The desks and chairs, along with the worn-out mannequins, had been moved aside. Several guests walked through the freshly cleared passage.
"Old Yang, hurry up!" Wang Yan spotted Yang Chen standing alone at the back and called out, unaware that a storm had already erupted inside Yang Chen's mind, where a fierce internal struggle was raging.
"What's the rush, you two?" Yang Chen shouted back at Wang Yan. He hadn't sent the message yet and was about to persuade Wang Yan and Li Xue to turn back when the wall lamp beside him suddenly flickered.
"The lights?" Yang Chen seemed to realize something all at once. He sprinted wildly toward Wang Yan and Li Xue. "Get back to me! Now! The lights are going out!"
One by one, the wall lamps in the passage began to die, faster than the two times before.
Li Xue heard Yang Chen's voice and immediately ran toward him, but Wang Yan was farther away. He'd only made it halfway when the wall lamp beside him went out.
For the third time, the passage plunged into darkness. What made Yang Chen uneasy was that they were now right at the boundary between the outer zone and the middle zone—who knew what kind of monster lurked beyond the hole in the wall? That was an uncharted stretch of Lingsu territory.
"The haunted house owner killed the lights the moment I was about to say those five ghosts' names. Has he already figured out that someone has guessed the five ghosts' identities? If so, the next victim could very well be me. Of all the guests, Bai Qiulin—the aloof one—is the hardest to deal with, and after him, it's probably me. Having visited the haunted house multiple times, I've already figured out the haunted house owner's tricks. He'll definitely see me as a major threat and target me specifically." A powerful sense of crisis surged within Yang Chen. He refused to sit and wait for death. Rising to his feet, he grabbed Li Xue and shouted toward the other end of the passage: "Wang Yan! Over here!"
Shadows flickered in the darkness. Liquid dripped from overhead, and a silhouette scurried across the ceiling at alarming speed.
"What the hell is that?"
Wang Yan, halfway through his dash, felt a damp, bone-chilling aura rush toward him. He stared blankly upward, his pupils slowly adjusting to the dark. Just as he was about to make out the creature's form, a hand suddenly slapped him on the shoulder.
His body shuddered. Wang Yan instinctively turned to look—nothing was there.
"Who's behind me?"
A drop of icy liquid fell onto the back of his neck. Wang Yan jumped with fright, and before he could recover, his shoulder was tapped again. This time he could clearly feel a hand resting on it.
"Got you!"
Wang Yan had a short temper—he wasn't built for deduction or deep thinking—but his physical conditioning was excellent and his reflexes were sharp.
Before the hand could withdraw, he seized it directly. The fact that something was deliberately scaring him at a time like this annoyed him.
He moved roughly, gripping the hand and flinging it forward with all his strength.
His arm swung, and the hand was yanked right in front of his eyes.
Five slender fingers were interlocked with his own. Looking further back, there was a pale palm and a jagged, uneven stump—as if it had been hacked off with a cleaver.
It was a severed hand, cut off at the wrist, and it was now clutched tight in Wang Yan's palm.
"A hand?"
His thoughts froze for a full second before fear engulfed him completely.
"Where did this hand come from?!"
In the darkness, he thrashed his arm wildly. A knot of air lodged in his throat. Just as he was about to scream, all the broken mannequins scattered around seemed to come alive at once, turning toward Wang Yan.
Completely consumed by terror, Wang Yan lost all sense of direction. He screamed and shouted, instinctively running toward the spot where no mannequins stood.
"Wang Yan!" Yang Chen heard his companion's cries and immediately pulled his phone from his pocket.
As he swiped the screen and turned on the flashlight, liquid dripped from the ceiling. Dense darkness gathered above his head, coalescing into a face with its skull hollowed out, slowly closing in—as if it intended to envelop Yang Chen's entire head.
With all his attention fixed on Wang Yan, Yang Chen failed to notice the shadow looming directly above him. It was Li Xue who let out a sharp scream. She scrambled backward, dropping to the ground, her back pressed flat against the wall as she tried to push even farther away.
Seeing Li Xue's reaction, Yang Chen realized he was being targeted too. "The haunted house owner's real target is me?"
The phone light in the passage flickered erratically. Dark monsters materialized out of the gloom in large numbers.
"Don't panic! The darkness only lasts for a short time!" Yang Chen dodged to one side, holding the phone up to shield Li Xue.
Footsteps echoed through the cluttered passage. In the dark, some of the guests were fleeing in a particular direction.
"Stay where you are! Don't run! Stop!" Yang Chen heard the chaotic footsteps and finally realized something was wrong. He guessed the haunted house owner had already noticed that some guests had discovered there were ghosts mixed into their group—and so this blackout was designed to scatter the guest party, creating a more favorable environment for his employees.
Yang Chen screamed himself hoarse, but Wang Yan, already panic-stricken, wasn't listening carefully. He thrashed his hand with all his might, but what terrified him even more was that the severed hand was gripping him back—on its own.
Their ten fingers were interlocked, as if the hand had been glued to his palm.
A monster was closing in on the ceiling, the mannequins around him seemed to have come back to life, and severed heads rolled across the floor. Wang Yan stood alone amid the piles of debris, his capacity for rational thought completely gone.
Footsteps sounded nearby—some guests in the group were fleeing into the distance. Wang Yan twisted sideways and shuffled backward, caring about nothing else, following those footsteps as he retreated, desperate to break free from the encirclement of mannequins and the creature overhead.
"Who's running?! Get on the ground! Against the wall! Everyone stay put!" Huya and Ah Nan were shouting too. They had noticed that someone in the group seemed to be deliberately stirring things up, fomenting panic.
Black shadows swayed. The wall lamps never came back on. With mannequins and monsters in pursuit, Wang Yan ran straight into the middle zone.
He followed the guests ahead—he had no idea how long he'd been running. In his memory, they had passed through several turns. There was no going back now.
Once his emotions had settled somewhat, Wang Yan felt a twinge of regret, but he'd had no other choice.
The force on his hand was growing stronger. He was a medical student, and the sensation that hand gave him was identical to human skin—except it had no warmth. It felt like the hand of a dead man.
Ducking his head to evade the mannequins and the creature above, Wang Yan suddenly heard Bai Qiulin's voice ahead—surprised and laced with anger: "Who's there? Who is that?!"
Immediately after came a piercing scream from Xiao Li. Wang Yan knew Xiao Li had been following right behind Bai Qiulin this whole time.
"What happened? Did they run into something too?" There was a corner just ahead. Wang Yan crept closer and finally saw—two figures were slumped in the corner.
Xiao Li had collapsed on the ground, unconscious.