Where was Pei Yanchuan? Where was Su Fengzi? Weren't both classes supposed to have PE together?!
Perhaps because he was too tired, Ye Chu was growing irritable. On his fourth lap around the field, he finally spotted the other class.
Pei Yanchuan spotted Ye Chu the moment he entered the field. For one thing, he had excellent eyesight. For another, at six feet tall, Ye Chu stood out among a crowd of girls. It would have been hard to miss him.
He waved vigorously at Ye Chu, only for his hand to freeze after two waves. "What's wrong?" Su Fengzi looked toward Ye Chu too, then froze.
"Xiao Pei, Feng Zi." Seeing that the PE Teacher wasn't looking their way, Ye Chu sneaked out of the line. Wu You and Lu Rui followed him over and greeted the two frozen boys.
At the sound of his name, Pei Yanchuan blinked slowly. It took him several seconds to recover. "Ye Chu..."
Ye Chu tugged awkwardly at his skirt and glared at the two before him. "Stop looking at my skirt!" His eyes were wide and round, like a cat whose tail had been stepped on.
Pei Yanchuan gave a light cough and looked away. He really hadn't expected Ye Chu to look like this in girls' clothes.
At Ye Chu's words, Su Fengzi only grew more blatant in his scrutiny. "Tsk, tsk, tsk. Chu Chuzi, I never knew you'd look so hot in girls' clothes."
The girls' uniform shirt was fitted, perfectly outlining Ye Chu's lean waist. Beneath his short skirt, his legs were long and straight, his skin fair, his muscles present but not pronounced.
With a figure like that, he could have debuted as an idol on the spot.
[Finally, someone said what I was thinking!]
[Ye Chu is such a hottie!! Drool, drool.]
[Look at Xiao Pei, hahaha. He's completely stunned, hahaha...]
Seeing that Ye Chu was about to bristle, Lu Rui hurriedly changed the subject. "Have you found any clues these past two days?"
Su Fengzi knew when to quit teasing. "Xiao Pei and I went to clean the Laboratory Building last night. The rabbit-headed people we saw were probably Ye Chu and someone else, right?"
Lu Rui nodded. Ye Chu had told them about it that morning, so she knew he had run into the two of them the night before.
"The ritual in the Laboratory Building seems pretty important to the monster setting these rules. We know now that the teachers and some of the students at this school work for it, which means it isn't relying solely on that ritual in the Laboratory Building. It has other ways of gathering power." Su Fengzi produced a stack of test papers from somewhere, folded them into a fan, and fanned the two girls.
Pei Yanchuan stood beside Ye Chu, took off his uniform jacket, and held it up, barely shielding them both from some of the sunlight. "I suspect those other methods might involve normal students like us. It uses certain means to transform students into part of its power. Take the Dormitory Matron's nighttime room inspections, for example. That might be what happened to the students who disappeared."
The others nodded at Pei Yanchuan's theory. Their own thoughts were much the same. The key to the Rules of the Strange Tales was the rules. This monster used rules to restrict them and turn them into its own power.
"Then what's this about leaving the school safely after a month?" Wu You asked, puzzled. "If it sees the students as its own power, why would it be willing to let that power go?"
"As for that..." Ye Chu had barely opened his mouth when the PE Teacher's shrill voice rang out behind him. "You lot over there! Have you finished your five kilometers?! Get running, or I'll add another kilometer!"
Wu You rolled her eyes. "I can't take this anymore. I'm going to grab that thing and beat it up. Who the fuck can run five kilometers in one class?" She marched furiously toward the PE Teacher, only for Lu Rui to hook an arm around her and haul her back.
"We don't know how strong those teachers are yet. Don't act rashly."
Pei Yanchuan quietly raised his hand to add, "Um, the Dormitory Supervisor probably isn't that strong. I can beat him."
Lu Rui/Ye Chu/Wu You: ??? Why did you fight the dormitory supervisor?
There was no time to explain. Seeing that they still hadn't moved, the PE Teacher came over, and they returned to the track and began jogging at a leisurely pace.
Pei Yanchuan briefly summed up what had happened. Wu You's eyes lit up as she listened. "Does that mean I could also..."
Lu Rui hurriedly cut off that train of thought. "No, you can't."
Ye Chu frowned in disapproval too. "That was too risky. What if the dormitory supervisor had been much stronger than you? Were you hurt?"
Su Fengzi was just about to call Pei Yanchuan reckless when he saw the boy lower his eyes and pout, looking for all the world like a good child obediently admitting his mistake. He edged closer to Ye Chu. "I won't do it again."
Su Fengzi: Huzi, what happened to you, Huzi?
"So were you hurt?"
"Yes. It really hurt." Pei Yanchuan moved a little closer to Ye Chu and gave him an aggrieved look. "That Dormitory Warden was vicious with his claws."
Su Fengzi stared at him, dumbfounded. Was this still the Pei Yanchuan who had said, "Making your opponent suffer more is a kind of victory"? Who was this person looking so wronged and begging to be petted? Who?!
[I hereby declare that Pei Yanchuan shall henceforth be renamed Pei the Manipulative Tease.]
[With everyone else: I can take ten at once. With Ye Chu: It hurts~]
[Feng Zi's expression is killing me, hahahahahaha.]
Before they had even finished a lap, they sneaked away again while the PE Teacher wasn't looking and sat on the ground in the shade of the trees to slack off.
They had just hidden behind a tree when they suddenly heard other voices, which sounded rather familiar. Taking a few steps deeper into the grove, they spotted two others who had also hidden there to slack off.
"Xiao Xiao?"
"Zhang Lian?"
The two jumped at the sound of their names, then turned around and sighed in relief when they saw familiar faces. "You came to slack off too?"
Ye Chu sat down, and his brow twitched as he looked at the nameplate on Zhang Lian's chest. Remembering that he hadn't yet looked at Pei Yanchuan's or Su Fengzi's nameplates, he fell silent.
What could he say? It was about what he'd expected.
They exchanged greetings, which served as introductions. "Come on, spread out a bit," Xiao Xiao said, shifting backward. "If we're too close together, we'll be too obvious. The PE Teacher will spot us easily."
The others spread out as well. Leaning against the back of a tree, Ye Chu asked, "Did you only have these four classes before too?" A school with only four classes sounded strange no matter how he looked at it.
Xiao Xiao shook her head. "No, we used to have an English class too. But then, for some reason, the English teacher suddenly stopped coming to class. We've only had four classes a day ever since."
Zhang Lian looked up and thought for a moment, then added, "Oh, right. During English class that day, the Chinese teacher came in and told us, 'Your English teacher is dead. We'll have Chinese this period.'" Perhaps recalling the scene, Zhang Lian shuddered.
Propping his cheek on one hand, Ye Chu looked thoughtfully at Pei Yanchuan. "So the teachers can be killed."
Pei Yanchuan met his gaze, and a smile curled at the corners of his lips.
Before you continue