The sound of keyboards and pens in the Office sliced crisply through the air, not at all noisy.
She wanted to stand up, but for some reason, her legs felt powerless, as if an invisible person was pressing against her forehead, refusing to let her get up from the sofa.
This feeling of being restrained was suffocating, causing Su Mu’s previously joyful mood to plummet instantly to the bottom.
A voice of reprimand, coming from who knows where, entered her ears.
It was impossible to tell if it was a man or a woman, unlike anyone she knew, yet it carried an overwhelming authority.
“Look carefully at your school uniform. What kind of appearance is this? Are you worthy of this uniform, worthy of your teachers?”
To be fair, there were indeed many good teachers at school, teachers like Mr. Tree, who also worked hard to prepare lessons and do their jobs.
She subconsciously lowered her head and looked at her blue-and-white school uniform, now dirty from firecrackers, her eyes momentarily dazed.
Its overly large size covered Su Mu’s delicate chest almost completely, but at this moment, Su Mu felt as if she were wrapped even tighter than usual.
‘So tight, it was hard to breathe.’
“Student, why are you sitting here? It’s time for class, pay attention to the time.”
The passing math teacher noticed Su Mu.
Although he couldn’t recall her name, he still reminded her gently.
After meeting the familiar dark face with a glance, Su Mu lowered her head again, pulling the zipper all the way up, wrapping herself even tighter in her uniform.
That day, what made her feel most ashamed was not the scolding she barely listened to, but this seemingly casual reminder.
There really were people who would notice her.
Maybe they were willing to listen to this invisible girl speak.
But by the time Su Mu realized it, their figures had already walked far away.
The long shadow they cast stretched beside her, just a hair’s breadth from her toes, but in the end, it still passed her by.
‘What am I thinking? This warmth doesn’t belong to me, not even the shadow.’
Su Mu had long since stopped expecting anything from anyone.
After all, what she always received was disappointment.
The homeroom teacher was still in class, and since Su Mu’s parents hadn’t shown up, all she could do was wait here.
Even if they did meet, who would know how to explain Su Mu’s situation?
After all, no one remembered anything about her worth paying attention to.
It was as if a witch was at work.
Otherwise, how could someone become so transparent?
The only young physics teacher left in the Office, seeing everyone else had gone, quietly closed the door and opened up Solitaire on his computer.
Su Mu stared blankly at his back as he cleared the cards one by one until the [YOU WIN!] screen popped up.
[Degree of Immersion: 30%]
The bell rang for the end of class, and the hallway became noisy again.
The Office door was pushed open, but the Solitaire game had already been swapped for a work screen in the blink of an eye.
“Su Mu, your parents still haven’t come?”
The homeroom teacher who returned was a bit surprised, but looking at the dirty, disheveled pink-haired girl, she didn’t know quite what to say.
If it weren’t for that annoying old man insisting she talk to this student’s parent today, she wouldn’t have much of an impression of this child either.
It was as if there was suddenly one more person in the class.
She was there in class, at meals, and handing in homework, but when you looked at her, you just couldn’t recall her name.
Su Mu nodded numbly.
She could barely remember why she was sitting here, but her vision was growing clearer, not as blurry as before.
Her gradually indifferent ice-blue eyes were as clear as a mirror, but on the surface, it was as if a layer of dust had settled that could never be wiped away.
“Uh, then just sit here for now. Do you want some tea or something?”
She shook her head.
“All right, then pick up a book and read for a while. If you need anything, just call me.”
She nodded.
But Su Mu didn’t move, just continued to lean on the sofa, sometimes staring at the ceiling, sometimes at her toes.
‘Does it matter where I look? No one will come anyway.’
[Warning! Degree of Immersion: 50%]
The four morning classes passed quickly.
Time was neither long nor short.
To the students in the Classroom, it was probably endless, but for Su Mu, it passed in the blink of an eye.
“Go eat first… Su Mu, is something going on at home? If it’s not convenient, we can talk next time.”
She nodded, then shook her head.
Seeing her listless appearance, the homeroom teacher felt a bit worried but eventually walked away helplessly.
For some reason, after sitting there for a while, she forgot about Su Mu again.
Was it because of staying up late lately?
