Chapter 14: Teenage

When I returned to school the next day, I was greeted with a horrific sight.

Everyone was, actually. When I passed through the gate, I stopped and stared at the macabre sight.

"Is it suicide?"

"How horrible…"

"But why would he commit suicide? What reason did he…?"

Stupefied, I stared at the huge statue of our great founder in the school square. Hanging from the immense sculpture's outstretched hand was Gao Fu Shuai. His face was purple from suffocation, and his neck was twisted at an unnatural angle. His body dangled high above the ground, his expression a frozen rictus of fear.

If the hanging hadn't killed him, the fear would have.

"What the hell happened to him?" I murmured under my breath, too astonished to rhyme my sentences. I had just seen him yesterday evening, right before I went home. He was bitching like a brat to his system just because things didn't go his way.

And now he was dead.

"How…?"

I recalled the remark he made yesterday about system rewards. Even though the system conveniently and opportunely offered him a reward that involved exorcizing ghosts, he chose the option that rewarded him with girls' sympathy and affection points instead.

He screwed up his choice, and his plot armor was no longer able to protect him. As such, he was killed by the ghosts in school. I still recalled him staying back in the dark corridor after the student council members had gone home.

Was he attacked shortly after that? That was the only explanation. I shuddered to think what would have happened if I had stuck around for a bit longer. My hand automatically went to the peach wood sword that I had brought along.

I had been carrying it since last week when I accompanied Lian Hua. Having experienced a ghostly encounter two weeks prior, I could never be too cautious.

Despite my vigilance, I wasn't able to prevent the death of a classmate. Admittedly, I had focused my attention on Shu Hong Qiu and Lian Hua, not bothering too much about Gao Fu Shuai. I thought the guy had plot armor, but he clearly irritated the system, who responded by abandoning him yesterday.

Or maybe because he chose the wrong reward. Or he was just deluded and the system didn't actually exist. The whole "system" was simply his imagination.

"That's not good," I muttered under my breath. "A dark mood…"

"Keep going! Don't look!" Jiao Shi yelled, gesturing for the students to move past the grisly sight. The teachers had come out to guide the students away and into the buildings. In the distance, I heard sirens. The police were coming. It was best to leave it to them.

Of course, the incident was written off as suicide. The police interrogated several of the students and grilled me for more details because the girls in class complained that I had an altercation with him. Furthermore, I had stayed back late last night.

Fortunately, the student council members could attest that I went home with Shu Hong Qiu last night, and we all last saw Gao Fu Shuai loitering in the corridor before we left. The police recorded the details and deduced it highly possible that Gao Fu Shuai committed suicide because he perceived himself as being rejected by Shu Hong Qiu after she had hooked up with a rival.

That rival being me, of course.

That couldn't be further from the truth, but I doubted we could convince the police otherwise. What was I supposed to tell them? That a ghost killed Gao Fu Shuai? To be fair, I didn't see it happen. I simply assumed that a ghost killed Gao Fu Shuai, but I didn't have any real evidence other than the expression of utmost fear etched into his face.

What should I do?

"Don't do anything reckless," Shu Hong Qiu told me after the police finally released us from their interrogations. "You're not to be blamed for Gao Fu Shuai's death. Nobody is."

"Even so, we've to find out the root cause." I sighed. "Having a threat in school gives me pause."

Given Shu Hong Qiu's expression, I could tell that she shared the same suspicions. That Gao Fu Shuai's death was not suicide.

Her fingers curled and she fidgeted anxiously, staring at the school building where the student council office was. Her mouth set in a grim line, she set her expression into one of steely resolve.

"Hey, let me say the same thing. Don't do anything reckless. Make sure you don't overthink. The ghost's target's you, no less."

"Ghost…" Shu Hong Qiu snorted. "I mean, yeah, I've seen it, but still pretty hard to believe they really exist. But they've gone too far, involving innocent students…"

That reminded me. Even though Gao Fu Shuai's corpse was left at the front for all to see, Shen Ai Qing and her friends remained missing. I wondered what had happened to them. Did they turn into ghosts too? Would we find their bodies after their ghosts were defeated, just like what had happened to Han Zhi Hui?

I wasn't sure I wanted to know.

Despite the gruesome sight in the school square, lessons proceeded as per usual. The police removed Gao Fu Shuai's corpse from the statue of our great founder, wrapped it in a shroud, and took it away. Later, there would be a funeral held for him, but it would be attended mostly by the girls in our school. The guys, on the other hand, would be inwardly celebrating.

Though he was popular among the girls, Gao Fu Shuai had…to put it mildly, offended a lot of the guys. You know how in Chinese web fiction, all the girls were part of the protagonist's harem, and every guy who wasn't a fat best friend were depicted as the most evil, pettiest antagonists ever, whose sole existences were to serve as mob cannon fodder for the protagonist to beat up and flex his strength or gain experience points for his system?

Yeah, that was pretty much how he treated us. No wonder the guys didn't like him – and that was a massive understatement.

Thankfully, he mostly left me alone until he started targeting Shu Hong Qiu yesterday. Personally, I wondered if that was what caused his death. Even protagonists weren't immune to poor choices, and he ran out of plot armor on the whim of an author.

"Hey! Pay attention!" Jiao Shi shouted in class. He relaxed a little when he detected the somber mood in class. "I know there have been many…tragedies recently, but don't let them distract you. Watch out for each other. If anyone has any issues, please reach out. Don't keep it all bottled up and end up killing yourselves."

