Chapter 106
Chapter 106
The moment Ning Wang’s hand touched that NPC, something felt wrong.
He saw something black seep from the point of contact between his hand and the NPC and crawl onto him. Before Ning Wang could react, his vision went dark, and his consciousness was thrown into a shattered night.
It was nighttime. A red moon hung in the sky, as red as blood.
Ning Wang found himself holding a book. Its pages were completely blank.
Yet, mechanically and beyond his control, he began to recite, “There was a You Ge at A High School. She ranked dead last in academics. What use is art? Nothing but entertainment for others.”
As he recited, the corresponding words appeared on the blank page.
Beside the text, an illustration surfaced like ink spreading through water: a girl in a ballet outfit dancing with calm poise while many spectators applauded. Yet next to the girl were several large words-Last Place.
“There was a You Ge at A High School. She worked harder than anyone, studying late into the night, quietly overtaking them all.”
The next illustration appeared. It was still the girl in the ballet outfit, but this time she was not dancing. A small lamp was drawn beside her, its warm, dim yellow light illuminating the textbook in front of her.
Immediately after, another illustration appeared below it: the girl in the ballet outfit holding a certificate that read “Outstanding Student.” In stark contrast to the brilliant smile on the girl’s face were the resentful expressions of several girls behind her.
“There was a You Ge at A High School. One day, she disappeared, and from then on A High School sang on high.”
The girl vanished. All that remained was a floor covered in torn ballet clothes, speckled with red. A stone tablet engraved with “No. 1 High School” pressed down on the scraps, so heavy it made it hard to breathe.
But Ning Wang felt that line was wrong.
…It felt like half of it was missing.
The classroom, which had been looping those lines over and over, suddenly fell silent. Ning Wang looked up and saw that everyone in the room was staring fixedly at him.
Regardless of gender, every single person had the same soft, beautiful face-one covered in scars.
Their eyes locked on Ning Wang as they raised their hands and clawed toward him. “Be careful not to become last place. She’s coming for you.”
“Be careful not to become last place. She’s coming for you.”
There was a reason Xie Ning and Rao Lin could get along. In a certain sense, both of them were pretty reckless.
For example, faced with the scene before him, Ning Wang’s first thought was not to run. It was to beat every Ghost/Monster flat, then make his escape with maximum style.
Unfortunately, Ning Wang was punished by the Script: his body ran to the window on its own and prepared to jump. Through the window, Ning Wang’s consciousness, attached to that body, saw that face.
It was Passerby B, the suicidal student who had ranked last on the weekly exam on Monday of Week 20 and whom Ning Wang had pushed.
Ning Wang could not control this body. His consciousness and body had been split into two. His consciousness watched as his body collapsed to the floor in terror, countless hands grabbing him and dragging him back.
His consciousness tried to break free of its restraints, but dense blackness followed every hand gripping him, yanking him backward, dragging him into an endless abyss.
Suddenly, pain shot through his left hand.
This pain was different from the illusory yet crushing restraint that held him. Just as he was being pulled into the abyss, a hand suddenly seized his, and the pain was sharp enough to snap his consciousness awake.
The sunlight was blinding. Ning Wang’s entire body was hanging upside down from the rooftop. He saw Ning Shuo holding on to him, Ning Shuo’s left hand bent at an unnatural angle, the dislocation clearly visible.
Ning Shuo hauled him up in one motion. “Got ambushed?”
But Ning Wang only stared at Ning Shuo’s left hand and did not answer.
Ning Shuo knew Ning Wang was angry.
The reason Ning Shuo had Lolita make a prediction instead of going straight in was to guard against the possibility that another NPC might appear on the rooftop. If Ning Shuo barged in rashly, it would inevitably seem out of place-not to mention that there simply wasn’t enough of a relationship between Ning Shuo and Ning Wang for him to risk saving him.
If the prediction showed that Ning Shuo himself wouldn’t get into trouble, then there was no need for him to take the risk and go in.
In short, the prediction was only meant to confirm whether Ning Wang was safe, and whether there was any need to take that risk.
Ning Wang didn’t answer his question. He only pressed his lips into a thin line, carefully set Ning Shuo’s hand down, and snapped, “Did I ask you to save me?!”
He looked every bit like an ungrateful man who had been saved by the legitimate young master, only to fly into a shamefaced rage and repay kindness with malice.
Luo Li, who had followed them up from behind, paused mid-step. Almost instantly, she realized one thing: there really was another NPC on the rooftop.
Ning Shuo realized it too. He turned back and said coldly to Luo Li, “Did you record it?”
Having fought alongside him through multiple Script instances, Luo Li understood what he meant almost immediately. She raised her phone at once and said, “Recorded. He attempted suicide and caused trouble for the school. How could someone like him possibly deserve to inherit your family’s assets and shares?”
“And you set aside your past grievances and were even willing to save this mistress’s son. That’ll definitely win you public sympathy.”
It was a stretch, but the motive was clearly to fight Ning Wang for the family fortune, not out of personal goodwill.
Besides, Lolita was relatively close to Ning Banxian, so she was in just the right position to say it.
Ning Wang hid his left hand behind his back and barely tugged at the corner of his mouth. “Is that so? Brother, I won’t let you get what you want.”
With that, he strode off.
—
The people from Zone F returned to the classroom one after another. All seven of them were present, not a single one missing.
Instead, it was the people from Zone B who began to grow anxious: Yan Xingyi had been gone for a long time, but he still hadn’t come back.
Song Zhu had been in the classroom the whole time and knew everyone’s movements. After realizing Yan Xingyi still hadn’t returned, he patted an NPC and, as if casually asking while doing questions, said, “Why hasn’t the one who went to the bathroom come back yet? Don’t tell me he’s secretly trying to get ahead of us in there.”
The NPC looked around in confusion. “Didn’t everyone come back? Who’s missing?”
Song Zhu also swept his gaze around. “Oh, he is back. My eyes are going blurry from doing questions. I thought Zhuang Yao hadn’t come back yet.”
A dead Player, like those NPC individuals who had fallen from the building, left no trace behind in this school.
But there was still a difference. For example, when it came to those NPC individuals who had jumped to their deaths, the living NPC avoided talking about them, as if they were taboo. But when it came to Yan Xingyi, they were simply confused: Who was that?
It was as if that person had never existed at all.
A typical Script Effect.
On the other side, the Zone B Player group obtained the same answer using the same method.
After morning reading ended, Chen Qu’an was the first to lose his composure. “I’m going to look for him!”
Jiang Zong rebuked him in a low voice, “Look for what? You don’t even know how Zhi Xing died. What if we lose you too?”
Shangguan Zhigu, codename Shangguan, pointed at the corpse outside the window that still hadn’t disappeared and said, “Just as we guessed, Zone F has already successfully completed one Murder Case.”
Unlike Passerby A, who died by jumping off the building because of the plot, Passerby B hadn’t died because of the plot.
At least, not entirely because of the plot. Since the Murderer couldn’t hide the body, the corpse of Passerby B, which had appeared because of Zone F’s Murderer, was still there even now.