Raising a Wife in a Supernatural World [Infinite] – CH3

Chapter 3: Spook High (3)

Yet what method could they possibly use to effectively derail this class?

Nan Zhu’s mind involuntarily drifted back to the final ten minutes of the previous period—those endless ten minutes dominated by the relentless sounds of wet chewing. Now, looking toward those three vacant desks, not a trace of blood or splintered bone remained.

The instant the connection clicked, a shiver ran down her spine. She finally realized where the true, sinister trap of this instance lay.

One misstep led to another. During the break after the first period, they had squandered their time hunting for rules, falling headfirst into the instance’s invisible snare. Failing to finish the test led to a tenfold copy punishment, and to buy enough time to complete it, the simplest and most effective shortcut was to sacrifice their own companions.

Feed the teacher until he was sated, and an entire period could be used to catch up on homework.

Not only that, but this tactic would prevent the current teacher from assigning any new coursework, sparing them the assignments due next period as well.

Vicious. Utterly vicious.

That was the first thought that flashed through Nan Zhu’s mind.

Immediately after, a swell of gratitude rose toward the person who had tossed the note. Fortunately, his warning had arrived early enough to give her room to think, rather than letting the group spiral into mutual sabotage and paranoia from the very start.

Mid-thought, Nan Zhu glanced up slightly, her eyes catching the rapid stream of bullet chat rolling across her screen.

[Streamer, streamer, that Yake guy looks like he’s got plenty of meat on his bones. Feed him to the teacher, and I’ll tip you ten Crimson Moons.]

[Get moving, Streamer! If you stuff this teacher full, I’ll drop a Super Moon on you too.]

One Crimson Moon = 100 points.

One Super Moon = 500 points.

In the instance mall, points held immense purchasing power. A single point could buy a bottle of water or bread, while a hundred points could purchase a stockpile of disposable white-tier items. The temptation offered by the audience was staggering.

Even Nan Zhu, across her first two beginner instances combined, had accumulated fewer than five hundred points. That meant if she followed the chat’s bidding, a single class period would not only solve their present crisis, but make her an overnight fortune.

Yet Nan Zhu calmly averted her eyes from those venomous, coaxing messages.

She ignored the barrage of petulant complaints that followed, threatening to unfollow.

Raising her hand from her desk, she caught the attention of the bloated, flabby teacher on the podium, who squinted his tiny slits of eyes and signaled for her to stand.

“Teacher, could you explain the previous problem in a bit more detail?” Nan Zhu gathered her courage to hold the entity’s gaze. Before the teacher’s expression could sour, she spoke up in a crisp, earnest voice, “Teacher Zhang, I know the answer to this question, but I’d really like to hear you break down more variations of this type. That way, if something similar appears on the Gaokao, I won’t disappoint you.”

Unable to devise a cleaner way to disrupt the lecture, and anxious that the other players might succumb to the lure of the bullet chat, she had no choice but to bite the bullet and pitch a measured compromise.

The players who had survived into their second or third instances were far from stupid. Realizing what Nan Zhu was trying to achieve, Yake raised his hand as well, heaping on generous layers of flattery. His praise spanned everything from how much he adored this class to declaring that Teacher Zhang’s pedagogical skills were leagues ahead of any other teacher…

Qin Fu’an found this batch of players rather entertaining.

At this rate, a few more compliments from Yake might actually eat up half the period.

Still, there were always a rare few who remained completely oblivious. Rather than capitalizing on the time Nan Zhu and Yake were buying, they sat with their heads tilted back, staring vacantly into space without the foggiest idea of what to do.

Yes—specifically referring to that total rookie.

The slender pen spun lazily through Qin Fu’an’s fingers once more. Bored, he rested his chin in his left palm, tilting his head to study his deskmate.

Everyone wore the same blue-and-white high school tracksuits, and everyone bore thoroughly ordinary faces. Yet for reasons unknown, whenever his deskmate bent his head over his work, Qin Fu’an detected an inexplicable hint of docility in him.

Perhaps it was simply because Xie Yunhuai was too diligent. He didn’t look like an eldritch creature teetering on the verge of mutation and madness; he looked like a hardworking little nerd buried in his books.

Had the standards in the afterworld risen so high that being a ghost required Oscar-tier acting?

Qin Fu’an stared at the boy’s delicate profile, lost in thought.

Xie Yunhuai held out for as long as he could, but that direct, unblinking gaze remained glued to him without straying an inch.

While the teacher was occupied by the bizarre flattery of the other students, Xie Yunhuai furrowed his brow and shot a glare at his neighbor.

Only to slam straight into those clear, pale green eyes.

Xie Yunhuai had to admit the man’s eyes were striking.

Striking enough to stir an impulse within him: to gouge them out, polish them into the most exquisite, priceless gems, and mount them in his personal collection.

Yet the bizarre thought vanished as quickly as it had surfaced. The owner of those pretty eyes had already plunged into negative territory in his mental ledger.

Disliking the man meant disliking everything about him; those eyes suddenly didn’t look so captivating anymore.

Brought back to earth by his deskmate’s glare, Qin Fu’an blinked, slightly puzzled by the sudden, faint trace of bloodlust in the air.

Failing to pinpoint the source, and noting that Nan Zhu and Yake had already sat back down while the bloated teacher droned on about similar problem sets, Qin Fu’an reeled himself in.

He stopped musing about how much theatrical skill was required to be an anomaly. Letting his gaze drift blankly, he dutifully spent the rest of the dreary lesson daydreaming.

