Chapter 43

It was a midsummer afternoon, and the bright sun was strong enough to make one dizzy. By the wall in the southeast corner of No. 16 Middle School, five figures stood in a neat row, their heads bowed, listening meekly to a lecture.

Unlike the gentle demeanor she displayed in the previous two instances, this version of Teacher Yang was much closer to the real Yang Caisi. Her unsmiling face was enough to make anyone hesitate, and beneath her gold-rimmed glasses were eyes simmering with suppressed anger. Teacher Yang slapped the documents in her hand, her face a mask of frustration at their lack of promise.

“If you’re on break, you should be at home studying. The final exams are just around the corner. What are you all doing sneaking into school?”

Her stern tone made Zhu Yan flinch, instantly reminding him of the fear of being dominated by teachers in the real world. He nodded miserably. “You’re right, teacher. We won’t do it again.”

His proactive admission of guilt softened Teacher Yang’s expression slightly, but when she looked at the others, her anger flared up again. Jiang Liu and Xu Meng were relatively well-behaved, just standing there silently. In contrast, Zhao Ziming and Zhang Xiaochen, who hadn’t been reprimanded like this in ages, were trying to suppress their laughter, especially since the person in front of them was an acquaintance. Their struggling expressions made Teacher Yang shake her head repeatedly.

She rubbed her temples with a headache, seemingly at a loss with what to do about Zhang Xiaochen. She pointed at his hair and sighed. “How many times have I told you? Your hair! Get it dyed back today!”

Zhang Xiaochen pouted and lowered his head, not saying a word.

Once Teacher Yang had finished her tirade, her expression finally relaxed. She glanced at her watch and frowned. “Go on home, all of you. I don’t see you this eager to run to school on a normal school day.”

She muttered a complaint under her breath and hastily turned to leave, her steps urgent, as if someone were chasing her. Jiang Liu quickly ran forward and, like a robber, snatched the stack of documents from her hands, following her with a grin. “It’s so hot. Let me carry these for you, Tea-cher Yang?”

The last part of her address was drawn out with a slight upward inflection, creating a sense of intimate awkwardness that made Yang Caisi’s fingers unconsciously tighten. But Jiang Liu didn’t stop there; she waved for the others behind her to come and help, looking for all the world like a pack of wolves ready to surround and devour their prey.

She couldn’t very well refuse her students’ goodwill, so she reluctantly said, “Class is about to start. Just help me deliver these to Grade 3, Class 5.”

As she spoke, she seemed to have something more important to attend to and couldn’t help but quicken her pace. A dark glint flashed in Jiang Liu’s eyes. She casually handed the documents to Zhao Ziming and asked, as if by chance, “Aren’t you coming with us, teacher?”

Yang Caisi couldn’t help but glance at her. For a fleeting moment, a subtle look of helplessness crossed her face, so brief that even Jiang Liu failed to catch it.

She was having a major headache right now. This Teacher Yang wasn’t an important NPC in the instance and had little to do with the plot. In all the years The System had been running, errors were few and far between. Such a serious bug should never have occurred. Therefore, the first thing Yang Caisi did upon arriving was to check with The System. The feedback she received not only failed to resolve her confusion but made her even more anxious.

The main NPC’s position in the instance had been usurped. It was obvious someone had discovered her actions and was secretly sabotaging her. As for who it was—Yang Caisi already had some suspicions, but she wasn’t certain yet. That was why she was in such a hurry to climb the wall and take a shortcut to investigate the changes in the instance. She never expected to run into Jiang Liu by a stroke of bad luck, and for her to hit the nail on the head with her playful guess that she was trying to skip class.

Though a thousand thoughts were racing through her mind, Yang Caisi’s face remained impassive. “I’m going to the principal’s office,” she said calmly. “These documents are very important for the third-year seniors. Make sure you deliver them.”

Jiang Liu raised an eyebrow. Her slightly taller stature allowed her to easily see Yang Caisi’s expression, but no matter how closely she observed, she couldn’t detect anything amiss on Teacher Yang’s face.

This is a bit tricky.

Sighing inwardly, Jiang Liu stepped aside to let her pass. “Then take care, teacher.”

Seeing her give up so readily, Yang Caisi breathed a sigh of relief and walked away quickly with her back to them. Her mind was so preoccupied with the system bug that she completely missed the probing gaze Jiang Liu cast her way.

Her appearance was abrupt, and her departure was equally surprising.

“Are we still delivering these?” Zhao Ziming asked, staring blankly at Yang Caisi’s retreating back and pointing to the documents in his hands.

He had thought Sister Yang was being kind and delivering clues, but a quick flip through the papers revealed they were just senior-year practice problems, which looked like gibberish to him and made his head spin.

Jiang Liu withdrew her gaze and walked over to flip through a few pages, also feeling puzzled. In the previous two instances, Yang Caisi had always acted as a guide to inform them of the specifics. But this time, she was acting completely out of character, trying to leave after just a few words.

Was this what an Advanced Instance was like? Were they supposed to just run around aimlessly like headless flies? Jiang Liu had a gut feeling it wasn’t that simple. She squinted her eyes toward the academic building. “Let’s go check it out first.”

