I created a foundation

"We...we are all still alive. We don't have any wounds on our bodies. Nothing happened."

"Everyone thought... that they were just too exhausted and nervous after playing in the haunted house, so they all had... a bizarre nightmare."

“No one took that seriously.”

"No one thought...that that wasn't the end at all."

Her voice choked again.

"That's just... the beginning."

There was deathly silence in the classroom.

Only the suppressed sobs of Miura and Yuigahama echoed in the empty room, sounding particularly mournful.

"A few days later..."

Miura's voice sounded like it was squeezed out from between his teeth, and every word tasted of blood.

"The first one to get into trouble was Xiaoya."

"She...she passed away in her sleep."

"Her mother said that when she passed away, she had a very... very happy smile on her face."

"It's like...it's like having the sweetest dream."

Yuigahama Yui buried her face deeply in Miura's shoulder, her body shaking like a sieve.

"Then... it's the Ministry of Revenue."

Hayato Hayama's breathing suddenly hitched. Tobe was a good friend of his.

"It's the same... in my dream... I left with a smile."

"Then...Ebina-san..."

"One... after another..."

Miura's voice grew lower and more desperate.

"Those...those companions who once entered the haunted house with us, those friends who shared our dreams with that man..."

"They...they really did, one after another, in a sweet dream..."

"Never woke up again."

After telling all this, Miura Yumiko and Yuigahama Yui could no longer hold on and completely collapsed.

Chapter 118: The selected “audience”?

Yukino put away the pistol.

The cold metal that had been against Miura Yumiko's forehead was put back into the holster on her waist with a mechanical and precise movement without any emotion.

A soft "click" sound echoed in the silent music classroom, extremely clear.

However, the disappearance of the gun did not loosen the solidified air at all.

Instead, a deeper, more invisible pressure, like the water of the deep sea, pressed in from all directions towards the three people huddled in the corner.

Yuigahama Yui's sobbing had long stopped, leaving only the suppressed, subtle sobs, and her body was shaking like a fallen leaf in the autumn wind.

She hugged Miura Yumiko tightly beside her, as if she was the only piece of driftwood in the shipwreck.

Miura Yumiko's face was as pale as paper, her lips trembling, but she couldn't utter a single sound. Her eyes were hollow, her pupils constricted to the limit by sheer terror, reflecting Yukino's slender yet inhumanly chilling figure.

Hayato Hayama leaned against the wall not far from them, his body stiff.

His face, always wearing a calm smile and known as "Mr. Perfect," was now covered with cracks. Cold sweat slid down his forehead, dripping onto his collar, bringing with it a chilling shudder.

He tried to comprehend what was happening.

The female classmate was holding a gun.

Friends died silently in their dreams.

"ghost".

"messenger".

These unfamiliar and ominous words, like the sharpest wedges, struck at the solid worldview he had built up over the past seventeen years.

Yukino didn't look at him.

Killing through dreams.

The victims would smile happily before they died.

These scattered fragments swirled, collided, and reorganized rapidly in her mind.

However, there is one most critical link that remains unclear.

Yukino took a small step forward.

Just a small step.

Yuigahama Yui, however, shrank back suddenly like a frightened rabbit, almost crying out loud.

Yumiko Miura bit her lower lip so hard that a trace of blood oozed out. She used all her strength to prevent herself from screaming.

Yukino paused.

Her gaze finally fixed on their intertwined fingers, which were twitching with fear.

Then she spoke.

The voice was still icy cold, without a trace of the normal human warmth of 28 degrees Celsius. It was like icicles condensed on the window frames in winter, knocking on everyone's eardrums.

"last question."

Her voice was not loud, but it had an unquestionable penetrating power that instantly pierced the suffocating membrane in the classroom.

The bodies of Yumiko Miura and Yuigahama Yui trembled at the same time.

They raised their bloodshot eyes and looked at Yukino in despair, as if waiting for the final verdict.

Yukino's tone remained unchanged.

"There are seven of you who went with you to the abandoned music classroom."

"According to your testimony, they all died silently in their dreams."

Every word was like a small hammer, hitting Miura and Yuigahama's hearts.

Their breathing became heavy and their chests rose and fell violently.

Yukino tilted her head slightly, and a very faint, almost imperceptible sharp light seemed to flash in her ice-blue eyes.

"why."

She paused, giving the two words enough time to sink into the depths of their confused consciousness.

"You two are the only ones who survived?"

This question, like an invisible ice cone, carried tremendous force and pierced the softest and most fearful part of Miura Yumiko and Yuigahama Yui's hearts fiercely and precisely.

"boom--!"

It was as if something exploded in their minds.

All the crying, all the trembling, all the confusion, at this moment, was replaced by a bigger and deeper fear.

Time seems to have stood still.

Yuigahama Yui's eyes, already wide with fear, were now even more pronounced, the whites of her eyes streaked with terrifying bloodshot. Her mouth unconsciously opened, and a "ho ho" sound like a broken bellows came out of her throat, but she couldn't utter a single complete syllable.

Yumiko Miura's situation is even worse.

Her body suddenly fell back and hit the cold wall with a dull thud, but she seemed unaware of it, staring at Xue No with an unbelievable, ghost-like look.

"Why...why..." She murmured to herself, her voice as thin as a mosquito, but filled with boundless horror, "Yes...why..."

They had never thought about this question before.

In their relief at surviving the disaster and their fear of unknown "ghosts", they instinctively ignored this most unreasonable detail.

Now, being revealed so directly and cruelly by Yukino, this question turned into the most terrifying curse, instantly grabbing their souls.

Why did all the companions die?

Why did we survive?

That "nightmare" who kills without blood, that monster who feeds on other people's sweet dreams, what are the criteria for him to choose his targets?

Is it...

A terrible thought, like a poisonous snake, emerged from the darkest corner of their hearts, quickly coiling and tightening, almost suffocating them.

They looked at each other in horror, and saw in each other's pupils the same fear that was on the verge of collapse as their own.

Then, they all shook their heads wildly.

"No... I don't know..." Yuigahama Yui finally squeezed out a word, her voice hoarse, "We don't know anything..."

“Please… don’t ask anymore…” Miura Yumiko also cried out, waving her hands wildly as if trying to drive away some invisible terror, “We really don’t know… we really don’t know!”

Their reactions were so intense, so real.

The fear that comes from the depths of the soul does not seem fake.

Yukino looked at them quietly.

There was no mercy or mockery in those ice-blue cat eyes.

Just pure, cold observation and analysis.

Yes, they didn't lie.

They really don't know why they were able to "survive".

This conclusion put the last piece of the puzzle in Yukino's heart into its rightful place.

"Survivor bias."