The classmate's killing logic

Lin Yi wanted to look too, but he did not.

Yet the more he restrained himself, the more unbearably restless he became.

Finally, he decided to do something productive that would definitely bring his attention back-review what had happened.

So he took a deep breath and closed the manga. His eyes fixed on the nurse on its cover, while he applied the survival conclusion he had deduced to everything that had happened after the classroom lights flickered, analyzing it anew to find why that classmate had locked onto him.

Fortunately, Lin Yi had a habit of checking his watch, so when he began his review, he could match most of the details to their times.

"If I remember correctly, the classroom lights went out completely before 22:00. At exactly ten, that thing outside the door walked into the classroom."

"Judging from what the Security Guard did later, that thing seemed to stay at the lectern after entering the classroom..."

"It might have moved, but I'll assume it stayed at the lectern for now."

That thing did not affect his review, so Lin Yi did not focus on it.

"At 22:02, that Little Genius turned on his flashlight... then that classmate found him and killed him..."

"The flashlight fell to the floor, sweeping over me. That classmate saw me when he bent down to pick it up, then went back and forth with me three times..."

"After that, the classmate wandered around the classroom dragging Little Genius's corpse. The other classmates who weren't right left their seats one after another, and then the classroom filled with screams..."

"At 22:43, the Security Guard came and took the thing at the lectern out of the classroom. After the classroom door closed, the lights gradually returned to normal..."

"The lights seemed to start flickering before the Security Guard appeared. I can't determine whether that had anything to do with him yet..."

During his first review, the entire sequence flashed through his mind like a movie on fast-forward. He seemed to discover nothing after going through it once.

"Something seems wrong. I feel like I've missed something crucial?" Lin Yi could not help frowning.

Fortunately, evening study might have lacked many things, but time was not one of them. Lin Yi soon began his second review.

After his second review, he found three points:

[1. Little Genius turned on his flashlight, attracting the first classmate to leave his seat, and was killed by that classmate.]

[2. The classmate picked up the flashlight and saw him, but did not find him, much less kill him.]

[3. The other classmates seemed to have been injured.]

But there was no logical connection between these three points. Lin Yi could only continue with a third review, a fourth, a fifth...

Yet after reviewing it repeatedly, he suddenly realized something-that classmate had not actually seen him while picking up the flashlight!

"That classmate was blind. He couldn't see me at all!"

"Wrong, wrong, wrong!"

"My review's logic was wrong from the very beginning!"

"So I'll keep the survival method unchanged, add the condition that 'the classmate has no sight,' and review it to find the logic..."

The survival method was:

[Do not think; ignore reality through your actions.]

The additional condition was:

[The classmate has no sight.]

Then... the flashlight's beam was not actually what had drawn the classmate to attack Little Genius.

"So what triggered that classmate to start moving?"

Lin Yi carefully recalled it...

Immediately afterward, he discovered that he had missed yet another crucial condition-what that classmate had said while searching for him.

Those words might not have come from the classmate's own mouth, but they had certainly sounded beside his ears.

"If I remember correctly, those words were roughly... begging me to look at him?"

["Look at me..."

"Take a look at me..."

"I know... you can see me..."

"Hurry and look at me..."

"Please..."]

"'I know you can see me,' 'hurry and look at me'..."

Lin Yi repeated those phrases to himself.

Suddenly, inspiration seemed to streak across the boundless night, tracing a silvery flash behind his head!

"Clang-"

His eyes lit up, and he could almost hear the "There is always only one truth" theme music playing beside his ears.

It was as though that bespectacled boy detective had untangled the chain of logic and was about to deliver his final deduction.

The truth was-

"Only someone who clearly sees that classmate will be found and killed by him!"

"Little Genius turned on his flashlight, which caused him to see the classmate and trigger some mechanism belonging to him, resulting in the classmate killing him!"

"That classmate didn't pick up the flashlight because its beam caught his attention. He merely heard an unusual noise and wanted to catch it."

