Temptation and Promises

Putting aside the school history, Yu Xing walked a few steps into the darkness. The library wasn't too big or too small, but it would take two or three minutes for one person to walk around it slowly without stopping. Along the way, there were many dark areas, and safety couldn't be guaranteed.

He touched the [playing license] hidden in his pocket again. He hadn't left his real name when he came today, nor was there an identity tag to restrict his identity. This was the best time to explore.

Even if the library is full of hidden horrors.

He inexplicably began to imagine some eerie scenes. Yu Xing knew that this was probably due to the atmosphere of the place. Ignoring the fear that was beginning to spread in his heart, he stirred his nerves and began to look at the book titles as he walked in.

The other bookshelves were filled with many strange books, in a very messy state, including some comic books.

As Yu Xing passed by the comic book, she reached out and wiped it, removing a thick layer of dust.

Even if it were in the library, obviously no one would look at it.

He deliberately searched for secluded bookshelves and locations that ordinary people wouldn't look for. The further he went, the faster his heart beat. He walked between black and white, and other sounds gradually appeared in his breathing.

Call...

Suck...

Call...

Yu Xing's slow steps came to a stop.

Among his breathing and footsteps, there was another person's voice.

Someone else might have thought they misheard, but he wouldn't; he's always been confident in his perception.

But now that he has stopped, the sound has dissolved into the air, leaving no trace.

"My actions have attracted the attention of something in this library after all," Yu Xing concluded calmly to herself, continuing forward without changing her expression.

He had reached the innermost corner of the third floor, which was almost the place with the smallest area of white light on the entire third floor. Large swathes of darkness surrounded him, eroding his vision and mind.

In a moment of Spiritual Sense, he stopped in front of the bookshelf with a pleasant smile. The mysterious Spiritual Sense had helped him many times before reappeared, telling him that what he wanted was in this bookshelf.

Yu Xing wasn't really sure what he wanted from the library, since he had only decided to come and investigate on a whim. But when it came to the books in the library, they were nothing more than textual clues, especially clues that could explain the origin of the school or the patterns of the ghosts' behavior.

He hadn't officially started classes yet. Apart from the three types of students, the red armbands, the strange cafeteria cook, and the library itself, he hadn't encountered any bloodshed or danger. If he could find clues here, it would be a preventative measure, even more effective than waiting for the crisis to begin before searching for a solution.

And now, what he might want is right in front of him, among the hundreds of books on this bookshelf.

Because the books on the bookshelf were some distance from the light, he really couldn't see what books were inside this time. He could only pick up the books one by one and carry them to a place with light to identify them. He went back and forth like this, which didn't actually take up much time.

Yu Xing walked very quietly back and forth on the silent third floor. Most of the books on this bookshelf were useless miscellaneous books, and even some novels, which were also ignored and covered in dust.

Thump.

Suddenly, a muffled thud came from the darkness and silence, like the sound of a knife being chopped on a chopping board.

Yu Xing paused, then quickly left the white light and disappeared into the unseen darkness.

If he wasn't mistaken, the voice came from the female administrator who claimed to only stay on the first floor.

After the first sound, the noises became more frequent, and it was clear that the sound was slowly approaching from the stairs downstairs. The heavy stomping of high heels echoed through the rows of bookshelves on the third floor.

She came up to find me? Yu Xing stood in the middle of several bookshelves, her arms wrapped with books, barely touching the edge of the shelves to avoid bumping into them and making a noise.

He squinted and looked towards the stairs, seemingly spotting a corner of clothing.

Sure enough, it came up.

If he needed to resist, having his hands full would put him in a very passive position. He thought about it, but instead of putting the book down, he listened carefully to the female administrator's footsteps to determine her location.

The female administrator remained silent, as if she were investigating something. Her figure would occasionally appear in the area where there was white light. Yu Xing could see her deathly pale face and her legs, which were raised high and thinner than a normal person's arm.

He hid in the darkness, like a viewer watching a horror movie.

The female administrator gradually approached the bookshelf where he was.

Yu Xing discerned her movements, secretly calculated the timing, and at the opportune moment, he took a step forward, following the sound of her high heels.

He was wearing leather shoes that came with his school uniform. As a European-style garment, leather shoes had heels, which would make an unmistakable sound when he walked. However, if the sound overlapped with that of high heels, it would be completely inconspicuous.

Step by step, Yu Xing would move forward each time he stopped just as the female manager stepped down, only passing through the limited, unavoidable areas of white light when he was sure she couldn't see him.

