The black phone's screen lingered in Chen Ge's vision like a portal to untapped potentials, its glowing text unfurling the mission's core directive with an inexorable clarity that demanded his full immersion: "Mission Requirement: Find the Pen Spirit's best friend and fulfil its wish," the words etched in digital luminescence that pulsed with the subtle rhythm of spectral expectation, outlining a quest that delved into the heart of unresolved hauntings, where bonds forged in the innocence of youth now frayed across the divide of death, compelling him to unearth a figure lost to time and tragedy, piecing together fragments of a story that spanned beyond the grave to grant closure to an entity adrift in eternal limbo. Appended to this solemn charge came the tantalizing promise of recompense, proclaimed in bold, unyielding script: "Mission Reward: The Pen Spirit's affection level will increase tremendously, and you will have a chance to recruit it as the Haunted House's employee!"—a bounty that dangled not just intangible favor but the prospect of alliance with the otherworldly, transforming a fleeting spectral encounter into a cornerstone of his burgeoning empire of frights, where the veil between worlds thinned not in peril but in partnership.
Chen Ge's eyes, sharp and unblinking, traced the contours of that final sentence with the intensity of a scholar deciphering an ancient codex, each syllable resonating with the weight of long-nurtured aspirations that had simmered in the recesses of his ambitious soul; the notion of enlisting an authentic ghost into his payroll, a living—nay, undead—asset to orchestrate the symphony of screams that defined his Haunted House, had crystallized as his most cherished reverie, a pinnacle of innovation that blurred the lines between mortal ingenuity and supernatural spectacle, fueling countless late-night strategems and whispered plans amid the creaking rafters of his nocturnal domain. He had never dared to envision the fulfillment of this vision materializing with such precipitous haste, the black phone's capricious benevolence catching him off guard like a sudden eclipse, shattering the measured pace of his progression from novice proprietor to master of the macabre, and in that suspended moment of revelation, a surge of exhilaration coursed through him, mingling with the pragmatic caution that had become his second nature, for such gifts from the ether often came laced with thorns hidden in their petals.
From the very instant the black phone had materialized in his possession—a enigmatic artifact that had upended his existence with its cryptic trials and otherworldly summons—Chen Ge had devoted meticulous scrutiny to the enigmatic "My Team of Ghouls and Ghosts" tab, its barren interface a constant companion in his arsenal of features, drawing his gaze during every idle interlude as he harbored hopes of populating its voids with allies from beyond the veil, envisioning a roster that would elevate his scenarios from mere illusions to realms teeming with genuine peril. Yet, across the grueling gauntlet of missions he had conquered—each a crucible of cunning, endurance, and flirtation with the abyss—the tab had stubbornly persisted in its desolation, a mocking expanse of nothingness that mocked his efforts, with neither Xiaoxiao nor Zhang Ya proving amenable to recruitment, their essences bound by inscrutable constraints that rendered them observers rather than enlistees, spectral confidants who lent their shadows but withheld their loyalties in full. Resignation had gradually eroded his initial fervor, a quiet acceptance settling over him like dust on forgotten relics, as he reconciled himself to the chasm between human ambition and ghostly autonomy, acknowledging that the dead operated by rhythms alien to the quick, their alliances forged in echoes rather than contracts—until this unforeseen issuance from the phone shattered that fragile peace, rekindling embers he had presumed extinguished, though tempered now by the sobering awareness that such boons arrived not as unalloyed triumphs but as intricate puzzles demanding his utmost guile.
