Chapter 13 Our Promise 5 The City Flooded
Under Xu Long's guidance, he pointed out to Jiao Jiao and Du Luo several class officers he had asked about back then, pointing them out to them in the graduation photo.
A homeroom teacher's memory might gradually become less accurate after three years of interaction, but the matter of a student's disappearance was too significant, so Xu Long repeatedly recalled the events of that period, which is why he can still point them out one by one now.
Among the people Xu Long pointed out, neither Jiao Jiao nor Du Luo were present. In Xu Long's memory, both of them were rather quiet girls.
According to Xu Long's description, Jiao Jiao hasn't changed much from before; she's still a shy and cute little girl. Du Luo, on the other hand, has become much more composed. In the past, she was probably quite sad and stressed during high school, probably because of her family's difficult circumstances. Now that she's working, things are much better.
As for the class officers, Xu Long had previously arranged the positions in a rather detailed way so that the students would have something to do and be obedient. There were 62 students in a class, plus various group leaders, so there were more than 20 class officers, such as class monitor, vice class monitor, academic representative, discipline representative, etc.
The situation is similar in other classes. Regardless of the era, teachers always try to assign enough class officers to deal with various activities that occur in the school. Therefore, some positions need to be filled by two students.
NPCs rarely resemble players. Players impersonating others only makes other NPCs think that the person is still the same, but in reality, their appearances are completely unrelated. In other words, just by looking at the photos, Jiao Jiao and Du Luo cannot tell whether there are other players among their classmates. They can only take pictures first.
Both of them originally wanted to ask Xu Long for it, but Xu Long said that he only kept two copies himself. One was kept in the school archives, and the other was kept by himself. In the future, when students like Jiao Jiao and Du Luo come to reminisce about their youth, he can tell them about the situation.
Xu Long didn't have a USB drive with him, so they couldn't send the electronic version yet; they just took photos instead.
After examining the photos, Jiaojiao suddenly asked, "So, the two missing classmates aren't in this photo?"
Xu Long paused for a moment, then couldn't help but look at the photo carefully again. He said, "Yes, it should be these two classmates. Sigh... I don't know why, I really forget about them very easily. I almost forgot just now. When we took this graduation photo, there were indeed only sixty people, but we later found someone with good skills to Photoshop them in."
Actually, it wasn't just Xu Long; after Jiao Jiao saw the students he pointed out, she also forgot what they looked like in no time, which was very strange.
Even though anyone who has been to school knows that this kind of situation can happen even in a small class, it's unacceptable for someone like you, a key character in an escape scenario, to forget things.
The list on the back of the photo shows that there is a boy and a girl who are missing. The boy's name is Guo Tianyin and the girl's name is Chu Ping.
Xu Long said that these two students were really unremarkable. They had ordinary looks, ordinary families, ordinary personalities, and ordinary grades. Although many students in the class had similar personalities, it was very suspicious that they had been missing for more than a week without anyone noticing.
Jiaojiao asked again, "I remember that the school used to be full-time, and students who lived far away basically had to live on campus. Didn't their roommates notice?"
"No, although most students in our class do live in the dorms, according to the dorm supervisor and their roommates, both of them sleep in the dorms every night and have never been absent. This is... to put it bluntly, it's like seeing a ghost." Xu Long lowered his voice and said to Jiao Jiao and the others with a worried look on his face.
He probably kept these words to himself for many years, but he couldn't say them before. Now, almost ten years later, he finally dared to say them to two students who graduated many years ago.
Jiaojiao and Dulu exchanged a glance. They couldn't figure out where the problem lay either. In the class, the person who knew all the classmates best was definitely the class monitor, followed by the homeroom teacher. No gossip or action could escape the eyes of these two.
As a result, even the class monitor and the homeroom teacher said they had no idea the two students were missing, which was almost like seeing a ghost.
Some questions should be left unanswered. The death rules in the game are sometimes quite absurd, and Jiaojiao didn't want to trigger them, so she quickly steered the conversation back to the time before and after the disappearance. She said that she was young at the time and didn't know much about anything except her classmate's disappearance.
Xu Long did try to keep things from the students in the past, afraid that they would overthink things. Now that the students have started working, many things are no different from gossiping, and he is no longer afraid of affecting the students. So he stopped hiding things.
When the parents arrived, they learned that the student was missing. At first, Xu Long thought that the student had secretly gone out to play or that they had some emotional problems behind the scenes. Then he started doing some outrageous things typical of adolescence.
