Autophagy

"Finally..." Song Lei muttered while looking at the ginormous campus of his university. As opposed to the empty streets of the city, this place was filled with youth and happiness.

'White Mountain University...'

The campus was made out of three buildings. The one on the right was the dormitory building. It was separated into two parts. One half was for the females while the other half was for the males. A lot of people chose to live here because of the cheap prices and the good dorm quality.

The other building was to the left. It was filled with different kinds of markets and recreational activities. This place was one of the selling points of this university. Most of the students spent their free time having fun in this place. It was easily the most crowded place Song Lei had seen in the remnant world so far. The place was bustling with young adults, laughing and having a great time. This kind of atmosphere was really strange for Song Lei. He had never been in such a place before.

With the situation his family was in, he had to stop going to school at a young age and start working to take care of his sister. Even when he was still going to school, he couldn't spend any money on recreational activities. Fortunately, he had really good friends at school that would make living a bit better.

The other building on the campus was the biggest of all. Almost double the size of the dorms, this place was filled to the brim with the best and most equipped classrooms in the country. Toda Anzai, being a rich and hard-working student, had managed to get into this university. It was truly a place for the elite.

This information was what Song Lei could scrap from the internet. Unfortunately, the internet wasn't as developed as it was in the Old World. If it was the same, he could probably find much more information about this place.

Song Lei took a deep breath and stepped into the campus after showing the guard his student ID. Toda Anzai was an IT major. Song Lei had to go to the farthest corner of the campus to get to his classroom.

His journey was uninterrupted. He could freely take in the atmosphere of the campus and feel the youth it was exuding as he still had twenty minutes before the class started. He didn't want to go too early as that could lead to someone striking up a conversation with him.

After strolling through the campus for a bit, it was finally time for Song Lei to get going. When he entered the amphitheater, he was left awe-struck by the size of it. If no one was watching, he would've stood there for a few seconds and admired the scenery. Unfortunately, if he did something like that at the moment, it would look incredibly weird.

After picking a random seat and sitting down, he took out the book he would need in the class. A short amount of time passed and the professor entered the class. All the chatterings and whisperings stopped as the class went into complete silence.

The professor was a middle-aged man with a bald head. His height seemed to be at around 1.70 meters. Although he had a gentle expression on his face, one could feel how serious of a person he was from his demeanor. There was a small nametag attached to his collar. Although the writings on the nametag seemed to be Japanese, Song Lei could easily read it.

'Koga Hitoshi...'

After greeting the class, Professor Koga started taking attendance.

'This is important!' Song Lei thought in his head. He stared around the room to note down every single person's name in the class as the professor was taking attendance. After noting down everyone, he breathed a sigh of relief. He could now at least memorize everyone's name.

The professor started the lesson without further ado after he was done taking attendance.

This lesson was named Object-Oriented Modeling and Design. Although Song Lei didn't understand most of the things that were being talked about, the parts he could understand were enough to keep him hooked up. He would have never thought that he would be able to listen to this kind of class in his life, much less in a different world.

The lesson ended and the professor left the class. Although everything had gone perfectly, there was still a slight problem for Song Lei.

'Everything is normal...'

This place seemed to be disconnected from the rest of the remnant world. Normally, even while randomly strolling, Song Lei felt someone gazing at him from afar. This eerie feeling would never go away no matter what he did. However, after entering the campus, that feeling suddenly disappeared. As if this place was safe from what or whoever was watching Song Lei.

As the lesson ended, Song Lei was done with today's lessons. He didn't have much left to do. He was wishing for something to happen so that he could gather some info. Unfortunately, nothing out of ordinary was happening. Song Lei sighed and massaged his temples.

"They say that it has appeared again," a girl with yellow hair in the class said. This picked Song Lei's interest as he started listening to whatever she was saying.

"Do you mean 'that'?" The girl's friend said. They seemed to be talking a bit cryptic.

"Yes. Do you remember the security guard that has gone missing?" the blonde girl said. Her friend nodded and kept listening. "He was found dead."

"What!?"

"Shush! Don't make a commotion here!"

"Sorry..." The girl's friend apologized while slumping over her head.

"Whatever... That thing has shown itself in the male dormitory again. What do you think it is?" The blonde girl asked. Before she could answer, Song Lei turned around and cut her off.

"Hi. Uhh... Those kinds of stories really interest me, so can you tell me more about it?" he said while taking out a notebook. The girl looked at Song Lei with a weird expression on her face. She glanced at her friend for a second and turned back to Song Lei.

"Sure," she said. This girl's name was Sugihara Tokiyo. Song Lei had managed to memorize everyone's names in a short amount of time although his mind stat had fallen to a quarter.

"I'm actually surprised that you've heard it for the first time," Sugihara said.  She finished gathering her stuff and zipped her bag. "There has been a rumor going around lately. They say that a disfigured man appears in the male dorms every night. Whatever he does is totally random. He sometimes randomly taps at the air. Sometimes stands still in his place until the morning," she said while twirling her hair. "They call him the Night Lunatic."

"Really? Then what about the security you were talking about?" Song Lei asked while raising one of his brows. He noted down the things that were told.

"Yesterday, a security guard went missing in the male dorms. It quickly became a sensation in the university forums and stuff. Apparently, they found him dead in a desolate corner of the male dorms. He seemed to have been nailed to the ground with kitchen knives." Sugihara said. She shivered in her place, imagining how it must've felt for the security guard. "There were signs of struggling on his body too," Sugihara explained. She sighed deeply and continued by saying, "Whoever that person that appears in the male dorms is, he must be a murderer."

Song Lei's heart bumped with excitement. He had finally found something that seemed to be of interest.

"I see... The campus seems incredibly calm though... Are you really sure that all of this stuff happened yesterday? Shouldn't there be chaos now?" Song Lei asked. It was truly weird for the campus to be so calm.

"Normally? There would be. But because of the prestige of our university and the connections it has with the government, they managed to silence it down. They don't want to stain our reputation and put a halt to education," Sugihara said while crossing her arms.

"What? Then how do you know about it?" Song Lei asked. It seemed nonsensical that she would know about such things if they were being hidden so well.

Sugihara and her friend raised their brows and looked at each other. 

"My father is the dean you know... Don't you remember?" Sugihara asked. Song Lei blushed a little bit. He almost facepalmed unintentionally.

"Sorry... I must be sleepy," Song Lei said.

"Well... Whatever Toda. See you later," Sugihara said. She took her bag and left with her friend. Song Lei sighed and left the class too. He now had to learn more about this Night Lunatic. Although he wanted to take things slow and approach this situation more carefully, he felt like he didn't have the chance to do so.

After the things that had happened last night, he was always alert and nervous. His sixth sense was telling him that he was running out of time.

"Now...."