Chapter 50 : Chapter 50
Chapter 50: Guess Who I Am
Ever since entering this place, Zhao Mingyue had felt that something was wrong.
But for a moment, she could not pinpoint exactly what it was.
Unlike Sunshine Apartments, there was no strong smell of disinfectant or burnt odor here to make one uneasy.
There was no smell at all.
Not even the chilling, bone-piercing yin wind that seemed to exist everywhere in haunted places.
Even more terrifying—there was not a single extra sound.
The surroundings were eerily silent.
No wind rustling the grass, no insects chirping.
Nothing at all.
It felt as if she had stepped into a world where time itself had stopped.
She stood in front of the dormitory building and observed it for quite a while.
Each floor only had four rooms, numbered from 101 to 104.
Every dormitory room contained large shared sleeping areas with bunk beds. Each room could easily house more than sixteen people—sometimes even twenty to thirty.
Each dormitory window had steel security bars welded onto it.
They were extremely sturdy, probably designed to prevent students from sneaking out.
The doors, however, were worn and old.
They were plain black wooden doors with nothing on them except the dormitory numbers painted in red.
The staircase divided the floor into two sides.
Two dormitories on the left, two on the right.
The dormitory building stood right at the entrance.
Zhao Mingyue even began wondering whether she should complete the “Under the Bed” task first.
【Under the Bed】
【Task Requirement: After starting the task, enter Room 404 of the Dongcheng No. 13 Middle School dormitory. Lie on the lower bunk near the window on the right side after entering, close your eyes for ten seconds, then open them.】
【I didn’t dare go to class. After everyone left, I was the only one left in the dormitory. I buried my head in the blanket. I was afraid to hear her voice… afraid to see her eyes.】
Room 404.
The number itself sounded unlucky.
Although, ironically, Zhao Mingyue had also lived in Room 404 at Sunshine Apartments.
“Let’s take a look first. If I can complete one task, that’s already something. Besides, Big Sister Yu is helping me.”
Encouraging herself silently, Zhao Mingyue did not take the rabbit doll out of her pocket.
Instead, she held her flashlight and approached the dormitory rooms.
All the dormitory doors were locked.
However, it was still possible to look inside through the windows.
The window glass was covered in thick dust.
Although the flashlight beam could penetrate it, it was still difficult to see clearly.
Fortunately, a piece of glass had been broken near the bottom of the window for some unknown reason.
Through that gap, she could observe the interior.
Because the broken section was near the lower corner of the window and the window itself was rather low, Zhao Mingyue had to bend down to look inside.
At the moment she bent over, her heart began beating rapidly.
She was afraid that the instant she lowered her head—a rotting face or some other terrifying thing might suddenly appear right in front of her.
Fortunately, nothing appeared.
The eerie silence remained unchanged.
The beam of the flashlight shone through the broken gap.
Just as she expected, inside were rows of large iron bunk beds.
She roughly counted thirteen sets.
If each bunk had two people sleeping on it, then one dormitory could house twenty-six students.
The room had clearly not been cleaned in a long time.
It was extremely messy.
Various items lay scattered on the floor and beds.
Most of them were belongings that students had brought but did not bother taking back home.
An old pair of cotton pants.
Several pairs of unwashed, smelly socks.
Aside from some broken toys, a few beds still had thin quilts that had already grown mold.
Zhao Mingyue frowned.
Her flashlight moved to the wall.
The wall had yellowed with age.
There were posters partially torn off and multiplication tables that had not been fully removed.
At first glance, it looked like nothing more than an ordinary abandoned dormitory.
That was—if one ignored the more than ten chairs neatly arranged on the floor.
Those chairs were placed very carefully.
Each chair leaned against the head of a bed.
All of them faced toward the interior of the room, while the backs of the chairs pointed toward the window.
Except for one chair.
The chair closest to the window, positioned in the middle.
It faced directly toward Zhao Mingyue.
