Chapter 37

Everything happened too fast.
When Brother Zhang looked back, all he saw was the female player being rapidly pulled into the ground.
By the time they processed what had happened, she was already buried.
Han Qiu, still holding the cleaver, was a step behind the others. She had been walking at the front and now turned to look back. "What happened? Where is she?" she asked, noticing the other female player had vanished.
As she spoke, Han Qiu hadn’t lowered the cleaver, and her menacing aura made Brother Zhang reluctant to get too close.
The cowardly male player made his fear obvious, shrinking behind Brother Zhang in a way that made him want to kick the guy aside.
The male player shrank back, pointing at the dark ground ahead. "She was dragged in there."
Brother Zhang added, "She's in the soil."
Han Qiu quickened her pace and vaguely noticed a patch of disturbed earth.
Brother Zhang took out his phone to illuminate the area.
Under the light, everyone saw the female player's hair tangled with the soil.
Han Qiu immediately used both her kitchen knife and hands to dig through the dirt.
Brother Zhang held up his phone for light and said, "She's probably beyond saving."
The male player couldn't bear it and couldn't stand by like Brother Zhang.
He glanced nervously at Han Qiu but still walked over to help her dig.
As the soil was turned over, the female player's face gradually became visible.
Han Qiu reached out to check for a breath.
Brother Zhang asked, "Is she breathing?"
Han Qiu replied emotionlessly, "No."
She continued digging with her hands.
Hearing there was no breath, the male player panicked and hurried back to Brother Zhang's side.
He dared not touch a dead person.
Brother Zhang held up his phone and looked outside again.
Fortunately, there were three of them, and the students passing by on the road were in a hurry to get to class. Some glanced in their direction, but none came over to ask questions.
The female player seemed to have been forcibly stuffed into the soil, buried tightly.
Han Qiu dug vigorously, unearthing the female player's entire head and neck.
Brother Zhang moved the phone's light to illuminate her neck.
There were deep wounds on her neck, with soil and bloodstains stuck together so firmly that Han Qiu couldn't brush them away.
Brother Zhang said, "She was likely suffocated in the soil, and then the female ghost used some tool..."
He glanced at the dirt mixed with fallen leaves and weeds and added, "Probably a sharp stone to slit her throat, killing her. Han Qiu, bury her."
Since she was already dead, the best course of action was to bury her on the spot. Conveniently, the body was already in the soil.
Compared to the two players who died earlier, this female player was treated slightly better, at least she had a resting place. The other two players' bodies were likely taken away for autopsies.
Han Qiu knew the importance of the situation and quickly covered the body with soil.
The male player, timidly, also went over to help scatter a few handfuls of dirt.
While providing light, Brother Zhang checked the signal on his phone.
There was a signal again.
Had the ghost interfering with his phone left?
Without overthinking it, since there was a signal, Brother Zhang quickly called Gu Yi'an.
When Gu Yi'an received Brother Zhang's call, there were only a few minutes left before class started.
She was already seated in the classroom, prepared for the lesson.
But since Brother Zhang had contacted her, and it was a matter of life and death, Gu Yi'an glanced at the empty podium at the front of the classroom. The teacher hadn't arrived yet.
With the teacher absent, Gu Yi'an felt no hesitation.
She swiftly packed her backpack and walked out of the classroom openly.
Behind her, the students in the classroom, having witnessed Gu Yi'an skipping class, couldn't help but start discussing, making the entire room unusually noisy.
Gu Yi'an was well aware of the commotion she caused. She chose the staircase on the side of the teaching building that students rarely used to avoid running into her major course teacher.
Gu Yi’an always sat in the front row of the classroom, her seat fixed and unchanging. She guessed that this alone would make the teacher recognize her, not to mention the incidents that had happened to her. The teacher probably had a deep impression of her as a fortunate survivor.
Gu Yi’an and the three others, Brother Zhang and his companions, finally managed to reunite at the small pavilion in the school garden.
Every university has a garden, and the small pavilions within are the perfect spots for couples to date.
When Gu Yi’an arrived, she even spotted a young couple heading toward the pavilion. But upon noticing that it was already occupied, they chatted and laughed with their partner before walking away.
The pillars of the pavilion were adorned with lantern-shaped lighting fixtures.
Gu Yi’an noticed that two female players were missing and asked, "Brother Zhang, what exactly happened? Why are two of you missing?"
As she spoke, her gaze swept over the female player standing behind Brother Zhang and the male player. She was gripping a kitchen knife, her face tense.
Gu Yi’an had met them at noon and exchanged names. She vaguely remembered that this female player was the one called Han Qiu among the three female players.
Fortunately, it was nighttime, and there weren’t many people around the pavilion. Passersby wouldn’t notice the kitchen knife in Han Qiu’s hand unless they looked closely.
Han Qiu watched Gu Yi’an approach with a highly vigilant expression but made no move with her hands.
Brother Zhang glanced at Gu Yi’an, who had just arrived, then turned to look at Han Qiu.
