Chapter 78

It's a matter of trusting the abilities of his teammates or his own judgment; under the time constraint, Feng Bujue must make a decision. This inner struggle is another form of pressure that the system imposes on him, besides fear. Regardless of the outcome of his choice, in this game of cat and mouse between the system and the player, he has already lost. Distracting himself with something that cannot yield a definitive conclusion will only bring him danger.

At that moment, the sudden cry of a baby rang out, reaching Feng Bujue's ears. He turned his head to find a dark, empty corridor, with the sound coming from the corner at the end of the corridor.

He did not rush over but instead looked down at his phone. The time was 40:27, and in eighteen seconds, he would miss the opportunity to make the call.

In the end, he pressed the speed dial button. Although they had only shared one script, he still trusted Siyu's capabilities. Additionally, he felt that if he did not make the call, the other party would also experience similar psychological pressure in the next fifteen minutes.

After just one ring, Siyu answered the phone: "I'm fine, don't worry."

"Hmm..." Feng Bujue was indeed glad to hear her voice, but he immediately said, "Didn't you say... not to ask if the other person is okay?"

There was about two seconds of silence...

Then, a beep sounded from the phone, and the call was disconnected.

This situation had only one explanation... Siyu, in a context without any intention to insult, said a censored word to Feng Bujue in great displeasure and then hung up the phone herself.

Listening to the busy signal, Feng Bujue stood there in a daze, holding the phone in front of his eyes: "Hey! What's this? Hanging up on me! You were the one who said not to ask if we're okay! Now you're cursing me! And the fact that you could curse me means you're confident!" He shouted at the phone with wide eyes, but the call was already disconnected, and Siyu couldn't hear him. This was just a one-sided vent: "Idiot? Moron? Fool? It's probably just one of these words! What did I do? You don't have to hang up after cursing me! I shouldn't have called in the first place!"

In front of him, the baby's cries grew louder, continuously piercing his ears, just as the nursery rhyme goes: "Wah wah wah, wah wah wah... the baby's cries echo in the ears."

Feng Bujue closed his phone, held it in his left hand, and passed the flashlight to the same hand. He then drew a kitchen knife from his backpack, holding it in his right hand, and quickly walked forward.

Turning the corner of the corridor, he immediately saw a basket on the ground, similar to a shoe-shaped bamboo basket used for picnics. Inside the basket lay a baby, wrapped in a white towel, with only its head exposed. Its face showed no abnormalities, looking like a newborn with closed eyes and undeveloped features.

Feng Bujue let out a long, deep breath, then squatted down and looked at the baby, speaking calmly: "What do you want? Speak up. If you don't say anything in thirty seconds, your head's coming off."

The baby continued to cry, and its cries grew even more intense: the "wah wah" sounds became shrill, like the sound of nails scratching on glass, making one's heart race.

"Cry!" Feng Bujue raised his voice: "Crying counts as time too!"

His rough interrogation method had dire consequences. The baby slowly opened its eyes, revealing blood-red pupils. Its squished features twisted into a sinister smile.

According to legend, newborns, whose souls and spirits are not yet fully formed, have the ability to see the supernatural. If such a baby dies, its resentment will be extremely strong, making it more ferocious than a typical bound spirit.

In front of Feng Bujue, the basket containing the baby suddenly turned into a human torso. The dead person's face was filled with horror, and their limbs were missing. The internal organs were removed and scattered on the ground. The baby lay inside the hollowed-out torso, grinning at Feng Bujue.

"Using bones as a cradle and skin as a sack, huh?" Feng Bujue smiled back, not at all afraid, but rather irritated.

As he spoke, he caught a glimpse of something out of the corner of his eye. Looking up, he saw that the corridor was now filled with similar corpses, all with their internal organs removed and limbs missing, their deaths gruesome.

"You're like a hermit crab reincarnated," Feng Bujue said. "Let me guess... Your mother was a student here. She was toyed with by a teacher or a boy, and after nearly ten months of pregnancy, she came to the school to beg for help but was cruelly rejected. In the end, she committed suicide in this corridor, and before dying, she dug you out of her womb in anger?"

A novelist is a novelist; their ability to fill in the blanks and convert them into words is strong.

Upon hearing this, the ghost baby's laughter abruptly stopped. In the next second, it turned into a heart-wrenching scream, so terrifying that it shattered the windows on one side of the corridor and caused Feng Bujue's health points to drop.

It seemed that this monster could not be dealt with peacefully. Feng Bujue quickly raised his knife to stab the ghost baby, but the tip of the knife failed to land. Something had suddenly grabbed his wrist. Turning his head, he saw an arm extending from the wall, preventing his attack. This indicated that the limbs of the corpses were still nearby...

Fortunately, the ghost baby's high-pitched scream lasted only about seven or eight seconds. If it had continued, Feng Bujue's health points might have been drained. However, the situation was still dire. Hands and feet began to emerge from the walls on both sides of the corridor, each one moving...

Feng Bujue knew that delaying was not in his favor. He decisively slashed with the kitchen knife, cutting into the arm. Unfortunately, human arms are not easily severed, and the same applied to the dead person's arm.

