Chapter 192: Genius Kindergarten (Part Five)

Chapter 192: Genius Kindergarten (Part Five)

In the first rest room—

Compared to Zhan Xiaoming, who had been caught by a ghost, and Liu Feiyao, who had encountered one while hiding, Zhou Yian, hiding atop a bookshelf, was indeed fortunate.

His choice was flawless. With their short limbs, the children couldn't even see him up there, much less climb up.

After the bell rang, Zhou Yian even found time to ponder how to clear this dungeon.

He kept one clue to himself: the teacher would grade the students based on their performance in school and would call the parents of the five lowest-scoring students.

There were a total of 30 students in Class 4; he had already identified five of them as ghosts.

Among the remaining 25 students, avoiding the bottom five was still a challenge. They could see the ghost children, which might make their behavior different and perhaps result in point deductions from the teacher.

Even among the players, there could be competition.

Zhou Yian kept this clue to himself, playing it close to the vest.

He did have his own strategy in mind.

Continuously performing well and currying favor with the teacher to smoothly pass through the dungeon? That didn't seem realistic.

The first-level dungeons might be the simplest and safest, but according to previous data from the Six Major Guilds, the mortality rate was around 50%. The harder the dungeon, the higher the death rate.

The highest level five dungeons had a mortality rate of over 90%.

While this was Zhou Yian's first time in a dungeon, the world he came from was a magical one. Although it had ultimately run out of resources and he was the only survivor, he still had many "items" brought from that world.

These items remained usable in the "Three Thousand Worlds" game. Moreover, he remembered a good number of magical spells. After entering the "Three Thousand Worlds," Zhou Yian had even assessed his own capabilities in a trial arena.

D-level Hunter.

Players who cleared a third-level dungeon would qualify to enter the Hunting Grounds. These grounds were said to consist of countless collapsing mini-worlds, allowing players to plunder their resources.

Dungeons were a byproduct of these mini-worlds. Generally, when a mini-world was about to collapse, the intense energy fluctuations would produce a dungeon.

It was as if the mini-worlds had a form of cognition. Before disappearing, they would reward the players who had come to explore them. Therefore, players would receive rewards after clearing dungeons.

Of course, most mini-worlds didn't perish due to collapsing, but simply because their time had come.

Just as people age and die, a planet too can disintegrate over time due to prolonged rotation—such is the law of nature.

Even though this period may span trillions of years, it is widely acknowledged that mini-worlds have a lifespan, and only the "Three Thousand Worlds" are eternal.

Mini-worlds that collapse are a minority; those that can generate dungeons and become Hunting Grounds are even rarer.

This indicates that the world had at least an S-level guardian at some point and could yield valuable resources and items. Thus, tickets to the Hunting Grounds are not something the average person can afford.

As for a D-level Hunter, this ranking signifies a significant acknowledgment of one's abilities.

Dungeons are places with rules and objectives, and many intellectually gifted players can clear them solely based on their wit, without the need for physical strength.

However, hunters face the guardians of each collapsing Hunting Ground directly. These guardians are formidable, and many B-level players fail to gain any advantage in D-level Hunting Grounds. Yet Zhou Yian's assessment positioned him as a D-level Hunter.

Of course, this also has to do with the dark magical bloodline Zhou Yian carries, as bloodlines are a significant measure of one's power in the "Three Thousand Worlds." The higher the bloodline tier, the greater the player's potential for development.

Bloodlines, like skills, can be bought and sold, but their prices vary widely.

Zhou Yian's dark magical bloodline ranks among the top 300 in tens of thousands of bloodline sequences, a considerably high ranking.

Upon entering the dungeon, while other players were terrified of encountering ghost children, Zhou Yian was not particularly concerned.

No matter how strong the ghost children were, he was confident that he could escape.

Lying atop the bookshelf at the moment, and unable to think of other clues, Zhou Yian casually raised his finger and murmured an incantation.

A wisp of dark smoke emanated from his fingertip and quickly formed into a shadow resembling a paper-thin skull.