Lin Yi remembered this clearly from his review: after bending down, the classmate had not immediately located the flashlight accurately, but had felt around on the floor a few times before finding it.

And after the classroom lights returned, that classmate had not switched the flashlight off. Instead, he held it and kept feeling it, seemingly curious about such an object.

"So even though he was clearly looking toward me, he never actually noticed me."

"But because my gaze vaguely caught glimpses of him, I brushed against his killing mechanism."

"He begged me to look at him. As soon as I saw him, he would kill me!"

"But I didn't look at him, so I never entered his killing mechanism. That's how I escaped!"

Once he worked out this chain of logic, Lin Yi matched up every detail!

The way that classmate had reached under the desk to grab Lin Yi was also remarkably similar to how he had groped across the floor tiles for the flashlight.

Sure enough, there were no terrifying supernatural attacks. It was all just an extreme survival game constrained by rules!

He had to believe in science as much as possible-even if reality slapped him hard across the face, even if science could not explain why these rules existed.

And all his deductions proved that the Head Teacher's warning, centered on the "principle of ignoring," was correct.

[Do not close your eyes!

Do not look around or look up!

Keep your eyes fixed on the patterns on the floor or the legs of your desk, while silently repeating your names and student numbers!

Do not communicate with anyone!

Ignore all sounds!]

"As long as I ignore everything, I naturally won't enter the classmate's killing mechanism!"

"And the other classmates were discovered because they saw him too!"

In that dark environment, focusing on the desk legs would have basically kept them safe, but a Little Genius carrying a portable flashlight just had to appear in that huge classroom!

A flashlight beam was enough to suddenly expose those abnormal classmates to the normal classmates hiding under their desks, getting them harmed.

"Liangzi was right again. What a fucking Little Genius of a saboteur!"

"One round of reverse plays wiped out the whole team!"

"He screwed himself and everyone else!"

"But why did the Head Teacher also warn us not to close our eyes?"

Normally, closing their eyes would be the easiest way to ignore things, wouldn't it?

Then why shouldn't they?

"There also seemed to be rules about 'closing your eyes' in the Student Rules..."

One concerned Abnormal Weather:

[If you happen to lose your way during Abnormal Weather, please find the nearest numbered streetlamp.

If you cannot immediately find a numbered streetlamp, lower your head and stare at the ground beneath your feet, looking for any reference point that can confirm you are still on the road. If you discover that the ground is twisting, stretching, or undergoing any changes that defy common sense, immediately grip your Student ID and the Map tightly and repeatedly remind yourself of your name and student number.

Remember that you are a student.]

There was another about the Dormitory. Compared with the one about Abnormal Weather, both the Dormitory and the classroom were indoors, so it seemed more useful as a reference:

[The Dormitory is equipped with a bathroom. If you wish to wash your hair, do not close your eyes while washing it. Ensure you can see the bathroom's ceramic tiles, patterns, or any other reference points that can confirm you are still in the bathroom.]

"Judging by the rules, although I don't know the reason yet, closing my eyes seems liable to expose me to unexpected dangers..."

But these were not things he should be thinking about now.

So Lin Yi stopped dwelling on them. Now that he had roughly deduced the classmate's killing mechanism, he needed to work from how it was triggered and find a way to eliminate the classmate's attention on him.

Otherwise, that classmate's presence would always hang over his head like a sharp sword that might fall at any moment, giving him a powerful sense of danger.

Lin Yi considered:

"For that classmate to see me, he first needs me to see him."

"And the reason he can notice me is precisely because I noticed him..."

"So he can use that to vaguely sense my location. That's why his attention could follow me no matter how I tried to hide by the bookshelves at first..."

Lin Yi arrived at a conjecture:

"In that case, if I don't want him to notice me, I just need to stop paying attention to him?"

He thought back over it. The reason this attention could exist was actually that it went both ways.

When he noticed that classmate, the classmate received feedback, then noticed him through that feedback.

And once that classmate noticed him, he would naturally feel that he was being watched.

