40: Chapter 18 Eliminating Distractions_2 40: Chapter 18 Eliminating Distractions_2 Lin Yi’s gaze shifted upward, and his pupils quaked momentarily, first dilating, then instantly shrinking to the size of pinholes.

The classmate was suddenly standing right in front of him, only the distance of three chairs away!

The classmate’s eyes were empty as they stared at Lin Yi’s position, his face devoid of any extra expression.

The eerie smile that had previously been visible in the dark, almost stretching to the ears, was gone at this moment.

He was like a walking corpse, slowly advancing towards Lin Yi.

Lin Yi’s back jolted upright, the hairs on his scalp standing on end, his eyes filled with disbelief.

“He clearly shouldn’t be able to notice me anymore, why is he still doing this?!”

“It’s like a persistent spirit!

Like he fucking has the ability to sense I’m here!”

Lin Yi dared not make any rash moves, yet his mind was frantically churning with ideas.

The classmate moved his stiff legs, slowly crossing over one chair after another, shortening the distance between himself and Lin Yi.

Lin Yi’s pupils continued to constrict, he clenched his teeth, his tension making him forget to breathe.

But under his absolutely concentrated focus, he suddenly deciphered something from the classmate’s behavior and actions.

A bold guess popped into his mind!

He quickly gathered all the comic books near him, then cautiously folded up the chair.

“Liangzi!” he called out softly to the sharpshooter by his side.

At this moment, Wei Liang was too engrossed, so focused that he hadn’t noticed Lin Yi had already stood up.

Hearing Lin Yi’s voice, Wei Liang quickly pulled his thoughts back.

“What’s up, Old Lin…

Oh shit!”

Wei Liang caught a glimpse of the classmate closing in behind Lin Yi, and his half-finished sentence turned into incomprehensible gibbering like monkey chatter from Huaguo Mountain…

“Shh, shh, shh—”

Lin Yi struggled to free one hand, putting a finger to his lips, then whispered lowly, “Pack up the books and run!

Quick, quick, quick!”

By this time, the classmate was only two chairs away from Lin Yi, a powerful oppressive force surged out from him like a tide, overwhelming Lin Yi and his companion.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck…”

Wei Liang spoke incoherently, his tongue tying knots in his anxiety.

As the classmate pressed closer, under the overwhelming pressure, Wei Liang suddenly gritted his teeth and pulled off a move that nearly popped Lin Yi’s eyeballs out.

He had at least three times as many comic books as Lin Yi, but even this number of books was swiftly clutched to his chest in one breath!

Then, under Lin Yi’s almost incomprehensible “subway grandpa on his phone” expression, Wei Liang used his precise glute and thigh muscles to silently fold the chair back up!

Lin Yi was astounded, with only four words left in his mind:

“Crafty Tricks!”

“Fuck, it’s all crafty tricks!”

“What are you looking at?

Get moving!” Wei Liang glared fiercely at Lin Yi and angrily whispered.

“I’m stuck if you don’t move, how am I supposed to go?” Lin Yi gave him a look.

“Oh, come on!

Let’s go, go, go!”

Thus, ‘Wolong and Fengchu’ held tightly to their comics, treading on thin ice as they weaved through the chairs of the amphitheater classroom, as if two brothers were walking on a narrow ridge in a field.

Only after they stepped out of the rows of chairs did Wei Liang dare to look back at the classmate, while also asking with concern, “What’s going on, Old Lin?

Hey, fuck…

Old Lin, you…”

Lin Yi had not left the row of chairs at all.

To be precise, he had stopped at a chair not too far from his original seat—that is, the second chair to the left of Wei Liang.

And he calmly watched every move of the classmate.

The classmate reached Lin Yi’s former spot and then extended a pair of skinny, pale hands, continually probing the area as if stirring waves.

It was just like Xiao Qiao in King’s Canyon, with three exclamation points popping up over her head and then using “Top-rank Prediction” to cast all her skills into a patch of empty air.

After his fruitless motions, the classmate slowly withdrew his hands and then silently left, blending into the stream of people stepping towards the exit of the Teaching Building.

Lin Yi squinted his eyes, a sharp light suddenly emerging in the depths of his calm gaze…

It was like a newbie in a game who, through his own efforts, successfully cracked a particular mechanism in a level, revealing a hint of excitement in his eyes!

Lin Yi watched his classmate with a calm and composed demeanor, eliciting a jolt of surprise from Wei Liang.

