CH 69

“They impersonate others and use their identities to study in university, and consequently, these students who originally should have gone to university didn’t and took a different road at fate’s intersection,” said Gu Xizhou. “This is no replacement, but rather a complete mutual exchange of life.”

Si Yu took the note with the woman’s identity written on it and spread it open. He spoke in a low voice: “Since Qi Fei and the others wanted all their great efforts in the first halves of their lives, they simply handed over the unfortunate latter half of their lives, too. Isn’t it really quite fair?” 

“Her identity should have been replaced by someone… Since no one knew she was genuinely missing even though she was imprisoned,” said Si Yu, pointing at the corpse on the ground.

Because of the dead woman’s corpse inside the room, there were many flies. Mosquitos flew in the air in random patterns making buzzing sounds. Those headless flies even flew straight into people’s faces, knocking against them.

Originally, such a dark, airtight, prison cell-like environment should make people uneasy, but Si Yu seemed to have already acquired immunity to places like this after experiencing so many other worlds, and Gu Xizhou and Fang Zhi had investigated many crime scenes which were more or less similar to this.

As the three people conversed, they heard a sound. Simultaneously, they turned toward the origin. 

Fang Zhi furrowed his brows and pointed to the body on the ground. “She wasn’t there a moment ago, right? I remember she was laying down a bit closer to the inside…”

Hearing Fang Zhi’s words, the woman on the ground, whose face had at some point morphed into a malevolent expression, slightly raised the corners of her mouth as if she was smiling…

“Run!”

After Si Yu looked at the woman smiling at them on the floor, he suddenly yelled at Gu Xizhou and Fang Zhi.

Opening the door of the room, Si Yu signaled for Gu Xizhou to keep up.

Gu Xizhou glanced back at the woman on the ground behind him. Her eyes were wide open as she assessed them. He wanted to go up and greet her with a slap, but suddenly, his wrist was seized. Si Yu grabbed him and dragged him out to run away without looking back.

After they escaped, they ran for an awfully long time. They kept in mind that they couldn’t go to the fourth floor and couldn’t walk the path of death. Opening and closing a classroom door only took half a second.

Fang Zhi gasped for breath and covered his madly beating heart. 

Since they had just passed through the woman’s room, they were much more careful. The three of them stayed in the classroom for a while, but then, they faintly heard the sound of footsteps outside. A lone person stood in the hallway.

The three glanced at each other silently. Then, they heard someone speak.

“Who’s there?” that person gently and cautiously asked.

Gu Xizhou heard the voice and raised his eyebrows, thinking that it sounded quite familiar, but he couldn’t remember who it was. 

“Bai Dongyang?” Si Yu didn’t answer the other’s question. Instead, he asked one of his own.

“It’s me,” Bai Dongyang said with excitement. “Very good, it turned out to be you guys!”

Bai Dongyang emerged from the darkness and saw Gu Xizhou’s group of three. He heaved a sigh of relief.

Gu Xizhou was silent for a moment, then he asked. “Where are the other two who were with you?” 

“Just a moment ago, we went into a classroom… no… maybe not a classroom. It was a room with a woman inside. The woman on the ground suddenly smiled at us, and we immediately turned around to escape. After we ran, we scattered. I don’t know where they are either.”

“You ran away and scattered?” asked Gu Xizhou.

His complexion lost color, and he nodded. It seemed he still hadn’t recovered from the fearful events just now. He shivered with fright from head to toe and said, “What do we do now? Go look for them?”

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“Rbatlcu…” Djl Gbcusjcu gfqilfv. “Qf rjk j mbgqrf ktfc kf kfca lc, jcv kf lwwfvljafis aegcfv jgbecv ab gec jkjs yfmjerf kf kfgf abb jogjlv. Glv sbe olcv rbwfatlcu?”

Si Yu took a look at Bai Dongyang and said lightly, “We didn’t find anything either. First, take us to look for the others, ba.”

The four left the classroom and went into the hallway. Bai Dongyang spoke as he walked. “First, I’ll bring you to that room, ba.”

“Good, you bring us there.” Si Yu replied without hesitation. “Let’s find them as soon as possible.” 

Si Yu touched Gu Xizhou’s back briefly. Gu Xizhou turned around and shot a glance at him. The two very quickly communicated with their eyes. Because they had experienced a few worlds together, the two had already formed excellent tacit communication.

Gu Xizhou and Si Yu walked slowly, following behind Bai Dongyang. Just as he wanted to ask a question, Gu Xizhou noticed that Si Yu’s mouth had a faint smiling expression, and his finger was extended to point at the ground.

He looked at the floor and discovered that Bai Dongyang had no shadow.