Grade 3, Class 5 was on the fourth floor. At this time, the vast campus was eerily quiet, with not a single person to ask for directions. They had to follow the signs to find it. The moment they stepped onto the fourth floor, the sense of silence became even more pronounced. The sounds of teaching emanated from the classrooms, amplified by speakers and echoing in their ears, making Zhang Xiaochen yawn.

“Class Three, Class Four… it’s just ahead!”

He had a loud voice and didn’t bother to lower it in the academic building, swaggering right up to the door of Class 5. He expected to draw a lot of attention, but the students inside were all engrossed in their studies. Only a few were distracted by the commotion at the door, glancing over before lowering their heads again.

There was no teacher in Class 5; it seemed to be a self-study session. Every student had a thick stack of reference books on their desk, and the atmosphere in the room was exceptionally oppressive. Seeing this scene, the group was instantly reminded of their own tough days in their final year of high school. Only Jiang Liu didn’t dwell on it. She walked up to the podium, placed the documents down, and glanced at the desks below.

Most of the students were present, with only eight or nine empty seats. Some were clean, without a single book, while others were messy and unattended. Jiang Liu raised an eyebrow and tapped on the desk of a girl with glasses in the front row. “Teacher Yang asked us to deliver these documents. Could you please help pass them out?”

The girl had a neat short haircut, and her glasses were very thick. When she lowered her head, Jiang Liu could only see the circles of light created by the varying thickness of the lenses. Her desk was relatively tidy, and the open book had two characters neatly written on it: Wen Xuan.

Wen Xuan looked up, a little startled to see her. She only relaxed after hearing Teacher Yang’s name, smiling shyly as she stood up to sort the documents. Jiang Liu followed behind to help, then passed some to Zhao Ziming and the others to distribute.

She was bustling about with a friendly smile, and with her bright personality and attractive appearance, she easily won the favor of a girl this age. In the time it took to organize the documents, she had already managed to get a lot of information out of Wen Xuan.

Finally, she pointed to the empty seats, lying without batting an eye. “Teacher Yang told me to wait for her to come back. Can I sit over there?”

Wen Xuan glanced over and nodded. “Sure, go ahead and sit.”

Jiang Liu thanked her quietly and led the group to the back row. The other empty seats were scattered around, but here there was a continuous block of five. As soon as they sat down, Zhang Xiaochen eagerly whispered, “Well? What did you find out?”

To be honest, he didn’t understand why Jiang Liu wanted to stay. He felt completely out of place in this classroom, so uncomfortable that he was itching to leave.

Jiang Liu pointed to her phone and shared what she had learned in the group chat. The few scattered empty seats in the front belonged to students who were supposedly on leave. Wen Xuan had also found it strange when she mentioned it. Her exact words were: “I don’t know why, but students from other classes have also been taking leave one after another.”

When asked for the reason, Wen Xuan’s attitude was odd. She averted her gaze for a moment before saying, “I guess the pressure is just too much.”

Zhang Xiaochen was unconvinced, typing furiously on his phone. “Isn’t it because of the photo studio? We should just ask about that directly.”

He hadn’t noticed, but the ever-observant Xu Meng and Zhu Yan had grasped the key point. Two messages appeared in the group chat simultaneously.

“What about the students from these seats?”

“What about the other few who aren’t in the classroom?”

It was so much easier talking to smart people. Jiang Liu subconsciously fiddled with the Communication Ring on her ring finger. She didn’t know how The System had managed it, but to fit her student identity, the black ring was completely invisible on her finger, yet she could clearly feel its presence.

She chuckled softly and started typing. “Five diligent third-year seniors all fail to show up for class this morning. Don’t you find that strange?”

If they were on leave, the news should have spread long ago. But when she mentioned these five, Wen Xuan had also looked puzzled, even emphasizing that one of them had asked for her help with a difficult topic just yesterday. Zhao Ziming instantly understood Jiang Liu’s thinking, his eyes lighting up.

“You want to investigate these guys?”

Jiang Liu snapped her fingers and put away her phone, starting to rummage through the desk. Seeing her action, the others followed suit, turning their own desks upside down. Books, small loaves of bread, drinks, and countless test papers—apart from the five names written at the top of the papers, they found nothing.

As the glaring sun began to set, Jiang Liu stretched and committed the names to memory before slowly getting up. “Let’s go for now.”

The back door was slightly ajar. The group left quietly, quickly disappearing from the classroom. Almost in the next second, a tall, slender figure pushed his glasses up and walked in through the front door with a stack of test papers.

Jiang Liu’s steps faltered slightly. As if sensing something, she looked back through the window and saw a pair of legs stopped at the doorway. The person was telling the students to put down what they were doing and take a mock test first. He was positioned cleverly, and from Jiang Liu’s angle, she couldn’t see his upper body.

“What’s wrong?” Xu Meng stopped to wait for Jiang Liu, looking puzzled.

“Nothing.” Jiang Liu shook her head and withdrew her gaze. As she headed for the stairs, she took out her phone and searched the navigation—Dayuan Photo Studio.

The System often set traps. She had to go see for herself what was really going on.