My Strange Tale Love Strategy Simulator

"So many...me?"

Zhang Ying stared at the floating black characters in front of him, his brows furrowed, and asked in a low voice into the room, "What does it mean?"

Xiao Hei's figure peeked out from the crack in the second bedroom door, and several crooked words appeared in front of him:

There are many beings inside... just like "me".

An existence just like "me." Zhang Ying's pupils suddenly contracted.

Xiao Hei is a Death Thought, so behind this door is a group of Death Thoughts locked up?

He turned around abruptly, his fist clenching involuntarily, his knuckles cracking.

"Xu Miaofeng!"

His voice was low, yet it carried a sense of oppression that made the air in the room freeze. Xu Miaofeng, lying on the ground, trembled at the shout and shrank her body even further into the corner.

"What exactly did you do?" Zhang Ying stared at her, his gaze sweeping over the dense array of nails on the door frame of the second bedroom.

Each nail was driven deep, and several layers of planks were stacked haphazardly, as if to seal something inside forever. "Why seal this room like this?"

Xu Miaofeng's lips trembled. She raised her head, her face covered in grease and tear stains, her eyes swollen and red like two walnuts, her pupils unfocused, as if she were looking at Zhang Ying, or perhaps at something else entirely.

"I...I don't know." Her voice was forced out of her throat, hoarse and broken, "I just moved in...I just moved into this house..."

She started pulling at her hair with both hands, her knuckles getting tangled in the knots, and she curled up into a small ball.

"They came to me on their own. I don't know where they came from... They're everywhere, all the time... They're watching me when I'm cooking, they're watching me when I'm sleeping, they're watching me when I'm in the bathroom—"

Her voice turned into a scream, a mixture of crying and howling, as she waved her hands wildly in the air.

"I'm so scared... I'm so scared! So I invited a master to come..."

Her body trembled violently, and her voice broke into fragments.

"The master said...seal this room shut. Use nails and planks to seal them inside...then they won't come out anymore...they won't follow me anymore..."

By the time she finished speaking, her voice had completely dissipated, as if something had torn it apart from her throat. Her eyes rolled upwards, and she slumped limply to the ground, motionless.

"Xiaofeng! Xiaofeng!" Zhou Ping squatted down, lifted Xu Miaofeng's head, placed her fingers on her forehead, and then frantically looked up at Zhang Ying, "Zhang Ying, what's wrong with her? Should we call an ambulance?"

Zhang Ying looked at Xu Miaofeng, who was curled up on the ground, remained silent for a moment, and then slowly shook his head.

"No need. She's just having trouble accepting it right now; let her process it gradually."

He raised his hand, letting Little Black disappear back into his shadow. The edge of the shadow twitched slightly, then quickly returned to stillness.

His gaze fell once again on the door to the second bedroom, which was nailed shut with wooden planks. Nothing could be seen through the gaps between the overlapping planks, but a chilling aura seeped out from every crack, as if something behind the door was breathing against the planks.

This group of suicidal thoughts is beyond his current ability to handle.

He turned around, walked to the window, and drew back the curtains.

The view from the floor-to-ceiling windows overlooks the Three Rivers and Lakes.

The full moon was reflected on the lake, shimmering and calm, without wind or waves. Moonlight spilled onto the lake's surface, breaking into countless silvery-white specks that floated quietly on the water.

Zhang Ying's pupils were unfathomably deep and as black as ink under the moonlight.

The face of Sanjianghu was completely rewritten in this gray world.

A thick, impenetrable black fog shrouded the lake, stretching straight from the water's surface to the horizon like a boundless black curtain.

Countless shadows moved through the mist, some white, some black, some large, some small; some resembled people, while others no longer did.

They swam, surged, and entangled, rising and sinking in the thick fog.

But none of them could leave the Three Rivers and Lakes even an inch.

They were all trapped inside.

Zhang Ying stared at the churning black mist and tapped his fingers lightly twice on the edge of the windowsill.

The creatures of the Three Rivers cannot escape, yet strange things are happening frequently and bizarre phenomena abound in this lakeside residential area. The ghostly figure calling out to people on the stairs, the dead spirit locked in this room—neither of these are from the lake. So where did they come from?

