At the instant the paper plane entered the Corpse Pit, the small cluster of flames at its nose burst forth. Burning not only the plane itself but also raising a wall of fire over two-metres high.
The inferno swept out of the iron door and within moments, transformed the air across a vast area into a sea of fire, distorting the iron door and turning it red.
Methane was a flammable gas. The barest spark was all it took to kindle. Not to mention the fact that the Corpse Pit was essentially a humongous methane-generating tank. Too many corpses were deposited inside, and the anaerobic environment was full of flammable and explosive gases. All it took was a small spark to reap unimaginable surprises.
Such as… an explosion.
AD
When Zong Jiu yelled “get down”, everyone instinctively followed his instruction.
Scorching air currents towered skyward, as though wrapped in the resentment of those departed in this school. It wailed and howled, singeing the hair of the trainees sprawled on the ground.
Once ignited, the fire was unstoppable, spreading to the core of the Corpse Pit in a matter of seconds.
Almost in an instant, the quadrangle surface ruptured. In the wake of the explosion, the concrete masonry lifted into the air, shattering flower beds beyond its outskirts and sending sand and dirt flying.
Prepared for the explosion, the trainees either took refuge on the stairs of the teaching block or the corners of the quadrangle that didn’t cover the Corpse Pit. Only a few unlucky souls got hit by the flying sand and dirt, rolling on the ground in pain.
The teaching assistants weren’t as fortunate.
Those teaching assistants behind the iron gate were the first impacted and the first to be cremated by the fiery sea. Those in the quadrangle who didn’t have the time to get out of the way were also tossed to the ground, the flesh of their featureless faces scrunched together as their lips split in a minute crack, hissing in abject terror.
Huge flames burst out of the rupture across the middle of the ruined quadrangle and jetted several metres high.
The exam paper storage room just a wall away from the Corpse Pit was immediately razed to rubble.
AD
Millions of papers stacked to the ceiling, printed in advance, the source of suffering throughout the school… all burned. All coming together to become the perfect accelerants for the flames that seemed to sweep heaven and earth in a roar of rage.
It was uncomfortable for the trainees outside the iron door to be in such close quarters to the explosion.
Fortunately, First High School built its underground area based on the design standards of air-raid shelters. Therefore, although the explosion occurred in the underground tunnel, the direction of the explosion was horizontal, and though the vertical direction was engulfed by fire, it still staunchly endured the first wave of explosions due to the high load-bearing force. Thus, trainees who were in front of the iron gate were able to escape with a buffer from the stairs.
This might have been beyond the wildest dreams of the staff at First High School. They had put the exam paper storage room and Corpse Pit in one place, deliberately setting up a robust load-bearing structure so teaching assistants could concentrate on guarding it in a secure facility. In the end, this area turned out to be their burial ground. What was even more ironic was the fact that these trainees were merely applying the knowledge they’d learned during high school chemistry.
“Go!”
After the first blast passed, Zong Jiu tugged the trainees around him, towing them with him as they stumbled away.
They were the closest to the centre of the blast. Not only did they suffer light burns on their skin, but their ears were also bleeding from the powerful sound and were unable to hear anything for a while. With body language as his only option, Zong Jiu could only pull them out one by one before proceeding.
This was only the first wave. Depending on the safety perimeters of the Corpse Pit, it was even possible that the teaching block might crumble too. Staying here would only lead to the doors of death.
Why they could only act now was because the instance would only end at noon today.
This was also the reason Zong Jiu said he thought of an idea before, but it could only be implemented during the final exam. If they blew up the school during the midterms, they wouldn’t have been able to complete the main task, but instead be lifting a rock and smashing it on their own feet.
The series of operations just now was swift and well-executed. Based on the schedule, they’d still have to stay here for four hours. During this, not only did they have to meet the system’s criteria of destroying the instance, but even had to survive to the end to fulfil both tasks.
The grim situation faced by the trainees had the bullet chat on tenterhooks.
[They still have to stay here for four hours. What can they do against so many teaching assistants?]
[They have to keep the fire going during this time. Just blowing up the Corpse Pit might not be enough for the system to declare the instance as destroyed, or it wouldn’t be so hard for everyone else but that guy to do it. Personally, I feel this instance isn’t too bad, I mean at least they’ve been given a way out.]
[The problem now is that many trainees on this side have gotten injured. Having to hold out for another four hours is going to be tough.]
[Believe in them. Besides, I feel assured when I think about how No. 1 is also in this instance.]
[Wake up from your idea. Since when has No. 1 ever helped another trainee? I bet you weren’t here at the start of the instance.]