Xu Long immediately called the police and checked the surveillance footage. He genuinely thought that the girl and boy might be planning to elope, have an abortion, or be under pressure due to poor grades. He had considered all sorts of reasons and was even thinking about how to appease their parents. However, when the police arrived, they found that the girl had indeed disappeared.
They disappeared without a trace. The parents were furious with Xu Long, but Xu Long was also baffled. He couldn't figure out how they had disappeared. The class took attendance at least twice a day, not counting the time during PE class. With such frequent attendance taking, how could the children just disappear?
The police have seen this kind of situation many times. Some children leave voluntarily because they have psychological problems or are not on good terms with their families. On impulse, they become homeless. Many students leave when they are young, and when they are in their fifties or sixties, they don't want to go home because they hate their families.
However, they couldn't say that in front of the parents, so the police said that the child might have encountered human traffickers while eating out, and they would thoroughly investigate all the surveillance footage in the area as soon as possible.
The most terrifying situation is human traffickers. The mother of a missing student almost fainted when she heard about human traffickers. Compared to being abducted by human traffickers, it seems that her child's abortion or running away from home is acceptable.
Xu Long was temporarily suspended from his post. Regardless of whether he was related to the students' disappearance, he was to be punished, and he himself admitted it. How come no one noticed?
After investigating the school's usual schedule, the police initially deduced that the two students likely disappeared while going out to buy food around dinner time, as the school is very strict and students are only allowed to leave the school during dinner time.
For safety reasons, the school only allows students to leave at lunchtime, not enter. Therefore, no boarding students go out to eat at noon. Even if the food in the cafeteria is not good, they can only secretly ask classmates to buy it for them through the fence, but they cannot leave.
But the evening is different, because many day students come and go during dinner time. Sometimes they just eat at the gate and go back. In addition, boarding students also need time to go out to the supermarket to buy daily necessities. So, whether they are day students or boarding students, they can go out during dinner time.
Many students from stable families will go to the school gate for a snack at dinner time, since the food in the school cafeteria is really bad.
The police were thinking that any accident that happened to a boarding student during this period could have been caused by leaving the school grounds during that time.
Almost everyone pinned their hopes on the surveillance cameras on the nearby streets, which every shop was required to install for the safety of the students.
The merchants were very cooperative, not only providing surveillance footage but also trying to recall if they had seen the two students.
Strangely, not only were they not in their surveillance footage, but no one in any of the shops had ever seen the two missing students, including the children of the shop owners. No one had seen them, there was no record of them, as if they had vanished into thin air.
The police found it increasingly strange as they investigated. As a result, they staked out the area for a long time and caught two human trafficking gangs in the city, but both gangs claimed to have never seen the two students.
Xu Long was very anxious and worried during that time, fearing that his negligence had led to the students' disappearance. Even though the police couldn't find any results, he still felt guilty. He wondered if this would have happened if he had asked more questions, asked more detailed questions, and paid more attention to the students.
Life has no "what ifs". After being suspended for six months, Xu Long was brought back to school because the police determined that his disappearance was unrelated to the school. The school originally wanted to have him teach a different class, but the students in his original class petitioned, saying they still wanted Xu Long. They felt that Xu Long was very serious and responsible and got along well with the students, so they didn't want to switch.
If something like this has already happened in the class, and we change the homeroom teacher, they might be too strict with the students. What if the students develop psychological problems or something else goes wrong?
No one wants to take over a class that has already had an accident. It's almost predictable that whether you manage it loosely or strictly, an accident will still happen. So it's better to manage it strictly, at least when an accident happens, you won't be so responsible.
The school was understanding, and the students even asked Xu Long to be their homeroom teacher again, which is why Xu Long was allowed to return to his post.
When Xu Long returned to the classroom, he bought a small whiteboard and hung it at the door. That whiteboard is still in use now, with the names of every student in the class pasted on it. Every day when the students arrive, they can sign in manually. They can't sign in for others, not even the class monitor.
There are no rewards or punishments; being late is fine, but you must ensure that you arrive on time.
Not long after Xu Long returned to his class, summer vacation began. Students had to be divided into classes and choose between arts and sciences. Even though the courses were the same at the beginning of the second year of high school, in order to avoid any trouble, the school chose to divide students into classes based on arts and sciences and their grades at the end of the first year of high school, so that students could focus on their studies in the second year.