The emergence of that feeling would, in turn, deepen his attention toward that classmate.

This created a vicious cycle. The classmate relied on Lin Yi's increasingly focused attention to strengthen his lock on him.

At that thought, Lin Yi could not help shivering!

If he had not deduced this causal relationship, then once the classroom lights went out, no matter how well he hid, his deepening attention would sooner or later make him follow in Little Genius's footsteps.

"So whoever tied the knot has to untie it. As long as I ignore him, he'll lose my 'coordinates.'"

After all those twists and turns, it came back to the warning the Head Teacher had given from the start-ignore.

"But what's the logic behind that?"

"Is it as simple as not thinking?"

How could it be that simple?

He could not help glancing at Wei Liang.

Wei Liang's face was almost pressed against his book as he examined the gaps between bodies with a highly dialectical gaze.

Lin Yi sighed deeply inside. Comparing Wei Liang with the other normal classmates, he suddenly understood the key to the problem-execution.

What difference did it make if everyone had a copy of the rules?

Everyone's ability to execute differed, so the extent to which they followed the rules differed too.

The real problem was how to obey every rule absolutely in this eerie atmosphere, and to what extent they could follow them.

Faced with something this absurd, who could stay rational-no, stay obtuse-and refrain from thinking?

Even Lin Yi himself had nearly fallen into traps several times after receiving Xu Shunkang's warning.

Those subconscious actions that might violate the rules were the deadliest.

Lin Yi took a deep breath and decided to use concrete action to break down his attention first, getting through the immediate difficulty before anything else.

So he set volume one of Night X Hospital Ward beside him, then picked out a manga from the mainstream action series he had selected.

Water Shadow Ninja: Kawaki Chronicles.

Lin Yi had read Water Shadow Ninja as a child. He had heard that Kawaki Chronicles was its sequel, telling the story of the original protagonist's son, Kawaki Uzumaki, fighting his father's killer, Boruto Otsutsuki.

He planned to revisit his childhood memories with some immersive reading, using it to disperse his attention toward that classmate.

After reading a few chapters...

Smack!!!

Lin Yi slammed Water Shadow Ninja: Kawaki Chronicles onto the floor.

"What the hell is this garbage! Are they screwing with us?"

"Did anyone actually consider readers' feelings before putting a book like this on the shelf?!"

Hearing Lin Yi's complaint, Wei Liang looked over in surprise. When he spotted Water Shadow Ninja: Kawaki Chronicles on the floor, he suddenly understood.

"I warned you when you picked it up. That Kawaki Chronicles was drawn by the original author's assistant. He shoehorned in way too much personal baggage. It's worse than toilet paper."

"What's wrong? Don't like Night X Hospital Ward?"

Wei Liang frowned slightly, not expecting Lin Yi to have such picky tastes.

But remembering that Lin Yi liked something more hot-blooded, he mentally ran through the titles on the shelves, then said, "Lao Lin, wait a moment!"

He left his seat like a little whirlwind, then passed through the ranks of abnormal classmates as though nothing were wrong, muttering as he walked, "Hey, move aside, please!"

"Damn it, none of you get sleepy during evening study? Standing around like wooden posts?"

Grumbling and swearing, he passed through the crowd and reached the bookshelves. A few minutes later, he returned with a set of manga and slapped it down in front of Lin Yi.

"One Knight Against X. Hot-blooded combat hentai. Might be your type."

"If you don't like it, there's this too, X Demon Ninja. It has some ninja elements and styling too, though it's a little more hardcore. Not really suitable for beginners... want to try it?"

Lin Yi stared at Wei Liang, eyes wide and mouth agape. Thinking of how nimbly he had moved around the bookshelves earlier, he could not help asking, "Liangzi... the last time you came here, did you spend all seven days reading manga?"

Thanks to readers "Eight or Nine out of Eighty-Nine Things in Life Go Wrong" and "Jianghu www" for the tips!!

Also, dear readers, I wonder whether you found "that classmate's" killing mechanism satisfying?