Fourth Campus

Chapter 21

Lin Duyu calmed down a little and slowly got up. "Isn't this just a corpse? That person just brought it out to scare us. Let's go." With that, she pulled me up.

I really hope that, as he said, it's just a corpse. Although I'm usually afraid of corpses, right now I'd rather she were just a corpse.

Just as we were walking toward the three-way intersection, the "creaking" sound rang out again! This time, the sound wasn't coming from the "corpse's" mouth, but from the three-way intersection itself!

Lin Duyu whirled around and shone her flashlight directly at the ceiling of the three-way intersection. Just then, I felt a chill on my calf, followed by a warm, sticky liquid running down it. I looked down and saw that my sock was stained red. Then, a sharp pain shot through my calf.

The "female corpse" was still swaying, just as before. Her two eyes were still staring intently at me. Suddenly, I noticed that the corner of her mouth was moving, revealing an evil smile.

"Lin Yuan, quick, run!" Lin Duyu suddenly panicked for some reason. The "crackling" sound gradually grew louder. I looked back and saw a clump of long, black hair hanging down from the left and right sides of the three-way intersection, and just like before, two ashen faces were revealed.

"I saw another version of myself in reality, a version of myself just like me!" I suddenly remembered Meng Li's suicide note. Before I could even feel afraid, the two "corpses," just like before, sank down, hanging upside down in the air, swinging like swings.

"Hmph--" A piercing, cold laugh escaped simultaneously from the throats of the three "female corpses," echoing in the eerie, dark passage. Then, with a "thud," they all fell to the ground and slowly crawled towards us!

"Run! Lin Yuan!" Lin Duyu shouted.

Blood had already soaked through my trouser legs, and a pool of blood had formed on the ground. Ignoring the intense pain, I followed Lin Duyu and ran towards the middle of the road.

PART 3.

Blood streamed down my ankle, and every step I took was excruciatingly painful. Lin Duyu seemed oblivious to my leg injury; he ran ahead, navigating winding paths and disappearing from my sight after a few turns.

He took the flashlight, and now there was no light at all; I was shrouded in complete darkness. Because of my frantic running, my bleeding hadn't stopped; in fact, it was increasing. I dared not stop to rest. I dared not think about whether the three "female corpses" were chasing me, nor did I dare look back. Actually, I couldn't see anything at all; I could only limp along, feeling my way along the walls like a blind man.

Turn the corner and walk forward.

Some say, "The root of human fear is darkness and death." Now I truly understand the meaning of this statement. In the darkness, you can't see anything around you, and you're shrouded in the threat of death. When these two things combine, your hearing becomes acute, because it's the only way to capture information from the outside world and escape danger. At that moment, I could even hear the sound of water droplets seeping from the bluestone falling to the ground.

In the darkness, all sense of time is lost; even a few minutes feel like hours. This dark passage leads nowhere underground, and the slope shows no sign of leveling out or going up. I just keep going down and down.

My body grew cold, my hearing became dulled, and each breath was incredibly difficult. It must be from excessive blood loss; I needed to stop and tend to my wound. Just then, my foot tripped over something, and I fell forward. It was a staircase, a stone staircase. Staircases meant the exit wasn't far. I slowly got up, sat on the staircase, tore open my clothes, and prepared to bandage my foot wound. But just then, I heard a creaking sound again in the darkness!

Those three "corpses" must have followed the smell of blood. The sound was getting closer and closer. I struggled to my feet and climbed the steps with difficulty.

In this deadly chase, when my head slammed heavily against the bluestone slab, I knew I had reached the end of the steps. I pushed hard against the bluestone above my head, and a breath of fresh air rushed in, moonlight streaming in through the opening!

Yes, the exit! The exit is right in front of us!

The passageway was naturally concealed by waist-high grass.

Without thinking, I climbed out, covered the stone slab with it, and sat on it, intending to use my weight to hold it down and prevent the three "corpses" from climbing up. Soon, the stone slab began to shake, indicating that someone below was trying to get out.

"It's those three 'corpses,' yes, it must be them." I pressed down hard on the stone slab.

A few minutes later, the shaking stopped, and there was no further reaction for a long time. My heart gradually calmed down, and only then did I have time to bandage the wound on my leg that I didn't know what had cut it. Then I started to wonder where I was and whether I had entered the "forbidden area" of the campus.

I slowly stood up from the weeds, and the first thing that caught my eye was a pavilion not far ahead.

"The highest point of the forbidden area is there. I remember there was a pavilion there, and a set of bluestone steps leading down from the pavilion to the other side of the hill, into the woods. There was a dry well at the foot of the hill." I remembered Lin Musen's words.

I struggled to walk into the pavilion, and soon I saw the steps paved with bluestone slabs.

As expected! That dark path to death leads to the "forbidden zone"!

But what about Du Yu? What about Lin Du Yu?

He ran ahead of me, so he should have come out first. He should have known I was behind him and should have opened the stone slab for me. But why was the stone slab covered when I came out?

