The intern’s negative emotions directly affected everyone in the lobby, spreading an indescribable sense of dread among them.
Xu Dengming’s gaze froze slightly.
From her angle, she could clearly see the intern’s transforming silhouette.
That deep blue figure shrouded in rain was “dissolving”-starting from the old umbrella held high, gradually collapsing downward.
The umbrella fabric melted first, followed by the ribs and handle turning into something resembling pine resin, rolling downward in viscous globs.
This substance flowed onto the intern’s body, enveloping and assimilating him from the head down at visible speed, until he too became a puddle of “wax” pooling on the ground.
Perhaps due to the acid rain, the “wax” disappeared quickly after spreading across the pavement.
The entire dissolution process took less than a minute.
At first, the intern screamed horribly, but soon his vocal cords melted into the rainwater.
The crowd stood pale-faced, staring transfixed at the scene as if watching some grotesque silent horror show.
They could feel the terror, yet couldn’t look away.
Lin Yunhui’s face turned snow-white, sweat beading on her forehead as she stammered with trembling lips:
“I…I heard acid rain could corrode animal flesh right after the Great Catastrophe.”
Someone nearby asked urgently: “So he was dissolved by the rain?”
That acid rain could completely corrode a person so quickly was hardly good news, but at least it was an anomaly science could explain.
Dong Shaodan pressed her lips together, equally pale.
“I don’t think so. Records show even the Great Catastrophe’s acid rain couldn’t decompose someone this fast.”
She struggled to maintain composure.
After Dong’s explanation, the lobby’s atmosphere plunged into indescribable oppression.
If a minute earlier some still believed the dormitory’s strangeness was just the Management Bureau’s test for interns, after witnessing a living person vanish in the rain, most survivors found it hard to remain optimistic.
Some sobbed, others desperately called for help but the building’s spotty signal made outside contact impossible no matter what they tried.
One intern’s face suddenly lit up with hope: “We’re not the only ones here! Let’s find staff-they must know how to contact Management!”
The suggestion gained immediate support.
Seeking staff during emergencies was logical, yet Xu Dengming’s intuition warned things wouldn’t be so simple.
-And based on past experience, she figured assuming the abnormal might prevent greater disappointment.
The newly inspired group sprang into action, displaying remarkable initiative under pressure far more than when searching for essay references earlier.
Though unfamiliar with the building’s layout, every intern had visited reception for keys upon moving in.
The reception desk was fixed in place, and naturally, so were its staff.
Compared to Yu Wu, whose whereabouts were unknown and who had left no contact information, the receptionist was much easier to find.
Since the group was already on the first floor, they collectively turned around and headed inward.
Navigating through the debris-strewn building with a few turns, they effortlessly located the administrator who had processed their paperwork earlier.
Music drifted through the air.
The distance between the reception area and the dormitory entrance wasn’t particularly close, and the surrounding lighting was dim due to the lack of proper illumination-only the reception desk itself was lit.
When the interns arrived, the administrator was still curled up in his overcoat, the dull gray fabric enveloping most of his body, revealing only half of his gaunt, aged face.
The old-fashioned radio remained by his side.
Outdated music crackled intermittently from the speaker.
The melody itself was meant to be soft and soothing, but the constant skips made it sound jarring instead.
Xu Dengming had little knowledge of music and couldn’t identify the tune, only that it wasn’t particularly pleasant to the ear.
She studied the administrator.
Just a day had passed, yet he seemed to have aged significantly.
Perhaps the monotony of his job was a torment to both mind and spirit.
Some of the more impatient interns rushed into the reception area without waiting for permission, while others lingered outside, observing.
With the poor lighting and most interns dressed in dark brown or black coats, a thought suddenly struck Xu Dengming—from the administrator’s perspective, it might seem as though he were surrounded by a crowd of shadowy figures.
Some of them seemed to understand.
Qin Linge, the most senior among them, stepped forward and relayed their situation:
“We just discovered someone has gone missing, and another person chose to leave the building-only to be caught in the acid rain outside. The signal here has been terrible. How do we contact the management bureau now?”
The administrator gave no reaction to Qin Linge’s question.
The dark overcoat remained curled in the rocking chair, creaking faintly in rhythm with the music.
Qin Linge repeated herself, but silence was the only response.
The crowd grew restless.
Someone, unable to hold back, lunged forward and grabbed the administrator by the collar, ready to challenge his indifference.
