Volume 4: Days of Making Mischief at School
Hide and Seek
You all be the humans, I’ll be the ghost catching you.
The memory came to an abrupt halt as a cold wind blew in through the window, making Golden Retriever shiver uncontrollably. He hugged his legs tightly and perked up his ears to listen to the sounds outside.
Besides the howling gloomy wind, there seemed to be light footsteps getting closer and closer.
“Ta ta——”
“Ta ta——”
Golden Retriever’s heartbeat quickened, his right hand clutching tightly to his life-saving tool.
Accompanying the footsteps was a girl’s muffled voice—”Mama, I’m really not cold, you should keep wearing the coat yourself.”
His eyes suddenly widened as he pushed open the cabinet door, shouting with tears in his eyes: “Sister Rabbit!!”
Shen Maomao, who was just outside the wall, paused for a moment, immediately walked into the classroom, and saw Golden Retriever crawling out of the cabinet, covered in dust.
The two stared at each other across half the classroom, and when Golden Retriever saw Shen Maomao’s face, he immediately shouted: “Wo kao!!”
Shen Maomao quickly said: “Don’t panic!! I’m still human!!”
Mother Shen hurried over to pull Golden Retriever out of the cabinet, placed him next to Shen Maomao, and asked: “Oh? Is this your classmate too, Maomao? This child’s hair color is so pretty!”
Two patches of blush appeared on Golden Retriever’s fair face. This was the first elder to compliment his hair color since he changed to his Shamate [sha ma te 杀马特 – A Chinese subculture fashion style] hairstyle. He shyly scratched the back of his head and said timidly: “Hello, auntie…”
His demeanor, like that of a shy young bride [xiao xi fu 小媳妇 – metaphor for someone being overly timid or submissive], was too embarrassing for Shen Maomao to watch.
She got straight to the point and asked: “Where’s Lou Jingmo? Why are you alone?”
“Ah!” Golden Retriever shouted, suddenly remembering how Sister Lou had led away the female ghost. He gave Mother Shen a grave look and mumbled, “She led away the person who was chasing us herself.”
Finally, he asked: “Sister Rabbit, this… how did you manage this?”
Shen Maomao sighed: “It’s a long story.”
Mother Shen, still not fully aware of the situation, asked: “Did you all arrange to come to school at night to play hide and seek?”
Since the excuse was already provided, Shen Maomao went along with it: “Yes.”
Mother Shen pondered: “Why don’t I play with you? You all be the humans, and I’ll be the ghost catching you.”
Golden Retriever frantically made eye signals at her, while Shen Maomao, looking dumbfounded, tried to discourage: “No, Mama, that’s really not necessary, right?”
Mother Shen said gently: “Don’t you want Mommy to play with you?”
A chill ran down Shen Maomao’s spine as she remembered this wasn’t her gentle mother at all, but a vicious ghost from the instance!
At this moment, she shamefully gave in: “O…okay…”
Golden Retriever gave her a look that said “how can you still be in the mood to play with an NPC at a time like this?”
Shen Maomao thought to herself that if she didn’t play along, they’d both be “game over” soon.
She didn’t explain much to Golden Retriever, just looked at Mother Shen: “Mama, how do you want to play?”
Mother Shen turned to face the cabinet and said: “You go hide, I’ll count to one hundred and then come find you. For safety reasons, you can’t run outside the teaching building, okay?”
After saying this, she covered her eyes and started counting backwards——
“One hundred… ninety-nine… ninety-eight…”
Like a countdown of their lives.
Golden Retriever still looked completely confused, unable to understand how they suddenly started playing this game. Shen Maomao grabbed his arm and pulled him towards the exit.
“Eighty-three… eighty-two… eighty-one…” Mother Shen’s voice echoed from the distant classroom, becoming particularly ethereal and dreamlike.
After reaching the main staircase, Shen Maomao was unsure which direction to run, so she asked Golden Retriever: “Do you know where Sister Lou is?”
Golden Retriever shook his head.
Shen Maomao sighed and started running downstairs: “Then let’s go down, it’s more…” free down there…
Before she could finish speaking, she saw in the mirror on the landing that there were small black umbrellas placed on each of the only two staircases leading down.
However, when she took her eyes away from the mirror, she couldn’t see the same umbrellas in reality.
Her footsteps came to a halt.
Golden Retriever bumped into her back, making her stumble, and anxiously asked: “What’s wrong?!”
“We can’t go down.” Shen Maomao didn’t dare waste time and immediately turned back to go up.
“Fifty-five… fifty-four… fifty-three…”
Halfway through the counting, Mother Shen’s originally sweet and gentle voice began to change, becoming deep and distorted. Who knew if Mother Shen herself was also undergoing a transformation at this moment.
Golden Retriever said, panting heavily: “What will happen if your mom catches us?”
Shen Maomao paused her steps slightly, showing her teeth in a smile: “I probably won’t die since I’m her real daughter, but you’ll be a different story.”
Golden Retriever, who was tired as a dead dog [si gou 死狗 – metaphor for extremely exhausted], suddenly burst out with another surge of energy, instantly overtaking Shen Maomao and leaving her behind.
Shen Maomao rolled her eyes, and they quickly climbed to the top, crouching on the side staircase on the right side of the fifth floor.
They could no longer hear Mother Shen’s counting here. Golden Retriever looked at his watch – it had been a minute and a half since she started counting to one hundred, which meant: Mother Shen would start searching in ten seconds.
Due to excessive exercise and fear, Shen Maomao’s heart felt like it was going to jump out of her throat. She calmed herself down a bit, trying her best to control and soften her breathing, and carefully asked Golden Retriever: “Do you want to find a fixed spot to hide, or do you want to play guerrilla [da you ji 打游击 – military term meaning guerrilla warfare, here used to mean moving around to avoid capture] with me?”