Xu Long thought he wouldn't be able to teach the students for much longer, so he held a class meeting for them, telling them to take what happened in their first year of high school as a lesson, to protect themselves in the future, and to study hard. He said that life is really long, and the three years of high school are actually pitifully short in the long run.
People feel that the process is long because it is arduous and they lack the capacity for independent action. However, the age for independent action is set by the state at eighteen. Waiting a while before making a decision is also taking responsibility for one's own life.
Xu Long said many things that should have been said at graduation, all at once in the class meeting at the end of the first year of high school. He was really worried about this class of students and afraid that they would be affected.
To everyone's surprise, in August, the school held a meeting and decided not to separate the class.
Xu Long was not present during the discussion about class division. He had already requested not to teach the second and third year high school classes anymore, as he wanted to pay more attention to the first year high school students. He believed that they might be psychologically weaker after changing environments and would need more guidance.
After discussion, the grade leaders surprisingly decided to have Xu Long return to lead this special Class 6, and that it would be best if the class were not divided into separate classes.
Xu Long was the first to object. He thought of the students who had chosen to specialize. Even though science was the mainstream now, there were still students who liked humanities. Although they were fewer in number, they didn't need to compromise in the science class for the sake of so-called stability.
The material is the same at the beginning, but the test papers are different later on, the elective questions taught by the teachers are different, and the subjects of the comprehensive test papers are different. How are these students supposed to survive?
The school also took this issue into consideration, so their solution was that students would attend classes normally during the regular semester, but when it came to the integrated three subjects, the teachers would give separate lessons. In other words, the school would allocate an extra classroom for liberal arts students, solely for classroom use, while they would still gather in their regular classrooms at other times.
Xu Long was so angry he almost laughed. He said to his superiors, "You're just afraid they'll disappear again, but a disappearance might just be an accident. Are you going to risk the students' future?"
The leaders are also afraid. They believe that children who have been affected will find it very difficult to obey discipline as before. What if they go through a rebellious phase and threaten teachers and parents with running away from home or disappearing?
Kids these days have big tempers and all sorts of psychological problems. It's impossible to guard against them all. Who can guarantee that they won't get into any trouble?
Putting them in the same class makes them easier to manage, and they know each other well, so they won't be unhappy about not knowing anyone in a new class and try to cause trouble.
Besides being easy to manage, the biggest reason is that the school wants to leverage the bond that students have built up over the past year so that they can support each other until graduation. Children are emotional beings, and they will feel secure with familiar friends around them, so they won't do anything too outrageous.
Despite Xu Long's repeated rebuttals, the final result remained unchanged. He could only explain to the students when the new semester began that the classroom next door would also be their classroom, and they would have two classes. When liberal arts students needed to attend classes, take tests, or take exams, they would go to the classroom next door.
Everyone knew this class was special, but once they entered the second year of high school, no one cared anymore. The sudden increase in academic pressure allowed the students to quickly get through the adjustment period.
Xu Long sighed as he said this: "Actually, I was really worried at the time, because being special among young students is the easiest way to cause isolation and bullying. Even if the students in the class are mentally strong, it is hard to guarantee that other students will not deliberately cause trouble."
"But we didn't feel anything at the time." Jiao Jiao told a little lie. She just guessed that the students in this class probably didn't react to the decision back then, otherwise the classmates in the reunion group wouldn't have had no objections to it.
"That's certainly true. At that time, there were only four liberal arts students in our class, and one of them was an art student who had gone to training camp a long time ago, so she didn't really feel anything about it. But the remaining three liberal arts students felt that the large, private classroom was very comfortable and quiet, and their grades were very good later on," Xu Long said with satisfaction.
Having an extra classroom makes a difference. Many senior high school students would rather move to an empty corner of the corridor to study than stay in the classroom. The pressure is high, and with other students in the class, it becomes noisy. At that point, if they could have an extra quiet classroom for their class, they would be overjoyed.
During the senior year of high school, other science students in the class would occasionally move to the next classroom to do practice tests with the humanities students. No one reacted much, since as long as it was quiet, it didn't matter where they were.
After recounting the past, Xu Long took a sip of tea and said with emotion, "Fortunately, you all grew up safely and went to university. Only a few of you underperformed and ended up in junior colleges. I'm really happy that you all achieved those results."
