Chapter 1 Yes Or No
"Officer Song, I couldn't hear very clearly over the phone. This time you've come looking for Bai Cangzhu for…"
The counselor, surnamed Zhang, was nearly forty. Due to nervousness and the stuffy weather, sweat had washed away her foundation, leaving awkward streaks on her face.
But she just wiped it haphazardly. In her heart, she had long anticipated that this student of hers would face such a situation sooner or later, but now… wasn't it a bit too soon?
She thought it would at least wait until after graduation.
The man called Officer Song was around thirty or forty years old, with dark skin suggesting he often did fieldwork, completely different from the fair-skinned, exquisitely made-up female officer behind him.
"Teacher Zhang, please relax. We're just here to understand some things."
Counselor Teacher Zhang just smiled but didn't completely relax. As she walked, she said,
"This kid, Bai Cangzhu, isn't fundamentally bad."
"Um… although his relationships with classmates aren't very good, and he has some personality issues, and there are supposedly many terrible rumors about him around the university town…"
The counselor felt she was saying more and more inappropriate things and quickly stopped herself.
"But overall, he's still very good, hehe…"
The pretty female officer, Luo Shui, realized for the first time that a teacher could use so many qualifiers when speaking well of a student.
Teacher Zhang led the group to dorm room 1314 at the end of the hallway, knocked on the door, waited for a response from inside, then opened the door and led the two officers in.
This was a four-person dormitory, but three beds were empty. The room's furnishings were simple, but everything was arranged orderly, so clean that Luo Shui found it hard to believe it was a male student's dorm.
The person in the dorm was standing by the window and happened to turn around when he heard them enter.
Short black hair trembled slightly with the breeze coming through the window. A clean white shirt. On a face that seemed to have its own halo under the sunlight from outside, were sharp eyebrows and star-like eyes, dark pupils.
Graceful is my young lord, his ingenuity suddenly god-like.
Luo Shui herself was beautiful, but she had never thought a man would inexplicably bring such poetry to her mind.
This student named Bai Cangzhu indeed had an appearance that drew the eye.
Officer Song also raised his eyebrows, but he had seen all sorts of people and quickly regained his usual expression, glancing at the book on the desk. It was a hardcover edition of [Complete Laws - Criminal Law Volume].
"Student Bai Cangzhu, right? I'm from the Binhai City Bureau. Today, there are some questions we hope you can cooperate with us on."
Bai Cangzhu nodded, a gentle smile on his face that Teacher Zhang found very uncharacteristic. He moved chairs from near the other beds for them to sit.
"Please ask. I will tell you everything I know."
Officer Song held out his hand but received no response. He turned back to find his apprentice still staring at the student's face. After a cough, Luo Shui flusteredly pulled a photograph out of her bag.
Song Xian handed the photo to Bai Cangzhu and asked,
"You should know this person, right?"
In the photo was a young man with a baby face, wearing black-framed glasses, lips pressed together, his expression looking rather cold, somewhat incongruous with his baby-faced appearance.
Bai Cangzhu looked at the photo and nodded, saying,
"Yes, I know him. Chu Qi. We grew up together. We used to have a decent relationship."
Song Xian nodded. He had been watching Bai Cangzhu's expression, feeling that although the young man's features were handsome, there was always something missing in his smile.
"He died yesterday. Did you know?"
Teacher Zhang let out a short gasp.
Bai Cangzhu sighed, shook his head, pinched the bridge of his nose, seeming somewhat sad, and said,
"Is that so… dead…"
Seeing the atmosphere was a bit heavy, Luo Shui took the initiative to change the subject.
"Did Chu Qi contact you before this? I mean, recently."
Bai Cangzhu looked up, gave the beautiful and kind-hearted female officer a smile, and shook his head.
"In the third year of junior high, he transferred schools midway. After that, I haven't heard anything from him."
Luo Shui nodded, jotting down the details. In her heart, she already felt there were no issues.
Song Xian, however, looked around the dormitory environment. Honestly, he hadn't expected a male dorm to be so clean and tidy. Looking at the empty beds, he asked,
"Why are three beds empty? Such a big dorm, you live here alone?"
The counselor, Teacher Zhang, in her late thirties, had a somewhat shifty gaze at this moment. She rubbed her hands together, wondering how best to phrase her words.
Instead, Bai Cangzhu scratched his head and laughed naturally,
"Hehe, they're all locals, you know. They have money, and they all have partners. It's normal they wouldn't want to share a dorm with a single dog like me."
Luo Shui put away her notebook, amused by Bai Cangzhu's self-deprecation. Teacher Zhang also coughed and mumbled a few words vaguely.
