianyan didn’t say a word.
He took a deep breath, walked past Brother Hu, and soon stood before the mirror.
Then, he cautiously raised his hand and reached for the mirror’s surface.
The other two watched Wen Jianyan’s actions blankly, unable to guess his intentions. But as Wen Jianyan moved, Brother Hu and A-Bao suddenly froze. They stared with wide eyes, almost unable to believe what they were seeing—the young man’s fingertips sank into the mirror’s surface, bit by bit, followed by his fingers, his palm, and even his wrist.
“Th-th-this—” A-Bao gasped in disbelief, stammering.
Wen Jianyan suddenly withdrew his hand and took several steps back, putting distance between himself and the mirror.
“I think,” he took a deep breath, glanced at his own unharmed fingers, then turned to look at the mirror beside him and said, “I know where the missing people went.”
“Wait a minute…” Brother Hu’s face also turned pale, seemingly frightened by this speculation. “You mean, the others couldn’t have—”
“Yes.” Wen Jianyan gave a firm reply.
Staring at the calm, blurry mirror not far away, both Brother Hu and A-Bao couldn’t help but feel a chill run down their spines. They couldn’t resist taking a step back, trying to distance themselves from it.
“Shit! What do we do now?”
Wen Jianyan paused, turning his head to look in the mirror’s direction.
Brother Hu and A-Bao: “…”
They had a bad feeling.
Sure enough, they heard the young man not far away continue: “Go in.”
Brother Hu and A-Bao: “…”
Great, the bad feeling was right.
Brother Hu hesitated, his expression conflicted, and slowly asked, “So, regardless of whether we join or not, you’re planning to go in?”
Wen Jianyan wore a pained expression: “Yes.”
Anything else didn’t matter, the main thing was that the principal’s office was in there!!
This was the final destination of his trip!
Hearing this, the two couldn’t help but be taken aback, their expressions showing considerable shock.
Even this frail-looking little brother had so much courage, daring to brave the lion’s den alone to save complete strangers. If they were to back down now, they would feel less than human.
The two exchanged a look, gritted their teeth, “What’s there to stay for, to hell with it, let’s go, go, in!”
“Right! Hesitating any longer would be shameful! If we’re going, we go together!”
In the [Integrity First] live room chat:
[?]
[Is it just me? Why do these two look like they’re moved to tears?]
[They don’t actually think the streamer is doing this to save people, do they…]
[Shit, I think they do.]
[I want to rush in and shake them awake, wake up! Don’t be fooled by this guy’s facade!!]
[Trash streamer deceiving the feelings of innocent young men, and he scammed two of them, shameless!]
But at least the three had reached a consensus.
After a few simple instructions, Wen Jianyan once again stood before the mirror.
But this time, he didn’t raise his hand, instead walking straight towards the mirror.
The cold, smooth surface of the mirror drew closer, the blurry reflection within it magnifying bit by bit. Even though no horrifying images appeared, it seemed to contain some unknown danger that made one’s hair stand on end.
…To hell with it!
Wen Jianyan gritted his teeth, steeled his heart,
The next second, a bone-chilling cold spread throughout his body.
, he opened his eyes.
What met his eyes,
all the furnishings and details were no different from before.
But something was off.
The light was tinged with red. A dark red.
If it was considered dark before, this time, the visibility was even lower.
Everything was hazy, as if shrouded in a red filter. A cold, dark curtain enveloped every corner of the hall. Clearly, all the scenery looked so familiar, but beyond the familiarity, there was a strange unfamiliarity that was very unsettling.
“This is… inside the mirror?” Brother Hu’s voice came from behind.
Wen Jianyan turned to look.
Sure enough, Brother Hu and A-Bao had followed him in. They stood behind him, uneasily sizing up this very familiar yet secretly treacherous hall.
“This place gives me a really bad feeling,” A-Bao said in a low voice, rubbing the goosebumps on his arms.
Wen Jianyan glanced at him.
A-Bao’s SAN value shouldn’t be too low, but ever since entering the administrative building, every one of his instincts had been extremely accurate. Clearly, his talent was likely in the “intuition” category; he was probably a medium.
“So, where are they?” Brother Hu looked around but saw no sign of those who had been pulled into the mirror. “No way. They dare to run around in a dangerous, ghostly place like this?”
“…No.” Wen Jianyan spoke slowly, his gaze passing over Brother Hu’s shoulder to look behind him. He said in a low voice, “I don’t think they ran off.”
The two froze and turned to look behind them.
Behind them, where the mirror should have been, now lay a cold corpse.
The corpse lay on the ground, motionless, its face turned away, the angle of its neck twisted bizarrely, its chest and abdomen showing no rise and fall.