The advantages of integrating the Pen Spirit into his cadre of spectral performers unfurled in Chen Ge's mind like an inexhaustible scroll, each benefit a brushstroke in the masterpiece of operational synergy he could envision: her innate prescience, a clairvoyant thread woven from the fabric of fate itself, would allow her to anticipate the ebb and flow of visitor trepidations, tailoring scares with precognitive precision that outstripped any mortal's intuition, turning potential lulls into crescendos of unrelenting dread. Moreover, her capacity to instill terror stood unparalleled, manifesting horrors without recourse to the cumbersome trappings of cosmetics or costuming, her ethereal form gliding through the gloom as an unadorned embodiment of the uncanny, evoking primal responses that no latex apparition could rival, her whispers alone sufficient to unravel nerves and summon screams from the depths of the subconscious. In the discerning lens of Chen Ge's entrepreneurial vision, she emerged not merely as an employee but as the quintessential operative, a linchpin whose seamless fusion of foresight and fright would redefine the boundaries of immersive entertainment, elevating his Haunted House from a local curiosity to an unassailable legend whispered about in awed tones across the city's shadowed underbelly.
I shall help the Pen Spirit fulfil her wish, Chen Ge resolved inwardly, the declaration solidifying in his thoughts like a vow etched in unyielding stone, a personal covenant born from the intersection of pragmatic gain and an undercurrent of empathy for the entity's lingering yearnings, for in granting this spectral petition, he would not only secure her allegiance but honor the fragile tapestry of regrets that bound her to the mortal plane, navigating the delicate interplay of her unspoken desires with the care of one who had learned to tread lightly among the restless dead.
With a fluid motion that belied the whirlwind of calculations churning within, Chen Ge secreted the black phone back into the secure folds of his pocket, its weight a reassuring talisman against his thigh as he marshaled his resolve and insinuated himself through the milling throng of spectators, his path a deliberate weave amid the press of bodies still abuzz with the aftershocks of the footage's revelations. The quartet from Qin Guang's studio, their earlier bravado eroded into hasty disarray, were hastily bundling their gear—the laptop snapping shut with a decisive click, cables coiled in frantic loops, and peripherals shoved into battered cases—as if the room's shifting allegiances had ignited an urgent flight instinct, their postures hunched in collective defeat, eyes darting toward the exit like cornered prey sensing the hunt's inexorable turn. "Who said you people can go?" Chen Ge's voice sliced through the murmurings with authoritative calm, halting their retreat in its tracks, the question laced not with overt menace but with the unyielding finality of one who held the narrative's reins, drawing all gazes to his unyielding stance at the crowd's epicenter.
Chen Ge advanced with measured strides toward the prostrate form of Fei Youliang, who lay in a haze of post-incident stupor amid the cluster of concerned onlookers, his hand dipping into the man's pocket with clinical detachment to extract the pilfered artifact—a tarnished name tag that gleamed dully under the room's harsh fluorescents, its surface marred by the grime of illicit handling and bearing the elegant script of a woman's name: Chen Yalin, the inscription evoking a spectral echo that hung in the air like an unresolved chord from the scenario's tragic overture. "Why would you steal a prop from the Haunted House?" Chen Ge interrogated, his tone a blend of incredulity and pointed accusation as he brandished the tag aloft, twirling it between thumb and forefinger to catch the light in accusatory flashes that danced across the faces of the assembled, the metal's faint clink punctuating his words like a gavel's prelude. "Don't tell me, this old nametag belongs to Fei Youliang?" he pressed, the rhetorical jab laced with sardonic edge, underscoring the absurdity of the claim while weaving a web of implication that ensnared the intruders' motives in further disrepute, the crowd's murmurs swelling in sympathetic outrage at the blatant desecration of his domain's hallowed relics.
The operatives from Qin Guang's studio exchanged furtive glances heavy with mutual bafflement, their expressions a mosaic of furrowed brows and tightened lips as they grappled with the inexplicable twist in their operative's behavior, the classroom theft emerging as an anomalous thread that unraveled the tidy fabric of their sabotage plot into something perilously unhinged. They had orchestrated the intrusion with calculated malice, anticipating a harvest of incriminating clips to fuel their smear campaign, yet this bizarre larceny of a innocuous prop—a name tag plucked from the scenario's lore like a forbidden heirloom—defied their scripting, leaving them adrift in a sea of unanswered queries about what compulsion had driven Fei Youliang to such eccentric pilfering, his actions a riddle wrapped in the enigma of the footage's supernatural undercurrents, their earlier confidence fracturing under the weight of this unforeseen complication that painted their ally not as victim but as unwitting vandal.
