Professor

The next morning.

Chen Feng followed the Imposter Trainees from his dorm room to a classroom on the second floor.

He pushed the door open, but Bing, the goat-headed teacher Yellow Hair had mentioned, was nowhere in sight.

Did those three kill him?

With that thought, Chen Feng went to the desk in the corner.

A book, a notebook, and a black gel pen lay on it.

Chen Feng opened the book. It was filled with classical prose and poetry.

When he opened the notebook, he found a slip of paper tucked inside.

There really is a secret.

He looked closer. It was a map of the Internet Addiction Rehabilitation School!

First came the Internet Addiction Rehabilitation Building, where Chen Feng was now. Professor Sheep's office and the electric shock room were on the third floor, the cafeteria and classrooms on the second, and the dormitories and bathrooms on the first.

Behind the building was the confinement area—the dark room where Chen Feng had been locked up. Beyond it lay the psychiatric sanatorium. A skull was drawn over it, with a note underneath: "In an emergency, you can pretend to be insane to get in. But no one who's gone inside has ever come back."

In Yellow Hair's way of ranking the dangers here, Rabbit Nurse was the final boss. The sanatorium really did seem even more dangerous than the school.

In front of the building was the athletic field, and it was no simple matter either. The map stated that a ghostly maze appeared there at night, making it impossible to cross. You needed the key from Professor Sheep's office to get through.

Chen Feng realized at once that it was just like the real and fake third floors of Happiness Internet Cafe. The key was the way through the hidden door.

Beyond the field stood the school gate. Electrified walls surrounded it, too high to climb while the power was on. Beside the gate was the Pig-Headed Man's guardroom, marked with a skull to warn against confronting him head-on.

Can't face him head-on? Then I can go around him.

The walls are electrified, so I can't climb them. But what if the power's out?

Thinking of last night's blackout, Chen Feng guessed the three of them must have stolen the office key, cut the school's power, and climbed over the wall.

If they could do it, I should be able to as well.

Chen Feng pretended to read all morning, then ate lunch.

That afternoon, it was time for physical training under the Pig-Headed Man's supervision again.

"Horse stance, burp! Horizontal strike."

"Hmph!"

"Inward block, burp! Rising hook!"

"Ha!"

The Pig-Headed Man was acting strangely today. He kept belching and swayed as he walked, as if he'd had too much to drink.

An hour into training, a tall, thin figure in a white coat with a goat's head came in from the direction of the school gate.

So that's the professor everyone talks about?

Professor Sheep was so thin that Chen Feng thought the Pig-Headed Man could flatten him with one punch. Yet as Professor Sheep approached, the Pig-Headed Man trembled all over and grew visibly tense.

That monster makes the ground shake when he walks, and he's afraid?

Professor Sheep held out a hand. With a crackling sound, an arc of lightning shot out.

The Pig-Headed Man convulsed and fell unconscious.

After disciplining Pig Instructor, Professor Sheep glanced at the trainees and said in a kindly voice, "Last night, two naughty children tried to run away. I've put so much effort into keeping them from going astray. Why can't they understand that I only want what's best for them?"

Two?

Weren't there three?

Chen Feng frowned, worried for Li Guolong and the others.

Professor Sheep clapped his hands, and Imposter Trainees brought two people forward. "After some corrective instruction, I believe they've seen the error of their ways. They won't be naughty children again."

Chen Feng recognized Yellow Hair and the fat man immediately. But now their faces were expressionless, their smiles vacant. They looked exactly like the other Imposters.

They had both been turned into monsters!

Why are there only two? Where's Li Guolong? Did he escape, or is he dead?

Questions spun through Chen Feng's mind.

But Professor Sheep offered no explanation. He strode off the field.

That afternoon, after training ended.

Chen Feng went straight to the fat man and Yellow Hair. "Hey, do you remember me?"

Neither of them reacted. Their faces remained calm.

It seemed that turning into monsters had cost them their humanity and their memories.

Chen Feng tried to stir Yellow Hair's memory. "Yellow Hair! Wake up! Don't you remember wanting to escape and become a professional player?"

At those words, Yellow Hair jolted. At last, a reaction!

It's working!

Chen Feng was about to continue when Yellow Hair raised his hand and reported to Pig Instructor, "Going online makes you a naughty child."

So Chen Feng had to stand alone on the field for another hour as punishment.

At dinnertime.

Looking at Yellow Hair and the fat man, now transformed into Imposters, Chen Feng came up with another idea.

The Mythic Three Kingdoms System had a Blessing that could restore them to normal.

Hua Tuo's Blessing: Qing Pouch.

A green pouch was a cloth bag ancient physicians used to carry medical texts. Legend held that before Cao Cao executed the divine physician Hua Tuo, Hua Tuo filled a pouch with his medical writings and gave it to a prison guard. Because it contained everything he had learned about medicine, the collection became known as the "Green Pouch Classic."

The Green Pouch Blessing could completely heal one living being at the cost of one point.

Chen Feng weighed the options.

Using Green Pouch to save them would cost two points. Once they recovered, he could learn why their escape had failed last night. He might even find out how Li Guolong had managed to get away!

If he spent those points on loading a save instead, he could save both of them for one point and get a new system as a bonus.

I'd miss out on the information, but if I go with them in the next loop, won't I find out why they failed?

For the next few days, Chen Feng followed the routine.

Classes, physical training, early nights, and early mornings.

To be fair, aside from the three daily meals that weren't fit for human consumption, it wasn't so bad here.

Given how dangerous Cihang City was, even if he escaped, he might end up trapped in some other hellhole. At Happiness Internet Cafe, for instance, one wrong move and the woman at the front desk would eat him for dessert.

It's like a bird in a cage. It loses its freedom, but it gains safety.

As long as I follow the rules, at least I won't have to worry about dying at any moment.

The more Chen Feng thought about it, the more something felt wrong. He just couldn't put his finger on it.

Then one day, he saw the girl with glasses had been turned into an Imposter Model Student.

Strange. She didn't break any rules.

Not only that, she was always reporting other trainees' rule violations to the Drill Instructor. She was the model of a model student. Why would she be punished?

Wait. Model student!

Does obeying the rules here long enough get you assimilated and turned into a Model Student?

Chen Feng remembered the film The Shawshank Redemption. It had talked about a concept called institutionalization.

Put simply, when someone first entered prison, they hated it. Gradually, they got used to it, until they eventually found they could no longer survive outside.

That was institutionalization.

Likewise, anyone who submitted to the rules here would gradually turn into a monster without realizing it.

Chen Feng promptly slapped his right cheek to snap himself out of it.

"Wake up!"

"Don't forget, those bastards locked me up for seven fucking days! Seven whole days!"

Chen Feng swore to himself that he would take revenge on those bastards.

That day soon came.

A few nights later, rain poured down in sheets.

Thunder rumbled across the sky. Chen Feng, who had been feigning sleep in the dormitory, opened his eyes. It was time to raise hell.

[Rainy weather detected. Summoning Water Ghost... Summon successful!]

Footprints appeared out of nowhere on the athletic field, and the air around them suddenly turned cold.

Chen Feng opened the dormitory door, pointed at his Imposter roommates, and gave his order:

"Old Water, kill them."

"Yes, all of them. Leave none alive."