Regardless of how everyone's life turned out after finishing school, at least in the summer right after the college entrance exam, apart from those who underperformed, everyone was happy to have achieved a good result.
Jiaojiao and Du Luo came to thank Xu Long and then returned. They knew there was another gathering later, so they kept quiet about it, as a surprise for their teacher.
That's all for the meeting with the homeroom teacher. Wu Wangwang discovered that the two of them didn't know about the accident that happened in the class during their senior year. They didn't ask, and Xu Long probably thought it was just a hallucination caused by the students' stress, so he didn't say much.
Judging from the story told by the ghost, this person must have existed in the class, and many students probably heard the cries for help at the time, but they didn't take it seriously. In addition, the police didn't find anything, so the students naturally didn't care.
The reunion is just around the corner. Soon, those in the class who heard the conversation will know the truth. What choice will he or she make?
After Jiao Jiao finished her long description, Wu Wangwang said, "Maybe the homeroom teacher has been holding it in for so many years and it's been tough, so she just told you everything. Do you think this plot has anything to do with the dungeon?"
She wanted to hear Jiao Jiao and Du Luo's perspectives, because she had almost finished understanding the plot and was only missing the murderer's reasons and details. In order to play the role more convincingly, she still needed to hear the opinions of other players.
Jiaojiao replied, "Based on my previous experience with dungeons, generally speaking, people who die in dungeons will definitely become ghosts. They are not necessarily the bosses, nor do they necessarily have to be the ones who killed the players, but once they become ghosts, they may kill indiscriminately."
"Indiscriminate killing?" This was the first time Wu Wangwang had heard of this concept.
“Yes, I went to a dungeon before. What we had to do was bring the murderer to justice. But in the process of finding the murderer, everyone who was killed by the murderer would become a vengeful ghost and would chase after NPCs and players. We were facing two threats: the murderer and the ghosts of the victims.” Jiao Jiao said, her voice filled with fear.
Du Luo's voice then broke in: "So, does this mean that you might get killed if you encounter a human, and you might get killed if you encounter a ghost? How are you going to survive?"
Jiaojiao replied, "It's filled by human lives. The players and NPCs who died were because they found clues. Otherwise, we wouldn't actually be within the killer's hunting range. I survived because I was lucky, not because I had the ability to complete the game."
In the game, good luck is the most powerful cheat code besides the protection of the boss. Jiaojiao dares not say that she can be so lucky in every dungeon, but she can still do it by summarizing her experience.
Wu Wangwang thought for a moment and said, "It's unlikely that the dungeon will use the repeat rule, so we can temporarily treat the ghost of the deceased as one of the bosses. As for whether there is a murderer, let's continue to investigate. Perhaps we can wait for the ghost to tell us."
They had very little information. They had been there for almost a month and hadn't encountered anything particularly strange. They knew nothing except that the ghost might be their two missing high school classmates.
It was already quite late. Considering that Wu Wangwang had to get up early to clock in the next day, Jiaojiao and Du Luo quickly said goodnight. They would try to find more information and warn Wu Wangwang to be careful. Since they had confirmed that they were in the same class, there was no guarantee that there was any special meaning in this classmate list.
After the group call ended, Jiaojiao posted the photos in the group, which included a list of people with both the front and back of their graduation photos, making it easy to match them up.
Wu Wangwang opened the original image, saved it, and zoomed in to check the positions of Fu Mei, Jiao Jiao, and Du Luo.
It's said online that graduation photos are usually arranged according to height, but if students are of similar height and have a good relationship, the teacher will make an exception and let them stand together.
In the photo, Fu Mei is slightly taller and stands on the side of the third row, while Jiao Jiao and Du Luo are standing together. Judging from their posture, the two of them are holding hands below, and it is obvious that they are very good friends.
As for the two classmates who died, the boy Guo Tianyin was standing in the second to last row, in a corner, and was not noticeable unless you looked closely. The girl Chu Ping was rather thin and was standing on the side of the second row.
Xu Long said that both of these people were photoshopped in, so it's not surprising that they're standing on the very edge; those are the only two good spots to add photos.
Guo Tianyin and Chu Ping were indeed very hard to remember. Wu Wangwang observed them carefully for a long time but couldn't find any special features. They seemed like ordinary students with normal facial features and normal skin color, neither too fair nor too dark.
It's no wonder that the homeroom teacher didn't pay much attention to these two completely unremarkable people.