It was the exact opposite of all the other chairs.
A filthy dormitory that nobody cleaned—yet the chairs on the floor were arranged in perfect order.
“How strange…”
Zhao Mingyue straightened up.
She had just been imagining—what if those chairs were not meant for people to sit on?
If someone walked past at night and saw every chair occupied by a shadowy figure…that would truly be terrifying.
After finishing with this dormitory, Zhao Mingyue checked the other rooms on the first floor as well.
The situation was identical.
The same messy environment.
The same neatly arranged chairs.
The only difference was the direction of the chairs.
Some rooms had chairs facing inward.
Some had chairs facing outward.
But no matter the arrangement, there was always one chair different from the others.
“Could this unique chair be hinting at something?”
“If one chair represents one ghost…”
“Then the opposite chair—does it represent a ghost that betrayed the others?”
“Or one that escaped?”
Zhao Mingyue thought of the little boy who had hidden in the convenience store that night.
He had escaped from Dongcheng No. 13 Middle School.
She had no idea whether he had returned.
“If not… then could that chair represent the teacher? The old director who burned to death?”
She stepped back several paces.
Just as she was about to leave, something caught the corner of her eye.
A face.
A bluish-green face.
It belonged to a young child.
Just moments earlier, that face had been pressed against the window of one of the dormitories, watching her.
The moment she turned her head—it disappeared.
Zhao Mingyue did not panic.
Instead, she walked over quickly.
Only then did she realize that this was the very first dormitory she had checked.
It was also the only one where the reversed chair was placed near the window and facing outward.
The boy had been watching her from the broken gap in the window.
Earlier, she had even been thinking—what if a face suddenly appeared when she looked inside?
Carefully bending down again, she shone her flashlight into the room.
Unfortunately, since she could only look through the window, there were blind spots she could not see.
For example—the wall beside the window.
What if that ghost was hiding right there?
At this moment, her face was less than one meter away from that spot.
“Little friend, I mean no harm.”
“I came here to help you.”
“If you can hear me, sit in the chair in front of me. I will help you.”
Zhao Mingyue spoke softly.
Her voice was barely louder than a whisper.
After she finished speaking, the dormitory remained silent.
Just as she was about to leave—something appeared within her line of sight.
From below the broken window gap, a lollipop slowly rose upward.
“Sister, if you really want to help me, hold this lollipop.”
“Then I’ll be able to go outside.”
The voice also came from below.
Zhao Mingyue’s pupils shrank.
That ghost was not beside her.
It was directly in front of her.
Her breathing grew slightly heavier.
She did not reach out immediately.
“Stand up first. Let me see you.”
“No.”
“Why?”
“If I said no, then it’s no.”
“If Sister is afraid, you don’t have to hold the lollipop.”
“You can just lean closer and read the numbers written on it for me.”
Zhao Mingyue looked carefully.
Sure enough, there seemed to be three tiny numbers printed on it.
But they were extremely small.
She would have to lean very close and widen her eyes to see them clearly.
Before she could speak, Bai Yu’s voice sounded in her mind.
“Don’t lower your head. Just walk forward.”
Zhao Mingyue stepped forward.
At that moment—from the pocket where the rabbit doll was stored, a slender arm suddenly extended outward.
Five delicate fingers shot forward and firmly grabbed the lollipop.
At the exact moment Bai Yu seized it, two small hands lunged upward from below.
A mischievous childlike laugh rang out as they tried to grab Bai Yu’s arm.
Before Zhao Mingyue could even react, her vision blurred.
She saw Bai Yu’s hand gripping the lollipop suddenly twist and seize the little ghost’s wrist instead.
Then—she did not know exactly what happened.
A miserable scream echoed from inside the dormitory.
The ghost’s wrist in Bai Yu’s grasp dissolved into smoke—and was absorbed by her.
“Be careful of the little ghosts here.”
“None of them are good.”
“Don’t lower your guard.”