Nan Yue paid no mind to the events behind her. It was already past eleven at night. After a quick wash, the three of them returned to their room, and soon the courtyard fell silent.
"I heard it. In five different places, children were crying."
Zhu Xi Ning had completely become Nan Yue's little fangirl, her eyes sparkling as she watched Nan Yue earlier. Now, hearing Gu Xiang Kai's words, her attention finally returned to the matter at hand.
"Are you sure they were children?"
Gu Xiang Kai's expression wasn't good. "To be precise, they were infants."
"Only appearing at night, it was the sound of babies crying."
Zhu Xi Ning hissed, rubbing the goosebumps on her arms. A psychological trait common among women, they were especially afraid of supernatural events involving children or infants.
"Just as I said? They don't not have children; they're hiding them."
"I didn't expect this to be a monster mission. How annoying."
Monster-type missions usually involved fleeing, gore, and violence, none of which she was particularly good at.
Nan Yue sat cross-legged on the bed. "Then we'll proceed with that idea for now. I'm still a bit concerned about what was added to the food, though."
Zhu Xi Ning's imagination ran wild. "It might be something that allows the monsters to lock onto a target."
"As for the townspeople eating it, perhaps it also has some beneficial effect on the human body."
Nan Yue wasn't one to overthink things, so she accepted this explanation for the time being.
She yawned. "I'm going to sleep now. If anything happens tonight, wake me up."
Zhu Xi Ning looked speechless. Within minutes of Nan Yue wrapping herself in the blanket, even breaths could be heard.
Gu Xiang Kai turned off the light, plunging the room into darkness.
Nan Yue was shaken awake by Zhu Xi Ning at almost three o'clock. As soon as she awoke, she heard countless footsteps outside the door.
Just as they had described, it sounded like the entire town had come.
Knowing they couldn't make eye contact with whatever was outside, the three listened to the sounds in the darkness.
Suddenly, the aimless wandering footsteps vanished, replaced by sparse but distinctly rhythmic ones.
Tap, tap... tap, tap...
Two taps per set, with a pause in between.
The three exchanged glances in the darkness. What was that sound?
Because they couldn't see, their imaginations ran wild, and the three racked their brains trying to figure out what was happening outside.
Suddenly, Gu Xiang Kai raised a hand to signal. Nan Yue saw his lips move in the dim darkness: Someone opened a door.
Nan Yue sneered silently. After what happened yesterday, anyone would know not to look; if you didn't look, you wouldn't fall victim.
So, if there weren't other death conditions today, then... someone was harming others.
When Gu Xiang Kai said someone had gone out, the previously neat, eerie, and ritualistic footsteps became chaotic again.
Nan Yue waved her hand and burrowed back into the still-warm blanket.
Zhu Xi Ning was dumbfounded.
When Nan Yue woke up the next day, she noticed that Zhu Xi Ning and Gu Xiang Kai looked much better than before.
Apparently, it was thanks to her; the atmosphere didn't feel as terrifying, and they both managed to get some sleep afterward.
It wasn't fully bright yet. After washing up, the three weren't in a hurry to go out and discussed in the room.
"What do you think those sounds last night were?"
Zhu Xi Ning stood up and took two steps forward. "Could they have been playing 'follow the leader'?"
Gu Xiang Kai frowned, finding Zhu Xi Ning's ideas quite creepy.
A group of unknown monsters in the dead of night, hands on the shoulders of the person in front, taking two steps then pausing, playing a boring train game.
Nan Yue didn't think so. "I don't think just walking would make that much noise. You could try replacing walking with jumping."
Zhu Xi Ning alternated bouncing on her left and right feet; it indeed matched what they heard last night more closely.
"Were they really playing 'follow the leader'?"
Nan Yue shrugged. "I don't know what they were doing, but I think it was either a game or a ritual."
Zhu Xi Ning let out a breath, unsure if it was relief. The terrifying events of both nights had occurred in the inner residence; people in the outer residence were safe as long as they didn't court death.
"No, when I chose the outer residence, one reason was that I didn't want to be with He Jiang. The other was that if something happened, the inner residence, which originally housed important people, might be more prone to incidents."
"Whether it's revenge or murder, they usually wouldn't target the outer storerooms. Of course, if the ghosts in the mission were sentient, then it wouldn't matter where you stayed."
"However, the scavengers in a mission, since they undertake a higher risk of death, would certainly receive clues that we wouldn't."
Nan Yue's gaze fell on the paper window. Last night, because of the moonlight, she could see Gu Xiang Kai's lip movements through it.
Thinking this way, the people in the inner residence should be able to get some clues from the shadows outside their windows.
Zhu Xi Ning wasn't interested in seeing another bloody scene. After a moment, she said, "Why is it still dark today? Or did we wake up too early?"
"No, it's already eight o'clock."
Nan Yue had already noticed something was off with the sun today. "Yesterday, it was bright by 6:30 AM."
The three waited until nine o'clock for the sky to finally brighten. Pushing open their door, they found they were the first ones out.
The scent of blood in the inner residence was even stronger. Again, within the square frame, lay a corpse with its flesh stripped from the bones.
It was Jiang Ximing.
His eyeballs had also been gouged out.
But this time, his head wasn't resting on the bones; it was in another corner of the frame.
Nan Yue walked over to look. Yesterday, with the head on the body, she hadn't noticed, but now she realized the skull itself was hollowed out, and the brain matter had been removed.
Nan Yue looked at the room Jiang Ximing had stayed in yesterday. Sure enough, there was an extra hole. But why would he still look, knowing it would lead to death?
"It must have been He Jiang. They shared a room, and he forced Jiang Ximing to look."
Lu Jiao appeared behind them at some point. Frowning and holding her nose, she clearly disapproved of He Jiang's actions.
"I don't think so."
Zhu Xi Ning shook her head. "Didn't we say yesterday that after seeing it, a person's body becomes uncontrollable? Even if He Jiang forced him to look, he wouldn't get any information, so what would be the point?"
Lu Jiao hadn't considered that and fell silent after being questioned.
Creak.
The door opened, and out came He Jiang and Zhao Dekai.
Zhao Dekai's arms hadn't been reset yet; every tug sent excruciating pain through him. He followed behind He Jiang, his face pale.
Without Nan Yue needing to ask, the others surrounded He Jiang.
"Brother He, what happened?"
"Why did Jiang Ximing die? Didn't he know not to look?"
"What happened to you? What exactly is out there?"
The scene of coercing Nan Yue from yesterday was replayed, only this time it was He Jiang.
But to Nan Yue's surprise, it wasn't He Jiang who came out to calm the crowd, but Zhao Dekai, who could barely speak steadily.
Rate on N.U.
