So Envious of Someone Like You

"Of course not." Yu Xing sat down on the edge of the bed with a relaxed expression. "I knew I'd be the first suspect. How could I possibly bring back any evidence under these circumstances?"

"What exactly is that book?" Zhao Yijiu had wanted to ask for a long time. He had never seen a dungeon item cause an NPC to lose their composure like this, requiring such a large-scale investigation.

"You'll find out once I get it back." Yu Xing smiled, glancing at Zhao Yijiu's table. "Anyway, those two shouldn't be coming up anytime soon. Tell me first, what did you hear at the office door?"

The dormitory curtains had been drawn when they left, and the room was dimly lit by a common area light.

Zhao Yijiu repeated almost everything he heard without omitting a single word, because he was afraid that his summary would overlook some key points from the original statement.

Why is it just not good-looking?

Downstairs in the dormitory supervisor's office, the female dorm supervisor held up a half-finished wooden carving and placed it in front of Zhao Mou and Wen Qinghuai. Her slender finger pointed to the eye area of the carved baby's head. "Look here, it'll be ruined if I carve it any further."

Wen Qinghuai examined the wood carving. Indeed, the craftsmanship was very rough, and the sculptor's inexperience was evident. In some places, he couldn't even tell that it was carved with a carving knife; it looked more like the result of violently scratching with fingernails.

"What can we do to help you?" Zhao Mou quickly got into character after accepting reality. At this moment, the female dorm supervisor was still sitting in her chair, while he and Wen Qinghuai were standing to the side.

It was their first time entering the duty room. From the outside, the duty room didn't look very big, but once inside, you could really tell that the description of it as "not big" was a bit of an exaggeration.

This place is so small it's almost painful.

"I want to make a perfect wood carving. Look, just make it like this." The female dorm supervisor his cabinet and took out a fluffy thing. The two recognized it as the wool felt she had made at noon.

This felted object is the same size as the half of the wooden carving in the aluminum-plastic tube's hand. The baby's face is lifelike. In addition to the head, there is a small, seemingly malnourished body attached to the bottom, with its limbs curled up and wrinkled together. It is a deformed fetus.

"How about this, I'll re-carve an outline, and you can familiarize yourselves with the baby's appearance. Then you can help me carve the face, okay?" she said, and without further ado, she stuffed the felted wool baby into Wen Qinghuai's hands.

"..." Wen Qinghuai felt that the thing that was stuffed into his hand was covered in hair, which was a bit creepy to the touch. The hair seemed to be constantly wriggling in his palm, and he even had the illusion that it was growing and taking root, which was even more disgusting than it looked.

After handing them the items, the female dorm supervisor lowered her head and began carving her work again on a piece of wood, appearing completely absorbed and unconcerned about how the two men standing there intended to observe her.

Anyway, she's already given the task, and she's acting like she doesn't care about the process, only the result.

The carving knife scraped against the wood, making a swishing sound. Zhao Mou remembered hearing a different sound when they approached; it was more like the gnawing of wood. He couldn't help but glance at the female dorm supervisor's teeth, feeling that before they appeared in the duty room, female dorm supervisor had been gnawing on wood...

But the female dorm supervisor's profile was very serene. She had delicately applied colored lipstick to her lips, which were closed, so her teeth were not visible.

As Zhao Mou was pondering this, he suddenly caught a glimpse of Wen Qinghuai taking a few steps back while holding the felted baby, trying to shove the baby into his hands. He quickly put his hands behind his back and mouthed, "Don't even think about giving it to me."

Wen Qinghuai sighed.

The two had no choice but to lean back together, keeping a safe distance from the female dorm supervisor, their legs touching the bed female dorm supervisor had placed in the corner of the room.

He whispered, "This wool felt... it's actually quite well-stitched."

Zhao Mou peeked out and looked at it for a while, then nodded in agreement.

The felted wool is exquisitely crafted; the baby's eyes are glued on with a black, semi-transparent, hard material of unknown origin, giving them a dark and eerie appearance. When people look at this felted baby, they feel as if the baby is looking back at them.

"It's not the dorm supervisor's fault for not carving well; wool felting and wood carving are two completely opposite processes." Wen Qinghuai knew the female dorm supervisor could hear them, so she could only try to say something useful. "Wool felting is done from scratch, by prying wool bit by bit onto it. If it's not enough, you can add wool; if there's too much, you can pick it out. Wood carving, on the other hand, is done from scratch. You have to be careful when you've determined the outline. If you cut off an extra piece of scrap material, the whole outline might be ruined."

