Chapter 98
Chapter 98
When the man in the plain yellow coat appeared, “Li Yuan” went completely rigid.
“Dad…?”
His lips trembled. Flecks of another color suddenly surfaced in his pitch-black eyes.
Xue Chuan stared, first at the figure ahead and then at Qin Lan.
“What the hell is that?”
“You can summon other people’s fathers?!”
Qin Lan glanced sideways at him.
He casually removed a Curse Crystal from his bracelet and began absorbing it to replenish his badly depleted curse energy. “What’s so strange about that? It isn’t the first time I’ve used it… Oh, right. You forgot.”
Xue Chuan looked horrified. “What?!”
“What do you mean, I forgot?!”
“You just casually said something extremely sinister!”
Qin Lan ignored him and quietly observed the situation.
Xue Chuan’s Dimensional Pocket was their final line of defense–no, their second-to-last line of defense.
If Call the Parents did not work on Li Yuan, or if Qin Lan’s judgment was wrong, Xue Chuan would attempt to produce something capable of destroying a 4-Star anomaly.
It might take many attempts, but Qin Lan had more opportunities for trial and error than anyone.
If even that failed…
Qin Lan would activate his Talent and force the opponent to attack him, rewind to before they entered the principal’s office, then teleport out of the instance and flee.
For now, however, Qin Lan appeared to have guessed correctly.
Dead Silence Academy truly was built upon Li Yuan’s twisted consciousness.
That was why Qin Lan had chosen to summon Li Yuan’s father.
He had deliberately avoided summoning the boy’s mother.
Her behavior had been one of the primary causes of Li Yuan’s increasingly distorted worldview.
Her constant criticism, suppression, and abuse had steadily pushed his mind toward an uncontrollable extreme.
If Qin Lan summoned her, Li Yuan might suffer an immediate breakdown and make the situation even more difficult.
“Dad… Is that really you?”
Confusion filled Li Yuan’s voice. The broad figure before him stirred fragments buried in the deepest reaches of his memory.
Another voice shrieked inside him.
[No! It isn’t! He’s fake!]
[You’ve been deceived! Your father abandoned you long ago! He threw you away because you were a burden!]
Li Yuan’s expression shifted constantly as he struggled between hatred and confusion.
“Son, it’s me.”
“I’m your dad.”
Under Qin Lan’s control, the copy of Li Yuan’s father spoke gently and walked toward him step by step.
“Why does that sound like trash talk…?” Xue Chuan muttered nearby.
The shrieking in Li Yuan’s ears intensified.
[Don’t believe him!]
[You have no love! You never received his love before, and you never will!]
[Only hatred lasts forever!]
The copied father suddenly embraced Li Yuan and began sobbing.
“Son, you’ve suffered all these years.”
“You have always been your father’s pride…”
Xue Chuan covered his eyes. “Ah… What a blinding performance. It’s like watching a bargain-bin teen melodrama starring bottom-tier actors…”
“I rate it worse than a student film.”
Qin Lan continued pouring on the emotion.
“No matter what you’ve done, you will always be my good son.”
“Daddy has come to take you home…”
The darkness gradually receded from Li Yuan’s eyes.
He seemed to become the little boy who had once waited outside the school gates for his father to pick him up.
Trembling, he reached out and took “Dad’s” rough hand.
[No…]
[His acting is so bad people would demand refunds! How are you still falling for this?!]
[Are you a daddy’s boy?!]
The Abyssal spawn inside Li Yuan was on the verge of collapse.
The perfect vessel it had spent so long raising was being cleansed right before its eyes.
How was it supposed to continue playing this game?
“Really, Dad?”
“You won’t leave me again?”
Li Yuan raised his head anxiously but did not dare meet his “father’s” gaze.
“I lied.”
“I would never take you with me. You deserve to rot in this place forever.”
The “father’s” voice abruptly turned cold, leaving Li Yuan stunned.
“You imposed your suffering and resentment on innocent people. Trash like you thinks it deserves love?”
It was both the “father’s” voice and Qin Lan’s.
Mockery spread across Qin Lan’s face.
“You weren’t loved, so that gives you the right to torture innocent children who were?”
“You had nothing but grades, so that gives you the right to force everyone else to obey your idiotic ‘grades above all’ rules?”
“As far as I’m concerned, you’re just a spoiled brat who didn’t get the toy he wanted, so he threw a tantrum and smashed everyone else’s toys too.”
“Setting you free would be terribly unfair to the other students…”
“So a brat like you gets only one thing–a beating from his old man!”
The instant Qin Lan finished, Xue Chuan moved. He yanked his right hand from his pocket.
Clutched in that hand…
Was a glossy black belt.
[Seven Wolves Copper-Buckle Belt (Weapon)]
[Description: This is the weapon of the sternest father any naughty child will ever face. It possesses exceptional flexibility and a natural suppressive effect against children. No matter how troublesome the brat, an education delivered by this copper-buckle belt will send them spinning like a top until they weep and repent.]