He had been a bit worried earlier that Han Qiu might attack Gu Yi’an, especially since she had genuinely intended to follow the female ghost’s instructions and kill Gu Yi’an.
After communicating with her, however, Brother Zhang realized that Han Qiu was still rational. She clearly understood that their current adversary was the female ghost, not Gu Yi’an.
She wouldn’t harm Gu Yi’an, only the ghost.
Listening to Han Qiu’s words and looking at the kitchen knife in her hand, Brother Zhang felt an odd sense of security emanating from the girl.
Brother Zhang mused that although his teammate had gone a bit mad, there were advantages to that madness.
Hearing Gu Yi’an’s question, he replied, "Don’t even ask. Those ghosts went crazy for some reason and started hunting us down relentlessly. They killed one female player at the restaurant, and just now, they took out another."
Brother Zhang glanced sideways at the male player beside him, who was cowering and had lost his carefree, joking demeanor from the daytime. He said to Gu Yi’an, "He’s a fool blessed with luck. He escaped danger at the restaurant, and later, by walking ahead of that female player, he dodged another close call."
The male player wasn’t pleased with Brother Zhang’s remark.
"Brother Zhang, how is that ‘a fool blessed with luck’? It’s just that my luck is good."
But the more he spoke, the less confident he sounded. Under the gazes of Gu Yi’an, Brother Zhang, and the female player Han Qiu, he chose to shut his mouth and not interfere with their conversation.
Gu Yi'an found a stone stool by the pavilion's stone table and sat down.
She took off her backpack and placed it on the table, saying, "You've been targeted by ghosts since noon, right?"
Brother Zhang nodded. "After you left, they started targeting us. They deliberately avoided you because you have something protecting you."
Gu Yi'an gave a slight nod.
She knew she was under the protection of the notebook. With it around, other female ghosts wouldn't dare come looking for trouble.
Gu Yi'an said, "I think I know why they suddenly attacked you."
Brother Zhang's eyes lit up. "Little Gu, if you knew, why didn't you tell us earlier? Ah... wait, you don't have my number, do you?"
Gu Yi'an replied, "No."
When she first heard the news from the student union cadre, she had wanted to inform Brother Zhang immediately, but then she realized she didn't have his contact number.
As for the phone Brother Zhang had, who knew where he'd gotten it from, he didn't even know the number himself.
They hadn't thought to exchange contact information earlier; only Gu Yi'an had given her number to Brother Zhang.
Brother Zhang coughed awkwardly. "My bad."
Gu Yi'an studied him and felt he wasn't quite himself.
She remembered how, during their first game together, Brother Zhang had been cunning and meticulous, constantly scheming. Now, he was missing details and wholeheartedly leading the team to solve the game, it didn't seem like him at all.
But Gu Yi'an didn't dwell on it. Brother Zhang's mental state was his own business.
Gu Yi'an said, "The school invited a high monk to capture ghosts, but a few escaped."
"A few?" The male player looked incredulous.
Brother Zhang pondered this. "So, you can't be sure how many got away?"
Gu Yi'an nodded. She had only heard this from the student union cadre. More precise information had likely been suppressed.
Upon hearing that several ghosts were on the loose, the male player curled into a ball, too scared to speak or even look at Gu Yi'an, afraid she might be a ghost in disguise trying to deceive them.
Everyone could see right through his fear, but no one paid him any mind.
Brother Zhang glanced at Gu Yi'an. "Little Gu, I never asked, why did your roommates want to kill you? That's pretty rough."
Gu Yi'an remained calm. "I'm not sure."
She suspected that once her roommates turned into ghosts, they were no longer themselves but had become "them."
They killed without hesitation, free from moral constraints, just as they were now targeting the players.
Brother Zhang adopted a knowing tone. "In situations like yours, it's often due to a lack of communication. Little Gu, no offense, but girls shouldn't be too aloof. You need to be more approachable with friends."
Gu Yi'an looked puzzled. "Aloof?"
Brother Zhang faltered.
If Gu Yi'an was aloof, then no one was down-to-earth.
She was just quiet and reserved, that's all.
Gu Yi'an sighed inwardly and said, "Brother Zhang, stop trying to butter me up. If you have something to say, just say it."
Caught off guard, Brother Zhang laughed awkwardly. "I didn't expect you to see through me so quickly, Little Gu. I guess I'm just not cut out for sweet-talking."
Gu Yi'an watched him put on his act.
Brother Zhang casually uttered a few polite remarks before his expression turned serious as he asked, "Do you think your world is real?"
This was a question unrelated to their current game round but deeply connected to the game of the gods itself.
When Gu Yi'an discovered that this round of the game was set in her own world, she had pondered similar questions.
Were those game worlds she had visited real worlds?
Gu Yi'an couldn't determine whether those worlds were real or not.
The only thing she could confirm was that the world she had lived in for nearly nineteen years was real.
Recalling something, Gu Yi'an said, "Brother Zhang, in our last game, I remember you saw the labeled bibimbap sauce and suddenly had a great appetite. Shouldn't that have confirmed for you that the game world is a real world?"
Her implication was clear, her world was real.
