Wedding candles emitted a faint red glow, making the old mansion appear even more eerie.
Standing at the bedroom doorway, a woman in tattered bridal robes stared at
"She's calling my name?"
When he was young, Chen Ge had heard the elders in his family say that there were certain ghosts in this world who would call out to passersby on late-night streets, then transform into the person most deeply etched in their memories, draw close, and kill them.
"Could this female ghost have a similar ability?"
The voices he had heard along the way were amplified endlessly, disrupting his judgment. He tried to focus, but his body had gone completely limp.
When he looked up, the woman's face—so deformed that only a vague outline could be discerned—was slowly becoming something warm and familiar, like someone he had once encountered in his life.
Beautiful memories were stitched together with needle and thread. The woman, who had died a terrible death, gently covered her face with the sleeve of her bridal robe. She stepped out of the bedroom, her movements soft and delicate.
Her embroidered shoes stepped upon the paper-cut double-happiness character pasted on the white paper. Her bridal gown grew ever more vivid and striking. She discreetly lowered the corner of her sleeve, and her originally horrifying face had become remarkably refined—her features gradually clarifying until Chen Ge felt an overwhelming sense of familiarity.
"She must be someone very important in my life."
Her voice seeped into his very bones, like threads of silk binding his body, leaving him incapable of harboring any thought of harm toward her.
His thoughts froze. His body acted on pure instinct. Unconsciously, Chen Ge took a step forward. It was as though someone inside his head was urging him—telling him not to leave any more regrets in this lifetime.
"Such a familiar voice… who is she?"
Memories buried at the bottom of his heart were stirred. Chen Ge felt as if his soul were about to leave his body.
The voice in his head echoed over and over. The sinister, terrifying hall no longer felt frightening. Everything around him faded into nothing. Under the voice's persuasion, Chen Ge walked forward, step by step.
The two drew closer and closer. The woman's blood-red bridal sleeves slowly lowered. The face that had once been disfigured in death had long since transformed. She seemed to have leafed through Chen Ge's memories and found the woman who had loved him most deeply.
The blurred features sharpened into perfect clarity—flawless. Even the most fastidious artist would have been moved to exclaim: beautiful.
Those familiar features, that exquisite face. The woman tilted her head up, gazing at Chen Ge with anticipation.
Their eyes met. But Chen Ge, who had been completely ensnared by her voice, now looked as though he had been struck by a bolt of lightning!
His entire body trembled uncontrollably, his heart pounding wildly. An indescribable terror tore apart all romance and memory.
"
A powerful will to survive drove Chen Ge to instinctively recoil. No matter how the woman called out to him, it was useless.
The flickering candlelight was snuffed out by a gust of wind. In the face of that ultimate terror, the woman's voice inside his head could no longer pose any threat to Chen Ge.
The woman's face reverted to its original state. She stood in the center of the room, holding a pair of scissors and a length of red thread.
She had used her ability to take on the form of the most striking woman in Chen Ge's memories, weaving her trap step by step, hoping to lure him into it of his own accord.
Everything had been going smoothly at first. The man before her had been completely under her control. But no matter how she racked her mind, she could not understand why this man had reacted so violently upon seeing the face of someone who loved him deeply!
Gasping for breath, Chen Ge felt fear for the first time since entering Living