Chapter 15 The Seed of Doubt

Fatty simply thought for a moment and realized Jiang Cheng was right. "Doctor, while that's true, none of us had ever seen a ghost before, let alone know their habits or characteristics. How could she be sure she was targeted by a ghost?"

Jiang Cheng smiled. "Remember those two in room 405?"

Fatty frowned. "The suit guy and the baseball cap?"

"Exactly," Jiang Cheng nodded. "Why were they so scared last night they couldn't sleep?"

"Wasn't it because you were being a jerk, scratching the wall with a coin to scare them?" Fatty said, then suddenly stopped, his pupils contracting as if he had suddenly realized something. He quickly said, "Doctor, are you saying someone deliberately instilled that idea in her, hinting that there was a ghost around her, that it was already watching her!" He grew increasingly agitated. "That she would die if she didn't leave!"

"Mm," Jiang Cheng responded, then added, "That's not what I'm saying. It's just the most logical explanation based on the development of events."

"But..." Fatty lowered his head and pondered for a while. "The qipao woman didn't seem like someone easily fooled. Remember, she came out in the middle of the night, while the suit guy and his friend only experienced it right after we lay down. The risks and psychological pressure they faced were completely different."

"Sometimes you don't need to be too explicit. You just need to plant a seed of doubt in her mind, and the rest..." Jiang Cheng said slowly, "she can fill in with her imagination."

"This is especially true for people who are smart and cautious."

"Especially in a place like the Dream Realm, which can't be explained by common sense, even the slightest suspicion will be amplified infinitely. Caution is good, but endless caution and excessive suspicion can backfire."

Jiang Cheng's words took Fatty a long time to digest. Most of the people in the cafeteria had left before Fatty finally let out a deep breath. "Doctor, if, and I mean if, all your assumptions are correct, then who would be the one who drove the qipao woman into the hallway to kill her?"

Jiang Cheng seemed surprised that Fatty would use the word "drive," but he liked the word and found it very appropriate.

"What do you think?"

"Based solely on location, the woman in the pajamas in the same room is the most suspicious, but you saw her, she's just a jumpy newbie," Fatty said with a grimace. "The only others are the suit guy and the baseball cap, and the ponytail woman in room 406."

When he mentioned the ponytail woman, Fatty's eyes became more profound. He licked his slightly chapped lips, then looked up and said, "I think that woman is not simple. I don't know why, but I feel uncomfortable around her, like a chill surrounds me, and it goes away when I leave."

"That's a murderous aura," Jiang Cheng said, a strange look appearing on his face when the ponytail woman was mentioned. "You feel uncomfortable because of her presence."

"If you look closely, you'll notice her eyes are sharp, like a cold, gleaming blade that will dissect you little by little." Jiang Cheng leaned back in his plastic chair, looking straight ahead. "When I shook her hand, I noticed her wrist was deeper than the average woman's, and her fingertips and the base of her thumb had calluses that hadn't faded yet. When she makes an arm swing, her elbows drop, both to protect her ribs and other weak points, and to facilitate sudden force. She's obviously a trained fighter, and not just any ordinary one."

"She's likely handled a gun, even gotten blood on her hands. When suddenly confronted with the qipao woman's corpse with a missing jaw, she was the calmest, even able to squat down and observe the detail that the tongue was missing." Jiang Cheng took a breath. "That's unimaginable for the average person."

Fatty looked at Jiang Cheng and nodded firmly, as if confirming something. "So, if you ask me, she definitely did it! She lives next door to the qipao woman, which is a convenient distance."

Jiang Cheng turned his head and looked at Fatty for a few seconds. He didn't give any affirmative or negative answer to Fatty's question, so he didn't understand. He had simply analyzed the known facts, but why were some people so eager to jump to conclusions after seeing only the surface?

Fatty was like that, and so was Fan Li in the last mission.

"What's wrong?" Fatty asked suspiciously. "Am I wrong?"

"Could it really be the suit guy and the baseball cap?" Fatty's eyes widened. "That shouldn't be possible. You should have scared them to the point where they're seeing ghosts everywhere. How could they still be in the mood to scheme against others?"

Just then, a crisp bell rang.

It startled Fatty.

It was the bell for the morning class, short but intense. Hearing such a sound while discussing a crucial case made Fatty feel annoyed.

"Let's go," Jiang Cheng stood up. "Let's go look somewhere else."

"Oh, okay, Doctor."

The two walked through the campus, which seemed much larger than its actual area. Since the students were all in class, there were few people on campus, only one or two sporadic staff members.

What Fatty couldn't understand was that these staff members looked at them with strange eyes, as if they were looking at rare animals.

"Doctor," Fatty finally couldn't help but say after the third time they encountered this, "have you noticed that the way they look at us is a little strange?"

"Mm," Jiang Cheng replied, "It's definitely not normal. I noticed it in the cafeteria earlier, but they were being secretive about it then. Now it's becoming more obvious."

Fatty seemed to have thought of something, and his throat gurgled. He said nervously, "They wouldn't all be transformed ghosts, would they? And as time goes on, they'll gradually reveal their true forms and kill us all..."

The more he talked, the more scared he became, and the quieter his voice became. Before he could finish, he was already terrified, and his two sausage-like legs went weak.

"Probably not," Jiang Cheng shook his head.

At this point, Fatty desperately needed a boost from Jiang Cheng, and he instantly perked up and asked, "Why, Doctor?"

"Because the law doesn't allow it," Jiang Cheng replied righteously, "Especially mass transformations into ghosts like this. That's defying the law. If they're caught, they'll be dragged off to a small dark room."

Fatty: "???"

Ever since he met Jiang Cheng, Fatty had been having some problems with his facial expressions, often not knowing whether to cry or laugh. Like now, his face began to twitch uncontrollably.

"Doctor," Fatty twitched violently, then tried his best to suppress it, and said tremblingly, "If I didn't know your background, I'd suspect you were in league with the things in the nightmare, really."

At this moment, Jiang Cheng suddenly stopped.