It seemed to have been dead for a while, with still-wet bloodstains around it.
At this sight, the breathing of all three hitched, and their hearts sank.
Clearly, compared to the outside of the mirror, the inside was far more dangerous, and there was already a body count.
Who died? How did they die? What did the streamers who were pulled into the mirror encounter?
Countless questions swirled in their minds, but the first one to be asked was another, more urgent, more terrifying question: “So… where did the mirror go?”
Staring at the empty hall before them, Brother Hu shivered.
The mirror that had been their entry passage had now vanished, leaving only an empty space in the center of the hall.
A-Bao’s face was grim. He shook his head, “I don’t know.”
In an instant, in the dark hall filled with the endless stench of blood, the atmosphere dropped to a freezing point.
Although no one continued to ask questions on the topic, they all knew the answer in their hearts.
Since the mirror was gone, how would they get back? —They didn’t know.
They had come through the mirror in the hall, and now, their path back was completely blocked.
In the [Integrity First] live room chat:
[…]
[Holy shit, so you mean once you’re in, you can’t get out?]
[Worthy of an SS-rank, goddamn it, I’m breaking out in a cold sweat.]
Wen Jianyan was the first to speak: “Don’t worry.”
The other two turned to look at him.
Although the current situation was abysmal, the other party seemed excessively calm.
The young man lowered his eyes. In the dim red light, his skin appeared exceptionally pale. His voice was soft and calm: “Don’t forget, there are no certain-death scenarios in the Nightmare.”
He raised a hand, patted Brother Hu’s shoulder, and suddenly smiled, “We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.”
After speaking, Wen Jianyan walked past them and headed straight for the pool of blood in front of them.
“…” Although they were just a few ordinary words, they inexplicably had a strange power that seemed to soothe one’s heart.
Brother Hu and A-Bao were both startled, and the way they looked at Wen Jianyan changed.
Although various signs had shown that this seemingly frail young man was not as simple as he appeared on the surface, since they were assigned to the same instance, their level difference logically shouldn’t be too great.
But… to be able to maintain such a state under these circumstances, wasn’t his mental fortitude a bit too terrifying?
Wen Jianyan crouched down, turned on his flashlight, and carefully shone it on the face of the corpse on the ground.
In the faint light, a ghastly white, lifeless face appeared before him.
The moment he saw that face, Wen Jianyan’s heart sank slightly.
From behind came Brother Hu’s voice: “Who’s the deceased?”
Wen Jianyan took a deep breath and replied, “It’s Zhao Ze.”
At once, the entire hall fell silent. The air was deathly still.
The person lying dead before them was someone they were all quite familiar with.
He was Weasle’s former teammate, a streamer who had been his roommate twice and whom he had encountered multiple times in instances.
And now, that face from his memory was shrouded in a deathly gray. The lusterless eyelids drooped halfway, hiding the unfocused pupils beneath. The entire face was covered with a shadow of death. Although the features were familiar, they now seemed exceptionally strange, exuding an inexplicable and heart-pounding sense of horror.
Brother Hu asked, “How did Zhao Ze die?”
“I don’t kno—” Wen Jianyan’s words were halfway out before they got stuck in his throat.
In the boundless, suffocating darkness, Wen Jianyan clearly saw the other’s dull eyelid suddenly twitch.
The next second, beneath the eyelid, the unfocused, dim eyeball of the dead man slowly turned, then fixed its gaze on Wen Jianyan.
“…!!!” Wen Jianyan’s face changed, the hairs on his body standing on end.
He shot up with a leap, screaming in panic, “Quick, quick, quick!! Run, run, run!!!”
“???” Not far away, Brother Hu and A-Bao were given a huge fright by Wen Jianyan. Before they could react, they saw the young man, who had just been calm and composed like a master, now with a deathly pale face, scurrying over like a rabbit. “Run, run, run!”
He shrieked.
Brother Hu and A-Bao: “…” So, that feeling from before really was just an illusion, huh?
But soon, a strange “ge ge” sound began to emanate from behind them.
The two subconsciously followed the sound with their eyes.
In the dark and viscous hall, the cold corpse that had been motionless just moments ago was now standing up bit by bit in a bizarre posture that no living person could ever achieve, its joints twisting with a sharp grinding of bones.
Zhao Ze turned its head, bit by bit.
On that ashen face filled with the aura of death, the corners of its mouth had, at some point, split wide open, forming a chilling smile.
“!!!” The hairs on Brother Hu and A-Bao’s bodies instantly stood on end, and they also let out a scream, “Run!”