Wu Wangwang did not comment on the fact that someone who had been missing for two years was still photoshopped into a graduation photo; perhaps it was just the teacher's good intention to comfort the parents.
The group chat was still lively. Everyone expected Guo Tianyin and Chu Ping to be there, and inevitably they started talking about how they had been searching for them for so many years without any results.
But everyone tried to think the best, like maybe she really was abducted or something. In any case, it's best to be alive.
The next day, Wu Wangwang had to work overtime. She brought her own clothes to the company. The company wanted to launch a new advertisement and needed copywriters. Wu Wangwang used her not-so-professional writing skills to imitate Fu Mei's style to write the draft.
However, when she went to print it, the printer was broken again.
Wu Wangwang stared silently for a while, then raised her hand and patted the printer. As people age, some strange habits gradually become ingrained in their DNA. However, the printer still didn't respond. Helpless, she had to go find a repairman again.
The same player came this time. He silently walked into the office and started repairing, without saying a word to anyone, as if he were just a quest NPC available whenever needed.
While the player was repairing, Wu Wangwang observed for a while, then walked over and asked, "Speaking of which, we should be old classmates, right? Are you also in the class group for Senior Three, Class Six?"
Upon hearing this, the player's hand trembled, and he accidentally broke off a connector.
Seeing his reaction, Wu Wangwang knew what was going on: "It seems you are too. Then I can boldly guess that the players who came this time are all playing the roles of classmates. The strange thing is, what kind of existence do we have in this class?"
This question is for the players, but also for ourselves.
To be honest, Wu Wangwang felt that all nine players were probably the murderers of Guo Tianyin and Chu Ping. Only with enough of them could they conceal everything, making the two classmates appear to be missing, and that no one had noticed their disappearance for more than a week.
The question is, why did these nine people commit murder? And how did they manage to commit the perfect crime?
Back then, they were just nine high school freshmen, young and impulsive. How could they possibly work together to commit the perfect crime?
The player was silent for a moment, then took out tools from his bag to try to repair the broken cable. After looking around to make sure no one was around, he asked, "How did you know I was your classmate?"
Seeing his frightened and reluctant expression, Wu Wangwang could only say, "I naturally have my own sources of information. I don't necessarily need you to tell me anything. I just want to ask you, why didn't you go to the square to gather on the 19th?"
This was the question Wu Wangwang really wanted to ask. She had always been puzzled: even if they guessed something from her note, didn't they have any doubts at all?
No matter how clearly the information on the note is stated, it is still just a vow. Before realizing the effect of the vow, shouldn't players be more focused on finding information to complete the game?
The player's hands kept moving, as if he was considering whether to answer the question.
After the wires were reused, the player finally spoke up: "I can't go. Every NPC has their own secrets. Your secrets may not be there that day, so you don't care. But this NPC's identity is there. Even if we are classmates in terms of identity, we are just classmates. Our relationship isn't that good."
After saying that, the player packed up his things, restarted the printer, and this time the printer worked. He didn't say anything more and left quietly.
After printing out her manuscript and handing it to her supervisor, Wu Wangwang returned to her seat and recalled what the player had just said—that every NPC has their own secrets.
Could it be that besides all nine players being the murderers, there's another secret?
Could that secret be the rule of death?
As Wu Wangwang sat in her seat, she recalled all the information about Fu Mei. Apart from the high school information that Fu Mei had deleted, her life after college was unremarkable. What kind of secrets could someone like that have?
Isn't her biggest secret that she killed two other classmates with eight other classmates during high school?
Or perhaps there's something Fu Mei doesn't know about this whole affair. She thought it was a quiet murder, but are the other eight people secretly harboring their own ulterior motives?
The storyline of the dungeon became increasingly unpredictable, and Wu Wangwang could still hear the sound of water in the dark. The sound of water became clearer and clearer, and she wondered if it was just her preconceived notion, but she felt that the sound was gradually becoming like a story being told on the radio.
The audience will gradually hear the sound of water and voices, and realize that it was classmates who pushed the two missing classmates into the water.
But what is the pattern that makes the sound of water louder and clearer?
Wu Wangwang couldn't find the answer, and she waited for news from Jiaojiao and Du Luo.
Before Jiaojiao and Duluo found any new clues, everyone in the gathering group was present on August 3rd.
The original class had a total of 62 people. After removing two missing students, there are now 60 people in the group. The class monitor counted the number of people to confirm that everyone was present.