Has he not come out yet? Did I wander into another path in the darkness? Yes, very likely. I've been feeling my way along the left wall; perhaps there's another path on the right. I hope that path isn't a dead end, and I hope he can find another exit like I have.

The Fourth Campus: Three Female Corpses (3)

Everything before my eyes gradually blurred and began to spin rapidly. I knew this was a reaction to excessive blood loss. I didn't know how much blood I had lost. I struggled desperately to stay conscious, but everything in front of me continued to turn black. Finally, I collapsed to the ground.

PART 4.

"Lin Yuan...Lin Yuan..."

Who is it? Who is calling me? The voice is far away, yet it seems so close. I want to open my eyes, but I don't even have the strength to do so.

"Lin Yuan... Lin Yuan... wake up."

Who is calling me? Is it Lin Duyu? But it doesn't sound like his voice.

"what to do?"

"We can't just let him lie here."

It sounds like two voices, two people talking. Where am I? I remember being in that "forbidden area," has someone else broken in? And someone who knows me?

"Let's get him to the hospital first. He's lost too much blood; it's very dangerous."

"Okay, go and call all the students from the other dormitories over."

I heard an even louder noise, as if more people had arrived.

Where am I? I should be in that "forbidden area." Even if others discovered the passage, they wouldn't have been able to get here from the dormitory in such a short time. Where am I? Gradually, I drifted back into unconsciousness.

When I woke up again, I was lying in a hospital bed, with my homeroom teacher sitting next to me.

"You're awake. How are you feeling?" she asked with concern.

"Where am I?"

"The hospital, of course."

"Am I not dead yet?"

"Of course not, but it was really dangerous. If it had been any later... you would have been unconscious for three days."

"Teacher Li, how did I get here? What happened?"

"Lin Yuan, do you have a history of sleepwalking?"

"Sleepwalking?" I asked, puzzled. "Never."

Teacher Li frowned, then stood up and turned her face to the window, as if she was thinking about something.

"Teacher, could it be...?"

"Yes, after a doctor's examination, you do indeed have symptoms of sleepwalking." Teacher Li said with a serious expression, "But you don't need to worry, sleepwalking is not a terrible condition; it is treatable."

"Was I hospitalized because I was sleepwalking?"

The teacher shook his head. "I'm not entirely sure of the specifics, but your roommates found you outside the morgue. Your leg was still bleeding profusely, and the blood trail stretched from the hillside wall all the way to where you were lying. I asked Xu Zhifei, and he said you once smashed his head open because of a nightmare. Is that true?"

I nodded; that was indeed the case.

"This time, Zhao Jun and Lin Duyu noticed you suddenly got up and went out in the middle of the night. They followed you the whole time. Then they saw you enter the 'Clock Tower.' Zhao Jun realized something was wrong, so he went back to wake Xu Zhifei. But when they returned to the 'Clock Tower,' they found that Lin Duyu was also gone. They went inside to look for you, but couldn't find you."

"Where was I found?" I recalled the conversation I heard while I was unconscious.

"Next to the morgue." The teacher's expression turned serious. "I want to ask you something. There have been rumors circulating on campus lately that the morgue is haunted. Were you involved in the investigation?"

I was frightened by this sudden question. This was supposed to be a secret; no one except the members of the Séance should know that Lin Musen and I had been to the morgue. "I...I didn't go."

"Lin Yuan, stop lying. We don't have any lab classes this semester, and it's impossible for us to go to the morgue. If you haven't been there, how could you have ended up there in your sleep?"

"I went to see the spectacle when Old Man Sun died." I think I've found a very good excuse.

"When Old Man Sun died, there were your and Maeda Reiko's footprints at the scene. This has already been reported to the dean. I shouldn't be telling you this, but you are my student after all, and I hope you won't continue lying. This will be helpful to you. I believe that Old Man Sun's death has nothing to do with you, but you need to give yourself a reason to prove it. If you don't tell the truth, the footprints at the scene will become the most damaging evidence against you."

"Teacher, I..."

"Lin Yuan, I don't want any bad rumors to spread in my class, so I hope you can trust me and tell me everything." Teacher Li looked at me sincerely. Actually, she didn't seem like our class teacher at all. She was at most three or four years older than me. She had always been very kind to us, without any airs of a teacher. In the eyes of the students, she was actually like an older sister.

"Teacher, I...yes, Maeda Reiko and I went there before the incident, and we also saw Old Man Sun." Then, I told her everything about seeing the female ghost in the morgue with Lin Musen, and about going to find Old Man Sun with Maeda Reiko. However, I kept my investigation into the forbidden areas of the school a secret. This wasn't because I didn't trust her, but because I knew the stakes involved and didn't want to drag her into this vortex of fear!

After listening to my explanation, Teacher Li silently shook her head and said to me with concern, "Lin Yuan, there are no ghosts in this world. You need to be rational. You've received so many years of materialistic education, why are you still having such wild thoughts? I don't want you to have anything to do with spirit possession anymore. As for the fact that you went to the crime scene before Old Man Sun died, don't worry too much. As long as you are innocent, you won't be wrongly accused."