It was fortunate that the library itself wasn't very large; otherwise, using footsteps as a cover wouldn't have worked. Sound takes time to travel, and by the time the sound reached his ears and his footsteps reached the female administrator's ears, there would be a difference of a fraction of a second or even a second, directly revealing his location.

Gradually, he walked to the spot where the female manager had already inspected the area and stopped. The female manager had already touched the last row of bookshelves and seemed to be standing in front of the bookshelf where he had just stopped.

Realizing he wasn't there, the silent female manager suddenly spoke to him, "Sweet child, aren't you on the third floor?"

As she spoke, she began to move again, but her voice confused her footsteps, making her location harder to pinpoint.

"I just remembered I forgot to tell you something, so I went upstairs to look for you, but I couldn't find you."

Yu Xing peeked out and calculated the time, only to find that the female manager had also started to detour, avoiding the area of the white light.

To use an analogy, it's like a ghost boss in a horror Yugi being defeated by a player who finds a way to beat it. Once its health drops to a certain level, it unlocks its second stage, becoming even more difficult to deal with and dodge.

This time, both of them became the hunter and the prey chasing in the darkness.

"Son, you're already a senior in high school. Why aren't you looking at your study materials? What are you doing up to the third floor? The books on the third floor aren't suitable for someone like you who's trying to make every second count."

The female manager kept talking, but Yu Xing believed that she probably wasn't sure if she was on the third floor either.

There is also hiding space on the second floor.

He didn't put down the books in his arms so that the female administrator would expand his possible location to the second and third floors, giving him a chance to escape. Otherwise, if the female administrator found the stack of books he hadn't put away on the ground, she would know he was definitely there.

"Kid? Are you there? Let's go downstairs together and chat. I'd like to recommend some useful resources to you."

The female manager moved outwards little by little from the innermost part, constantly talking to distract her from judging her footsteps. Yu Xing chuckled softly in the darkness, focused her attention, and used the same method to switch places with the female manager.

He returned to the bookshelf where he had taken the books, while the female manager returned to the stairwell.

After two unsuccessful searches, and without even hearing a trace of Yu Xing's presence, the female manager's voice lowered as she muttered to herself, "Could she really not be here...?"

She stood at the door for five minutes, then finally turned around and went downstairs.

The sound of footsteps thumping grew fainter and fainter, Yu Xing let out a soft breath.

He safely evaded a round of arrests, but I don't really understand why the female manager allowed him to roam freely in the library if he couldn't go up to the third floor. Was she trying to set him up as a sting operation?

Having no knowledge of the female administrator's backstory, he didn't want to speculate unnecessarily, and since he didn't know when she would come up again, he made the most of his time to finish what he hadn't done earlier.

After what had just happened, he was less resistant to the darkness. In fact, the darkness helped him escape the female manager, and he moved much faster, repeatedly looking at the titles and tables of contents of the books he had brought.

Two minutes later.

When he touched the fifth line of books from the top, his scalp suddenly tightened, and a feeling of unease swept over him, making the hairs on the back of his head stand on end. At the same time, a strong feeling reminded him that the useful books were among the seven or eight books he was holding.

Since arriving on Dead Silent Island, his Spiritual Sense seemed to be triggered more frequently than usual. Yu Xing became increasingly convinced of his guess, but the current situation was not good. On the one hand, he might have clues that he hadn't yet looked at; on the other hand, one problem after another arose, and he knew that he was being watched.

Not a female administrator.

Rather... it's something hidden inside the building, something even less known.

"Sizzle"

A heavy aura pressed down on him from behind. This time, Yu Xing felt a much greater pressure field than the female manager, as if a huge eye in the darkness was slowly opening and staring at him.

The white light flickered, then dimmed as the breath passed by, finally extinguishing quietly under Yu Xing's gaze.

Like a chain reaction, after the light closest to him went out, one light after another went out, the light growing farther and fainter until finally, the entire third floor was plunged into complete darkness.

Rustling sounds...

Losing one's sight can easily make people uneasy and breed fear. Yu Xing shook her head, feeling that there were many people around her.

It might not even be a person, because he heard a snake-like slithering sound approaching from the ground, felt a slight, spiderweb-like resistance above his head, and felt an itch. He also felt a series of small gusts of wind that shouldn't be there, the kind of wind that someone was mischievously blowing on the back of his neck.

It's as if, at this very moment, he is in the very center of a group of "people," and each of them is facing him, watching him, and approaching him.