"Xiao Chen, let me handle this," Uncle Xu interjected with his characteristic diffidence, his voice a gentle buffer against the brewing storm, stepping forward with the instinctive mediation of one who had weathered countless tempests in the park's fractious ecosystem, positioning his sturdy frame as a human bulwark between Chen Ge's righteous indignation and the beleaguered interlopers, his eyes pleading for restraint amid the tension that crackled like static in the air. Ever the peacemaker forged in the fires of amicable resolutions, Uncle Xu harbored a deep-seated aversion to the acrimony of direct confrontation, preferring the subtle arts of negotiation to the blunt force of escalation, and in this moment, his intervention stemmed from a paternal urge to shield his young charge from the fallout's sharper edges, even as he acknowledged the justice simmering in Chen Ge's demands.
"First thing's first, I need them to delete all the videos from their laptop, or else they are not leaving this place," Chen Ge articulated with unwavering firmness, his stipulation cutting through the room's undercurrents like a decree from on high, underscoring the non-negotiable imperative that safeguarded his enterprise's sanctity against the marauding threat of digital dissemination. "Every set inside the Haunted House took painstaking effort to build, and I will not allow my effort to go to waste just like that," he elaborated, his words infused with the raw passion of creation's toil—the sleepless nights sketching blueprints in the dim glow of desk lamps, the callused hands hammering props into spectral verisimilitude, the endless iterations refining atmospheres until they hummed with latent terror—each element a testament to his unyielding dedication that no opportunistic incursion could be permitted to erode, the crowd nodding in solemn accord as the gravity of his investment resonated like a shared creed among artisans of the uncanny.
Uncle Xu, attuned to the precarious balance of reputation that underpinned the park's fragile harmony, grasped intuitively the cataclysmic repercussions that awaited should the incriminating footage escape into the wilds of the internet—a viral specter that could poison wells of potential patronage, tarnishing the Haunted House's allure with whispers of peril and impropriety, unraveling the delicate ecosystem of trust he had helped nurture over years of steadfast stewardship. With vigilant oversight, he shadowed the Qin Guang studio members as they complied under duress, their fingers hovering over the delete keys with reluctant precision, purging the files one by one in a ritual of capitulation that he monitored with the hawkish intensity of a sentinel, ensuring no digital remnants lingered to haunt the ether; once the deed was sealed, he escorted them firmly toward the administrative sanctum of park management, his grip on their egress unyielding, for their transgressions had sown discord within the venue's bounds, meriting the measured retribution of institutional protocols that would levy fines, bans, or worse upon those who disrupted the collective pursuit of escapist delight.
Once the interlopers had been ushered from the premises under Uncle Xu's watchful convoy, their silhouettes receding into the park's bustling arteries like vanquished shades, Chen Ge consciously expelled them from the forefront of his considerations, compartmentalizing the episode with the practiced detachment of one who had danced too often with chaos to let it linger; in the quiet aftermath, a thread of reluctant compassion wove through his reflections, for he could not wholly condemn the unwitting architects of their own undoing, their meddlesome venture a tragic collision with forces they could scarcely comprehend, having blundered into the Pen Spirit's domain and provoked a wrath that eclipsed mere mortal grudges, leaving them as inadvertent pawns in a spectral chess game whose rules bent to the whims of the unseen.
