Chapter 85 - Eighty-Four:

Chapter 85: Chapter Eighty-Four: "Stay With MeA pungent smell of blood mixed with formalin hit him in the face.

The space around him shimmered momentarily, and his clone quickly teleported a short distance away.

"Bang!"

The door in front of him was shattered as it opened, revealing a skeleton, stripped of its skin, enveloped in muscle tissue, and continuously oozing blood and formalin. It grimaced at him, its bones smeared with blood where it appeared.

Footsteps thudded, and a strange light laughter seemed to permeate from behind, echoing endlessly in the empty hallway. The once calm ceiling was now coated with red and black hues, with blood dripping down.

"Let’s leave this place," Su Ming’an ordered from afar.

The clone immediately turned and ran, sprinting down the deserted corridor. The rooms on both sides appeared to have vanished altogether, offering no place to hide.

The whispering in his ears became clearer, as if a girl was gently breathing into his ear.

"Stay with me."

All that lay ahead was the long corridor, resounding only with his rapid footsteps.

"Join me... become eternal."

The clone ignored these increasingly clear voices and took a step towards the staircase ahead, aiming to return to the rooftop—

He missed a step.

...The previously dark staircase, those thirteen steps, had vanished, replaced by a gaping, abyss-like fissure.

In a vision mixed with darkness and blood-red, everything seemed obscured, as if shrouded in fog.

Originally sitting at the desk, Su Ming’an uncontrollably spat out a mouthful of fresh blood, a feeling of numbness and cold enveloping his entire body as clear red strands appeared in his eyes.

...The clone died.

It died so suddenly that even spatial displacement couldn’t be activated in time.

...The difficulty of this was alarmingly high; Su Ming’an faintly felt a targeted malice.

The barrage of comments began:

"What happened? How did this suddenly...?"

"Why did Ming’an suddenly vomit blood?!"

"Is it, is the clone in trouble? We can’t see what the clone is doing, did something happen to it?"

"Ming’an, such a night segment is very likely to cause problems. Don’t risk your life!"

Wang Ran, who was beside him, saw Su Ming’an suddenly spit blood and shuddered in fright.

"Are you, are you, all right..." he didn’t know what was happening and thought the danger was nearby.

"It’s nothing... wait." Su Ming’an waved his hand. He suddenly recalled the scenes the clone had seen and immediately got up, climbed the bunk ladder swiftly, and flung open Zhang Jinfei’s bed curtain—

Inside was not the fellow classmate who should have been asleep, but a skeleton stripped of flesh.

He then lifted Li Xin’s bed curtain, with the same result.

He now understood why there had been no sounds from those dorm rooms from midnight to twelve.

"Aaaaah—" Wang Ran couldn’t help but scream, and Su Ming’an glared at him fiercely to stop him.

"They are not NPCs?" Wang Ran, teary-eyed, was terrified: "Why do they turn into skeletons at night? That’s really frightening. What if I went to bed tonight and ended up sharing a platform with a bunch of skeletons?"

"..." Su Ming’an let down the bed curtain and walked back to his desk, pondering.

But something suddenly struck him.

He remembered something.

At the last moment the clone’s vision disappeared, it saw the blood-flesh composed horrid skeleton looking in a direction.

That direction was clearly pointing downward... toward his own dormitory.

He abruptly looked up towards the door—

He heard an unusually clear set of footsteps, as if suddenly appearing at the door.

"Bang!"

The door was instantaneously smashed open by the skeleton, wood chips and blood blurring the entire vision.

"Waaah—" Wang Ran screamed in utter terror; his desk was closest to the door, making him the skeleton’s first target, and in the next moment of his cry, a sharp bone spike impaled his abdomen.

It was as if his voice were suddenly suppressed, a murky gurgle issuing from his throat as blood burst everywhere.

Su Ming’an immediately turned around, wrenched open the balcony window, and jumped down!

"Bang!"

He had scoped it out earlier—the area beneath the window was a green lawn. Although the impact of jumping from the third floor was strong, it wouldn’t injure him.

Beneath him was pitch black, not a single light in sight. Su Ming’an remembered the school’s loudspeaker announcements about "no leaving the dormitory at night," but it was already too late to turn back.

The soft female voice came again near his ear, as if a breath was flowing down his neck, yet there was nothing behind him.

"Bang——!"

The sound of a skeleton hitting the ground came from behind; that thing had caught up to him.

The barrage condensed into a cluster:

Su Ming’an ran with all his might, his speed in Bright State truly much faster than in Shadow State, but he still couldn’t shake off the shadow behind him. He smelled a strong scent of formalin growing more intense—although he was on grass that should smell of fresh grass, the bloody scent seemed as if it were pouring in.

He ran as hard as he could, and then he saw the cafeteria.

Sets of eyes, glowing red, peered at him through the doorway.

Their shadows stretched long, their bead-like eyes exceptionally bright in the darkness.

The sound of bones dragging on the ground came from behind.

Pincered from front and back, there was no escape.

The Sword of Yarman appeared in Su Ming’an’s hand.

"...Come with me."

Suddenly, a soft female voice came from diagonally nearby.

Su Ming’an caught the intoxicating scent of roses.

Shen Yue’s eyes, normally regular but now incredibly precious, looked at him. She appeared suddenly from a corner, quickly grabbed Su Ming’an’s hand, and dragged him toward a path to the side.

The night was pitch black, and only then could he see this hidden path.

Su Ming’an ran through the night, dragged by Shen Yue. He could see nothing around him, yet the roar behind him and the cold wind brushing past his ear were still distinct. His hand was gripped tightly by the one ahead, a continuous warmth passing through, her grip very firm, constantly pulling him away from that perilous mire.

They suddenly ran into a building, and the howling behind stopped.

"We can’t turn on the lights, the school rule stated that after midnight there shouldn’t be any light anywhere." Shen Yue pulled the door shut, leading him into a room. Su Ming’an groped his way to a chair and sat down, facing what seemed to be a desk, his hand touching a pencil holder and some folders—this appeared to be an office.

"This is the office building, my father’s office," Shen Yue said, "but he’s gone to the hall to work tonight, so you can stay here for the night."

"Your father?" Su Ming’an couldn’t see where she was, and just spoke in the direction of her voice.

"He’s your homeroom teacher, Teacher Shen," she said.

Su Ming’an remembered the homeroom teacher from the afternoon, who enthusiastically invited him to the office to talk about his essay.

It was only after Shen Yue’s intervention that the homeroom teacher temporarily dropped the idea of dragging him to his office.

"The Literature teacher working at the hall late at night... What work is it? Creating those students with bead-like eyes?"

"..." Shen Yue’s hands tightened, then relaxed, and she sidestepped his question: "...You shouldn’t be out at night."

"It’s indeed very dangerous. School rules... must be the so-called Death Points." Su Ming’an said, "I violated the school rules and regulations, so it’s supposed to be a certain death situation. But why... why did you save me?"

He felt the scent of roses become even more intense as Shen Yue moved closer to him.