[Переселение душ] Супруга Бога Войны

Глава 5

The directors exchanged glances, then coughed. "Alright. By the way, don't let that group outside crowd around. We haven't confirmed if they're missing yet; they might have just gone out to play. Remember, you're not allowed to leave campus during school hours. If something happens that negatively impacts the school, that's one thing, but causing psychological stress for your classmates is the most serious consequence. The school will handle this; now everyone get to class."

In short, the surrounding students gradually dispersed, and the school's explanation reassured the children somewhat. Indeed, saying that a few students had gone out to play and hadn't returned was a more convincing reason, wasn't it?

However… after carefully observing the principal's expression, and then at the boy sitting on the bed waiting for everyone to leave, Duan Lin knew that things weren't so simple. Although the principal still had a smile on his face, there was a hidden anxiety beneath that smile…

The school locked the dormitory room. Duan Lin said to the boy, "You can start living here today." The boy was expressionless, but finally nodded slightly.

Although the school tried to reassure the students with various excuses, Duan Lin still noticed a change in the school atmosphere during class: everyone was much quieter than yesterday. After a sullen day of classes, Duan Lin returned to his dormitory, where the student from that morning was standing with his luggage at the door of room "143".

"Aren't you going in? Didn't the dorm supervisor give you the key?" Third graders have a lot of self-study time now, and they finish class early. It seems this child has been standing at the door for quite a while.

"No, I just..." Before he could finish speaking, the boy gave Duan Lin a complicated look, picked up his luggage, and followed Duan Lin into the dormitory.

The boy's name was Chen Jiaming. He was a senior high school student at the school. His grades were average, his social skills were average, and he was an extremely quiet student.

At this moment, Chen Jiaming was sitting opposite his own bed, staring blankly at his... bed?

Duan Lin had initially worried that he, as a student, would feel uncomfortable living with his teacher, but now he suddenly realized that he was the one who felt more awkward between them, as the other person was staring straight at him with an almost rude gaze…

Duan Lin glanced at himself sideways. There was nothing wrong with him. Just as he was about to speak, the other person spoke first: "The bed you're sleeping in now is the place I slept in two years ago."

Duan Lin's mind immediately stirred at those words.

Two years ago, my roommate also disappeared and never came back.

"All of them?" With an unexpectedly calm attitude, Duan Lin believed the boy's words and then asked him the question in a casual tone. He knew he would answer.

"No, there was only one, it was the one in the bunk above me. I saw him go out, he said someone was calling him from outside..."

In the boy's pale narration, Duan Lin seemed to be transported back to that night, that quiet night where only the rustling of leaves could be heard outside the window, a small window, a dark room, two pale-faced boys, and the unintelligible calls from outside...

Thinking about what had happened around him in the past few days, Duan Lin suddenly felt the air around him grow cold.

"The people living in my current dorm room are the ones who were left over from back then. Over the years, one of our roommates disappeared, and we are the four of us who are left."

It means...the people who lived in this dormitory back then...

Looking at Chen Jiaming across from him, the boy's slender eyes stared at him, the light and shadow casting deep shadows in the boy's sunken eye sockets. His eyes were filled with fear, no, that look was beyond fear, something deeper than fear... despair!

So Duan Lin rubbed his hands and stood up. "I think you should drink some warm milk and then get a good night's sleep..."

Chen Jiaming silently accepted the milk Duan Lin handed him, drank it, and went to bed.

Even after the lights were turned off, room "143" was still so dark. There was one more person in the room, but it was still so cold.

Listening to the sound of the wind rustling through the leaves outside the window, Duan Lin seemed to hear the description the boy was making.

The bed was creaking and groaning. Duan Lin knew it was because he was tossing and turning and couldn't sleep. Not wanting to disturb the person opposite him, Duan Lin suppressed the urge to turn over and forced himself to sit up straight. But the creaking continued. Duan Lin looked across at the person opposite him. "Not asleep?" It was Chen Jiaming. He wasn't asleep either.

"It's almost 3:15." In the darkness, Chen Jiaming's voice was rigid and stiff.

Duan Lin glanced at his digital watch, which still emitted a faint glow in the darkness. Chen Jiaming was right; it was indeed five minutes to 3:15. He realized he had been tossing and turning for so long…

But why did Chen Jiaming specifically mention this time? Suddenly, the time Chen Jiaming had told his roommate he was leaving that morning flashed into Duan Lin's mind, if he remembered correctly...

"Your roommates... went out at 3:15 yesterday?"

The darkness was silent, and it seemed like a long time had passed before Duan Lin heard the other person softly hum in response. A subtle feeling stirred within Duan Lin, but then he heard the boy speak again.