In the wake of their departure, as the room's tension ebbed into a collective exhale, Xu Wan emerged from the shadowed maw of the Haunted House's entrance, her steps tentative yet purposeful, wiping faint traces of exertion from her brow with the back of her hand, her uniform slightly askew from the rigors of standby vigilance amid the unfolding drama. "Boss, are we still going to continue for the rest of the day?" she queried, her voice pitched with a blend of practicality and underlying weariness, eyes scanning the dispersing crowd for cues of resumption, her question a pragmatic anchor amid the swirl of emotions that had gripped the afternoon, seeking clarity on whether the specter of disruption would shutter operations or if the resilient pulse of business demanded they press onward into the evening's promise.
"Of course," Chen Ge affirmed without hesitation, his response a beacon of unswerving determination that sliced through any lingering doubts, pivoting smoothly back toward the ticket booth where the day's ledger awaited his stewardship, the structure a humble bastion of commerce amid the park's whimsical sprawl. No sooner had he settled into its familiar confines than the previously decorous assembly of patrons erupted into a surging tide, enveloping him in a whirlwind of eager bodies and overlapping voices, their orderly restraint dissolving into a fervent crush that pressed against the booth's barriers, hands clutching bills and eyes alight with the afterglow of vicarious thrills, the air thick with the electric hum of anticipation reborn from the ashes of skepticism.
"Brother, how come there is no mention of the school scenario on the public forum? It looks f*cking interesting!" one particularly boisterous visitor bellowed, his words tumbling forth in a rush of profane enthusiasm, leaning perilously over the counter as if proximity could hasten the revelation, his face flushed with the raw adrenaline of the witnessed footage, the query laced with a mix of accusatory wonder and infectious hype that encapsulated the scenario's magnetic pull, drawing nods and echoes from the cluster of peers who jostled beside him, their shared bafflement at the online oversight only amplifying the underground allure that now crackled among them like unspoken legend.
"Is the ticket to visit the school the same price?" another interjected seamlessly, her voice rising above the din with the precision of a shopper appraising value, fingers drumming impatiently on the booth's scarred surface as she weighed the thrill's worth against her wallet's constraints, the question threading through the melee to underscore the practical underbelly of their fervor, eyes narrowing in shrewd calculation while the crowd's momentum carried her forward, transforming the inquiry into a collective bargaining chip that hung expectant in the charged atmosphere.
"Can we go in four at a time I haven't been so excited and scared at the same time! Someone hold me!" a third voice wailed, the exclamation laced with hyperbolic glee that bordered on hysteria, the speaker clutching at a companion's arm in mock collapse even as genuine tremors of exhilaration quivered through her frame, her words painting a vivid portrait of the dual-edged sword of anticipation that the Mu Yang High School scenario wielded, the plea for group entry a bid for communal fortitude against the unknown, eliciting laughter and sympathetic groans from the surrounding throng who mirrored her cocktail of trepidation and thrill in their animated gestures and wide-eyed exchanges.
Chen Ge had harbored no inkling that the spectators' response to the freshly unveiled school scenario would burgeon into such an unbridled wave of positivity, especially in the harrowing shadow cast by Fei Youliang and Zhu Jianing's visceral downfall, their collapse a stark tableau that might have deterred the faint-hearted rather than igniting this blaze of curiosity; surveying the sea of upturned faces that encircled his booth, he discerned the demographic skew toward youthful vigor, the majority comprising students whose unjaded palates craved the sharp tang of authentic fright, their backpacks slung haphazardly and uniforms bearing the faint creases of hurried transit, a cohort primed by the digital age's thirst for experiential extremes to embrace the Haunted House's offerings with the fervor of explorers charting forbidden territories.
"I'm sorry, but due to some accidents, the scenario is temporarily closed for a two-day maintenance period," Chen Ge announced with measured regret, his voice projecting over the crest of disappointment that rippled through the assembly, the proclamation a necessary bulwark against unchecked peril, tempering enthusiasm with the prudence of oversight. Fei Youliang and Zhu Jianing had unwittingly served as unwitting beta testers, their harrowing odyssey through the depths yielding invaluable data on the scenario's autonomous ferocity—triggers firing without his guiding hand, entities manifesting in self-sustaining dread that affirmed the setup's independence in ensnaring souls—yet beneath this efficacy lurked a proliferation of variables, from the Pen Spirit's mercurial interventions to the labyrinth's unpredictable echoes, imbuing the experience with risks that demanded meticulous recalibration before unleashing it upon the masses, lest the line between thrill and tragedy blur irreparably.
