I, the screenwriter, have experienced a resurgence of inspiration.

Chapter 30 : High School Ghost Stories

At 10:01 AM, on the western long slope of Jiangcheng University.

Armed police officers stood beside the cordon, holding riot guns, their eyes scanning the surrounding area.

Not far away, police dog handlers were leading their dogs, carrying out search and rescue work under the scorching sun.

The police dog was so hot and listless that its handler was heartbroken.

Every location on campus where the disappearance occurred was monitored, with military and police officers on duty in three shifts, and a thorough search was conducted throughout the campus.

Changpo is where Weng Yang and Tan Moli disappeared.

There are three layers of police tape around here right now, and the special task force's testing equipment is running continuously.

At this point, twelve hours had passed since the missing person went missing.

The officer on duty suppressed the urge to yawn and was just about to say a word to his comrade who was coming to relieve him—

Suddenly, a flash of white light appeared before everyone's eyes.

"Who?!"

"alert!"

Something's up!

A series of "whooshing" sounds suddenly filled the air as countless dark gun barrels were aimed at the white light.

After the white light, a still-shaken Weng Yang appeared within the cordon, his face still showing signs of urgency.

"I'm back?"

She clutched her chest, gasping for breath, her lips as white as paper.

Someone immediately recognized her—she was on the missing persons list.

The officer on duty immediately pressed the intercom, his voice trembling slightly: "Reporting to command! A missing person has been spotted at the Changpo location! Repeat, a missing person has returned!"

The other end of the walkie-talkie erupted in chaos.

Weng Yang fell uncontrollably to the ground, his eyes filled with the joy of surviving a disaster and deep worry.

A policewoman immediately came over and helped her to the side, followed by a stretcher and medical staff.

"Blood pressure is normal!"

Heart rate 112 beats/min, blood pressure 145/95.

"Pupillary reflex is normal."

"Hello, hello, can you hear me?"

Before Weng Yang could recover from the lingering fear brought on by the dungeon, he heard familiar and friendly voices and footsteps all around him.

There was also the feeling of the doctor's slightly warm palm lifting my eyelids.

The surrounding area was filled with medical staff in white coats, cordoned off, armed police and military personnel, and reassuring red and blue lights...

This is reality.

She really came out.

Weng Yang opened his mouth, his throat was so dry it hurt.

She looked down at what she was holding in her hand.

A tiny embroidered shoe, no bigger than the palm of your hand, with fine stitches, still damp and cold.

A milky white candle, with wax forming uneven marks on its surface.

It also has a faint fishy smell.

This is... something she brought out of the dungeon?

【The Water Ghost's Embroidered Shoes (Bronze): This is an embroidered shoe forgotten at the bottom of the lake, and it seems that there is another one.】

(This is a warning item. When a spirit appears within five meters of the wearer, the embroidered shoes will automatically leak water.)

【Corpse Oil Candle (Copper): An ever-burning candle made from human oil, capable of illuminating things invisible to the human eye.】

(A special lighting device that, when lit, can make invisible spirits visible within a certain range for ten minutes.)

The air was humid and stuffy, with the familiar and comforting smell of disinfectant.

But the ink-wash characters that appeared before Weng Yang's eyes reminded him that all of this was not yet over.

She threw the items aside with almost physical disgust, and immediately staff in hazmat suits came forward to collect samples.

……

Fifty-one minutes after Weng Yang appeared, Liu Guilan appeared.

Then there's Tan Moli, and Fu Qinqin, who reappears inside the library.

Liu Guilan had no obvious external injuries, but she looked somewhat disheveled.

After realizing she was safe, she kept asking the police to find a way to rescue Zhao Weilai and the others.

When Fu Qinqin appeared at the library, she was still spitting out muddy water and nearly suffocated.

Fortunately, the rescue was timely, and medical personnel used instruments to remove excess mud, water, and hair from her lungs.

Although I was in a bit of a mess, at least I survived.

Tan Moli's health condition is not good either.

Her left arm was dislocated, and there were many bruises on her body.

If you look closely, you'll see that they are scratches.

Due to diabetes and excessive fright, Tan Moli's current mental state is worrying, and she is even unable to accept normal questioning.

But their appearance proved the special task force's suspicions:

Within Jiangcheng University, there exists a game instance that is significantly more dangerous than Taiping Cemetery.

Almost instantly upon receiving the news, Chen Xi immediately applied to higher authorities, requesting an emergency evacuation of Jiangcheng University.

Public pressure and outside speculation suggest that, faced with the loss of so many lives, the authorities have long lost the right to weigh the consequences.

……

At 3:51 p.m., Jiangcheng University officially issued an evacuation notice.

At 4:10, public opinion began to ferment online.

At 4:36, all teachers and students were forcibly evacuated without any reason.

—And at the same time, no new missing persons were found on campus.

……

Soon, Weng Yang, Liu Guilan, Fu Qinqin, and Tan Moli were sent to a temporary isolation point converted from the First People's Hospital.

Outside the medical area, in the separate interrogation rooms separated by partitions, armed police were on guard, prohibiting anyone from entering or leaving at will.

The four people underwent a full set of physical examinations first.

Blood tests, urine tests, electrocardiogram, chest X-ray, abdominal ultrasound—one by one, they were done.

The special task force members presented the report to Chen Xi and summarized it one by one:

"Weng Yang: Stress-induced tachycardia, multiple soft tissue contusions, no other abnormalities."

"Tan Moli: Low blood sugar, mild dehydration, stress reaction, and strange bruises on her body. She has been given sugar and fluids and her blood sugar is rising."

"Liu Guilan: There is a laceration on the sole of her foot and a mild soft tissue contusion in her lower back. Her white blood cell count is slightly elevated, which is considered to be a stress response. The rest of her blood test results are normal."

