He stared at the computer screen, his heart pounding, hoping to glean some information from the characters that were about to appear.
However, after waiting a moment, even the keyboard stopped moving. Only the cursor continued to move, and Ren Yifei's eyes followed its trajectory, his wide eyes taking in one strange symbol after another.
Ren Yifei stared blankly, one hand reaching out without him noticing, his fingertip touching the moving cursor on the screen. For a moment, he seemed to see a finger from another dimension, overlapping with his own.
What is it trying to express? Who is it?
When the cursor stopped moving, he immediately took a notebook from the drawer and a pen from the shelf. He bent down and drew the symbols he had just memorized onto the paper one by one.
However, whether it was a mistake in memory or my own lack of skill in drawing accurately, the symbols I drew were crooked and unrecognizable.
He turned the notebook upside down and examined it, but still couldn't figure it out. Somewhat discouraged, Ren Yifei placed the notebook on the table and looked at the computer again, but the keyboard and mouse remained unresponsive.
It was almost nine o'clock; more than an hour had passed without us realizing it.
He turned off the computer, went to the bathroom to wash up, changed into his pajamas, turned off the lights, and climbed into bed.
Ren Yifei's roommate across the way seemed to be fast asleep; when he calmed down, he could hear rhythmic breathing inside the tent. He couldn't quite figure out his roommate's personality, so he forced himself to stop thinking about him for the time being.
Right now, his mind was filled with strange symbols drawn on paper.
He connected the charger to his phone and took out his phone to continue looking at his previous chat history. He found the phone numbers of several group members who had previously mentioned acting strangely and tried sending them friend requests.
No one has replied immediately yet. Ren Yifei continued to look through the small photos and took screenshots of each one.
"Ding—" Someone accepted his friend request.
"Hello, I don't know if you still remember me, the one who said he had nightmares in the club before." Ren Yifei sent a message to the other party.
"I know, and I also..." There seemed to be some hesitation on the other end.
It seems this person has become suspicious of what the group leader said. Ren Yifei stroked his chin: "Do you know who proposed and was in charge of this ritual? Especially the choreography and the ritual song."
After a while, the other party sent a voice message. Ren Yifei put the earphones he had prepared in advance into his ears and then opened the message.
The speaker was a girl with a soft, delicate voice and a hesitant tone, who seemed like the type who had difficulty making decisions and was easily influenced.
She knew more than the original owner. Through her, Ren Yifei learned that the club's sacrificial ceremony was decided upon after discussions between the club president and the two vice presidents. It was uncertain whether anyone else had made the suggestion, but the two vice presidents were mainly responsible for organizing the event, including logistics.
At the same time, the girl also talked about the trouble she was encountering: nightmares.
She's been having nightmares about the school's sacrificial ceremony these past few days, but in the dream, everyone looks like a puppet, which is quite terrifying.
During the performance, she was actually playing a minor priestess, but in the dream, she was kneeling naked on the ground, bound hand and foot.
But what terrified her most wasn't that, but rather...
"The boy who was like us before jumped off the top floor of the art students' building today." The girl gasped in fear as she said this. "I don't know how to say it. It feels like something is watching me. My best friend and I have been inseparable for the past two days. We even go to the bathroom together."
So the person who jumped off the building this morning was also a participant in this bizarre ritual and sensed something was wrong? Ren Yifei hesitated for a moment: "How about we meet tomorrow? Let's talk face to face?"
"Okay." The girl hesitated for a moment, then agreed. They arranged to meet at a bubble tea shop at school at nine o'clock the next day.
Ren Yifei closed the chat page and sprawled on the bed.
He closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and tried to just fall asleep without thinking about anything. But he couldn't; if he relaxed, the consequence could be death.
Ren Yifei opened his phone again to search for information about the ancient Dian Kingdom's sacrificial rites. He clicked on link after link, and before he knew it, he had stumbled upon a post titled 'Descendants of the Ancient Dian People'.
"Could the Bada people of Indonesia be descendants of the ancient Dian people?" Ren Yifei looked at the map and was surprised that they had crossed the ocean to travel so far.
However, looking at the saddle-shaped houses of the Bada people, the sacrificial rituals, and even some funeral customs, they really are all reminiscent of the ancient Dian people.
However, Ren Yifei believed that what he was looking for was not the ancient Dian people, but a tribe that might have been wiped out by the ancient Dian people.
However, this also suggests that although they are from Yunnan, they may have been worshipping sea monsters.
Ren Yifei turned to the side and repeatedly scrolled through the information he had captured on his phone, including mysterious symbols, dreamlike architecture, and strange rituals. All sorts of elements were piled together like scattered beads.
The more he thought about it, the more tired he became, and the more his eyelids drooped. Before long, he fell asleep.
Ren Yifei slept very soundly. In his dream, he came to a completely dark place. He stopped there and vaguely sensed something.
The person in the dream was not Zhang Zhengyuan, but his original appearance.
