Seeing the two writhing lumps of flesh still unwilling to give up and attempting to leap again, Eric strode over and kicked them away without hesitation.
"Not too difficult to deal with," Eric assessed flatly—though they were utterly revolting.
Rushing toward the school gate, she discovered it was tightly shut, and no buildings could be seen beyond it.
This school was an isolated scene, completely disconnected from the outside world.
Realizing this, Eric immediately changed her plan—from escaping the campus to finding a secure place to hide.
Five minutes later, she sprinted to the top floor of the nearest school building, pried open the rooftop door, shut it behind her, and wedged a metal rod from the supermarket through the handle to block it.
It was dinnertime, and the rooftop was completely deserted. Eric walked to the edge and looked down. She saw students running—some of them with mouths agape, revealing parasitic creatures as they chased relentlessly. At the right moment, the parasites launched themselves, clamping onto their victims' heads, writhing from the nape to the face, desperately trying to bore into their mouths.
"Help me! Aaaah!"
The victims struggled, but could not stop the slick creatures from forcing their way deep down their throats.
Eric involuntarily touched her own throat. Such a death… was pure torment.
Within ten minutes, there were no longer any normal humans in sight below.
With no prey remaining, the parasitized students shut their mouths, now indistinguishable from the others, quietly wandering the campus like ordinary students.
Alone atop the rooftop, Eric made a decision: she must not interact with other NPCs, for she could no longer tell who was still human.
As night fell, the campus plunged into eerie silence. But under the streetlights, Eric could still see the possessed wandering aimlessly below.
The other survivors must have hidden themselves too. Eric's thoughts churned ceaselessly—how could she clear this sealed instance? Since the school was a closed-off setting, then the exit portal must lie somewhere within.
The players were trapped here. No amount of fleeing would help—so… was the goal to eliminate every parasite? Or perhaps… discover the nest from which they originated?
But why had the students suddenly turned into such monsters? Those grotesque parasites were not small—how could they have entered the students' bodies so silently?
At that moment, a searing pain stabbed through her abdomen.
Eric's expression changed drastically—she realized something.
Without hesitation, she purchased a basic healing kit. The moment she activated it, the pain in her stomach vanished—replaced by violent nausea, a twisting of her insides, and a tightness in her throat.
Doubling over, she vomited uncontrollably. The stench of bile and something metallic stung her nostrils, making her retch even harder.
Tears blurred her vision. It felt endless. Only after expelling everything in her stomach did she finally feel a little relief. Guided by instinct, she staggered back several steps and sank down against the wall.
From the supermarket, she retrieved tissues to wipe the sweat and tears from her face, rinsed her mouth with bottled water, and rested briefly to regain her strength. Her stomach was now completely empty—she was ravenous, yet had no appetite. All she could do was drink more water.
Returning to where she had vomited, Eric stared at the quail egg-sized remains on the ground, silently relieved that she had used the healing kit in time to kill the parasite. Otherwise, it would have grown rapidly inside her, eventually bursting from her throat—an agonizing death.
She recalled the new player she'd seen in the cafeteria. That poor novice had no points—such an opening scenario would've been a death sentence.
Who would've thought players could be infected immediately after entering the instance, even without eating or drinking anything inside?
"Bastard," Eric muttered, cursing this damned instance.
After dodging that deadly trap, she was exhausted. She found a spot far from the mess and laid down to rest.
But the night offered no peace. Throughout the darkness, she heard constant banging and crashing—likely parasitized students still hunting. The rooftop was secure, though, and wrapped in a blanket, she eventually fell asleep. When she awoke, her body had fully recovered.
With dawn came sunlight. Eric stretched and prepared to assess the situation below.
She didn't open the rooftop door, but instead climbed down the exterior wall.
The school building was five stories high. She descended three levels, spotting some NPC survivors through classroom windows—on the second floor, she even saw another player. His eyes lit up upon seeing her, and he ran to the window.
"Hey! Have you found the portal?"
"Not yet."
"So where are you heading now?" Micah asked.
"Looking around," Eric replied, then climbed down without further delay, landing smoothly.
Micah leaned against the window, watching her go. This classroom was fairly secure—though the infected wandered nearby, they weren't particularly strong. He'd blocked the door with desks and chairs, and they hadn't been able to break in.
But… could he really just stay here?
