There was hardly anything much in my recollections of music students’ varsity life aside from the habitual eating, sleeping, and repetitive practice sessions, although much of it was bedewed with the occasional truants, and dates. But there was something that set me apart from your usual university undergraduates: a hidden talent called “Ghost-hunting.” Of course, dating was a necessity of varsity life. Besides, as the only little brother who played the Chinese zither, I surely had several female fans. But I never dared to tell Edelweiss about that. Readers please kept this secret for me. Thanks a lot!

It was only the third day of the military exercise. I was still not used to waking up even before the rooster’s crow, although I would continue the first jog of the morning with half-opened eyes and a still-dozing mind. We would be drilled into running lap after lap. Rest would only come when we could finally run no more. But we had neither any complaints, considering the trouble our instructors had to go through to transform us undisciplined and mischievous greenhorns into proper “heirs to the future” material.

The instructor was a captain from a nearby military district, although I never knew which. Although he was similar to us in age, he hardly looked like a peer to us with his mature and hardened look; bearing a proud and stern demeanor than even we, who could only strum the strings of our instrument with the creativity and flair like an artist with his brush, had to admire, not to mention those female students. They thought highly of and always fixed their eager eyes on him.

But there were rules for military officers serving as instructors, forbidding them from divulging any contact details and names. The only thing we knew about him, even until the end of our exercise, was his surname Cao. Some of the freshmen had overheard other instructors calling him by that name, calling him Old Cao.

Because his gallantry and dashing look that enameled him, plus his serious expression, Instructor Cao quickly became a favorite of the girls from my class who were known to be carefree and unrestrained folks, the usual labels commonly tagged upon us students of music.

We were just having a break after a tiring morning on the third day when one of the girls who looked relatively gorgeous in my class darted towards Instructor Cao. All of us instantly trained our eyes upon her as she beelined towards the handsome army officer and produced a large bouquet of flowers! It was a mystery upon itself; no one noticed her holding anything during our long jog in the morning, and there she was, with a bouquet of flowers out of nowhere! The army instructor was dazed when he saw the flowers, flustered by the sudden show of favor. The girl, true to our brand of being “free and unrestrained,” immediately squeaked, “Please be my boyfriend, Instructor!”

The shrill cry of the girl rang through the entire field, and everyone else fell silent, staring at the episode with disbelief. The cheeks of Instructor Cao burned with a shade of scarlet as he stammered a decline, “We have rules against this, Student. Please take this away, and we’ll say no more of this. Your main focus now should be your studies…”

The same day, this girl was criticized in a circulated notice as expected. So the news of the confession burst across the whole varsity like the eruption of a bomb. The school was no stranger to tales and rumors of students confessing their love and affection to the instructors, but this was the first time everyone witnessed one such larger-than-life occurrence! I would have buried myself alive out of shame if I was in the girl’s shoes. But instead, she was rather pleased to hear her exploits now being the talk of the entire school. No one knew what was swirling in her mind then until another rumor broke out. As it turned out, the girl was happy because she believed that the rumors would affirm to the Instructor of her love for him. I was so shocked to hear this news that I began to wonder how would Instructor Cao continue with his training for the entire week.

The girl, and by extension the whole lot of the class, along with Instructor Cao, then fell under the scrutiny of the entire school as the rumors not only did not diminished but instead continued snowballing out of proportion.

Finally, on the evening of the third day, we retreated back to our dormitories, a bunch of fatigued boys dragging their limp and wearied bodies. No one spoke about the rumors that day. We were still hardly close to each other then. But a strange thing happened that night.

On that night, the still silence of the darkened dormitories of the school was broken only by the cacophonic blasts of snores coming from my asleep dormmates. It was so hot in the summer, and I got up in the blackness of the room to look for some water to drink. The windows were opened, and the girls’ dormitories were right opposite our building. They were targeted by a good many boys who had telescopes or binoculars propped by the windows. Well, I had my Spirit Sight. Prior to my freshman year, I had barely any experience with encountering supernatural events. Hence, I was especially anxious, looking forward to my own adventures one day.

