Raising a Wife in a Supernatural World [Infinite] – CH25

Chapter 25: Spook High (25)

The crisp, rhythmic rap-rap-rap echoed distinctly through the classroom and the corridor. The students hiding in various corners felt their hearts leap into their throats; shrinking even deeper into their hiding spots, they frantically pleaded under their breath not to be found.

Under the grip of sheer, paralyzing terror, not a single soul dared steal a glance outside.

Until Qin Fu’an’s voice rang out across the hollow room.

“Any students still breathing interested in discussing the questions and working on the answers together?”

Everyone: “…”

Even Xie Yunhuai couldn’t help casting him a sidelong glance. This was truly the first time he had seen someone frame blatant cheating in such a dignified, upright light.

Discussing the questions and working on the answers together…?

Absurd as it sounded, whether due to the innate charisma woven into Qin Fu’an’s voice or the deep impression his brazen maneuvers during the day had left on the class, it was enough to earn their trust.

The moment his words fell, the anomalous student NPCs trembling in their hideouts cautiously poked their heads out, emerging one by one.

Their reveal gave Qin Fu’an and the livestream audience a front-row seat to their utterly unhinged hiding abilities.

One student was merged entirely into the shadow cast by the overhead light; unless one brushed against it with bare skin, its presence was impossible to detect.

Another had folded itself into the tiny compartment beneath a desk; when it climbed out, it had to shift stack after stack of textbooks before its twisted, contorted frame finally manifested.

Still others were piled on top of each other inside the trash can at the back of the room, clad in tattered rags and buried under shredded scrap paper. A casual glance would never lead anyone to suspect that a single overstuffed wastebasket concealed no fewer than three entities.

Once all the students stood gathered in the room like a flock of terrified quails, Qin Fu’an did a rough headcount: nearly ten students had managed to survive.

He counted “nearly” because several of their exam scores had already plummeted to eighty or sixty points.

Every one of them was teetering dangerously on the brink of being converted into Physical Training Aids.

Meeting those pairs of clear, wide eyes brimming with fear and desperate yearning, Qin Fu’an clearly sensed that these NPC students—who had appeared blank-faced and copy-pasted during the day—harbored emotional swings far more volatile than ordinary mortals when confronted with life and death.

Because they wanted to live.

Just like Xie Yunhuai, they were insignificant background NPCs in the eyes of players and viewers, yet within this school, each was a protagonist fighting tooth and nail to claw out a chance at survival.

Under the students’ terrified yet expectant stares, Qin Fu’an shut the classroom door behind him, stepped up to the podium, and addressed the shivering youths in an even tone: “As your acting teacher and the designated proctor for this period, now that the exam is half over, I expect every single one of you to pass.”

As Qin Fu’an stepped onto the podium, Xie Yunhuai gripped his item and positioned himself at the classroom door, vigilant against any ambush from prowling monsters.

The positions taken by the other students were rather intriguing: every one of them pressed tightly against the far wall, staying as far away from the corridor windows as possible.

Qin Fu’an knew full well that time was the most precious commodity they had to fight for. Without wasting a breath, he began barking out rapid directives from behind the lectern.

Formally, it was a group discussion on solving exam problems; in practice, he was organizing the students to unscrew and tear down desk and bench legs to use as blunt weapons, piling the spare timber against the windows as a makeshift barricade.

Beyond that, students hung school jackets covered in blood-and-ink writing along the corridor railings. Others scribbled across loose sheets of paper at top speed before scattering them by the handful from various points on the fourth floor, letting the bitter winter gale whip the lightweight flyers across every corner of the campus.

This instance, crowned as the Rookie Graveyard, was never meant to be cleared by a lone wolf or a tiny cabal of players.

Just as Qin Fu’an had deduced earlier that day: as students, the players occupied the lowest rung of the campus food chain—rock bottom, with nowhere lower to fall.

To withstand the crushing oppression and lethal threats, their only path was to expand their faction, rallying the collective power of the bottom-tier students to mount a united counterattack.

Only then could they carve out a sliver of hope for survival.

Provided, of course, that a player possessed the charisma and authority to marshal NPC students in the first place; otherwise, talking about cooperative resistance was nothing more than a joke.

“The rooftop would actually have been better. Easy to defend, hard to breach, and an absolute tactical vantage point,” Qin Fu’an remarked once the arrangements were settled, sounding slightly dissatisfied.

Hearing this, Xie Yunhuai shot him a questioning look.

Inexplicably, Qin Fu’an read the silent inquiry written across the youth’s face: Then why didn’t we stay up there?

“It’s easy to defend, yes, but we would forfeit all routes of retreat,” he explained. “Besides, since this is a pop quiz, examinees cannot leave the testing site at will. Nobody knows whether lingering on the roof counts as an infraction.”

If the game harbored even a shred more malice toward players and students, locked spaces like the rooftop were bound to conceal lethal traps.

Qin Fu’an despised letting unpredictable variables dictate his actions, which was why he had planned to abandon the rooftop once the exam reached its midpoint anyway.

Hearing the explanation, not only did Xie Yunhuai understand, but even the students straining their ears to eavesdrop put on expressions of sudden enlightenment.

Their subsequent behavior toward Qin Fu’an brimmed with even deeper trust and reliance.

