"Ah? Oh."
Meng Jixi looked at the spot Master Xiao had been watching. Master Xiao's words from moments ago kept replaying in his mind.
He had a vague feeling that he almost understood.
"Master Xiao."
Seeing that Master Xiao showed no sign of explaining on his own, Meng Jixi finally couldn't help speaking up.
"Those students didn't kill themselves? They were murdered?"
"They killed themselves."
Xiao Xiao's answer left Meng Jixi stunned. "Huh?"
"They had already begun thinking about ending their lives."
The Hanging Ghost only approached people who wanted to die, clinging to them. "Then some ill-intentioned person noticed and took advantage of the opportunity."
It watched them die.
When they hesitated, it didn't mind giving them a push.
"It was just that, to begin with, the thought might have been no more than a moment of madness brought on by a rash impulse."
"Maybe they were serious in that moment."
"But once the moment had passed, they lost the courage to kill themselves."
"They might even have wondered how they could ever have had such a terrible thought."
"But the interference of an outside force took away their chance to regret it."
"Before their turbulent emotions had time to cool, they were egged on to hang themselves."
Meng Jixi fell silent.
They'd already been thinking about ending their lives?
So this was what they meant by a single moment making all the difference?
If they had been strong-willed, they would have been like Ye Xiaomeng. They wouldn't have let outside influences cloud their minds and ended their lives so easily.
"Um... that ill-intentioned person—"
"Was it the Hanging Ghost?"
Meng Jixi asked hesitantly. Thinking of how the students had killed themselves, he had a rough idea what the creature's name meant.
"Yes.