What exactly is this lake?

"This lake is truly eerie."

He muttered to himself, closed his eerie eye, and turned around.

Xu Miaofeng had woken up. She leaned against Zhou Ping's knees, her eyes still red and swollen, but her pupils were no longer dilated. When she saw Zhang Ying turn around, she instinctively shrank back, snuggling closer to Zhou Ping, her gaze darting away, unable to meet his eyes.

Zhang Ying sighed as he looked at her like this.

"Don't worry, I won't hurt you." His voice was much softer than before. He didn't make any unnecessary movements, standing still without taking a single step closer. "I just want to ask about some things."

Zhou Ping gently patted Xu Miaofeng's back and whispered in her ear, "Xiaofeng, don't be afraid. He's my student, he won't hurt you."

Zhou Ping looked up at Zhang Ying. As she spoke, she wasn't entirely sure herself. This student, who had been the same high school student twirling his pen in the classroom these past few days, now seemed different to her in this dimly lit room.

It was an aura that even she found chilling. Yet beneath that aura lay a strange tenderness that she couldn't quite describe.

Xu Miaofeng bit her lip, lowered her head, and remained silent for a long time. Her hand clenched on Zhou Ping's sleeve for a long time before slowly loosening.

She looked up and sniffed.

"What do you want to ask?"

Zhang Ying's lips curled into a smile as he pulled over a chair and sat down. An empty soda can was still hanging on the chair leg, and it rolled to the ground with a clatter as he moved, eventually ending up in the corner of the wall.

"No rush. Let's talk slowly."

The atmosphere in the room gradually quieted down. The candle flames on the table stopped flickering and stood upright, casting the shadows of several people onto the wall.

Zhang Ying sat in the chair and waited until Xu Miaofeng's breathing had completely calmed down before speaking.

"Ms. Xu, there's something I'd like to ask you."

Xu Miaofeng lifted her head from Zhou Ping's embrace, her eyes still swollen, and looked at him.

"Why were you expelled from school back then?" Zhang Ying's voice wasn't loud, but he spoke each word clearly. "What did you do at school? The school dance team—and why was that team disbanded?"

Xu Miaofeng's body suddenly stiffened.

Her teeth clenched, the muscles in her cheeks tensed into two hard lines, and her eyes, still wet from crying, began to glaze over again. Her legs clamped together, her hands gripping Zhou Ping's sleeve tightly, her knuckles turning white. Her whole body began to tremble.

Zhou Ping felt the body trembling in her arms and reached out to stroke her forehead, but Xu Miaofeng grabbed her wrist tightly, like a drowning person grasping at the last piece of driftwood.

Xu Miaofeng's lips moved a few times. No sound came out. She moved them a few more times.

She was waging a silent battle between speaking and remaining silent, something stuck in her throat that she couldn't swallow or spit out.

a long time.

A sigh escaped from his chapped lips.

"Where should I even begin to explain this debt?" Her voice suddenly calmed down, an unnatural calmness, as if she were talking about something unrelated to herself. "What happened back then is a debt rotten to the core. I don't know why you're asking these questions, but... I can vaguely sense it."

She raised her eyes and looked at Zhang Ying. A glimmer of clarity flashed in those cloudy eyes.

"She's back. Isn't she?"

Zhang Ying remained silent.

Xu Miaofeng didn't need his answer. She slowly released Zhou Ping's wrist, withdrew her own hand, and placed it on her knees. Her hand was still trembling, but her voice had become steady.

"Back then, I was just an ordinary school dance teacher. The salary wasn't high, and I had a lot of work, but back then there was the dance team, those kids, and..." She paused, then turned to Zhou Ping, "and Ping'er."

Zhou Ping's body stiffened slightly.

Xu Miaofeng looked at her with a very light gaze, as if she were looking at something far away.

"Ping'er and I were talking privately at that time."

Zhou Ping bit her lip. She looked away, turning her face to the side, not daring to meet Xu Miaofeng's eyes. The candlelight divided her profile into two halves, one dark and the other obscuring her expression.