The precedent set by the Murder by Midnight scenario lingered in Chen Ge's mind like a spectral blueprint, its chaotic inception a vivid reminder of the volatile interplay between the living and the restless dead that defined his Haunted House's unique alchemy; in those early days, the impish spirit Xiaoxiao had trailed the hapless visitor known as Monkey, weaving through the shadows with mischievous glee to orchestrate a terror so profound it had etched itself into the park's nascent lore, sending the man fleeing in a paroxysm of dread that bordered on the primal, his screams echoing long after he vanished into the night. It was only through Chen Ge's relentless pursuit of that scenario's hidden mission—a labyrinthine quest that demanded he unravel the tangled threads of spectral motivations and buried traumas—that he had tamed the scenario's volatile spirits, coaxing them into a semblance of cooperation that transformed raw chaos into a curated crescendo of fright, stabilizing the experience into one that thrilled without unraveling the delicate fabric of visitor safety. That hard-won lesson now loomed large as he contemplated the Mu Yang High School scenario, its own spectral denizens—chief among them the mercurial Pen Spirit—demanding a similar resolution to bend their wills to his, their compliance the key to unlocking a domain where terror served his vision rather than spiraling into unchecked peril.
To bring the lingering spirits of Mu Yang High School under his command, Chen Ge reasoned with the clarity of a strategist plotting a campaign, the most straightforward path lay in deciphering and fulfilling the scenario's hidden mission, a task that promised not merely control but a deeper communion with the entities that haunted its shadowed corridors, their acquiescence hinging on the resolution of grievances that tethered them to the mortal plane like chains forged from regret. His hand instinctively sought the reassuring weight of the black phone in his pocket, fingers curling around its cool, obsidian surface as if anchoring himself to its enigmatic guidance, the device a silent oracle whose cryptic directives had steered him through countless trials, each more perilous than the last. With a resolve hardened by the memory of past triumphs, he made his decision, the path forward crystallizing in his mind like frost on a winter pane: he would delve into the heart of the scenario, confront its spectral denizens, and fulfill the Pen Spirit's wish, not merely to secure her allegiance but to honor the fragile humanity that lingered within her spectral form, a mission that wove duty with ambition in a tapestry only he could fully comprehend.
The Haunted House resumed its relentless rhythm, the morning's tumult with Qin Guang's studio fading into the background like a discordant note swallowed by a larger symphony, its impact reduced to a fleeting interlude in the day's unyielding cadence of shrieks and shadows. Chen Ge immersed himself in the operational fray, orchestrating ticket sales and guiding visitors with the practiced ease of a maestro, his focus unbroken until the clock struck 4 pm, when the tide of park-goers ebbed as the afternoon waned, leaving the pathways quieter and the air tinged with the languor of a day well spent. Seizing the moment, he summoned Xu Wan, his steadfast aide whose tireless presence had anchored the day's chaos, and instructed her to clock out early, her departure a gesture of reprieve for her diligence amid the morning's upheaval. Once she had vanished into the park's bustling arteries, Chen Ge steeled himself and ventured alone into the Mu Yang High School scenario, his solitary descent a deliberate plunge into the crucible of the unknown, driven by the imperative to confront the spectral forces that had upended his carefully laid plans.
