Illusions, Lies, Truth

Volume 4, Chapter 3: It Has Begun, Part 2——The Bookcase

Translated by lucathia (proofread by Taffygirl13 & Trespasserby)

Lin Zhixiang anxiously rushed to the guys’ dormitory. Along the way, plenty of boys gave her dubious looks, but she couldn’t pay them any mind. The moment she grabbed someone, she pressed, “Do you know where Jian Zhi is?” She grabbed several guys in succession for answers. When she learned the correct location of his room, she immediately headed over and pounded on his door thunderously.

“Jian Zhi? Jian Zhi!”

The door opened. A guy stared in bewilderment at Lin Zhixiang, confused over why this woman was crazed to this degree.

Lin Zhixiang pushed the guy aside and ran into the room. It was empty. She immediately spun around, grabbed the guy’s collar, and demanded, “Where is Jian Zhi? Where is he?”

The guy frantically said, “Jian Zhi went to participate in a club activity. He isn’t back yet. He should be back soon. You can just wait for him. Aren’t you overreacting?”

Lin Zhixiang ignored him. She took out her phone and called Jiang Ziya, only for no one to pick up after three consecutive tries. She paled but remembered that she also had Lu Yang’s number. She quickly called Lu Yang and told him everything, including how Jiang Ziya wanted her to find Jian Zhi, but she couldn’t find him. Now, even Jiang Ziya’s number was not connecting.

Lu Yang told her he would search for Jiang Ziya and hung up on her. He did not instruct her on what to do next.

Lin Zhixiang stared at her cell phone. She could not help but call Jiang Ziya’s number several times more, but it never connected. The unease she felt grew stronger and stronger… I really am existence’s bane!

She should never have dreamed of academics, of joining this club, of approaching Jiang Ziya and Lu Yang. In fact, she should have firmly embarrassed Jian Zhi long ago and made him give up on her…

“Hey, you okay? Jian Zhi will be back soon!”

The guy beside her felt uneasy. This girl looks like she’s about to cry. What in the world has Jian Zhi done? He took some tissues from the desk to give her in case the tears in her eyes overflowed.

“Don’t come near me!”

Lin Zhixiang shrieked, scaring the guy so much that he jumped back. She turned and ran off.

However, once she exited the dormitory, she fell into a daze and had no clue where to go. She stood blankly at the entrance until someone grabbed her and pulled her away.

Lin Zhixiang screamed, “Let go of me! Don’t touch me. You’ll die because of me!”

“Lin Zhixiang, it’s me.”

Lin Zhixiang stilled. Only then did she see who had come.

“President?”

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Xu Xikai smiled at the few surrounding onlookers that had started to pay attention to them and said, “I’m sorry, my girlfriend was just bickering with me.”

After observing that Lin Zhixiang was neither struggling nor crying for help, those people smiled to indicate that they understood and left.

“Come!” Xu Xikai pulled Lin Zhixiang away.

“No, you can’t. You have to leave. You don’t understand!” Lin Zhixiang began to resist again. She cried out, “I-I’m the bane of all existence. Anyone who comes near me will be endangered!”

“Jian Zhi died.”

A single sentence from Xu Xikai put a stop to Lin Zhixiang’s struggling. She stared at him blankly and asked, “He’s really dead?”

Xu Xikai nodded, his eyes tearful. After he dragged Lin Zhixiang to a deserted location, he then cried out in frustration, “It was all my fault. I shouldn’t have planned something like a night venture. It was all me!”

“No, it’s not your fault.” Lin Zhixiang mumbled dispiritedly, “It’s mine. It has always been my fault. My parents died, and even my brother became crippled because of me. Has even Jian Zhi died now?”

“Two other club members also died. One drowned in the Pond of Meditation. The other died in the bathroom.”

Lin Zhixiang froze. She lifted her head in disbelief at Xu Xikai.

“I just learned from Lu Yang and the others that it wasn’t just our club members who died either.”

Xu Xikai said with some confusion, “There was even a female student who died at the abandoned campus that we didn’t go to. Just what is going on? Could it be that our venture put the school wonders in motion, and even uninvolved people got dragged in?”

“A f-female student?” Lin Zhixiang suddenly thought of something. A chill seized her heart, and she shook all over. “Do you know h-her name?”

“Yes.” Xu Xikai nodded. “Li Yao.”

Lin Zhixiang fell to the floor, her face as white as paper.

“What’s the matter?” Xu Xikai frowned. “What is this bane of all existence thing you keep talking about?”

Lin Zhixiang shook her head and kept mumbling over and over, “Get away from me.”

“I won’t leave if you don’t tell me!”

In order to get rid of Xu Xikai sooner, Lin Zhixiang had no more reservations. It did not matter even if the president choked her to death after hearing her out. She divulged her identity as “existence’s bane” in full detail, and even revealed that Li Yao had been a classmate of hers from the same major. They had done a small group project together before.

After divulging all of this, she lifted her head and gazed at Xu Xikai with a frightful but expectant expression.

Xu Xikai remained silent for a long while before he said, “No matter if this is your fault or mine, you and I both only have one chance at atonement.”

Lin Zhixiang’s eyes widened. I still have a chance?

“Since the school wonders have come true one after another, then that means that the thirteenth bookcase of forbidden books must also be real!”

Lin Zhixiang looked at Xu Xikai in confusion. So what if it’s real?

