Translator:
MrJ_
Editor:
Zayn_
This was a destined feeling; it was as if Wang Xue’s superfluous actions had finally stimulated that shadow. Su Bai was certain that the message left by Wang Xue had enraged the murderer, foreshadowing the Hushang poisoning case which shocked the nation.
Perhaps if Wang Xue had treated it like a prank note that day and simply thrown it away or if she was in a better mood, treated it like a game, joined in and simply written something down, maybe her ending and future would not have been the same.
Of course, there are no ifs in life. Su Bai was just re-enacting the scene based on the description of Chu Jianguo’s notebook. Everything was destined and had already happened. Su Bai was like sitting in the cinema, watching a movie and feeling pointless regret.
He got up and left this self-revision room. Su Bai then walked into another self-revision room. The skies then brightened.
The university’s self-revision room would sometimes serve as a classroom.
However, there weren’t that many general courses in the university. It was easy and simple to find a vacant classroom. When Su Bai was in university, he did not like to go to the library. He preferred to find a vacant classroom all by himself with a cup of tea and holding a few books, doing his own things.
However, most people would come for self-revision in the evening.
Su Bai’s body slowly faded and sat on a chair. There was a constant change of events outside the window. Very soon, the skies turned grey and the sun had set.
Student after student coincidentally entered this self-revision room. A majority of them had their own taste in choosing a self-revision room. For example, a specific classroom or a specific spot. Within this lecture theater which could accommodate a hundred people, there were more than ten students bending over the desk doing homework, there was no one making noise or causing a racket; it was very quiet.
Su Bai then saw a shadow walking into the classroom. He stopped for a moment in front of the classroom as if trying to distinguish certain people. He then directly walked over and brazenly placed some notes on the designated person’s desk.
Many students did not find it surprising. Su Bai could feel that they were familiar with the student who passed the notes and even felt a slight reverence for him.
Reverence?
The word reverence was a term which always appeared in Chu Jianguo’s notebook. This meant that the person who passed the notes had huge influence among the students. It might be a teacher, it might be a cadre among the students.
It was a pity that the investigation was brought to a halt by the higher-ups and had no way of continuing. Because once it continued deeper, a huge implication was bound to happen, generating a domino effect. Even if they did not arrest someone, someone was bound to arrested. This was not what the higher-ups who tried to maintain social stability wished to see. Over a hundred students from a key university involved in a murder case; listening to this was a deliberate exaggeration to scare people. That was why Chu Jianguo did not know that person’s actual identity.
The male student in front of Su Bai also received this note. He was overwhelmed and even thanked the person who passed the note. He sat down and started reading.
Su Bai stood up and walked to the side of the male student, Su Bai and the student read the note together. The contents of this note were also recorded in Chu Jianguo’s notebook. It was a few simple phrases:
Currently, I’ve found a target,
A vulgar and filthy woman,
A self-approbating and condescending woman,
A selfish and pedantic woman,
A disgusting and hard to look in the eye woman,
What should I do?
What should I do?
No,
It should be what should we do!
Write your reply at the back, and throw it into the dustbin before you leave. The cleaning lady would normally clean up this place the second day, so do not worry about me not being able to receive your replies. Each and every one of your replies, I have seen it and remembered it.
The male student was very excited, he turned over note and immediately wrote down:
Kill her, kill that whre!
Su Bai furrowed his brows. He felt that he had understood the process and method of playing. In 1994, there were no smartphones, and it took a long time later for it to be popularized. Even handphones were considered a luxury for a majority of people. The method of using notes to pass messages gave the targeted audience a smooth, steady and exciting feeling. Every stroke and line of the words written was an immersive sensory substitution feeling.
This was a murder game.
Su Bai was already able to predict how it would develop. From the development, it would brew up Wang Xue’s tragic ending.
It wasn’t realistic to have these group of privileged students participate in a murder case. Allowing them to participate step by step by making use of the youngster’s psychology of seeking novelty, it was indeed a very advanced method of that era. Since that case happened in 1994 and it wasn’t the era of the information technology outburst, there were still huge limitations to people’s thoughts. For someone who was able to operate such a game, even as an observer, Su Bai was curious about the perpetrator behind the scenes. What had become of him twenty years later?
