## Chapter 11: The Game Begins
Zhao Mingyue was hunched over the dining table, slurping up a bowl of egg noodles she had just made, her cheeks puffing up like a chipmunk. Every now and then, she couldn’t help but sneak a glance at Bai Yu, who was standing in front of the TV, looking mighty intriguing.
Once she had devoured a few big helpings, Zhao Mingyue could no longer hold back. “Um, is there something wrong with this staff? It feels like you’ve been staring at it forever. If it’s not good enough, I can search for other weapons, you know?”
The moment she pulled out the staff, Bai Yu’s eyes practically sparkled with interest. And, truth be told, it was hard to look away—especially with Zhao Mingyue’s voice reaching him. He shook his head, “No, no need to swap it out; this staff is completely sufficient.”
This thing was a full meter long, solid as a rock, and weighed a jaw-dropping seven or eight pounds. It could double as a hammer! Sure, it might not smash a ghost, but if it connected with a person, they might just find themselves with a new profile picture featuring crutches.
“I’m just curious—how did you even get this?”
If Zhao Mingyue pulled out a hammer, Bai Yu wouldn’t bat an eye; it was this staff that took the cake.
The cuteness of its design was equaled only by its lethality. It was hard to argue it really wasn’t suitable for a little girl. Zhao Mingyue couldn’t help but daydream: her wielding the “staff” while facing off against a gang of cross-dressing weirdos—one swing and down they go!
Feeling a bit embarrassed, Zhao Mingyue stepped over to grasp the staff tightly. “I bought this at a comic convention ages ago! I didn’t expect it to be so heavy. I usually use it for hammering nails. And you mentioned needing weapons, right? I think this can count as one!”
“It’s a weapon because tonight there are not just ghosts coming. I can’t protect you all the time, so you need something for self-defense,” Bai Yu’s gaze settled back on Zhao Mingyue.
It was certain—a certain “cousin” of Lu Liangting’s wouldn’t be the only guest tonight. There would definitely be more game participants joining in, some maybe there to protect Lu Liangting, and others possibly aiming to eliminate Zhao Mingyue. Whatever their purpose, they were all enemies.
“Wait, not just ghosts? Are there other people, like Lu Liangting and his crew?”
“Yep, other people, and let me tell you, they’re a bunch of absolute lunatics. Compared to them, ghosts are a walk in the park.”
As Bai Yu finished his sentence, Zhao Mingyue remembered the chilling gaze of Lu Liangting’s cousin, Xia Han. Just thinking about it sent a shiver down her spine.
“What are we going to do?”
“Just be careful. Remember, tonight, whoever approaches you with intent, pull away and counterattack.”
“Got it!” Zhao Mingyue nodded vigorously; her nerves were already frayed, and Bai Yu’s words only cranked up the tension.
“Trust no one; the only one you can trust is yourself.”
With a final word of warning, Bai Yu wouldn’t have given her this much advice had it not been her first mission. He stepped into Zhao Mingyue’s shadow, and the room fell silent again.
It was now ten past nine. Seeing Bai Yu ignore her, Zhao Mingyue tidied up the dining table before retreating to her bedroom, booting up her computer to scour for every piece of info about the Tomorrow Apartment.
She had searched before but found nothing useful. This time, however, when she swapped “Sunny Apartment” for “Tomorrow Apartment,” a flood of ancient forum posts popped up—things weren’t looking good. Topics ranged from a fire years ago to users recounting their spine-chilling experiences there.
Like the one where a guy claimed he saw someone jump from the fifth floor at midnight, only to mysteriously disappear after he called the cops.
Or the tale of a midnight fire that abruptly morphed into a woman staring at him from the fifth floor when he blinked.
Another poster mentioned strolling by at night, suddenly feeling a cold wind, only to turn around and find a dozen people on the fifth floor staring at him. The visuals were uncanny.
One user recounted spending a single night there, waking up to the sound of footsteps. Initially brushed off, but the noise only grew louder and continuous.
When he opened the door to see who was stomping around, he spotted an old man with no head walking backwards up and down the stairs. The headless old man noticed him and zoomed down almost like a horror movie villain.
The user, terrified, quickly slammed the door, only to hear knocking that continued the whole night until dawn. He was so spooked he bolted the next day.
With each story, Zhao Mingyue’s anxiety deepened. If she had known these details before considering renting, not even at half-price would she touch this place—too chilling. It felt like ever since the incidents, this place had turned into some kind of forbidden area, leaving netizens hesitant to even mention it.
Imagining herself interacting with these ghosts tonight made Zhao Mingyue’s expression sour.
She was just your average high school girl; how did she find herself unlocking another world during a short holiday break?
“Don’t be scared! I have help; it’ll be fine!”
Cheerleading herself mentally, she considered herself lucky to be on the fourth floor. So far, she hadn’t encountered any bizarre happenings, though she had to admit she often did hear the sound of footsteps going up and down the stairs…
Shutting down her computer, Zhao Mingyue pulled aside the curtains and stood by the window, watching as a car rolled up and stopped downstairs.
“Lu Liangting?”
Why would he take a cab to the Tomorrow Apartment at this hour?
“I wonder what brings him to this eerie place? Is he trying to find someone too?”
The sky was completely dark now, and there was just over an hour left until the mission started.
“The task is for me to survive in the Tomorrow Apartment until dawn. I wonder what would happen if I just stayed indoors? I’d technically still be in the apartment, right? But I guess that’d give me a low completion rate, like in a game.”
Zhao Mingyue’s mind raced with details about the task.
“To complete the mission at a high rate, those ‘sub-tasks’ must be key. But how do I fulfill them? It never mentioned specific objectives. Is it just about experiencing things?”
“Wait, do I have to take down these ghosts? Or fulfill some wishes?”
“Forget it! Enough thinking! There’s always a way out. As long as I don’t stay home, I’ll be fine!”
“Wait, that’s not right. I’ve taken on this task, and staying indoors won’t be safe either. Better to go outside than let these ghosts burst into my room. Yep, definitely better to go out!”
After weighing her options, Zhao Mingyue decided to delay for a bit, eavesdrop on the sounds outside, and see what Lu Liangting and his crew were up to. No rush to go out until midnight.
Just as she settled on this plan, the lights in her room suddenly went out. The whole place, including the hallway outside, got swallowed up by darkness.
“Not again! Power outage?”
