Chapter 80: The Fifth Stall of the Restroom
"When did the viewership break twenty thousand? When I first started streaming, I remember there were only a few dozen people in the room." Chen Ge held up his phone; the signal was terrible, and the comments were lagging, often taking ages to load a single one, only to suddenly flood in all at once, impossible to keep up with.
"Over twenty thousand viewers, but subscriptions and bookmarks are still under five thousand—that conversion rate is pretty low." He took his phone, snapped photos of all the papers from the Ouija board game he'd just played, then aimed the camera at the shattered ballpoint pen lying between the chairs. "Fellow stream-watchers, did you see that? I played the Ouija board game, and the pen committed suicide! Why aren't you hitting that follow button? Do you have any idea how much risk I took? A small streamer like me, with no equipment, no team, just me constantly teetering on the edge of danger. I know my setup is lousy, I can't even see your comments, but I can lead you through the most authentic supernatural experiences—unique and impossible to replicate."
After he said this, the follower count in the livestream began to rise. His little speech had some effect.
For him, it was just about completing the mission issued by the black phone, but from the viewers' perspective, it was a different story.
Especially compared to Qin Guang, Chen Ge's setup was shabby, but the content of his stream was utterly unmatched—whether in terms of spectacle or danger.
People watch streams for novelty. Qin Guang and his crew scripted their shows and hired actors to play along; no matter how well they performed, it always felt stiff. Chen Ge, on the other hand, was a whole different beast—even he didn't know what would happen next.
"Thanks for the support, everyone. The Ouija board game—amateurs, please don't try this at home. Alright, now it's time to head somewhere else." Chen Ge watched the viewership still climbing, his heart swelling with joy. Since he had to carry out these missions under the black phone's orders anyway, he might as well make the most of them, squeezing out every bit of hidden value and turning the process into popularity.
"I wonder what's going on in the stream room, but more viewers is a good thing—it's not for nothing that I took such a big risk." Having easily completed one side mission, Chen Ge felt more confident about surviving the night.
He put on his raincoat hood, stepped out of the dormitory building. The search here was done; no need to linger.
"Three missions left: the last classroom, the deep well, and the fifth stall of the restroom."
The fifth stall of the restroom should also be in the teaching building. He'd checked the dormitory restroom earlier—there were only four stalls there. If the office building and dormitory had the same layout, then only the teaching building's restroom matched the mission description.
Chen Ge glanced at his phone. He'd arrived at Muyang Middle School at eight in the evening. The Ouija board game hadn't taken that long, but when he checked the time again, it was nearly nine.
"Three hours until midnight. Three hours to finish three missions—barely enough." Chen Ge had already planned it out in his head: after completing all the side missions, he'd find a corner that allowed both attack and retreat, hunker down, and quietly wait until dawn.
Standing again at the entrance of the teaching building, Chen Ge felt a strange sensation, as if what lay before him wasn't a ruined building but a massive coffin burying countless people.
"The side mission doesn't specify which restroom. The teaching building has three floors, meaning the fifth stall on each floor could be my target." Chen Ge used his flashlight to light the way, holding his phone in the other hand as he entered.
Walking past empty classrooms late at night was a spine-chilling experience in itself. Chen Ge was terrified that if he glanced inside, he might see something strange lurking there.
He quickly ran to the end of the corridor and ducked into the first-floor restroom.
The fire hadn't spread here. The restroom had mostly retained its appearance from years ago, with cracked floor tiles and weeds sprouting through them.
Dark brown stains lingered on the walls. Only one window remained, creaking harshly in the wind and rain.
"Focus on the mission—no time to waste."
The restroom in the teaching building had six stalls in total. After so many years, many of the stall doors were damaged; he could see inside without even pushing them open.
Tool hammer in hand, he walked past the six stalls in order. The first four showed nothing unusual, but the fifth and sixth stalls were off.
Their doors were tightly shut. Chen Ge gave them a gentle push—they were locked.
"Usually, a stall is only locked when someone's inside." The thought had barely crossed his mind when Chen Ge dismissed it. "The school's been abandoned for three years. What's inside might not be 'human.' Let's check first."
He raised the tool hammer and smashed it against the lock. The stall door swung open, and before Chen Ge could react, several dark shapes lunged at him.
"What the hell?!"
He dodged aside, shining his flashlight to see that the stall was stuffed with mops, brooms, and other clutter.
False alarm. Chen Ge set the mops and brooms back in place, then leaned over to peer into the last stall—it, too, was packed with junk.
All six stalls on the first floor were normal. His mission target must be on another floor.
Stepping out of the first-floor restroom, Chen Ge couldn't help but glance back. The half-open stall doors looked like they were beckoning.
"This scene would definitely scare off a lot of people if it were in a haunted house." Thinking this, Chen Ge carried his tool hammer up to the second-floor restroom.
Same layout, but different—the windows here were boarded up with planks, making it feel much more oppressive than the first floor.
"Could it be here?"
Maybe because the windows were sealed, the second-floor restroom was well-preserved, hardly changed from years ago.
He walked to the first stall. Before he could push the door, faint footsteps seemed to echo from the hallway outside.
The heavy rain made it hard to hear clearly. "Someone running in the hallway?"
He crouched in the corner of the restroom, tool hammer in hand, waiting for a few minutes. Nothing strange passed by.
"I feel like, as time goes on, this school is slowly changing, as if it's coming back to life. I need to speed up."
Chen Ge hesitated no longer. He entered the restroom and pushed open the first four stalls in succession. When he stood outside the fifth stall, the footsteps in the hallway sounded again—this time, he heard them clearly: two people walking side by side.
"The mission info for the fifth stall says that every midnight, a red figure always appears. Could it be here already?"