My House of Horrors

Chen Ge lifted up the hood, which was hiding a ruined face. “Who is your chairperson?”

“It’s not me.” The black robe’s face was filled with a smile. “Have fun guessing. You’ll definitely see him before you die.”

Then, blood vessels crawled out of the man’s lips. The blood seemed to have a life of its own. Veins popped up on the man’s skin; he seemed to be experiencing some kind of extremely painful torture. His lips fell open, and his throat and mouth were filled with blood vessels.

The blood in his body seems to be consuming him. Chen Ge gripped the hammer and wanted to give him a whack but was stopped by the woman beside him. After the blood crawled out from his mouth, it wrapped the man up fully, and only his general shape remained.

“The chairperson is just next to you. He has been watching you and is the most interesting person among all the people you’ve met.” The black robe croaked. Chen Ge and the woman watched as the black robe was slowly consumed from within. He gradually become a pool of blood and seeped into the blood-soaked ground.

“What are those blood vessels?”

“You can understand them as part of a Red Specter.” The woman picked up the black robe and seemed to discover something interesting within. “Take the children and leave. If you stay too long inside the door, you’ll be trapped here forever.”

The woman held the black robe and disappeared amid the blood fog. Chen Ge looked in the direction she had disappeared, and his heart was filled with confusion. “What was inside that black robe? How come I heard traces of joy in her voice?”

Chen Ge found the white cat on the rooftop of the ancestral hall. It still did not understand what had happened. It held the vial in its lips, and its white fur was standing on end. Obviously, it was spooked.

“Come down here, it’s safe now.” The white cat eventually jumped down from the beam. When Chen Ge caught it, he realized that the cat had gotten heavier.

“Why do you have to eat everything?” Chen Ge pried the cat’s mouth open to take a look, but he could not see anything off about it.

“That thing was prepared by the ghost stories society. Is it harmful to a cat if consumed?” This was the first time Chen Ge had come across such a problem. Realizing there was nothing wrong with the white cat, he placed it inside his backpack and led the two children to the bedroom where the woman had once stayed.

“The blood door is her room door, so for her, every time this door is opened, it’s the return of her nightmare.” The blood door was closed. Chen Ge tried pushing it several times, but it would not budge.

“Let me. Jiang Ling has taught me how to open the door.” When Fan Yu pressed against the door, the bangle gifted by the woman started to bleed, and the blood covered his palm. Slowly but surely, the door was being pushed open.

After they left the blood door, Chen Ge took out his black phone to take a look. He had been waiting for the message on his phone. The black robe was most likely Patient 9 from the Third Sick Hall—Wu Fei!

However, the black phone did not update after the man’s death. Whenever one of the patients from Third Sick Hall was killed, the mission completion rate would increase, and after gaining a ninety percent completion rate, he would receive the hidden item for this three-star scenario!

When Xiong Qing was captured and the Devil was killed, the black phone updated, but this time, there was no update after Wu Fei’s death.

What’s wrong? Chen Ge thought back to the events with the black robe and felt like he had overlooked something important.

The black robe has been tailing us and only made his move after he made sure Zhang Ya was asleep. When he saw me, the second sentence out of his mouth was uttered in the voice of the investigator. Chen Ge frowned. There was not anything particularly suspicious about the black robe. Is he still alive? The blood vessels carried his soul and escaped? Or did he hide his real consciousness somewhere else, like how it was with that dead investigator?

Chen Ge thought back to the woman’s reaction when she picked up the black robe and realized the key might have been that robe.

“This is such a waste.” Zhang Ya was asleep, and he had no power to demand the robe from that woman. “The one who pushed open the door seemed to be more powerful than a normal Red Specter inside the door.”

Chen Ge gave it some thought after leaving the old home. He decided not to return to the well but find a place to hide until dawn. Chen Ge led the two children to the middle of the village. He crawled through the secret tunnel to reach the two-story building.

“Granny, are you asleep?” Chen Ge carried the two children into the room, and when he went upstairs, the old lady was not in the small room.

“Where is she?” Chen Ge put down Jiang Ling and grabbed the hammer. “The old lady’s legs are seriously atrophied, so she couldn’t move on her own. Someone got here before me?”

All the furniture in the room looked tidy and untouched. If the old lady had been forcefully taken away, the place would not have been so clean. Chen Ge tapped Fan Yu’s shoulder. “Can you see anyone inside this room?”

“No.” Fan Yu shook his head.

“Then where can she disappear to?”

A baby’s crying filled up the room. The place was not big. Chen Ge ransacked the place, but he could not find the old woman.

“This is weird.” Chen Ge placed the unconscious Jiang Ling on the bed. He sat on the ground. He was about to take a breather when a gunshot was heard from the western end of the village!

“A gunshot‽ Is that Ol’ Wei?” Chen Ge climbed up from the ground. “They’ve returned? Or have some accidents befallen them? Or has backup arrived?”

There was only one gunshot before the world became quiet again. Chen Ge was worried about Master Bai and Ol’ Wei’s safety, so he led Fan Yu and Jiang Ling out of the house and headed for the western part of the village. By then, the sun was coming up.

When Chen Ge arrived at the western part of the village, No. 10 had left. Xiong Qing and the ghost baby had disappeared. Only the fainted villagers remained.

“What happened here after I left?” Chen Ge grabbed a villager to ask, but the man was too traumatized to say anything other than the repeating, “It split. It split.”

Chen Ge was not sure whether that was local slang or something really did split. He looked around and saw the Zhu woman collapsed next to the well. Her hair was a mess, and she looked horrible.

“Can you hear me?” Due to his work, Chen Ge was very good at treating fainting spells. With his aid, the woman slowly awakened.

“Don’t worry, the black robe has already left.” Chen Ge held the weakened woman in his arms. “Can you tell me what happened here? Where is the black robe carrying the wooden box?”