"Void Targeting"

Seeing no response from Lin Yi, Wei Liang crawled out from under the desk on his own, then waved a hand in front of his face.

"What's wrong? Legs gone numb from squatting? Come on out. It's fine now!" He reached out and pulled Lin Yi out from under the desk.

"Lao Lin, you haven't actually been scared stupid, have you?"

He rubbed Lin Yi's face with both hands.

Lin Yi's head shook like a rattle drum. Just as he was about to shake Wei Liang's hands off, his pupils suddenly contracted violently.

His face went white in an instant.

He saw a classmate curled up in a seat in the Circular Lecture Hall, his body almost embedded in it, facing him.

The classmate's eyes were wide open, but his gaze was hollow and vacant. His lips curved into an enormous grin, stretching almost to his ears like a clown's.

Obsession, madness, dullness... he had crammed contradictory expressions onto a single face in jarring conflict, making him look eerie and terrifying.

Lin Yi wasn't sure whether the classmate was looking at him, but he looked like an evil spirit crouching on a windowsill, staring unblinkingly at the delicious flesh and blood inside a display window.

What truly made Lin Yi's scalp prickle, though, was the portable flashlight he saw in that classmate's hand.

That alone was enough for Lin Yi to be certain that this classmate was the guy who had killed Little Genius after the classroom lights went out!

This was also the classmate who had come at him three times in the darkness, repeatedly struggling with him, trying to catch him!

"What the fuck..."

A shudder ran through Lin Yi's entire body.

Wei Liang noticed this unusual reaction and turned around in puzzlement, following Lin Yi's gaze.

"Lao Lin, what are you look-holy shit!"

The instant Wei Liang saw that classmate, his legs buckled, and he almost died on the spot. Only grabbing Lin Yi's shoulder in time kept him from falling.

Wei Liang didn't dare speak anymore either. Ducking his head, he slowly shuffled aside and leaned against a desk, panting, his face still full of fright.

Lin Yi cautiously leaned a little to his left.

The dull, vacant classmate tilted his neck slightly in the same direction...

Terrified, Lin Yi straightened up, then leaned a little the other way.

Sure enough, the classmate followed his movement again, slowly tilting his neck without blinking once. Even the curve of his lips remained unchanged.

"Fuck, he really is looking at me?!" Lin Yi's hair stood on end. The classroom's warm light fell over him, but all he could feel was cold.

He took off running toward a nearby bookshelf and hid behind it.

That eerie sense of discomfort vanished at that moment.

Lin Yi secretly breathed a sigh of relief.

But it didn't last. Before long, he once again felt that he was being watched.

Following that feeling, he cautiously poked his head out from behind the bookshelf. Sure enough, he found the classmate staring toward his hiding place with hollow eyes and an enormous grin.

A chill swept through Lin Yi. That empty yet icy gaze made his whole body uncomfortable, as though Medusa were staring at him.

He drew a deep breath and tried several different hiding places in succession, but after a brief delay, the classmate's gaze always followed.

It clung to him like a festering sore on the bone.

The longer this went on, the stronger the chill in Lin Yi's heart became.

Gradually, he felt the fine hairs on his arms stand up. Even the air around him seemed filled with countless needles gently pricking his pores...

He scratched his arms, easing the goosebumps a little, but the discomfort barely diminished.

Wei Liang noticed the problem too. Bending low and tiptoeing, he scurried over to Lin Yi in incredibly tiny steps that he himself thought made him inconspicuous, then whispered:

"Lao Lin, have you fucking run into something supernatural?"

Lin Yi was speechless for a moment, but the prickling sensation on his back was so strong that he said, "I'd really like to tell you to trust science, but I genuinely feel awful right now."

"Shit, then what do we do?" Wei Liang asked worriedly.

"I don't know either."

"Huh? You don't know either? Then how did that fucker latch onto you?" Wei Liang gestured with the corner of his mouth and glanced sideways at the classmate.

Wei Liang's arrival distracted Lin Yi, making the sensation fade a little.