The money for the gathering was paid when we joined the group. Now we need to start calculating everyone's free time to ensure that everyone can participate on the same day.
The fixed arrangement for the day of the gathering was to treat the teachers to dinner, and then go to the school to meet and chat with them. The class monitor could arrange both of these things by contacting the homeroom teacher and school leaders. He posted it in the group to ask if anyone else had any other arrangements they wanted.
For example, after strolling around the campus, you could go singing, or add some other activities during the day.
We're all in our early twenties right now, not particularly busy. Normally, we've all just graduated, and not many of us have officially entered the workforce. We've probably just found a job to support ourselves and are living in a daze. So, a gathering shouldn't be a problem.
However, after collecting opinions, the class monitor found that several girls had already gotten married and had children very quickly. They had to take care of their children and couldn't leave home for long periods of time. So the final arrangement was to have a meal and then go back to campus in the evening to chat with the teachers, which would be a way to put a period to their ten years of youth.
Everyone agreed with the arrangement; on the contrary, they felt quite emotional. Ten years of life had passed in the blink of an eye. The arrogance, dreams, and pride of their teenage years had all been worn down little by little after the college entrance examination. It seemed that everyone had become the ordinary adults they least wanted to be.
Next comes the voting time. Once the time is set, the class monitor will go and reserve seats.
We conducted a questionnaire about time, which included options for every day between August and September. The class monitor's idea was to try to get everyone's available time to select. If a student could only take one day off, it should be marked at the end as an abstention.
Thinking about her company's bizarre arrangements, which didn't even provide rest time but also didn't allow overtime, Wu Wangwang asked her team leader about the specific meal times and explained her situation.
The class monitor was very understanding and replied, "Don't worry, I've considered your situation. So I'll schedule dinner after 6 p.m. You don't need to be on time. Just know that you can come anytime after 6 p.m. and you'll get something to eat."
With the class monitor's answer, Wu Wangwang felt relieved. In the questionnaire, she said that she was available anytime. She thought that even if she accidentally ran into a situation where the leader needed her to work overtime, she could ask for a night off if she couldn't manage it.
The gathering was decided in one night. Considering that many people are really busy, it's better to do it sooner rather than later, so the date was set for August 8th, an auspicious day, and it's also a weekend, so most people are free.
With only a few days left, in order to appear normal when they went to class, Jiao Jiao and Du Luo began to try to simulate the original appearance of the NPC. They would occasionally ask Wu Wangwang what kind of person Fu Mei was. Even with the help of the notes, it was hard to say what kind of person she was.
After thinking it over, Wu Wangwang replied: I think Fu Mei is someone who deliberately marginalizes herself. I don’t know if you can understand, but it seems that she deliberately keeps her daily life unchanged.
Jiaojiao and Dulu were a little confused, and they asked questions in the group chat.
[Jiaojiao: Deliberately controlling it so there's no change? Is that something you can control?]
[Du Luo: Why did she go to such lengths?]
Wu Wangwang had also thought about these two questions, but had no answers. She could only say that she didn't know. She discovered this from the daily expense records. Fu Mei's life really didn't change much every day.
When Wu Wangwang learned that Fu Mei might be one of the murderers, she thought that Fu Mei was just keeping her vow to avoid being discovered. However, after hearing what the printer repairman said, Wu Wangwang realized that she must have overlooked something, a secret that belonged only to Fu Mei and that was why outsiders couldn't find it.
Similarly, Fu Mei's current state of being must also be related to this secret.
To go a little further, perhaps Jiaojiao and Dulu also have such a secret, but they didn't realize it like that player did. They probably wouldn't hide their secrets anywhere that could be discovered, and they even fooled themselves.
Men are different. They are creatures who would rather be immune than deceive themselves. This may lead to later players quickly discovering the strange things in the house and uncovering the secret.
To some extent, both male and female NPCs have the same goal—to ensure that they can face the situation with composure and normal attitude when their secrets are discovered.
The only difference is that male NPCs familiarize themselves with all possibilities, while female NPCs can only deceive themselves so that others won't find out. Even if they do find out, they can perfectly pretend they don't know.
Both approaches have their advantages. The only problem is that female players are protected, while male players are threatened.
