Chapter 98 Mandala 18
The campus investigation continued over the next two days.
By Wednesday, police had identified 44 students involved in the APP, spanning six classes across three grades.
Fortunately, except for a small number of students, most students are still at the primary stage of the game and are not deeply involved.
Police questioned the students, collected their detailed information, and confiscated their electronic devices. Since they were still in the investigation phase, they did not restrict the students' freedom or provide any information to their parents. They simply advised parents to limit their students' phone use.
At the same time, Ni Xiang copied all the surveillance footage from the school and the area around the campus and began searching for the identities of the 27 students.
In addition to Yu Tingting, the police have successively confirmed the identities of several students with more obvious characteristics.
The police's work continued to progress in an orderly manner, and their understanding of the overall situation gradually deepened. They then began to compare these lists and compile the files of the students involved.
Unfortunately, some students, fearing discovery, have already begun deleting apps from their phones. Others have had their apps deleted after being caught by the police. Furthermore, the software undergoes daily "flushes," regularly clearing data. The electronic information Tang Xi collected was extremely limited.
However, as the problems came to light, the school's attitude changed.
Principal Liang specially prepared several faculty and staff dormitories so that the police could rest on campus.
Starting from the next day, Luo Siwei took the initiative to stay here to work overtime. She was assigned to a small dormitory.
At ten o'clock on Wednesday night, Luo Siwei entered the house carrying a stack of information. The environment here was quite good, with simple furniture, a place to take a shower, and a bed to rest.
Sitting at the table, Luo Siwei carefully looked through the student files.
After investigation, Luo Siwei found that those members can be divided into three levels according to the survey results: low, medium and high.
Most low-level members are not deeply involved and still maintain a normal outlook on life, morality and world view.
Intermediate members have lost the basic ability to distinguish between good and evil and will perform some immoral tasks, but they still have conscience and will not directly kill or burn people.
Senior members are like Zhong Ziling, who have completely lost the sense of right and wrong and have been deeply brainwashed, but it is difficult to change them by ordinary means.
This grading is not completely equivalent to their points. For example, although Zhou Bingcheng did not have enough points, he also cooperated in killing and arson.
Luo Siwei judged that if the intermediate members were not controlled, they would likely continue to degenerate.
Based on the situation, she classified the 27 students involved this time as likely mid- to high-level members.
Next, Luo Siwei tried to think from the perspective of those whisperers, why this school was chosen, and why these students were chosen.
The students involved include good and bad students, from rich and poor families, and some are single children while others have siblings.
Luo Siwei studied it carefully and gradually discovered the common points among these children involved in the case: they all had unfortunate childhoods.
Some of these children are left behind, the unloved siblings of their parents. Some, like He Jin and Zhong Ziling, have suffered long-term neglect or abuse. Some, like Zhou Bingcheng and Zhao Si, come from violent families. Others, like Yu Tingting and several other students, come from single-parent families. And some users themselves are victims of school bullying.
These children are neglected in the world and in turn vent these emotions.
Although Luo Siwei didn't want to attribute his gradual decline entirely to childhood, the data showed that such people were more likely to go astray.
Lack of love and insecurity will cause children to huddle together for warmth and start using the Whisper app.
This also fits with Chi Li's previous profile. The Whispering App designed many functions to attract these people. Then, it used the characteristics of the Internet to manipulate people's hearts.
Luo Siwei thought that the first step in the police operation was to identify the problematic children. Then, they would isolate them, trying to separate them from those involved, preventing them from accessing these apps and further influencing them, so that their lives could gradually return to normal. Finally, they would gradually educate them; perhaps some of them were not beyond help.
It's like a silent battle.
They were trying to pull the children back to the real world, as if they were trying to recapture cities that had been captured by the enemy.
One day, they will eradicate all these cancers.
After being busy until late at night, Luo Siwei lay on the bed in the dormitory. She was a little picky about her bed and had not slept well in the past few days. Then she began to check her mobile phone habitually.
Luo Siwei suddenly had an idea. She opened the photos taken a few days ago and carefully looked at the photo of hell.
Luo Siwei then searched for the photo using the image recognition function of the search website. She found some similar pictures, but could not find the author.
Luo Siwei tried searching for some keywords: Donglan, No. 3 Middle School, award-winning, hell...
Still no clear results found.
Luo Siwei persevered. She removed several key words and finally found a name in the list of winners of an art competition: Hua Wenyi, Donglan No. 3 Middle School.
This person is a young painter and is also a member of the Donglan City Art Association.