This was a closed, self-contained instance. No rescue would come. He rubbed his stomach—after vomiting everything last night, he was now starving. But he didn't dare touch any of the food in the instance—not even the snacks hidden in student desks.
He could rely on his points to buy healing kits when on the brink of starvation… but eventually, those would run out. If he never found the portal, it would all be for nothing.
Summoning his courage, Micah climbed out the window and decided to follow Eric.
Unaware she was being followed, Eric headed toward the cafeteria with clear purpose.
Though she had stashed some gasoline in the supermarket, she was reluctant to use it.
There had to be gas pipes or tanks in the cafeteria kitchen—those would be just as effective. After all, not every player had her kind of advantage. For those without "cheats," the only way to take out large groups of parasites would be something like this.
She quickly gathered as many kitchen knives as possible, especially cleavers—those were incredibly useful. There were some in the supermarket too, but you could never have too many. Just as she picked up a gas canister, footsteps approached from behind.
She turned to find herself face to face with a beautiful woman in her thirties.
Iris nodded at Eric, but made no move to come closer.
"Hello."
"Hi." Eric, wary, asked, "Have you been parasitized?"
Iris nodded. "I used a healing kit."
"So did I."
With that brief exchange, the tension between them eased, and Iris stepped forward with Eric's silent approval.
"Have you found the parasite nest? I suspect the portal's located there."
Eric shook her head. "I want to prepare my tools first." As she spoke, she stored all the gas canisters from the kitchen into her supermarket space.
Iris's pupils dilated. "You… have an item that can store things?"
"Yeah," Eric replied casually. "Want to team up?"
"Yes!" Iris had been worrying about how to transport the gas to the parasite nest. With a storage item in play, this was a perfect solution!
Just as they agreed to cooperate, Micah quietly slipped in, raising a hand in greeting when the two women looked over alertly.
"H-hi, ladies. I'd like to team up too—cooperate, um, heh."
Eric repeated the same question she'd asked Iris. Micah nodded eagerly. "I'm clean! I already used a healing kit to kill the parasite in my gut!"
And so the three formed a temporary alliance.
There weren't many infected NPCs wandering outside. When possible, they avoided them—when not, they struck back.
Whenever a parasite spotted fresh prey, it burst from its host's body in a frenzied leap. Eric met them with her cleaver, slicing them cleanly in half.
But something troubled her—today's parasites were noticeably larger than those she'd seen yesterday. The students they controlled now had swollen necks as thick as their heads, their mouths torn grotesquely open, stretching to the earlobes.
The parasite had taken root deep within the body. After being slain by Eric's blade, the host collapsed. Their abdomen looked almost hollow—just a thin stretch of skin remained.
Taking a deep breath, Eric made a small incision with her knife and gently lifted the flap. The inside was, indeed, completely empty.
"Today's parasites are bigger than yesterday's. They also seem harder to kill," Eric said to Iris and Micah.
Yesterday, she had managed to sever them with a cracked steel tray. Today, even with a cleaver, the blade met more resistance.
"That's true," Iris replied grimly. "We can't drag this out. We need to find the portal fast. I'm afraid the longer we wait, the stronger these things will become—and we'll be overwhelmed."
Judging by the number of classrooms and buildings, the student body was massive. If every single one was infected…
"Let's split up and search," Eric said.
They agreed to separate in three directions. But Micah, unable to act alone, hesitated—then quietly followed Eric. She noticed quickly but said nothing. You couldn't force cooperation from strangers in an instance. In the end, she could only rely on herself.
She moved swiftly and efficiently. The infected students showed no consistent behavior. They wandered in search of prey, but lacked the brute force of zombies, and couldn't breach locked and barricaded rooms.
It seemed that, as long as a player survived the initial infection surge and the subsequent gut-bursting phase, they could live relatively safely.
But Eric didn't dare let her guard down—the portal had yet to appear.
She found several NPC survivors and two players during her search—but there was still no trace of a parasite nest.
Did it even exist?
By noon, Eric had returned to the rooftop to rest.
Watching her figure vanish into the distance, Micah's face darkened. He couldn't just climb the outer wall like she did—one slip and he'd be dead. Helpless, he reverted to old tactics and crawled into a second-floor classroom to hide.
After lunch and a brief rest, Eric felt fully recovered. Her mind sharp and her senses alert once more, she suddenly brightened. In a flash, she climbed onto the rooftop railing and scanned the surroundings, searching intently.