Not just empty—the dorm they lived in had just been renovated, with new walls, doors, and windows. The one they entered looked identical from outside to the daytime dorm, but inside, it was dilapidated and full of signs of age.
The deeper they went in, the higher Shi Haochen’s heart rose in tension. They made it all the way to Room 201 and pushed open the rusty door. Inside was no longer the familiar scene but an obviously abandoned one.
Beds in pieces, walls scarred, windows broken, iron frames rusted—everything showed they had entered a world utterly opposite to daytime.
“We were totally devastated at first.” That devastation couldn’t be put into words, like being abandoned by the entire world for no reason.
“We thought, maybe once day broke, it’d be fine.”
“Reality proved otherwise. We never saw daybreak. We were trapped in the nighttime campus.”
Being teenagers with pride, the three didn’t mention how devastated they’d been upon realizing that, or how they’d nearly fallen out, or their series of embarrassing actions.
In short, after a brief breakdown period, the three pulled themselves together and looked for ways to escape.
High schoolers had all read web novels to some extent. Shi Haochen joked bitterly with Zhou Ping and Zhu Zhihui, “Maybe we’re the heaven-chosen protagonists, and it’s up to us to save the whole class!”
With their moods adjusted, the three began hunting for clues.
Since they could enter the nighttime campus, there had to be a way out.
“We searched a lot of places and tried leaving warnings for the other students not to leave the dorm at night. We don’t know if anyone found the traces we left.”
“We found it,” the class monitor, who had been listening quietly, spoke up. “We found words carved on the wall by someone, saying ‘Don’t go out at midnight, or you’ll run into monsters.’ Had you already encountered those monsters when you left the clues?”
“It really works,” Shi Haochen lit up with joy and continued answering the class monitor’s question. “We saw some figures back then but didn’t dare get close. Last night was our first real encounter with a monster.”
“Where did you encounter the monsters?” Lin Juan asked.
“In the dorm.”
They had entered this world through the dorm entrance, so they wondered if they could exit the same way.
“We came out from right here,” Shi Haochen said. He led Lin Juan to the dorm entrance and pointed ahead. “We’ve gone in from here several times but never made it back to the normal world. It wasn’t until yesterday, when we ran into monsters inside, that we didn’t dare go any farther.”
The monsters stood two meters tall, with long arms and legs plus sharp claws. The three of them were just ordinary high school students—no match for those things.
Sure, they talked big about being heaven-chosen protagonists, but they cherished their lives too much to clash head-on with the monsters.
“We only arrived today and planned to just check things out from outside. We never expected the monsters inside to spot us and chase us all the way here.”
“It was weird too. Before, the monsters stayed inside the dorm. The moment we left, something always blocked them from chasing us. This time, we figured it was safe to observe from outside, but the monsters came right out after us.”
That memory was one the three of them never wanted to revisit.
They pushed their running speed to the limit, the monsters in relentless pursuit. No matter where they fled, it felt like they couldn’t escape the monsters’ control.
Adrenaline spiked to its peak, oxygen deprivation tightening their breaths. Zhou Ping tripped on a loose stone and tumbled forward.
In the grip of utter terror, he didn’t even feel the pain.
The monster closed in, and he caught the waves of rotting stench wafting from its body—nausea hit him hard.
“Get up! Run!” Shi Haochen yelled when he saw Zhou Ping go down.
Zhou Ping wanted to stand, but his limbs wouldn’t cooperate. The more he tried, the less they obeyed.
“I can’t get up,” Zhou Ping said, choking back sobs. “Don’t worry about me—you guys run! Don’t let it catch you!”
Shi Haochen couldn’t just abandon his best friend. He scanned around, grabbed a rock, and hurled it at the monster lunging for Zhou Ping. “Bastard! Come chase me if you’ve got the guts!”
The monster flew into a rage and pounced toward Shi Haochen instead.
Zhu Zhihui took the opening to haul Zhou Ping up and keep running.
Relentless, exhausted, but they couldn’t stop.
If Lin Juan hadn’t shown up, they didn’t dare imagine what fate awaited them once the monsters caught up.
The thought sent a wave of after-fear crashing over them.
“I’ll go in and take a look.” To escape the domain, they had to locate the source of the weird phenomena. Eliminate whatever created the domain, and it would dissolve on its own.
Lin Juan hadn’t expected to stumble onto the school’s anomaly on his very first day.
“Are you all coming with?”
He got their synchronized reply without hesitation.
“Together.”
Staying outside alone beat following Lin Juan? No way—monsters had already emerged from the dorm. Who knew how many more hid out there?
What if one burst out the moment Lin Juan went in?
At least they’d seen Lin Juan’s terrifying fighting strength up close. He smashed monsters like they were watermelons.
“It’s safer if you stick close to me.” Lin Juan took the lead and stepped inside.
Just as Shi Haochen described, the dorm—putting it nicely—was steeped in the marks of time. In truth, it was rundown, filthy, and choked with a foul stench.
Moldy, like the smell of rotting corpses.
Lin Juan pinched his nose. “Did it smell like this when you came before?”
Zhou Ping clamped his nose too, his voice muffled. “No, not before.”
If it had, they would’ve said something. The stench was brutal, right up into your brain. Trying to sleep in there, they wouldn’t have dozed off—they’d have passed out from the fumes.
Cobwebs draped everywhere. Shi Haochen swatted a strand drifting into his face. “The gap between daytime and nighttime dorms is way too big.”
“What if this is the dorm’s real appearance?” Zhou Ping’s face turned ugly at the notion.
