CH 70

(You need structure when being a ghost)

Edited by Silver Wind 

The Blonde Lady stayed outside the toilet. Despite waiting for a long time, she did not see the Long-skirted Lady coming out and she called out to her from her position outside. However, the toilet remained silent, and there was no reply.

Under the assumption that the Long-skirted Lady was met with a mishap inside, she was a little reluctant to go inside. She paced back and forth, but she still decided to go in to collect her corpse out of an act of humanitarianism.

“Hello, are you still there?”

The Blonde Lady walked in on light feet. 

The walls of the toilet were pasted with flowery and green wallpaper, and the warning “Caution Slippery Floor” was tiled into the white porcelain floor.

Playful innocence permeated the place.

The Blonde Lady stepped on the periphery of the “Caution: Slippery Floor” warning and stopped at the doorway of the entrance, so she could flee immediately the moment something occurred.

At first glance, the doors to the four toilet stalls were closed, and it was unknown which stall the Long-skirted Lady had gone into.

After a brief moment of contemplation, the Blonde Lady ultimately decided that she should not put her life at risk so she turned around, preparing to leave. However, before she could leave the toilet, the hanging lamp above her head flickered, then the light bulb abruptly exploded, causing some sparks to fly out.

The Blonde Lady humped in fright and subconsciously turned her head towards the source.

The fragments of the lightbulb impacted on the ground as the entire toilet descended into darkness.

The composition of the toilet was somewhat strange; logically speaking, there should be windows to ventilate the room but all four sides were walls. Now that the lights had been extinguished, there was only a small illumination coming from the door. 

Neck stiffening, the Blonde Lady took two steps back.

The original toilet was completely clean, but once the lights were extinguished, it seemed to have plunged into another world.

Borrowing the dim light, a trail of blood flowing out from one of the stalls could be seen on the porcelain-tiled ground, cutting across the floor surface in a shapeless and twisted manner. Furthermore, there were small footprints all over, like a small child had dragged something along the floor to make a painting.

Without needing to ask, that thing was the Long-skirted Lady who had entered prior. 

The Blonde Lady could not suppress her terror and she kept moving backwards before she knocked into something from her blind spot. It scared her into screaming: “Ah!”

She did not dare to look back, deathly afraid that she would be killed once she did so.

However, not turning back did not mean that the thing behind her did not exist. She heard the sound of relaxed breathing before someone opened their mouth sweetly: “Teacher, I want to go to the toilet.”

It turns out it’s a student. 

Blonde Lady heaved a sigh of relief: “Sure, teacher will bring you…”

Her voice ceased abruptly.

Standing behind the Blonde Lady was a kindergarten student, except his face was completely smeared with blood and only his pitch-black eyes could be perceived. He only reached the Blonde Lady’s knees, that much was certain, but he was holding onto a matured woman who was laying limp with his bare hands.

The Long-skirted Lady’s hair was scattered, her body was leaving behind a blood trail, and she was not reacting in the slightest. 

Blonde Lady swallowed her saliva as she stood rooted to the ground.

The little child revealed a smile: “Teacher, play with me.”

The Blonde Lady’s heart lurched when she thought about the Long-skirted Lady’s ending. With one hand, she shoved the child aside and took to her heels, running, only stopping when she had reached the corridor.

The Uncle happened to patrol past the area just then. Upon seeing the Blonde Lady’s flustered expression, he stopped and asked: “What’s wrong with you?” 

The Blonde Lady’s words were incoherent. “There was a child, in the toilet…”

Their movements attracted the rest of the group, and after hearing the Blonde Lady’s account, he said in a resolute tone: “Let’s go there and take a look.”

Perhaps because their courage had been bolstered by their numbers, the group of players strode over to the toilet high and mightily.

However, when they reached the toilet entrance that the Blonde Lady was talking about, the scene that she had depicted was non-existent. Instead, there was not a single speck of blood on the clean, porcelain tiles. 

Blonde Lady: “But I clearly saw it just now!”

Even if the toilet was reverted back to normal, the fact that the Long-skirted Lady had disappeared could not be refuted.

Thankfully, this was not a horror movie, and the players were not cannon fodders who were persistent in denying the existence of ghosts and monsters.

The Yellow-haired Boy said: “Since you encountered a child, why don’t we go back to the classroom to check which child had disappeared?” 

Everyone returned back to the classroom.

All the children were lying in their small beds, and a headcount told them that none of them were missing and they all looked like they were sleeping soundly.

The players exchanged gazes with one another.

They had lost a player in just half a day’s work. It was apparent that difficulty of A-level copies had a well-deserved reputation. 

Although everyone here were old players, the “old” could be an overstatement as well. Players who had been through ten D-level copies were not the same grade as those who had been through three A-level copies; take the Long-skirted Lady who had died like cannon fodder for example: it was highly likely that she was a player who had dithered around the lower level copies, which was why she committed such rookie mistakes.