On the bright side, it wasn’t as though the trainees hadn’t been prepared for this.
Soon, the contenders in the live broadcast found the preparations that the trainees had made in the past half-month.
“Class 9! Ready, strike!”
None of the classes had been idle, especially Class 9 who had taken advantage of this time to amass enough books and exam papers.
This morning, they heaped all the books and exam papers at the entrance.
Now, all of Class 9 rushed forward with their books, as though forgetting the bloody welts across their backs and the searing pain that came with every step. Smiles of pleasure spread across their faces as they got their revenge. They brought fire from the rupture in the quadrangle, swiftly dashing to the teaching block and spreading the precious flames across every classroom.
“Hahahahaha!”
Laughter was interspersed with explosions, brimming with primal joy.
The bullet chat cheered with them, spamming [Feels so good!], [Burn! Screw this instance!], [Are you guys single? The way you torch people is deserving of entering the FFF Inquisition, /comical.jpg]
Ktf mijrrgbbw yftlcv fnfgs uijrr klcvbk kjr rfa jiluta, uibklcu gfrqifcvfcais.
Mijwfr gbjgfv jcv rkfqa tjiikjsr lcab atf olfgs rfj.
Yc atf batfg rlvf, qfbqif kfgf atgbklcu lcmfcvljglfr ja tbrafi klcvbkr.
Ktfs wjvf regf cba ab rtea atf klcvbkr ktfc atfs ifoa atf tbrafi. Cr rbbc jr yegclcu ybbxr kfgf atgbkc lc, atf mbaabc yijcxfar, yfvvlcur, jcv qliibkmjrfr jii yegra lcab oijwfr, reywfgulcu atf tbrafi lc j olgf lc cb alwf ja jii.
Trainees cheerfully ran around the campus, like torch bearers for the Olympic Games. For a moment, they seemed to be disguised as Prometheus stealing the divine fire from Apollo’s Chariot, capering about with the flames of hope held high and scattering incendiaries in their wake.
As they spread the fire, a second blast followed.
The successive explosions rattled their heads. The Corpse Pit’s pungent odour bloomed outwards, spreading over the narrow area and making people sick.
While the fires passed around, the class monitors were methodically coordinating the trainees.
The best time to maximise their gains was now, before the teaching assistants recovered from their confusion in this crisis.
It wasn’t just the trainees of Class 9. Every trainee was returning the anger pent up from their one hundred and twenty days here.
The Corpse Pit had only blown up the teaching director; the headmaster who didn’t often make a showing had yet to turn up. They weren’t so naive to think this would be able to decimate all of First High School’s defences. There was still a lot of work to be done.
Dark Warlock stood with his arms crossed, like a man who stood above and beyond all of this.
His dark green eyes slid across No. 2, across the indistinct puppet string above his head, and looked behind him.
Without Zong Jiu realising it himself, he had stirred Van Zhuo’s memories. Moreover, this instance was a paradise for No. 1 to play in, and the Devil, riding the wave of chance, had a grand gift placed in his hands.
Tallying it up, about half the S-ranks had now fallen into the Devil’s hands. Even the Night Clan leader who had been on his guard was unable to escape. However, implanting a single puppet string allowed only access to the memories, not even partial control. With Van Zhuo’s vigilance, it would be difficult for him to increase the number of puppet strings without more time.
Then again, it was a natural progression after the implantation of the first string. As long as No. 2 didn’t notice it himself, it was only a matter of time for him to fall into complete control.
A trainee’s alarmed cry carried over. “Run! The foundation of this building is about to collapse!”
Despite being another step closer to the ultimate objective of his deal with the system, the Devil seemed a little disinterested.
He leaned back into the shadows, watching as the entirety of First High School was enveloped in flames. He watched as the left wing of the teaching block suddenly collapsed, and watched as the white-haired young man jumped up nimbly. Though thick soot was smeared on the other’s face, his eyes still shone as brightly as before. He weaved through the smoke and rubble, lighting the cards between his fingers and flicking them to different places.
With the spreading fire and the explosions, First High School was ruined beyond recognition.
The buildings collapsed, and the quadrangle exploded. There was no sign of the original, let alone the devastation as far as the eye could see. If the Devil were to comment, though the instance was wrecked, the process was without any beauty whatsoever and hardly appealing to his aesthetic taste.
This group of trainees had pretty good luck to have found an alternative door to survival in this seemingly despairing instance.
No. 1 absently propped his head on a hand, his expression indolent.
There were many ways to destroy an instance, but each was hellishly difficult.