He spread his hands and told Wei Liang everything he had heard of Little Genius's death, along with his struggle against that classmate.

"That's what happened. Honestly, I was already lucky to survive."

"What a fucking disaster out of nowhere. That Little Genius really screwed you over!" Wei Liang listened with his heart pounding. Imagining himself in Lin Yi's place left him shaken too.

He stared at Lin Yi with wide, astonished eyes and couldn't help saying, "But seriously, Lao Lin, you're something else. If that had been me, I'd definitely be gone already!"

"Oh, but then again-and again and again-why do you think that classmate locked onto you? From everything you've said, he sounds like he's blind despite having his eyes open. Could he be using... 'Void Targeting'?"

Void Targeting, my fucking ass! Lin Yi grumbled inwardly, then said speechlessly, "If it's really that supernatural, aren't you afraid he'll target you too if you stay beside me?"

Wei Liang shrugged and admitted, "I'm scared of getting caught in the crossfire, but I still feel safer with two of us together. Besides, wasn't I hiding under the desk right next to you earlier? Nothing happened to me, did it?"

Lin Yi froze, immediately puzzled. "Right. Why didn't anything happen to you? We were so close. Didn't you hear Little Genius die?"

"I did!"

"Did you hear Little Genius's body fall, then?"

"I heard that too..."

"Fuck... you heard all of it, and you didn't feel a thing?" Lin Yi stepped back and looked Wei Liang up and down. "Are you... really that unflappable?"

Lin Yi had hoped to get some inspiration from what Wei Liang had done, only to discover that Wei Liang hadn't done anything at all!

Wait...?!

Didn't do anything?

"Liangzi, after the power went out, you hid under the desk. Then what? You didn't do anything?"

"Right! I just stared at the desk leg, then thought about-you know... hehehe, that kind of stuff!"

"..."

"Although, I might have a very unique technique for staring at desk legs. Not sure whether that has anything to do with it."

"Oh?" Lin Yi looked at him curiously. "What technique?"

"Hehe, watch!"

Wei Liang held up a finger in front of his face, then slowly moved it toward his nose. His eyes widened, then rolled inward, going cross-eyed.

"Like this, I can't see anything except the desk leg! Even if the king of heaven himself showed up, all I'd see would be one desk leg!"

Lin Yi: "..."

"Well? Anything you can learn from that?" Wei Liang asked with a chuckle.

He closed his eyes and shook his head. "The only drawback is that your eyes get sore after a while, but it's fine once you get used to it."

Lin Yi sighed deeply, torn in countless ways, before finally saying helplessly, "I never would have imagined you had a bizarre little trick like that up your sleeve."

Wei Liang waved a hand. "Just a cheap trick. Never thought I'd actually get to put it to use... why don't you try?"

Lin Yi shook his head. "Forget it."

"Hey! Don't do that. It might actually work!" Wei Liang said seriously.

Unable to withstand Wei Liang's insistence, Lin Yi could only cross his eyes once.

Wei Liang burst out laughing and couldn't help saying, "Lao Lin, making that face looks like it dropped your IQ by 250!"

Lin Yi sneered and was about to retort when he suddenly froze.

"Hmm?!" Lin Yi shook his head, his eyes returning to normal, and looked startled.

"Huh? What do you mean, hmm?" Wei Liang paused.

"This-?!" Lin Yi narrowed his eyes in thought, then his expression turned serious.

"Shit, did you figure something out?" Wei Liang asked excitedly. "Was it inspiration from this genius... pfft, no, no! From this young master?"

Lin Yi nodded. "As much as I hate to admit it, yes."

When he had crossed his eyes just now, Lin Yi noticed that everything in his vision had become distorted except for a single point. In the darkness, even if that classmate actually came right up to him, he might see nothing but a tangled mess.

Once he could no longer jump at shadows, and filled his mind with completely unrelated things, sounds alone would make it very difficult to think of anything eerie.

Using this method, Wei Liang had severed his connection to that eerie environment the instant he grabbed the desk leg!

"That really is brilliant, but it's also genuinely ridiculous."

