Chapter 39: [want You Dead]
Lu Jinzhao’s expression showed a moment of speechlessness.
After all, she never expected the parchment’s response to be so direct.
“Are you serious?”
She couldn’t help but ask.
The parchment didn’t respond to this question, merely repeating:
[Give it to me]
Lu Jinzhao was speechless for a moment, not knowing what to say, but she definitely wouldn’t give this thing to the parchment.
“What could be inside this?”
She looked for a long time but saw no gaps on the box. It seemed designed this way precisely to prevent people from opening it and taking out what’s inside.
“It must be something good if the parchment calls it that, and it’s designed so sealed. Perhaps I shouldn’t open it easily.”
Thinking this, Lu Jinzhao put the box into her backpack, no longer fixated on opening it right then.
But after she zipped up her backpack, perhaps realizing she was giving up on opening the box, the previously silent parchment suddenly popped up again.
[You’re not opening it?]
Whether it was an illusion or not, Lu Jinzhao strangely sensed a hint of regret in those words.
“This is seeing a ghost.”
Why did she feel that after the transaction, the parchment had become much more “lively” than before?
The parchment didn’t respond to her seeing a ghost comment, but the line of text kept floating in front of Lu Jinzhao, making her irritated just looking at it.
Even after she circled the room once more, confirmed there were no clues, left home, locked the door, and went downstairs, the line of text was still floating in front of her!
The more Lu Jinzhao looked, the more restless she felt. On the way to the station, she finally couldn’t help but close her eyes and mutter to herself: “Right, I’m not opening it.”
As soon as she said it, the blood script in front of her indeed changed again.
[Since you’re not opening it, give it to me]
Lu Jinzhao was utterly speechless, even letting out a chuckle.
“No, I’m not giving it to you either.”
She rejected it immediately.
She could tell now that whatever the parchment was, it really wasn’t smart, and it really wanted whatever was in the box.
Rejected again, the parchment fell silent.
But Lu Jinzhao caught the parchment’s unusual difference from before. Realizing it was now in a “communicable” state, she decisively tried asking a question.
“The difficulty of my previous two platform missions was off, was that your doing?”
The question was too blunt. If this was man-made, and she was asking the person responsible, they absolutely wouldn’t answer so straightforwardly.
But she was asking the parchment.
[Yes.]
The parchment replied straightforwardly.
Even though Lu Jinzhao had mentally prepared herself, she still couldn’t help but freeze for a moment.
“Why?” she pressed.
And the parchment’s answer was, as always, direct. It said:
[Because I want you dead.]
The already vigilant atmosphere instantly dropped to freezing point.
Lu Jinzhao hadn’t expected the answer to be so blunt, landing coldly in front of her.
The parchment didn’t lie to Lu Jinzhao, nor did it hide its malice at all.
“You want me dead, so why trade with me?” Lu Jinzhao continued to press.
She didn’t doubt that the parchment’s desire for her death was genuine. Its firm attitude in [Loss of Control] was proof enough that it didn’t value Lu Jinzhao’s life.
It just wanted to complete the transaction.
And now, the parchment gave its answer.
[Because I want your soul.]
It wanted her dead, wanted her soul, and was asking for the thing in the box?
Lu Jinzhao sneered. As if there was such a good deal.
This ghostly thing dared to say it so openly, wasn’t it because they had already traded, its purpose achieved, and she had no way to deal with it now?
The anger rising in Lu Jinzhao’s heart dispelled the fear born from the parchment’s words. Now looking at the thing in her hand, it was no longer just wariness; instead, there was annoyance and resentment.
Sooner or later, she would teach it a lesson.
Lu Jinzhao tried asking a few more questions and then realized the parchment wouldn’t answer everything. Using its answers to judge things wouldn’t work.
“As expected. This ghostly thing couldn’t be that kind-hearted.”
Lu Jinzhao wasn’t disappointed by this.
She had new discoveries in her hometown, but the developments made the path ahead seem even more shrouded in fog.
It started as an anomaly due to her roommate’s strange dying words, but now it seemed to involve her parents too.
“What did Lin Zhao mean by ‘not harming me’? What does it have to do with my parents?”
“What’s in this box? Do my parents know about the train?”
The unsolvable mysteries weighed on Lu Jinzhao’s mood. She knew the item in the iron box might not be suitable to open, but she felt that one day, she would open it.
Just not until she had some self-protection ability.
After leaving her hometown and returning to the dormitory, her roommates didn’t ask what she had done during her leave. Lu Jinzhao was getting used to this “freedom.”
But she also realized this freedom might not be a good thing.
She could skip classes freely, not do homework, cheat on exams without getting caught.
Society’s constraints on her had become extremely low.
This wouldn’t change Lu Jinzhao’s essence. She would still go to classes, trying to be an ordinary student in her calm daily life.
But what if it were someone with unstable mentality?
These past few days, Lu Jinzhao had frequently browsed the website Wei Ling gave her. The website required login, and registration was quite troublesome, needing confirmation as a Yuncheng local, plus answering a series of questions about the train and platform.
These weren’t multiple-choice questions. After answering, the website administrator would judge based on the answers whether the respondent was a passenger, then grant qualification.
In the past few days on the forum, she learned much more detailed knowledge about the train and passengers. She was no longer a clueless newcomer.
Lin Zhao’s influence on campus had completely vanished. Her dormitory had one less person, but the other roommates acted as if it was natural.
As if Lin Zhao had never existed from start to finish.
But if Lu Jinzhao deliberately brought it up, the roommates clearly still remembered her, yet showed no emotion, not even a sigh.
“Weekend’s almost here. Are you all going home?”
A roommate said, completely forgetting Lu Jinzhao had just returned from her hometown a couple days ago after taking leave.
Lu Jinzhao didn’t join their conversation, and the roommates naturally ignored her, not pressing further.
At the start of the semester, Lu Jinzhao had thought about building good relations with her roommates, at least to make dorm life easier, but now she no longer wanted to befriend them.
As for other friends, there was only one childhood friend studying in another city. Come to think of it, they hadn’t contacted each other in a long time.
It seemed after Gaokao ended and they chose different majors, they gradually drifted apart.
Up to now, their last chat was almost two months ago.