At the same time, the stench reappeared, even stronger than the one he had briefly smelled on the first floor.

Yu Xing guessed the identities of these beings lurking in the shadows.

Wow, this is much more troublesome than a female manager.

It carries the stench of a garbage dump and seems to be everywhere. The only ghosts that exist in such large numbers are probably those students who were buried in the garbage dump.

Judging from both its pre-death experience and its number, it must have been a very, very powerful and ferocious ghost—only one, not many.

Yu Xing knew very well that what was wandering in the darkness was not a group of student ghosts, but a collection of student ghosts or resentment, because he only sensed malice and a gaze.

Finally, in the darkness, something sticky and tentacle-like touched his neck.

"An, I've read the letter I sent you," Yu Xing suddenly whispered.

The tentacle suddenly stopped, and even curled up as if it had a nerve twitch.

"You have a girl who loves you deeply. I don't know if she's here too, but I just want to say..." Yu Xing said, "I know about the unfair treatment you've received. You may have resisted, but failed, or perhaps you didn't even have the will to resist. But I did."

The sliding sounds on the ground and the spiderwebs floating overhead also stopped.

"And there are others, people who were thrown here for whatever reason... you could have stood in the light."

Yu Xing's words received no response.

The tentacle remained stuck to his neck, neither retreating nor making any further movement.

Yu Xing spoke softly, almost seductively, coaxing the "it" in the darkness, like a false god leading people astray. "Haven't you thought about revenge? Let me take the clues out, and I'll avenge you. I'll make those hypocritical and wicked 'shiny' people experience pain and despair, how about it?"

"They will suffer more than you."

Violence is not a good method.

But at this moment, Yu Xing seemed to have forgotten about order, and in order to achieve his goal, he made a chilling promise.

The tentacles suddenly detached.

The white light returned to bright mode in an instant. Yu Xing raised her hand to shield her eyes, only to find that there was nothing there.

His neck was clean and untouched, without any trace of the sticky tentacles touching it.

But both he and "it" knew it was real.

Yu Xing quietly walked into the light and began to look at the titles of the books in her arms.

After watching for a while, he felt the spying subside, as if the "it" in the darkness had decided to stop attacking and had become curious about him, deciding to observe him for a while before leaving because it was bored.

It's completely safe now.

He curled his lips into a smile before turning his attention to the books. Among these eight books, some were island biographies that should be classified as "geography," while others were "lists of harmful species" related to biology. Seeing the titles, he had a premonition that these clues seemed to be more than just related to the school.

After reviewing the materials, it became even clearer that this school actually possessed a record of the current architectural layout of Dead Silent Island and information about ghosts!

This is a big surprise.

The setting of this school instance is completely different from the original setting of Dead Silent Island, yet it contains such clues. It's true that if you don't think of it, you'll miss it forever.

After receiving the two most concise and comprehensive extracurricular books on "Geography" and "Biology," Yu Xing quickly flipped through them before finally snapping out of her reverie in the third-floor library.

Marvelous.

This was more valuable than he had ever imagined, all the clues he had obtained in this school instance. Was this the benefit of large buildings?

Could irreplaceable clues also be found in places like hospitals and subway stations?

He looked up, his only wish now being to leave the library as soon as possible, carrying with him these two hard-won books that had caused him to be captured by ghosts twice.

Yes, he's taking it with him, and he probably won't be back at the library for a very long time. Even now, he has to avoid the female librarian.

After thinking for a moment, he took two books from another bookshelf and put them into the innermost bookshelf. Then he walked back to the other bookshelf, exerted his strength, and pushed the entire bookshelf over!

The bookshelf made a loud crash, Yu Xing ran to the darkness near the stairwell, crouched down, and waited.

As expected, the noise alerted the female administrator. The sound of her high heels was rapid; she almost rushed over, climbed the stairs, and appeared on the third floor.

"Child, it seems you've gotten into trouble!" The female administrator's voice was tinged with excitement. She thought the bird that had caused the trouble must be cowering in fear deep inside.

She rushed inside, Yu Xing also took the opportunity to run downstairs.

Even while running, he ran very carefully, still following the sound of his high heels. He reached the second floor, and only when he figured the female librarian couldn't hear him anymore did he speed up and rush towards the first floor and the library door, carrying two books in his hands.

The faint light of daylight was just outside the door. He rushed out in one breath, letting out a joyful laugh.

The female administrator is probably still looking for him on the third floor, but unfortunately, she can't find him.

He turned and left the library.