Rules Ch.121

Chapter 121: School Shooting (3)

“Huh, the gunfire seems to have stopped.” Sitting in the passenger seat, Misha tilted her head and listened for a moment, muttering in confusion.

Everly stopped her wandering thoughts and listened as well, then nodded. “Seems like it has. Probably ran out of ammunition.”

“Then the campus police should be able to go in now.”

“Yeah.”

As she spoke, Everly adjusted the car slightly and drove it onto a slope on the right side of the school gate. With the Jeep’s high chassis, she didn’t even need to get out—just looking through the window, she could see the situation around Teaching Building No. 2 in the distance through the fence.

She saw that after the gunfire inside the building ceased, the campus police didn’t act immediately. Instead, they waited cautiously for a while before finally raising their guns and entering the building one by one.

At the same time, some of the students and teachers trapped inside began to react. Rather than continuing to sit and wait for death, they seized the precious moment when the attacker had stopped firing, gathered their courage, rushed out of the classrooms, and ran through the three exits to the outside of the building.

The city police responsible for evacuation saw the survivors and immediately ran forward to assist them, organizing these trembling and crying survivors into groups and escorting them toward the school gate.

More than a dozen campus police officers against a killer who had likely run out of ammunition—the outcome seemed obvious.

This human tragedy was finally about to end…

Everly leaned back in her seat, quietly waiting for the final result.

After waiting for about five or six minutes, there was still no sound from the distant building. Meanwhile, the survivors who had escaped had already reached the school gate.

Everly’s wandering gaze swept across the survivors—until it landed on one of them, and her expression suddenly sharpened.

Every person’s behavior and mannerisms are unique.

This kind of uniqueness can show in the rhythm of how someone swings their arms while walking, the length of their stride, a slightly hunched posture, a habit of clearing their throat when lying, or tapping their fingers unconsciously when irritated…

Criminals are often very cunning. Some are skilled at disguises, while others even change their appearance through plastic surgery. So, to recognize a person, remembering only their face is far from enough. Observing their gait, body outline, habitual movements, and noting the details that set them apart—this is a fundamental skill for a seasoned police officer.

Having been raised by Old John, Everly didn’t dare claim she had the same level of experience as veteran officers, but when it came to recognizing people, she believed she had a fair amount of insight.

The boy who caught her attention was one of the survivors who had mustered the courage to flee the building after the gunfire stopped. He had messy dirty-blond hair, the most common shade of brown eyes, and a face dotted with freckles. There was nothing remarkable about him—he looked like a completely ordinary college student.

He carried a backpack slung over one shoulder and walked expressionlessly near the back of the group of survivors, moving toward the school gate under police escort.

There were three reasons Everly noticed him.

First, the backpack.

It was a common black backpack, the kind students used to carry textbooks, stationery, and water bottles. But in a life-or-death escape, people usually preferred to carry nothing to move faster. For example, Everly remembered that during an earthquake in her previous life, when she ran downstairs with the crowd, everyone had empty hands—at most holding a phone.

In that situation, a boy carrying a backpack stood out immediately.

The second reason was the way he walked.

Although she had only caught a brief glimpse of him, Everly remembered clearly: when the shooter walked—or even ran—he had a habit of landing on the balls of his feet first, then slowly transitioning to the full sole. It gave his gait a somewhat cat-like quality. On top of that, he was slightly pigeon-toed, making his walking pattern very distinctive.

The boy hidden among the survivors walked in exactly the same way.

The final clue was on the back of his left hand.

While carrying his backpack, he habitually gripped the strap across his chest with his left hand, exposing the back of his hand—perfectly visible from Everly’s angle.

And when he reached the school gate, the distance was close enough that with a single glance, Everly saw what she was looking for—a small bluish bruise.

It was the mark she had left when she hit him with a pebble.

Taking all these points together, even though the boy looked nothing like the owner of the black car—the junior named Dustin Grove—and had changed all his clothes, Everly was still ninety percent certain that he was the one who had been shooting.

So the attacker had disguised himself as an ordinary student and blended into the group of survivors to escape?

Sensing something was wrong, Everly immediately reversed the car and drove up to the top of a slope about a hundred meters from the school gate. From that vantage point, she stared intently at the suspect’s every move.

She didn’t think he was doing this just to escape.

After all, someone who had already gone on a shooting spree on campus had likely long accepted the possibility of death. A person bent on revenge like this wasn’t the type to back down out of fear—instead, he might feel he hadn’t killed enough yet and want to drag even more people down with him…

Wait—so that’s it!

When Everly saw the boy reach the school gate, glance around, move toward a less crowded area, unzip his backpack, and take out something that looked like a TV remote, she finally understood what he was about to do.

Most ordinary people wouldn’t recognize it, but Old John had once taken part in the Vietnam War. He had shown her weapons used during that time, including electronic detonators and their corresponding triggers.

The “remote control” in the attacker’s hand was exactly an electronic detonator—he must have explosives on him!

In a split second, Everly put everything together. Her first reaction was to vault into the back seat, reach over, and pull out a Barrett M82A1—famous for its long range—from the rear compartment.

Thanks to her past training, the entire sequence—from climbing over the seat to retrieving the rifle—took less than ten seconds. Meanwhile, the attacker in the distance, whether from nervousness or excitement, had trembling hands. At that critical moment, he actually dropped the detonator.

Good. Good. Just keep fumbling like that—buy her a little more time!

Holding the rifle, Everly loaded a round, attached the scope, and pushed open the car door in one smooth motion.

She positioned herself behind the door, using its thick, bullet-resistant material as cover. From behind it, she extended the barrel, lined up her sights through the crowd, and began her final aim at the attacker.

