Global Collapse-Chapter 663 - 631: Yellow Book_1

"Li Yi"

"Shu Jianmin"

"Qi Haixuan"

These were the names of the three victims who had died on the scene. And "Zheng Dejun," "Li Guoxin," "Deng Xiaofang," and "Zhao Linan" were the four students who had luckily escaped.

Ye Weiwei held a dimly glowing glow stick, swiftly scanning the seating chart on the podium for these names. Certain dark moments in a horror instance weren't suitable for flashlights. The intense light might attract other things, so she had bought several glow sticks at the supermarket for small-scale illumination.

Screw-head, on the other hand, didn't immediately start searching the desks. He quietly picked up a few chairs and stacked them on the desk near the window, forming a staircase-like structure. This would make climbing out the window later much more convenient. He stood on the desk and passed a stool to Wang Youcai and Ye Qianqian outside. It wasn't to offer them a place to sit and rest, but to allow them to stand on the stools and observe the situation inside the classroom.

Ye Qianqian stood on the stool, her head just above the window. She had a clear view of the classroom's interior. She carefully observed every corner of the room. When the two people inside were searching for evidence, they might inadvertently overlook their surroundings. If a ghost suddenly appeared from a concealed corner, they would likely fail to notice it immediately. It was Ye Qianqian's duty to observe the entire classroom and issue a warning if danger approached.

Wang Youcai stood beside Ye Qianqian, attentively watching the corridor and the restroom behind him. Danger could come from anywhere within the instance. Although the classroom seemed very dangerous, they couldn't relax their guard in the corridor either.

Ye Weiwei quickly found the names of these seven individuals. Their seats were almost all together. This wasn't surprising, as these students were from the same dormitory. That night, their dormitory group had gone out for dinner together and unexpectedly encountered the drunk suspect, Liu Ben. Three of them were fatally stabbed on the spot.

When assigning dormitories, the class teacher had likely considered academic performance. A seating chart on the podium showed that these students were all poor performers, seated in the last few rows at the back.

Without any delay, Ye Weiwei strode towards the back rows. When Screw-head saw Ye Weiwei heading to the back of the classroom, he also followed her to the last couple of rows. The textbooks on the back desks were very clean. Thankfully, the students had written their names in them. Ye Weiwei easily found the desks of the seven individuals by the names in their books.

She first approached the desk of the deceased Li Yi and began her search carefully. Screw-head thoroughly inspected a nearby desk, which belonged to Zhao Linan, one of the survivors.

Searching for clues in the dark was quite straining on the eyes, and Screw-head didn't dare turn on his flashlight. He had no choice but to ask Ye Weiwei for a glow stick. Each of them in the classroom held a glow stick, a stark mismatch with the eerie surroundings.

With the glow stick in her hand, Ye Weiwei carefully searched Li Yi's desktop but could find hardly any clues. Perhaps to obstruct the teacher's view from the podium, he had piled all his books on his desk, forming a high stack. Not wanting to miss any clues, Ye Weiwei searched methodically through each book. Yet, after going through more than half of them, she hadn't found even a bookmark. Most of the books were empty, without a single highlighted line.

Is this the world of a slacker? she wondered, putting down the book. Before the global game began, Ye Weiwei had been a top student, her books filled with annotations, notes practically spilling off the pages. Li Yi's textbooks now showed her just how different people could be.

Screw-head, beside her, was in a similar predicament. He worked faster and had already gone through all the books on the desk but found no clues. Holding a glow stick in one hand, he rubbed his eyes with the other, then squatted down to inspect the dark desk compartment. The desk compartment was stuffed with balled-up tissues. These probably just contain snot, no clues here, Screw-head thought, looking at the mess.

Fortunately, besides the tissues, there was something else in the compartment. Suppressing his disgust, he pulled out a notebook from beneath the tissues. It was a homework book. With his index finger and thumb, Screw-head pinched a corner of the cover and flipped it open. Surprisingly, this homework book was filled with writing, not at all like a slacker's. Screw-head glanced at the name on the cover again, puzzled. Yes, it's definitely Zhao Linan's homework book, he confirmed.