They didn’t dare hesitate for a second, turning around at top speed and chasing after Wen Jianyan, who had already bounded away like a rabbit. The three of them sprinted for their lives down the corridor.
In the [Integrity First] live room chat:
[Fucking hell, that scared me so bad I almost couldn’t breathe.]
[Besides that monster, the streamer’s jumpy reaction is also largely to blame!]
[But I have to say, the streamer… he’s really fast at running away.]
[…]
[…True that.]
The first-floor hall connected to corridors. The corridors on both sides were pitch-black, without a single sound.
Suddenly, Wen Jianyan seemed to sense something was wrong. “Wait, wait a minute!”
Behind him, Brother Hu and A-Bao, though confused, also stopped, panting.
“What’s wrong?” Brother Hu lowered his voice, looking back nervously.
The light was too dim; they could barely see anything clearly. They could only hear the grinding of bones following them like a shadow, as if it were right behind their heads, giving the illusion that they were about to be caught at any second. It made their bodies tense up, and their blood rush.
Although it seemed to be only one corpse while there were three of them, they all knew that the real danger wasn’t just that single corpse, but the danger it represented.
—The danger that could pull all the other streamers into the mirror, leaving their fates unknown, a danger they were powerless to resist.
Even with so many people together, they had fallen for it and suffered casualties, let alone just the three of them.
In this situation, running was the best solution.
“What are we waiting for?” A-Bao’s breath trembled as he urged them on through gritted teeth. “That thing’s catching up!”
“Don’t.” Wen Jianyan’s breathing was rapid and unsteady, but his voice was kept very low.
“Huh?” Brother Hu and A-Bao were both dumbfounded.
You were the one who told us to run, and now you’re the one telling us not to? What on earth are you trying to do?
Next, they saw Wen Jianyan once again take out the two dead eyeballs from his pocket.
But this time, the eyeballs had been in front of his eyes for less than a second before a suppressed cry of pain escaped his throat, and he immediately squeezed the eyeballs back into his palm.
The next second, the young man before them curled up like a shrimp, as if enduring some unbearable pain, gasping for breath.
His reaction frightened Brother Hu and A-Bao. “Wh-what’s wrong?” “What happened?”
Wen Jianyan remained bent over, his thin back trembling slightly from extreme tension. He turned his head, looking up at them from below.
His eyelids were red, and a misty layer of tears covered his unfocused eyes, as if he had received some kind of invisible stimulation.
“Running… will attract something more dangerous.” Wen Jianyan gritted his teeth, his voice low and trembling. “The entrance of the administrative building, rule number two.”
“…” Hearing this, the two were stunned.
At Wen Jianyan’s reminder, the previously forgotten “rules” once again surfaced in their minds.
It was the notice posted outside the security office downstairs. And the content of the second rule was: In the corridors, please speak softly and walk slowly and carefully. Do not disturb the normal work of the staff in the office building.
The moment they remembered its contents, a layer of cold sweat shot up their backs. Right, they had all forgotten about that.
Wen Jianyan took a deep breath. Fine beads of sweat had already formed in his palms without him realizing.
He had previously shone his flashlight into the security office but had not seen the security guard. This meant that although the “security guard” existed, it was not in the same space as them.
Even on the outside, the security guard was terrifying enough. And now, they had basically walked right into a trap, voluntarily entering the area where the other being existed and held control… Wen Jianyan couldn’t imagine how horrifying the “security guard” inside the mirror would be.
For that reason, they couldn’t afford to casually break the “rules.”
Although they had only stood in place for less than half a minute, the “ge ge” sound of grinding bones from behind was approaching at an alarming speed.
The temperature around them seemed to be dropping rapidly, the cold air cutting at their skin like daggers.
They had to leave.
“Slow down,” Wen Jianyan squeezed his eyes shut forcefully before straightening up. His eyelids were still red, his eyes brimming with physiological tears.
He lowered his voice and said:
“Don’t make a sound.”
Brother Hu and A-Bao took a deep breath, suppressed the unease in their hearts, and nodded.
They followed silently behind Wen Jianyan, no longer running but maintaining a pace that was neither fast nor slow, moving through the pitch-black corridor.
Soon, the three left the first-floor corridor and entered the stairwell.
Upon entering the stairwell, they discovered with astonishment:
The iron gate that should have been between the first and second floors had now disappeared.
Behind them, the thick stench of rot and blood from the “corpse” grew stronger.
They didn’t dare to pause and continued walking upstairs.
Compared to the first floor, the second floor was even darker. The entire corridor was shrouded in a heavy, dark red. Just like outside the mirror, the doors in this corridor were still tightly closed.
“What do we do?”
Cold sweat beaded on A-Bao’s forehead.