I instinctively peered out the open window into the hot summer night and I almost jumped! A pale glow was shimmering from one of the windows of the girls’ dormitories and one could have thought that that was merely mischief concocted by some of the playful ones from the opposite building if not for the shadowy silhouettes drifting about in the eerily faint light behind the curtains at the window! Come to think of it, that was a scene that would have continued to send me goosebumps if I had not been used to Xiao Qi and the Sisters.

I immediately believed that it was something paranormal and I looked again, this time with my Spirit Sight. Lo and behold! Tendrils of Yin energies swirled about just outside the window, growing thicker and thicker like a mob of the crowd enjoying a scene!

It was a sight that did not bode well; even with my experiences today, I would have thought the same. Some foolish girls must have been meddling with spiritual entertainment like an ouija board, or similar spiritual rituals commonly performed with mirrors or little saucers. But I felt no fear or dread; instead, I was feeling rather anxious to test my skills. Then I remembered that it was after midnight. Therefore, there was no way I could slip out of the dormitory’s doors which had already been locked no matter how curious and how rabid I am to delve more into this mystery.

I was still new and I barely knew the old watchman who guarded the entrance of the dormitory. Hence I crouched at the window and watched from afar while trying my best to stamp down the flames of fervor burning in me. But nothing else happened the whole night and here I was, an equally foolish boy who had watched through the night for nothing. The spirits inside and outside the window opposite were merely dancing and drifting about aimlessly all night; they had not done anything malignant as yet.

It was hardly my first time dealing with ouija boards or specifically the mishaps which might occur thereafter; I had encountered once in my high school, although the matter was easily resolved by me snapping the pen in question into halves before I destroyed the malignant spirit with just a simple talismanic charm. But this time, it was different; not only the incident occurred within the confines of the girls’ dormitories, which were strictly off-limits to us boys, but the wandering spirits and ghosts hardly did anything aside from lolling about idly.

I endured the laborious morning with dark-ring eyes. Then something happened. At the first break, the bold girl from yesterday walked up to Instructor Cao, insisting that she buy him lunch. The instructor had braved the constant teasing by his colleagues and the embarrassment that entailed the day before and he was immediately stunned when faced with the question. But the girl’s face was brilliant with confidence, beaming at the young man whom she was swooning over, whereas everyone looked on, expecting to see her being rebuffed. But what happened next shocked everyone: Instructor Cao spent a few seconds contemplating his answer, and he finally nodded!

A voice cried, “What the hell?! Did the instructor react completely different from yesterday?!” Muffled murmurs and excited whispers rose from all quarters like the buzzing of bees as the girl walked out of the field with Instructor Cao, looking absolutely happy and pleased!

I must be the only person in the midst of the surprised and astonished crowd able to be calm; I rubbed my chin and smirked. No one but me could see what happened to both the girl and Instructor Cao. With my Spirit Sight, I had long noticed dark aura churning and twirling in faint wisps around the girl. Instructor Cao looked normal at first, but he was infected by the dark aura just when the girl offered her invitation, and the influence of the dark aura immediately took hold of him.

But the dark aura emanating from the bold girl was Yin energies. That must be this girl’s room which I saw the apparitions all congregating around last night. But the dark aura that lingered above Instructor Cao’s head was hardly the usual Yin energies but rather, the aura of someone being cursed!

Still rubbing my chin and grinning to myself, I watched them leave, anxious to see how things would unfurl from then on. In my smugness, I did not notice a person approaching me. The person slapped a hand on my shoulder and I nearly jumped out of fright! I yanked myself to whirl and saw that it was a girl! A girl with short hair like a boy!

“Hey, what’s your name? I remember you were the one with the strange name, are you not?” The girl asked jauntily. “Murong Shiyan. That’s my name,” I answered, shrugging. “Ah, yes! That’s it! Murong Shiyan! Say, why did your parents give you such a long name? And yeah, what were you thinking about, staring at my friend and the instructor? You were even grinning like a fool?!”