As compared to the method the Devil liked most, physical destruction was harder to execute. Because the background of high-ranking instances was mostly laid out in malformed worlds, to physically destroy it would require destroying the world, which was absurd for even No. 1 to achieve.
Even the trainee acknowledged to be the strongest physically, the walking humanoid weapon Van Zhuo, could at best split steel plates with his bare hands. Under the system’s premise of ‘no breaking beyond the limitations of human strength’, even the strongest couldn’t turn into a Super Saiyan.
Take the previous instances, for example. Neither Zhuge An, Van Zhuo, nor any other S-rank would be able to wreck the Mental Asylum and the Famine Mountain Village—save for the Devil.
Just like this instance, First High School. It belonged to an independent world.
Luck, however… was also a type of strength.
Quietly, the corner of the man’s lips curled up, and he melted into the shadows.
The remaining trainees stood with their backs against each other on the southwest side of the quadrangle that didn’t cover the Corpse Pit, locking eyes with the teaching assistants standing on the other side of the fiery sea. The headmaster had now appeared, standing behind the crowd with his pot belly and his face twisted.
A faceless person stood apart amidst the trainees.
Class 9 pulled index 15 to join them. Even if he had become a faceless trainee, Class 9 didn’t toss him aside but instead sent some from their already limited manpower to protect and haul him to safety.
Zong Jiu, guarding the front, crushed the fire-borne exam papers into a ball and threw them at a teaching assistant who tried to break through the tight encirclement.
Unable to dodge in time, the teaching assistant burned. His entire body stiffened and unexpectedly, he didn’t try to put out the fire but stood still and waited for the flames to spread.
They were scared of fire!
While escaping for his life just now, Zong Jiu still paid close attention to how the instance NPCs reacted. With the billowing smog, it was difficult to tell what was beneath the thick soot on their faces.
But his multitasking wasn’t for naught. On the contrary, it was a bountiful harvest.
The faceless people moved extraordinarily slowly when encircled by fire.
Though they didn’t have faces, they were still humans in all other ways and naturally would be afraid of fire as well.
A more welcome discovery was that if a faceless person died in the flames, the flesh on his face would contort, like being remoulded into twisted, ghastly faces charred in the blazing flames.
Zong Jiu shared his discoveries with everyone.
The Night Clan leader nodded. His red irises darkened as he drew his sabre from the system backpack.
“We must seize the initiative. If I’m not mistaken, we’ll have to wreck more than just the scene, but also eliminate these NPCs for the instance to be truly considered destroyed.”
After special props were deactivated, the imposing ‘Caligula’ also lost its bloody shine when being drawn from its sheath.
Caligula was historically the Roman Empire’s third emperor. Ancient Rome was full of tyrants, especially the aforementioned. This sabre named after the emperor was no different, unremittingly sucking blood like a savage fiend whenever it inflicted a wound on an enemy.
The sabre was a weapon bestowed on Van Zhuo in the S-rank instance he gained his vampiric lineage. It started as a solid A-rank prop, later enhanced to S-rank by strange encounters in other instances. This greatly boosted Van Zhuo’s personal strength and was one of the reasons for which he could be firmly enthroned as No. 2.
Nevertheless, the deactivation of its prop ability didn’t detract from Caligula’s intimidating reputation.
At least, there wasn’t the slightest drag as it speared a burning page and brought it to a faceless person’s chest.
Since it was No. 2 who spoke, no trainee doubted it.
“Fighting is not necessary! They’re afraid of fire, so just have the fire burn everything down!”
Everyone’s combat power was reduced to a minimum, so this was the only method available to them.
To fully utilise the paper, everyone followed Zong Jiu and crumpled each page into a ball to use as incendiaries, flinging them everywhere.
The effect was delightful. The already raging flames connected and surrounded the entire quadrangle.
Faceless people wailed and disappeared in the inferno, their faces gruesomely contorted as they turned into charred black bodies.
“Rumble—”
Some time passed. More buildings grated uncomfortably, collapsing.
By now, none of the school buildings of First High School was intact. All of them had areas that collapsed or exploded, looking in a dismal state.
Although, everyone was anxious as they still had three faceless people to deal with.
First High School’s headmaster was seriously too much of a wimp, hiding behind the teaching assistants all throughout. He pulled a few people to stand in the other area untouched by the fire, even trying to phone for external help.
The distance between their two camps was truly too far for them to spread the fire over. It spanned more than half of a basketball court. Without his enhancements, even Zong Jiu couldn’t do anything about it. It was literally a head-spinning situation.
“What should we do? Charge in?”
“No.”