The lights of the maths block were switched off, and the students gradually left the self-revision room and headed back to their dormitories. The administrator had switch off the power floor by floor and this self-revision room turned dark very soon. However, not long after that, a shadow walked into the self-revision room Su Bai was in and started rummaging the dustbin and kept the notes. He then left the self-revision room and headed to other rooms to collect the notes.
Su Bai followed behind and saw this shadow going in and out of the other revision rooms. In the records of Chu Jianguo’s notebook, it’s stated that there were almost a hundred students who participated in this murder, but it was only a student or a few students who grouped up to implement it.
With such a huge workload, it was difficult to perfectly implement it. If there was a slip-up and the note failed to be passed along in time or was passed to the wrong person, it would flat-line the attraction of this game.
Within Su Bai’s line of sight started to appear two shadows, three shadows and finally four shadows.
Four shadows should be the right amount. There would not be a need for the game if there were more people. They could have organized a small-scale murder game and have no need to pull in external players. They wouldn’t have the fun of playing the game.
The skies brightened again.
Su Bai saw Wang Xue entering the self-revision room in the morning; she took out a book and was tidying up her notes earnestly and in full concentration.
Su Bai leaned on the door of the classroom Wang Xue was in and looked at the people inside. Hmmm, it was only Wang Xue inside at the moment.
In a short while, more and more students gradually entered and there were almost thirty people inside.
If it was a lecture, thirty people couldn’t be considered much. But when it came to self-revision, thirty people could be considered quite crowded. Normally, a student who wanted to self-revise would find a classroom with less people. It was best if there were no people in his surroundings which was more suitable for self-revision.
Wang Xue was also stunned when she realized that there were quite a lot of people in the self-revision room. But because the people were quiet, she just continued with her own thing.
Su Bai walked in, he reached out to a student’s book and flipped through. He indeed found a note:
This girl is in classroom AJ203 right now self-revising at the second last row. Do you want to see the target we would be killing?
Remember to remain quiet,
Remember to remain unperturbed,
Remember to remain calm,
Yesterday, all of you replied to kill her. Heh heh. Of course, there are many other people who could not attend due to morning lecture. It’s alright, there are plenty of chances. We are just secretly observing our prey.
The same old rules: write your reply at the back of the note and throw it in the dustbin of this lecture theater.
Su Bai placed the note back on the table and walked over to the rostrum. He looked at the surround thirty over students. They were secretly sizing up Wang Xue; the whole scene was very weird.
Wang Xue was too preoccupied reading and taking notes that she did not realize a thing.
Su Bai suddenly found it ridiculous, really ridiculous.
Over thirty students and not a single person went to remind Wang Xue.
Everyone really treated it like a game, followed the pace of the game and started examining their prey. It was really preposterous and bizarre. Compared to the rational conjectures on the web these twenty years about the murderer having strong background, the scene that Su Bai currently saw really was hard to comprehend.
Time passed very quickly. When the students who came into the room to observe left, they threw the note into the dustbin.
Su Bai did not know what they wrote because it was not recorded in Chu Jianguo’s notebook. The previous contents of the notes he saw were all recorded by Chu Jianguo.
In the end, because the investigation was put to a halt, the case was covered in dust. That is why there was no thorough and detailed information in Chu Jianguo’s hand. However, it was enough for Su Bai to continue observing this case.
The shadow came to collect the notes at night and then left.
Su Bai continued to sit at the rostrum, and the second day came very soon.
Wang Xue did not enter this self-revision room today but there were other students. The shadow started passing notes. There were ten or mote students, but only three people received the note. He obviously had his own motive in passing the note to whoever he wished.
Perhaps he passed the note to a few hundred people at the beginning and started weeding them out. In the end, it was estimated to have around one hundred people remaining.
A murder game done with much exaggeration and obviousness but succeeded in the end. They even forced the police to cover up the case to maintain social stability because the law couldn’t be enforced when everyone was an offender. For the results, they really were successful.
Su Bai walked to the front of a girl. The contents of the note today were:
Come, let us discuss. How should we kill that girl? Do you all have any suggestions?
Same old rules, throw your replies in the dustbin.
This girl had some baby fat and was quite good-looking. Su Bai stood beside her, and she started writing the reply:
There is thallium in the laboratory. The effects are much better than poison. Other than that, there is no way of testing it out domestically currently. I personally feel that using it to kill this girl is giving her a worthy death.
Su Bai puckered his lips.
The show…
…had finally begun.