The skull slid down the bookshelf and moved into a corner, becoming Zhou Yian's "eyes."

It observed how the child NPCs were hiding, how five of them turned into "ghosts," and even... ah, what was that kid's name?

Xie Fangcheng?

Is he seriously just lying there and sleeping without moving??

Zhou Yian, already considering himself rather audacious given his power, couldn't believe someone could be sleeping so soundly in such circumstances!

Moreover, this kid was caught and became a sacrificial pawn; he merely turned over and fell right back to sleep.

This is just... utterly...

At this moment, even the grotesque-looking skull seemed a bit stupefied.

Xie Fangcheng's commitment to slacking off was so brazen, it wasn't long before the four "ghosts" lost all interest in him and moved on to find other targets.

After contemplating for a moment, the skull decided to follow Zhan Xiaoming.

The moment Zhan Xiaoming pulled open the wardrobe, the skull's eye sockets widened in astonishment.

There's a change inside the wardrobe!

The moment Zhan Xiaoming pulled open the wardrobe door, the space inside seemed to shift as if influenced by spatial magic.

The previously plump, ordinary civilian NPC had transformed into a ghost child.

Was this random?

Zhou Yian's brows furrowed tightly. On the other end, Zhan Xiaoming immediately let go of the hand he had grabbed upon realizing it belonged to the ghost child.

His heart pounding, he took two steps back.

The pigtailed ghost child was slowly crawling out of the wardrobe. Zhan Xiaoming gritted his teeth; it had already come to this!

A talisman materialized in his hand. Making a set of hand signs, the talisman in his hands grew, transforming into a blazing phantom flame.

The phantom flame closed the wardrobe door, sealing it firmly.

Taking advantage of the flame's barrier, Zhan Xiaoming dashed to the entrance of the second resting room. The moment he opened the door, he felt something was off.

He had never experienced it, but Zhou Yian, having studied a bit of spatial magic, immediately recognized what was happening.

The space had shifted once again.

As soon as Zhan Xiaoming stepped into the second resting room, his heart sank.

Even if he didn't understand what was happening, he could sense that the room was perilous.

Zhan Xiaoming involuntarily took a step back, but the door behind him, leading to the first resting room, had already closed.

And going back would mean facing that ghost child again...

Struggling to suppress his anxiety, Zhan Xiaoming drew upon the gamer's instinct to "seek clues," cautiously stepping further into the room.

The second resting room had several wardrobes. Some were open, revealing the hanging clothes inside.

Children's clothes were eerily held up by white hangers, swaying in the dim light as a chilling wind blew through. Zhan Xiaoming's heart raced as he carefully moved forward.

The surrounding silence was as oppressive as a graveyard, devoid of any sound.

As he passed a mirror, Zhan Xiaoming caught something in the corner of his eye.

In the mirror, the hangers in the wardrobe behind him, which should have held clothes, were instead supporting the emaciated bodies of children, their skin clinging tightly to their bones.

The "children" had their arms spread out in the wardrobe, their clothes hanging from them like garments on a hanger, with a rod passing through their temples.

"Damn it!" Zhan Xiaoming cursed aloud, retreating in panic and knocking over a water bottle placed nearby.

The bottle crashed to the ground with a thud, and instead of water spilling out, it was thick, coagulated blood.

From the viscous blood, a pair of eyes emerged, bubbling to the surface. The eyes, reminiscent of the ghost child he had encountered earlier, were pallid white with pupils composed of densely packed black dots.

Zhan Xiaoming's fingers trembled as he reached for his weapon, but in the next instant, in the blink of an eye, the terrifying scene before him vanished.

No trace of the blood or eyeballs remained on the floor—only a shattered bottle and puddle of clean water.

It was as if what had just happened was a mere illusion.

Damn it... what kind of twisted game is this!

Zhan Xiaoming's legs were shaking. He had entirely forgotten the rule about "not yelling after the bell rings." Right now, his only thought was to get out of this nightmarish place as fast as possible!

The resting room had two doors: one leading to other resting rooms, and another to the hallway.