Regarding the secret, Wu Wangwang was unsure whether she should tell Jiaojiao and Du Luo. She was still a little worried about the oath. Knowing too much would break the protection of the oath, but not knowing would risk being erased by the hidden rules. It was a real dilemma for her.
The repetitive life passed quickly, and before she knew it, it was time for the gathering. Wu Wangwang was perfectly normal.
The class monitor booked a private room at a hotel, ensuring that everyone could be seated. Not only students, but also the teachers who taught the class back then were invited, making it a very grand affair.
The private room also has karaoke facilities. In short, the class monitor is very thoughtful. Knowing that everyone will be busy after growing up, he chose this hotel that specializes in hosting banquets and has all kinds of functions.
Wu Wangwang arrived a bit late. She didn't get off work early to begin with, and the company was a little far from the hotel, so taking the bus wasn't convenient.
When she arrived, Wu Wangwang found that no one was paying attention to her. After scanning around, she found a few players, but not all of them were there. They were scattered around different tables. She noticed Jiaojiao and Du Luo waving and greeting her, so she quickly went over to them.
The class monitor booked a table for twelve people. There were five tables for students and one table for teachers, so the number of people was just right.
Besides Jiaojiao and Duluo, there were a few unfamiliar NPCs at the table. They seemed to be classmates from the past. Everyone looked like an ordinary person, quietly eating and playing on their phones, and no one looked up.
After sitting down, Jiaojiao quickly poured Wu Wangwang some juice and wine, and then frantically typed in the group chat.
[Jiaojiao: Oh my god, this is so embarrassing! I knew these kinds of gatherings could never be enjoyable. What's the point of sitting together with a bunch of strangers?]
[Jiaojiao: It would be better to put all of us players at one table, but even with nine of us, we can't fill a table. We still have to add strangers. Oh my god, I'm suffocating.]
[Jiaojiao: But it's good that everyone's on i, at least we don't need to socialize. Everyone's on their phones, which feels much better than forcing conversation.]
Messages were sent one by one in the group chat, and Wu Wangwang read them but didn't reply, mainly observing the students' reactions.
Every class has a few social butterflies, such as those with exceptionally good grades and those with exceptionally bad grades. Good or bad grades have nothing to do with how they are as people. It's not that good or bad grades necessarily make someone cheerful, but rather that only social butterflies are always the ones who liven up the atmosphere at gatherings.
Especially when they gathered around the teacher and talked about interesting things from the past.
The teachers probably felt awkward attending the party, but with these witty and humorous classmates, the atmosphere was easily lively.
Everyone tacitly avoids mentioning the missing classmates from back then, and mostly talks about things from their school days, such as their grades, the funny things they did and the funny mishaps they made.
Our homeroom teacher, Xu Long, always taught physics. The students made all sorts of jokes about it, teasing Xu Long and the math teacher together, saying that they just couldn't learn these things. Some students in the class later chose to major in mathematics and cried to their math teacher, saying that they never expected studying mathematics would make them go bald.
The private room was actually quite lively, and on the surface it looked like a normal gathering, except for those silent corners.
After the atmosphere warmed up, the class monitor took the microphone and started a simple round of toasts. Since everyone was a teacher and student, there were no rules about how many drinks to have. Everyone just toasted the teachers and then did their own thing. After not seeing each other for many years, they preferred chatting to drinking at various events.
Music played continuously in the private room. Students who like to sing could treat the room like a karaoke room. If someone sang well, everyone would applaud; even if someone sang a little badly, the applause would be playful and not mocking.
It's called a gathering, but it's really just a party for a few people, like activities in high school. I guess only a third of the people will really enjoy the activities, a third will be indifferent, and the remaining third will just follow the crowd, feeling that if everyone else goes, it would be too conspicuous for them not to go, so they will also come along despite feeling uncomfortable.
This is the situation at Wu Wangwang's table right now. She noticed that apart from the players, the NPCs clearly didn't like this kind of activity. They were anxious and were typing things like "When can we leave?" on their phones, probably complaining to their friends.
The players arrived one after another, exactly nine, no more and no less. Except for Wu Wangwang, who had guessed in advance, the other players were all shocked. They had never been in contact with each other before, but they were brought together by a high school reunion, which made the previous pretense of not knowing each other seem particularly ridiculous.
They should clearly know each other, maybe even be close classmates in high school, but for one reason or another they pretend to be strangers. It's like they're trying to hide something obvious.
Several players looked extremely upset, feeling as if they had been tricked by the game.
