"After the child woke up, the door vanished. He couldn't see me, but it seemed like he knew someone else was in the room. He said 'Dad' in a very quiet voice."
"Can you describe in more detail what the door that appeared beside the child's bed looked like? How was it different from the door you yourself pushed open?"
"It felt very unreal — like it could dissipate at any moment. The blood threads on the door were faint, all concentrated in one spot, as if they'd been stitched together." It was the first time Men Nan had seen a door like that too. "It's hard to put into words. I'd recommend you go see it yourself."
"That residential compound has a password lock at the stairwell entrance, and there are surveillance cameras all over the courtyard. If I go there carrying my backpack, I'll definitely be spotted. Acting rashly will only alert them."
After observing the area, Chen Ge had realized that those upscale residential compounds had their security measures well covered. There was no way he could sneak into that child's home unnoticed.
"Let's change the plan." Chen Ge glanced at his phone. He'd left the third ward at twelve fifty in the morning — it was already one thirty now.
"You want to force your way in?"
"No need. We'll come back tomorrow when Jiang Ming is at work." Chen Ge stood up and walked over to a nearby late-night food stall, ordering a few things to eat. "Want some?"
"No, I'm good. Just call me when you come tomorrow. I'm quite interested in that child."
Men Nan retreated back into the manga sketchbook. After eating his fill, Chen Ge hailed a taxi and headed toward Jiangyuan Residential Compound.
His original plan had been to go to the Living
"Some other time, then. I should be qualified to learn more now anyway."
Past two in the morning, Chen Ge arrived at Jiangyuan Residential Compound, his heavy backpack in tow as he entered the stairwell.
Same place, same person returning — but his mood was completely different.
He hadn't forgotten a single thing that had happened during the previous nightmare mission. This time, he deliberately walked toward those dark, creepy little corners.
But perhaps because the Red-clothed ghost inside the building had put in a good word ahead of time, nothing popped out to scare him.
"I remember it was on this floor last time — someone was desperately trying to drag me inside." Chen Ge took the Skull Crusher from his backpack, and in a very polite manner, knocked on the door of that apartment at two thirty in the morning.
He waited outside for a long time, but no one answered. Just as he stood there staring at the lock with the Skull Crusher in hand, half-tempted to go to work on it, a child's laughter echoed through the stairwell.
"The people who lived here moved out the night you came." A boy of seven or eight was crouching on the stair railing, drenched in blood-red clothes from which crimson water streamed down ceaselessly. His eyes were swollen, the orbs nothing but white. "I'm a water ghost — killed in the water, I wandered for a long time before I found that door. Becoming a Red-clothed was a stroke of luck." The boy hopped down from the railing. Long-haired, with eyes full of nothing but white, he stared straight at Chen Ge. "Our deal was this — at two in the morning three days later, you'd bring the real Door Pusher. It hasn't been three days yet, so why are you here early?"