Chapter 25 A Choice Must Be Made

Whether to believe in a teammate's ability or to trust one's own judgment—under a time constraint, Feng Bujue had to make a decision. This internal struggle was another form of pressure the system exerted, aside from fear. Regardless of the outcome of Feng Bujue's choice, he had already lost this game between the system and the player. He was now distracted, considering a matter that couldn't be accurately resolved, which would only bring him danger.

Just then, the sudden sound of an infant's cry rang out, reaching Feng Bujue's ears. He turned his head toward the sound, and before him was a dark, empty corridor. The sound came from the corner at the end of the corridor.

He didn't rush over; instead, he looked down at his phone. The time was 40:27. In eighteen seconds, he would miss the opportunity to dial.

In the end, he still pressed the speed dial. Although they had only been through one script together, he was willing to believe in Si Yu's strength. Besides, he felt that if he didn't make this call, the other party would also suffer similar psychological pressure for the next fifteen minutes.

At this point, he completely understood: if it was possible, he had to dial. Regardless of whether the two could successfully connect, dialing could at least indirectly prove the safety of one of them. Mathematically speaking, as long as a call was initiated, there was a 50% chance that neither of them would encounter a ghost; but if they didn't dial, one of them would be 100% pursued.

Beep—

It only rang once before Si Yu answered the phone, "I'm fine, don't worry."

"Yeah..." Feng Bujue was indeed happy to hear her voice, but then he said, "Didn't you say... don't ask each other if you're okay?"

About two seconds of silence...

Then, a "beep" sound came from the phone, and the call was disconnected the next second.

There was only one explanation for this situation... Si Yu, in a context without any intention of insult, said a censored word to Feng Bujue with great displeasure, and then took the initiative to hang up the phone.

Listening to the busy tone of "beep—beep—", Feng Bujue stood there dumbfounded, mechanically holding the phone in front of him: "Hey! What's this about? Hanging up on me! You were the one who said not to ask each other if we were okay! And now you're even cursing me! And the fact that you could successfully curse means you're confident!" He stared at the phone and roared, but the call was already disconnected, and Si Yu couldn't hear him. He was just venting unilaterally. "Idiot? Moron? Fool? It's nothing more than these few words! What did I do! You don't have to hang up after cursing me! I knew I shouldn't have called!"

Ahead of him, the sound of the infant's cry grew louder and louder, constantly drilling into his ears, just as the nursery rhyme sang: "Waaah, waaaah... the infant's cry echoes in the ears."

Feng Bujue closed the flip of the phone, held it in the palm of his left hand, handed the flashlight to this hand as well, and then took out the kitchen knife from his knapsack, holding it in his right hand in a reverse grip, and strode forward.

Turning the corner of the corridor, he immediately saw a basket on the ground, resembling the kind of shoe-shaped bamboo basket used for picnics. In the basket lay an infant, its body wrapped in a white towel, only its head exposed. Its face looked normal, like that of a newborn child, with its eyes closed and its features not yet fully developed.

Feng Bujue let out a long breath and then squatted down, looking at the infant and saying calmly, "What do you want? Speak up. If you can't say it in thirty seconds, your head will move."

The infant was still crying, and crying even harder. The "waaaah..." cry became extremely shrill, like the sound of fingernails scratching across glass, making people feel uneasy.

"Cry!" Feng Bujue raised his voice. "Crying also counts as time!"

His bandit-style interrogation method brought about very bad consequences. He saw the infant slowly open its eyes, its eyes under the eyelids like blood-colored amber. The squeezed-together features also revealed a ferocious smile.

According to legend, newborn infants have not yet gathered their three souls and seven spirits, and all have yin-yang eyes. If such an infant dies, its resentment will be extremely strong, even more ferocious than ordinary earthbound spirits.

Before Feng Bujue, the cradle containing the infant instantly turned into a human torso. The face of the deceased was filled with horror, and all four limbs were gone. The internal organs of the chest and abdomen were taken out and scattered on the surrounding ground. And the infant was lying in the emptied torso of the corpse, grinning at Feng Bujue.

