When the bell rang to end class, Nan Yue collected the assignments. The students had already washed their hands and were waiting for the cafeteria to open for lunch.
It seemed like nothing strange had happened all morning. Everyone gathered together to discuss Jiang Mu's death instead.
They had heard that Jiang Mu might have triggered a death rule by going out alone in the middle of the night, which left the faces of several newcomers looking quite pale.
Liu Kai, in particular, looked ghost-white to Nan Yue. It seemed he hadn't recovered since seeing Jiang Mu's corpse that morning.
"Liu Kai, are you all right?"
It took a moment for Liu Kai to realize Nan Yue was calling him. He wore a wooden expression and forced out a response, "...I'm fine."
Standing nearby, Zhao Zhenzhen couldn't bear to watch and began complaining to Shi Yu.
"A grown man with less courage than me. He's been dazed with fear since this morning. I have no idea how he passed his qualification exam."
Shi Yu also disliked Liu Kai's performance and whispered back to Zhao Zhenzhen.
"You don't realize that qualification exams depend more on luck. For many people, their exam isn't even as hard as a mock exam."
Nan Yue, overhearing their conversation from the side, felt a bit speechless.
She gave a complicated look and happened to meet the gaze of Chi He, who seemed to share her lack of luck.
Chi He gave her a shy smile, which sent a wave of goosebumps down Nan Yue's arms.
The two women weren't exactly being quiet, so everyone heard them. Liu Kai didn't react, but he lowered his head, leaving only the top of his black hair visible.
"Forget it. Everyone should go back and rest. I hope no one is hiding any clues. In this mission, there might be malicious people as well as ghosts. Don't let yourselves be deceived."
Jiang Xicheng stepped in to smooth things over. No one had much else to say, but Liu Kai clearly felt too ashamed to follow them back to rest, keeping his head hung low.
"Liu Kai, aren't you coming?"
Liu Kai's muffled voice drifted over, "You guys go ahead..."
Gu Yun didn't press him. It was survival of the fittest in these missions; being gossiped about for poor performance was already a mild consequence.
This was just a small interlude. Regarding Jiang Mu's death, Nan Yue suspected someone had intentionally led him to violate a rule, though she wasn't sure what that specific rule was.
The afternoon classes were calm. During dinner that evening, Guan Qing said with lingering fear that she and Bai La La hadn't dared to let the children trace drawings anymore. Instead, they had just taught them how to draw flowers and grass to get by.
Nan Yue asked, "What was the tracing content?"
Bai La La handed her the sketchbook. It depicted a person standing, but their neck was twisted into a gruesome spiral, tilting at a bizarre angle.
"What the hell? That's disgusting."
Gu Xiang Kai frowned as he flipped through the pages. The rest of the sketchbook was empty; it was unclear how the new teaching content appeared each day.
"Where is your textbook?"
Although Nan Yue hadn't taught from the textbook today, she had looked over the content.
"Today's text was roughly about a girl whose family planned to send her away because they favored her newborn sister. She harbored a grudge and wanted to kill her sister, but her parents found out and had her arrested."
"Today's... doesn't seem to be a ghost story."
Zhou Zhou breathed a sigh of relief. "The daily themes in these textbooks jump around so much."
"The content probably depends entirely on the mood of whoever wrote it."
Nan Yue gave Zhou Zhou a deep look. "You're right."
"The textbooks are indeed very sloppy and haphazard."
Zhou Zhou didn't realize the significance of her words. Just as she was about to ask more, Jiang Xicheng, sitting opposite them, put down his chopsticks.
"Where's Liu Kai?"
Everyone looked at each other, only then realizing that Liu Kai wasn't eating with them.
There were over a dozen scavengers, and many were so quiet they had no presence at all. It was only when Jiang Xicheng asked that they noticed Liu Kai was missing.
"Did any of you see him this afternoon?"
Gu Xiang Kai's face darkened as he recalled the day. "No. Engineer Yang didn't act unusually either, so I assumed he had been assigned to some chores."
Gu Yun was starting to panic. There were originally four people in the kitchen; one was dead, and another had vanished. Was he going to be next?
Everyone's hearts sank. Liu Kai was a coward; even if he felt a bit slighted by the mockery at noon, he didn't seem like the type to act alone out of spite during a mission.
Something... must have happened.
No one had the appetite to finish eating. They set down their trays and scattered to search for Liu Kai.
He wasn't in the kitchen, the dormitory, or any of the several rooms they checked.
It was currently free time, and children were running in and out. Liu Kai was a large man; it was impossible to miss him.
"Teacher Nan."
Li Xue'er saw Nan Yue while she was searching and trotted over.
"Teacher Nan, it's true!"
Nan Yue found it strange. What was true?
"If a neck is broken, you really can't live."
Nan Yue thought back to the question Li Xue'er had asked in class, and a very bad premonition suddenly surged in her heart.
Nearby, Gu Xiang Kai seemed to realize something. His face turned ashen, and he cursed under his breath, "The shower room!"
The group rushed to the shower room. Someone was inside bathing, and the mist from the hot water made the room hazy.
The others heard the commotion and, gritting their teeth, followed Nan Yue and the others inside.
"Liu Kai? Are you in there?"
Xu Yuan was usually quite brave, but his voice was trembling now.
"Why are you showering by yourself?"
In the first compartment, Liu Kai was standing there with his back to everyone, his head lowered as if he were bending over to rinse foam from his hair.
Seeing that it really was Liu Kai, Xu Yuan breathed a sigh of relief. He was about to say something else when he turned and saw that the expressions on Nan Yue and the others' faces were horrific.
"Wh... what's wrong?"
Zhu Xi Ning glanced at Xu Yuan and pointed toward the bottom of the curtain.
"Didn't you notice... he's still wearing his pants."
With Zhu Xi Ning's reminder, Xu Yuan finally noticed that in the space visible below the curtain, Liu Kai's pants were still on his body.
For a moment, the only sound in the shower room was the spray of the showerhead.
Who would shower without taking off their clothes?
Nan Yue steeled herself, stepped forward, and pulled back the curtain.
Liu Kai's face appeared before everyone's eyes.
Yes, Liu Kai's back was toward them, but his neck had been twisted a full circle like a noodle, his head dangling over his back.
His face was ashen and rigid, clearly having been dead for a long time.
"Ah!"
Zhao Zhenzhen hadn't expected to see such a scene up close and couldn't help but scream.
Zhu Xi Ning reacted with lightning speed, clamping her hand over Zhao Zhenzhen's mouth.
"Shut up!"
It was currently free time. Judging by what happened this morning, Director Wu and the others didn't want the children to see such scenes.
Don't attract the children here!
Zhu Xi Ning's usually gentle and cute face was now filled with solemnity. She held Zhao Zhenzhen still and glared at the others.
The others were scared out of their wits by Liu Kai's death, but at least a few of them still had their wits about them.
Zhou Zhou and Guan Qing immediately understood Zhu Xi Ning's intent. Hearing children running toward the area, they hurried to the door to soothe them.
The shower room already had a faint stench of decay; after all, a corpse being soaked in hot water for so long was bound to smell.
"He didn't just die."
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