Brother Zhang replied, "I saw the label, so I knew it couldn't be some unmarked product conjured by ghosts or monsters. I thought it was a constructed level world. Do you understand? It was the game's world, not a real one. That's what we all believed, only when we entered would the game begin. Not like now, where we just join midway as participants. We are outsiders."
Brother Zhang realized his thoughts were becoming jumbled. He paused before voicing the question that had been weighing on his mind.
"I can't be sure if I'm truly alive, if I truly exist. Can you be certain?"
Gu Yi'an could see the confusion in Brother Zhang's eyes; he was genuinely lost in these thoughts.
Gu Yi'an said, "Brother Zhang, perhaps the game of the gods includes both real worlds and fabricated game worlds. Some games take place in the real world, while others are set in worlds constructed by the gods. And you, you truly exist."
Nearby, the female player Han Qiu, holding a kitchen knife, stood thoughtfully in place.
Gu Yi'an and Brother Zhang hadn't avoided her during their conversation, and Han Qiu understood that they tacitly allowed her to listen in.
This was crucial information about the game of the gods, she needed to remember it.
Meanwhile, the male player, having overcome his earlier fear, heard Brother Zhang discussing profound topics like life and existence. His head slumped onto the stone table, and he actually began to sleep.
"Ding dong!"
A bell reverberated across the entire university campus.
It was the class dismissal bell.
In the classroom Gu Yi'an had just left, the teacher heard the bell and said, "Alright, let's take a break."
He picked up the water bottle he had brought with him, took a sip, and then glanced at the seats below.
The teacher spoke into the microphone, "Huh? That girl who usually sits in the front row didn’t come today? She’s quite a pretty young lady. That’s unusual, I hope nothing’s happened to her?"
There was something hidden in the teacher’s words. The students below could tell he was referring to Gu Yi'an, and it seemed the teacher was aware of the incidents involving Gu Yi’an’s roommate and the recent murders on campus, which explained his concern for her.
A student replied, "Teacher, she suddenly left right before class started. She was originally here."
Hearing that Gu Yi’an had been present earlier, the teacher immediately asked the class for the contact number of Gu Yi’an’s academic advisor and stepped out to call her.
The call connected.
The teacher introduced himself as the instructor of a specific professional course and inquired whether Gu Yi’an, a student in the advisor’s class, had encountered any issues, asking why she had abruptly left during class.
On the other end of the line, the advisor stood at the foot of a dormitory building, her figure obscured by the shadows of trees, making it impossible for others to see her clearly.
Clutching an urn in her hands, the advisor replied in a gentle tone, "I’m aware of the situation. She wasn’t feeling well today. She asked me for leave, yes, that’s right, she did... She forgot to inform you. My apologies."
A minute later, the call ended.
The advisor carefully wiped the soil off the urn with a handkerchief.
"Qiaoqiao, don’t be afraid. I’m here; they won’t take you away. I’m sorry you have to stay underground today. I made a deal with a demon. Soon, you’ll be resurrected. It’s my fault you died. Once you’re alive again, we can live together peacefully. Are you hungry? Later, when it’s darker and fewer people are around, I’ll take you to find them.
You want Gu Yi’an’s body? She’s not an option; we’ll find someone else. Originally, she was meant to be your new vessel, but there’s a demon by her side. I struck a bargain with it, as long as we don’t harm her and protect her instead, it agreed to bring you back to life. Those ghosts obey you. If we eliminate them, we’ll fulfill the demon’s task.
Qiaoqiao, no, we can’t hurt her. Wait for me, let me check where she is."
The advisor muttered to herself at length.
She took out her phone and dialed a number.
At the small pavilion, Gu Yi’an, Brother Zhang, and the female player Han Qiu were quietly contemplating how to deal with the female ghost. The male player was sound asleep nearby.
When Gu Yi’an was present, the female ghost didn’t dare approach, but if Gu Yi’an were absent, the ghost would inevitably come for them.
Gu Yi’an felt her phone vibrate.
She had developed a habit of adjusting her phone’s mode according to different environments.
Glancing at the name on the screen, Gu Yi’an answered the call.
Instantly, the advisor’s gentle voice came through the phone.
"Yi’an, where are you?"
Hearing this, Gu Yi’an realized that her skipping class must have been noticed by the teacher, who had specifically contacted her advisor.
Gu Yi’an quickly fabricated an excuse, saying, "Ms. Huang, I’m on campus. I wasn’t feeling well, so I stepped out for a walk."
"I thought you might be unwell. That’s what I told the teacher," the advisor replied with a light laugh.
Having nothing else to discuss, she exchanged a few more words with Gu Yi’an before hanging up.
Night had deepened, and a cool breeze rustled through the air.
Everyone exchanged glances, uncertain of what to do next.
The female player Han Qiu, who had been holding a kitchen knife all along, was growing tired.
She finally found a stone bench and sat down.
Han Qiu asked somewhat confusedly, "Will the ghosts come?"
Brother Zhang said, "Those ghosts have marked us. As long as we're here, they'll come eventually."