"Two years ago, my roommate on the top bunk also heard someone calling at 3:15 and went outside..."

After he finished speaking, the room suddenly fell silent. For a moment, only the rustling of leaves outside the window and the cautious breathing of the two people inside could be heard.

Having told everything, Chen Jiaming finally breathed a sigh of relief. He had said it, but no one was willing to believe him, so gradually he stopped talking about it.

But today, he knew that the person on the other end would believe it, and for some reason, that's what he thought.

When Chen Jiaming discovered that the dormitory room his teacher had invited him to share was the very same room that haunted his nightmares, a sudden, inexplicable fear gripped him. Coupled with what had happened the previous night, Chen Jiaming instinctively knew that things might have started again, and this time... it wouldn't end the same way as before...

The dormitory room was all too familiar, the darkness all too familiar, the silence all too familiar… Chen Jiaming seemed to hear again the scraping sound of slippers scraping the floor in the hallway when his bunkmate left…

Cold sweat gradually beaded on his forehead. These past few days, the auditory hallucinations had become increasingly severe; every night he would hear similar sounds, but everyone else denied it, leaving Chen Jiaming to endure this torment night after night. He had considered transferring schools, but a voice inside him warned him that even if his body left, his mind would remain…

The footsteps grew louder and closer... Suddenly!

"Did you... hear footsteps outside?" In the darkness, Duan Lin's slightly puzzled voice struck Chen Jiaming like a bolt of lightning!

Chen Jiaming was sweating profusely as he struggled to look at the watch that had been with him for many years. The time on it was clearly... 3:15!

With a thud, Chen Jiaming saw the person opposite him suddenly get up. "Did you hear that?" The man's expression was hidden in the darkness and could not be seen, but it overlapped with that of his bunkmate from many years ago!

"I didn't hear anything! Nothing at all!" Chen Jiaming clutched his head tightly, his eyes wide open.

The footsteps, however, felt like taps on his forehead, growing closer and closer... He arrived, stopped in front of his door, and then... faded into the distance...

Seeing Chen Jiaming like this, Duan Lin sighed, gently touched his trembling shoulders, and walked towards the door.

"No! Don't go! Don't go!" Suddenly jumping out of bed, Chen Jiaming grabbed Duan Lin tightly!

"You will disappear! Don't go!" Chen Jiaming repeated, as if it were a prophecy.

After a while, he felt the other person pat his shoulder again. "It's okay. I want to go and see. If we don't understand some things, they will become nightmares and torment us for a long time. Once we understand, even if we die, we will die knowing why."

"Everything has a reason." Recalling what Mu Zi had told him, Duan Lin unconsciously uttered these words, speaking to Chen Jiaming, and perhaps also to himself. The later the discovery, the greater the harm; Duan Lin was beginning to understand this principle.

Looking at the boy beside him with some pity, Duan Linyi opened the door without hesitation and then closed it.

Staring at the closed door, Chen Jiaming clutched his head tightly and squatted down...

Duan Lin closed the door and walked in the opposite direction. He came out, but that didn't mean he wasn't afraid at all. In fact, after the Kant incident, he believed more than anyone else that ghosts really existed in this world; and that ghosts could really take lives. It was precisely because of this that he wanted to find out the truth.

The corridor was pitch black, except for the central stairwell, which was bathed in moonlight...

In the late spring and early summer, the fragrance of flowers outside the window was incredibly strong. With a frown, Duan Lin walked quietly down the corridor, carefully trying not to make a sound.

The voice seemed to have vanished into thin air.

Standing on the stairs, looking at the empty staircase, Duan Lin frowned.

Suddenly! The sound of a toilet flushing! Duan Lin's gaze immediately shifted in the direction he had come from!

Then, the familiar clattering sound—the sound of slippers I'd just heard inside the house—was heard. They seemed half-asleep, the slippers scraping the floor, the sound fading into the distance…

"Phew." Duan Lin let out a long breath as he looked at the white figure ahead. It turned out to be a student coming to use the restroom.

That's right. I was only thinking about strange things, and I ignored the simplest and most realistic reasons.

How ridiculous!

Having figured out the origin of the sound, Duan Lin decided to go back to sleep.

The student was always walking ahead of him, and Duan Lin noticed that his steps were unsteady.

I wonder which dorm they're from. It's so late, why aren't they walking quietly? Once I figure out which dorm they're from, I'll remember to go over and tell them to be quieter at night in the future.

While casually thinking, Duan Lin suddenly realized that the student had already walked to dormitory "142" at the very end of the corridor.

The moment the student turned around to look, Duan Lin saw the student's face.