With the first player being slaughtered as sacrifice, the other players heightened their vigilance as well.

The killing done by the ghosts and monsters had always been a steady and incremental process, going from the one person to two and then a group, which could even result in total annihilation in the end. The first person’s death was equivalent to the opening prologue of a massacre.

However, there just had to be two people who were completely out of the situation in the group of players that wore heavy expressions. 

* * *

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Shen Dongqing grumbled like a cat in response, head leaning into Zhou Wenyan’s embrace. 

The only other couple in the group readily acknowledged their inferiority; they did not dare to be so lovey-dovey in a horror movie setting.

The Uncle spat in reply, saying in a low voice: “An offence to public decency.”

He was still holding onto the previous grudge that culminated from being slammed into the wall. But after he had been rolled over by true strength, he did not dare to confront them again, and he could only scold them behind their backs to maintain his own repute.

The Fringed Girl asked the Blonde Lady in a low voice: “Have you identified which child it was?” 

The Blonde Lady circled around the entire classroom once before she returned and shook her head. “Not here.”

The Fringed Girl posited a conjecture: “Could it be that one of the children who disappeared?”

The clues they had on their hands were too few, they could not guess anything either.

As the players continued discussing in soft voices, the bell rang. 

The three teachers were initially wondering if they should wake the children, but once the bell rang thrice, they saw the slumbering children open their eyes in an instant and sit up straight without the slightest trace of drowsiness on the faces.

It would not be a cause for concern if they had made some noise, but with the dozen of children climbing out of bed in such uniform actions, the consistency of the movement made them suspect that they were soulless wooden puppets that were being controlled.

The players present felt a chill running down their spines.

Time was up. 

The three teachers had to begin their classes, the Male Student had to prepare dinner, the two bodyguards went for their patrols, and the two cleaners… were sitting on the staircase eating ice cream.

Fang Qi had borrowed the pretext of going to the restroom to slink out of the classroom secretly. And even though he was used to it, some imbalance arose in his heart when he saw this scene.

However, there was no way around it; the big bosses have always been this wilful.

Fang Qi recounted the incident that the Blonde Lady had talked about just now. 

Zhou Wenyan was preoccupied. “Understood.”

Fang Qi came to a realisation after seeing that.

In the eyes of the big boss, clearance was not as important as his love affair.

He went back to the classroom with a dim expression on his face, which prompted the Fringed Girl to ask him: “What’s the matter?” 

Fang Qi: “Just ate dog food.”

The Fringed Girl was puzzled: ???

In response, Fang Qi heaved a sigh: “It’s nothing…”

Guo Guo dashed out from the group of children and hugged onto Fang Qi. With a bright smile, she raised her head and said: “Teacher, can you accompany us to play?” 

In all fairness, Guo Guo was extremely cute with her small round face and big eyes, which could make a person’s heart melt upon seeing it.

The entranced Fang Qi almost agreed to her request, only to remember the ending of the Long-skirted Lady at the critical juncture. He shuddered, returning to his senses, “Teacher still has matters to attend to, he can’t accompany you to play.”

Guo Guo’s visage scrunched together, preparing to cry because the words did not conform with her expectations.

Before she could squeeze out her tears, however, she saw Shen Dongqing walking past the door and remembered the ice cream assault. Hence, she choked back her cry forcefully, and she looked incredibly pitiful. 

Taking advantage of the chance before him, Fang Qi quickly escaped from her grasp to attend to the other children.

After working for an entire day, the evening finally arrived.

Since the kindergarten was a student boarding model, all of the students stayed in the school and their rooms were right next to the teaching building. Fortunately, these children did not need to be coaxed before they obediently fell asleep, and they did not create trouble for the three new teachers.

When the students finally fell asleep, the teachers went back to the second floor to rest. 

The second floor was the dormitory for the staff, with two people sharing one room and apart from the bodyguards who were sleeping at the guard house at the entrance, the other staff would be sleeping here.

From the bottom of his heart, Fang Qi genuinely wanted to share one room with the big bosses, but he was intellectually aware that it was impossible, so he could only settle for the next best thing, which was choosing the room next to them.

Shen Dongqing casually pushed open the hinged door and walked in.

Perhaps due to the fact that no one had stayed in the room for a long time, the flower placed on the desk had already withered. 

Zhou Wenyan removed the flowers and threw it into the dustbin before he tidied up the room a little.

Generally speaking, the décor in the room could reveal what kind of person the inhabitant was.

Zhou Wenyan surveyed the room for a moment. Judging from the flowers on the table and the body length mirror hanging on the wall, it was apparent that the previous inhabitant of the room should be a female.

