Today, Luo Yang experienced three strange events.

First, while returning from basketball practice at the school gym, he unexpectedly spotted a bizarre creature flying in the sky—neither bird nor beast, light as a feather, like a glimmer of dawn, radiating a faint glow, resembling an illusion refracted by the sun as it pierced through the atmosphere and clouds, vanishing in an instant.

Just as he was about to look away, he noticed someone on the rooftop of a teaching building preparing to jump. He called the police while running upstairs, but he was still a step too late. He watched helplessly as a classmate jumped right in front of him. However, when he rushed to the rooftop’s edge, he didn’t hear the horrifying sound of a heavy object hitting the ground. Looking down, he could only see a lush, empty patch of grass.

—The jumper had vanished.

No matter how strong Luo Yang's mental fortitude was, he couldn’t handle a third shock like this in such a short time.

But fate seemed to believe he could.

So, the next moment, he disappeared as well.

…

The empty campus was dim, making it hard to tell if it was overcast or evening.

A tall boy with a sports training bag was walking along the main road of the campus toward the school gate. With a fuzzy buzz cut, a healthy complexion from his love of sports, and a clear, handsome brow creased with troubled thoughts, his once casually unzipped sports jacket was now fully zipped, yet the cold wind kept seeping inside.

Minutes later, instead of reaching the school gate, the boy found himself in front of a certain teaching building again.

Seeing the building appear in his view for the fourth time, Luo Yang finally realized the truth: he couldn’t leave this campus.

Not only could he not leave, but no matter which direction he walked—whether on the main road or a side path, no matter how hard he tried to escape, through the front gate or by climbing the wall, he would ultimately find himself back here.

Yuxiu Building.

One of the main teaching buildings of S University, named after "Zhong Ling Yu Xiu," which embodies the namer's infinite hopes for diligent students. But now, faced with this familiar building, Luo Yang felt only a chill down his spine.

This was still the school.

Yet it also felt like it was no longer.

His sports training bag and phone were still with him, but inexplicably, the phone had turned into a "locked brick," with battery remaining but stuck permanently on the lock screen, no matter how many times he pressed it or rebooted it.

The lock screen time was frozen at the moment all the bizarre events occurred—4:18 PM, a perfectly normal time, even a bit auspicious. Yet the classmate who had jumped from the building was gone, and his mind was blank, realizing he was now standing in front of the Yuxiu Building.

The rooftop he had gone to wasn’t even the Yuxiu Building; that building was located on the west side of the school, almost half a campus away from the main teaching building. Just transporting someone there would take half a day, yet everything had happened in the blink of an eye.

The location had changed, the sky had changed, and the campus was eerily silent as if not a single person was around, while he was stuck in a loop, unable to escape.

Illusion?

A dream?

Or had he entered some other-dimensional space?

In such a chilling environment, Luo Yang managed to maintain his rationality, thanks to his resilience and focus developed from sports since childhood, as well as his strong psychological quality honed through countless horror games. Not to mention that just last year…

Forget it.

Luo Yang really didn’t want to remember, nor did he dare to. In any case, compared to the terrifying events he experienced last year, what he was facing now was still within his mental limits.

Clearly, there was a strange force pushing Luo Yang toward the Yuxiu Building, so he decided to stop resisting. Since he could neither walk out nor escape, he braced himself and stepped onto the stairs, entering the teaching building.

As he walked through the wide-open front door, a male student suddenly rushed toward him. Luo Yang stepped inside while the boy ran out, looking so panicked as if he were fleeing for his life, and collided hard with Luo Yang.

Luo Yang, a member of the school basketball team with good physical fitness, staggered but quickly steadied himself, while the boy fell in a heap.

Surprised and delighted, Luo Yang finally encountered a living person and quickly reached out to help, saying, "Hey, wait—"

"Ahhh—" The boy suddenly screamed, almost sounding inhuman in his madness, scrambling backward as if Luo Yang's hand was that of a hellish demon.

Only then did Luo Yang notice that the boy's face was pale, his whole body trembling, as if he had already endured some unbearable horror before.

The shrill scream finally ceased; the boy no longer looked at Luo Yang, shaking like a leaf as he scrambled to his feet, muttering, "The box, yes, I need to find the box…" He turned and ran back, disappearing into the darkness of the corridor in the blink of an eye.

The same thing happened again when Luo Yang ascended the stairs to the fourth floor.