The commotion on the fourth floor inevitably drew the attention of the horrors wandering the school grounds.

Unfortunately for the beasts, the prey that usually screamed and scrambled for cover upon catching their scent seemed to have swallowed a gallon of liquid courage. Not only did they stand their ground, but as the monsters stumbled up the stairs, the students raised their weapons with gleaming eyes, practically itching for a fight.

[Teacher Qin said that every student who passes tonight will get sweet honey water tomorrow! And anyone who personally kills a monster will receive a bounty of delicious snacks!]

To students who had never tasted anything flavorful in this school, this was nothing short of a windfall. Under the irresistible allure of honey water and packaged treats, their lingering dread curdled instantly into sharp, unadulterated bloodlust directed at the monsters.

None of them doubted whether Teacher Qin was feeding them empty promises. They had all witnessed with their own eyes how Xie Yunhuai had abruptly stepped into a paradise of pampering under Qin Fu’an’s wing—a life of luxury they wouldn’t have dared dream of.

And now, all they had to do was maintain a passing grade to drink sweet honey water.

All they had to do was put down a monster with their own hands to earn delicious snacks they had never tasted in their lives!

No kid could resist a temptation like that.

More importantly, they knew better than anyone that Teacher Qin had laid down these terms and helped them answer the questions purely because he wanted them to pass and stay alive.

Sandwiched between the threat of death and the temptation of exquisite food, these seemingly terrifying abominations no longer appeared insurmountable.

And when Xie Yunhuai led the charge, trapping a monster inside a bubble before the students swarmed forward to beat it to death with blunt rods, every student who witnessed and took part in the slaughter felt their eyes turn red with raw adrenaline.

These monsters could be killed.

These difficult, seemingly impossible exam questions had solutions—they could be solved and wiped out.

Once an invincible horror showed a health bar above its head, it meant the entity could be brought down.

And the moment an individual entity was annihilated, it proved that a counterattack—even a complete reversal—was within their grasp.

Qin Fu’an didn’t leave the students cooped up inside the room. He split them into two squads guarding either end of the stairwells, with Xie Yunhuai leading one wing and a physically stronger student spearheading the other.

Confirming that these youths were aggressively regarding the monsters as prey, Qin Fu’an found himself with time on his hands.

He stood in the corridor outside the classroom, leaning against the gore-spattered wall, his gaze drifting down to the crimson high heels rooted motionless further down the hall.

The proctor for the physical education exam.

Yet aside from declaring the testing rules at the very start, she had never shown herself.

Why were these shoes lingering right outside this classroom—and solely here?

Qin Fu’an remembered vividly that no such conspicuous footwear stood outside any of the other classrooms.

If judged as an individual entity, this proctor had likely remained planted here from the moment the exam commenced, never taking a single step away.

Yet Qin Fu’an’s eyes could not perceive her presence.

Now that was truly bizarre.

Qin Fu’an’s eyes were an innate racial gift. He could see through every falsehood under heaven and peer into the very souls of living beings, yet right now, he could not see the proctor at all.

Noticing Qin Fu’an fixing an unblinking stare on the high heels, the viewers in the chat—who had nearly forgotten about the proctor entirely—began voicing their own confusion.

[Wait, why are those shoes still there? Do they not move at all?]

[Does anyone know what the proctor actually is?]

[I know, but the system rules forbid me from spoiling it (exhausted smile)]

[I know too, but I’ve already racked up two yellow warning flags…]

[Feels insanely dangerous. Did the streamer spot something weird? Maybe try picking them up and chucking them down the stairs to see what happens?]

[…]

From the moment Qin Fu’an organized the students to mount an active defense, the bullet chat had descended into utter pandemonium.

The screen was clogged with chaotic chatter of every variety, but the most useful, explanatory comments couldn’t make it through the filters at all, earning their senders immediate system strikes.

Without anyone noticing, Qin Fu’an’s face and the stream title Spook High had quietly climbed to the number-one spot on the trending charts, its viewer metrics continuing an unbroken ascent.

It reached so high that it quietly settled onto the coveted “Rising Star” showcase on the front page of the horror streaming hub.

Yet Qin Fu’an couldn’t care less about these metrics. Not only did he decline to banter with the chat or put on an entertaining show, but finding the glowing interface a nuisance, he shoved the display off to a blind angle where it wouldn’t obstruct his sight, returning his undivided attention to the crimson shoes.

Currently, two possibilities presented themselves.

First: the proctor’s true form was literally this pair of crimson high heels, which was why Qin Fu’an could not perceive any broader entity.

Second: the proctor possessed a method within the scenario’s rules to shield herself from Qin Fu’an’s vision, leaving only a pair of shoes visible to the naked eye.

Qin Fu’an leaned toward the second hypothesis. In a school entirely populated by humanoid horrors, having a rogue pair of high heels pop up as an anomaly defied all narrative logic.

If it truly was the second case, however, he had to guard against the lethal threats lurking within this institution.

For instance: slipping past his senses unseen, closing the distance soundlessly, and striking him down in a single blow.

At that thought, a faint thread of anticipation actually stirred in Qin Fu’an’s chest.

As the stairwells on either side erupted into violent clashes once more, he cast the shoes a profound, lingering look. Then, straightening up with cold detachment, he strode right past the mysterious, ominous pair of crimson heels as if traversing an empty hall.

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