The words that had been on the tip of his tongue were all discarded to the back of his mind.

At this moment, he had only one question:

“Old Lin, what just happened?

That guy…”

Lin Yi gave Wei Liang a glance, raising his eyebrows, “Now you’re curious about things outside the rules again?”

“Heh, curious my ass!

I definitely don’t want to be dragged into a pit by you.” Wei Liang curled his lips, scoffed, and said, “I mean, did you find a way to avoid that guy’s attention?”

Lin Yi nodded, about to tell Wei Liang that the other party probably possessed a certain “Sensing Ability,” but Wei Liang cut him off in time, “Alright, alright, stop right there, it’s fine as long as you know the method, don’t tell me.”

Lin Yi knew Wei Liang’s concerns, but still said, “Liangzi, I think you should still know a bit about the ‘mechanism’, just in case…”

“Ah, stop!

I’m advising you not to jinx me!” Wei Liang hurriedly said, “There are no ‘just in cases’, I wasn’t noticed by him before, I won’t be now, and I certainly won’t be in the future…”

“If I knew how to avoid attention, I’d probably end up being noticed by accident.”

“…” Lin Yi opened his mouth but found himself at a loss for words, “…then…

okay, I can only say, reading comics is really a good method.”

“Ah???”

“emmm…nothing.”

“Oh, okay…

Ah, right, Old Lin!” Wei Liang suddenly remembered, then became visibly excited, “Did you see my move just now?”

“That one, that one, that one…” He put down the comic book and gestured, pointing at his thigh muscles and then patting his butt, looking more and more like a monkey from Huaguo Mountain.

“Maxed out!

My move was totally maxed out!”

Lin Yi rolled his eyes and could only chime in, “Ah, 66666…”

Then he flipped open his chair to sit down, casually placed down the comic, and looked toward the classroom door, also glancing at the clock hanging above the lectern and his watch.

The time was 4:46.

‘Just one staircase, yet it took a full 16 minutes!’

‘This speed is nothing compared to after the lights out!’

Lin Yi glanced at the ceiling.

‘It seems that “light” imposes a significant restriction on them…’

He remembered the corridor, the lights flickering on and off, and that curling figure vanishing in the darkness.

He also thought of the streetlights in the mist, which seemed to have the power to repel those unknown creatures.

With that in mind, he immediately shook his head to stop himself from continuing down this line of thought and opened his notebook, writing “light” next to “4:30.”

These were the short notes he made to prevent himself from forgetting key clues; he would contemplate these issues when he was in a time and place where he could think properly.

Wei Liang brought the comic book back, following Lin Yi’s gaze to look at the walls of the classroom.

“It’s almost five o’clock, huh?

Daybreak is coming, shall we go to the cafeteria for breakfast together later?”

“Sure.” Lin Yi nodded but then asked, “But do we have enough time?”

The Teaching Building’s rules included a map that indicated the cafeteria’s opening hours: 5:40~8:00, 10:40~13:20, and 16:00~20:00 every day.

“How could we be late?” Wei Liang said subconsciously, “The doors open at 5:40, right!”

Lin Yi corrected him, “But the rules of the Teaching Building state that if you stay overnight, you must study until 7:40 before you can leave the classroom, we can only leave at 6:00 if we stay overnight in the dormitories.”

Wei Liang was taken aback and then realized the issue, awkwardly scratching the back of his head and smiling, “Oh, I almost got the time wrong just now; good thing you reminded me!”

“But now that I think about it, we really might not have enough time…” Wei Liang mumbled.

Lin Yi waved his hand, reassuringly saying, “No worries, we’ll talk about it later.

If it really comes to it, we’ll skip a meal and eat more at lunch.”

“Yeah, that’s the only option…”

Just then, the classmate leading the way, who was off somehow, reached out and grabbed the classroom door handle.

‘Click!

Click!’

After the security guard dragged away the unidentified creature, the classroom door remained unlocked.

The classmate’s movements were slow but natural as he opened the door.

‘Beep beep beep…’

As the door opened, the morning breeze from the mountains, carrying the dew and the fragrance of flowers and grass, flowed in like a stream of water, diffusing the murky breath that had settled in the classroom overnight.

As the door continued to open, Lin Yi saw a deep blue world, shrouded in mist…

May 7, X023, 4:53.

The sky, faintly bright, reflected the blue of the sea; S City University was awash with thin mists, as if sunken into the deep ocean.