Song Xian also smiled faintly, put on his hat, and stood up. Just as he was about to leave the dormitory, a thought suddenly flashed through his mind. He turned back and said,
"Right, I haven't told you Chu Qi's cause of death yet."
"In Binhai City's most bustling commercial street, he suddenly went berserk, using a sharpened, custom-made Tang sword to stab eight people to death and severely injure two others..."
"He was ultimately shot dead by the SWAT team that arrived after attempts to persuade him to surrender failed."
Bai Cangzhu seemed stunned for a moment, then rubbed his nose and whispered,
"Looking at it that way, he indeed deserved to die."
Song Xian looked at Bai Cangzhu, whose emotions showed no fluctuation upon hearing about such a tragedy. The strange feeling in his heart grew stronger. He thought for a moment and suddenly asked,
"Have you heard of [Infinite Dimensional Adventure]?"
Song Xian stared into Bai Cangzhu's eyes, but there was no flaw in Bai Cangzhu's gaze. He just frowned slightly and asked doubtfully,
"What's that? A new game?"
Song Xian's peripheral vision caught Bai Cangzhu's hand. Finally, he relaxed inwardly. He shook his head and smiled,
"Hehe, I heard someone mention a popular game recently. Maybe I remembered the name wrong."
"Thank you for your time today, Student Bai and Teacher Zhang. If you remember anything later, you can contact me."
With that, Officer Song took out a business card and placed it on the table.
Only when Song Xian reached the ground floor did he realize what that strange feeling was. Wasn't that Bai Cangzhu's emotional state a bit too stable? Even when facing police questioning, he showed no nervousness or discomfort throughout.
He asked the female teacher beside him with this doubt.
"Teacher Zhang, I see that Student Bai's mental state and emotions are quite stable. Why does his file have those kinds of records?"
Even for an experienced old detective like him, who had seen a lot, it was hard to imagine that a student involved in over 10 incidents of "justifiable self-defense" over four years would look so refined, clean, and emotionally stable.
The female counselor, surnamed Zhang, thought to herself, I thought the same thing initially. She pondered for a moment and explained,
"Bai Cangzhu is quite normal when he's normal."
Luo Shui frowned, looking at Teacher Zhang with a face full of question marks.
"And when he's not normal?" Song Xian pressed.
Teacher Zhang opened her mouth, hesitated, and finally, driven by her instinct to protect her student, she slightly polished her words,
"When he's not normal, he seems a bit… crazy…"
"Crazy?!"
Luo Shui couldn't equate that word with the clean and gentle person she had just met.
"What kind of crazy?"
Teacher Zhang's expression changed several times. Finally, she extended her index finger and thumb, leaving a tiny gap between them.
"A billion points crazy kind."
Bai Cangzhu, at the window, saw the group talking in the small square in front of the dormitory. He even waved at them from afar before closing the window and returning to the seat under his bunk bed.
He took out his phone from his pocket, rereading a series of text messages from different numbers, though clearly from the same sender.
[Cangzhu, I don't know if your illness has recovered, but I have no choice. This game might just be the stage for lunatics like you…]
[I've placed a hot potato that many people are fighting over in the old place only we know]
[Cangzhu, go go crazy in that world, let those self-righteous guys feel what a real anomaly is]
[Haha, after I die, who cares if the floodgates open…]
Hey, Chu Qi, with such a fun game, why did you only tell me now? Look… without me, you played yourself to death…
The smile on Bai Cangzhu's face grew more pronounced. He felt Chu Qi was still the same, lucky but a bit foolish, hmm, although already dead.
And this thing…
Bai Cangzhu fumbled in his pocket and pulled out a black card. This was what he had retrieved from the "old place."
One side of the card appeared completely black, but when held against the sunlight from the window and tilted, the character [罪] (Sin/Crime) appeared.
The other side of the card was adorned with intricate patterns, golden lines forming an ouroboros-like symbol on the black surface.
At the bottom center were two white standard script characters—[无限 (infinite)].
Pfft.
While rubbing it, Bai Cangzhu's finger suddenly paused. A wound inexplicably appeared. He looked at the character [罪] on the back of the card, his pupils suddenly shrinking. The character actually seeped through the card surface and appeared in his palm.
[Special item bound]
[Sin Sequence activation initiated…]
[Activation failed, Reincarnator ID not detected]
[Correcting…]
Bai Cangzhu's muscles tensed instantly, but then quickly relaxed.
He reached out, trying to touch the text before his eyes, but to no avail.
Suddenly, the white text disappeared, and scarlet bloodstains began to appear.
[Self-important, inherently different, you don't fit in with anything, long bored with the mundane routine]
[Now, a new stage has been set]
[Will you gamble your life to start the Infinite Dimensional Adventure?]
[Yes Or No]
(End of this chapter)