At this point, Zhan Xiaoming didn't care which door could be opened and which couldn't.

He dashed frantically to the closest door and turned the handle.

The door swung open effortlessly.

Warm, soothing sunlight flooded in from the hallway, revealing a clear blue sky outside... and a waiting teacher in the corridor.

Teacher Liu looked furious upon seeing him.

"Zhan Xiaoming! What did I say? Have you forgotten?" Teacher Liu's anger seemed tinged with a hint of excitement. "How dare you yell and swear! Moreover, I've emphasized that you must not leave the resting room! How can you be considered a well-behaved child? Parents won't appreciate disobedient children!"

With that, Teacher Liu delivered the final verdict: "I'll be informing your parents this evening! They really need to discipline you!"

Under normal circumstances, a player would find such "punitive" comments from an NPC alarming.

But after experiencing the terrifying atmosphere in the resting room, Zhan Xiaoming merely stared at her blankly. After a moment, his legs gave way, and he collapsed to the floor.

In any case... it couldn't be worse than what he had faced in the resting room, right?

Meanwhile, as he had opened the door to the corridor, back in the first resting room—

Zhou Yian's skeleton had not followed Zhan Xiaoming into the transformed second resting room.

Sensing the danger in the second resting room, it remained at the doorway.

All was quiet, except for faint sounds emanating from the resting rooms.

The other four "ghost" NPCs were engaged in a real game of hide-and-seek, searching for the civilian NPCs in the first resting room. Soon enough, the number of "scapegoats" grew.

When it seemed that the first resting room had been nearly emptied, these NPCs opened the door to the second resting room.

Zhou Yian distinctly felt that, this time, the space did not change.

In other words, when ordinary "ghosts" opened the doors of the resting rooms and wardrobes, the space inside did not transform.

However, if a player unwittingly drew the "ghost" card and attempted to open a door, it would cause the space inside to shift.

It appears this is another clue.

Zhou Yian pondered absentmindedly.

All his focus was on the skeleton, which served as his eyes.

Just as he was engrossed in observing through the skeleton, Zhou Yian suddenly felt a chill at his neck.

On top of the bookshelf, his physical body snapped open its eyes.

A pair of jet-black eyes stared intently at him. Only a handspan away, a ghostly child—its neck twisted 180 degrees—clung to the ceiling like a spider.

Upon seeing Zhou Yian open his eyes, the ghostly child grinned, revealing its crimson mouth.

"Ah! Found you!" the child said cheerfully. "Since we're playing hide-and-seek—I'm 'it,' too!"

The next second, the ghostly child lunged its hand forward.

Zhou Yian quickly dodged in a moment of panic, forgetting he was perched atop a bookshelf.

With a thud, he plummeted down, crashing onto the bed below in a parabolic trajectory. The bed splintered into pieces, sending wood chips flying.

Zhou Yian somersaulted and sprang to his feet immediately.

That was too fast!

The ghostly child zoomed towards him, its eyes gleaming with excitement.

As a mage, Zhou Yian had all the strengths and weaknesses typical of one.

For instance, many of his attacks had homing capabilities and generally packed a punch—that was his strength.

The downside was that he needed time to channel his magical energy, and often he had to chant spells.

The ghostly child was already upon him, so close that Zhou Yian could even smell the stench of blood it carried.

Just then, a wooden stick appeared out of nowhere in front of him.

Thwack!

The ghostly child flew back with the same velocity it had charged forward with.

Zhou Yian's mouth dropped open.

He turned his head.

Standing beside him, a player named Jie Fangcheng held a wooden stick he had just picked up from the floor. Thanks to Zhou Yian's destructive fall, the bed had shattered, conveniently providing four wooden sticks.

At that moment, Jie Fangcheng looked disheveled, his hair filled with wood chips, although his body remained relatively clean thanks to the blanket he was under.

With an expressionless face but a disgruntled tone that seemed even more resentful than the ghost’s, he said, "What are you doing? Can't you let someone sleep?!"