"Is there a problem?" Chen Ge placed two hundred yuan on the ticket counter.
The ticket clerk was stunned for a moment before quickly replying: "No, it's just that this name feels a bit familiar. It's a lot like a friend of mine."
"Is that so?" Chen Ge gave a faint smile and didn't think much of it.
The staff member's hands visibly sped up, finishing all the paperwork in just a few seconds.
The tickets for Nightmare Academy were quite interesting — they were admission notices, with Chen Ge's name already printed on them.
"Please keep your ID and admission notice with you. Head to the waiting area and queue up. Once there are five visitors, you can enter." After finishing Chen Ge's paperwork, the staff member seemed to feel unwell, clutching her stomach as she walked away.
Chen Ge picked up his bag and strolled over behind the other two visitors, looking perfectly relaxed, as though he had returned to his own home.
"Hey, buddy, here alone?" The couple queuing at the front held hands tightly, both looking rather nervous.
"Yeah, had some free time, so I figured I'd come check it out."
"You've got some guts, coming to a place like this solo. This place is seriously terrifying. Just now I was telling my girlfriend that if there aren't enough people going in together, we're just going to bail." The man was a little over 1.7 meters tall, dressed entirely in black, wearing wide-framed glasses. He seemed like a decent enough guy.
"If you bail, wouldn't the ticket money just go to waste?" Chen Ge couldn't quite understand.
"That's still better than getting scared to tears and running out on your own!" The man thought Chen Ge's train of thought was rather unusual. "A coworker of mine played this haunted house before. It's insanely scary. When we go in later, the group needs to stick together."
"Sure." Chen Ge ran a haunted house himself, so he certainly wasn't going to underestimate the competition. Nightmare Academy had grown this big — they definitely had some serious tricks up their sleeve.
The man seemed to have very little courage, constantly recounting to his girlfriend just how terrifying this haunted house was. His girlfriend played along perfectly, and just from listening to his stories alone, her face had already gone pale.
After waiting about another minute, a woman in her twenties and three students walked in through the entrance.
They didn't know each other. The three students chattered away endlessly, looking incredibly excited. One of them seemed to have played this haunted house before, though he had been scared halfway through and quit.
The newly arrived female visitor was dressed very ordinarily, with no distinguishing features — the type who would be completely unrecognizable in a crowd. She didn't talk much, standing alone in a corner.
"The count is sufficient. All visitors, follow me." The staff member who had left with a stomachache emerged from the employee corridor, carrying a tattered red schoolbag and several blue storage boxes. "Once inside the haunted house, please refrain from using your mobile phones. We will provide you with illumination tools. Do not chase or roughhouse, and do not touch the actors. The actors, of course, will not touch you either."
The staff member went through the rules visitors needed to follow inside the haunted house, then reached into the schoolbag and pulled out a small flashlight. "Now please line up and come to me to collect your illumination tools."
When the couple at the front walked over, the staff member handed them their flashlights right away. But when Chen Ge stepped forward, the staff member reached out to stop him. "Sir, would you mind leaving your backpack with us temporarily? We'll return it to you in its original condition after the tour."
Chen Ge shook his head. His backpack alone contained four red-robed ghosts. Hand it over to someone else? If something went wrong, the entire building would probably go down with it.
"I'm sorry, but we're just following regulations. We'd appreciate your cooperation." The staff member's attitude was firm.
"You're worried I might have prohibited items in my bag, right? That's fine — I can open it up and show you." Compared to the Nightmare Academy staff, Chen Ge was far more reasonable.
He opened his backpack in front of everyone. "I've read your guidelines. No flammables or explosives, no blades, no recording equipment. None of the things you mentioned are in my bag."