Chapter Nineteen: The Courage Brought by Miss Rabbit
Zhao Mingyue watched as Lu Liangting went inside, and when she heard Bai Yu’s words, she snapped back to reality, though her eyes were filled with confusion.
“Is there any danger?”
“Of course there’s danger! Whether this guy can come out, I’m not sure. Anyway, regardless of whether he succeeds or fails, the task is nearly over. Let’s figure out how to deal with the aftermath,” Bai Yu squinted her eyes, peering through the door where the female ghost was standing ominously behind.
Poor Lu Liangting had been chosen by that female ghost and dragged into her memories. Now, there were only two possible outcomes: either Lu Liangting would resolve the ghost’s grievances within her memories, or he’d end up as a corpse in this very room.
“So, what do we do now?” Zhao Mingyue asked.
“We go inside. We definitely can’t stay out here; it’s safer in there,” Bai Yu declared, tapping the rusty keyhole. After Lu Liangting had entered the room, the key had mysteriously snapped in two.
Bai Yu gently twirled the bl**d thread around the key, and with a satisfying click, the door swung open.
In an instant, Bai Yu threw a punch straight through the door, sending the female ghost flying.
The ghost crashed into a couch in the room, dark smoke mingling with countless tiny bl**d threads diffusing through the air before she vanished completely.
You had to hand it to this ghost; she had some bite. If it came down to one-on-one combat, taking her down would come with a price.
Bai Yu stepped into the room, and Zhao Mingyue followed closely behind.
At that moment, Lu Liangting toppled over at the threshold, but Bai Yu ignored him completely. Zhao Mingyue checked his breathing and confirmed he was still alive, letting out a sigh of relief.
“This place feels… different from what I imagined,” Zhao Mingyue said as she got up, glancing around the room’s layout.
The place was immaculately clean. If it weren’t for the red tint cast by the filters, she might have thought someone still lived here. The room sparkled, with furniture neatly arranged and a peculiar carpet laid over the wooden floor.
The curtains were tightly drawn, and on the coffee table in front of the TV, two plates of snacks and some sunflower seeds were laid out. Even the paintings on the walls had been scrubbed spotless.
The furniture style was a bit outdated, reminiscent of the ’80s and ’90s.
Normally, such a well-kept household would give off a warm feeling, but instead, it sent chills down Zhao Mingyue’s spine.
Even without knowing the house’s dark past, the mere presence of a paper-burning basin in the living room was eerie enough to raise the hair on her arms.
Yes, a paper-burning basin — identical to those found at a spirit hall.
With the already ghostly atmosphere, placing such morbid items right in the living space made it all the more clear: this place was less about cozy vibes and more about creeping horror.
Not a trace of life graced the environment.
The air carried a peculiar scent — a mix of mild mildew and burnt things, with a hint of something indescribably off — a first instinctive reaction was to think of “decay.”
Downstairs, in that man’s room, everything had erupted into chaos. The place looked as if a fire had ravaged it, with charred furniture strewn about and eerie black silhouettes left behind where bodies had been burnt.
And yet, even in such a hellish setting, Zhao Mingyue had charged boldly into the man’s bedroom, rummaging through the almost ash-like furniture to find the key to room 506.
But in this neatly arranged, immaculate space, she was suddenly overwhelmed with apprehension.
A sense of unease washed over her as if something unseen was watching her every move.
After everything she had been through last night, Zhao Mingyue thought her courage would have grown a bit. Yet, stepping into this room, her fears seemed to magnify, and she couldn’t quite articulate just what it was that frightened her.
Especially recalling Bai Yu’s words before their mission began.
When she had discovered the bl**d in the walls, Bai Yu had said it might belong to that very female ghost, who now probably resided in a container in the room on the fifth floor.
Perhaps she feared the ghost that had morphed into something unrecognizable floating in that container, or perhaps she feared the person who had locked her away and had the audacity to use the ghost’s putrid remains to paint the walls.
“Bai Yu…” Zhao Mingyue murmured softly.
Bai Yu was inspecting the paper-burning basin on the floor when she heard Zhao Mingyue and turned to glance at her, “What’s up?”
“I… I’m a little scared.”
“Fear is a normal reaction. The owner of this house is far more menacing than those ghosts etched into the walls or that guy on the fourth floor. But if you’re really that scared, just wait here for me; don’t go into any other rooms.”
Bai Yu’s words melted Zhao Mingyue’s apprehension a bit. It was bizarre, finding solace in an evil ghost, but her instincts weren’t leading her astray this time.
At that moment, Zhao Mingyue instinctively reached for Bai Yu’s hand, but hesitated for just a heartbeat. In that split second, she changed her mind, diving into her backpack to pull out that bloodstained rabbit plush toy, clutching it tightly to her chest.
As if Miss Rabbit herself would suddenly lend her an extraordinary courage.
“I think I’ll stick with you,” Zhao Mingyue said, forcing a smile that felt more like a grimace while her tone remained resolute.
Bai Yu gave Zhao Mingyue a lingering look, pausing for a moment on the plushie in her arms.
“Alright.”
Instead of letting Zhao Mingyue lead the way, Bai Yu took the initiative and stepped into the bathroom first, sensing that the female ghost’s corpse was right there.
As she swung the door open, a ghastly odor assailed her, starkly contrasting the cleanliness outside; the bathroom was a sight that could barely be described as disastrous.
White tiles tinged with red, the floor, walls, and ceiling were decorated with black handprints and drag marks.
“Here…” Zhao Mingyue stepped into the bathroom with her plushie in hand and immediately spotted the grotesque remains of the female corpse in the bathtub.
The corpse’s limbs, along with its head, were bound with chains and hung in the air, the other end of the chains connected to the ceiling. The bathtub was filled with a thick, red-black sludge meant to conceal the body, leaving only the grotesque sight of the dangling limbs and head visible; the rest of the body was buried beneath the disgusting mire.
The sight made Zhao Mingyue feel a wave of nausea wash over her. Suddenly, she recognized what that red-black muck beneath the layer of white plaster in the hallway was.
In the room, a third figure began to materialize.
Zhao Mingyue was still oblivious to the ghost’s emergence, her mind was racing with a pressing question.
“Weren’t they supposed to say the female ghost was burned together with her children? If the mother is here, then where are those two kids?”