Strange...it seems...it's not someone from the next dorm room...Duan Lin was thinking when he suddenly noticed that the student who was looking at him seemed to have seen something terrifying! He immediately stepped inside.

Entering?!

Duan Lin's eyes widened to the point of being completely disoriented!

There was nothing wrong with the student going into "142" in general; the problem was the method the "student" used to get in!

He didn't open the door; he just walked right through it! Straight through the door panel!

Duan Lin stood at the door, and for a moment he felt his hands and feet turn ice cold!

After a long while, Duan Lin suddenly remembered something, his expression changed, and he no longer cared about anything else. He pressed his ear against the door and called out softly.

"Mu Zi! Mu Zi! Tian Miao! Tian Miao!" (Tian Miao is the monkey's full name)

Heavens! Whoever it is, open the door! Heaven knows what that person... no! What might a ghost do to them if it goes in! Duan Lin called for a long time without getting a response, and in his anxiety, he was about to knock on the door when suddenly...

"What are you doing?" Duan Lin turned around sharply the moment his shoulder was patted, only to find that the man shining a flashlight at him was none other than Mu Zi.

"Why do you look like that? Have you seen a ghost?" Mu Zi asked casually, shining the flashlight beam on Duan Lin's face.

Unexpectedly, Duan Lin did not deny it. After a moment of hesitation, Duan Lin whispered to Mu Zi, "Quick! Take out the key! Open the door quickly! Something has gone in..."

As she was speaking, Mu Zi had already started looking for her keys. After hearing Duan Lin's words, Mu Zi paused slightly, then turned the key, and before he could push the door open, it opened by itself.

The monkey stared at Duan Lin with its big eyes, filled with fear. "Ah?! Teacher, you scared me to death! I heard someone call my name, and I thought that ghost had come..." Still shaken, the monkey gave a pale smile.

"When did you wake up?" Duan Lin asked anxiously, not even having time to return a reassuring smile to the monkey.

"We just woke up and heard someone calling... but we didn't recognize the teacher's voice..." the monkey said, scratching his head. But then he noticed Duan Lin's pale face and stammered, "Is... is something wrong?"

He pursed his lips, but ultimately said nothing. "...You guys go to sleep. Call me if you need anything; I'm next door." After thinking for a moment, Duan Lin decided to leave it at that for today. He gave a few simple instructions and went out on his own. As his hand touched the door, he suddenly remembered the white figure that had passed through the door panel, and a chill ran down his spine. Duan Lin gently closed the door.

"I'm definitely not going to sleep tonight," Duan Lin thought.

But his spirit couldn't hold on for long. When Duan Lin finally drifted off to sleep, he was half-asleep when he suddenly heard a loud knocking on the door. The door was kicked open, and Monkey and Mu Zi came in. Mu Zi was expressionless, while Monkey and his roommate looked terrified.

"T-Teacher, everyone...everyone has disappeared!"

In short, Duan Lin was fully awake! He ran out of room "143," and the corridor was silent except for the echo of his own footsteps. Duan Lin knocked on each door, but the doors opened the moment he touched them, only to find them empty, empty, empty...

All the dorm rooms are empty!

Only the wrinkles in the bedding reminded me that someone had once rested here.

As he drove from one end of the corridor to the other, the soft moonlight gently shone on Duan Lin's shoulders. Standing at the end of the corridor, Duan Lin looked back. The whole way was quiet, except for the occasional dull sound of the doors he had opened hitting the walls.

The door was open, but no one came out. No one would come out, because inside…

There wasn't a single person there!

Staring at Mu Zi and the others, who had turned into four small black dots at the other end of the corridor, Duan Lin felt as if he were in an ice cellar!

Chapter Four: Grandpa's Warning

"Fatty Wang, what are you pretending to be so profound for? Are you coming down or not? Damn it! I'm freezing!" Two teenagers were standing under the wall, and the one cursing was the shorter one.

The fat man is still watching.

God knows how many times I, my boss, and I have climbed over this wall. Even if there was something there, we should be tired of it by now. I really don't understand what Fatty is looking at!

"From this angle, the school really does... look like a prison." The chubby boy's mutterings on the wall drifted into the ears of the boy below.

The boy frowned and looked up. "Hey! You bet! It's like a prison! What kind of school doesn't allow students to go home for a whole semester? Damn it! This wall looks just like a prison, they even have barbed wire on top! Ugh! My new pants! Shit!"

He seemed to have thought of something, but the tear in his pants instantly diverted the boy's attention.

The boy, who was called Fatty, seemed to be deep in thought, his eyes fixed on the front of him, unable to look away.