He glanced at Gu Yi'an and added, "With Little Gu here, we're very safe."
The three of them had just discussed methods to deal with ghosts.
This was Han Qiu's first time encountering such things, and she said she would simply hack at any ghost that appeared with her kitchen knife.
Brother Zhang openly admitted he had some tools, but wasn't sure if they could kill ghosts.
The only one who could actually deal with the female ghost was Gu Yi'an, who possessed something so powerful that ghosts would stay far away from her.
Their discussion didn't lead to a unified approach.
Gu Yi'an asked if everyone had the strength to confront ghosts.
Both Brother Zhang and Han Qiu were exhausted.
They hadn't eaten dinner.
Finally, Gu Yi'an treated everyone by ordering four portions of takeout, specifically requesting delivery to the small pavilion in the garden.
Fortunately, delivery riders were used to all kinds of strange addresses, and the food arrived at the pavilion on time.
The sleeping male player woke up to the aroma of food, and after the four of them finished dinner, it was almost ten o'clock.
The period between nine and ten at night was when students were most active.
Around nine o'clock, students had just finished classes, and the main paths were crowded with people. Their laughter and chatter faintly reached the group in the pavilion.
When students passed near the garden, they would occasionally glance curiously at the people sitting in the pavilion, but they would just look and then move on.
As the night deepened, fewer and fewer people moved through the campus.
The outside world grew increasingly quiet.
The male player fell asleep immediately after eating, sleeping so soundly that his snoring echoed through the pavilion, somewhat dispelling the chill of the late night.
Brother Zhang looked at the night sky and signaled to Gu Yi'an that it was time.
Seeing this, Han Qiu stood up with her kitchen knife, ready for battle.
Gu Yi'an opened her bag and took out the notebook she had placed inside.
Brother Zhang glanced at the notebook - it looked ordinary and unremarkable, just a regular notebook.
But this was something that had appeared in Gu Yi'an's hands.
Brother Zhang asked, "Is this your tool?"
He didn't avoid Han Qiu when asking.
Han Qiu glanced at Brother Zhang but remained silent, taking in the information revealed in their conversation.
Gu Yi'an said, "It's one of my companions."
Brother Zhang looked at Gu Yi'an with some pity and said, "Little Gu, treating tools as friends - you must have very few friends."
Gu Yi’an calmly retorted, “Brother Zhang, do you have friends in your world?”
Brother Zhang replied, “Who doesn’t have a few friends in this world?”
Gu Yi’an added, “Fair-weather friends don’t count.”
Brother Zhang fell silent.
Han Qiu, the female player who had kept a stern face all along, listened to the conversation between Brother Zhang and Gu Yi’an. As she wiped her cleaver, the corners of her mouth curled upward.
She was amused by their exchange.
Surrounding Gu Yi’an, Brother Zhang, and Han Qiu were the sounds of the male player’s snoring.
With the snoring, the silence of the night was largely dispelled.
Gu Yi’an turned her gaze to the open notebook.
At that moment, a line of glowing white text appeared on the notebook.
“Yi’an, you’ve become mischievous.”
The meaning behind its words was unclear.
Gu Yi’an had no intention of beating around the bush and asked directly, “What did I do?”
The notebook sensed Gu Yi’an’s impatience.
It immediately displayed new text.
“You skipped class.”
Gu Yi’an had indeed skipped class.
After attending classes diligently for so many years, this seemed to be the first time she had ever skipped.
Skipping class contradicted her usual behavior as a good student. From this perspective, she had indeed become mischievous.
Gu Yi’an avoided the topic and said, “I want to go to bed early.”
Upon hearing this, the notebook displayed new words on its page.
“I understand.”
After these words faded, it showed no further unusual activity, as if it had become a perfectly ordinary notebook.
Brother Zhang, sitting on a stone bench beside Gu Yi’an, had heard and witnessed the entire exchange between the notebook and Gu Yi’an.
He remarked, “Somehow, the atmosphere between you two feels strange.”
One said, “I want to go to bed early,” and the other said, “I understand.”
Two completely unrelated statements, yet the communication seemed to flow smoothly.
Brother Zhang didn’t understand the way young people communicated, but he did grasp one thing.
The notebook was the very thing that had been protecting Gu Yi’an from the female ghost.
Brother Zhang said, “Little Gu, you said earlier you didn’t know about the strangeness around you.”
Gu Yi’an closed the notebook and replied, “Now I do.”
Seeing that Gu Yi’an was unwilling to elaborate, Brother Zhang didn’t press further.
After the notebook became ordinary, the small pavilion returned to silence.
Occasionally, a few students returning late passed by on the road. They were drunk, muttering incoherently.
Gu Yi’an stared at the notebook’s cover, seemingly lost in thought.
Brother Zhang gazed into the distance, also appearing distracted.
Seeing this, Han Qiu tucked her cleaver inside her coat and remained vigilant, watching for any signs of movement around her.
Her eyes were bloodshot, and she looked utterly exhausted, almost like a female ghost herself.
The male player snored loudly, completely unaware that his teammates were using themselves as bait to lure the female ghost.
