"Good morning, Engineering Batch of 2020. Welcome back to St. Louie University."
Shocked and confused, the engineering graduates slowly removed their hands from covering their ears. The voice from the speakers was suddenly different. Too far from the calm feminine voice that they used to hear on every announcement during their student days and the voice that greeted them every 30 minutes this morning, the voice now sounds bitter and deep.
"Have you seen the announcement?"
That line is very much familiar to anyone who has been a student of St. Louie University, making all the graduates know what they need to do. They slowly walked towards the big whiteboard between the building of IT and CE, where all the announcements or guidelines for the entire college are usually written or posted. Even though there were about two hundred of them, they all felt the same surprise when they saw the five big letters written in bloody red.
L V G T P
"I-Is it blood?!" a guy from the graduates asked loudly when Kingsley approached the bulletin board.
The former student council president turned to his batchmate, feeling uneasy. He chose to shake his head but before he could, a beastly laugh echoed from the speakers.
"Of course, it is. Why do you think I killed the registrar?"
The graduates fell silent. Some started to cry. All felt fear.
"I needed ink," the deep voice added which caused everyone more discomfort. "It's a code, engineers. You're all smart, right?"
The wind seemed to become eerily colder as the graduates finally understood what they had to do.
"Prove it."
No one moved even an inch. No one knew what to do.
"There's no limit, don't worry. We still have two months before the new academic year starts, right? We can stay here until the end of May."
"We won't do it!" one of the graduates dared to say. With one showing the nerve to argue with the voice, the others took the risk as well and screamed the same thing. The graduates were suddenly bolder and made sure their voices were heard, but all they received was another laugh from the speakers.
"Please, don't disappoint me, dear engineers. I have high expectations for all of you." The deep voice had a teasing tone. "I know you don't want to die."
"Who are you?!" Kingsley asked, plucking up the courage when everyone fell silent again. The former president of the student council kept his head high and looked directly at the nearest speaker as if getting eye-to-eye with whoever owned the voice that tells them to crack the code.
"I'm… watching," was the voice's answer. Just by the tone, one could tell that the speaker was grinning while saying that. "Oh, since I killed your college registrar, I'll give you a clue."
No one dared to even open their mouth at that point. Everyone was covered in fear.
"The clue is everywhere, engineers," the voice said. "Don't disappoint me, okay?"
The speakers seem to have turned off after that line. Still, no one moved. It was like everyone was waiting for anyone to tell them what to do.
"Does anybody know how to decode this?!" Kingsley asked, loud enough for all his almost 200 batchmates to hear.
"We're really going to answer that?!" one guy asked in an annoyed tone.
"It's not like we have a choice!" a lady replied. With how many they are, they didn't mind that they are not even seeing who they are talking to.
"Doesn't whoever-that-idiot-is want us to follow him?! Are we going to let them control us like that?! Are you fucking idiots?!"
Chaos suddenly ensued once again when someone rushed to the guy who was screaming. A familiar man seething with anger—Arkin Rodriquez, a graduate of Bachelor of Science in Electronics and Communication Engineering and well-known student for always getting called to the Guidance Office.
"Are you fucking stupid?!" Arkin shouted as he gripped the man's collar tightly. "Someone just died and you think this is just a joke?!"
"Arkin! Arkin!" Noah pulled the young man. He tried to remove his hands from the collar of the other guy, who couldn't say a word now, until he voluntarily let go.
Kingsley could only sigh because of what happened. He turned his back on the three and faced the other graduates instead. "The voice said that the clue is everywhere! Go, find anything!"
The other graduates of St. Louie were just starting to move when a young woman raised her hand. Everybody looked at her.
"Solved it," Ally said in a serious, almost flat tone. Even Ella and Terrence who were beside her seemed surprised as they stared at her.
"You did?" Kingsley asked with a hint of doubt. Whispers about Ally started to echo through the whole department. "How?"
Not wanting to waste her energy on explaining, Ally sighed. "The answer is CVMBS. College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences. I think we need to go there."
"Wait!" Hailey intervened. "The voice said that the clue is everywhere. How come you decoded it when you didn't look anywhere?"
"The clue is really everywhere." The others purposely became quiet to hear what Ally was going to say. "Everywhere you look is St. Louie."
Hailey just raised an eyebrow and the whispers returned. Noah was startled when Arkin suddenly withdrew his arm from his grip. He quickly chased after him when he saw him approaching Ally.
"Arkin!"
Everyone held their breath as their eyes followed the well-known hostile and belligerent person who approached the young woman.
"Explain it," Arkin told her.
Ally slightly frowned when the young man tilted his head, pointing at the announcement board. She turned to look there and saw Kingsley raise his hand holding the whiteboard marker tied to the side of the board. She sighed and walked towards him.
"Everywhere you look is a part of the campus. Everywhere you look is St. Louie," Ally repeated before writing the name of their university under the big letters written with blood. She could feel the strange silence as all the attention was on her. She glanced at her back and saw the others doing everything they can to see her and the board. She had to take a deep breath. "St. Louie is the key. I removed the letters from St. Louie and wrote the remaining letters of the alphabet next to them. Then, I just compared it to the normal alphabet."
Everyone was still quiet until Ally finished writing the entire English alphabet on the whiteboard. "L is C, V is still V, G is M, T is B, and P is S. It's a cipher I watched from somewhere before, but I forgot what it is called."
"How can we be sure that you are correct—" Hailey was interrupted when a young man also approached the whiteboard. Even if they didn't look, by just the strange intimidating aura, everyone already knew who it was—Vince Pascual, a graduate of Electrical Engineering and the Class Valedictorian of Batch 2020.
"It's simply called the Keyword Cipher," Vince casually said as he looked at each person currently standing by the whiteboard—Kingsley, Hailey, Noah, Arkin, and Ally. He smiled at the latter. "Quick thinking."
Ally just took a quick look at Vince, then returned her gaze back to Kingsley. "Can I go to CVMBS now?"
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