Xue Chuan was not the only one to attack. Qin Lan struck as well.
Death’s Curse: Despondency!
After an entire day of being “educated” by the school’s classes, Qin Lan’s attributes had soared once more.
With the amplification from his Soul Strength, his current Spirit had nearly reached the level of the Dean of Students.
He simultaneously unleashed the Spirit-weakening Death’s Curse: Despondency and Verbal Condemnation.
Combined with the mental intimidation inherent to Call the Parents, they formed the strongest mental attack Qin Lan could currently produce.
All one hundred and thirty points of his curse energy vanished in a single second.
He also held the Seven Wolves Copper-Buckle Belt that Xue Chuan had drawn.
The weapon had been selected according to Xue Chuan’s intentions, making it the most effective possible weapon against a “teenager.”
Not only did it deal formidable physical damage, but each strike also inflicted additional mental trauma.
Qin Lan’s Death’s Curse could last for only one second.
But a great deal could be accomplished in one second–such as beating a rotten student with warped values to death.
Li Yuan had actually died long ago.
Only his lingering resentment remained. His soul had been occupied by the Abyssal spawn, trapping him within Dead Silence Academy.
In other words, the Li Yuan before them was also a spiritual entity.
He did not even have time to scream before the copper-buckle belt lashed across his body and shattered him into pieces.
Rumble…
As Li Yuan vanished, the entirety of Dead Silence Academy began to collapse.
The dark clouds overhead faded, revealing sunlight that had not touched the school for untold years.
Countless ghosts relaxed. Bathed in long-forgotten warmth, they slowly drifted away.
Creak… Creak…
The surrounding walls groaned under the strain.
The entire principal’s office trembled on the verge of collapse.
Across from Qin Lan, an indescribable dark-green apparition glared viciously at him.
It was the true culprit created by an existence on the other side of the Abyss, the thing that had lain dormant inside Li Yuan’s soul.
Without a host, it could not remain in this world for long.
No matter how unwilling it was, it could only watch itself disintegrate.
[Qin Lan!!!]
[Do you think you’ve won?!]
[No! You’re wrong! Completely wrong!]
The green apparition shrieked.
Holding the belt, Qin Lan replied speechlessly, “This doesn’t count as winning?”
“How much more do I have to win? Do I need to whip you until you spin like a top too?”
The apparition’s shrieks grew increasingly anguished, yet it continued hurling threats.
[Just wait! You wait!]
[Our plan is nearly complete…]
[Everything you treasure, and the place where you live, will all be destroyed! Everything!]
[No one can escape. Not one of you!]
Qin Lan looked unconcerned, but his heart still lurched at those words.
There was no time to demand more details.
Li Yuan’s soul, the resentment supporting the entire instance, had dispersed. The instance itself could no longer exist.
The surrounding space rapidly twisted and collapsed.
Qin Lan and Xue Chuan were forcibly expelled from the instance and reappeared in the Fallen Zone.
At the same time, a notification sounded in Qin Lan’s mind.
[Additional objective completed: Free the souls of Wind Chime High School.]
[Cursed artifact acquired: Top Student’s Mistake Notebook (4-Star)]
[Description: This notebook contains many complex and obscure problems. If the target fails to provide an answer in time, they will be dragged into the special space “Dead Silence Classroom” and attacked by a randomly selected teacher.]
Another cursed artifact!
After a very long wait, this was only the second cursed artifact Qin Lan had obtained from an instance.
And it was 4-Star.
There might not be more than a handful of cursed artifacts at this level in all of Safe Zone 088.
Lu Xingshan had killed plenty of 4-Star anomalies, but even he could not obtain cursed artifacts easily.
After all, they were special items awarded only for completing hidden objectives.
In truth, Qin Lan had taken a shortcut to acquire the Top Student’s Mistake Notebook.
Under the normal course of events, he would have fought a brutal battle against Li Yuan’s ghost and most likely lost.
Despite his tremendous attribute growth, a sizable gap still separated him from a 4-Star anomaly.
As the final boss of Dead Silence Academy, Li Yuan was far from weak. Even Lu Xingshan would have needed time to deal with him.
But Call the Parents awakened the softest memory buried in Li Yuan’s heart and left his soul completely defenseless.
Together with Xue Chuan’s perfectly timed assistance, it produced the best possible result.
Qin Lan could have continued the act and allowed Li Yuan’s soul to find release.
But as Qin Lan had said, even if a creation of the Abyss had influenced him, Li Yuan himself bore considerable responsibility.
Freeing him would have been unfair to the innocent teachers and students who suffered without ever understanding why.
Qin Lan hated injustice.
“Fuck, that’s it? He just died?”
Qin Lan was still studying the cursed artifact in his hand when Xue Chuan began swearing beside him.
“That was much too easy on the little bastard!”
“I didn’t even get to show him my improved Mustard Leather Treatment before he slipped away!”
The corner of Qin Lan’s mouth twitched.
“This Mustard Leather Treatment of yours… Are we talking about an actual leather bag?”