In his sleep, the male player suddenly felt a chill around him. His hands moved on their own, climbing up to his neck and tightening abruptly.
“Ahhh!”
The male player jolted awake with a scream.
The moment he cried out, Han Qiu kicked him away.
She had noticed his movements from the very beginning.
Brother Zhang stood up and, together with Han Qiu, grabbed the male player’s hands, which were still clutching his neck.
Gu Yi’an’s gaze was also fixed intently on the commotion on the ground.
At that moment, none of them noticed a dark shadow sliding swiftly down the pillar supporting the pavilion from the very top. In an instant, it closed in on Gu Yi’an’s side.
Just as the shadow was about to touch Gu Yi'an, she turned around.
She glanced at the blurry shadow before her, and her mind quickly flashed through the names of her roommates, finally settling on one in particular.
"Yi Feifei?"
After Gu Yi'an uttered the name, the shadow's attempt to escape faltered.
Having been discovered by Gu Yi'an, it had intended to retreat, but it could only move a short distance, trapped within a confined space.
The shadow gave up struggling and let out a chilling female voice, filled with resentment, "Why is it that someone always protects you?"
Gu Yi'an recognized the voice, it belonged to Yi Feifei.
Ghosts still retained some characteristics from their lives.
Gu Yi'an had guessed correctly, but she felt little joy in it.
Yi Feifei was the quietest among her roommates, even more so than Gu Yi'an herself.
Gu Yi'an was merely calm in the face of events, composed, but still willing to chat with others.
Yi Feifei was different. She was the most reserved among Gu Yi'an's roommates, so quiet that others couldn't discern her personality, assuming she was just shy.
Earlier, when Gu Yi'an speculated about who could be so persistent and eager to kill her, the only person she ultimately thought of was Yi Feifei.
Because Gu Yi'an couldn't figure out her thoughts. She felt it couldn't be anyone else, only the enigmatic Yi Feifei.
If it hadn't been for her roommate Zhou Yaling, who had suggested playing the spirit board game and was crushed to death by Brother Zhang that morning after being trapped in the pen, Gu Yi'an would have suspected Zhou Yaling first.
Realizing her identity had been exposed and unable to escape, the shadow decided to reveal itself.
From within the shadow, a human-like form gradually emerged, unveiling its true appearance, a pale-faced young girl.
Brother Zhang set aside the matter with the male player, leaving Han Qiu to deal with the possessed male player alone. He turned his gaze to the female ghost and said, "It was you standing behind them last night."
During the spirit board game the previous night, a female ghost had floated behind the female players who were watching from the sidelines.
At the time, Brother Zhang had known there was more than one ghost, but he hadn't spoken up about it.
Brother Zhang looked at Gu Yi'an, then at the female ghost.
He realized that, at this moment, there was nothing for the players to do.
Because they hadn't even investigated Gu Yi'an's roommate, Yi Feifei.
The female ghost completely ignored Brother Zhang, staring fixedly at Gu Yi'an.
"Why do you always have someone protecting you?"
Gu Yi'an sat on the stone bench, one hand resting on the notebook's cover, signaling the notebook not to take action.
Gu Yi'an said calmly, "Can I know what I did to make you hate me so much?"
She didn't understand why her deceased roommate wanted to kill her.
The female ghost sneered, "You ask me why? It's because you killed us!"
Gu Yi'an found this baffling and said, "Let's be clear, you were the ones who wanted to play with the pen spirit. What does that have to do with me?"
It wasn't as if Gu Yi'an hadn't tried to dissuade them. They didn't listen, went to the neighboring dorm to play with the pen spirit, and ended up causing the death of someone from another dorm.
The female ghost said resentfully, "If you had kept trying to persuade us, we wouldn't have played, and we wouldn't have involved people from other dorms."
Brother Zhang, overhearing this, couldn't help but shake his head.
"Today, I finally heard some real 'ghost talk.' This kind of logic is a first for me."
He was truly gaining new insights.
Behind them, Han Qiu was beating up the male player.
The male player's screams pierced the sky, "Ouch! I'm awake. Stop hitting me!"
Curious passersby who heard the commotion assumed it was a couple playfully bickering and avoided the pavilion.
Listening to the female ghost's words, Gu Yi'an felt helpless.
If they had listened to her advice back then, they wouldn't have ended up as ghosts.
Gu Yi'an said, "How do you know that if I had kept persuading you, you would have listened?"
Brother Zhang's eyes shifted, and he chimed in, "Little Gu, don't try to reason with ghosts. They hold too much malice toward you."
Having just heard Gu Yi'an's account, he guessed what had happened and said, "This is the true embodiment of malice. Little Gu, you did nothing wrong and even tried to dissuade them from playing with the pen spirit, yet they insist you're the one who killed them and are throwing all this blame at you."
Gu Yi'an keenly picked up on the word "malice."
Brother Zhang then directed his words at the female ghost, who had been ignoring him all along, "You people, Little Gu was trying to help you, but you didn't appreciate it. Now that you're dead, you blame her for your deaths. Do you have any conscience?"