Luo Siwei's fingers stopped.
She suddenly remembered something. She seemed to have heard her mother mention this student before. He should be only one grade higher than her, and he was in the art class implicated in the cheating case in the exam that year.
But this place doesn't match the dream. Luo Siwei remembered that the boy in the dream was older than her.
She wondered if she was overthinking it, but as soon as she closed her eyes, the strange painting seemed to flash before her eyes.
Luo Siwei felt that he should at least find out who this Hua Wenyi was.
The surname Hua is not common.
Luo Siwei thought of a person - Hua Yanming, the media tycoon who owns many companies in Donglan City.
Thinking of this, Luo Siwei turned over in bed.
She searched again on her phone and found out that Hua Wenyi was actually Hua Yanming's younger brother.
Now that all that connected, it was no wonder Hua Zong attended Mom's funeral. Perhaps as the older brother, he had attended Hua Wenyi's parent-teacher conference and that's how he got to know Mom.
Luo Siwei wanted to continue investigating.
However, the task force is busy with a case now, and she is too busy to spare the time to investigate these.
Besides, she was just a little suspicious about this Hua Wenyi, but she had no evidence or basis, and she couldn't even tell where to start investigating.
Luo Siwei suddenly had an idea. She made a voice call to Su Ye Nan.
Su Ye Nan, the night owl, was indeed awake. She quickly picked up the phone: "Hello, Luo Luo, it's rare that you need to talk to me."
Luo Siwei said, "I have something serious to say. Did you know that President Hua has a younger brother?"
"I know. You're talking about Mr. Hua? I think his name is Hua Wenyi?"
"Yes, what else do you know about him?"
"I'm not sure. All I know is that Xiaohua is an artist. He goes to various parties every few days and has a lot of gossip. A lot of girls think he is a single, wealthy bachelor and want to marry him."
"Then can you help me check him out? Is he a year older than us? Has he ever drawn any pictures of hell? One of them even won an award? Also, does he have anything special?"
Su Ye Nan said, "Wait, wait, wait, speak slower so I can take notes." Then she asked, "Why, did you find him while investigating the case?"
Luo Siwei quickly denied it: "No, no, I just happened to recall what happened to my mother back then, and I remembered that she had such a student. I didn't mean anything else, and he has nothing to do with the case... I just..."
Luo Siwei hadn't figured out what to say yet. Su Ye Nan said on the other end of the phone, "I understand. I know what you mean. A woman's sixth sense. I'll help you find out and tell you when I have news."
"Thank you." Luo Siwei thanked him and put her phone on the bedside. After putting her mind at ease, she turned over and went to sleep.
Late at night in Donglan, there are still some people who can't sleep.
Yu Tingting looked at the Chinese language test paper in front of her. She had already done the reading comprehension part and knew every word, but when they were put together, she couldn't figure out what they meant.
Her mind seemed to have thoughts of its own, completely out of her control.
She kept thinking about recent events, the police coming in and out of the school, and the repeated questioning.
Unable to solve the problem, Yu Tingting locked the door and went to bed in a huff. Hiding under the covers, she secretly pulled out a spare phone from under her pillow. She had taken it from her grandmother's house, and her mother didn't know about it.
After hesitating for a while, Yu Tingting decided to install the software again to find out how things had developed.
She said to herself, I'll just watch... I won't speak, and I won't participate in the game.
The QR code she shared with her classmates for download is still there.
Yu Tingting clicked identify, downloaded, and logged in using her previous mobile phone number and the password she had set.
Soon, the familiar app returned. It turned out that the app was only deleted from her phone, and the account was not completely cancelled.
But this time, when she opened the software, she didn't feel the same joy as before, but instead had a heavy sense of guilt.
Yu Tingting took a deep breath and clicked into an anonymous group related to No. 3 Middle School. Sure enough, the people in it were discussing what had happened in school in the past few days.
“Why did the police come?”
"Are they questioning everyone one by one? I think they checked several classes in the second year of high school today."
"Isn't it because of that incident?"
"What is it?"
"You don't know yet, do you? I live nearby, and I heard... the old lady who sold sesame paste pancakes on West Street passed away."
Yu Tingting suddenly opened her eyes wide and her fingers were cold.
Died?
Could it be related to their last game?
She never saw the old woman again. She heard from her classmates that she had a heart attack and was sent to the hospital.
People in the group continued to ask: "Really? You're not lying?"
"Why would I lie to you about this? He really died. He was taken away that day and died a few days later."
The group was quiet for a while, and then someone sent a message.
