ATFBETIBM Chapter 663.2

Xia Chi looked at Li Mi’s head, which was now buried in the dirt, and exclaimed, “You didn’t smash him to death, did you, Tan Yue?”

Tan Yue glanced at Li Mi’s head. “He shouldn’t be dead. I didn’t use full force.”

Xia Chi: “…”

“If that wasn’t full force, what would it look like if you had?”

Tan Yue seemed much darker after entering the game!

Tan Yue bent down, grabbed Li Mi’s neck, and yanked his head out of the dirt. He gave it a shake, and Li Mi’s head flopped loosely along with the movement.

Tan Yue: “It looks like he fainted. Didn’t you want to ask him something? What now?”

Xia Chi: “…”

‘Whose fault was this?’

“You seem to have forgotten there’s a school doctor here,” Bai Lixin’s voice drifted over from behind them. He and Dijia approached leisurely. Dijia took Li Mi’s neck and head from Tan Yue.

“His neck’s mutated,” Bai Lixin commented casually. “He’s nearing his limit.”

Xia Chi was confused. “What do you mean?”

Bai Lixin: “It seems like he’s close to breaking.”

Xia Chi asked uncertainly, “What will happen then?”

Bai Lixin gave a meaningful look and said, “If he doesn’t explode in silence, he’ll perish in silence. If the east wind doesn’t overpower the west wind, the west wind will overpower the east wind.”

Xia Chi: “…”

‘More cryptic phrases.’

Dijia didn’t seem to use any special healing techniques. He shook Li Mi’s neck, much like Tan Yue had, but when he did it, Li Mi let out a groan, and his head slowly lifted.

‘He’s awake!’

‘Is this what it means to have the school doctor as a golden finger?’

Xia Chi looked at Li Mi.

Li Mi also looked at Xia Chi with his dark, hollow eyes.

He retracted his neck and returned to his relatively normal-looking but still terrifying form.

Xia Chi: “Li Mi, what just happened?”

Li Mi: “I saw Aloof Classmate fall from the rooftop.”

Xia Chi: “Did you see someone push him?”

Li Mi shook his head. “No, he did it on his own.”

“He jumped off by himself?” Xia Chi frowned. “Why would he do that?”

Li Mi hesitated for a moment. “He walked off by himself, but he kept saying ‘no’. It was like someone was controlling his body and made him jump.”

Xia Chi: “Then why were you so scared?”

Li Mi’s pale cheeks flushed red. “I’m afraid of dying. I’m scared someone might control my body and make me jump too.”

Xia Chi: “…”

‘What a pragmatic and honest answer!’

Li Mi got up from the ground. “Thank you for saving me just now. I’m going back to class now, bye.”

After he finished speaking, he turned and crawled toward the teaching building, his limbs twisting as he moved.

Watching Li Mi’s retreating figure, Xia Chi felt something odd about the whole situation.

He thought for a while, then suddenly shouted, “Ah! Li Mi didn’t cry just now. That’s strange!”

In the past, Li Mi would have cried at such an event, but just now, not a single tear had fallen.

What was going on?

Xia Chi followed after Li Mi.

Tan Yue and Bai Lixin followed Xia Chi.

Dijia followed Bai Lixin.

The four of them walked toward the teaching building like little tails.

When they passed the square, the pool of blood had already been cleaned up by the school’s sanitation workers.

He overheard one of the workers complaining.

“It’s one after another every few days, it’s really endless.”

Xia Chi abruptly stopped, “Uncle, what did you just say? What do you mean by ‘one after another every few days’?”

The sanitation worker’s old eyes were full of disdain. “You students, always snooping around. Why should I tell you?”

Xia Chi took out a [Good Person Card].

[ Ding! The prop [Good Person Card] has been used successfully. At this moment, the sanitation worker sees you as the best person in the world and will do everything he can to answer your questions. ]

Xia Chi flashed a smile like a model student. “Uncle, what do you mean by ‘one after another every few days’?”

The sanitation worker’s eyes widened, and a smile spread across his face. “Oh, it’s you, good child! What else could it be? Jumpers, of course. For some reason, these students are lining up to jump off the building as if having a seizure. And it’s always this same building, this same spot. I, an old man, who didn’t do anything bad in my life and is just trying to scrape by at this school, is now stuck cleaning up after them.”

“Did all the jumpers die?” Xia Chi asked in shock.

Sanitation Worker: “From such a tall building of 26 floors, how could they survive?”

Xia Chi felt like he had grasped a thread in the tangled mess. He asked anxiously, “Can you tell me more? When did the jumping start? Who were they?”

Sanitation Worker: “Including today’s, this makes the fifth. Six days ago, the first student jumped, then the next day another one, and the day after that, yet another. On the fourth day, there was another. There were two quiet days in between, and just when I thought it was over, boom, today there’s another one.”

“They were all excellent students. Why couldn’t they figure things out?”

Xia Chi: “How excellent?”