Seeing Brother Zhang acting like a righteous advocate, Gu Yi'an guessed why he had suddenly started speaking up for her.
"Brother Zhang, is the beginner's hint for this round 'malice'?"
Brother Zhang wasn't surprised that Gu Yi'an had figured it out. He had been too obvious.
"It's the word 'malice.'"
Brother Zhang said, "I'm thinking this round is similar to the 'kindness is a sin' round we entered together. To clear it, we'll have to explain to the god what we believe malice is."
Everything Brother Zhang had just said was meant for the god to hear.
It wasn't that he had suddenly turned charitable, he just wanted to show off his intelligence to the god by solving the puzzle of malice.
Gu Yi'an said, "The malice you're referring to is their malice toward me?"
Brother Zhang said, "What else?"
Noticing Gu Yi'an's expression, he frowned, "Is there another kind of malice?"
Gu Yi'an said, "Did you find any information about Huang Qiao?"
Huang Qiao was the counselor's younger sister, the girl who had died in the dormitory building due to rumors.
Brother Zhang said, "I couldn't find anything about Huang Qiao online. I even hacked into your school's digital archives, but there was no record of it there either."
Gu Yi'an heard this and said, "So, only 'people' know about this matter."
Gu Yi'an still went to ask the dorm supervisor, who had experienced the incident and thus informed Gu Yi'an about it.
If it hadn't been Gu Yi'an asking, the dorm supervisor would never have revealed it to anyone else.
This meant that the incident of the counselor's younger sister, Huang Qiao's suicide, had been deliberately erased.
Now Gu Yi'an had a question: Was this erasure done by the families behind those who drove Huang Qiao to suicide, interfering in the matter? Or did the counselor do it herself?
Gu Yi'an grew increasingly certain that her former roommates summoning the pen spirit was no accident.
Since it wasn't an accident but someone had hinted at them to play the game...
The one who hinted at them was the counselor.
The counselor hoped they would summon the pen spirit, summon her sister.
The traces online might have been erased by the counselor herself. With so many deaths occurring at the school, she was afraid someone would trace it back to her sister.
What exactly did the counselor want to do?
Could it be... raising a ghost?
Gu Yi'an's mind raced with thoughts.
Brother Zhang remembered something else. "I also looked into the player organizations in your area and only found a webpage that was shut down as a cult. It seems there aren't many players of The Game of the Gods in your world."
Gu Yi'an hadn't expected Brother Zhang to bring up player organizations.
Come to think of it, she had never actively searched for players of The Game of the Gods in this world. The first two times, she had no memory after the game ended. This time, with the notebook in hand, she was busy keeping an eye on it every day to prevent it from causing trouble, so she hadn't sought out companions.
Brother Zhang complained, "That website's slogan was 'Praise God, Rejoice in God.' It looked like brainwashing at first glance, no wonder it got shut down."
The two of them continued their conversation.
The female ghost, trapped in that space and unable to move much, sneered at Gu Yi'an, "What else can you do besides seducing men?"
If the ghost hadn't spoken, Gu Yi'an would have almost forgotten about her. She had just been distracted by the mention of player organizations.
Snapping back to reality, Gu Yi'an remained unaffected by the ghost's words and calmly asked, "Feifei. Was it the counselor who suggested you play the pen spirit game?"
The female ghost glared at Gu Yi'an with a sinister expression, "How would I know whose suggestion it was? All I know is, I want you dead!"
Before her words faded, the female ghost suddenly transformed into a shadow, converging into a single point, attempting to break free from her restraints and shoot toward Gu Yi'an like an arrow.
Brother Zhang leaped back abruptly, distancing himself from the trouble.
Gu Yi’an remained in place because she had the notebook.
A blue flame ignited at the tip where the shadows converged.
In an instant, the blue flame consumed all of the shadows.
The female ghost’s piercing screams echoed mournfully within the flames.
The male player’s wails mingled with them.
“Brother Zhang, save me!”
Gu Yi’an followed the sound and looked.
She saw the male player and Han Qiu, who was holding a kitchen knife, chasing a human-shaped shadow in the garden.
To be more precise, the male player was fleeing ahead, the shadow was chasing behind, and Han Qiu was hacking at the shadow with the kitchen knife. The male player desperately tried to run behind Han Qiu, creating a comical scene.
Brother Zhang glanced at Gu Yi’an, then pulled out a prop he had long despised from his pocket and shouted outside, “Han Qiu, block it!”
Upon hearing this, Han Qiu threw the kitchen knife in her hand.
The shadow, retaining its human instincts, instinctively dodged.
Han Qiu lunged forward.
The shadow instantly dissipated.
Just as it was about to reform, Brother Zhang rushed over and threw the prop in his hand.
Han Qiu watched as an object shaped exactly like a mushroom landed in the area where the shadow had dissipated. Like an eraser, the mushroom vanished, and the shadow disappeared into thin air.
It happened so fast that Han Qiu stared blankly for a second before running over to retrieve her knife.
The nearby male player glared at her angrily as she approached. The kitchen knife had missed the ghost but nearly hit him.