"A skeleton as a cradle and skin as a bag, huh?" Feng Bujue also smiled at the other party. Not only was he not afraid, but he also felt a little annoyed.

As he spoke, his peripheral vision caught something else. He looked up and saw that this corridor was already filled with similar corpses, all with their internal organs emptied and their limbs missing, their deaths extremely tragic.

"You're a hermit crab reincarnated," Feng Bujue said. "Let me guess... um... your mother was a student here. She was played with emotionally by a teacher or a boy. After nearly ten months of pregnancy, she came to the school to beg the other party, but was still mercilessly rejected. In the end, she could only commit suicide in this corridor, and before she died, she resentfully dug you out with her own hands?"

A novelist is a novelist; the ability to imagine plots and convert them into language is strong.

After hearing this, the ghost infant's laughter stopped abruptly. The next second, it turned into a heart-wrenching scream. This sound was extremely terrifying, shattering all the window glass on one side of the corridor. Feng Bujue's survival value also dropped accordingly.

It seemed that this monster couldn't be dealt with peacefully. Feng Bujue quickly raised his knife and stabbed at the ghost infant, but the tip of the knife failed to land successfully. His wrist was suddenly grabbed by something. He turned his head and saw that an arm had emerged from the wall out of thin air, preventing his attack. It seemed that the limbs of these corpses were still nearby...

Fortunately, the ghost infant's high-pitched screaming time was limited. It stopped after seven or eight seconds, otherwise Feng Bujue's survival value might have been drained. But the situation was still very bad. He saw many hands and feet emerging from the two walls of the corridor, each of them able to move...

Feng Bujue knew that delaying was not good for him. He decisively slashed back, cutting at the arm with the kitchen knife. Unfortunately, a human arm is not so easy to cut off, and neither is the arm of a corpse.

The blade of the kitchen knife was embedded in the flesh of the ghost arm, and a large amount of blood flowed down, flowing into the corpse's torso and pouring onto the ghost infant's body. The infant laughed again, and the sound it made pierced the ears, making people feel heartbroken. If the game hadn't limited the degree of pain, Feng Bujue might have fainted.

Seeing that he couldn't get rid of the restraint, Feng Bujue quickly put down the flashlight and phone in his other hand, took out Mario's pipe wrench from his knapsack, and swung it down with lightning speed, directly hitting the ghost infant's head. This time he succeeded and was fortunate enough to trigger the [Concussion] effect.

After this monster's main body was affected by the skill, all the moving severed limbs stopped moving. Taking advantage of the situation, Feng Bujue freed his right hand from the restraint, used both hands, and beat the ghost infant in the "corpse cradle" severely. The scene could be described as flesh and blood flying everywhere, and it would not be an exaggeration to say that it had a bit of anti-human tendency.

Soon, all the limbs protruding from the walls disappeared. It seemed that this monster was already unable to maintain it. He thought this was a sign that the ghost infant was about to be destroyed, but immediately, new anomalies appeared.

Feng Bujue discovered that the face of the corpse holding the ghost infant suddenly became blurred. Gradually, the image of that face turned into his own. And it also opened its mouth to speak, and even the voice was the same as his: "It hurts... stop... stop!" The voice of the corpse changed from a moan to a roar, and it struggled desperately to twist its back, trying to move its torso.

Just as Feng Bujue hesitated slightly, the ghost infant disappeared under his nose, leaving only an empty abdominal cavity and some remnants of internal organs in the corpse's torso.

Feng Bujue knew that he had been tricked. This monster undoubtedly used a blinding trick to gain a moment of respite and took the opportunity to escape elsewhere. He immediately put away the kitchen knife, picked up the flashlight on the ground, stood up, and scanned the hollowed-out corpses in the corridor with the beam of light, trying to find out where the ghost infant had escaped to.

