Chapter 158
There were several pieces of clothing hanging in the wardrobe.
The style and even color of the clothes were the same — they were the ones worn by the principal and the reporter.
Compared to reporter, the clothes fit much better on the principal. Just from this alone, it was evident that the clothes belonged to the principal and that this office too belonged to the principal.
Lin Yi counted and found that there were five pieces of clothing left inside.
Including the clothes worn by the principal and the reporter, there were seven pieces in total.
When Lin Yi buys clothes, he also buys seven identical ones at once for the savings. With seven, he can cycle through them throughout the week. The current situation should be the much same. The difference was that while Lin Yi did it for the savings, the principal probably did it for convenience.
And so, the clothes worn by the reporter were the principal’s.
Lin Yi looked back at the coat that was placed on the armrest of the sofa. The coat was placed on the armrest but part of it was intentionally left to drape on the floor instead of letting it touch the sofa, as though they were afraid of dirtying the sofa.
He closed the wardrobe door, returned to the sofa, picked up the coat and shook it loose.
Sure enough, he saw stains on the coat; stains mixed with blood.
The blood was spattered across the stomach area, about the size of two fists; as though someone had vomited blood and the owner of the coat couldn’t avoid it at close range.
Lin Yi reached out and touched the blood. His fingers came away wet, indicating that the blood hadn’t been on it for a long time, no more than two hours at most.
Lin Yi had the answer in his heart.
The person asking the questions wasn’t a reporter; or perhaps it was more accurate to say, that he wasn’t a real reporter.
He thought back to the interview he eavesdropped on. The person had sounded stiff and jerky when asking the questions. There wasn’t a smooth transition between each question, as if he were merely reading from a script.
That’s right. He had just been reading from a script.
Because this person wasn’t a reporter at all. He was from Xiushen Academy and belonged to the same camp as the principal.
During their interview, they mentioned the online accusations against Xiushen Academy. This interview was more like a response from Xiushen Academy to those accusations on the Internet.
But if this was a response, there would have been no need for Xiushen Academy to have such an unprofessional person to pretend to be a reporter. This fake reporter was purely a last minute emergency stand-in.
Lin Yi stared at the blood stains on the coat. If the fake reporter was a last minute stand in, this meant that Xiushen Academy had been unprepared for this interview to happen. They’d been caught off guard.
Generally speaking, reporters would make an appointment in advance with whomever they want to interview. They will then only will visit at the appointed time after obtaining permission.
If Xiushen Academy was unprepared for this interview, it could only mean that the reporter hadn’t made an appointment at all.
Xiushen Academy didn’t even know there was going to be an interview because the real reporter had come for a surprise interview!
The blood stains on the coat, the ill-fitting clothes on the fake reporter and the stiff script were all clues that intertwined with each other to create an outline in Lin Yi’s mind.
News of the abuse of children in Xiushen Academy had spread like wildfire. A reporter who learned of the news snuck into Xiushen Academy with equipment, preparing to reveal the truth of the incident to the public.
But unfortunately, the reporter was caught.
The reporter couldn’t have made the unannounced visit on a whim. Logically, he must have done stakeouts of Xiushen Academy for a long time.
While the reporter had been watching Xiushen Academy, there must been people also watching the reporter. The reporter might even have shared practical explanations regarding this adventure to other netizen, who like him were paying close attention to Xiushen Academy.
So he came here.
We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.
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But the reporter had been unwilling. So, he was beaten until he vomited blood and the blood spurted onto the assailant.
The dying reporter could no longer conduct the interview, so the principal had the assailant step in and serve as the stand in.
The assailant took off his blood-stained coat, the principal lent him a change of clothes and then the interview began.
After the interview ended, the principal and the fake reporter hurriedly left the room to go to the reporter. They needed to use the reporter’s account to publish the staged interview.
The interview had a been a video recorded and a video was more convincing than a written article.
In the video, it would be seen that the ‘reporter’ was not threatened. He had a pleasant conversation with the principal of Xiushen Academy. The previous misconceptions about Xiushen Academy would be resolved with this interview.
Lin Yi returned the coat to its original spot. He stood by the door and listened for any noises outside. After making sure it was all quiet, he opened the door and ran out.
He had to find the real reporter.
Once the reporter publishes the video, the reporter won’t any have any more value and would be silenced!