Zong Jiu immediately overruled this proposal. “Considering the distance and the intensity of the fire, it’s more probable that we’ll burn to our deaths midway, much less make it over.”
As idea after idea was rejected, everyone found themselves trapped in an impossible situation.
The viewers in the live broadcast were even more anxious than them.
[The anxiety is driving me crazy. Can they charge across?]
[Just ten more minutes, jiayou, stay strong!]
[C’mon, let’s go! Whether this instance can be taken down depends on this last stroke.]
[This headmaster is seriously dipshit… He’s just hiding there like a chicken, but anyone who crosses the fire to him is doomed. Damnit, if only they could use their special props.]
Just as they were at their wits’ ends, there was an abrupt development.
Index 15, who had been protected by Class 9’s trainees all this time, suddenly moved.
He rushed straight on, knocking the trainees in front of him out of the way, and rushed into the fire without a single look back.
The people who were knocked aside were stunned, sitting on the ground, bewildered.
“Room rep!”
This turnaround was so shocking that no one was able to react for a while—except index 98, seemingly woken up from a dream.
Tears rolled down from his eyes as he roared with all his might towards the fire, “What are you doing? Can you understand us? Come back!”
But index 15, who had become a faceless person, turned a deaf ear.
He dashed onwards. The soles of his shoes and the legs of his pants charred by the fire, yet he forged forth as though feeling no pain, sprinting straight towards the headmaster and the two teaching assistants.
Even the bullet chat was astonished.
[Wtf is going on, this is the first time I’m hearing that faceless people can still have awareness?]
[Can faceless people convert back? But I remembered several classes finding clues that said that it’s irreversible. Is this a system bug?]
[It can’t be. Many classes previously tried to check if faceless trainees lose their autonomy like zombies in apocalyptic instances and all came to the same conclusion. If they hadn’t lost their autonomy, why wouldn’t the system take them back?]
[Hang on, sisters, don’t be so quick to jump to conclusions. I suddenly thought of something. Class 9’s index 15 is different. Faceless trainees from other classes were forced into converting out of desperation and their environment. But this isn’t so for index 15. He voluntarily became a faceless person out of love for his peers. This isn’t the same as those who were pushed to the brink. Am I making sense?]
[Yeah! You do! I second that!]
In the second before reaching the headmaster, index 15 finally looked back.
From across the blazing fire, just for a moment, Class 9 seemed to see once more the smile always on the lips of that quiet and gentle face.
But there wasn’t.
The face across the flames was still flat, smooth, and expressionless. Without any sign of changing back.
But at the very last moment, a long slit for the mouth cracked open, the same as all other faceless people did when they spoke and gurgled.
Those lips fumbled, seemingly trying to say something, yet time not permitting.
Index 15 had already crossed a distance as long as half a basketball court in the fiery sea at the cost of becoming a man of fire. His hair had turned patchy, and it was even harder to see his face.
Of course, at a moment like this, no one cared about these.
Every trainee knew what index 15 was going to do next. Class 9’s voices were hoarse from their shouting, crying and choking on their sobs.
“Index 15, if you can fucking hear us, then why aren’t you coming back? Come back over!”
“Fuck you, you clearly still have awareness. Has it been fun keeping us in the dark and taking us for fools?!”
“You and index 99 are both idiots! Do you hear me! Big idiots!!”
Hearing the enraged cursing behind him, index 15 laughed mutely in his head.
He didn’t know why he wanted to laugh, for his thoughts seemed a million times slower now. He stood in place for a very long time, listening to the noise of destruction exploding around First High School. Only then, as though in an afterthought, did he take a step.
Perhaps it was because of the voluntary transformation that he miraculously retained a trace of autonomy—but he was unable to control his body either. Instead, it was his body that moved one step ahead of his consciousness, rushing forward.
Maybe somewhere in his subconscious, he wanted to protect the warmth and loveliness of this class with his life.
But it was as the diary had said. The transformation into a faceless person was irreversible. Whether or not there still existed consciousness didn’t matter—he couldn’t return to the trainee dormitories. From the moment that he chose to become a faceless person, this ending was predetermined. Irremediable, and irredeemable.
Therefore, let him do one last thing for Class 9.
Index 15 spread his arms. By spreading the fire with his body, he flung himself at the headmaster and the teaching assistants in the clearing down with him into the dark sinkhole behind, propelling them into the blazing fire.
Wretched screams reverberated through the quadrangle and not a splash was heard.
His figure was resolute, like a butterfly set aflame. Like a bird with a broken wing, completing his last mission.
Like he was silently telling everyone—
Never regret.