After observing, Wu Wangwang discovered a problem and quickly posted it in the group.
[Fu Mei: Have you guys noticed? The tables where the players are are all unusually quiet.]
In other words, the identities that the players are impersonating may have been those of inconspicuous people since high school.
The class monitor is a very tactful person; his smoothness is particularly evident. It can be said that he tries his best to take care of everyone. There must be a deeper meaning behind his seating arrangement. For example, everyone can sit at one table and play on their phones without talking.
The outgoing social butterflies sat together, closer to the teachers. This way, not only could the outgoing students have endless topics to talk about, but the teachers could also get answers to any questions they had, instead of asking the socially awkward ones.
All I can say is that it's quite an achievement that the class monitor could still grasp the personality of each of them so accurately even after so many years since graduation.
One very obvious thing is that there are only nine players in total, occupying three tables. However, the players are at the three quietest tables, while the other two tables are somewhat noisy. Even if they are not particularly socially anxious, they clearly prefer to gather at quieter tables.
Wu Wangwang's table, however, was completely silent.
In other words, from high school until now, all nine murderers have been taciturn individuals, and in the class monitor's memory, they have remained unchanged.
Does this prove that the murderer killed two people so quietly because he was silent enough?
But this doesn't make sense either. If all nine murderers were quiet and honest people, why would they conspire to kill two people when they were teenagers?
Listening to the conversations of other people in the group, and even the recollections of the homeroom teacher Xu Long, the two people who died were more taciturn and more ordinary than the nine murderers. In other words, they had no conflict at all. Just how impulsive must they have been to conspire to kill each other?
Wu Wangwang couldn't understand it, so she never dared to be sure that what the ghost said was true.
Once they become vengeful ghosts, their way of thinking will gradually change. They may also have some memory loss, only remembering the parts that left the deepest impression on them. What if they are remembering things wrong?
We need to find evidence and reasons to confirm that the player is one of the nine murderers.
It's not that Wu Wangwang is using victim blaming to excuse herself; rather, she genuinely finds the logic flawed.
Killing in a dungeon doesn't require logic, but the truth does; sometimes the truth can allow a player to survive to the end.
After a few rounds of drinks, the teachers were a bit tipsy and started eating normally. Once they finished the dishes and fruits, it was about time to head back to the school. Luckily, the hotel wasn't too far from the school, and it was convenient to visit by walking or taking the bus or subway.
When the meal ended, the homeroom teacher went up to the stage, held the microphone, and asked the class monitor to turn off the music. Then he looked carefully at all the students, as if he was recalling the students' youthful days.
"Before coming here, there were some things I had been holding back for a long time. Actually, I didn't want to say them, I didn't want to ruin the atmosphere of our gathering, but if I didn't say them, I would feel very sorry, because I might not have the chance to get everyone together like this again in the future," Xu Long gradually choked up, "I want to apologize to you. I didn't protect you well during your three years of high school. I always can't help but think, if I had tried harder, would you be living a better life now?"
The students and teachers with strong empathy had already gotten a little teary-eyed, partly because of the nostalgia of youth, and partly because no one had forgotten the two missing classmates.
Those two classmates were photoshopped into the graduation photo, but once they're gone, they're gone forever. Today's gathering, though called a class reunion, will always be missing those two people.
Xu Long paused for a moment and continued, "At the time, I trusted everyone because you were all so obedient. When I heard that someone was missing, I thought it was really just that they were missing. But afterwards, I thought about it for a long time. Whether it was the class monitor or the class officers, they must have heard a reason from someone when they were registering and signing in. There are no outsiders here today, so I really want to know where they heard that they went somewhere?"
The teachers and police weren't stupid; they had considered this question before. After questioning the students separately, everyone said they didn't know. Following the class monitor's instructions, they asked a student who said the missing classmate went to the toilet, but the student said they heard it from the missing classmate's roommate.
The police then asked the roommate, who said that the missing student needed to go to the toilet every morning because he had a good digestive system and his toilet time was fixed; it was just a matter of habit.
You can use the habit of going to the toilet as an excuse to skip morning sign-in, but what about morning exercises and PE class? Both of those require roll call.
Who told the student council members who were taking attendance that they went to participate in club activities? And who told the PE teacher that they were called away by the teacher?
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Author's Note: [End of Chapter]
Suddenly popping up, I feel like my update schedule is so chaotic QAQ
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