Don't provoke mentally ill people in the infinite flow genre!

The library at Mangcang High School has four floors, with white eaves, blue bricks, and wooden window frames. Its exterior looks very simple and elegant, as if it has been specially designed.

Shen Yubai and Qin Shaoyu pushed open the door and entered. They found that the lights were still on inside. Under the dim yellow light, everything in the building seemed so soft and quiet, giving people an imperceptible sense of academic atmosphere.

"Is this reasonable?" Qin Shaoyu muttered softly. "The whole school is so strange, but this library looks like a safe haven. I'm even starting to lose my guard—this is not a good thing."

His mental strength is S, so ordinary illusionary spaces can't do anything to him. But once he enters this place, he seems to have lost his sense of risk, which obviously makes him feel uneasy.

"Old Shen, we have to be careful, and make sure we don't get separated along the way."

"Okay," Shen Yubai agreed. "You go ahead, I'll follow closely."

To avoid missing any important clues or missing any triggering conditions, Qin Shaoyu tried his best to search every room, starting from the reading room on the first floor.

The first floor mainly contained social science and humanities books, all covered with a thick layer of dust. Flipping through them caused dust to fly everywhere, making the two cough repeatedly.

After half a day of searching without finding any clues, they did find two fruit knives on the windowsill.

"This kind of knife is definitely useless for killing ghosts," Shen Yubai concluded. "But it might come in handy later if we're trying to steal the token, so we won't be left empty-handed and lacking confidence."

After all, as things stand, there are almost no weapons available for players to use on campus; having a fruit knife is already quite a feat.

"This game doesn't seal skills, so what if some players can summon weapons on their own?" Qin Shaoyu said. "Giving them this kind of broken knife is purely for psychological comfort. I even feel like the system is deliberately provoking us."

"It's okay, if other teams can summon weapons, so can ours."

"That's right. Our captain and the great assassin are not to be trifled with."

The two casually tucked the fruit knife into their waistbands and continued upstairs.

The second floor mainly contains newspapers, magazines, comic books, and popular novels; the third floor contains professional academic reference books, as well as two computer rooms for students to consult materials on their own; the fourth floor contains some ancient books, out-of-print manuscripts, paranormal files, and other collections.

"Something's not right." Qin Shaoyu shook his head as he looked at it. "What kind of proper library would lend out books like this? Of course, I don't know much about libraries, this is just my subjective feeling."

"These old books are understandable." Shen Yubai picked up a hastily bound paranormal file. The pages were severely yellowed, and the pictures and text inside were somewhat blurry. "But this kind of file really shouldn't be in a library. The content is also rather... Is this really suitable for students to read?"

After he finished speaking, he waited for a while but Qin Shaoyu did not reply, so he looked up in confusion.

Qin Shaoyu stood in front of the last bookshelf, bending slightly to look at the gap in the third row.

Every corner of the bookshelf was crammed full of books, except for the third row, which was empty, as if a book was missing and had been taken away.

Logically speaking, since the bookshelf is against the wall, from his angle, he could only see the wall covered with beige wallpaper.

...However, unexpectedly, he saw an eye.

An eye covered by dark red blood vessels, with more white than black.

Those eyes stared at him fiercely, and Qin Shaoyu suddenly felt a buzzing in his mind, followed by an unpredictable wave of dizziness.

He subconsciously bit his tongue hard, blood seeped out, and the pain instantly brought him back to his senses.

Almost instinctively, he pulled a fruit knife from his waist and stabbed it decisively into the eye.

"Old Shen!"

The next second, Shen Yubai appeared behind him in a flash.

＊ ＊ ＊ ＊ ＊ ＊

Half an hour ago, on the fourth floor of the library.

Wu Ying stood in the same spot, frowning as she peered through the only gap in the bookshelf.

Without a doubt, she met the gaze of that eye.

She paused for a moment, then quickly made the same choice as Qin Shaoyu, stabbing him with a fruit knife.

"team leader!"

Before he could finish speaking, with a sticky, soft sound, the tip of the knife pierced his eyeball.

Suddenly, transparent ripples appeared in the air, and the bookshelf in front of us melted like wax, transforming into a square frosted mirror.

A strong suction force swept over her, and before she could react, her body was swept forward and she was about to be dragged into the mirror.

...Damn it, it's the same old routine again?!

Yi Zanglan was nearby and rushed over when he heard Wu Ying's call. He found that Wu Ying was still struggling with only her legs outside, so he quickly grabbed her feet.

The mirror's intense light surged, instantly engulfing the two of them before transforming back into the shape of a bookshelf.

The surroundings were quiet and peaceful, everything was as usual, as if nothing had happened.

……

About half a minute later, the two, now fully awake, were sitting slumped in front of the reading desk on the first floor of the library, staring at each other in bewilderment.

Yi Zanglan looked at Wu Ying to make sure she wasn't injured before slowly praising her.

"Your shoes are pretty good; they didn't loosen even when I pulled them like that."

"Of course, and we're wearing the same style, you're in mid-calf boots, I'm in ankle boots..." Wu Ying started to say, then belatedly realized her mistake, and put on a speechless face, "I give up, what time is it, still talking about shoes!"

"Oh, this mirror world is quite interesting."

The two stood up and looked around. They saw that the library was still the same library, with all the furnishings and layouts being the same, except that it had been completely changed to black and white tones, with a hazy, frosted texture, much like an old newspaper with a sense of history.

Not only that, they themselves blended into the environment, their skin and clothes turning completely black and white, looking like a pencil sketch.

"This is not good," Wu Ying said. "We need to find a way out quickly, otherwise we may be trapped in the mirror and become part of this place."

Yi Zanglan looked towards the stairs, lost in thought: "The mirror was found on the fourth floor, so we'll most likely need to go back to the fourth floor."

"Okay, let's go upstairs first and look for it as we go."

The two walked through the first-floor corridor and went up the stairs side by side.

The steps echoed dully underfoot, each step leaving a lingering sound, dragging on for a beat, as if something in the shadows was treading on their steps.

Yi Zanglan did not stop walking, remaining silent and listening intently. She waved slightly to Wu Ying beside her, signaling the other not to turn around for the time being.

Until she felt something gently kick her shoulder.

The force was not strong, it was like someone tapping with their toes, rhythmically tapping again and again.

"..."

She raised her head with a cold expression.