"Teacher Li, I..." I wanted to say something, but I couldn't get the words out; it felt like something was blocking my throat. Why, why didn't they believe everything I saw? Everyone knows there are no ghosts, no spirits in this world, but...

"Lin Yuan, get some rest. I hope you can come back to class soon." The teacher turned to leave.

"Teacher, I know you don't believe these things, but I really did see them." I tried to convince her.

Teacher Li stopped walking, but didn't turn around. She simply said coldly, "Lin Yuan, you need to receive psychological treatment. There's something else I should have told you after you recovered, but I have to now. I hope you can calm down and think about what you've been doing lately."

The Fourth Campus: Three Female Corpses (4)

"What's up?"

"Lin Duyu disappeared that night!"

Ms. Li's words kept echoing in my ears. I didn't know what she meant. Did she doubt me? I remembered that night three days ago, when Lin Duyu and I entered the reading room together, found the passage leading to the forbidden area on campus, where three identical corpses relentlessly chased us, and then we got separated during our escape. But now, what the teacher was telling me was not like that—I entered the "clock tower" in a sleepwalking state, and Lin Duyu and Zhao Jun followed me. When they discovered I had entered the "clock tower," Zhao Jun went to call Xu Zhifei, and then even Lin Duyu disappeared. Later, I was found outside the morgue, but Lin Duyu's whereabouts were unknown—what exactly happened?

Was all that I remembered just a dream? Or do I really have sleepwalking disorder?

Impossible, this is impossible. Everything feels so real. Everything that happened that night was so real. How could there be such subtle sensations in a dream? I tried desperately to recall. Yes, everything felt so real—the cold bluestone slabs in the passage, the pain from each fall. If it were a dream, how could there be such detailed sensations?

Sleepwalking is a medical condition, but sleepwalkers usually don't remember the process. If I were truly sleepwalking, how could I have such a vivid memory? There must be something wrong here. There must be something wrong. Who, who is framing me?

Yes, it's very likely him—Zhao Jun!

He said I sleepwalked in the middle of the night, and Lin Duyu came to find me. Now Lin Duyu has disappeared. People will believe whatever he says, but why would he do this? I don't understand.

Also, I remember collapsing in the pavilion, so how did I end up next to the morgue? Someone must have moved me there. Who was that person? Could it also be Zhao Jun?

So many questions, everything happened so suddenly, I can't figure it out, and in the end I'm too lazy to think about it anymore. I'll talk about it after I'm discharged from the hospital.

PART 5.

A week later, I recovered and was discharged from the hospital, but I still hadn't heard from Lin Duyu. Back in the dormitory, I could clearly feel that Zhao Jun and Xu Zhifei were distancing themselves from me.

I don't mind Xu Zhifei's unfriendly look, but I hate Zhao Jun more and more. I don't understand why he would slander me. I need to find evidence to clear my name before the hospital investigates this matter, and then slowly find out Zhao Jun's purpose in doing so.

Of course, I couldn't use the secret passage to access the reading room normally; I couldn't expose it to the public eye right now, as it would cause panic and alert the suspect. But I needed at least two witnesses. Who should I choose? After much deliberation, I finally decided to select Xu Zhifei and Hu Xiaoli.

Xu Zhifei was one of the people who went to find me with Zhao Jun that night. He also firmly believed that Lin Duyu disappeared because he was searching for me in my "sleepwalking" state. Although he didn't witness me sleepwalking, he had every reason to believe Zhao Jun's words. So, I took him to the secret passage to let him understand the truth, and his testimony would be strong evidence. Secondly, there's Hu Xiaoli. That night, we both saw lights in the reading room and went in to investigate. She also saw Lin Duyu inside, as well as that woman who was neither human nor ghost. Therefore, she is also the best witness. Of course, there's also Wang Siyue, but I'm not sure if she'll be on my side. I don't know this woman well, and based on my previous interactions with her, I don't think I can necessarily trust her.

During evening self-study, I left a note for Xu Zhifei, asking him to wait for me downstairs in the dormitory after self-study.

Xu Zhifei arrived at the appointment on time.

"I thought you wouldn't come," I said preemptively.

"I thought I wouldn't come, but I still came." Xu Zhifei seemed to have been reading a lot of Gu Long novels lately, and even his tone of voice was very similar to that of the characters in the novels.

I smiled helplessly and said, "Then you should know why I asked you out."

Xu Zhifei nodded. "Although I'm usually quite easygoing, at least I understand what you're trying to say to me at times like this, after all, we've lived in the same dorm for so long."

A pang of sadness welled up inside me. Yes, we'd lived in the same dorm for so long. But now, one of my friends was missing, likely in grave danger, and the other three were practically bitter enemies. I gently patted Xu Zhifei's shoulder, but he pulled it away. I paused, then shook my head helplessly. "Am I really that scary?"

Xu Zhifei lowered his head and remained silent.

"Do you really believe Zhao Jun's words, that Lin Duyu's disappearance is related to me?"