Golden Retriever chose the second option almost without hesitation. He answered in a low voice: “Being alone is too scary!!”
The scary environment was secondary; the main issue was the kind of mental oppression it brought. He felt that if it went on too long, he would develop claustrophobia.
Shen Maomao respected his opinion, her little mind spinning quickly: “The teaching building has three staircases on each floor – one main and two side ones, with six floors total. There’s also a staircase leading to the rooftop on the sixth floor, but that’s absolutely somewhere we can’t go.”
Golden Retriever nodded like a timid housewife [xiao xi fu er 小媳婦儿 – metaphor for someone being overly submissive].
Except for the rooftop, the remaining six floors and various rooms of different sizes would be their battlefield. Whether they could survive this chase and stay alive under the siege of ghosts would depend on their escape strategy.
As they were talking, suddenly there came the sound of someone climbing up from below the side staircase. Along with it came Mother Shen’s distorted voice: “Maomao—— are you here?”
Shen Maomao made a gesture to Golden Retriever, and they immediately ran for their lives towards the middle staircase, then directly down to the third floor, where they came face to face with a somewhat familiar-looking boy.
He must have been a player from Class 2-1 too. So there were other people still alive, just trapped in the inner world and unable to leave, not all dead…
The boy turned and ran at first sight of her, as if he’d seen some fierce ghost.
Shen Maomao: “…”
She and Golden Retriever continued downward. After encountering other players, Shen Maomao inevitably thought of Ren Yue again.
Ren Yue… was she still alive?
Ever since finding out that Ren Yue had deceived her, their friendship had come to an end. Although Shen Maomao wasn’t someone who held grudges, she wasn’t a “holy mother” [sheng mu 圣母 – Internet slang for someone overly kind or self-righteous] either. She wouldn’t protect someone who might have harmed her; whether Ren Yue lived or died didn’t matter much to her anymore…
Golden Retriever and she ran around the corner to the leftmost staircase on the third floor, leaning against the entrance as usual to catch their breath.
Looking at the pensive Shen Maomao, Golden Retriever seemed to think of something and suddenly said in a low voice: “Sister Rabbit—— are you worried about your friend?”
Shen Maomao paused for a moment, then shook her head: “She’s not really a friend… I’m worried about Sister Lou, but is Ren Yue still alive?”
Golden Retriever gave her an OK gesture: “Don’t worry, she’s living just fine.”
Shen Maomao lowered her head, thinking that her previous self who wanted to protect Ren Yue was like a “sha bi” [sha bi 傻逼 – vulgar slang meaning idiot].
The other person could live perfectly well on her own, and didn’t need her unnecessary intervention.
Mother Shen, who was searching for them in the corridor, started singing while walking, revealing her location to the two.
She was singing 《Little Frog》 [xiao tiao wa 小跳蛙 – children’s song], the same song Shen Maomao had sung that day, making Shen Maomao’s feelings quite complicated.
——Of course, she sang much better than Shen Maomao.
The two carefully circled around based on Mother Shen’s voice, and for a while, they managed to avoid being discovered.
Besides Mother Shen, many other ghosts were also chasing them during this time. These ghosts usually appeared as children, each with bizarre and grotesque appearances, maintaining their final form before death, each more terrifying than the last.
During the hide and seek game, a piercing scream echoed from one of the classrooms in the teaching building, startling both of them.
The scream was so sharp that they couldn’t even tell if the voice belonged to a male or female.
“What’s going on?!” Golden Retriever said anxiously.
Just as he finished speaking, a dark shadow quickly flashed past the small window of the side staircase, then landed on the ground with a “peng” sound, making both children shudder three times.
Shen Maomao swallowed: “Is that the female ghost…”
Golden Retriever’s face also showed an expression of fear, clearly remembering how he and Lou Jingmo had been chased around everywhere by this ghost sister.
The two made a quick decision and immediately turned to run downstairs, trying their best to avoid encountering the ghost sister.
But what neither of them expected was—— they actually met Ren Yue on the second floor!
If Ren Yue could hold out this long against the ghosts… then Sister Lou must be safe too, right?
At that moment, Ren Yue was in a terrible state, blood flowing from her arm, staring at them from across half a corridor, with a grotesque thing pursuing her relentlessly.
Shen Maomao’s heart skipped a beat, and she habitually wanted to help, but then she remembered the decision she had just made, gritted her teeth and prepared to take Golden Retriever downstairs to hide.
Ren Yue gave her a deep look, then made a decision she hadn’t expected—— she directly led the ghost down the middle staircase towards the lower floor!
Golden Retriever said: “Wow, is your friend really this noble?”
“Fuck!” Shen Maomao cursed, muttering under her breath, “Who the hell asked for your kindness!”
Golden Retriever didn’t hear clearly: “Huh? What did you say, Sister Rabbit?”
“Nothing,” Shen Maomao said, “I was asking if you have any props that can repel ghosts?”
Golden Retriever pulled out a bunch of things from his pocket: “Yes, which kind do you want?”
Shen Maomao: “…” “Chao neng li” is truly terrifying! [chāo néng lì 钞能力 – wordplay combining “money” and “ability”, meaning the power of money]
“Are we going to save someone?” Golden Retriever was eager to try, “But these items all make a lot of noise, they’ll easily attract the ghosts.”
Shen Maomao thought for a moment, pushed him into a nearby classroom, and instructed: “I’ll go save her, you hide here. Take care of yourself, run if there’s danger.”
Golden Retriever was stunned: “Why? You’re going to show off without me?”
Shen Maomao: “…”
She wanted to give this kid a big slap across the face.
The author has something to say:
Once on vacation, I lose all sense of time ying qwq [ying 嘤 – onomatopoeia for crying]
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