Han Qiu ignored the male player. Gripping her knife, she asked Brother Zhang, “Brother Zhang, what kind of prop was that?”
Brother Zhang replied, “Just a mushroom. Humans can eat it. Ghosts, it seems, cannot.”
If not for seeing Gu Yi’an, Brother Zhang wouldn’t have remembered that he had such a useless mushroom among his props.
They returned to the small pavilion.
The male player shuffled over step by step, looking pitifully at Gu Yi’an and the other two, and asked, “Is the ghost gone?”
Gu Yi’an’s gaze swept over Han Qiu’s eyes, but she said nothing.
Brother Zhang said, “Not sure. With Little Gu here, it was eliminated too quickly.”
He added, “The ghosts should have all come. But…”
Brother Zhang glanced at Gu Yi’an.
After Gu Yi’an’s earlier inquiry about Huang Qiao, Brother Zhang suddenly felt that things might not be so simple.
It was unlikely that all the ghosts had come at once. Perhaps there were others.
The night wind suddenly grew fierce, its sound indistinguishable from ghostly wails.
At the same time, a silent chill swept over them.
Brother Zhang said, “Little Gu, you were right.”
He looked in a certain direction.
That was the source of the cold.
A woman was approaching them, holding a square box.
The streetlight illuminated her face.
Brother Zhang narrowed his eyes and recognized the urn in her hands.
Gu Yi’an recognized the person, it was the counselor.
The counselor approached them, holding the urn. Her gaze fixed on Gu Yi’an, she asked with concern, “Yi’an, why are you still outside?”
Gu Yi’an didn’t answer the question. After seeing the counselor, she had figured out many things. She said, “Teacher Huang, are they the food you prepared for the ghosts?”
“They” referred to Brother Zhang, Han Qiu, and the male player.
The counselor smiled and praised, “You guessed right. So clever.”
Gu Yi’an felt no joy at being praised.
The moment the counselor appeared before her, Gu Yi'an realized that the counselor was the mastermind behind everything.
Her roommates' involvement with the spirit board must have had the counselor's influence behind it.
Gu Yi'an asked, "Did Yaling and the others try to kill because you controlled them?"
The counselor looked at the box in her hands with a soothing gaze. Hearing Gu Yi'an's question, she raised her head and said, "You think it was all me? No, their desire to kill you was real. I couldn't let them harm you."
With gentle hand movements, the counselor soothed the thing inside the box and said, "Do you know? Kind, beautiful, and outstanding people always bear the original sin in the eyes of the dull, ugly, and ordinary. Their crime is that they shouldn't be outstanding."
Gu Yi'an looked at the counselor and asked, "So, teacher, are you the kind of dull, ugly, ordinary person you mentioned?"
The counselor glanced at Gu Yi'an, then looked at the notebook on the stone table, and finally smiled. "I'm telling you that your roommates are such people."
Hearing this, Gu Yi'an turned to look into Han Qiu's eyes behind her.
She couldn't detect anything unusual.
Gu Yi'an turned back.
Brother Zhang stood nearby. He didn't fully understand because he had too few clues, but that didn't stop him from realizing that the mastermind was the one right in front of him.
The counselor said with a hint of regret, "I promised your protector that I could only protect you, not harm you."
She soothed the box in her hands, "Qiaoqiao, we won't eat today."
Then, she turned to Gu Yi'an and said, "Yi'an, go back to sleep early. I'll head back now."
The counselor turned and left.
No one stopped her.
Brother Zhang, however, suddenly had a look of enlightenment.
"I know what else the malice includes. Little Gu, it also includes your counselor's malice toward you!"
Without beating around the bush, Brother Zhang said, "She wants her sister to take over your body!"
Gu Yi'an had vaguely considered this possibility.
But hearing Brother Zhang say it out loud made her feel uneasy.
Brother Zhang looked at Gu Yi'an. This girl had suffered too much.
"It's not easy for you to have survived till now. Everyone around you is scheming against you."
Faced with Brother Zhang's sympathy, Gu Yi'an calmly packed her backpack.
With the mastermind gone, Brother Zhang and the others would have no problem surviving the day.
The current issue was how to clear the game.
Gu Yi'an said, "Do we need to eliminate her sister's ghost to pass the level?"
If the players weren't engaging in any internal conflicts, they could only follow the script set by the deity, solve the tasks and complete them.
The male player chimed in, "Isn't the task just to survive for seven days?"
Brother Zhang gave him an approving look, this was the benefit of being foolish.
Gu Yi'an had no way to deal with the male player, who always trusted Brother Zhang. She turned to Han Qiu and said, "Can I ask her a question?"
Han Qiu, upon hearing this, knew Gu Yi'an was referring to the ghost in her eyes. She first covered her own eyes.
After a moment, Han Qiu cautiously said, considering Gu Yi'an's feelings, "She doesn't seem to want to talk to you."
Gu Yi'an replied, "Okay, thank you."
She packed her bag, took a few hundred yuan from her wallet, and handed it to Brother Zhang, saying, "Find a place to stay for the night."
