“they seem to have left.” the normal gao ming crawled out from underneath the bed. he quietly opened the dresser door. the kind gao ming was curled up inside with guilt written all over his face.

“we can’t leave while carrying the dead body. this is already the best outcome.” the normal gao ming tried his best to console the other party.

“i’ve always tried to do my best and to satisfy everyone around me. however, problems keep happening...” the kind gao ming scratched his arms. actually, he was not as optimistic and as confident as he seemed. kindness came with a price.

“i know you want to save everyone. after we find a safe way out, i’ll help you.” the normal gao ming helped the kind gao ming out of the dresser. to distract the kind gao ming, he took out his diary, “if this didn’t happen, what was your original plan for today?”

“the school has organised a class trip tomorrow. i plan to buy some snacks so that i can share with everyone on the bus.” the kind gao ming sighed.

“a class trip?” the normal gao ming looked at his diary. “i will be participating in an event tomorrow too. even though we made different choices in our lives, every one of us seemed fated to attend that event on the 15th of july.” he didn’t mean anything by it, but this observation prompted the kind gao ming to check the normal gao ming’s diary. their diary entries were all different, but somehow, everything seemed to overlap on the 15th of july again. this appeared to be the intersection of all the different gao mings’ fates.

“why is this so?” the kind gao ming thought back to what had happened. “the monitor’s appearance is different from how i remember him, but his personality hasn’t changed. he looks selfless on the surface and puts the class first, but he is actually highly jealous of others.”

the entries flashed through his mind. the kind gao ming suddenly lifted his head to look at the normal gao ming, “the monitor should be the same age as us, but he looks almost thirty now.”

“has he somehow aged?”

“no. we have gotten younger instead...” the kind gao ming placed the two diaries before him. “normally, we should be the same age as yuan hui. we are from the same class. why are we sent back to high school, and specifically on the night of july 14th?”

the normal gao ming scratched his head. he didn’t get it. “why?”

“all the rooms on the floor we were on had the number 0715. 0715 might not be the room number, but a hint: the 15th of july,” the kind gao ming took out the message the rebellious gao ming slipped into every room. “someone told us that this place is haunted. the 15th of july is the hungry ghost festival.”

“i still don’t get it.” the normal gao ming smiled bitterly.

hearing the man’s voice, the kind gao ming finally spotted a ‘middle-aged man’ with salt-and-pepper hair at the corner. he wore a set of dark uniforms and a strange watch around his wrist. he was protecting his two dying teammates. one of them had lost his legs. strangely enough, a new pair of legs grew out of the monster’s stomach, wearing the man’s uniform.

“leader, you’re the hope of team one. just leave us be!”

“you need to leave! we’ll stay to delay this monster!”

his two teammates begged. they wished for the middle-aged man to save himself, “stop wasting your life force. we can’t access our ghost tattoos. your sacrifice is meaningless!”

his hair turned white, and wrinkles started to appear on his face. the ‘middle-aged man’ said nothing and held fast.

of the three, only he could still move. once he escaped, the other two would die. furthermore, he couldn’t hold on much longer.

“this anomaly seems to be targeting us. the gods took away all the powers related to ghosts. we and the horror game players have lost our biggest reliance. everything seems to be planned by the headquarters and the gods.” when the middle-aged man’s sight blurred, the kind and normal gao mings rushed over. the two high school students moved to pick up the injured members.

“come! we’ll go and hide!” the kind gao ming’s voice was soft, but his tone shocked the ‘middle-aged man’.

these three were the members of the security team one. the leading ‘middle-aged man’ was the leader.

“gao ming?” their revenge target had appeared, but he showed up to save them.

“do you know me?” the normal gao ming picked up the other injured member.

“the fuck! why are there two of you?”