Walking in the hallway, Fang Zhi perceptively saw a lone figure on the ground ahead. The figure was motionless. The sound-controlled light that had just dimmed lit up once again, allowing him to clearly see that the person on the floor was Xia Hang. 

“De-dead!” Bai Dongyang’s knees softened, and he leaned on the wall, not daring to move.

As soon as they saw Xia Hang’s head, Fang Zhi stumbled back and drew in a breath of air. Xia Hang’s death was just like those who had walked the path of death several days prior. Fang Zhi calculated his own route, crouching down by the body on the floor and examining it carefully. He shook his head at Gu Xizhou. “He’s already dead.”

Gu Xizhou moved forward without hesitation, lightly touching the body’s skin. He looked very professional as he said, “The body is still warm. He hasn’t been dead for long.”

“He should have forgotten to avoid the path of death as he was running away,” said Gu Xizhou. 

Si Yu nodded, looking at the blood trickling onto the ground. He said calmly, “Let’s go find the other one.”

Walking ahead, Bai Dongyang spoke incessantly about how afraid he felt, unable to speak of anything else and wanting to deliberately distract them, but Si Yu simply ignored him, following silently.

Bai Dongyang stopped at a corner and looked back at Gu Xizhou’s group, puzzled and helpless. He asked, “Why are you walking so slowly? Hurry up, ah!”

Fang Zhi raised an eyebrow and stopped, saying, “This is left. We already took a left just now.” 

“Ya!”

Bai Dongyang looked shocked. Frozen in place, he actually started to cry and said, “Then what do I do? Don’t abandon me– I don’t want to be alone! Just wait a bit, as long as we don’t go right then we’ll be fine!”

Fang Zhi was a little hesitant, but he also couldn’t abandon the other. Si Yu still didn’t speak. He saw Gu Xizhou lift the corners of his mouth and smile, saying, “All right.”

After the three turned left and went downstairs, they passed through a hallway and walked to an intersection. On the right was the sky passage leading to the opposite school building. They were just about to go left when they suddenly heard the sound of rustling footsteps. 

A single person came from the left side. Just when the person wanted to call out to them in excitement, their face suddenly showed great alarm. They turned their head at once and ran away while shouting, “I’m the real Bai Dongyang! The one with you isn’t me! Not me!”

The Bai Dongyang standing on the left side of the hallway seemed very afraid. With a rigid posture, he said, “No… no, believe me! I’m Bai Dongyang!”

Gu Xizhou and Si Yu looked at him wordlessly. They directly grabbed Fang Zhi and turned left.

“Do you really believe me?” It was somewhat astonished. 

Gu Xizhou shot a glance at him. “…” This ghost was putting on such a show? You really should have become an actor; there’s no trace of deceit at all.

Si Yu: “……”

They walked in the middle of the hallway, with the fake Bai Dongyang following behind them. Suddenly, Gu Xizhou’s group heard the sound of something falling on the ground. That thing must have been very soft because the falling sound was very light.

Gu Xizhou turned around and looked at the fake Bai Dongyang, who showed a malevolent smile. “Do you want to see what I dropped?” it said, moving away the hand that obscured the ground. 

Fang Zhi had good eyes, and he immediately recognized that it was a piece of a human lung. His face paled.

At the same time, Gu Xizhou moved forward and stepped on the greater part of the lung. The fake Bai Dongyang’s hands hovered cluelessly in midair for a moment, and he was speechless.

Seeing the fake Bai Dongyang’s shocked expression, Gu Xizhou crouched down and grabbed the lung, which had already been stepped on until it was mush. He stood up and kindly returned it to Bai Dongyang’s hand. “Important things must be held tightly. Don’t just casually drop them as you please. Oh no, It looks like this was stepped on by someone. How awful.”

It: “……” 

After a period of silence, it asked suspiciously, “Did you already know I wasn’t human?”

Gu Xizhou and Si Yu nodded simultaneously. Fang Zhi saw the two nodding and acting so unperturbed and felt stifled. He grudgingly shook his head at the fake Bai Dongyang.

“Why didn’t you run away?” it asked.

Fang Zhi clenched his hands together and said bitterly: “Wuwuwu, my legs are soft…” 

Gu Xizhou: “Actually, I’m not afraid of ghosts.”

Seeing it look at him, Si Yu thought and decided to mercifully tell it, “Xia Hang was frightened by you because he was already panicked and then triggered the path of death. Since you want to use the path of death to kill people, then it shows that your killing style still hasn’t shown up, or maybe your death conditions are too hard to meet, even so much that you’re unable to kill anyone.”

Blood quickly flowed from its body, and his whole body transformed into a blood person in a flash.

“Ah——” It roared furiously, exhausting the strength of its body, and glared fiercely at the three of them like a sinister viper. 

