Chapter 6

“Bang—”

The loud crash in the classroom abruptly interrupted Teacher Li’s animated solo lecture.

What shocked her even more was that this time, the disturbance wasn’t caused by any of the “bad students” on her list, but by Xie Xishu, who had always been an exemplary student and someone she held high hopes for.

“What are you doing?!”

Teacher Li’s eyes widened slightly. She screamed sharply and glared fiercely at Xie Xishu.

[He’s gone bad too.]

It felt as if a thin, crazed voice was howling inside her mind.

[There’s no hope.]

[This school is full of bad students.]

[They’re all hopeless.]

[&*%￥#……]

The strange voice’s frequency grew higher and higher, finally turning into a sharp, ringing buzz like tinnitus.

Teacher Li gasped for breath, her expression turning terrifying as she looked at Xie Xishu.

But at that moment, Xie Xishu had no energy left to pay any attention to the teacher on stage.

His face was unusually pale, and his body trembled like he was seriously ill. He had to use both hands to brace himself against the desk he had just knocked askew, just to avoid collapsing completely.

“I... I don’t feel well.”

His lips, completely colorless, moved for a long time before barely squeezing out a hoarse, weak, almost whimpering whisper.

“I... I need to go to the restroom...”

Without waiting for Teacher Li’s response, Xie Xishu mustered his last bit of strength and fled wildly from Senior Three, Class 1’s classroom.

Faintly, he seemed to hear the teacher utter a loud curse. The woman called his name, sounding frantic and angry. Then there was some commotion, but all of it was soon left far behind in his mind.

* * *

Senior Three, Nanning No. 3 High School — Boys’ Restroom

“Splash...”

“Splash...”

“Splash...”

The faucet was turned to full blast, and the pure white stream of water splashed violently against the sink, scattering droplets everywhere.

Xie Xishu’s face was ashen; he paid no heed to his soaked clothes but kept his head lowered, scooping up water with his hands and frantically rinsing the back of his neck.

His skin grew icy cold, almost numb from the water, yet the sticky, clammy sensation clung stubbornly to that small patch of skin—no matter how much he washed, it wouldn’t fade.

Soon, more than half of Xie Xishu’s body was drenched—not just his hair, but even his clothes were soaked through. The constant downward posture cut off blood flow to his head, and combined with the slippery floor, he stumbled and fell heavily onto the ground.

“Ugh…”

Pain surged through him, and a nearly tearful low moan escaped from his bloodless lips.

But after that fall, Xie Xishu finally regained some composure.

Gripping the edge of the sink tightly, he wobbled as he pushed himself up.

In the mirror above the sink, his reflection stared back at him—and he felt a strange unfamiliarity.

The boy’s face was so pale it could make hearts ache; his once clear, beautiful eyes had sunk deep into their sockets. His dark pupils twitched nervously and his gaze was vacant, unfocused.

Wet strands of black hair clung to his corpse-like pale skin, water droplets tracing down the sharp lines of his jaw to his chin, falling one by one.

Xie Xishu thought he looked like a pitifully drowned ghost.

…

He stared at the mirror for a long while, taking several deep breaths.

Then, summoning his courage, he raised his phone and held it to the back of his neck.

“Click.”

He brushed his hair aside and took a photo of the back of his neck.

* * *

The photo was somewhat blurry.

But even so, it clearly showed a faint red mark on the back of Xie Xishu’s neck.

It looked like a bruise left by someone’s long, lingering touch, or perhaps the bite marks of a mosquito or some unknown insect.

The moment he saw the red mark, his hand trembled, almost dropping his phone.

“It’s not an illusion.”

Like a madman, he muttered while staring at the photo.

* * *

Qi Wu... something is wrong.

* * *

Strictly speaking, Qi Wu never did anything overtly inappropriate toward Xie Xishu.

Even the fact that Qi Wu stared at Xie Xishu could be explained as Xie Xishu’s own paranoia—after all, Qi Wu’s seat was at the back of the classroom, and the only direction he could look was forward.

Yet Xie Xishu was nearly driven mad by Qi Wu’s gaze.

Everything felt off, as if something invisible and intangible in the air was gradually closing in, twisting reality.

He sensed his once-familiar daily life was quietly unraveling in ways he did not understand.

But Xie Xishu didn’t know where the problem lay, nor how to fix it.