At the instant the paper plane entered the Corpse Pit, the small cluster of flames at its nose burst forth. Burning not only the plane itself but also raising a wall of fire over two-metres high.
The inferno swept out of the iron door and within moments, transformed the air across a vast area into a sea of fire, distorting the iron door and turning it red.
Methane was a flammable gas. The barest spark was all it took to kindle. Not to mention the fact that the Corpse Pit was essentially a humongous methane-generating tank. Too many corpses were deposited inside, and the anaerobic environment was full of flammable and explosive gases. All it took was a small spark to reap unimaginable surprises.
Such as… an explosion.
AD
When Zong Jiu yelled “get down”, everyone instinctively followed his instruction.
Scorching air currents towered skyward, as though wrapped in the resentment of those departed in this school. It wailed and howled, singeing the hair of the trainees sprawled on the ground.
Once ignited, the fire was unstoppable, spreading to the core of the Corpse Pit in a matter of seconds.
Almost in an instant, the quadrangle surface ruptured. In the wake of the explosion, the concrete masonry lifted into the air, shattering flower beds beyond its outskirts and sending sand and dirt flying.
Prepared for the explosion, the trainees either took refuge on the stairs of the teaching block or the corners of the quadrangle that didn’t cover the Corpse Pit. Only a few unlucky souls got hit by the flying sand and dirt, rolling on the ground in pain.
The teaching assistants weren’t as fortunate.
Those teaching assistants behind the iron gate were the first impacted and the first to be cremated by the fiery sea. Those in the quadrangle who didn’t have the time to get out of the way were also tossed to the ground, the flesh of their featureless faces scrunched together as their lips split in a minute crack, hissing in abject terror.
Huge flames burst out of the rupture across the middle of the ruined quadrangle and jetted several metres high.
The exam paper storage room just a wall away from the Corpse Pit was immediately razed to rubble.
AD
Millions of papers stacked to the ceiling, printed in advance, the source of suffering throughout the school… all burned. All coming together to become the perfect accelerants for the flames that seemed to sweep heaven and earth in a roar of rage.
It was uncomfortable for the trainees outside the iron door to be in such close quarters to the explosion.
Fortunately, First High School built its underground area based on the design standards of air-raid shelters. Therefore, although the explosion occurred in the underground tunnel, the direction of the explosion was horizontal, and though the vertical direction was engulfed by fire, it still staunchly endured the first wave of explosions due to the high load-bearing force. Thus, trainees who were in front of the iron gate were able to escape with a buffer from the stairs.
This might have been beyond the wildest dreams of the staff at First High School. They had put the exam paper storage room and Corpse Pit in one place, deliberately setting up a robust load-bearing structure so teaching assistants could concentrate on guarding it in a secure facility. In the end, this area turned out to be their burial ground. What was even more ironic was the fact that these trainees were merely applying the knowledge they’d learned during high school chemistry.
“Go!”
After the first blast passed, Zong Jiu tugged the trainees around him, towing them with him as they stumbled away.
They were the closest to the centre of the blast. Not only did they suffer light burns on their skin, but their ears were also bleeding from the powerful sound and were unable to hear anything for a while. With body language as his only option, Zong Jiu could only pull them out one by one before proceeding.
This was only the first wave. Depending on the safety perimeters of the Corpse Pit, it was even possible that the teaching block might crumble too. Staying here would only lead to the doors of death.
Why they could only act now was because the instance would only end at noon today.
This was also the reason Zong Jiu said he thought of an idea before, but it could only be implemented during the final exam. If they blew up the school during the midterms, they wouldn’t have been able to complete the main task, but instead be lifting a rock and smashing it on their own feet.
The series of operations just now was swift and well-executed. Based on the schedule, they’d still have to stay here for four hours. During this, not only did they have to meet the system’s criteria of destroying the instance, but even had to survive to the end to fulfil both tasks.
The grim situation faced by the trainees had the bullet chat on tenterhooks.
[They still have to stay here for four hours. What can they do against so many teaching assistants?]
[They have to keep the fire going during this time. Just blowing up the Corpse Pit might not be enough for the system to declare the instance as destroyed, or it wouldn’t be so hard for everyone else but that guy to do it. Personally, I feel this instance isn’t too bad, I mean at least they’ve been given a way out.]
[The problem now is that many trainees on this side have gotten injured. Having to hold out for another four hours is going to be tough.]
[Believe in them. Besides, I feel assured when I think about how No. 1 is also in this instance.]
[Wake up from your idea. Since when has No. 1 ever helped another trainee? I bet you weren’t here at the start of the instance.]