A calmer intern tried to intervene, but the impulsive one reacted faster than anyone could stop him-letting go and stumbling back in shock a mere second later.
No one knew what the intern had touched, but everyone clearly saw what happened next.
With that single tug, the administrator’s overcoat-along with the hood-sloughed off his body like a layer of dust and grime, collapsing to the ground with a soft thud.
What followed was the shedding of the human skin draped over a white skeleton.
The overcoat had been his clothing.
The skin had been another.
Stripped of all concealment, the administrator now faced the surrounding crowd in an unsettlingly exposed state.
With inexplicable events piling up and nerves already stretched to the limit, the interns erupted into screams.
Driven by terror, they scattered in panic.
In the chaos, someone collided with the reception desk.
A spark flashed at the junction, and the broadcast system fell silent.
The white skeletal remains of the administrator slowly rose to its feet, its hollow eye sockets turning toward the survivors.
Though it lacked eyeballs, Xu Dengming could sense a cold, scrutinizing gaze emanating from it.
Negative emotions gathered like storm clouds in the air, growing thicker and heavier, pressing down until it was almost suffocating.
Some of the interns, fleeing in panic, stumbled and fell to the ground.
Trembling uncontrollably, their rational minds screamed at them to escape, but their legs had turned to jelly, leaving them unable to stand back up.
The interns’ overly obvious reactions made Xu Dengming realize one thing this administrator, like many dungeon entities, seemed capable of eroding human sanity.
With a total mental resilience of 200, Xu Dengming had a higher resistance to madness than ordinary people and hadn’t lost her ability to move despite facing the monster head-on.
She had hidden herself early on, clutching a broom she’d taken from the cafeteria.
The long handle of this cleaning tool was made of stainless steel-with a little modification, it could serve as a makeshift staff.
As the skeletal administrator began to move, Xu Dengming waited until it drew near before suddenly leaping out, swinging the steel rod with all her might toward the creature’s back.
BANG!
The rod struck the skeleton’s spine, producing a continuous, reverberating hum.
The force of the blow was so strong that Xu Dengming nearly lost her balance from the recoil, yet the administrator merely swayed slightly, as if completely unfazed by the ambush.
As someone whose supernatural abilities leaned heavily toward support, combat and defense-oriented monsters were her natural counters.
Xu Dengming still had an old pipe in her backpack, but with so many people around, it wasn’t the right time to pull it out.
Besides, without considering additional effects, the old pipe and the steel rod likely dealt similar damage yet this bizarre entity clearly possessed noteworthy physical resistance.
With her first strike ineffective, Xu Dengming immediately retreated.
Though the skeletal administrator hadn’t taken much damage, her actions had drawn its attention, and it now turned toward her, marking her as its next target.
Forced into the role of drawing aggro, a strange vision flashed before Xu Dengming’s eyes she saw the administrator’s skeletal fingers lash out from the right, tearing through her arm.
Blood sprayed from the wound, drenching half her body in crimson.
Her passive skill, [Premonition], had activated.
Forewarned of this unfortunate fate, Xu Dengming pushed off with her legs, twisting her body with all her strength to dodge left.
A split second later, the administrator’s skeletal fingers grazed past her, so close they severed several strands of her hair, scattering them like dust in the air.
The administrator showed no signs of stopping its assault despite this momentary miss, though its movements were stiff and awkward, likely due to the lack of muscles.
Guided by [Premonition], Xu Dengming didn’t hesitate-she dropped low, rolling across the ground while swinging the steel rod forward to block the administrator’s next strike.
A dull thud echoed as the sturdy steel rod shattered on impact.
Darkness swam before Xu Dengming’s eyes-it felt as though she’d been struck by a sledgehammer.
Her chest took the impact as her body suddenly left the ground, swiftly moving backward an all-too-rare experience of being violently knocked away.
Xu Dengming only flew a few steps before landing.
She could feel a dull, throbbing pain in her chest, and a metallic, coppery taste kept rising in her throat-clear signs of internal bleeding.
The administrator made several attempts to grab her but failed each time, even allowing her to put distance between them.
Perhaps deeming the effort not worth it, it abruptly halted its pursuit and shifted its target.
It turned around again, moving forward with stiff but rapid strides.
This time, unimpeded by any awakened abilities, the administrator successfully caught the reckless intern who had accidentally torn its coat away.
Clutching her chest as she struggled to her feet, Xu Dengming saw something she had never witnessed before in her life—a skeletal face, hollow and featureless, yet unmistakably radiating cruelty.