Whereas Shen Dongqing did not pay attention to those details, since he was already rolling about on the bed. 

Zhou Wenyan laid down on the outer edge of the bed and hugged his restless partner.

Yawning, Shen Dongqing asked: “Are we going out at night?”

Zhou Wenyan: “We’ll speak about it later.”

After all, going out to find trouble was too much of a hassle; it was better to wait for them to send themselves to their door. 

Shen Dongqing nodded his head.

Pa—

The incandescent lamp was switched off, thus plunging the room into darkness in an instant.

Shen Dongqing’s sleeping habits had always been great; no matter where he was, he was capable of sleeping once his head touched the pillow. And now that he had Zhou Wenyan by his side, impediments were essentially reduced into non-existence, and he fell asleep very quickly. 

However, that lasted until the middle of the night since Shen Dongqing heard an ear-piercing noise.

ZI LA—

It sounded like someone using their nails to scratch at the glass beside his ear non-stop.

Drowsy, Shen Dongqing opened his eyes and looked over. 

Their bed was placed underneath the window, which allowed them to see outside the window the moment they raised their head. With one glance, Shen Dongqing realised that there was a spot of red light twinkling between the seams of the window curtains.

Swish—

A small child with an ashen complexion was pasted on the glass window, and his facial features had become warped from the pressure as he tried to squeeze himself in.

He met Shen Dongqing’s gaze, scarlet red pupils shifting. He issued a strange voice from his throat: “Teacher, come out and play ya…” 

Shen Dongqing sobered up.

The small child kept repeating: “Come out and play, teacher, come out and play with us.”

Shen Dongqing climbed out of bed immediately.

The child originally thought that this person was frightened to the point where he wanted to flee, so he burst out into a peal of giggles. 

You can’t run, none of you can escape…

But the child had guessed wrongly.

Shen Dongqing was not trying to run. After standing on his feet, he lifted the latch on the window casement directly, pushed open the window and grabbed hold of the child without any hesitation.

Although the child looked young, he had already experienced this copy countless times, and while he did not know how many panic-stricken and fearful teachers he had met, he had never encountered someone this violent. 

The child was hauled into the room with a dumbstruck expression.

Shen Dongqing narrowed his eyes. “It’s deep in the night but you’re not properly sleeping, and you ran over to harass people in their sleep? Do you know that this is immoral behaviour?!”

Child: Hold on…

He was clearly a ghost ah, why was he being forced to listen to an ideological education lecture? 

Right, it must be that his current appearance was not ferocious enough, which made these people misunderstand!

Before the child could reveal a scarier appearance, however, he was pressed onto Shen Dongqing’s lap.

Rest assured, Shen Dongqing respected the old and cherished the young for the most part, he would never lay a heavy hand on a child. At most, he would… press the little ghost on his lap and slap his butt.

Pa! 

Shen Dongqing: “Are you still going to do this in the future!”

Child: ……

Where did he go wrong exactly!?

There was another loud and audible slap. 

Shen Dongqing: “Are you still going to disturb other people late at night next time?”

Lips trembling, the child could only beg for mercy: “I’m not going to, I don’t dare to! I won’t do it anymore…”

He was a formidable ghost among the tyrants; why was he being humiliated like this? He was so ashamed he almost cried right then and there. As he wiped away some snot and tears, he bawled: “I was wrong!”

Seeing that he was sincere in acknowledging his mistakes, Shen Dongqing lectured him out of a gesture of goodwill: “Sleep early and get up early in the future, make great efforts in your studies, and don’t immerse yourself in such nonsense. Only then can you grow taller and become smarter, do you understand?” 

The child hiccupped and reminded him: “But I’m already dead.”

Shen Dongqing slapped the bed: “What, you can’t actively strive to grow taller and become a powerful ghost after you’re dead? Are there any benefits to pasting yourself on other people’s windows daily? Apart from harassing people, what else can you do? Peep at other people while they’re asleep?

“If you don’t study properly, how are you supposed to hurt people? You need to have standards when you’re being a ghost, you can’t remain as a small ghost who only knows how to plaster himself to wall corners forever.”

Meanwhile, Zhou Wenyan was half-lying on the bed, and after listening to the conversation for some time, he could not resist laughing. 

What kind of strange thing did he just secretly witness again?

“I understand.” The child pulled a straight face and said, “I will study well and improve myself every day.”

Shen Dongqing nodded his head appreciatively.

He had no choice; after seeing so many worthless juniors, he could not stop himself from wanting to lecture them a little. 

Although the child did not accomplish what he originally set out to do, he had drunk a huge bowl of chicken soup for the soul. Hence, with a face brimming with fighting spirit, he climbed out of the window, appearing as though he was going back to disseminate the propaganda.

Zhou Wenyan finally remembered the proper business and called the child to a stop. “How did you die?”