On the bright side, it wasn’t as though the trainees hadn’t been prepared for this.
Soon, the contenders in the live broadcast found the preparations that the trainees had made in the past half-month.
“Class 9! Ready, strike!”
None of the classes had been idle, especially Class 9 who had taken advantage of this time to amass enough books and exam papers.
This morning, they heaped all the books and exam papers at the entrance.
Now, all of Class 9 rushed forward with their books, as though forgetting the bloody welts across their backs and the searing pain that came with every step. Smiles of pleasure spread across their faces as they got their revenge. They brought fire from the rupture in the quadrangle, swiftly dashing to the teaching block and spreading the precious flames across every classroom.
“Hahahahaha!”
Laughter was interspersed with explosions, brimming with primal joy.
The bullet chat cheered with them, spamming [Feels so good!], [Burn! Screw this instance!], [Are you guys single? The way you torch people is deserving of entering the FFF Inquisition, /comical.jpg]
Ktf mijrrgbbw yftlcv fnfgs uijrr klcvbk kjr rfa jiluta, uibklcu gfrqifcvfcais.
Mijwfr gbjgfv jcv rkfqa tjiikjsr lcab atf olfgs rfj.
Yc atf batfg rlvf, qfbqif kfgf atgbklcu lcmfcvljglfr ja tbrafi klcvbkr.
Ktfs wjvf regf cba ab rtea atf klcvbkr ktfc atfs ifoa atf tbrafi. Cr rbbc jr yegclcu ybbxr kfgf atgbkc lc, atf mbaabc yijcxfar, yfvvlcur, jcv qliibkmjrfr jii yegra lcab oijwfr, reywfgulcu atf tbrafi lc j olgf lc cb alwf ja jii.
Trainees cheerfully ran around the campus, like torch bearers for the Olympic Games. For a moment, they seemed to be disguised as Prometheus stealing the divine fire from Apollo’s Chariot, capering about with the flames of hope held high and scattering incendiaries in their wake.
As they spread the fire, a second blast followed.
The successive explosions rattled their heads. The Corpse Pit’s pungent odour bloomed outwards, spreading over the narrow area and making people sick.
While the fires passed around, the class monitors were methodically coordinating the trainees.
The best time to maximise their gains was now, before the teaching assistants recovered from their confusion in this crisis.
It wasn’t just the trainees of Class 9. Every trainee was returning the anger pent up from their one hundred and twenty days here.
The Corpse Pit had only blown up the teaching director; the headmaster who didn’t often make a showing had yet to turn up. They weren’t so naive to think this would be able to decimate all of First High School’s defences. There was still a lot of work to be done.
Dark Warlock stood with his arms crossed, like a man who stood above and beyond all of this.
His dark green eyes slid across No. 2, across the indistinct puppet string above his head, and looked behind him.
Without Zong Jiu realising it himself, he had stirred Van Zhuo’s memories. Moreover, this instance was a paradise for No. 1 to play in, and the Devil, riding the wave of chance, had a grand gift placed in his hands.
Tallying it up, about half the S-ranks had now fallen into the Devil’s hands. Even the Night Clan leader who had been on his guard was unable to escape. However, implanting a single puppet string allowed only access to the memories, not even partial control. With Van Zhuo’s vigilance, it would be difficult for him to increase the number of puppet strings without more time.
Then again, it was a natural progression after the implantation of the first string. As long as No. 2 didn’t notice it himself, it was only a matter of time for him to fall into complete control.
A trainee’s alarmed cry carried over. “Run! The foundation of this building is about to collapse!”
Despite being another step closer to the ultimate objective of his deal with the system, the Devil seemed a little disinterested.
He leaned back into the shadows, watching as the entirety of First High School was enveloped in flames. He watched as the left wing of the teaching block suddenly collapsed, and watched as the white-haired young man jumped up nimbly. Though thick soot was smeared on the other’s face, his eyes still shone as brightly as before. He weaved through the smoke and rubble, lighting the cards between his fingers and flicking them to different places.
With the spreading fire and the explosions, First High School was ruined beyond recognition.
The buildings collapsed, and the quadrangle exploded. There was no sign of the original, let alone the devastation as far as the eye could see. If the Devil were to comment, though the instance was wrecked, the process was without any beauty whatsoever and hardly appealing to his aesthetic taste.
This group of trainees had pretty good luck to have found an alternative door to survival in this seemingly despairing instance.
No. 1 absently propped his head on a hand, his expression indolent.
There were many ways to destroy an instance, but each was hellishly difficult.