“No matter how much blood there is, it’s useless.” Gu Xizhou waved his hand dismissively, looking a little disdainfully at this ghost. “It’s not like having a ton of blood will give you a tragic death and become frightening.”

Fang Zhi seemed to have listened to Si Yu’s explanation and realized that this ghost couldn’t touch them. He took Gu Xizhou’s words seriously and said very conscientiously and objectively, “Actually, its death can’t really be regarded as tragic. The one found in Phoenix Mountain last time was much more miserable… entirely dismembered. I threw up immediately back then. Even if it’s completely covered in holes, it’s still intact.”

It stared blankly. Clearly it was only this guy who was scared by him. Why is he still earnestly explaining to it… that its death wasn’t miserable enough?

At last, it seemed to have been angered, and it said provocatively, “I hope that when my death style appears, you can still speak so carefreely to me.” 

Gu Xizhou watched it with cold and indifferent eyes as it left.

“It was stabbed to death with a knife,” Si Yu said abruptly.

Gu Xizhou looked at him with a raised eyebrow, leaning against the wall with both hands in his pockets. “Anyone with eyes would know that. It seems that after it dropped out of school, it imitated those Hong Kong movies and became a gangster. As a result, it was stabbed to death with a knife.”

Fang Zhi had already sluggishly come over. Feeling especially wronged, he glared at the two of them. “You guys… Why didn’t you tell me, ah! Wuwuwu!” 

Gu Xizhou grinned at him and said abruptly, “If I had told you, you would have already been scared into shrieking.”

Switching the subject, Gu Xizhou turned to Si Yu again and said, “There must be a reason it appeared so urgently. I’d guess it has something to do with the real Su Xiaomian.”

“Qi Fei didn’t know he was going to starve to death, and Li Jia should have already died. She knows her own cause of death. Only the NPC Su Xiaomian called us over and didn’t die directly. Instead, she received… that woman’s hints,” Si Yu said deeply. “The ghosts shouldn’t be a united front.”

“The short haired woman’s goal is different from the others.” Gu Xizhou pondered for a moment and said, “She gave her a hint before replacing Su Xiaomian.” 

Gu Xizhou looked at the umbrella he was holding and said, “She drowned. It should be today. She gave us the umbrella first to warn us not to get wet in the rain.”

Si Yu gave an “en” and said, “Should be.”

“Which of them has the door?” Gu Xizhou was most concerned about this problem.

Si Yu said, “It should be the short-haired woman. The mission world won’t give a task with certain death.” 

As they were talking, they ran into Cheng Yue’s group of three. They looked very pale and shivered all over. They mentioned that they’d seen Xia Hang’s corpse on the way. Seeing as the sky was getting darker and darker, they went around the teaching building in another loop again and found a frightened Xiao Yue hiding in a corner. One of the female students supported Xiao Yue, and the group headed to the classroom on the first floor.

When they passed by the bathroom, Gu Xizhou pointed at the door and said, “I’m going to the bathroom. Wait for me outside.”

Fang Zhi glanced at the completely empty hallway and nodded. He said, “Okay, do you want us to go with you?”

“No need.” Gu Xizhou waved his hand. “I’m not an elementary student.” 

Si Yu just indifferently told him to hurry up, and the two female students went to the girls’ restroom together.

Entering the toilet, Gu Xizhou had just finished and was washing his hands when a closed bathroom stall behind him suddenly began to issue a rhythmic knocking sound. ‘Dong dong dong’ ‘dong dong dong’

Gu Xizhou raised an eyebrow and turned around to look at the closed bathroom door. Unexpectedly, red blood seeped out from the floor of the stall, flowing all the way across the floor to Gu Xizhou’s heel.

Gu Xizhou looked at the closed stall door… and walked over. 

“Dong dong dong——”

“Dong dong dong——”

This bathroom was dim and damp. It easily made people feel stifled. It’s a good choice to scare people in this kind of place, but unfortunately… you met the wrong person.

Gu Xizhou walked over and kicked open the door. Right inside, it struck a pose and rushed toward Gu Xizhou. It pasted its face snugly on Gu Xizhou’s. Gu Xizhou could smell the strong stench of blood. 

“Are you too scared to speak?” The corners of its mouth lifted, and it extended a dark red tongue to lick its lips.

“Yes, ah, I’m super afraid.” Gu Xizhou glanced at it and said in his heart: Oh, heh. Give you some color. You’re still panting.

Unexpectedly, the man who said he was afraid didn’t turn around and flee. Instead, he took a step inside the stall, put a hand behind his back, and closed the door…

Gu Xizhou pushed up his sleeves and smiled at it: If you don’t take the road to heaven, you’ll arrive at the gates of Hell. 

It: “……” This situation was a little messed up.