Not only that, it would be even more difficult for them to escape from Xiushen Academy once this video is released since no one would be paying attention to Xiushen Academy anymore. They would lose active help from the outside world.
Lin Yi left Building 2 and ran straight to Building 1.
There were only three buildings in Xiushen Academy. He saw the principal and the fake reporter leaving Building 2, which proved that the reporter wasn’t in Building 2.
Lin Yi had also confirmed that the reporter was not in Building 3. Building 3 contained the participants and was guarded by eight thugs. But tonight, he had tricked the thugs into giving him a new room and leaving to buy him food. The reporter was a key figure. If the reporter had been locked up in Building 3, how could the thugs have dared to leave at all.
All that remained was Building 1.
Three minutes later, Lin Yi arrived at Building 1.
Panting, he hid behind a tree trunk to catch his breath.
With his figure covered by the tree trunk, Lin Yi raised his head and looked towards Building 1.
Before he could find the room where the reporter might be detained, he saw two people dragging a person, walking towards the direction where Lin Yi had come from.
Lin Yi’s heart sank. The person being dragged must be the real reporter.
Given the current situation, it was unlikely he was being transferred to a different detention room in a different building. It would be unnecessary. In the direction which he came wasn’t only Building 2 and Building 3 but also the mass gravesite.
The reporter was going to be thrown into the mass gravesite, a natural place to dispose of corpses.
For the time being, Lin Yi had no way to find out whether the video interview had been released.
The reporter was covered in blood and he left long, shocking bloody marks as he was dragged along.
However, the reporter wasn’t dead yet. Lin Yi saw the reporter trying to raise his head. However, he was seriously injured and just this simply act seemed extremely difficult.
Lin Yi leaned against the tree trunk. He waited for a while and then quickly found the next hiding spot, following after them.
Just as Lin Yi guessed, the reporter was taken to the mass gravesite. Probably because they were confident that the reporter would die, they haphazardly left the reporter, turned around and left.
Lin Yi waited anxiously for the two to leave. As soon as their figures disappeared, he hurriedly rushed towards the reporter.
He checked for breathing but found nothing. He didn’t know whether the reporter was dead or his breathing was too weak.
“Mr. Reporter,” Lin Yi called him anxiously. He looked at the injuries on the reporter’s body. There wasn’t an inch of the reporter’s body that remained intact. His body was covered in blood and his face had been beaten to a pulp.
Lin Yi knew very well that the reporter’s injuries weren’t simply limited to these. He must have suffered terrible violence. Blood was oozing from his mouth, nose, eyes and ears. This was a reaction to the rupture of intracranial blood vessels. There was almost no way to provide emergency treatment outside a hospital.
“Mr. Reporter,.” As much as it pained Lin Yi, he was left with no choice but to beat a dead horse.
He was about to pinch the reporter, when a hand wrapped around his wrist.
——
All throughout this night, Lin Yi had been running and running. He ran back to Building 3, holding the lockpicking tool he had fashioned.
He ran to the dorm room where the participants were and unlocked the door.
The sound of the door opening woke up the participants who had finally fallen into fitful sleep. They were relieved when they saw it was Lin Yi, but then they became nervous again.
Lin Yi was sweating profusely from running and there were blood stains everywhere on his clothes and around his wrist.
Qin Zhou felt his heart tightening.
Lin Yi knew Qin Zhou would be worried so before Qin Zhou could ask about the situation, he said, “This is not my blood.”
“Did… something happen?” Ah Shan couldn’t help but ask, “Is it because the reporter wouldn’t help us or…”
Lin Yi’s current appearance was too frightening. Even if the blood didn’t belong to Lin Yi, it still meant that Lin Yi must have run into some sort of situation. Ah Shan had been the one to mention escape route D. If something happened, Ah Shan felt responsible.
There wasn’t time to explain clearly to everyone, so Lin Yi only said quickly, “We have a chance to escape right now.”
Everyone paused when they heard this. They’ve been met with bad news one after another that now, they couldn’t react to the good news.
Before they could show their surprised expressions, Lin Yi asked again, “Do we go?”
Hua Hua keenly discovered the problem. Lin Yi was asking for their opinions.
This meant that Lin Yi was doubtful about this opportunity.
Qin Zhou, who had been silent all this time, also discovered this and said to Lin Yi, “Tell me the key points.”
Only by knowing the specific situation can Qin Zhou help Lin Yi make a decision.