Xu Xikai explained, “The legend of the forbidden bookcase is the reason I started this society in the first place. I planned this activity because I knew that the forbidden bookcase has a specific book, one that can bring the deceased back to life: ‘Resurrection.’”

Lin Zhixiang retorted without a second thought, “Bring a dead person back to life? That’s impossible.”

“Look at this.”

Xu Xikai took out his cell phone and played a video. The video astonishingly showed Li Yao turning from a corpse back into a human step by step. In it, Li Yao asked in confusion, “Where am I,” “What’s going on,” before the video ended.

“Is L-Li Yao not dead?”

Lin Zhixiang grabbed the cell phone, nearly about to cry out of joy.

“No…” Xu Xikai’s complexion was ashen. He quietly said, “Lu Yang and his father believed the resurrected Li Yao to be a monster and cut her down again.”

Lin Zhixiang froze.

Xu Xikai quickly explained, “But you can’t blame them. I’m sure that anyone who saw a corpse come back to life would believe them to be a monster. He didn’t know that resurrection was part of the school wonders either. As long as we acquire that book, we can resurrect her again.”

Lin Zhixiang gazed at the Li Yao in the video and asked in a daze, “As long as we get that book, we can resurrect her?”

“Not just Li Yao. As long as we get the book ‘Resurrection,’ everyone can come back to life: Li Yao, Jian Zhi, the other club members, and even…”

Xu Xikai leaned forward, his voice softly enticing. “Even your parents who died because of you can come back to life.”

Lin Zhixiang’s eyes widened.

Xu Xikai pulled the cell phone away and took out an enlarged photograph. He placed it in her hands.

“Look at this. This book is Resurrection. It took me a lot of effort to discover it.”

Lin Zhixiang lowered her head to look at the photograph. She mumbled, “This is Resurrection? Resurre—”

Xu Xikai gently held Lin Zhixiang and glanced at the photograph. His lips curled up.

This was completely out of his expectations. He had thought the book of Resurrection would be white.

Xu Xikai pulled Lin Zhixiang up and forcefully said, “Come, it’s almost dawn. We don’t have much time left. We can’t just let our club members die because of our mistakes. They still have family waiting for them to return!”

Hearing the word “family,” Lin Zhixiang jolted and finally stepped forward and followed Xu Xikai away.

The library was obviously closed in the middle of the night, but this was not a problem at all for Xu Xikai. It didn’t matter either that the school had not agreed to lend the library to him. Why would the university lend the library to a club in the middle of the night?

Xu Xikai had never requested permission to borrow the library in the first place. In any case, these foolish students would never overly wonder about the possibility of such a matter to begin with.

Xu Xikai led Lin Zhixiang straight up to the second floor with assured strides, as if he were in his own home. Upon reaching the entrance, he carefully told her, “Count the bookcases with me one by one, all the way until we reach the thirteenth one.”

Lin Zhixiang nodded, forcefully squashing down the anxiety in her heart and the logic that held on by a thread. One by one, she counted with Xu Xikai. As the number went up, the unease in her heart also rose.

Resurrecting everyone should be okay, right?

They won’t become possessed by the devil like in the movies, right?

But Li Yao looked very normal, and… Lu Yang was able to cut her down! Even if they really are devils, Lu Yang can take care of them.

After making her decision, she sucked in a deep breath and counted the bookcases.

“One… two… seven… eleven…”

“Twelve!”

After counting up to twelve, Lin Zhixiang saw between the gaps of the books on the twelfth bookcase—the thirteenth bookcase!

A black bookcase with a wooden frame.

The thirteenth bookcase actually exists! Lin Zhixiang trembled. Does Resurrection really exist? What if it doesn’t? But what if… it does?

“Lin Zhixiang, let’s go!”

Xu Xikai waited for her to step over. Only then would the dust settle.

Trembling, Lin Zhixiang slowly moved her feet. She walked around the twelfth bookcase, toward the thirteenth.

Standing before the bookcase, she lifted her head to search for the book, Resurrection. However, out of her expectations, she saw a humongous mound of black perched on the bookcase, and it pounced down at her.

“Ah—”

Lin Zhixiang fell against the floor, the impact and the fright she had suffered over the course of the night directly rendering her unconscious.

“Stand down!”

Xu Xikai rushed forward and used the large cross he had prepared ahead of time to thrash the mound of black. Each strike caused the thing to shriek with pain, yet it refused to retreat and used both hands to hold onto Lin Zhixiang tightly without letting go.

“Don’t you want to resurrect Jian Zhi?”

Hearing Jian Zhi’s name, the mound of black hesitated and finally released its hold. It retreated back to the corner and huddled down, both arms hugging the mud below its feet. Tears of blood accompanied endless cries of “Jian Zhi,” “girl he liked”…

“It seems that Lin Zhixiang and the angel are not enough.”

Xu Xikai paid no attention to the unconscious Lin Zhixiang. He walked up to the forbidden black bookcase and casually looked through the books, which mostly consisted of all sorts of curses, yet Resurrection was not among them. There aren’t even any healing spells!

“As expected, Resurrection isn’t something that can easily be made to appear. As for Lin Zhixiang…”

Xu Xikai lowered his head to look at the unconscious Lin Zhixiang. “She has been so unfortunate, yet her morals are unexpectedly proper. How troublesome. This must be the fault of her crippled brother.”

Even though he complained, Xu Xikai’s mood was quite good. His plan was unfolding step by step, and the forbidden bookcase had already appeared. The only thing left to do now was continue to increase the strength behind the “belief.”

Up until Resurrection appears.