Her memory seemed to be getting worse.
The Cafeteria was packed, filled with faces Su Mu recognized.
‘That one sat on my right, that one is the class monitor…’
They held their bowls, laughing as they brushed past Su Mu on both sides, like two gusts of wind she could never catch, making Su Mu unconsciously wrap her uniform tighter.
“I want this one, this one, and that one.”
Before she finished speaking, the meal was already handed out the window, but it wasn’t any of the dishes Su Mu wanted.
Luckily, none of it was hard to eat.
The taste was more or less the same.
Su Mu took her meal card from her uniform pocket, swiped 10 yuan at the machine, and found an empty spot to sit.
‘It tasted okay, but why was the tomato and egg stir-fry sweet?’
[Warning! Degree of Immersion: 60%]
Something was buzzing near her ear.
Su Mu shook her head, tossing that unknown noise to the back of her mind.
‘Degree of immersion or whatever, am I dreaming or something?’
‘I don’t even know what the homework is today. I’ll ask someone later. Who should I ask? Anyway, I’m just sitting in the Office, so I’ll ask a teacher.’
She took her nap on the sofa during lunch break.
It was much more comfortable than the Classroom, but the lights were a bit too bright, and Su Mu couldn’t fall asleep.
A faint voice warned her that something very bad would happen if she did.
Indeed, falling asleep in front of the teachers in the Office wasn’t a good idea.
In the afternoon, the homeroom teacher seemed to have a meeting but forgot about Su Mu, rushing out with her laptop, heels clacking on the stone tiles as she hurried past Su Mu.
Su Mu was about to call her, but in the end, she gave up.
‘Forget it.’
With no one to arrange anything, Su Mu could only sit quietly in the Office, waiting for the person who would never appear.
Students who caused trouble weren’t allowed back in the Classroom.
That was an unspoken rule at school—the length of suspension depended on the seriousness of the incident.
But Su Mu’s case was more like a life sentence—unless her mom showed up, she couldn’t go back to class.
But now, whether she attended class or not didn’t matter.
Even if Su Mu was sent back to the Classroom, she had no heart for lessons.
Whether she was there or not, the teachers wouldn’t notice.
Unknowingly, the cold winter sun had already climbed past its peak, inching down until it barely shone through the window to Su Mu’s feet.
Su Mu instinctively stretched out her foot, lifted her pant leg, letting the sunlight touch her pale skin.
‘Warm.’
[Degree of Immersion: 70%]
All this time, Irina had been silently watching, sensing that Su Mu was drawing closer to her.
Through their shared perception, Irina could also feel the warmth touching Su Mu’s ankle, and she bit her lip in secret.
Before succumbing, the Dream World should not generate such vivid sensations.
Yet Su Mu could taste the food in the Cafeteria, and now she could feel the warmth—these were all signs that she was gradually sinking deeper into the Dream World.
Troubled, Irina took off her witch’s hat, lowered her eyes, and absentmindedly tugged at her hair.
Still can’t escape this trauma?
In the end, it has to be that woman…
‘What if little Su Mu softens and forgives her?’
At this moment, Irina could not remind Su Mu again.
If she got even a bit closer, the pull between them would cause an irreversible fusion at the boundary between the Second-Layer Dreamscape and the Three-layer Dream.
Irina herself could resist the pull, but Su Mu could not; she would be forcibly dragged into the Three-layer Dream.
After that, the girl named Su Mu would disappear, replaced by the genius girl Irina.
Perhaps this was a kind of growth—abandoning the past self and accepting the new—but that was not the outcome Irina wanted to see.
She hoped that when asked her name in the future, her first reaction would be “I am Su Mu,” not “I am Irina.”
Someone else shared this wish, but Irina did not want her to be the one to step in.
Unfortunately, it was too late to worry about that now.
The sunlight gradually swallowed Su Mu’s calves, and her ice-blue eyes grew even gloomier as they reflected the scene.
Until another person pushed open the door.
A strand of pink hair fell softly before Su Mu’s nose.
At first, she thought it was her own and impatiently brushed it aside, but upon noticing something odd, she looked up.
She saw a figure who should not have appeared here.
“Sorry, I’m late.”
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