Those students who had been following the two of them had now all stopped moving because of the presence of [Teacher Turtle]. This effectively gave Takumi and Miko more time to act, allowing them to pause briefly and catch their breath before continuing.
"Did you see any kind of scene just now? Something like someone offering flowers to a school that had turned into ruins."
Takumi turned to look at Miko and asked her.
Since he himself had been able to see that blurry scene earlier, he felt that with Miko's senses being even stronger than his own, she should also have been able to see something—and perhaps even more clearly and comprehensively than he had.
"Huh? I didn't see it. No, I didn't see the kind of scene Takumi-san is talking about."
But this time, the situation seemed a little different.
The expression on Miko's face looked very confused. She seemed to have absolutely no idea what Takumi was talking about, appearing completely clueless about his question.
'She didn't see it—only I did?'
This situation made Takumi pause in surprise.
'Since entering this place, Miko's senses had always been able to detect abnormalities before mine. Why did it suddenly fail this time?'
'Could it be that the scene I saw has some special characteristic—something that only I can see?'
If that were the case, why did that scene suddenly cut off, as if some kind of force had interfered with it and caused it to lose its effect?
'Almost as if something had noticed that I saw that scene and then cut it off, preventing me from seeing the complete picture…'
"Let's go. It's time to continue moving forward."
In the end, Takumi did not continue thinking about this issue. He simply said something casually and then continued walking forward.
Dwelling on questions that had no way of yielding an answer was meaningless. For now, it was better to focus his energy on finding a way to change identity.
Thinking this, Takumi walked forward and soon saw the entrance to the Printing Room on one side.
At this moment, the door of the Printing Room was half open. By the faint light of the candle, one could vaguely see the printer and office desk inside the room, as well as a thick stack of white paper placed on the desk, which looked like some kind of test papers.
Takumi did not rashly enter the Printing Room. He vaguely sensed a trace of malice hidden inside that room, so he had no intention of disturbing it.
Continuing forward, at the end of the corridor was the entrance to Teachers' Office No. 3.
The door of the teachers' office was clearly different from the classroom doors. This door was vermilion in color, and the door itself was a metal anti-theft door, extremely sturdy, as if it had been deliberately installed to prevent someone from sneaking inside. In contrast, the classroom doors seen earlier were basically wooden doors or light metal doors. At a glance, one could tell they were in a completely different price range. Some classroom doors even looked somewhat shabby, as if they had merely been installed to make up the numbers.
Takumi walked up to the door, reached out to grab the handle, and tried pulling and pushing it, only to find that the door was locked.
So he used the power of the Rescue Team Badge. Reaching out, he grabbed the edge of the doorframe. Accompanied by a dull sound, Takumi slowly pried open the edge of the heavy iron door bit by bit, forcibly pressing the lock cylinder back in before opening the door just like that.
Watching this process left Miko stunned. Although Takumi breaking through walls several times earlier had already been eye-catching, pulling open a heavy anti-theft door with his bare hands still had a considerable visual impact for Miko, leaving her momentarily unsure how to describe the shock she felt.
"Will I become like Takumi-san in the future?"
After hesitating for a moment, Miko pointed at the anti-theft door that Takumi had already torn open and rendered useless, and asked tentatively.
"As for that, it's actually a very basic thing. Only with a sufficiently strong body can one withstand the damage and curses of Aberrations, and only then does one have a better chance of escaping or resisting when facing danger. Of course, for you it might still be a bit early. For now, just focus on surviving."
Takumi said this with a smile. First, he carefully sensed the situation inside the office through the power of his blessing. Only after confirming that nothing was inside did he open the door and step in.
This office was not very large. There were three large office desks in total, with wooden partitions standing in the middle of each desk, dividing them into six teachers' workspaces. In addition, each workspace had a small sign indicating which subject teacher's desk it belonged to.
Inside the six desks here, five belonged respectively to the five subjects of Chinese, Mathematics, English, Science, and Social Studies, while the remaining desk was left vacant. At this moment, Takumi noticed that on five of the six desks there were only things like exam papers and textbooks, with nothing of value among them. However, on the empty desk that had no label indicating which subject it belonged to, there was a sheep-head hood emitting a bloody, foul odor. Beside the hood, a pink sticky note had also been left there.
'What was going on?'
Takumi frowned.
It was as if someone had deliberately prepared it here.
It felt as though someone had already anticipated his thoughts and actions, which was why a hood had been specially left here.
This feeling made Takumi very uncomfortable.
"Did you see anything unusual?"
Takumi turned his head and asked Miko.