When the bell rang again, Teacher Zhang fixed his gaze on the few players who hadn’t finished their papers. His eyes were dark and malicious, tinged with lingering frustration: “If your homework isn’t done by next period, you will spend the entire class standing out in the hallway.”

The players he singled out didn’t even have the breath to reply. Heads down, they scribbled frantically, determined to squeeze every single second out of their break.

Yet a moment later, static crackled from the loudspeaker mounted above the blackboard.

“Good day, students. It’s time for morning calisthenics. Our esteemed Principal will be delivering a brief address on the athletic grounds today. All students are required to assemble on the field within three minutes. Tardy students will have their names recorded, resulting in deductions from both personal conduct and class scores~”

A girl’s voice drifted out, distant and ethereal, fractured by choppy electronic static like an old cassette player mangling its tape.

The earlier words were standard enough, but by the final sentence, the exaggerated lilt in her tone failed entirely to conceal the mocking, spiteful glee dripping from every syllable.

The moment the broadcast sounded, the ordinary students in the room scrambled to their feet, eager to leave.

Nan Zhu, Yake, and the rest, despite their ashen complexions, had no choice but to drop their pens and squeeze into the departing crowd.

Except…

“The malice in this game really is everywhere,” Qin Fu’an murmured, watching Teacher Zhang stand squarely in the frame, his massive bulk wedged tight to block the classroom door. He finally understood why the creature had been so easily flattered during the second period, showing none of the grotesque appetite of the first teacher.

He had never intended to let the students of Grade 12, Class 4 live to see the third period in the first place.

“What do you usually do in a spot like this?” Qin Fu’an tugged familiarly at the sleeve of his deskmate ahead of him.

Xie Yunhuai, whose erratic breathing had begun slipping toward a frenzied mutation, found himself violently derailed once more. He drew in a silent, shuddering breath, yanked his sleeve from the man’s grip, and turned around with a deadpan stare.

“Can’t get out? You die.” Just four words, laced with razor-sharp intent.

Yet to Qin Fu’an’s ears, it sounded suspiciously like the brat was cursing him right to his face.

He let out an amused huff. Meeting his little deskmate’s frigid gaze, he raised his voice without warning: “Excuse me, classmates! Mind clearing a path?”

The room went dead silent.

Only Qin Fu’an’s clear, leisurely voice echoed against the broadcast’s ticking countdown.

“My grades aren’t great, but I was born with a fair bit of muscle. If you clear a path, I’ll boot the obstacle blocking the doorway straight out of our way so we all have a bright and hopeful future. What do you say?”

The dense cluster of “classmates” wedged against the door with the teacher turned their heads in unison.

Some people, even with their uniforms zipped up cleanly to the collar, carried an effortless, unyielding edge that made them look like a schoolyard delinquent you didn’t dare cross. At this very moment, Qin Fu’an’s aura—coupled with that outrageously insolent proposal—was… surprisingly persuasive.

Like marionettes severed from their strings, the crowd of students parted to both sides.

The opening finally laid bare Teacher Zhang, whose face had darkened so severely it looked ready to drip ink.

“Teacher Zhang, this is all for the good of the school and the student body. Surely you wouldn’t be petty enough to hold a grudge against me, right?” Qin Fu’an gave a cheerful wave toward the teacher.

The second the greeting left his lips, his leg snapped out. Right before everyone’s eyes, his foot planted squarely into the swollen mountain of flab.

Qin Fu’an held nothing back. While Nan Zhu and the other players were still paralyzed, wondering whether the move violated school rules, their beloved Teacher Zhang was launched out the door like a gargantuan fleshy cannonball.

The colossal mass of meat slammed into the concrete railing of the hallway balcony, rebounded with surprising elasticity onto the floor, and was instantly trampled beneath the frantic feet of students stampeding down from the neighboring classrooms.

Everyone was racing against the clock. With the principal waiting, no one cared about the meat cushion underfoot. Trampled again and again, Teacher Zhang’s bloated bulk flattened out at a visible rate—a twisted stroke of luck, perhaps, if one considered it an aggressive weight-loss regimen.

“Come on, what are you waiting for?” Qin Fu’an glanced back at the stunned high schoolers. Dropping the reminder as he strolled out, he reached out, caught the hesitant Xie Yunhuai by the collar, and broke into a sprint.

“…Let go! I can walk on my own!” Caught off guard, Xie Yunhuai nearly went airborne from the pull.

He was completely at a loss. He couldn’t fathom why, when he was just an ordinary, unremarkable, faceless student NPC, Qin Fu’an seemed fixated on him, refusing to treat him like background noise.

It made no sense.

Just like Qin Fu’an punting Teacher Zhang across the corridor made no sense at all.

Yet that cool, detached thought merely grazed Xie Yunhuai’s mind before he was hauled along by Qin Fu’an’s long strides, the biting wind whipping against his face and blowing his thoughts entirely blank.

Meanwhile, the perpetrator had the leisure to share his architectural critique: “Well, well. Our school really has character. Scheduling such an important exam in the dead of winter? Outstanding.”

“Given thermal expansion and contraction, our beloved Teacher Zhang might just achieve a stunning weight-loss transformation by next period.”

Xie Yunhuai: “…”

Was it truly forbidden to gouge those eyes out, and then take a needle and thread to stitch that mouth shut forever?!

Click here to download the full novel (PDF & EPUB)