"The owner of Ward Three is Men Nan. People with the surname Men are rare to begin with, so that child's name might very well be a hint he left for me."
Doors represent the unknown, but they also represent a way out.
"Thinking about it carefully, there have been plenty of other hints. What kind of trouble did my parents actually run into? Why can they only guide me toward the truth bit by bit through methods like these?"
Some questions were dangerous to dwell on. Through his conversations with the old principal, Chen Ge had learned that his parents were hiding a great many things, and that they were far from being the simple people they appeared to be on the surface. There were situations even Dr. Gao couldn't handle, yet Chen Ge's parents had been able to resolve them. And even so, they still didn't dare tell Chen Ge the truth — they could only drip-feed information through constant guidance and hints. This abnormal behavior made Chen Ge deeply uneasy.
"I don't know what I need to watch out for, but I'm certain of one thing now: my family has run into something extremely troublesome."
Chen Ge stood beside the table, his mind still churning. Every word the old principal had said was critically important to him.
"Chen Ge, are you all right?" The principal saw Chen Ge standing motionless for a long time and wanted to approach, but he was afraid of the red-clothed ghost beside him.
"I'm fine." Chen Ge waved his hand. "The path you mentioned is far too dangerous. All sorts of horrifying monsters exist in that blood-red city. Leaving through there — I don't have any confidence in that at all."
The shock of what had happened to Dr. Gao was still fresh in his mind. A perfectly sane person had gone mad in just one week. He simply couldn't accept that.
"I can't gamble with my employees' lives." Chen Ge sat down on the table. Perhaps from thinking too hard, his face had gone pale.
"But that's the only way out!" The old principal hadn't expected Chen Ge to push back.
"I know another way." Chen Ge slowly raised his head and looked at the old principal. "Every scenario has a door. We can leave through the door inside the Haunted School."
"That's impossible. The school's will would never let any child leave. It gave those children a home, and those children became part of the door. They are one and the same." The old principal pointed toward the window. "Do you see that blood-red eye? All of the students' negative emotions are gathered there. The moment it discovers anyone trying to leave the school, the entire school's will will block them in an instant. It will never let a single student leave, let alone actively open the door to let Xue Ying out."
"You don't understand that door well enough. As far as I know, a girl left the haunted school through that door a long time ago. Her name was Chang Wenyu." Chen Ge was well aware of the limitations of the school's will.
"Are you sure? How did she do it?" The old principal was genuinely shocked — this was the first he'd ever heard of it.
"This school is currently controlled by the combined will of its many students. Those despairing students won't let us leave. But if someone among us were to take over those students' will and become the haunted school's new master, forget opening the door to let people out — the entire haunted school would be ours to command." As Chen Ge spoke, his eyes remained locked on the old principal's face, carefully cataloging every subtle expression that flickered across it.
"Us?" The old principal looked at him like he was insane. "That's impossible. The school's will has been growing for years — it's become a monster now. Even red-clothed ghosts can't contend with it..."
The old principal paused, as if worried he hadn't made himself clear enough, and added: "Even six red-clothed ghosts wouldn't be enough!"
He wanted to stamp out that dangerous idea in Chen Ge's head. In his view, trying to replace the school's will was nothing short of suicide.
"Aren't you curious why I'd rather fight the school's will than simply enter that blood-red city directly?" The image of his father surfaced in Chen Ge's mind. But the father he remembered and the man the old principal described were completely different people — he simply couldn't see everything from his father's perspective. Honestly, he had no idea what his family was actually trying to do. He just instinctively believed that they would never hurt him.
"Why?" The old principal was just as puzzled. He had come through that very route, and in his eyes, it was a reasonably safe path.
"You're underestimating just how dangerous that blood-red city is." Chen Ge told the old principal about Dr. Gao's experience, withholding nothing.
"I have plenty of witnesses here — Xu Yin, Bai Qiulin, and your student, the Pen Spirit. That nightmarish past still lingers in our minds. Even now, when I close my eyes, those scenes come flooding back." To prove he wasn't exaggerating, Chen Ge brought out the Pen Spirit. She had been right there when Dr. Gao appeared in the Liwan Town scenario, and she had participated in everything Chen Ge had been through.
When it came to describing danger, the Pen Spirit possessed a talent that few "ghosts" could match. She sketched and wrote on a sheet of white paper, and the contents turned the old principal's face white with shock.
"That blood-red city is that dangerous?" A chill of retrospective fear ran through the old principal.
"Exactly. So when I heard you had crossed through the blood-red city to get here, I was very surprised. Though it's possible that you did many good deeds during your lifetime, and people of good fortune are protected by heaven — perhaps some unseen force was watching over you." Chen Ge chose his words carefully.
"I was just lucky, that's all."
"Luck is part of strength. The abandoned well on the school's back field — I plan to use that as our fallback route. If my plan fails, we leave through that instead. Two options, double the insurance — that's the safest approach under the current circumstances." Chen Ge still had designs on the blood-red city; it held far too many unknowns.
Convincing the old principal didn't take much time. The old man quickly agreed to follow Chen Ge.
"Principal, since we're on the same team now, there are certain uncertainties within the team that we should clear up as soon as possible, so as to avoid misunderstandings." Chen Ge pulled Ying Bai out from among the crowd of "people." "You're looking for Li Xueying. But why are there two Li Xueyings in this school? Which one is real? Which one is fake?"
Ying Bai hadn't expected to be dragged into this. When she first saw the old principal, she had been overjoyed. But the moment she spotted Ying Hong standing behind him, her heart sank, as if something precious — the most important thing she had — had been snatched away by someone else.
Ying Hong's expression grew tense when she saw Ying Bai. She clutched at the old man's clothes from behind, not daring to say a word.
To prevent any mishaps, Chen Ge released every one of his red-clothed ghosts at once. It was meant as an intimidation display aimed squarely at Ying Hong.
He didn't want some petty issue to sour his relationship with the old principal, so he chose to crush any potential sources of discord with overwhelming force before they could even begin.