This time it was a girl, with the same pale face, same wild fear, repeating "The box, the box."

Having gained some experience, Luo Yang successfully stopped her, asking, "What box? What happened to you all…"

The girl looked insane, gripping Luo Yang's shirt tightly, her eyes filled with terror, as if possessed by some evil spirit, continuously repeating, "If I don’t find the box, I’ll die, I must find the box…"

The girl was petite, and no matter how hard she struggled and screamed, she couldn't budge the tall boy in front of her. However, Luo Yang, a man who could stay calm even when encountering a suddenly appearing terrifying NPC in the most horrifying puzzle games, felt a chill run down his spine the moment he met the girl’s eyes, trembling as if countless cold snakes were crawling all over his body.

Because in her eyes, he saw a familiar, indescribable unknown fear that he had experienced and desperately wanted to forget.

A sudden noise from the stairs pulled Luo Yang out of his daze.

He immediately turned toward the sound but only managed to catch a glimpse of a light beige figure disappearing at the end of the stairs.

It was the same light beige color as the commemorative sportswear he was wearing.

It was the jumper from the rooftop!

Luo Yang had no need to think further to confirm this.

Today, two months after the school anniversary, it would be hard to find even a few people still wearing the commemorative outfit at S University. Luo Yang was only wearing the top because the material was indeed soft and suitable for layering over his team training gear, while the jumper was in a complete set.

Although he only made eye contact with that person for a brief moment as he ran onto the rooftop, he had seen clearly.

Perhaps it had something to do with personal aura; the light beige top and pants on that person looked neither casual nor relaxed, and even the tone seemed to shift from warm to cold.

The noise on the stairs startled the girl, causing her to abruptly release Luo Yang and run in the opposite direction.

Luo Yang had no time to think about her, turning and sprinting up the stairs.

He chased all the way to the fifth floor but didn’t catch a glimpse of the light beige figure; all he faced was a dark, silent corridor on the fifth floor.

Luo Yang had a strong intuition that the person was here, yet he could no longer hear any footsteps or sounds; he could only search through the classrooms along the corridor.

He didn’t find the classmate who had jumped but instead saw a few big words written in white chalk on the blackboard of Classroom 503—

Hurry and escape! This is not a school!

The handwriting was neat, yet the content was chilling.

Then he checked 504, 505, and 506.

In four consecutive classrooms, the blackboards bore the same message, but the handwriting grew more chaotic as he went further back, as if the writer was facing an ever-approaching terror.

By the time he reached 507, the message on the blackboard finally changed—

They have all gone mad!!

The message stopped there; Luo Yang continued to check classrooms 508, 509… all the way to the last classroom on the fifth floor, 513, where the blackboard was completely blank.

He should have felt relieved that no more horrifying content appeared, but Luo Yang felt worse. He couldn’t help but wonder what the writer had experienced; had they, like him, become trapped in a loop and encountered classmates screaming in madness? Where was that writer now? Why had they written in several classrooms and abruptly stopped after 507? Were they safe?

"Tingting—"

A hoarse, wailing male voice suddenly erupted, echoing through the fifth-floor corridor.

Luo Yang's eardrums nearly burst as he followed the sound, which surprisingly came from Classroom 507.

Previously distracted by the message on the blackboard, he had only just noticed, in the dim light, that there lay a person on the podium. Most of their body was blocked by the desk, with only two feet extending from the dark shadow between the blackboard and the lectern; one slipper had fallen off.

Cautiously and defensively, Luo Yang approached the podium.

It was not the jumper from the rooftop; he could tell from a closer look that the shape and color of their clothes were entirely different.

This was the third classmate Luo Yang had encountered since entering the building. He could only hope…

"Don’t leave me! I’m… urgh… I’m going to drink myself to death, urgh… there will never be anyone who treats you as well as I did… you’ll regret it…."

Hope shattered.

The third classmate had also gone mad, drunk out of his mind.

Still sobbing and hiccuping.

Luo Yang crouched beside the drunken person, using the dim light to get a clearer look at his face: deep brow bones, a prominent nose, even in this disheveled state of drunkenness with his eyes half-closed, he wore an expression of melancholic despair.

"Classmate? Wake up." Luo Yang tried tentatively, "Did you write the words on the blackboard?"