Lin Yi nodded. “The reporter conducted the interview was a fake and the real reporter was killed. The real reporter was conducting an undercover investigation. Before he died, he told me the route he took to sneak into Xiushen Academy.”
Qin Zhou frowned.
So their current chance to escape was based on the route the real reporter had used to sneak in. The uncertainty lay in that they didn’t know whether the reporter had lied. Although a person about to die wouldn’t have a reason to lie, the report was, after all, still an NPC, a tool created by the Monster.
If the Monster were so merciful as to allow NPCs to guide the participants to escape, why would this kind-hearted Monster drag people here in the first place?
Qin Zhou asked, “Which route is it?”
Such a simple possibility as an NPC lying was something that couldn’t have not occurred to Lin Yi. The only reason Lin Yi would be willing to try this was if the route given by this NPC matched a certain escape route they’d already identified.
Lin Yi said, “The one Xiao Chen said.”
Escape route C: Run to the south on the left side, where a river stood in their way.
Qin Zhou threw a scrutinizing glance at Xiao Chen. Xiao Chen had a surprised expression on his face. He didn’t expect that he had come so close to an escape.
Withdrawing his gaze, Qin Zhou said, “Escape is not guaranteed. Someone might die in the middle of this escape. It’s even more uncertain what will be waiting on the other side of the river. Whether to try or not, the minority must go with the decision of the majority.”
Saying so, Qin Zhou then said, “If you agree, raise your hand.”
Seeing that everyone was beginning to hesitate, Qin Zhou urged in a deep voice, “We don’t have all the time in the world to think on this. Raise your hand if you agree.”
Everyone looked at each other in dismay.
Hua Hua thought for a moment and raised her hand. “I agree, maybe we’ll die if we run but we’ll for sure die if we don’t.”
Her words moved many of the others and slowly everyone raised their hands.
In fact, it was exactly as Hua Hua said, If they don’t escape, they’ll just be waiting for death.
Because of the beating, Eyes wasn’t patrolling the halls.
Everyone easily left the room and ran towards the left side of Xiushen Academy.
No one talked during the escape and everyone looked solemn.
It was too easy, so easy that it felt surreal.
However, this sense of unreality was quickly dispelled by the sound of rapid footsteps.
Something was chasing them!
The participants didn’t dare look back. They knew what was chasing them.
Xiao Chen had said before that he was chased by a blood-drenched person all the way to the river. They shouted towards the village but the thing got a firm hold on him.
It was most probably this thing that was chasing them now!
Lin Yi and Qin Zhou were the first to arrive at the river. Qin Zhou estimated the width of the river, calculating the possibility of crossing it.
“Senior, stone.” Lin Yi picked up a stone in his hand. Qin Zhou: “En.”
Lin Yi launched the stone into the river and judged the depth by the sound of the water.
The moment the stone fell into the water, the sound of reached his ears. He quickly heard the stone thunk to the bottom proving that the river wasn’t deep.
Lin Yi did not hesitate and jumped directly into the water.
When his feet reached the bottom, he turned to Qin Zhou, who was about to wade in to measure the specific water depth. He gestured. “Senior, it reaches up to our chest.”
Qin Zhou laughed angrily. “…I have decided to give you the most hardworking patrol team member award of the year.”
Lin Yi: “…”
Lin Yi didn’t know how to answer. He simply shifted his gaze to look at the participants. When he was about to urge them to hurry, he saw the thing chasing them.
Lin Yi was stunned.
It was indeed as everyone had described. The distinction between flesh and blood was blurred. Its arms were pale but its eyes were blood red.
The sound of splashing came one after another. Lin Yi, who was already in the river served as their example. The participants did not hesitate upon reaching the river and jumped in directly.
Lin Yi stared at the thing. The thing reached out to grab one of the participants. It got a hold of a corner of Xiao Chen’s clothes, but Xiao Chen was very determined to get away that the corner was torn away as the thing pulled.
After successfully getting into the water, Xiao Chen let out a long sigh of relief.
The thing stopped chasing them and it simply watched them cross the river.
A pair of blood-red eyes shed two streams of bloody tears.
… Somehow I feels really bad for the monster…
Awww take him with you
The more I read this novel the more I find these characters cute. Like the previous arc’s Xia Hui in cat form was adorable, I almost wanted someone to pet him. And now this
Exactly. The monsters are born from the pain 🥺
is it the reporter??