As compared to the method the Devil liked most, physical destruction was harder to execute. Because the background of high-ranking instances was mostly laid out in malformed worlds, to physically destroy it would require destroying the world, which was absurd for even No. 1 to achieve.
Even the trainee acknowledged to be the strongest physically, the walking humanoid weapon Van Zhuo, could at best split steel plates with his bare hands. Under the system’s premise of ‘no breaking beyond the limitations of human strength’, even the strongest couldn’t turn into a Super Saiyan.
Take the previous instances, for example. Neither Zhuge An, Van Zhuo, nor any other S-rank would be able to wreck the Mental Asylum and the Famine Mountain Village—save for the Devil.
Just like this instance, First High School. It belonged to an independent world.
Luck, however… was also a type of strength.
Quietly, the corner of the man’s lips curled up, and he melted into the shadows.
The remaining trainees stood with their backs against each other on the southwest side of the quadrangle that didn’t cover the Corpse Pit, locking eyes with the teaching assistants standing on the other side of the fiery sea. The headmaster had now appeared, standing behind the crowd with his pot belly and his face twisted.
A faceless person stood apart amidst the trainees.
Class 9 pulled index 15 to join them. Even if he had become a faceless trainee, Class 9 didn’t toss him aside but instead sent some from their already limited manpower to protect and haul him to safety.
Zong Jiu, guarding the front, crushed the fire-borne exam papers into a ball and threw them at a teaching assistant who tried to break through the tight encirclement.
Unable to dodge in time, the teaching assistant burned. His entire body stiffened and unexpectedly, he didn’t try to put out the fire but stood still and waited for the flames to spread.
They were scared of fire!
While escaping for his life just now, Zong Jiu still paid close attention to how the instance NPCs reacted. With the billowing smog, it was difficult to tell what was beneath the thick soot on their faces.
But his multitasking wasn’t for naught. On the contrary, it was a bountiful harvest.
The faceless people moved extraordinarily slowly when encircled by fire.
Though they didn’t have faces, they were still humans in all other ways and naturally would be afraid of fire as well.
A more welcome discovery was that if a faceless person died in the flames, the flesh on his face would contort, like being remoulded into twisted, ghastly faces charred in the blazing flames.
Zong Jiu shared his discoveries with everyone.
The Night Clan leader nodded. His red irises darkened as he drew his sabre from the system backpack.
“We must seize the initiative. If I’m not mistaken, we’ll have to wreck more than just the scene, but also eliminate these NPCs for the instance to be truly considered destroyed.”
After special props were deactivated, the imposing ‘Caligula’ also lost its bloody shine when being drawn from its sheath.
Caligula was historically the Roman Empire’s third emperor. Ancient Rome was full of tyrants, especially the aforementioned. This sabre named after the emperor was no different, unremittingly sucking blood like a savage fiend whenever it inflicted a wound on an enemy.
The sabre was a weapon bestowed on Van Zhuo in the S-rank instance he gained his vampiric lineage. It started as a solid A-rank prop, later enhanced to S-rank by strange encounters in other instances. This greatly boosted Van Zhuo’s personal strength and was one of the reasons for which he could be firmly enthroned as No. 2.
Nevertheless, the deactivation of its prop ability didn’t detract from Caligula’s intimidating reputation.
At least, there wasn’t the slightest drag as it speared a burning page and brought it to a faceless person’s chest.
Since it was No. 2 who spoke, no trainee doubted it.
“Fighting is not necessary! They’re afraid of fire, so just have the fire burn everything down!”
Everyone’s combat power was reduced to a minimum, so this was the only method available to them.
To fully utilise the paper, everyone followed Zong Jiu and crumpled each page into a ball to use as incendiaries, flinging them everywhere.
The effect was delightful. The already raging flames connected and surrounded the entire quadrangle.
Faceless people wailed and disappeared in the inferno, their faces gruesomely contorted as they turned into charred black bodies.
“Rumble—”
Some time passed. More buildings grated uncomfortably, collapsing.
By now, none of the school buildings of First High School was intact. All of them had areas that collapsed or exploded, looking in a dismal state.
Although, everyone was anxious as they still had three faceless people to deal with.
First High School’s headmaster was seriously too much of a wimp, hiding behind the teaching assistants all throughout. He pulled a few people to stand in the other area untouched by the fire, even trying to phone for external help.
The distance between their two camps was truly too far for them to spread the fire over. It spanned more than half of a basketball court. Without his enhancements, even Zong Jiu couldn’t do anything about it. It was literally a head-spinning situation.
“What should we do? Charge in?”
“No.”
