Chapter 18: Transcript
"Smack!" Out of nowhere, Chu Jiang slapped Zhang Haoran, causing blood to trickle from the corner of his mouth.
At the same time, Chu Jiang tightly grabbed onto Zhang Haoran's collar, angrily shouting, "Snap out of it!"
The intense pain on his face brought back a bit of focus to Zhang Haoran's eyes, as he looked at Chu Jiang with a slightly puzzled expression.
"Why did you hit me? Is it because I couldn't save all of you? I didn't want this to happen!" Zhang Haoran also shouted.
He grabbed onto Chu Jiang's clothes and said, "Everyone says there are ghosts, but I can't see any!"
"All I could do was helplessly hold a knife and watch as my classmates, teachers, one by one died in front of me, they all died, it was so tragic..." As he spoke, Zhang Haoran unexpectedly burst into tears, resembling a pitiful and helpless child.
Chu Jiang watched the boy, who was clinging to his clothes and weakly kneeling on the ground, and helped him up, sitting together on the main road.
Chu Jiang whispered, "I know, the teacher wanted you and me to help everyone escape alive. You wanted to save others too, but you couldn't."
"It's not your fault. Look, I'm useless too. Many classmates followed me, but I couldn't save anyone except for these few people beside me. Even Li Yan died..."
At that moment, Zhang Haoran seemed to notice that Li Yan was not here. He murmured, "Li Yan, Li Yan... He's also gone."
Chu Jiang, Li Yan, and Zhang Haoran were good friends, and Li Yan was even Zhang Haoran's middle school classmate.
Seeing some improvement in Zhang Haoran's condition, Chu Jiang patted his back and said, "Don't die, my friend. I don't have many left. There are only a few classmates from Class 2 of the third year left. If one dies, there will be one less."
"Don't you want to find out the truth behind this haunting incident? Don't you want to avenge your fellow classmates?"
These last few words from Chu Jiang ignited Zhang Haoran's anger. He exclaimed, "Revenge, I want revenge! Those people tortured me. I don't know what they are, but they deliberately kept me and only targeted the people around me. I won't let them get away with it!"
"Yes, that's right." Chu Jiang patted his shoulder again and gestured with his eyes for the police officers to come over.
"You still have injuries on you, go to the hospital for treatment."
"And Gao Yifei is there too, didn't you notice just now? Let's go see him, he broke his hand and needs someone to comfort him. We have to go to the police station now, so we can't go there."
"Really?" Zhang Haoran raised his head blankly and looked at Chu Jiang.
Chu Jiang nodded seriously, "Really."
So, with Chu Jiang's help and persuasion, Zhang Haoran got into the police car and was taken to the city's best hospital.
After the police car drove away, the middle-aged police officer walked over. He encouragedly said, "You did a good job, you should consider becoming a psychologist in the future."
Chu Jiang forced a smile, "You flatter me."
As he spoke, he took out his phone and edited a text message, sending it to Gao Yifei.
The main purpose was to ask Gao Yifei to help comfort Zhang Haoran and stabilize his mental condition.
As for what Zhang Haoran actually experienced at school, they could only ask him after he completed his psychological treatment.
However, in his words just now, he revealed some important information.
Zhang Haoran seemed unable to see ghosts, but he should be able to see dead bodies. Liu Mingming said that Zhang Haoran once took a knife and stabbed the librarian's body.
Moreover, it seemed that his ability to survive in the end was also related to his inability to see ghosts...
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The following development was very normal. Everyone went to the police station, where there were medical personnel waiting in advance. They helped clean up the wounds of a few people and someone brought them water and food to eat.
During this process, the uncle and the young man kept an eye on the five students, as if they were worried that they still carried hidden dangers.
As for Gao Yifei and Zhang Haoran, someone should also be responsible for them.
This made Chu Jiang feel a little guilty, because he suspected that there were ghosts on him, and there might be more than one.
Fortunately, no one forced them to be searched, after all, up to now they had all been victims, just the uncle and everyone else shook hands with them.
Maybe this was the way the other person checked.
After finishing the meal, everyone was separated and asked to write down separately, not at the same time. Each person was called into a room individually.
The first one to be called was Chu Jiang. The police officers saw it clearly. The survivors gathered around Chu Jiang spontaneously. It should be this boy who led them to escape.
After Chu Jiang entered the room, he basically said everything that needed to be said, except for the existence of the diary and the blood handprint.
As for why he was the first to discover that the school was haunted, Chu Jiang explained it very clearly. He pretended to be sick and skipped class, but he couldn't leave through the main gate. He was even chased by the body of the security guard uncle.
The questioning personnel didn't delve into this aspect, they just kept asking for details about the haunted incidents, especially about the form, features, and abilities of the ghost.
Among them, a sloppy man was very serious, unlike his cynical appearance. He even asked Chu Jiang specifically, "When Slender Man killed someone, did he show any signs or patterns?"
"Patterns?" Chu Jiang thought about it. He wanted to say something about the ringing sound, but then realized it was incorrect. In the time when he was killed by the shadow ghost, there was no ringing sound at all. When they wanted to kill, they just did it.
So he honestly replied, "No."
The uncle sighed and said, "That could be indiscriminate killing, which is even more troublesome."
Chu Jiang didn't understand much and didn't ask further. He just kept remembering, describing, and answering.
There were only three people in the room - a police officer and the uncle took turns asking questions, a female clerk continuously recorded the content, and there were also audio and video recordings to ensure that nothing was missed.
Chu Jiang had clear thoughts and told the story all the way to the end. He described how Slender Man was attracted by a mysterious sound, ignoring a few insignificant characters and directly running away with the school.
The police officer was a little puzzled, "You managed to escape so easily?"
Chu Jiang nodded.
Seeing this, the uncle didn't ask much and just asked Chu Jiang to leave and call the next person in.
By the way, Chu Jiang didn't mention the matter of restarting time because there was only that one time. Besides, Chu Jiang couldn't explain why he was the only one who retained the memories before the restart.
He only mentioned the experience that the survivors all knew, the suspected period of time freezing.
Even so, it made the uncle call him a weirdo.
......
When they saw Chu Jiang coming out, Cheng Jie and the person sitting on the chair outside both looked at him nervously.
Chu Jiang just smiled and told them to relax.
Like mentioned before, Chu Jiang never thought he could hide the truth from the police and the uncle. The other side was an experienced detective, how could they not tell if a few students were lying or not?
He just didn't want to reveal the secrets of the diary and blood handprints too soon.
Let's take it slow, there would probably be opportunities for both parties to interact in the future.
Translator: Volume 3 (Chapters 110-160) has been translated and published on Amazon (https://amzn.to/4b2NEQq).