"I think it's like this..." Lin Yi intended to share his analysis with Wei Liang, but Wei Liang waved his hands repeatedly. "Hey, wait, wait, wait! I don't want to hear it!"

"Huh?"

"What do you mean, huh? I don't want to know anything. Hehehe. I just need to know the most basic rules. As for everything else... the less I know, the better."

Wei Liang smiled, his eyes beneath the messy hair under his baseball cap carrying a profound, wise look.

Lin Yi felt increasingly certain that Wei Liang hadn't survived last time through luck alone.

At times like this, for example, Wei Liang seemed to be contemplating something extremely profound...

Sure enough, Wei Liang raised a hand and pointed behind Lin Yi. "Lao Lin, those books have pretty good covers... since you've figured it out, how about we read some manga and spend this long night in the wonderful world of harem manga?"

Lin Yi opened his mouth. So Wei Liang's profound gaze just now had been him picking out manga...?

"Impressive..."

"Hey, quit spacing out! Come on, let's pick some manga!" Wei Liang tugged at Lin Yi's clothes and urged him, "Remember what Xu Shunkang and the others said? The more you think, the more dangerous it gets. Come on, let's read manga. If the lights go out later, just use my method!"

"All right..." Unable to resist Wei Liang's tugging, Lin Yi let himself be dragged to the bookshelf with a wry smile.

A short while later, Lin Yi and Wei Liang left the bookshelf area, each carrying some manga.

As they passed through the desk area, Lin Yi noticed that the legs of every desk were fastened into the floor tiles. This design turned the desks into makeshift shelters to a certain extent.

So that guy really was trying to overturn the desk earlier, but only gave up because it was fixed in place? Not because I held it steady?

He also noticed obvious impact marks on one of the desks. Looking closely, he could even make out a trace of blood on its surface.

That was the desk Little Genius's body had struck, and beneath its top...

Lin Yi's pupils contracted.

Just as I thought!

Near the top of the desk legs were clearly visible white scratches, as though someone had scraped them with plaster.

That was the very desk Lin Yi had hidden beneath earlier. Meanwhile, the desk Wei Liang had hidden beneath... really was completely untouched.

Lin Yi couldn't help feeling some admiration for Wei Liang.

As they passed through the desk area, he also noticed an identical note stuck to every desk. It read:

[Except for Art Students, all other students are forbidden from sitting at the desks to read.]

Lin Yi was slightly taken aback, but immediately noticed something strange-the rear of this enormous Circular Lecture Hall was filled with desks, yet not a single person sat there.

Everyone sat on the folding chairs in the Circular Lecture Hall, reading books placed on the fold-down writing tablets.

So that's why no one sits over here?

Lin Yi had no time to think further. Holding his manga, he followed Wei Liang back to their original seats.

After setting down the manga, Lin Yi lowered his head to check his watch.

23:45.

"Only 23:45?"

Although it had only been 22:43 the last time he looked down at his watch, the time since then had truly felt as long as a century.

Yet only an hour had passed?

He leaned back slightly, resting his full weight against the backrest, then looked at the ceiling and let out a long sigh.

"What a long night..."

Worry flickered in his eyes, while the sound of turning pages suddenly reached his ears.

Beside him, Wei Liang had already started reading a collected manga volume, looking radiant and full of life.

"Well... apparently not for someone."

He took a deep breath, then rubbed his arms.

"What, still feeling awful?" Wei Liang asked as he turned a page.

Lin Yi raised his eyebrows and said helplessly, "Anyone would feel uncomfortable being stared at, never mind by a gaze like that."

Wei Liang glanced back at the classmate, then shrugged and said half-jokingly, "What can you do? Now isn't the time to think up countermeasures either... huh, what's that look on your face?"

Lin Yi narrowed his eyes, his thoughts unknown, but Wei Liang felt that he wasn't pondering a problem-he had thought of something.

"Do you... have an idea?"

Lin Yi looked back at the classmate, then turned to Wei Liang. He stretched, stared into Wei Liang's eyes, and said each word distinctly, "Do you think... there's any way to stop him paying attention to me?"