Meanwhile, Ye Weiwei had also found a homework book. The one in her hand was also full, a stark contrast to the empty textbooks. She leaned towards Screw-head, glanced at the homework book in his hand, and concluded, "Copied. They're identical."

Alright.

Screw-head put down the notebook and moved to a desk on Ye Weiwei's other side to continue searching. Ye Weiwei then started checking the compartment of Li Yi's desk. She half-knelt before the desk, frowning at the storybooks, comics, and pornographic magazines filling the desk compartment.

Suddenly, the corner of a notebook caught her eye. Ye Weiwei reached out, grabbed the corner of the notebook, and pulled it out from between the pornographic magazines. This was also a homework book. She looked at the name on its cover: "Liu Baoma."

An unfamiliar name, she thought.

Just then, Screw-head, searching a desk behind her, suddenly spoke up, "Hey, Ye Weiwei, isn't something odd? High school dorms usually have eight people, right? Theirs only has seven. Were there always just seven, or…"

But before he could finish, Ye Weiwei heard Ye Qianqian gasp from near the window. Almost instantly, Ye Weiwei dropped the homework book and sprinted towards the window. Then, Ye Qianqian's voice erupted in the dark classroom, "Run! Run quickly!"

Ye Weiwei was explosive and close to the window. With Wang Youcai in the hallway also pulling hard on the rope, she scrambled onto the stool-ladder and through the window just as Ye Qianqian finished shouting.

Screw-head, his words cut off, froze for a split second before realizing the danger and bolting towards the window. But he was a beat too slow. He found that no matter how he lifted his feet, he couldn't get any closer to the window, as if something were pulling him back. He clung to his glow stick and looked back stiffly. He saw a bloodless hand shoot out from a desk compartment, grabbing the hem of his shirt.

He opened his mouth to scream, but before any sound escaped, the hand yanked violently. He was dragged entirely into the desk compartment, and the classroom fell silent once more.

Ye Qianqian clapped her hands tightly over her mouth, staring at the now-empty classroom.

Ye Weiwei leaned against the wall, gasping for breath, cold sweat trickling down her forehead. She didn't look into the classroom but saw the snapped rope in Wang Youcai's hands. It was the rope that had been tied around Screw-head's waist, now broken. When Wang Youcai retrieved the rope, he found the broken end stained with blood.

He stared at the rope in his hands for two silent seconds, then said, "Let's go. Quickly."

While Wang Youcai's group had lost a member, Gu Mian and the others arrived at Dayang Garden, Yuan Haotian's residence.

Looking at the gray residential buildings in the complex, Gu Mian frowned slightly.

Bai Lu wiped sweat from her forehead. "This is awful. Tonight, we first went to the victim's house and encountered a ghost. Now we have to go to the suspect's house. Yuan Haotian's home won't have a ghost too, will it?"

"Very possible," Gu Mian said, looking at her. "Didn't Li Shu say Yuan Haotian's entire family died? We might get a warm welcome from them the moment we open the door."

Bai Lu wiped her sweat again. "That's the last thing we need..."

Without further delay, Gu Mian stepped into the complex. The guard in the security booth had presumably gone home to sleep, as the booth was empty. Lights were still on in a few apartments; perhaps angry parents were dealing with children who hadn't finished their homework.

Gu Mian quickly found Building Number 13. They stood at the entrance of the second unit. Fortunately, the entrance door to this unit was broken, sparing it from being forced open by Gu Mian.

Bai Lu really didn't want to take the elevator; in previous horror instances, she always avoided them. Even if their destination was the twentieth floor, she would have preferred to walk. But her teammates in this instance didn't seem to share her aversion to elevators. They didn't seem afraid of encountering ghosts in the elevator; it was as if they feared something else entirely.

"I just hope this elevator doesn't plummet before it reaches the thirteenth floor," Bai Lu heard their 'judge' say.