To be honest, the administrative building didn’t have a large footprint, and its layout was simple. There was no way for them to put much distance between themselves and the corpse chasing them.
In other words, they had three paths before them.
One, face it head-on.
Two, hide on the second floor.
Three, enter the third floor.
Since they had to “speak softly and walk slowly and carefully” in the corridor, to avoid becoming the security guard’s prey, the option of entering the third floor was naturally discarded.
After all, the third rule on the notice was “Please do not enter the third-floor area without authorization.”
“There are three of us, are we really afraid of a corpse that just died?” Brother Hu gritted his teeth, a hint of ruthlessness appearing between his simple, firm brows. “If you ask me, we should just end it here!”
But unexpectedly, Wen Jianyan rejected it outright:
“No.”
He lowered his eyes, hiding his still-reddened eye sockets, and said calmly:
“The risk is too great.”
The first and second floors of the administrative building were different. The student council was stationed here. If they started a fight here and disturbed the student council in their office, they would all be finished.
Brother Hu’s gaze remained fixed on the stairwell.
In the dark stairwell, the stiff sound of approaching footsteps could be heard. That bizarre figure was ascending the stairs, the cold aura growing heavier.
His muscles tensed, and he asked through gritted teeth:
“Then what do we do?”
“Follow me.” As he spoke, Wen Jianyan turned and walked quickly down the second-floor corridor. “I have a rough idea of which office is safe.”
“…?”
The two were stunned.
“What? You know?” A-Bao was愣了, “How is that possible?”
Since the entire corridor was shrouded in dark red light, it was completely impossible for them to judge which room was occupied by the light projected into the corridor, unless someone could accurately remember which office had its lights on and which didn’t.
But how could that be possible…
Wen Jianyan glanced at him and smiled, as if answering both the spoken and unspoken question:
“Why would it be impossible?”
“…”
Both of them were shocked.
Soon, Wen Jianyan stopped in front of one of the offices. He curled his knuckles and knocked twice on the door.
The sound was very light, but in the deathly silent corridor, it was excessively clear, causing Brother Hu and A-Bao’s hearts to leap into their throats. They looked at Wen Jianyan with terrified expressions, not knowing why he was knocking.
Before they could do anything, Wen Jianyan unhesitatingly pressed down on the handle and pulled the door open.
The next second, Brother Hu and A-Bao’s pupils shrank slightly.
—The light in the office was on.
As the door creaked open, a strange red light flowed out, falling on their faces.
Their hearts stopped.
Behind them, the sound of stiff footsteps and the smell of rot grew closer.
The corpse had reached the second floor.
In the [Integrity First] live room chat:
[Oh ho, it’s over.]
[Attacked from both front and back, hahaha!]
“What are you standing around for, get in here!” A familiar, urgent voice sounded from inside the door. Then, several arms reached out from within, forcibly pulling the few people standing outside the door inside.
Before they could react, the office door had closed behind them, blocking out the sound of the corpse’s footsteps.
The harsh red light from above made them squint their eyes, and it took a while for them to adjust to the light.
“…It’s, it’s you guys?”
Brother Hu was shocked the moment he saw the people in front of him.
Appearing before them were several very familiar faces.
They were the same streamers who had entered the administrative building with them earlier and had separated from them on the first floor.
They didn’t look to be in good shape either—nerves on edge, faces pale, and some were even injured. Bai Qiangwei’s arm was wrapped in a bloody bandage, and blood was seeping from A-Rui’s abdomen.
“How did you find us?” one of them asked.
Brother Hu and A-Bao couldn’t help but be taken aback.
They seemed to have just realized something and subconsciously turned to look at Wen Jianyan beside them.
The young man’s profile was very pale, like glazed porcelain coated in the red light.
Only then did they realize that he had probably known what was behind the door before opening it, and the knock just now was likely a signal for the streamers inside—otherwise, opening the door without any warning would have a high chance of provoking an indiscriminate attack.
“Blood.”
Wen Jianyan said, his gaze sweeping over the people before him.
His eyes paused on Bai Qiangwei’s arm for a moment. “The trail you left was obvious. It wasn’t hard to find.”
“To be honest, I was really worried,” another familiar voice sounded from not far away. “I saw you guys didn’t come back for so long, I thought something had happened to you.”
Hearing this, the expressions of Wen Jianyan’s group changed slightly, and they turned to look in the direction of the voice.
A few steps away, Zhao Ze was walking over, the face they had just seen outside the door showing no trace of death, but instead an expression of relief.
He looked at Wen Jianyan, seeming to let out a sigh of relief, and gave a smile:
“That’s great. Now we can all finally act together.”
Oh heellll nooo