As the first 2-star scenario unlocked by Chen Ge's relentless ambition, Mu Yang High School held a hallowed place in his enterprise, its entrance cunningly integrated into the stairwell that plunged into the underground carpark—a liminal threshold that blurred the line between mundane utility and otherworldly dread, ensuring its prominence as the inaugural gauntlet for thrill-seekers drawn to his domain. This subterranean placement was no mere whim but a calculated constant, a fixed point in the sprawling architecture of his vision; no matter how he expanded the carpark's labyrinthine depths in future iterations—carving out new chambers or weaving additional scenarios into its shadowed expanse—the entrance to Mu Yang High School would remain immutable, a sentinel of terror that greeted every visitor with its oppressive promise, the first whisper of fear to kiss their senses as they crossed into his curated abyss, setting the tone for the horrors that awaited below.
With the beam of his flashlight cutting through the oppressive gloom like a blade of light, Chen Ge navigated toward the sealed classroom, its door a scarred relic that seemed to pulse with latent secrets, the air around it heavy with the residue of spectral confrontations. Inside, the scene was a frozen tableau of disarray—chairs toppled in haphazard heaps, tables askew as if shoved by unseen hands, and the lectern bearing its solemn cargo of name tags, each a metallic epitaph for the lost students of Mu Yang High School, meticulously restored to their places save for the conspicuous absence of one, its void a silent accusation that echoed the morning's theft. The missing tag—Chen Yalin's, as revealed by Fei Youliang's possessed pilfering—hung in Chen Ge's mind like a missing note in a dirge, its absence a thread he would need to pursue to unravel the Pen Spirit's enigmatic wish, the classroom's stillness amplifying his resolve as he surveyed the relics of a tragedy that refused to rest.
"Can you hear me?" Chen Ge's voice rang out from the doorway, a deliberate challenge hurled into the classroom's stifling silence, the words reverberating off the walls with a clarity that belied the emptiness, seeking to pierce the veil that cloaked the spirits within. The uniforms, draped over their chairs like spectral effigies, remained inert, their folds undisturbed by any breeze or presence, offering no reply to his summons, the silence a palpable barrier that tested his nerve even as it spurred his determination to press deeper into the scenario's heart, undeterred by the lack of immediate response from the entities he knew lurked just beyond perception's edge.
Shaking his head with a blend of exasperation and resolve, Chen Ge pressed onward to the female dormitory, his steps echoing in the corridor's tomblike hush, the flashlight's beam dancing across peeling paint and cracked tiles that whispered of neglect and lingering sorrow. There, amid the Spartan bunks and faded linens, he located the broken ballpoint pen—the Pen Spirit's erstwhile conduit, its fractured barrel a relic of the ritual that had summoned her wrath. With deft fingers, he mended its shattered form, coaxing it back to wholeness with a care that bordered on reverence, before slipping it into his pocket as a talisman of intent, its weight a reminder of the task ahead. From there, he drifted to the well at the corridor's far junction, its stone rim a silent sentinel that loomed in the flashlight's glow like a portal to forgotten depths, its presence anchoring the scenario's darkest mysteries.
The well had been the stage for Fei Youliang's eerie soliloquy in the video, his possessed form teetering on its edge as he communed with unseen forces, his words a fractured mosaic of spectral voices that hinted at a multiplicity of spirits vying for control within his frame. Chen Ge recalled the footage with vivid clarity—the man's ramblings, disjointed yet laden with meaning, suggesting a confluence of lingering entities, each with its own agenda, their collective possession manifesting as a cacophony of nonsense to the untrained ear but a cipher to one versed in the language of the dead. Peering into the well's inky depths, no more than two or three meters deep—a shallow plunge unlikely to cause harm—he pondered the cryptic utterances about jumping and Chen Yalin's pain, questioning why such a benign feature had inspired such dread. Could there be a hidden facet to this well, a secret woven into its stones that eluded casual inspection, much like the spectral door that flickered in the bathroom mirror for a fleeting minute past midnight, a portal to realms unseen that defied the mundane world's logic?