Zong Jiu immediately overruled this proposal. “Considering the distance and the intensity of the fire, it’s more probable that we’ll burn to our deaths midway, much less make it over.”
As idea after idea was rejected, everyone found themselves trapped in an impossible situation.
The viewers in the live broadcast were even more anxious than them.
[The anxiety is driving me crazy. Can they charge across?]
[Just ten more minutes, jiayou, stay strong!]
[C’mon, let’s go! Whether this instance can be taken down depends on this last stroke.]
[This headmaster is seriously dipshit… He’s just hiding there like a chicken, but anyone who crosses the fire to him is doomed. Damnit, if only they could use their special props.]
Just as they were at their wits’ ends, there was an abrupt development.
Index 15, who had been protected by Class 9’s trainees all this time, suddenly moved.
He rushed straight on, knocking the trainees in front of him out of the way, and rushed into the fire without a single look back.
The people who were knocked aside were stunned, sitting on the ground, bewildered.
“Room rep!”
This turnaround was so shocking that no one was able to react for a while—except index 98, seemingly woken up from a dream.
Tears rolled down from his eyes as he roared with all his might towards the fire, “What are you doing? Can you understand us? Come back!”
But index 15, who had become a faceless person, turned a deaf ear.
He dashed onwards. The soles of his shoes and the legs of his pants charred by the fire, yet he forged forth as though feeling no pain, sprinting straight towards the headmaster and the two teaching assistants.
Even the bullet chat was astonished.
[Wtf is going on, this is the first time I’m hearing that faceless people can still have awareness?]
[Can faceless people convert back? But I remembered several classes finding clues that said that it’s irreversible. Is this a system bug?]
[It can’t be. Many classes previously tried to check if faceless trainees lose their autonomy like zombies in apocalyptic instances and all came to the same conclusion. If they hadn’t lost their autonomy, why wouldn’t the system take them back?]
[Hang on, sisters, don’t be so quick to jump to conclusions. I suddenly thought of something. Class 9’s index 15 is different. Faceless trainees from other classes were forced into converting out of desperation and their environment. But this isn’t so for index 15. He voluntarily became a faceless person out of love for his peers. This isn’t the same as those who were pushed to the brink. Am I making sense?]
[Yeah! You do! I second that!]
In the second before reaching the headmaster, index 15 finally looked back.
From across the blazing fire, just for a moment, Class 9 seemed to see once more the smile always on the lips of that quiet and gentle face.
But there wasn’t.
The face across the flames was still flat, smooth, and expressionless. Without any sign of changing back.
But at the very last moment, a long slit for the mouth cracked open, the same as all other faceless people did when they spoke and gurgled.
Those lips fumbled, seemingly trying to say something, yet time not permitting.
Index 15 had already crossed a distance as long as half a basketball court in the fiery sea at the cost of becoming a man of fire. His hair had turned patchy, and it was even harder to see his face.
Of course, at a moment like this, no one cared about these.
Every trainee knew what index 15 was going to do next. Class 9’s voices were hoarse from their shouting, crying and choking on their sobs.
“Index 15, if you can fucking hear us, then why aren’t you coming back? Come back over!”
“Fuck you, you clearly still have awareness. Has it been fun keeping us in the dark and taking us for fools?!”
“You and index 99 are both idiots! Do you hear me! Big idiots!!”
Hearing the enraged cursing behind him, index 15 laughed mutely in his head.
He didn’t know why he wanted to laugh, for his thoughts seemed a million times slower now. He stood in place for a very long time, listening to the noise of destruction exploding around First High School. Only then, as though in an afterthought, did he take a step.
Perhaps it was because of the voluntary transformation that he miraculously retained a trace of autonomy—but he was unable to control his body either. Instead, it was his body that moved one step ahead of his consciousness, rushing forward.
Maybe somewhere in his subconscious, he wanted to protect the warmth and loveliness of this class with his life.
But it was as the diary had said. The transformation into a faceless person was irreversible. Whether or not there still existed consciousness didn’t matter—he couldn’t return to the trainee dormitories. From the moment that he chose to become a faceless person, this ending was predetermined. Irremediable, and irredeemable.
Therefore, let him do one last thing for Class 9.
Index 15 spread his arms. By spreading the fire with his body, he flung himself at the headmaster and the teaching assistants in the clearing down with him into the dark sinkhole behind, propelling them into the blazing fire.
Wretched screams reverberated through the quadrangle and not a splash was heard.
His figure was resolute, like a butterfly set aflame. Like a bird with a broken wing, completing his last mission.
Like he was silently telling everyone—
Never regret.
