Li Changyin was the "most popular" performer at the Nightmare Academy. He had a certain air of madness about him — he didn't even need to act. All he had to do was be himself, and he could perfectly embody the word "psychopath."
Standing in the shadows outside the restaurant entrance, he pulled on a maternity outfit he'd found in one of the rooms, then fished makeup tools from the fanny pack at his waist. With just a few strokes, his face looked nothing like before.
Li Changyin had delicate, almost feminine features. After applying the makeup, even though he still had short hair, he looked remarkably like a woman.
"No wig? Guess I'll just find a hat then." He darted into a nearby building, not bothered by the filth, and bunched up a bedsheet before stuffing it into the maternity outfit.
Once everything was in place, Li Changyin returned to the restaurant entrance and peered sideways at Zhang Jingjiu inside. After building up the right emotion, he spoke with a hint of a sob in his voice: "Can you help me? I lost something."
His voice was completely different from before — identical to a young woman's.
Zhang Jingjiu had been studying his acting techniques when he suddenly heard the cry for help. He immediately set down his phone.
"A tourist?" he thought, feeling that the moment he'd been waiting for had finally arrived. He stood up and headed toward the restaurant exit.
Li Changyin saw the bait had been taken and immediately backed away, retreating into the narrow alley between the restaurant and another building.
He stood deep in the alley, so that anyone outside could only see the silhouette of a back.
"Is there anything I can help you with?" Zhang Jingjiu saw the figure hiding in the alley and assumed the person was like Wang Yan — scared witless, seeing ghosts in every face inside the haunted house.
"I lost something very important. Can you help me find it?" It was the same pitiful female voice, but Li Changyin's expression had turned vicious. With the disguise dropped, this was his truest self.
"No problem." Zhang Jingjiu was a bit puzzled, but after thinking it through, this was his own turf — there was no need to worry.
He entered the alley, and only when he got closer did he notice the rounded belly on Li Changyin.
"A pregnant woman?" A rule from the employee handbook flashed through Zhang Jingjiu's mind — for safety reasons, pregnant women were prohibited from visiting the haunted house.
"Not a tourist, so it must be one of the long-time staff in the scenario…" Zhang Jingjiu slowed his pace. He knew very well what kind of "things" played the roles of employees in this scenario.
Li Changyin saw the other man stop in his tracks. His eyes narrowed to a single point, and he grew even more cautious.
Both sides suspected the other was a ghost. Neither had any experience dealing with the supernatural, so both began acting increasingly strange.
"My stomach hurts so much, can you help me? I lost it somewhere around here." Li Changyin continued using the fake voice.
"What exactly did you lose?" Zhang Jingjiu figured the other person had to be a long-time employee. It never even occurred to him that a tourist might be disguised as a ghost to scare him.
Though fear gnawed at him, the thought that he'd be working in the haunted house for the foreseeable future made him realize he needed to maintain good relations with the veteran staff. So he swallowed his fear and didn't leave.
Hearing Zhang Jingjiu's response, Li Changyin's expression grew even more solemn.
When a normal person encountered a strange pregnant woman inside a haunted house who said her stomach hurt and that she was looking for something, wouldn't their first reaction be to immediately contact the haunted house owner — or just call an ambulance?
Yet this man actually looked like he was genuinely going to help her find whatever she'd lost.
"I lost something very important. It's been with me for nine months, and I was about to meet it soon, but I accidentally lost it." Li Changyin's "crying" grew even more intense.