Old Wei and Grandpa Bai fell silent at the same time, holding their breath as they hid.
Chen Ge gripped the hammer handle inside his backpack, pressing his eyes against the crack in the door.
On the pitch-black long street, a faint cold light was steadily approaching.
"What is that?"
The deathly pale light stopped outside the main gate, seeping through the door crack into the courtyard.
"Creak..."
The gate swung open. There was nothing outside the old house — the street was deserted. The only change was a white paper lantern that had appeared at the entrance.
When the three of them had entered the old house, there had been no such thing on the door.
In this strange village, the paper lanterns seemed to carry a special meaning.
"They've come in?"
The white paper lantern cast its deathly pale glow across the ground. There was clearly no one in the courtyard, yet three shadows — two tall and one short — were projected on the floor.
They swayed about the courtyard, seemingly unaware that three outsiders were hiding inside the house.
A cold wind blew through, and the gate closed on its own. When the deathly pale light vanished from outside, three strange figures with bowed heads appeared.
They pressed their heads against their chests, walking on tiptoe with their heads down, moving in what seemed like forward hops.
Their messy hair obscured their faces. Their clothes were tattered and stained with blood, giving off a foul stench.
"That stench — it's just like the one in Ward Three! Have they been through the world behind the 'door'?" Chen Ge gestured for Old Wei and Grandpa Bai to stay hidden.
The three strange figures stood in the center of the courtyard. Just as Chen Ge had guessed — two adults and a child. Their posture was bizarre: bodies leaning forward, as if ready to lunge into the house at any moment.
The atmosphere grew heavy. As seconds ticked by, the three figures outside seemed to sense something. They moved forward simultaneously, approaching the main hall's entrance with an eerie, unnatural gait.
Separated by only a single door, Chen Ge could already make out the patterns on their clothes through the crack.
The three figures did not enter directly. They stopped at the doorway.
The two adults stood motionless with their heads bowed. The smallest one — the child — held a paper doll in its hands, continuously peeling tiny fragments from it with its fingernails, only a sliver at a time. And the paper doll in its grip seemed to have come alive, its expression twisted in agony, wailing and begging for mercy.
But the child didn't stop. Instead, it let out a chilling laugh and tormented the paper doll with even more "interesting" methods.
"There seems to be a name on the paper doll." Chen Ge possessed the Ghost Eye, and he could just barely make it out — a name on the paper doll that he thought he had seen in Lin Guan Village.
"Could this paper doll be one of the missing people from Lin Guan Village?"
Some of the residents of Lin Guan Village were villagers who had escaped from the Living Coffin Village, but aside from themselves, no one knew the true reason they had fled.
The ghostly figures outside lingered for several seconds. They seemed to be trying to determine whether anyone was inside. One of them drifted over to the window.
Chen Ge could see it clearly: the bowed head pressed itself against the window, silently pushing the wooden frame open. Matted hair hung downward — it was preparing to stick its head inside!
At that very moment, Old Wei was crouching directly beneath the window, completely oblivious to the fact that another head was hovering right above him.
Chen Ge looked at Old Wei, his expression unchanged.
Old Wei stared back at Chen Ge, assuming everything was fine, maintaining his position.
The sticky black hair brushed against Old Wei's neck. Finding it slightly itchy, he reached up and scratched.