The drunk raised his hand and waved aimlessly in the air, "I’m very sober—"

Luo Yang felt a chill; those who claimed they were sober were usually beyond help.

Still unwilling to give up, he switched to a simpler question: "Do you know where you are?"

"I’m drinking in my dorm, why would you care?" The drunk got angry and tried to sit up… but fell back to the ground.

Drinking in the dorm?

Though it was the ramblings of a drunken man, recalling his sudden “teleportation” from one rooftop to the front of the Yuxiu Building, Luo Yang was inclined to believe it was the truth. The other person had likely been drinking alone in his dorm just a moment ago, and now he lay on the classroom floor, raising a toast to the air.

The strongest evidence was that the drunk was not only wearing slippers but also pajamas.

A peacock green silk pajama set, with an orange little lion embroidered on the pocket of the top. Even shrouded in the dark shadow of the lectern, the peacock green silk shone softly and delicately, and the little lion was lively and bright, understated yet luxurious, dignified yet playful, lazily flowing with a hint of cheekiness.

"Who are you…" The drunk struggled to half-open his eyes, seemingly just realizing there was another face in his line of sight, "Did you… urgh… drink yourself to death too?"

"I should be alive," Luo Yang replied cautiously, "With your loud wailing just now, you’d still be healthy if you weren’t drinking."

"Impossible!" The owner of the peacock green garment firmly denied, his drunken eyes hazy and voice hoarse, "I’m already dead, my heart is dead! The moment I saw you two together, I died completely…"

Luo Yang: "?"

Peacock Green: "You clearly said you didn’t want to date before graduation, that if I really liked you, I could wait four years… I’ve been waiting, why don’t you keep your word!"

Luo Yang: "??"

Peacock Green: "I won’t listen! If you don’t like me, why were you so jealous when other girls confessed to me? Why did you say you hoped I only had you as a girl in my WeChat? Now I realize, I’m just a fish in your pond—"

Luo Yang: "…" Startled awake from his drunken state, realizing he was the one being accused.

Caught off guard by the accusation, he hesitated between continuing to play the part of the heartbreaker who raised fish and trying to find someone else here who was not insane and could communicate.

But the whimpering Peacock Green suddenly fell silent, furrowing his brows, lying on the ground with his head tilted slightly, his hazy gaze drifting over Luo Yang’s face: "Huh? I know you…"

"Yes, yes, yes, I’m in a forbidden relationship, illegally raising fish." It was pointless to reason with a drunk.

"You’re Luo Yang…" The drunken Peacock Green slurred out the name correctly, and the guy who had just been howling with bloodshot eyes suddenly brightened up, "That sharpshooter from our school’s basketball team, I’m not mistaken, right, hehehe…"

Now it was Luo Yang’s turn to be surprised.

The S University basketball team was basically an amateur club; everyone, including him, were enthusiasts, practicing casually and focusing on participation in competitions. Every year, it was a struggle to gather enough players for the provincial qualification matches of Cuba. The school did not value it, and its presence was zero; if he stopped ten people on campus and asked, he might not find one who knew their school had a basketball team.

"You don’t know, Tian Xiaoxia likes you so much, she never misses a match…" Peacock Green continued on his own.

Luo Yang was bewildered: "Who is Tian Xiaoxia?"

"Tingting’s roommate… I’ve watched you play several matches with them in the dorm, even though we lost every time, you really are incredible. If it weren’t for you being such a sharpshooter, we would have definitely been humiliated by a large margin…"

The praise came out of nowhere, making Luo Yang a bit shy: "Actually, well…"

"I even went to watch those boring matches; how could she deceive me about her feelings—" Peacock Green returned to his original grievance and started howling again.

Luo Yang sighed, momentarily indecisive about whether to stay or leave.

Staying here would make effective communication with Peacock Green difficult for the short term, but leaving the drunk alone worried him about the dangers he might face; the warnings of "Hurry and escape" from several classrooms didn’t seem like a joke at all.

As he pondered, his gaze inadvertently glanced toward the back of the classroom, and Luo Yang suddenly noticed that some rows of desks and chairs were missing, leaving a noticeably wider area than usual.

It seemed like something was placed there, but the light was too dim to see more than a dark silhouette.

Steeling himself, Luo Yang temporarily set the drunk aside, stood up, and left the lectern, slowly walking through the desks and chairs to approach the unidentified object.

The outline gradually became clearer; it was… an automatic vending machine?