By then, the attacker had already bent down and picked up the detonator. Through the scope, Everly could see the malicious, curse-filled smile tugging at the corner of his lips.

Electronic detonators like that were usually equipped with passwords—no fewer than 13 digits—to prevent accidental activation. Everly still had time, but not much.

The attacker held the detonator in his left hand, and with his right index finger, pressed the first button.

At the same moment, Everly aligned her sights with his temple.

But pulling the trigger on a living person was no simple matter—especially for someone like her, a normal person with a functioning conscience. It meant overcoming a heavy psychological barrier.

What if she was wrong? What if she had misjudged, overthought things, and this wasn’t the real killer, and he didn’t even have a detonator—wouldn’t that make her a criminal?

With all these doubts weighing on her, just before pulling the trigger, Everly stopped. Instead, she aimed the rifle at the electronic detonator itself.

“Hey! What… what are you doing?!”

A shout came from behind. A middle-aged man had happened to pass by, saw Everly pointing a rifle at the distant crowd, and assumed she was about to do something bad. Acting out of misplaced courage, he called out.

Everly didn’t have time to explain. Judging by his posture and movements, the man had probably trained in some form of combat; he looked capable, and seeing that Everly was just a girl, he underestimated her. He relied on his size and stepped forward to try to stop her. But just as he got within about a meter, Misha suddenly leapt out from the side—like a little bear—tackling him to the ground using her weight and pressing a hand over his mouth.

“Mmm… mmm mmm…”

With all outside interference neutralized, Everly took a deep breath, cleared her mind, and focused entirely on distance, wind, and the subtle tremor in her arms from holding the rifle.

Click. About a hundred meters away, the attacker’s expression was relaxed, his fingers light as a butterfly as he pressed the fourth and fifth digits of the password in quick succession.

Everly finally had the detonator in her sights. She inhaled deeply, ready to squeeze the trigger—when a passerby suddenly walked in front of the attacker, briefly obscuring his hands.

!!!

Everly immediately released her finger from the trigger. Cold sweat broke out on her forehead from the unexpected interruption.

Finally, once the passerby moved on and no one else was nearby, the attacker was down to the last few digits of the password.

There was no time left—she had to act immediately!

With no time to hesitate, Everly decided to trust the countless hours of training that had left her arms almost automatic. She placed the crosshair right on the center of the detonator—

Yes—at this moment, she was over a hundred meters away from the center of the blast, and the Jeep’s bulletproof body provided extra protection. Even if the bomb went off, both she and Misha would most likely walk away unharmed.

But the reason humanity has survived from prehistoric times until now isn’t through lone struggles or individual competition—it’s social cooperation driven by empathy. As anthropologist Margaret once said, “The earliest sign of civilization is a fractured femur that has healed.”

The boundary between savagery and civilization lies in that very capacity for compassion.

Everly didn’t want to become a cold, selfish person. She wanted, like Old John, to be someone who could help others whenever she still had the strength to do so.

And now, this was the moment her hard-earned skills truly mattered!

“Misha, cover your ears!”

Then… go!

With a silent shout of hope in her heart, Everly pulled the trigger.

Bang!

The metal bullet erupted with a thunderous roar from the muzzle, streaking forward like a shooting star tearing through the air. In an instant, it reached the attacker, obliterating the detonator and half of his hand in one strike, reducing both to a bloody mess.

“Ah! Ahhh!”

The attacker clutched his mangled hand and collapsed to the ground amid the screams of those around him, wailing uncontrollably.

On the slope above, Everly pressed her hands to her ears, leaning back against the Jeep in discomfort. She fumbled at her chest, trying to retrieve her universal remedy.

Alongside the Barrett’s extraordinary long-range capability came its immense recoil and a gunshot noise “as loud as a cannon.”

The recoil was manageable—Everly had braced herself during the shot, so at worst her shoulder would be sore for a few days. The noise, however, was far more dangerous. The sonic boom from the supersonic bullet, combined with the explosive roar of gunpowder igniting at the muzzle, far exceeded the human ear’s tolerance and could cause irreversible damage.

Because time was so urgent, Everly didn’t have a chance to take any protective measures. The gunshot—far exceeding 160 decibels—pierced her eardrums like knives.

Her eardrums were likely ruptured. Her ear canals felt clogged, as if stuffed with cotton. All external sound seemed to vanish; the world became eerily silent. Everly shook her head and felt a warm, trickling flow from her ears. Reaching up, she confirmed her ears were bleeding.

It wasn’t just hearing loss. The blast’s vibrations had disrupted her inner ear’s vestibular system, and her autonomic nervous system went haywire. Though she was standing upright, the world spun around her; her temples felt like they’d been hit by heavy blows, throbbing unbearably.

After several tries, she finally managed to retrieve the universal remedy from her chest and squirted three drops into her mouth.

The instant the green liquid touched her tongue, every pain—her throbbing head, ruptured eardrums, aching shoulder—vanished in an instant. Everly clenched her fists, feeling her body restored from “half-life” back to peak condition.

By now, the gunfire from the slope had also succeeded in drawing the attention of the city police stationed outside the school gate.

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Author’s Note:

Yesterday, an angel in the U.S. shared some info: “In the U.S., after receiving an acceptance letter, you can visit the school, choose courses, and select housing at any time before the semester starts—you don’t have to wait until a few days before. Roommates are assigned randomly, and about a month before school starts, you’ll receive an email with your roommate and housing info.” Thanks for the clarification. This shows that the story’s content is purely the author’s imagination—already published and won’t be revised, so just take it as reading material and don’t memorize it [pleading]. Some local knowledge is hard to find online; searches mostly return intermediary ads [clown].

The Barrett rifle’s gunshot can cause truly irreversible damage without protection. Since the heroine needed to keep observing the killer after firing, she had to use the medicine.

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