Although
His arm was seized, his eyes saw nothing, and Chen Ge could only rely on instinct as he lashed out with a vicious kick in the direction of the corridor.
He seemed to have hit something — his shin stung fiercely — but the pain only sharpened his focus.
"
The only one Chen Ge could trust right now was the white cat, but to his bewilderment, the cat perched on his shoulder didn't move a muscle. He could feel the weight on his neck hadn't lessened in the slightest.
His body was being dragged. The two sides wrestled at the stairwell entrance for nearly half a minute before Chen Ge suddenly heard a man's voice from the corridor.
"Are you trying to get yourself killed?! I'm trying to save you! There's a ghost in the corridor!"
With those words, the force pulling at Chen Ge's arm surged again.
Now a choice was laid before him: follow the man's voice into the corridor, or keep heading toward the roof.
Chen Ge made his decision in a fraction of a second. He shouted toward the corridor: "It was people who drove them to their deaths — why should I be afraid of ghosts? If you really want to save me, then let go!"
In this critical moment, Chen Ge was resolute about staying on the staircase. He would rather remain with a ghost whose identity was already known than leave with some stranger who called himself a person.
The force on his arm grew weaker and weaker, and finally a door slammed shut. The man who had tried to drag Chen Ge into his room seemed to have left.
"In such a rush — were you looking for a scapegoat? The last guy who tried to use me as one is still trapped in a painting." Chen Ge slowly rose to his feet. "That door was close — his room must be near the stairwell entrance. When I've got the other employees with me, I'll pay him a visit."
Chen Ge slowly swept his hand along the steps and walls, first re-establishing his position.
"Thanks for that just now," he said toward the banister. His hand was no longer being held, so he wasn't sure whether the boy was still there.
"Da Bao?"
No response. Chen Ge waited in place for a while longer before continuing upstairs.
"The situation is worse than I predicted. I figured this building held two or three fierce ghosts at most, along with some lingering obsessions that refused to dissipate. Looking at it now, I was far too optimistic."
Obsessions could hardly cause any real physical harm, so the man who had grabbed Chen Ge's arm and the little boy were not mere obsessions — they were fierce ghosts.
He had only reached the eleventh floor, and he had already encountered two fierce ghosts. The road ahead would only get harder.
Shuffling forward, Chen Ge had just reached the landing between the eleventh and twelfth floors when he suddenly felt something under his foot — wet and slick.
"A water stain? Not a single light is on at the top of the building — how could there be a water stain in the stairwell in the middle of the night? Burst pipe?"
Chen Ge was certain that what was under his shoe was not blood. Blood clotted quickly, and the artificial blood packs in his haunted house all contained thinning agents.
"This must be water…"
The thought had barely formed in his mind when he felt a faint coolness on his cheek, as though a drop of water had landed on his face.
Before he could reach up to touch his face, a sudden chill seized his ankle — as if something had just slithered past his leg like a snake.