As I said, everyone was made to believe that Gao Fu Shuai's death was suicide, but I didn't buy that for even one second. Nonetheless, I dragged my attention back to class. Jiao Shi was right. One task at a time…

The lessons dragged on, and I breathed a sigh of relief once classes were all over. Picking up my peach wood sword and backpack, I went to wait outside the student council room once more. Yun Shan and Lian Hua shot me worried glances, but I smiled reassuringly.

"I'm just looking out for Shu Hong Qiu."

"Ho…" Yun Shan hid her smile and chuckled mischievously. "So our Ming Cong finally has someone he likes."

"Shu Hong Qiu is a lot better than Shen Ai Qing," Lian Hua said seriously. My shoulders sagged, and I wondered if I should tell them there was no romantic relationship between me and Shu Hong Qiu. I was her bodyguard, nothing more.

Fortunately, Yun Shan changed the topic quickly.

"Lian Hua, make sure you go home early. I don't know what's happening in this school, but there have been far too many…accidents. I won't rest easy unless I know you're safe."

"Yeah, I understand. Honestly, I feel scared too." Lian Hua put her hand on her chest. "Especially when I saw Gao Fu Shuai's body this morning…I don't know why, but I felt an inexplicable fear. A weird sense of déjà vu. I can't explain it, but…"

She trailed off. Her memories had been sealed by the medicine, after all. It was best to keep it that way, so I hurriedly interjected.

"That's fine and all, and you should go home early to stay safe. I will check out the school later and see what I can strafe."

"Strafe?" Yun Shan repeated incredulously. She shook her head and sighed. "Stop the rhyming. It's no longer funny. Actually, it was never funny to begin with."

"You wound me." I clutched my chest. "Leave me be."

We then went our separate ways. Yun Shan joined her basketball club fellows, Lian Hua went home after a couple of hours in the art club room, and I waited outside the student council room after that. While I silently read, the student council members debated their course of action in the aftermath of so many deaths and disappearances.

They weren't able to reach a consensus. Doing my best to leave positive and encouraging comments in the Honyfeed stories, I looked up when the meeting was over. The student council members were filing out, looking depressed and frustrated.

A few of them nodded to me in acknowledgement before they headed for the stairs. The last to exit the room was Shu Hong Qiu, but instead of going to the stairs, she lingered in the corridor after locking the room behind her.

"I've called my staff," she said, turning to me. Her smartphone was in her hand. "They'll be here soon. I don't know what's happening here, but I plan to get to the bottom of this. We'll be searching the building and looking out for any…"

A low, rattling hiss emanated from the shadows. Glancing out of the windows, I noticed that evening had come. The sun had set quite some time ago, and now that the other student council members had left, Shu Hong Qiu and I were alone.

Perhaps they had gotten impatient, or they thought we were easier targets when there were only two of us. That might be why they only struck when Gao Fu Shuai was left alone last night – too many student council members might make things difficult.

My guess was shattered when I caught sight of the ghosts.

Three of them emerged from the darkness, scuttling forward like spiders. Despite their arachnid like movements, they were simply moving on all fours, their bodies bent and contorted in weird shapes. Their hair fell over their faces, concealing their features, but I had a feeling I used to recognize them. There was a strange sense of familiarity…

"Shen Ai Qing…and her friends."

Shu Hong Qiu recognized them instantly. I turned to her in surprise, but she shook her head and pointed.

"They went missing…but clearly, they were also victims…"

With a shriek, the three wraiths hurled themselves forward. I stepped up, unslinging the peach wood sword from my back. Meeting the first of them – one of Shen Ai Qing's flunkies, Wang Mei Nu – I decapitated her with a swing of my weapon.

There was a cry and the disembodied head flew and toppled on the ground, rolling somewhere. I kicked the headless corpse away, which continued to twitch before it burst into flames and vanished.

Unfortunately, I still had two more opponents. Ducking under a slash, long fingernails the size of blades slicing through the air with a frightening whistle, I then counterattacked with a thrust that stabbed my assailant in the chest. She squealed and fell. Pulling out the peach wood sword, I hacked her head off.

Whirling about, I kicked Shen Ai Qing – or the specter that she had been transformed into – before she could sink her long nails into me. She staggered, and I took the chance to ram my peach wood sword into her face. She wailed and thrashed about wildly, almost ripping my hands off. Forced to cartwheel back, I waited for her flailing to subside.

However, Shen Ai Qing lunged at me with a chilling scream, scuttling across the floor with her long nails scraping the concrete. I evaded her first strike before kicking her over. Jumping up, I stomped on the peach wood sword that was sticking out of her face, hammering it deeper and obliterating her skull.

The wraith that used to be Shen Ai Qing exploded into dust and brimstone.

"Phew…" I straightened up and flicked the cinders off my peach wood sword. I was about to turn back to Shu Hong Qiu when I heard slow, mocking applause. Glancing up, I caught sight of a newcomer emerging from the shadows.

She looked human, unlike the specters I had just defeated…except that her skin was unnaturally pale – even paler than the supposedly snow-white skin of immortal jade beauties in cultivation web novels – a stark contrast against the blood-red of her lips and eyes. Her hair was long and black, the color blending into the darkness that shrouded her, and reminiscent of a moonless night.

Despite her ethereal beauty, I kept my guard up. I didn't know what she was, but my instincts were screaming, warning me that she wasn't human. Even though she resembled an ordinary teenage girl not unlike Shu Hong Qiu, she radiated a dangerous power that made my hair stand on end. With a smirk, she beckoned me over, revealing nails that were as long and sharp as daggers.

"Shall we dance?"