"We...became murderers?"
Yu Tingting's hands were shaking as she held the phone.
That was a living, heavy human life. Even a naughty boy would feel guilty and uncomfortable at this moment.
Yu Tingting felt her heart pounding, her palms were hot, and there seemed to be blood in her palms. She had no idea that things would be so serious.
No wonder the police came to question her and the female police officer even wanted to talk to her alone.
She began to regret why she did that that day, even though she didn't think there was anything wrong with it at the time.
So what now? What should we do now?
She participated in the murder.
Will this be known to others?
Will she go to jail?
Yu Tingting bit her lips and felt that the blood in her body had frozen.
"If I had known she was so fragile, I wouldn't have done that..." Obviously, some of the others also regretted it.
"It's not our fault. She was going to die anyway."
"That was just an old man who never died. Maybe he died because of something else. What are you afraid of?"
"She's so stupid, if she were to encounter a scam, she would definitely get scammed out of her money."
"Exactly. We were just playing a game, and I only cheated her out of ten dollars. It's just bad luck for us."
Some people's words have lost their respect for life. Seeing these remarks, Yu Tingting did not feel relieved, but felt even more uncomfortable. More people are concerned about the development of the situation.
“Will we be sentenced?”
"The police have no evidence at all."
"I heard that a boy from Class 6 has been arrested. Maybe they are investigating."
"It's funny. There were a lot of people playing the game that day, right? How could they have caught all of us?"
"Will turning yourself in help?"
"Idiot, it's useless except that your family will feel ashamed of your behavior."
"He's just a poor ant. He dies, so he dies. So many people die on Earth every day."
"Anyway, if anyone gives me away, I will kill him!"
There was chaos in the group for a while.
An account named Lingkong popped up without being anonymous.
Yu Tingting knew this account; he had always been the one taking the lead.
"It'll be fine, don't scare yourself. Be careful recently. Delete all apps during the day, and don't bring your phone to school anymore. Those useless police officers won't find anything after checking for a while and will leave."
The discussion in the group chat stopped, and he continued, "The school cares about its reputation and will protect us. People will soon forget about this, and it will be over soon."
As soon as midnight arrived, the entire conversation was like Cinderella's crystal slippers. In a flash, all the chat records were deleted.
The group owner then activated the mute function.
Yu Tingting's heart was still beating fast.
Murder, she killed.
After all, it is a human life. You can't just forget it.
Suddenly, her mother knocked on her door, and a concerned woman's voice came: "Tingting, it's so late, why are you still not asleep?"
Yu Tingting hurriedly hid her phone: "I'm going to sleep soon."
The person outside the door persisted and hadn't left yet: "I know you're busy with your studies, but don't work too hard. Would you like some milk? I'll heat it up for you."
"No." Yu Tingting said.
"How about I make you some wontons?"
"No! I don't want to eat!" Yu Tingting almost shouted this, and then she turned off the light.
Yes, when the policewoman asked her about her relationship with her family, she lied and her family relationships were not good.
She didn't want to accept her mother's hypocritical care. If she had thought her father was honest, she shouldn't have married him. Now that they were married, why did she cheat? Why did she get a divorce? Because of her, she lost her home, and she resented her so much.
There were footsteps outside the door, and then it was finally quiet.
Yu Tingting breathed a sigh of relief. She poked her head out from under the quilt, and suddenly her heart almost stopped beating.
The light and shadow outside the curtains reflected on her bedroom wall, as if outlining a human figure. At first glance, it looked like an old man with a hunched back.
Yu Tingting screamed and buried her head in the quilt. She could feel heavy breathing outside the quilt.
There seemed to be a voice in my head saying, "You took my sesame sauce pancake, why didn't you pay for it?"
Yu Tingting hid in the quilt and cried, she bit her fingers and whispered.
"I was wrong... I was really wrong. I won't do this again, never again... How can I make it up to you? I won 300 yuan from this game, plus the money I saved. Can I burn it all for you?"
Yu Tingting cried for a while, then mustered up the courage to stick her head out from under the quilt.
Or her bedroom.
The room was dark and quiet, with nothing on the walls.
It seems like nothing has changed.
But she knew that nothing was the same.
She was like a lost child who was poisoned by the flowers because of her greedy desire to pick some beautiful flowers.
When she got the flowers, she discovered that there were dead bones buried under the flowers. The clothes on the bones were exactly the same as hers.
Turning back, she found herself in hell.
Behind him is the River Styx.
She knew exactly which direction her home was, but she couldn't go back.
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