"…No. I didn't see anything strange in this office."
Miko very seriously scanned the entire office. Then she carefully looked again at the place where the sheep-head hood was, and finally shook her head at Takumi as she spoke.
"Alright. I'll go take a closer look. Keep watch around us—if you notice anything wrong, warn me immediately."
Thus Takumi decided not to hesitate any longer. After giving Miko that instruction, he walked forward and arrived in front of the sheep-head hood.
Without a doubt, it was a genuine sheep's head. It had already begun to show a certain degree of decay, though it had not yet developed maggots, so it was not excessively disgusting.
Takumi did not touch the hood first. Instead, he looked at the note placed beside it. He had already noticed that there was writing on the note, and the handwriting… looked very similar to the handwriting used in Alice's Grand Adventure Game, seemingly written by the same person.
The content of the handwriting was quite simple; it could be read in just a few moments.
[Adults always like to wear masks; they always like to disguise themselves.]
[They make up many reasons for themselves and tell everyone many excuses, yet they still refuse to speak the truth.]
[Is it because they put on masks that they become like this?]
[Why is it that those adults who wear masks cannot take them off and tell everyone the truth?]
[Could it be that lying is actually some kind of very fun game?]
It was like a somewhat naive child asking questions about a phenomenon they could not understand.
However, considering that Fujihana Middle School was only a middle school, and the children studying here were merely middle school students, having such doubts did not seem particularly strange.
Still, it had to be said that this note gave Takumi a very uneasy feeling.
He recalled the opening hints about the Fujihana Middle School area that previous players had summarized before.
Of those hints, one was: [Once a mask is put on, it can no longer be easily taken off]. And now that same hint had appeared beside the hood. This was truly very concerning, and it inevitably made one suspect that the identity of [Teacher] might bring some kind of bad influence—just like the identity of [Security Guard] in Red Nut Grey Cave, a dangerous identity that, once obtained, easily led to death.
But… there was no choice. Having already come this far, and having already fallen into an extremely dangerous situation, he could only give it a try.
Without hesitating any longer, Takumi finally reached out and picked up the sheep-head hood.
The inside of this head had already been completely hollowed out, but it had only been hollowed out and nothing more. No cleaning had been done afterward, so the hood was filthy, stained with a large amount of blood foam and rotten flesh, and looked quite disgusting.
"Takumi-san, um, are you going to put that thing on your head?"
Miko, who had been paying close attention to the situation over here the whole time, could not help but step two paces closer and ask in a low voice after seeing Takumi pick up that filthy hood.
"I have to try. If there's a problem, after I put it on I might still have some way to break free, but you definitely have no way to resist it. So right now, only I can serve as the test subject for this thing."
As Takumi spoke, he raised the hood.
He could feel a sinister aura spreading within the hood.
This thing was not an Obsession Item, yet it possessed a kind of aberrational nature in a certain sense. It was certain that after putting this thing on, he absolutely would not merely be "changing identity". As for what exactly would happen, that could only be known after truly trying it.
Squish—
Takumi shoved his head into the hood. Amid the sticky, writhing sound, he could feel the strange noises made by the bits of flesh inside the hood that had not been completely scooped out being compressed.
Little by little, he pushed his head deeper into the hood.
His head, his face—every inch of his skin and every pore—at this moment clearly felt an intense wetness.
That came from the fresh blood inside the hood that had not yet completely dried.
At this very moment, as his movements continued, sheep's-head blood gradually smeared all over his head, bringing him an even stronger sense of discomfort.
There were no eyeholes left in this hood through which to observe the outside environment. It was completely sealed. Logically, after putting on such a thing, one should only be plunged into total darkness and be unable to see anything.
But Takumi discovered that he could still see. Everything around him was so clear—clearer even than before—as though the whole world had upgraded from 480p to 1080p, which felt extremely novel.
"T-Takumi-san?"
Miko stepped back.
Takumi turned his head and could see the nervous and frightened expression on the girl's face.
"It's fine. I'm still me. I'm still Takumi."
A muffled voice sounded from within that sheep's head.
"To be honest, it actually feels quite strange. In any case, this hood might allow my identity to change into "Teacher", but whether it will succeed or not can only be determined when we encounter those "Students"."
"Alright. We've already spent quite a bit of time. There should still be some time before the lights come on. Let's go. Next, we need to find a way to change your identity."
Accompanied by the muffled voice, the sheep-headed man took a step and walked toward the office door.
And the bulging sheep eyes on that rotting sheep head, at this moment, wriggled slightly and slowly turned to look at Miko walking beside him.
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