NASAY CH 69

The campus of No. 2 High School was vast, being an old school with a large area. Apart from the newly built teaching buildings, exhibition hall, and auditorium, there were also many old, abandoned buildings.

He searched the senior year teaching building one by one, while Lu Qinghe and Li Lefan searched the first and second-year buildings, but they still couldn’t find anything. Huo Xingzhou’s heart grew heavier, and an overwhelming sense of unease threatened to swallow him whole.

His whole body was trembling, and he spoke with an unsteady voice,
“I’ll check the abandoned buildings at the back. You and Li Lefan search near the exhibition hall. Feng Jia has already gone to check the surveillance footage. If there’s any news, let’s meet back here later.”

Lu Qinghe didn’t say much, just nodded and immediately left.

The group of them searched the campus like headless flies. Along the way, they ran into students from Class 9, who were startled by how distraught Huo Xingzhou looked.

Huo Xingzhou grabbed one of them and asked,
“Have you seen Luo Xing?”

Everyone shook their heads. He nodded absentmindedly, murmured a quiet “okay,” then turned away and continued his search. In his heart, he kept repeating, Luo Xing, please don’t let anything happen to you.

“Luo Xing, wait for me.”

Huo Xingzhou ran through the old buildings, where everything was eerily silent, making his rough breathing sound even heavier, like a beast prowling in the darkness.

If there had been light shining on him at that moment, it would have revealed his bloodshot eyes and the menacing aura surrounding him, as if he were ready to tear someone apart.

“Luo Xing!”

“Luo Xing…”

Suddenly, he heard voices calling out across the campus. He immediately took off toward the sound and discovered that students from Class 9 had come out to help him search for Luo Xing.

Some had already washed up for the night, wearing slippers as they joined the search. Some of the girls still had wet hair clinging to their backs but didn’t seem to care about the cold as they hurried through the campus.

A warmth spread through Huo Xingzhou’s chest.

There was no time to thank them. He turned and ran in the opposite direction, repeating in his heart, Luo Xing, see? You have so many people who care about you. Don’t be afraid. Just wait for us to find you!

They had been searching for a full forty minutes now. It had been four and a half hours since Luo Xing disappeared.

Huo Xingzhou was almost certain that something had happened to him. Luo Xing wasn’t the type to act recklessly. If he had gone somewhere, he would have told someone to avoid making others worry.

Especially since he had specifically asked Feng Jia to look after him before leaving. He wouldn’t just disappear and let Feng Jia take the blame.

He would rather suffer himself than let others be troubled because of him. So where had he gone?!

Could he have gone to Zhao Jiulan?

That didn’t seem possible. Around seven o’clock, it was still evening study period. Without a leave permit, he couldn’t have left. The evening self-study sessions over the past few days had been unsupervised since Teacher Cheng had other matters to attend to, but there was still no way he could have left.

“Ah!”

Huo Xingzhou, caught off guard, bumped into someone. She hadn’t noticed him either and ended up falling to the ground.

“Huo Xingzhou?”
Chen Yiyi got up from the ground and walked up to him, puzzled. She asked with concern,
“What’s wrong with you?”

Huo Xingzhou had no time to entertain her. He coldly stepped around her and said, “Nothing.”

“Did you get the phone?”
Chen Yiyi followed behind him, but he was walking too fast. She couldn’t keep up, so she had to raise her voice and call out.

The moment he heard “phone,” Huo Xingzhou stopped in his tracks and turned back with a frown.

“What did you just say?”

Chen Yiyi quickly jogged over to him, catching her breath as she said,
“Earlier today, when you answered a call at the stairwell, someone bumped into you while carrying a pile of assignments. While you were helping her pick them up, your phone accidentally fell out of your pocket… I wanted to return it to you, but you had already walked away.”

“Get to the point.”

Chen Yiyi was startled by his anger, her face turning pale as she instinctively took a few steps back. Stammering, she said,
“I gave it to someone else.”

“Who did you give it to?!”
Huo Xingzhou could barely contain his rage, his fists clenched so tightly that his knuckles cracked.

Chen Yiyi was on the verge of tears. She had never seen him like this before—she realized that when she confessed to him that day, he had already been showing her his most restrained and pleasant side.

Was this… the real him?

“Speak!”

Chen Yiyi flinched, and tears instantly streamed down her face. Huo Xingzhou grew even more frustrated and forced himself to lower his voice, suppressing his temper.
“Stop crying. Just tell me—who did you give the phone to?”