Sanitation Worker: “The first was, I think, the student council president? The second was the swimming team captain? The third was a great dancer, and the fourth a singer. Today’s was a piano player.”

Xia Chi thought for a moment. “Were they all popular at school?”

Sanitation Worker: “I think so. When they were alive, students were always chasing after them. The kids these days,
they’re like fickle grass in the wind. The person they idolize dies, and they move on to the next one without a single tear.”

Xia Chi: “…”

It was just like earlier—so many people idolized the piano prince, even crowding the classroom just to hear him play.

Today, when something happened to him, those same students took photos and left indifferently, as if they didn’t even know him.

One dies, and they quickly move on to the next idol?

Four people had died in quick succession.

Could it be that Aloof Senior and the other two were only idolized after the first four had died?

Xia Chi hesitantly voiced this hypothesis.

Sanitation Worker: “I don’t quite remember, but you might be right.”

Xia Chi: “…”

‘Was there some kind of connection?’

Xia Chi: “Were all the ones who died male?”

Sanitation Worker: “Yes, yes.”

Xia Chi looked up at the high rooftop, then down at the smooth marble floor below.

Yesterday, he had almost fallen from up there too.

If Tan Yue hadn’t pulled him back, it would have been him smashed on the ground today.

Something was starting to click.

After thanking the sanitation worker, Xia Chi habitually grabbed Tan Yue and hurried toward the teaching building.

It didn’t take them long to find Li Mi in the corner of a classroom. He was immersed in drawing and didn’t notice Xia Chi.

The teacher on the podium was giving a lecture.

The teacher’s posture was stiff, the hand holding the chalk slowly moved across the blackboard, like an old, rusty sewing machine.

“Stu-dents, turn to page six-ty-two, we will now move on to the next les-son.”

Every word came out one at a time, making the listener’s scalp tingle.

Xia Chi didn’t rush in but stood at the back of the classroom, watching.

All the students were stiff, their necks rigid, eyes glued to the blackboard, as stiff as the teacher.

On the contrary, Li Mi, who had his head down and was drawing, looked relatively normal. Though his appearance was terrifying, at least his movements weren’t stiff.

Xia Chi waited until class ended before walking over to Li Mi.

Li Mi raised his head, his hollow eyes looking at Xia Chi with confusion. “Why are you here?”

Xia Chi: “The student council president six days ago, the swimming team captain five days ago, the dancer four days ago, the music student three days ago—did they all do the same thing to you that Aloof Senior did?”

Li Mi’s already pale face was completely drained of blood, and was even whiter than the wall behind him.

“Seems like it,” Xia Chi said, already knowing the answer from Li Mi’s reaction. “Did they all jump off the building themselves?”

Li Mi stiffly nodded. “Yes, yes.”

Xia Chi: “…Did you do it?”

Li Mi was shocked and opened his mouth to reveal a red tongue. “It wasn’t me. It had nothing to do with me. It really wasn’t me.”

“If it wasn’t you, could it have something to do with you?” Xia Chi paused. “Like, did you ever wish in your heart that those who hurt you would die? Or did you draw a picture of them jumping? Or write about it?”

Li Mi shook his head like a rattle. “No, no, no, I didn’t. I never thought about them dying. I just wanted to escape.”

Xia Chi stared down at Li Mi’s face. After a long time, he asked, “Why don’t you cry anymore?”

Li Mi touched his hollow eyes in confusion, realizing there were no tears.

Maybe the question had stumped him too, and he stood there stunned for a long time before answering, “I don’t know why. I just can’t cry anymore.”

Xia Chi: “…”

Why couldn’t he cry anymore?

Xia Chi turned his head with confusion, and his eyes happened to fall on Bai Lixin’s face. Bai Lixin’s eyes were sparkling, as if water was swirling in them.

“Brother,” Xia Chi asked tentatively, “Did you do something?”

Bai Lixin: “I sympathized with Li Mi. His passive skill affected me, and I could feel his pain, fear, anxiety, and resentment.”

Xia Chi: “…And then?”

Bai Lixin: “Then I thought in my heart, ‘There’s nothing to cry about. Be strong.’ Then the negative emotions Li Mi passed on just disappeared.”

Xia Chi glanced at Bai Lixin, then at Li Mi, who was sitting at the desk in a daze, and his mouth twitched into a cramp. “Did you… counteract Li Mi?”

Bai Lixin: “It seems so.”

Xia Chi: “…”

‘As expected of you, brother.’

‘While everyone else was turned into crybabies by Li Mi’s influence, you went and reversed it, turning him into a stoic warrior.’

‘The direction of this copy was getting stranger and stranger.’

“This copy allows for 10 players, and since we entered, we’ve only known of three—us,” Bai Lixin continued. “But if you count the four who died before, plus Aloof Senior this time, along with the two, Handsome Senior and Rich and Cool Senior, doesn’t that make ten?”

The light sentence felt like a heavy bomb dropped into a lake.

Xia Chi felt a little dizzy: “…”

‘Brother, when you brainstorm, you don’t care whether others can follow or not.’