His perceptions and instincts were so absurd that even he felt like a madman on the verge of a breakdown from the pressure of the college entrance exam.

For example, the touch on his neck—though it was clearly only Qi Wu’s finger—felt moist, smooth, and burning hot.

It was nothing like skin texture.

Because his nerves were taut and all his attention was fixed on the movements behind him, Xie Xishu was absolutely certain of this.

The thing that touched him was covered in countless fine, soft little nodules, like a tongue’s coating, and over those nodules lay a thick, sticky mucus.

That thing had clearly sucked on the back of his neck.

The mark in the photo was proof it had been there.

* * *

Xie Xishu’s mind was about to explode.

* * *

If this were someone else’s story, he would have dismissed it as absurd fantasy—no matter how you analyzed it, Qi Wu could not have licked his neck with a tongue in front of the whole class.

Moreover, a normal tongue’s texture was completely different from what had clung to his neck.

Xie Xishu tried to rationalize the sensation as some kind of prank toy, but no matter how hard he thought, he couldn’t imagine any kind of silicone toy that would feel so wet, slimy, and disgusting.

So what was it?

He once again thought of the things from his nightmares, those flexible, soft, moist appendages like tongues that stretched out from Qi Wu’s eye sockets.

The next moment, he hugged his own arm nervously; a violent spasm gripped his stomach, nearly causing him to vomit.

* * *

“Hey, have you guys heard? That crazy woman named Li has really lost it lately.”

“…Ah, I heard she clashed with the discipline director? She said she wanted to clean up the school’s atmosphere and discipline, and called us students the cancer of the school, saying we should be gotten rid of. Haha, who does she think she is? The head of state?”

“Yeah, yeah, I heard that too. But I also heard that crazy woman has some mental issues.”

“Oh, I know what you mean. Apparently she wanted to quit before, but the director wouldn’t let her. If she left, no teacher would want to come here. I heard she’s a graduate from a prestigious university and took years to become a teacher. Hahaha, what a tragedy—ending up teaching at Nanning No. 3 High School. She might as well work in a factory tightening screws…”

“Damn, don’t act like you’ll never end up tightening screws in a factory yourself…”

* * *

Xie Xishu was so dazed that his reactions became sluggish.

By the time he noticed, a group of boys skipping class had pushed open the restroom door, laughing and shouting about school gossip.

Their eyes met his—wet through, hollow-eyed, and standing alone.

“Whoa, playing ghost?”

The first boy who entered almost jumped and nearly screamed at the sight of Xie Xishu.

When he recovered, embarrassed, his face immediately darkened.

“Are you nuts? Standing here without a word… what the hell are you doing?!”

The boy’s anger was obvious as he shouted loudly.

“Wait, if I’m not mistaken, isn’t this the top scholar from Class One?”

His companion, having laughed enough at the first boy’s reaction, peeked over his shoulder and raised his eyebrows in surprise.

“Top scholar? He’s the valedictorian.”

At that moment, another companion also recognized Xie Xishu.

Looking at the usually renowned academic achiever standing alone in the boys’ restroom, pale and twitchy as he splashed water on himself, a flicker of doubt crossed their eyes.

Once one noticed, the others recognized Xie Xishu too.

“Wow, is the sky about to rain blood? Or did I really see it wrong? Why are you skipping class during lesson time?”

“Tsk tsk tsk, I thought we had a pure flower among us, but even our top scholar’s gone bad...”

The boys sneered without mercy.

As they approached Xie Xishu, scrutinizing him silently, an inexplicable shift occurred—their teasing and mockery suddenly faded.

“Hey, do you guys smell that…”

One boy stared blankly at Xie Xishu, muttering.

“It smells so good.”

* * *

Xie Xishu’s pupils instantly narrowed to thin slits.

But the next moment, the restroom door’s long-neglected hinge let out a piercing screech as someone else pushed the door open.

“Hey, someone’s here. If you want to flush, go to another floor. We’ve got this place to ourselves today, okay?”

One of the boys, who mixed in the Nanning crowd like a small-time street thug, kept his gaze glued on Xie Xishu, unwilling to look back even when he heard the noise, and shouted impatiently.

“What’s the matter?”

A hoarse, rough male voice replied, dark in tone.

“What matter? None of your damn business—”