Chapter 72 Surprise Hygiene Inspection
Before the game came, Tang Xinjue had always thought that nightmares were just psychological cues after her brain was stimulated.
When monsters emerged from the darkness and nightmares came into reality, she temporarily regarded the three-year nightmare as some kind of prophecy, like some kind of subtle spoiler, showing the details of the dark creatures in advance.
But it wasn't until the moment she saw the black mist in the "cave" last night that she realized that she had ignored another possibility -
The nightmare. Why couldn't it be real?
"...You mean that every day in the past three years, you did not just have nightmares, but actually came into contact with dark creatures, fighting and escaping in the form of nightmares?"
After listening to the statement, Zhang You finally concluded this out of her words. As she spoke the last few words, her voice subconsciously became louder.
She had personally experienced how dangerous dark creatures were in the dungeon.
What's more, three years ago, there were no powers or props, and Tang Xinjue was just a student who had just graduated from high school! Once she slipped inside the nightmare… she looked at the other person in disbelief.
Tang Xinjue nodded lightly: "If you regard these dreams as another form of reality, dying in a dream may not damage my body in reality, but it will kill me in another way. "
Spiritual death was also death.
...
During a sleepless night, Tang Xinjue recalled a lot, and didn't know whether to be grateful or frightened.
She never gave up or slacked off for a second through all kinds of strange nightmares and pursuits. Even if she thought it was a ridiculous dream, she would try her best as if it was really happening, and she would narrowly escape death again and again.
How many times had she had a brush with death?
"Wait, I don't understand!"
Guo Guo raised her hand and interrupted the conversation: "Jue shen Jue shen, let's not talk about why your dream appeared three years earlier than the game. What happened last night and what does it have to do with this matter?"
The most important thing was that both Tang Xinjue and the counselor kept talking about the dark atmosphere, wrong judgment, not being like a person, etc., and every word stepped on her sensitive and fearful nerves.
If she didn't figure it out, Guo Guo would be frightened to death by her imagination before the next exam started.
Under Guo Guo's sincere eyes, Tang Xinjue pushed out the draft paper again. The drawings on it had been horribly drawn, and only the original cone-shaped outline could be vaguely seen.
She briefly described what she saw in the "cave", and finally attributed it to her brush strokes: "The space inside the cave is a cone shape that shrinks infinitely above and expands infinitely below."
Human consciousness was often described as an iceberg. A small part emerges from the water, and a large part sinks to the bottom. The counselor wanted to kill her, but accidentally let her enter the bottom of her consciousness and get a glimpse of what was inside.
"And this cave was all my spiritual power - my sea of consciousness."
The surface consciousness was like the entrance of the cave illuminated by the dim light from the outside world, and where the light did not shine, there was the deep and vast space of deep consciousness.
The dark atmosphere mentioned by the counselor persists in the depths in the form of black mist. When Tang Xinjue felt the touch, some fragmented memories began to come back - these memories were the details of her mental energy escaping and fighting in countless dreams.
It turns out that from the beginning, through these "nightmares", the omnipresent darkness had been eroding in.
So she can sense ghost breath, use ghost items, and resist mental pollution... To a certain extent, her existence itself is already approaching the other side of the game. No wonder she encounters so many "special treatments" ".
"To sum up, I'm sorry for causing trouble to everyone."
Tang Xinjue spread her hands, "Although these things that are rooted in my brain do not appear to be aggressive or dangerous, they have become acclimatized inside. I can't get rid of them at the moment, but can only coexist for this while.”
[Counselor’s Encouragement] has limited effect and collectively treats the symptoms rather than the root cause.
This was the first time she faced this situation head-on, and she didn't know if anything would happen in the future.
"Perhaps, is it possible," Guo Guo still gritted her teeth and hypothesized: "Why is the erosion of the dark aura not serious and the counselor is just intimidating you? You see, Wanqing and Zhang You and I stay with you every day, and we don't even feel it..."
Halfway through, Guo Guo couldn't make it up.
Things that even Tang Xinjue had confirmed are almost certain to be finalized.
The dormitory was silent for a long time, half digesting the matter and half sweating over Tang Xinjue.
"No wonder that Li Xiaoyu, as soon as she saw you, said that you are suitable for the same kind of person." Zheng Wanqing realized later that she had been so close to the spoiler, "Did she also see it?"
"That's it. It involves another issue."
Tang Xinjue took out another piece of paper with dense writing and pasted it on the previous mind map.
Another problem was the hierarchical differentiation of ghosts.
Taking all the student ghosts that have appeared in the game so far as an example, Tang Xinjue briefly explained her speculation on the levels of ghosts: they should be distinguished by the three universities.
The most common were probably the Third University’s ghosts, like Xiaohong, Xiaolu, and Jin Wen and her other roommates next door from the Headless Ghost movie. Human freshmen can also try to fight against them with the help of props and powers, and the risk was not high.
The most dangerous thing was the First University’s ghosts. For example, Wu Shi, who could break into their exam instance, Li Xiaoyu, who could withhold their rewards from the instance, and they surprisingly had the ability to violate the rules to a certain extent - even like the black mist, leaving a mark in Tang Xinjue’s sea of knowledge.
Her three roommates looked at the four strange patterns on the paper.
Zhang You frowned: "Including Wu Shi and Li Xiaoyu, there are only two ghosts. You have four marks..."
The ghost symbols couldn’t be understood, and they looked at Tang Xinjue hesitantly, but Tang Xinjue nodded with satisfaction: "My drawing skills have improved a lot. These four things are clear at a glance. You should be able to see them even if I don't tell you."