The child stiffened and looked towards his life instructor.

Shen Dongqing: “He’s asking you a question.” 

The child shook his head. “Don’t know.” He paused for a moment, “… Only remembered that it was very painful.”

Zhou Wenyan knocked his index finger on the bed.

These small ghosts did not remember how they died, he could not directly ask them for the answer.

Noticing that they still had questions they wanted to ask, the child added in a hurry, “Truthfully speaking, I don’t know anything, I was like this the moment I woke up.” 

A-level copies had always been this; wherein they could not clear the copy with brute force, and they had to decrypt the riddle to pass.

Zhou Wenyan contemplated for a moment. Instead of asking another pivotal question, he chose a simple one: “How many students are there in Haiduo Kindergarten in total?”

Slowly, the child replied: “My mathematics isn’t very good, but probably fifty to sixty.”

But there were only a dozen students in the classroom. 

Which means to say that the players had to find the cause of the death for the other tens of students. It seems like the problem was quite complicated.

Zhou Wenyan tossed out another question: “What is a bad teacher?”

The child’s expression changed and contorted into a ferocious one: “Bad teachers, bad teachers are the teachers who don’t play with us!” He issued a teeth-grating cackle from his lips, “Do you want to be bad teachers too?”

Shen Dongqing scrunched his brows together. “How old are you, why do you keep wanting to play with the teachers? Could you be more progressive? Do you know your ABCs? Have you memorised your addition, subtraction, multiplication and division tables?” 

With each conscientious question being issued, it directly forced the child into a halt.

He shrank his neck, genuinely tempted to say that he did not know. However, when he recalled the terror he felt when he was being pressed down on his lap and getting spanked, he did not dare to utter a single word. He could only follow the wall and climb out, slinking away.

Shen Dongqing huffed: “This group of bear children.”

Shen Dongqing was deeply worried and sick at heart. 

The ghosts he was meeting in these copies were each weaker chickens than the last. He could disregard the fact that the previous game was a trash recycling station for ghosts since they could make good food at least, but this copy even used child labour, it was utterly devoid of conscience!

The game expressed its extreme helplessness.

The ghosts and monsters were not weak chicken, it was clearly because he was too capable in dispensing beatings. The game was on the verge of tears.

Zhou Wenyan abruptly said: “I have an idea.” 

Train of thought interrupted, Shen Dongqing tilted his head to look at him: “What is it?”

Zhou Wenyan said: “I want to play a game with them.”

The game would not establish such a setting without any rhyme or reason.

This incident and the children’s “game”, it was without a doubt that there would be clues in its midst. 

Shen Dongqing rubbed his eyes: “Me and you together…”

Zhou Wenyan kissed his forehead in reply. “Sleep.”

* * *

The next morning. 

When the bell that was persistently urging them rang, the players got out of bed punctually.

Their punctuality was not by choice because they did not sleep at all last night. With the innumerable small ghosts plastering themselves outside their window, who would dare to sleep? All of them were listless and lethargic, and that was when Shen Dongqing and Zhou Wenyan – who evidently slept very well – appeared.

The Blonde Lady found it strange. “Didn’t you encounter anything last night?”

Shen Dongqing answered truthfully: “Lectured a bear child.” 

The Blonde Lady: “Huh?”

Other people encountered ghosts, and yet you encountered a bear child?

Despite the Blonde Lady’s palpable disbelief, she did not have the time to ask more because she had to run over to attend to the children.

The players were akin to spinning tops as they started working ceaselessly from the moment they got out of bed, and it was more miserable than going to work. 

Their salaries would be deducted if they work at their jobs; their lives would be forfeit if they attempted to skip work here.

With that fact deeply engraved, the Male Student delivered the breakfast that consisted of a bowl of porridge and an egg for each person, and the meal could be considered as done.

Once the children ate their fill, they started making noise, pulling on the teachers as they said: “Teacher, accompany us to play.”

“Teacher, I really like you, I want to play with you.” 

“Teacher, can you play toys with me?”

With all the young and tender voices superimposing on one another in the tight classroom space, hearing the racket could cause a person’s head to spin.

They only had one purpose, which was to make the players play with them.

The three teachers were extremely frustrated, but with the precedent of the Long-skirted Lady, they did not dare to agree to it either. Hence, they could only cajole them and reject them good-naturedly. 

They would die if they agreed to it. The body of the previous person who had agreed had already gone cold, who would dare to agree? Do they resent their lives for being too long?

The students had already come to a consensus last night. After they were rejected, they exchanged glances, and they started to slip into the expression where they were suppressing their tears together.

Guo Guo glanced at Shen Dongqing triumphantly. You can stuff someone’s mouth with ice cream, but can you stuff the mouths of everyone here? I will cry, I am going to cry! What are you going to do about us?

“Wah—”