The memory of that mirror-door—a transient anomaly that materialized only in the witching hour's embrace—stirred in Chen Ge's mind, its mystery a parallel to the well's enigma, both hinting at thresholds where the fabric of reality frayed to admit the impossible, yet yielding no immediate answers to his probing scrutiny. After a thorough examination of the well's weathered contours, its stones unyielding in their silence, Chen Ge retraced his steps and ascended from the underground carpark, sealing the wooden boards behind him with a ritualistic finality that marked the boundary between his world and the scenario's shadowed dominion, the act a temporary closure until he could return armed with deeper insights to confront the spirits' demands.
From the staff breakroom, Chen Ge withdrew 5,000 in crisp notes, the sum a debt owed to Uncle Xu for his steadfast mediation, and locked the door with a practiced turn of the key, securing the heart of his operations before venturing toward the park management office, where the day's administrative loose ends awaited resolution. Upon encountering Uncle Xu, his weathered face etched with the day's exertions, Chen Ge pressed the money into his hands with a nod of gratitude, inquiring with measured curiosity about the fate of Qin Guang's studio operatives. Uncle Xu, ever the pillar of procedural calm, assured him the matter had been resolved—likely with fines or bans meted out per park regulations—and urged him to set the incident aside, the assurance a balm to Chen Ge's lingering concerns, freeing his mind to pivot toward the mission's next phase.
Stepping out into the cooling dusk that draped the park in hues of twilight, Chen Ge drew his phone—not the black one, but its mundane counterpart—and dialed Inspector Lee, the call connecting after three rings to a line crackling with an almost palpable tension, the silence broken only by the strained rhythm of heavy breathing that suggested a precinct on edge. "Uncle San Bao?" Chen Ge ventured, his tone measured to pierce the unease, invoking the familiar moniker that bridged their unconventional alliance, forged in late-night confidences and shared brushes with the inexplicable, a partnership that had weathered countless inquiries into the city's darker corners.
"What have you discovered this time?" Inspector Lee's voice cut through, gruff with the weight of perpetual vigilance, the question tinged with wary anticipation, as if bracing for another of Chen Ge's forays into the abyss that routinely upended his team's fragile equilibrium. "It's nothing—I just need your help to find a person," Chen Ge clarified swiftly, his words a deliberate pivot from the macabre to the mundane, aiming to quell the undercurrent of dread that his calls often evoked, the request framed with a simplicity that belied the spectral stakes at play.
"Not a murder suspect?" Lee pressed, the skepticism in his tone a testament to their history, where Chen Ge's inquiries often skirted the edges of grim discoveries, his voice betraying a flicker of hope that this time, the task might skirt the usual grim revelations that shadowed their exchanges. "No, just a normal student," Chen Ge reassured, his calm insistence piercing the line's tension like a needle through taut fabric, prompting an audible shift on the other end—papers rustling, voices resuming muted conversations, and footsteps echoing as the precinct exhaled, its machinery grinding back to life in the wake of his disarming clarification.
The silence shattered fully, replaced by a flurry of background activity—documents shuffled, phones ringing in distant corners, and officers resuming their tasks with renewed vigor, as if Chen Ge's assurance had lifted a collective weight from their shoulders, the precinct's pulse quickening in the absence of imminent dread. Inspector Lee's sigh crackled through the receiver, heavy with relief yet laced with exasperation. "I told them that four times in one week is too much. The stress you give my men…" he grumbled, the words a half-hearted rebuke softened by the camaraderie that underpinned their rapport, his tone betraying a grudging fondness for the chaos Chen Ge invariably brought, a storm that stirred the mundane into the extraordinary with unnerving regularity.
"Uncle San Bao, the person I'm looking for is Chen Yalin. She should be one of the victims from Mu Yang High School three years ago," Chen Ge stated, his voice steady but infused with the quiet urgency of his mission, the name dropping like a stone into the well of their conversation, rippling outward with the weight of a tragedy that had scarred the city's memory, its mention a summons to delve into archives of sorrow where the Pen Spirit's wish lay entwined with the ghosts of Mu Yang's lost, setting the stage for a quest that would bridge the living and the dead in a dance as delicate as it was perilous.