As long as you had money, there were plenty of places to stay.
Brother Zhang waved it off, "No need for that. Why would I take money from a young girl like you? I have a feeling we'll be leaving soon, so there's no point in holding onto the money."
He didn't mention where his money came from, and Gu Yi'an guessed it wasn't through legitimate means.
The male player muttered, "We still have to stay for five more days."
No one paid him any attention.
Han Qiu suddenly called out to Gu Yi'an.
After hesitating for a moment, Han Qiu said, "She said she hates you, for no reason."
Gu Yi'an smiled upon hearing this, "Thank you."
Han Qiu added, "I think she's just jealous. She's jealous of you. That's all."
"Maybe. Thanks for the comfort." Gu Yi'an didn't say anything more.
No one could ever know the truth of the past.
Perhaps even the person involved didn't know.
Gu Yi'an returned to the place she was renting.
She cleaned up, washing away the fatigue of the day, and finally sat at her desk, using a hairdryer to dry her hair.
The notebook lay open on the desk, its pages undisturbed by the airflow from the hairdryer.
There was a line of text on it.
"You're unhappy?"
Gu Yi'an's mood was indeed low. Today, she had discovered that her caring counselor only wanted to use her body for her sister.
For a moment, there wasn't a single person around her she could trust.
Her brother, Gu Tianjing, was trustworthy, but he was too far away.
Gu Yi'an was human, of course she would feel upset. But after the sadness, she regained her composure.
People always have to look forward. She had made friends in the game, after all.
The notebook knew about Gu Yi'an's experiences and understood her thoughts.
Another line of text appeared on it, "You have me. I will protect you."
These words were spoken by Lu Zize.
What kind of person was Lu Zize? When it came to deception, the counselor was no match for him.
As soon as he said something like that, Gu Yi'an felt uneasy.
Gu Yi'an looked at the notebook suspiciously, put down the hairdryer, and said, "Why do I feel like you orchestrated the whole thing with the counselor?"
The notebook seemed hurt.
"You never believe me."
Gu Yi'an said bluntly, "I've never believed you. Tell me, what did you discuss with the counselor before? Why couldn't she harm me?"
The notebook had previously avoided answering what it had discussed with the counselor.
It dodged the question and said something completely unrelated.
"I will always be by your side."
Gu Yi'an looked at this notebook that couldn't even be bothered to put effort into deceiving people. With a flick of her hand, she closed it.
Out of sight, out of mind.
Brother Zhang huddled in the rented double room with two players, one man and one woman.
Although the looks they received when checking in were strange, Brother Zhang maintained a calm expression as he booked the room.
The advantage of shady inns was that they didn't pry into customers' private affairs, they didn't even ask for identification.
In the room, with the male player's snoring in the background, Brother Zhang pondered seriously.
He thought to himself, This isn't right. They hadn't been completely idle; they had even deduced the meaning behind the malicious references. Now that the ghosts were gone, why hadn't the god allowed them to leave the game yet?
Brother Zhang glanced at Han Qiu, who was wiping a kitchen knife while threatening the ghost in his own eyes. This ghost didn't count, it had been subdued by the player.
Brother Zhang pondered, wondering which piece of the puzzle was missing.
He carefully recalled the day's events.
Then he remembered a sentence exchanged during the confrontation that evening.
Brother Zhang immediately pulled out his phone and dialed a number.
"Hey, Little Gu. When you asked your counselor today if she was a dull and ugly ordinary person, what did you mean?"
On the other end of the line, Gu Yi'an glanced at the notebook playing dead on her desk and replied to Brother Zhang.
"I asked if she was the same kind of person as my roommate."
Brother Zhang asked, "Did she hold malice toward you and spread rumors about you too?"
In Brother Zhang's understanding, Gu Yi'an's roommate equaled someone who held malice toward Gu Yi'an.
Gu Yi'an said, "Not toward me. It was about her sister, who committed suicide because of rumors. Her sister, Huang Qiao."
"Rumors don't come out of nowhere. The closer the words are to someone dear, the more easily they are believed."
Gu Yi'an drew an analogy to herself: her mother in this life believed she was a possessing ghost, which made almost everyone in the Gu family afraid to approach her.
Gu Yi'an continued, "So, my guess is that she was jealous of her sister, spread rumors, and ultimately caused her sister's death. That's why she's been atoning ever since. She wants to resurrect her sister."
"The malice mentioned in the beginner's hint doesn't just refer to my roommate's malice toward me, but also the malice she once held toward her sister."
After Gu Yi'an finished speaking, she didn't hear a response from Brother Zhang.
But it didn't matter anymore, because she saw the black characters floating in mid-air.
Gu Yi'an continued to look at the black text floating in the air.
[Game Clear Status: Due to your mercy, two players have successfully cleared the game.]
[Reward: (It seems you have no items on hand that can be rewarded to the players.)]
[Message: (Please designate a player to convey the words you wish to say to him/her/it. Of course, you can choose to block or ignore them.)]
Gu Yi'an glanced at the black text, feeling a momentary illusion that she, too, could be a god.