"Hehehe..." Another chilling laugh rang out. This time, the laugh didn't sound like it came from an infant at all, and the most terrifying thing was that the sound came from a very close location...

Feng Bujue realized something. He lowered his head and looked at his chest. The scene that entered his eyes was enough to make anyone's heart break... The blood-stained ghost infant was curled up and lying on its side in his abdominal cavity, with one small hand clinging to one of his ribs. Bursts of sinister laughter came from inside his body.

"You want me to commit suicide with this kind of illusion?" Feng Bujue said calmly, completely ignoring the scene, and reached out to touch his knapsack. He knew that what he saw was just an illusion, and his sense of touch was not affected. He could still feel his clothes and the backpack slung across his body.

He took out the Eye of Hatred and put it on while saying, "I almost forgot about this thing." At this moment, he happened to remember another use of this equipment.

After putting on this equipment, Feng Bujue, in conjunction with the beam of light from the flashlight, scanned every corpse and every part of the corridor. As long as the ghost infant was still creating illusions, it would definitely be exposed.

Sure enough, when his gaze fell on a corpse that seemed to be hollowed out, the Eye of Hatred reacted, indicating that there was a monster targeting the player at this location.

Feng Bujue strode over and, without hesitation, brought down the pipe wrench. This time, the severely injured monster had no way to resist.

[Main Quest Progress Updated]

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

[Main Quest Progress Updated]

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

Almost at the same time, two system prompts popped up, indicating that at the moment Feng Bujue finished off this ghost infant, Si Yu also completed the task on the thirteenth step.

"Hmph..." Feng Bujue snorted coldly and mocked himself, "It seems I worried for nothing."

…………

In the main building, Si Yu leaned against the wall of the corridor and sat on the ground.

Looking into the corridor beside her, there were countless corpses of ghosts and monsters along the way. The floor was covered in blood, and the strong smell of blood and the strange smell from the monsters were enough to make people avoid it.

But at this moment, she had no strength to move anywhere else.

The lantern and long sword were placed on the floor beside her. Her right hand was holding the phone, and her left hand was covering the wound on the right side of her waist. The blood from the wound had not stopped, and it was still seeping out from between her fingers.

Once you step into this floor, which is connected by the thirteenth step, you cannot escape, and there is nowhere to hide. The space is filled with a large number of monsters, some of which can make people's shock value soar just by their appearance. The people who come in are either killed and become a part of those evil spirits, or like Si Yu, kill them all...

In fact, Si Yu's condition was already very bad during the last call. She was lying to Feng Bujue when she said, "I'm fine, don't worry."

At around 40:00, Si Yu was just in a lull in the battle. Although she was already injured at the time, she still consciously adjusted her breathing and quickly answered the phone in the first time. She also knew very well that even if she showed any abnormalities, it would only become a mental burden on her teammate.

Now, Si Yu has finally cleared the monsters in this space, and she must rest for a while. Her survival value and stamina value need to be restored, and the bleeding state cannot be treated for the time being. Only by maintaining this still state and pressing the wound can she stop the loss of survival value.

In this case, the system will not judge it as "passive gaming" because the player has to stop the activity due to specific circumstances. Under "normal" difficulty, the system will not force players who are already on the verge of death to continue to act. As for "nightmare" difficulty, that's another matter...

Si Yu paid attention to the time on her phone. There were still ten minutes before the next call. She didn't want to meet any "ghosts" in her current state, so she had to complete the dialing next time.

After the previous call, Feng Bujue felt annoyed, while Si Yu felt aggrieved. Objectively speaking, both of them were responsible for this matter, but the main responsibility... still had to be attributed to Feng Bujue. Who told him to be so unappreciative and reply with such an embarrassing sentence.

At any time, even if a man is completely right, it is best not to correct a woman's contradictions...

Drip... drip...

Just when Si Yu thought she could catch a breath, in the darkness in the distance, the sound of water droplets quietly sounded...