He didn't know if Zhao Mou understood this knowledge, so he was speaking partly to Zhao Mou and partly to the female dorm supervisor.

"You're very knowledgeable about carving," the female dorm supervisor interjected, sounding rather pleased.

"These are just common sense." Wen Qinghuai smiled modestly, but his words were rather straightforward.

Zhao Mou said, "Winter is very talented, but unfortunately I'm not skilled in carving. I'll help Winter out later."

As a master of intelligence gathering, how could he not know that Wen Qinghuai's real-life profession was a sculptor?

The source of this information was Yu Xing. Back when Yu Xing was doing the deduction in Alice's Hell, he guessed Wen Qinghuai's background from the stone statues and sculptures in the hall. After the deduction ended, Wen Qinghuai did not hide it from Yu Xing and admitted his profession.

It could be said that the female dorm supervisor's punishment just happened to fall into the hands of a professional.

"Great, I'm about to have a perfect baby sculpture." The female dorm supervisor turned around and smiled at them with delight. Zhao Mou's eyes flashed behind his glasses as he noticed her motionless legs.

Wen Qinghuai was in charge of the carving, so he had to take this opportunity to get some information back. At that moment, Zhao Mou began to carefully look around, searching for anything that shouldn't be there.

An orange-yellow lamp sat on the bedside table. Patches of plaster had peeled off the walls, and the corners of the wooden bed were uneven, revealing tiny holes.

Opposite the bed was an iron shelf, on which were placed a few books and more miscellaneous items, mostly common and simple things.

Aside from these, the only furniture in the room was a table and chair set that the female dorm supervisor was using. The table had drawers, and it was unknown what was inside.

These things filled the small room, leaving him and Wen Qinghuai with very little space to move around; the only feeling was one of crampedness and confinement.

It's so small... why is it so small?

Zhao Mou raised questions about this.

Not only is it small, but it's also very dilapidated. Judging from the era of this story, the school should be in a relatively new stage, and their dormitories are very clean. Why is it that the living conditions of the dormitory manager, a school staff member, are so much worse than those of the students, even though they live in the same building?

"Alright, now it's up to you." The female dorm supervisor's voice interrupted Zhao Mou's observation. He saw that the female supervisor had sculpted the outline with remarkable speed. With such skill, it was hard to believe that she couldn't sculpt facial features well.

Zhao Mou had a sudden inspiration and asked before the female dorm supervisor handed the wooden carving to Wen Qinghuai, "Carving this requires a steady hand, so standing is definitely not an option. Could the dormitory supervisor let him sit for a while?"

Wen Qinghuai understood and cooperated, saying, "This table is quite suitable. Let me sit for a while, dorm supervisor. I guarantee I can carve something very beautiful for you."

The two of them just wanted the female dorm supervisor to get up from her chair.

Something just doesn't look right. It's like she's rooted to the chair; it wouldn't be an exaggeration to say she's grown there.

The female dorm supervisor hesitated for two seconds, seemingly moved by Wen Qinghuai's comment that the carving was very beautiful. After a moment, she unexpectedly nodded in agreement.

"Alright then, come sit here."

As she spoke, she used her legs to support herself and moved the chair back a little, then stood up.

The lady's elegant skirt trailed on the ground, obscuring her feet. The female dorm supervisor shifted her legs, moving from the chair to where the two were now standing. Zhao Mou watched this strange gait thoughtfully.

It's not that her buttocks are rooted to the chair, but rather that her "feet" under her skirt are rooted to the ground...

Wen Qinghuai naturally saw this scene as well. On the surface, he showed no sign of anything amiss. He took the wood carving and tools, sat down on the female dorm supervisor's wooden chair, which was cold and showed no signs of having been sat on.

He no longer needed to hold the wool felt, and the wool felt baby was naturally placed on the tabletop. Perhaps the Wen Qinghuai put it down, it rolled over and became a side-lying position facing him.

It was as if... they were very interested in Wen Qinghuai's next carving.

The female dorm supervisor only had one carving tool, which was not suitable for real carving. However, Wen Qinghuai was a professional. He carefully adjusted the angle of the carving tool and quickly carved lifelike facial features on the baby's face, which looked very much like wool felt.