His phone wasn’t locked. If the person who found it had bad intentions, they could easily use it to trick Luo Xing.

“X-Xue Jian.”
Chen Yiyi trembled as she hiccupped between sobs.
“He said he was your good friend and was just about to look for you, so I gave it to him.”

Huo Xingzhou’s mind went blank.

Xue Jian!

Suppressing his growing hostility, he stretched out his hand.
“Let me borrow your phone.”

Chen Yiyi eyed him warily and asked cautiously,
“What do you need my phone for?”

Huo Xingzhou had no patience for this. “Hurry up!”

Terrified, Chen Yiyi shrank back, her hands trembling as she quickly unlocked her phone and handed it to him with great hesitation, watching nervously as his fingers moved swiftly across the screen.

He dialed Lu Qinghe’s number at lightning speed. The moment the call connected, he said,
“Go check Xue Jian’s dorm and see if he’s there. My phone is with him. I suspect he used it to text Luo Xing and lure him out.”

“Xue Jian?” Lu Qinghe hesitated for only half a second before immediately responding,
“Got it, I’m on it.”

“Yeah. I’m borrowing someone else’s phone for this call, so don’t call back.”
Pausing, Huo Xingzhou spotted Ye Qiaoqiao in the distance and added,
“If there’s any news, call Qiaoqiao.”

After hanging up, he tossed the phone back to Chen Yiyi. His gaze was icy, devoid of any warmth, and his words were chilling enough to cut through bone.

“You better start praying that nothing happens to Luo Xing.”

As soon as he finished speaking, Chen Yiyi collapsed to the ground, trembling as she watched him walk away.

She had only picked up his phone. She had meant well. It wasn’t like she had deliberately given it to the wrong person. How was she supposed to know Xue Jian had bad intentions?

He always seemed refined and polite, with good grades—he didn’t look like a bad person at all!

—

Huo Xingzhou borrowed Ye Qiaoqiao’s phone since she and Zhang Chenlan were coordinating their search efforts. The last places left without surveillance footage were the abandoned gym and training grounds.

Feng Jia had been watching the security cameras at the guardhouse, but because Luo Xing had left right after class, the sheer number of people, combined with the darkness, made it nearly impossible to spot him.

Lu Qinghe quickly returned to the dorm building and questioned Xue Jian’s roommates. They all said he hadn’t returned at all that day, and when they tried calling his phone, it was turned off.

Running out of options, even though it seemed unlikely, Huo Xingzhou still called Zhao Jiulan.

“He’s missing?!”
Zhao Jiulan instantly exploded like a firecracker, screaming,
“How could you be so careless?! I entrusted him to you—how could you not protect him?!”

“He’ll be fine. I won’t let anything happen to him.”
That was all Huo Xingzhou said before hanging up, not bothering to argue further.

He won’t be hurt. I won’t let him be hurt.

Over and over again, he repeated these words. He wasn’t sure if he was saying them to himself, to Zhao Jiulan, or to Luo Xing—who couldn’t even hear him right now.

In his eighteen years of life, this was the first time he truly understood fear.

He was terrified. From the depths of his heart to the tips of his toes, his entire body was consumed by fear.

He didn’t even dare to let the thought form in his mind. He forced himself to stay calm, over and over again.

He was about to lose his mind.

Crack.

His steps halted. He had stepped on something.

Lowering his phone to shine some light, he saw that he had crushed a shattered phone screen.

He bent down to pick it up, and the moment he saw what it was, his heart sank.

It was Luo Xing’s phone.

Huo Xingzhou sucked in a sharp breath and quickly used his phone’s flashlight to scan his surroundings. That was when he realized—he had stumbled upon the infamous abandoned exhibition hall rumored to be haunted.

Inside, dozens of plaster statues stood eerily in the darkness. The electricity had long been cut off, leaving the place in a perpetual state of gloom—even in broad daylight, it was unsettling.

No one ever dared to come here.

His legs went weak.

Practically tripping over himself, he scrambled toward the entrance—only to find that it was locked.

Holding up his phone, Huo Xingzhou moved toward the window. Since it was an exhibition hall, the windows were covered with blackout curtains to prevent sunlight from affecting the displays.

All he could see was complete darkness. Nothing inside was visible.

He pressed his ear against the window but heard nothing.

Without hesitation, he picked up a stone and hurled it at the glass with all his strength. With a loud crash, the window shattered, glass fragments raining down onto the floor. Since this was an old building, the windows weren’t made of tempered glass, and several sharp shards landed on the back of his hand.