He had wild, unruly white hair that moved without wind, bloodshot eyes, a black talisman around his neck, and an expressionless face, like a clay doll.
Suddenly, two faint blue lights appeared in the darkness, and stars rotated within the blue light.
He quietly raised his head and met the blue light.
A string of bubbles rose from the dark world, and bursting light shone from above. A blurry yet enormous shadow appeared directly in front of him. Looking up from below, all that could be seen was the shadow as majestic as a mountain, with two points of star-like blue light above it.
In the dream, they did not speak or communicate with each other. When the world returned to darkness, Ren Yifei woke up. He habitually took out his phone and found that there were hundreds of unread messages in the class group.
Wang Yan, the girl who fell to her death yesterday, had her parents rush to the school overnight. The school promised to take full responsibility and provide compensation, but what the couple wanted wasn't compensation or money; they just wanted their only daughter to come back to life.
The students saw it too, and they were naturally filled with sighs, but even more curious about what had happened yesterday. Many people privately messaged Ren Yifei, but Ren Yifei remained silent and didn't reply to a single one.
However, he did contact Wang Yan's friend and roommate to ask if Wang Yan was a member of the 'Mysterious Life Research Society'.
"I've never heard of her. I think she's in a photography club."
A photography club? Could she have been one of the people who participated in the observation and filming back then?
He was still thinking about the attack that happened in the self-study classroom last night, so he went to the campus network to check the situation. It turned out that the incident had also been deleted, with only a very few exceptions that had slipped through the net.
Based on these few words, Ren Yifei learned the rest of the story.
After the boy who attacked others was caught, he committed suicide on the way to the detention center—he actually strangled himself to death with his own hands.
A truly ruthless person would never strangle themselves; to say there wasn't something going on would be unbelievable.
Of course, they didn't witness the strangulation themselves; all they saw was the sudden attack.
Witnesses on the forum recounted the terrifying moment yesterday.
The classroom was quiet until the boy suddenly stood up and pulled out a knife. Everyone was startled, but he seemed to have gone mad, grabbing the boy next to him and stabbing him in the neck with the knife. Fortunately, that boy was quick and kicked the boy away; otherwise, the consequences would have been unimaginable.
[That's terrifying? Are you having a fit of hysteria?]
[It was truly terrifying! You didn't see it, so you can't imagine the scene... He was covered in blood, but he kept smiling, and he was incredibly strong; many people were stabbed.]
Could this guy have joined some cult? I heard that madman keeps chanting that he's a loyal servant, and no one else can compare to him.
There isn't much information online, but based on what we have, the boy was indeed influenced. However, this influence turned him from an ordinary person into a believer.
From this perspective, being influenced by cult rituals doesn't just mean becoming a sacrifice; it can also lead to fanatical believers who commit extremely cruel acts.
In the past few days, there have been student suicides and attacks on others at the school. Don't the authorities have any more effective measures to deal with this?
Lying on the bed, Ren Yifei rubbed his temples, trying to temporarily escape this mess. He could actually look at the hints given by the Wasteland Corner, but he didn't.
There was no movement from the tent opposite, so he quietly climbed down, washed his face, and brushed his teeth. Since he was still within the two-day leave period, he didn't have to go to school and could focus on looking for other clues.
Ren Yifei quickly packed his things and left the dormitory. Halfway there, he looked back and saw a blurry shadow standing in the shadows of his fifth-floor dormitory balcony.
Without any evidence, he was certain that the other party was watching him.
Ren Yifei ran away from the dormitory building until it was completely out of sight before stopping. Seeing that there was no one on the road, he took out his ID card.
[First Night: The Priest.]
Seven players have died, and seven-ninety-nine percent of the 'Demon' seal has been unlocked.
Yesterday, he knew of three deaths: one who jumped from a building, one who rolled down the stairs, and one who strangled himself.
So how was the death toll of seven calculated?
And since the players died so easily, did they also encounter the situation Ren Yifei started in, to the point that they couldn't control their brains and bodies?
Ren Yifei put his ID card away and then walked towards the cafeteria.
The information was quite clear: the priest referred to the person who planned the guild's ritual. If he had a plan, he wanted to meet with the two vice presidents of the guild; these two were the most likely candidates.
He arrived at the cafeteria. It was still early, and there weren't many people inside. However, the other side of the display window was bustling with activity as the chefs prepared breakfast.
Ren Yifei bought a plate of freshly baked hot steamed buns and a free cup of soy milk, then found a clean spot to sit down.
"Ding-dong." A new message came in on my phone.
He took out his phone to check the situation, just as the cafeteria's loudspeaker began broadcasting campus news:
"...Due to the recent outbreak of an acute illness, many students are unable to attend classes normally. Therefore, the school administration has decided to temporarily close the school for disinfection and closure of all classes..."
Ren Yifei, who was biting into a steamed bun, was stunned: Classes suspended for disinfection?