Zhao Mou stood almost shoulder to shoulder with the female dorm supervisor. He could feel a deathly chill through the sleeves of her thin school uniform shirt, and as he listened carefully, he seemed to hear a barely perceptible crawling sound coming from under female dorm supervisor skirt.

Gnawing marks, crawling... the pits and dents on the wooden bed, the damage to the walls...

When these phenomena are put together, an answer emerges before Zhao Mou's eyes.

Mouse.

The female dorm supervisor's room was filled with signs of rats.

Moreover, these rats may very well be hiding under the female dorm supervisor's skirt, or perhaps the female dorm supervisor herself is a rat or a group of rats in disguise!

Thinking about this, and then looking at the sweet-smiling female dorm supervisor, Zhao Mou got goosebumps and felt extremely disgusted.

Although this is just speculation, his speculations are generally quite accurate; it's just that there's no crucial evidence to prove it right now.

Zhao Mou suddenly felt a pang of envy for Yu Xing's ability to stir up trouble. If Yu Xing were standing here right now, she would probably have just reached out and lifted Yu Xing's skirt.

Unfortunately Yu Xing was confident he could get away with his bad deeds, but he wasn't so sure.

"Dormitory supervisor, why are you so determined to carve a baby?" Wen Qinghuai asked, her hands moving steadily and quickly as she carved facial features, wood shavings falling with each stroke, while she still had the energy to spare to try and gather information.

This question was actually similar to the one Yu Xing asked, but the female dorm supervisor didn't answer Yu Xing at the time; instead, she changed the subject.

Now that the wood carving was almost finished, the female dorm supervisor no longer hid it, beaming as she held it to her chest with both hands. "This is my husband."

Wen Qinghuai paused, and both he and Zhao Mou adopted strange expressions.

They were speculating about the child, but they couldn't connect this deformed baby with the female dorm supervisor's husband.

"Why is your husband...?" Zhao Mou didn't quite understand. Was he an infant? A wooden sculpture? A deformed child? Every option seemed out of place when connected to the word "husband."

"You don't understand." The female dorm supervisor wore a strange, blissful expression. Zhao Mou tried to analyze this expression using the same methods he used to analyze human expressions, but he got an even stranger answer: she wasn't happy.

Or perhaps the female dorm supervisor, who was discussing this issue at that moment, didn't want to smile, but something deeply ingrained in her mind had created a conditioned reflex.

His intuition told him he couldn't keep asking; this wasn't a good time. If he continued, it might trigger the dormitory supervisor's murderous intent.

He waited silently for Wen Qinghuai to finish carving.

But that tiny crawling sound, once heard, never stopped, constantly reminding him of its presence.

Isabella, are my eyes beautiful?

In the girls' dormitory, which rivals the boys' dormitory, Qu Xuanqing sat half-sitting on her bed, a pale face looming in front of her.

The large eyes had no whites; the pupils took up all the space, making the owner of these eyes look like an insect with a human face... kind of like a spider.

"Beautiful." Qu Xuanqing said calmly, looking at the girl who was mostly leaning against her, she leaned back slightly to avoid the girl's face getting too close. "Just as beautiful as this morning."

"Are my hands pretty?" The girl shrank back and raised her limbs. Her school uniform shirt sleeves were empty, but four sharp spider legs covered with hard shells protruded from the hem of the shirt.

A red armband was tied to the base of one of the thinner spider legs.

"It looks good," Qu Xuanqing replied calmly, "It makes you look very slim."

"Hehe, really? But why doesn't anyone want to talk to me?" The girl with the red armband, who had mutated into half a spider, looked puzzled, with a hint of doubt about Qu Xuanqing's answer.

The other two roommates had already drawn the curtains of their cubicle, turned on a small lamp, and were trying their best to read and block out the noise from this side.

They all knew that their roommate was no longer human.

My roommate, who used to act like a tyrant after becoming a red armband wearer, has become a terrifying species, just like those unseen things during evening self-study sessions. Even the teachers allow her to skip class, ostensibly out of consideration for her exhaustion, but in reality, they are imprisoning her in the dormitory, waiting for her to die.

Qu Xuanqing replied, "I don't know what they think, but you asked me, and I think you're still as beautiful and slim as ever."

I really envy you.