NOVEL NEXT Ch. 15
Chapter 15: A Bit Short
The scene before his eyes made Lu Feng’s stomach churn violently.
This was the first time he had personally witnessed someone die in front of him, and in such a gruesome way.
After taking several deep breaths, Lu Feng finally managed to suppress the overwhelming urge to vomit.
He turned his head to look at Dong Ningning beside him, his gaze sharp as a blade.
“How did he die?”
……
In the second-floor reception hall, all the students of Grade 3 Class 2 were gathered—except for Wu Fan, who had just died.
Everyone’s eyes were focused on Dong Ningning, waiting for her to say something.
Wu Fan’s death had already been made known to all.
That unbearable corpse had caused those who tried to help move it to vomit again and again, until they eventually gave up.
Many eyes were filled with fear, suspicion, and confusion.
For the central figure of their class to suddenly fall to his death at a time like this was, from any perspective, an ominous sign.
Feeling the weight of everyone’s stares, Dong Ningning sat shivering on a stool.
She couldn’t help curling her body up.
Her petite figure of barely one meter fifty now looked even smaller.
As the one who had rushed to the scene first, Lu Feng sat across from her.
Seeing the girl still shaken, he unconsciously softened his voice,
“Dong Ningning, don’t be afraid. We’re not suspecting you, we just want to understand what really happened.”
“R-really? You don’t suspect me?” Her big, innocent eyes widened, glistening with tears.
“Yes, really.” Lu Feng nodded.
“So please, tell us—why were you two arguing? Why did Wu Fan fall from the window?”
“Th-that’s because…”
Dong Ningning’s expression shifted unpredictably.
After hesitating for a while, she finally clenched her teeth as if making up her mind and raised her head to look at Lu Feng.
“This is how it happened… At that time, I had gone back to the third-floor room to rest a bit before going to the second-floor reception hall for the meeting. But that’s when Wu Fan came to me. As soon as he entered the room, he said he wanted to… that…”
Her voice grew smaller and smaller, while the others gradually revealed an expression of “I get it.”
Dong Ningning and Wu Fan were an openly known couple in the class.
As high schoolers, the deepest level of intimacy they had publicly shown was hugs and kisses, but there had long been rumors that the two had gotten a hotel room much earlier.
Now, it seemed those rumors were actually true.
Still, just ten minutes? For that? Wasn’t that… a bit too short?
“But in a situation like this, how could I have the mood for that sort of thing? I didn’t expect that after I refused, he became agitated, insisting he wanted to do it. In the end, the two of us argued…”
At this point, Dong Ningning paused, fear surfacing in her eyes once again.
“While we were arguing more and more fiercely, he accidentally tripped over the table and fell toward the window.
But I didn’t expect that window to be so fragile—Wu Fan went straight through and fell…”
After saying this, tears streamed down Dong Ningning’s face.
She covered her eyes and wept bitterly.
“I… I never thought… he would leave me like this… I shouldn’t have argued with him…”
After hearing her account, the others sighed.
The girls gathered around Dong Ningning to comfort her.
Clearly, this had been a pure accident.
Lu Feng had checked that rotten window frame himself.
Just like Dong Ningning had said, it was as fragile as paper.
Once someone crashed into it, there was no way it could hold.
With the explanation clear, everyone left with heavy hearts, each of their faces clouded in gloom.
After such a tragedy, Lu Feng and the others no longer had the mood to go to the dining hall—Lin You even said that seeing anything with sauce made him want to vomit now.
So instead, they went directly to the third floor and chose their rooms.
Of course, their rooms were all next to each other.
But they had no time to rest.
Soon, they all gathered in Lu Feng’s room.
Each room on the third floor was quite luxurious, fully furnished and spacious, decorated in a uniform classical European style.
Though a bit old, it was hard to imagine that such a perfectly preserved interior existed inside this dilapidated mansion.
It was simply inconceivable.
Inside Lu Feng’s room, everyone sat around the table, their faces grim.
In the middle of the table lay the sheet of paper recording the game rules.
Lu Feng tapped the table lightly, his brows furrowed in thought.
Finally, he made up his mind and broke the heavy silence first,
“Listen to me, everyone—”
All eyes turned to Lu Feng.
“What I’m about to say is just my speculation, but it’s very likely the truth—”
Originally, Lu Feng hadn’t wanted to bring this up, worried that there might be Evil Spirit Followers among them.
But with things developing to this point, he felt he could no longer keep it hidden.
He pulled out a rusty pen he had found on the second floor, flicked it twice, and somehow produced a moldy notebook.
On its yellowed pages, he began writing something.
After finishing, Lu Feng set down the pen and pushed the notebook toward the others.
On the page were the names of all 37 classmates, with only Wu Fan’s name crossed out.
Beside it, a note read:
Deceased.
Identity: Unknown.
“Since Wu Fan has already died and we don’t know his identity, we can only treat him as an ordinary player, to prepare for the worst.”
Lu Feng crossed out the word “Unknown” and replaced it with “Ordinary Player.”
“But fortunately, our total number is odd. That means the evil spirit still needs to kill 19 people to win.”
Lu Feng tapped the first rule of the game with his pen tip:
1. An Evil Spirit will appear in the game scene.
Every 2 days, the Evil Spirit will kill 1 surviving player.
When the number of surviving players is less than half, the game ends, and the Evil Spirit wins.
“Wait… why 19? Shouldn’t it be 18?”
Lin You asked, puzzled.
Before Lu Feng could answer, Liuli spoke first,
“Because the rule says ‘less than half.’ Half of 37 is 18.5, and to be greater than 18.5, it has to be 19. You can’t exactly make half a person, right?”
Lin You nodded blankly, and Lu Feng continued,
“So, according to the rule that says ‘every 2 days, the Evil Spirit will kill 1 surviving player,’ we still have 38 days to meet the victory condition.”
At this, Lu Feng frowned.
He couldn’t help but wonder—why did the rule specifically mention ‘kill 1 surviving player’? If not a living player, would it kill a dead one?
Setting aside this seemingly trivial detail, Lu Feng went on,
“Even though we still have 38 days, a very serious problem lies right before us—”
His voice grew heavy, and his expression darkened,
“Tomorrow… the Evil Spirit will begin its first kill.”