Nan Yue quietly listened to the sounds outside, suddenly remembering something she had overlooked.
If the ghosts outside were invisible and only found people who made noise, then how did the people in the courtyard die earlier?
Weren't they seen after tearing open the window screen?
A sudden chill ran down Nan Yue's spine. Could it be... that between midnight and six in the morning, those things outside... could see?
Nan Yue quickly got up, her voice barely a whisper. “Close your eyes, don't move.”
After speaking, she extinguished the burning candle.
At the same time, the door was pounded.
“Thump, thump, thump.”
It wasn't a knock; it was the unrestrained pounding of a child's palms against the door in play.
Nan Yue sat by the window, leaning against the wall, her entire body like a taut string, ready to react at any moment.
Although Gu Xiang Kai and Zhu Xi Ning didn't know why Nan Yue had suddenly changed their original plan, they could tell from her tone that the situation was extremely critical.
The three-person room was silent, as if empty.
Their breathing slowed to a crawl, hoping that the things outside, pounding harder and harder on the door, would be fooled.
But it was to no avail. As more pounding sounds erupted, Zhu Xi Ning could imagine countless children outside, climbing over each other, densely covering the entire door and windows, beating frantically.
“Bang!”
The three of them tensed; the door had been forced open.
With her eyes closed, Nan Yue's hearing became more acute. Something had crawled into the room.
Nan Yue heard Zhu Xi Ning's shallow breathing hitch beside her. She couldn't afford to worry about others; in such a situation, where one couldn't see and imagination ran wild, anyone would feel fear.
Fear easily led to mistakes.
That was why the academy had always emphasized training for fear resistance, but humans were flesh and blood after all; even with training, they would still feel fear when it was due.
Most scavengers died because of fear.
Nan Yue, however, felt no such emotion, at least not towards these things.
She had never been afraid of death; she was merely unwilling to accept it.
And ever since she could remember, the thing inside her had terrified her more than anything else, tormenting her, keeping her awake at night, living each day on the brink of collapse, counting down the time.
So when facing the ghosts in missions, she truly didn't feel that kind of fear. Ghosts had weaknesses and rules for killing.
What was there to be afraid of?
Nan Yue trusted her judgment. She heard children's laughter echo in her ears, cold and eerie.
Something cold and soft touched her. Her breathing remained perfectly still, her eyes closed as if she felt nothing.
Could she really use that thing in a mission?
Regardless, she needed to try. If one day she could defeat or even get rid of that thing, she would truly die without regrets.
The cold sensation was already crawling up her pant leg, and an infant's wail exploded in her ear, as shrill as a night owl.
Nan Yue recalled her feelings at the time, sensing the constant sticky, cold, rotten-flesh-like aura enveloping her heart.
How did she do it back then?
If there had been a light in the room, all three would have seen it filled with infant ghosts, crawling on all fours, their pale bodies scrambling everywhere.
Their eye sockets, originally two black holes, now held eyeballs—not their original ones, but clearly adult eyes, gouged out alive and crudely forced into the infant ghosts' sockets.
The oversized, bloodshot white eyeballs, set in the tiny infant heads, revealed an age-inappropriate malevolence.
The eyeballs rolled around, staring at the three people sitting silently in various parts of the room.
Many infant ghosts had already crawled onto the ceiling like geckos, their heads tilted back almost parallel to their spines, glaring menacingly at the three below.
And many infant ghosts had already climbed onto the three, their heads as large as buckets, with two oversized, round eyeballs set in their palm-sized faces.
The infant ghosts opened their mouths, revealing layers of teeth that could strip a person to bone in seconds. Now, they wailed, clambering onto the three using both hands and feet.
Just a little more; if they moved, spoke, or made eye contact, they would be devoured.
Unnoticed by anyone, the three infant ghosts crawling on Nan Yue suddenly shrieked, fell to the ground, and then, with expressions of fear, scurried far away.
This slight disturbance was hidden amidst the continuous wailing, and no one noticed.
Nan Yue's face was calm, but sweat beaded at her temples. Her heart pounded like a drum, and her breathing was slightly ragged.
She had just used that thing's ability again, but it had drained her considerably. She felt as tired as if she had run several kilometers, her entire body aching faintly.
Nan Yue knew she couldn't use this ability indefinitely; at least, she wasn't strong enough yet.
The three infant ghosts crawled away, but more infant ghosts tugged at Nan Yue's clothes. This time, Nan Yue remained still, letting them wail with their foul-smelling mouths by her ear.
“Ah!!!”
A scream came from the inner residence. She couldn't tell who it was, but Nan Yue heard someone push open a door and run out frantically, while another person plunged with a splash into the courtyard's water vat.
The person running stumbled before reaching the main gate. The infant ghosts inside instantly began crawling out, and a man's shrill scream echoed from outside the door, sending a chill through those inside the room.
The protracted screams, accompanied by sounds of sucking and gnawing, were particularly eerie in the silent night.
The commotion outside gradually subsided, and the infant ghosts crawled back into the room, bringing with them a strong smell of blood. Combined with the screams from outside, it was enough to make one retch.
The three of them sat rigidly like that for an unknown duration before the infant ghosts slowly dispersed.
Nan Yue didn't dare to be careless. She waited a while longer, estimating it was roughly eight in the morning, before opening her eyes.
Outside, it was still pitch black. The room was a mess, things overturned on the floor, and fresh red crawling marks covered the floor, walls, and bed. It wasn't hard to imagine what the scene had been like last night.
“It's safe now.”
Hearing Nan Yue's voice, Gu Xiang Kai and Zhu Xi Ning waited a moment longer before opening their eyes.
As soon as Zhu Xi Ning opened her eyes, she clapped a hand over her mouth, suppressing the nausea rising in her stomach. Gu Xiang Kai's face was also pale. The three of them hadn't slept all night, acting like mannequins for hours, terrified, and now felt utterly exhausted.
“The sun won't rise.”
Nan Yue lit a candle and walked out of the room. Not far from the main gate lay a blood-covered skeleton, its face relatively intact but etched with pain and despair.
It was Zhao Dekai.
A person was submerged in the water vat, eyes wide in death, the entire tank of water stained red and emitting a strong, fishy stench.
It was Li Maocai.
Nan Yue's gaze shifted to the inner courtyard, where there were also numerous bloodstains on the ground.
More people had died.
Rate on N.U.
