At first, everyone thought it was a prank.
Someone brazenly pushed open the classroom door and stood in the corridor, looking around.
"What kind of cringe nonsense is that?"
The boy in the corridor scoffed.
A few bold students from the other classes also stepped out, showing their classmates how clearheaded and brave they were.
Of course, the players knew this was a world of ghosts and monsters. No matter how absurd or bizarre something was, it could happen here.
Naturally, they stayed obediently in the classroom, waiting to see what happened next.
Just as most of the class breathed a sigh of relief,
the boy in the corridor dropped to the floor.
His eyes were wide open, a bloody hole in his forehead. They could even make out the bright red brain tissue inside.
"Aaaah!!!"
Screams erupted throughout the classroom.
Liang Chen, who had insisted on staying from the start, looked thrilled. "A perfect wound! Smooth edges! Even the brain tissue inside is pristine!"
Yin Chao finally understood why Bai Yu had called Liang Chen a lunatic with unusual interests.
He probably pursued the ultimate in slaughter, which explained his admiration for someone like Midnight, who started massacring people at the slightest provocation.
As the people around him recovered, they all looked at Liang Chen as though he were insane.
Yin Chao was very familiar with those looks. They had followed him throughout his childhood.
But he had never cared.
Why should he?
Yin Rui had once followed everyone else's advice and taken him to a psychologist, who said he had an emotional deficiency.
Nothing interested him. Even things that brought others great joy or grief felt meaningless to him. He acted indifferently and lacked empathy.
Yet Yin Rui had been happy at the time.
She had stroked his head and told him he was a little monster, just like her and Shang Yi.
At that memory, Yin Chao let out a quiet scoff.
Now, no matter how he looked at it, Yin Rui's behavior seemed strange. She was nothing like the normal parents he had learned about at school.
Perhaps the Evil God was cold by nature.
As for Shang Yi, he was the person Yin Rui had defied her nature to love.
The broadcast sounded again. No one dared dismiss the rules anymore.
A strange, cackling laugh echoed through every corner of the campus.
"Now, everyone, go to the assembly hall. Remember to sit with your class!"
At the broadcast's next instruction, the teachers organized everyone and led them to the assembly hall.
Apparently, it happened to be the period when final-year students attended extra classes, so theirs were the only classes in the entire school.
There was more than enough room for them to sit in separate sections in the assembly hall.
Yin Chao calmly sat beside Linmu, earning an eye roll from him.
Midnight sat next, followed by Liang Chen.
Yin Chao looked through the packed crowd and spotted the vice principal, Director He, and the others, who had been so arrogant moments ago, huddling miserably among Zhang Di's class, trying to make themselves as inconspicuous as possible.
Once everyone was seated, the voice, neither male nor female, came from the podium in the assembly hall.
"Begin. In ten minutes, I want to see each class's chosen 'scapegoat' standing in front of the stage."
Everyone exchanged looks, unsure what a scapegoat meant.
The broadcast said, "A 'scapegoat,' of course. Choose one to bear the sins, and I will judge them. Hahahaha... honestly... just thinking about it gets me excited..."
"There is a stack of paper and a pen beneath each of your seat cushions. Write down a name anonymously, and I will send the adjudicators to collect them. Remember, do not try to persuade or threaten anyone. You will be judged for that too..."
As soon as the voice finished, everyone rummaged beneath their cushions.
Sure enough, there were paper and pens beneath every seat.
Then what were these adjudicators?
Yin Chao wondered.
He looked up and saw twelve figures in black robes and animal masks emerge from both sides of the hall.
Rat, ox, tiger, rabbit, dragon, snake, horse, goat, monkey, rooster, dog, pig.
The masks were modeled on the twelve zodiac animals, but looked far more grotesque and eerie.
Lowering his head, Yin Chao wrote down a name without a moment's hesitation.
Liang Chen was craning his neck to see what Midnight had written when angry shouting came from the neighboring class.
"You wrote my name? Change it right now! Who told you to write your teacher's name, you ungrateful brat!"
Director He pointed at the boy beside him, cursing furiously.
The boy kept his head down, meekly taking the abuse.
Thick black-framed glasses and a face covered in acne were practically the hallmarks of students like him, who had almost no presence.
The next second, Director He's mouth hung open as a thumb-sized bloody hole appeared between his eyebrows.
He had not even had time to wipe that lecturing expression off his face.
Blood streamed down his face, and he fell dead in front of everyone.
"Aaaah!!!"
The nearby students clung to each other and screamed in terror.
The vice principal, who was closest to Director He, slid off his chair, his crotch soaked.
The stench of urine mingled with blood spread through the air.
Yin Chao's brows drew together slightly, and he wrinkled his nose in disgust.
He badly wanted to cross out the name on his paper and replace it with the vice principal's.
So filthy. Better off dead.
The screaming only stopped completely when that voice, neither male nor female, sounded over the speakers.
"Didn't I tell you? Follow the rules, or die."
The ox-headed figure grabbed Director He's corpse by the feet and dragged it away like garbage.
A vivid, glaring trail of blood remained on the floor.
Then the black-robed figure in the rabbit mask came down to collect the slips bearing everyone's chosen names.
The slips were tipped into a black top hat half a person's height, and the rabbit-headed figure began reading out each name in a hoarse voice.
The process was dull and tedious.
Yet everyone listened intently, terrified they might hear their own name.
At last, the classes' "scapegoats" were selected and stood in front of the stage.
There were boys and girls among them.
One of them was Zhang Di.
"I was wrong! I really was wrong! Please, spare me!"
He knelt on the floor, trying to persuade the black-robed figure in the goat mask before him to show mercy and let him go.
But the goat-headed figure's towering body remained motionless. The figure did not even lower that masked head to glance at him.
The broadcast sounded. "Let the judgment begin."
The goat-headed figure walked past Zhang Di and stopped before the person at the far left.
Then the figure raised a right hand, likewise clad in a black leather glove, seized the boy by the throat, and lifted him off the ground.
No amount of kicking made any difference.
"Yang Yu. A bully who preyed on the weak and feared the strong. Frequently bullied his classmates. After Gao Louyu rejected his advances, he spread rumors about her, setting off the chain of events that led to her death."
The broadcast read out the charges without emotion.
As soon as it finished, Yang Yu's eyes became bloodshot, and he was strangled to death.
Yin Chao also noticed that many people's faces changed when the broadcast spoke Gao Louyu's name.
While the goat-headed figure moved to the next person, he took the opportunity to ask Linmu.
"Who was Gao Louyu?"
Linmu looked at him and said expressionlessly, "Gao Chao's younger sister. Like Xu Qianqian, she jumped off a building and died."
No wonder Gao Chao had reacted so strongly when he heard that Xu Qianqian had jumped to her death.
Yin Chao understood.
Onstage, the goat-headed figure continued slaughtering the "scapegoats" while the broadcast announced their crimes one by one.
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