"Fu Qinqin: Sinus arrhythmia, minor abrasions, risk of suffocation. Like the patients brought in before, she has unexplained paranormal symptoms and is currently receiving treatment."

"All four people had varying degrees of mud stains and unidentified green stains on their bodies, and samples have been taken and sent for testing."

After listening to the report, Chen Xi nodded: "It's good that they are healthy. Let them rest first, and we'll start by questioning Liu Guilan and Weng Yang later."

As for the items they brought back, just like last time, they were returned after being confirmed to be harmless.

In fact, she hasn't slept a wink since last night.

With ten people missing and no news for a full twelve hours, the pressure on the authorities must be immense.

The fact that four people have returned at once at least proves that they are still alive.

"What about the items they brought out? Have they been properly quarantined?" Chen Xi asked her assistant.

"The samples have been taken and sent to the identification center for testing. The forensic team is waiting in the evidence room."

Like Suya and the others, they brought some strange things from the dungeon.

The lab technicians just took a preliminary look and said the materials are strange; they've never seen several of them before.

"Let's go take a look."

……

Currently, Jiangcheng has not yet built a dedicated evidence room for storing copies of evidence.

The items that Suya and the others brought out of the dungeon have been returned to their owners after being confirmed to be harmless.

—As far as Chen Xi knew, the gold ingots that Zhang Dong and Zheng Zhi brought out had already been cashed out by the two of them, while Su Ya was considering whether to sell the Bone Flower to the authorities.

Therefore, the items that the four people brought out could only be temporarily stored at the quarantine point.

In a room not far from the quarantine site, the medical equipment had been removed, and several tables were set up with the personal belongings of four people.

The mission rewards that the group brought out this time were all packed separately into transparent glass boxes.

Weng Yang brought out two items: an embroidered shoe and a perpetually burning candle.

Liu Guilan received a rouge box filled with mud and two gold ingots.

Fu Qinqin carried with her five ever-burning candles and a small bundle of dried aquatic plants.

Tan Moli only had two gold ingots.

Zhang, an engineer from the laboratory, was wearing a gas mask, while a lab technician was conducting tests with instruments next to him.

"It's good that you came. Come on, let's quickly see how many of these are the 'props' you mentioned."

Seeing Chen Xi enter, Engineer Zhang casually removed his mask and shook his head: "This is too eerie."

He pointed to the embroidered shoe in the evidence bag:

"Take this embroidered shoe as an example. The fabric is brocade from the Ming Dynasty, and the stitches are also done using the techniques of the Ming Dynasty."

However, unknown aquatic DNA was detected inside.

It's so fresh, it looks like it was just pulled from the bottom of a river hundreds of years ago.

—The problem is, I haven't heard of any Ming Dynasty tombs under Jiangcheng University.

Where did these embroidered shoes come from?

Having said that, he pointed to the white ever-burning candle:

"The main component of this candle should be oil, I guess it's human corpse oil, but we'll have to wait for the test results to be accurate."

Forensic pathologists who frequently perform autopsies are familiar with the peculiar feel of human fat to the touch and the smell of burning.

Essentially, a person is just a large piece of moving flesh.

Most people can't tell the difference between candles made with human oil and candles made with lard.

Chen Xi frowned and looked at the items in the box. Sure enough, there were familiar ink-wash characters floating in mid-air:

【Rouge Mud (Copper): Dark black soft mud, mostly found in places where water ghosts dwell.

Use directly to stop bleeding and slowly restore health (50% restored over 30 seconds), but will inflict the "Cold and Wet" status, reducing movement speed by 10%.

[Waterwort: It often grows at the bottom of lakes where yin energy is abundant and death energy gathers. There is a certain probability that eating it will turn you into a water ghost.]

Gold ingots: A type of currency used to purchase resources.

……

Sure enough, these were the same "props" as last time.

So what does this mean?

What are the rewards for missing persons after completing the game?

Chen Xi felt inexplicably angry, but still relayed those words word by word.

"I really want to know what the world looks like from the perspective of the 'players'."

Engineer Zhang clicked his tongue enviously, unsurprised. "This is the first time I've ever seen a healing potion in a game—restoring 50% of your health within 30 seconds..."

What standards are being used to measure this? Does a broken arm or leg count? Can massive bleeding be treated?

Soon someone delivered rabbits for the experiments.

Amidst the expectant gazes of the crowd, Engineer Zhang used a scalpel to make several incisions on the rabbit's body—

Something magic happened.

Although only a small amount of mud was applied to the wound, the five-centimeter wound on the rabbit's right leg was healing at a visible speed.

In less than a minute, not only did the bleeding stop, but there wasn't even a scab left on the wound.

Zhang Gong excitedly asked someone to bring over the clippers for shaving the rabbit. After shaving off the rabbit's fur, he exclaimed, "Wow!"

The wound has completely disappeared, leaving only a few faint white marks that are almost invisible.

It's like something out of a science fiction movie.

"It's incredible. If it could bring out even more silt and have a positive effect on the human body—"

"You're overthinking it. Many times, people die from serious injuries not because of the external wounds. Think about it, if this thing can only treat external wounds, what will happen when the wound heals and there's just a bag of blood inside..."

"Then let's do a few more experiments. Since it's said to be 50% of the life force, it must also count as internal injury, right?"

Even a recovery rate of only 20% is quite astonishing.

"My God, this is amazing."

Everyone present was immersed in curiosity and amazement at the game props, except for Chen Xi, whose brows were furrowed.

Items, skills, and currency.

This dungeon system seems to be even more complete than she had expected.

It's like a real, existing alternate world.

But why would a copy appear?

Why would they appear in Jiangcheng?

What does it actually want?

Will there be any new dungeons in the future?

What will the future of Jiangcheng look like?