The blade of the kitchen knife embedded itself in the ghost arm's flesh, and a large amount of blood flowed down, seeping into the corpse's torso and splashing onto the ghost baby. The baby laughed again, its voice piercing and causing Feng Bujue immense pain. If the game did not limit the level of pain, he might have fainted.

Seeing that he could not break free, Feng Bujue quickly put down the flashlight and phone in his other hand, took out Mario's wrench from his backpack, and swung it down with lightning speed, striking the ghost baby's head. This time, he succeeded and even triggered the "Concussion" effect by luck.

The monster's body was affected by the skill, and the moving limbs stopped. Feng Bujue took the opportunity to free his right hand and, using both hands, began to beat the ghost baby in the "corpse cradle." The scene was gruesome, with blood and flesh flying everywhere, bordering on inhumane.

Soon, the limbs that had emerged from the walls disappeared, indicating that the monster was losing its strength. Feng Bujue thought this was a sign that the ghost baby was about to be defeated, but new phenomena appeared immediately.

Feng Bujue noticed that the face of the corpse containing the ghost baby began to blur and gradually transformed into his own face. It even spoke, with a voice identical to his: "It hurts... stop... stop!" The corpse's voice changed from a moan to a roar, and it struggled to move its torso.

As Feng Bujue hesitated, the ghost baby vanished right before his eyes, leaving only an empty abdominal cavity and some organ remnants in the corpse's torso.

Feng Bujue realized he had been tricked. The monster had used an illusion to gain a moment's respite and escape to another place. He immediately put away the kitchen knife, picked up the flashlight, stood up, and swept the light over the hollowed-out corpses in the corridor, trying to find where the ghost baby had gone.

"Hehehe..." A chilling laugh echoed, not sounding like a baby at all. The most terrifying part was that the sound came from very close by.

Feng Bujue realized something and looked down at his chest. The sight that met his eyes was enough to make anyone's blood run cold... the blood-covered ghost baby was curled up inside his abdominal cavity, one small hand clinging to one of his ribs, and the sinister laughter was coming from inside his body.

"Do you think this illusion will make me kill myself?" Feng Bujue said calmly, completely ignoring the scene. He reached into his backpack, knowing that what he saw was just an illusion and that his sense of touch was not affected. He could still feel his clothes and the backpack slung over his shoulder.

He took out the Eye of Enmity, put it on, and said, "I almost forgot about this thing." At this moment, he remembered another use for this equipment.

Wearing the Eye of Enmity and using the flashlight's beam, Feng Bujue scanned every corpse and every corner of the corridor. As long as the ghost baby was still creating illusions, it would be exposed.

Sure enough, when his gaze fell on a seemingly hollowed-out corpse, the Eye of Enmity reacted, indicating that there was a monster there, targeting the player.

Feng Bujue walked over without hesitation and swung the wrench down. This time, the heavily injured monster had no more tricks left.

[Main Quest Progress Updated]

[Explore Yejie High School, dispel seven paranormal phenomena, current progress: 3/7]

[Main Quest Progress Updated]

[Explore Yejie High School, dispel seven paranormal phenomena, current progress: 4/7]

Almost simultaneously, two system notifications appeared, indicating that at the moment Feng Bujue defeated the ghost baby, Siyu had also completed the task on the thirteenth step.

"Hmph..." Feng Bujue let out a cold laugh, mocking himself, "Looks like I was worrying for nothing."

...

In the main building, Siyu was leaning against the wall in the corridor, sitting on the ground.

Looking down the corridor, countless monster corpses lay scattered, blood pooling on the floor, and the heavy stench of blood and the monsters' foul odor was overwhelming.

But at this moment, she had no strength left to move to another place.

The lantern and long sword were placed on the floor beside her. Her right hand held the phone, and her left hand was pressing on a wound on her right waist. The wound was still bleeding, seeping through her fingers.

This floor, accessible via the thirteen steps, was a place from which one could not escape or hide. It was filled with numerous monsters, some of which could scare a person's fear level to the max just by their appearance. Those who entered either became part of the evil spirits or, like Siyu, killed them all...

Actually, during the last call, Siyu's condition was already very bad. When she told Feng Bujue, "I'm fine, don't worry," she was lying.

At around 40:00, Siyu was in a brief lull between battles. Although she was already injured, she had consciously adjusted her breathing and quickly answered the phone. She knew that showing any signs of distress would only burden her teammate.

Now, Siyu had finally cleared all the monsters in this space and needed to rest. Her health and stamina needed to recover, and the bleeding could not be stopped for the moment. Only by remaining still and pressing on the wound could she prevent further health loss.

In such a situation, the system would not consider it "passive gaming" because the player was forced to stop due to specific circumstances. On "Normal" difficulty, the system would not force a player on the brink of death to continue. As for "Nightmare" difficulty, that was another story...

Siyu checked the time on her phone; there were ten minutes until the next call. She did not want to face any "ghost chase" in her current state, so she had to complete the call next time.

After the last call, Feng Bujue felt angry, and Siyu felt wronged. Objectively, both were at fault, but the main responsibility... still lay with Feng Bujue, who had said something embarrassing in response.

At any time, even if a man is completely in the right, he should not correct a woman's contradictions...

Drip... Drip...

Just as Siyu thought she could catch her breath, the sound of dripping water quietly echoed from the darkness in the distance...