His hand stung, but he ignored it. He swiftly pulled away the remaining glass shards and climbed through the window.

The exhibition hall was pitch dark. There were no lights, and life-sized plaster statues stood ominously throughout the space, sending a chill down his spine.

“Luo Xing!”

The hall wasn’t very large—about the size of three classrooms—and it was only one floor. He gripped his phone tightly and advanced cautiously.

Finally, beneath one of the statues, he found Luo Xing curled up in a ball.

At that moment, a massive weight lifted from his chest, leaving him lightheaded. His vision blurred with emotion, and his throat tightened to the point where he could barely breathe.

He immediately called Lu Qinghe.
“I found him. Tell Qiaoqiao and the others, and thank them for me. Everyone worked hard today.”

Lu Qinghe responded,
“Good, as long as he’s safe. I’ll keep an eye on Xue Jian’s situation and update you when I know more.”

“Alright.”

Huo Xingzhou crouched down and gathered Luo Xing into his arms as if he had just reclaimed a lost part of himself. He let out a deep breath.

“I finally found you, Luo Xing.”

But the moment he touched him, Huo Xingzhou froze.

It felt as if he had been slashed open.

Luo Xing was trembling violently, murmuring his name in an unconscious, broken voice.

“…Mom… let me out…”

His breathing was ragged and uneven, his chest rising and falling erratically. He was barely holding it together. Again and again, in a voice filled with despair, he whispered,
“Huo Xingzhou… it’s so dark… Huo Xing…”

A storm of fury surged through Huo Xingzhou, but he forced himself to suppress it.

He turned on his phone’s flashlight and shined it onto Luo Xing’s face.

The moment he saw him, his heart clenched so hard it felt like it might shatter.

Luo Xing’s entire face was drenched in cold sweat. His lips were as pale as death, completely devoid of color. His eyes were tightly shut, and he kept murmuring those broken, unconscious words—on the brink of total collapse.

“Luo Xing! Look at me!”

Huo Xingzhou patted his face, rubbed his ears, and held him tightly in his arms, repeating over and over,
“I’m here, I’m here. Don’t be afraid. It’s over now.”

“Huo Xingzhou… save me…” Luo Xing murmured, as if he didn’t even realize Huo Xingzhou was there.

Huo Xingzhou could almost imagine what the past five hours had been like for him—a person already afraid of the dark—trapped inside this “haunted house.”

Just thinking about Luo Xing suffering here, desperately trying to escape with no way out, made Huo Xingzhou want to tear Xue Jian apart with his bare hands.

He gently pulled Luo Xing away from his embrace, but even in the dim light, he could see that Luo Xing’s eyes were unfocused, his lips trembling deathly pale, his entire body shaking uncontrollably.

“Little one, I’m here to save you. Don’t be afraid.”

Huo Xingzhou stroked his back repeatedly, not caring whether Luo Xing could hear him or not. He held him tightly and carried him toward the window, where a sliver of moonlight shone through.

Luo Xing instinctively curled up in his arms, mumbling broken pleas—begging Zhao Jiulan not to lock him up, promising over and over again that he would behave.

The words crushed Huo Xingzhou’s heart. He couldn’t help but lower his head and press a gentle kiss to Luo Xing’s lips.

Softly, he traced over them, licking and exploring his mouth tenderly—offering comfort in the gentlest way possible.

“Luo Xing, look at me.”

Huo Xingzhou released him slightly, pinching the soft flesh between his thumb and index finger to keep him grounded. He called out to him again and again.

“I’m Huo Xingzhou. You don’t have to be afraid anymore. I’m here to save you.”

“Luo Xing.”

“Huo Xingzhou.” Luo Xing murmured, repeating after him.

Huo Xingzhou’s heart leaped in joy. He held Luo Xing tighter.
“Yes, say it again. Who am I?”

Luo Xing looked into his eyes, dazed, and whispered again, “Huo Xingzhou.”

Huo Xingzhou was just about to speak when Luo Xing’s tears suddenly fell. Before he could react, Luo Xing threw himself into his arms.

“Don’t leave me.”

Luo Xing’s red-rimmed eyes filled with confusion and pain as he clutched at Huo Xingzhou’s sleeve, his voice breaking in raw despair.

For the first time, he completely lost control, crying out in anguish— “Why… why didn’t you come to save me?”

“I waited for you for ten years… why didn’t you come?”