Everyone: "???"
Under strong request, Tang Xinjue, who originally wanted to skip this part in a hurry, had to touch her nose and explain bitterly:
"The first mark is a glass bottle, which is a clue to Li Xiaoyu's seat in the movie instance. There is also the same red sand in it..."
Glass bottle, silver ring, yellow eyeball, white tape.
Each of the markers had its own characteristics, and Tang Xinjue can only identify three of them.
The glass bottle and ring probably belong to Li Xiaoyu and Wu Shi respectively, and the yellow eyeball was more like a split version of the huge yellow eyeball that appeared outside the dormitory window the night the game came. As for the white tape, Tang Xinjue didn't find a suitable candidate, so she could only put it aside for the time being.
After a night of trying, she found that she could not return to the state of immersed consciousness in the cave by herself for more than five minutes in a day. Therefore, the information she could get was also very limited, so she could only seize the time to record it.
Then, everyone fell into silence as they looked at the 15 pages of notes on the table.
Tang Xinjue's enthusiasm finally subsided a little, and she said calmly: "Dangers come with opportunities. Since I had been marked, no matter whether it is a blessing or a disaster, I should be prepared to deal with it, so that I can be responsible to everyone."
... No one knew why, whenever the situation was dangerous, Tang Xinjue was always as calm as a bell*, but now that she was so excited, everyone felt a bit of danger for some reason.
*from my search, I infer that this comes from the way they call the proper sitting position in Chinese, ‘sit like a bell’. As in sitting quietly, upright and calm like a bell. Please cmiiw
The next minute, they knew where this bad feeling came from.
Tang Xinjue divided her notes into three parts and said lightly: "There is still an hour before today's exam starts. Please take forty minutes to memorize the details of the classification of dark creatures on these fifteen pieces of paper. When today's exam is over, I will finish the remaining details."
The three of them said: "..."
Guo Guo swallowed: "Well, Jue shen, you don't need to be too stressed. We will take the exam normally even if we don't know about this. Otherwise, let's take it slow..."
"Memorize it."
"Okay."
The three of them, who had not slept much, began to browse and recite the contents of the manuscript. However, the more they read, the more frightened they became.
Low-level nightmares that imitate sounds, gluttons that imitate shapes, transparent ghosts that suck souls, long-tongued ghosts that eat human heads, phantoms that travel through space... In addition to the types of monsters they have already encountered, there are also some that they have yet to encounter. Such as skinless monsters, shadow monsters, thousand-legged monsters, air monsters...
"Wait, what is an air monster?"
Guo Guo opened her eyes wide.
Tang Xinjue: "As the name suggests, I have never seen the specific image of this kind of monster, and I cannot kill them either. They seem to be able to survive and move with the help of air, and their attack method is to breathe into you."
"Breathe into me?"
"Yes, and then you will find that there is no air within a few dozen meters of you."
Tang Xinjue said, and there was indeed a relevant record in her notes:
[If there are only a few air monsters nearby, hold your breath and escape from the area to survive immediately. If there are dozens or hundreds of them, just wait to die. ]
"..."
Eight o'clock came in a flash, and the three of them only had time to read through the notes. They could only hurriedly stuff them into the storage ring and wait until they entered the exam to read again.
"Ding dong dong, dong dong dong ding——"
"Happy Friday, class time is here, exam papers have been distributed, everyone get ready~"
The exam interface refreshed:
Volume A: "Investment and Financial Management" (Level B)
Volume B: "Surprise Hygiene Inspection" (Level C)
Volume C: "Research on Viruses and Parasitic Technology" (Level C)
The original options interface, because the [Counselor's Encouragement] buff was added, the difficulty level also emerged.
"B-level difficulty must be eliminated first. As for Volume B and Volume C..." Guo Guo scratched his head.
Zhang You: "Volume C is a professional question, which is more beneficial to medical students. Volume B does not seem to be targeted, but this exam may be more difficult."
Experience tells them that the lower the threshold of exam questions, the more perverted the exam content may be.
Tang Xinjue doesn't think so: "Not necessarily, cleaning also requires a threshold. Just cleaning the house perfectly is a technical job that is difficult to achieve for many people."
At this point, three pairs of eyes looked at each other. They all landed on Zhang You.
What's more, they also have a logistical god.
Zhang You, who had high hopes, said: "...Then choose Volume B. Is there anything we need to buy temporarily at the mall?"
Tang Xinjue used the last point she redeemed from her achievements to exchange a few bottles of cleaning supplies for cleaning, and then after upgrading her identification skills, she nodded: "Let's go."
"By the way," she suddenly remembered before her consciousness entered darkness: "I owed you guys spicy chicken feet mixed with yogurt last time... I'll definitely make it next time!"
Everyone: That's not necessary…
"Bang bang bang!!"
"Get up quickly! You are a bunch of lazy people! We’re checking the room hygiene immediately! Those who fail will be given major demerits and will be dropped out of school!"
The sound of the door slamming was loud in her ears, and Tang Xinjue opened her eyes suddenly, and found herself lying on a hard and uncomfortable bed.
Looking around, she saw that this was not the familiar dormitory bed, but a room many times larger.
Within a few seconds, the sounds of gasping, whispering, and quilt lifting spread rapidly in the room.
Tang Xinjue stood up silently, using the height of the second-story bed to bring into view the faces of young girls who were either surprised and panicked or serious.
This dusty room was a dormitory for 16 people!
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T/N: our first group instance! I’ve been MTL-ing other works from this author and they really like writing character surnamed Tang with a sea of consciousness. They're really awesome stories tbh
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