“Could be,” the class monitor said, her expression no better—purely from the stink. “Based on my infinite flow novel experience, the pristine daytime dorm is the fake one.”
“So we’ve been crashing in a garbage dump this whole time? Urgh—” Zhu Zhihui couldn’t hold it in and dry-heaved.
“There’s something here!” He braced against the wall and felt bumps under his palm. He pulled his hand away and saw the markings etched into the surface.
“We left our messages on the walls the same way before. Could this be from others who went through the same thing?” Shi Haochen crowded in, squinting to make out the scratches.
“What does it say?” Lin Juan walked over.
Lin Juan’s eyes narrowed when he made out the marks on the wall.
They weren’t writing—those were claw marks.
Claw marks gouged deep with tremendous force.
“What’s that?”
“Can’t tell—too messy.”
“You make it out?”
“Nope.”
The four debated it with no luck, then turned to Lin Juan. “Lin, can you read what these marks say?”
“These aren’t letters. They’re claw marks.” Lin Juan held nothing back.
“Claw marks?!” Shi Haochen and the others gaped in shock. “Claw marks? How deep are these? What kind of force leaves marks like that?”
More importantly, why were there such deep claw marks on the dorm walls?
Who made them?
Under what circumstances?
What events had unfolded in this dorm that they didn’t know about?
Lin Juan needed answers too. He’d focused on rescue before coming in; his intel on Upward Middle School came solely from Director Liu’s briefing materials.
He knew it was a fifty-year-old institution that had produced countless top students. Parents flocked to send their kids there to grind for high scores and prime university spots.
The materials painted it in glowing terms—no standout issues.
Thoughts raced through his mind in an instant. Had some hidden incident rocked the school?
“Any school secrets you’ve heard about?” Cut off from the outside, Lin Juan had to mine the students for leads.
“Secrets? None.”
All four shook their heads.
“Where exactly did you see the green light?” Lin Juan pivoted.
“Over here.”
They moved to the bathroom area. Peering out the shattered window, they spotted the Green Moon hanging in the night sky.
“Huh? Right from this spot—that’s what we saw that day? The Green Moon?”
Lin Juan remembered Shi Haochen mentioning they’d left the dorm to find Zhu Zhihui. He turned to him. “Zhu, did you see the green light too? How’d you get down from the bathroom?”
Zhu Zhihui stared vacantly, only snapping back after Zhou Ping shoved him. “I’m not sure. I opened my eyes and I was already outside. My stomach hurt like hell—like I blacked out from the pain.”
He scratched his head. “Woke up standing there, just followed the green light in a daze. Didn’t know how long I wandered until I heard you guys calling me. That jolted me awake, and I realized something was wrong.”
“I figured he was sleepwalking when he called us to come with him to the toilet.” Shi Haochen said it without sympathy.
He’d grilled Zhu Zhihui right after finding him. As the guy at the center of it, Zhu was even more clueless than they were.
“Did you have any dreams?” Lin Juan kept probing.
Zhu Zhihui racked his brain. “I think so. In the dream, I saw a pair of eyes—huge ones, like headlights. Oh yeah, they were green!”
“I saw green eyes too, just a flash. Thought it was my imagination.” The class monitor jumped in, confirming it wasn’t a hallucination.
“Did you see them too, Lin?”
All four pairs of eyes locked onto Lin Juan.
“I saw the Green Moon,” Lin Juan mused. “Looks like the Green Moon is the key to entering the nighttime campus.”
Moon or eyes, it was almost certainly tied to the weird phenomena.
“Let’s get out first.”
Shi Haochen and the others didn’t get why Lin Juan called it quits without clear findings, but their trust in him bordered on blind faith. When he said go, they trailed right behind him toward the exit.
Thud—thud—thud—
Heavy footsteps pounded from every direction. Lin Juan stopped short.
The four behind him halted too.
“Something’s coming.” Lin Juan spoke up before they could ask.
They stood at the stairwell, footsteps chaotic and converging from all sides. To play it safe, Lin Juan kicked open the nearest dorm room door, swept inside for threats, and confirmed it clear. “You all stay put in here for a bit.”
Shi Haochen and the others picked up the footsteps too.
Each step boomed—heavy enough to hint at massive bulk.
“Lin…”
“Don’t be scared,” Lin Juan said as he shoved the last one inside. “I’ll hold the door. They won’t get near you.”
By then, hulking figures materialized from the stairs below and the corridor depths.
Monsters even bigger than the ones outside—grayish-green skin, heads swollen with tumorous growths. The stench grew thicker the closer they got.
Lin Juan was about done with this world. Every weird phenomenon he met reeked.
The first one lumbered into view, followed by a second, third… more closing in from all around.
Their eyes bulged from bloated heads, torsos thick and heavy, limbs gaunt and elongated—like oversized, diseased frogs.
At least the four he’d flattened outside still vaguely resembled humans. These had lost any trace of it.
Lin Juan’s fingers flexed. The instant the monsters drew close, he shot forward.
He moved so fast the four inside only caught afterimages.
Piercing wails erupted wherever he struck.
The group watched monsters crumple to the floor in seconds. Fear? Not even a little.
Who could blame them for the rush—monsters dropped before they could make a move.
Lin Juan circled back once he’d cleared them, retreating to the dorm door.
In the distance, two fresh monsters poked out, spotted their downed packmates, and yanked back fast.
Lin Juan strode forward. “After them.”
The four rushed after him, hearts pounding as they watched the monsters flee for their lives.
Too damn satisfying!
Time these monsters tasted the hunted life!
