Chapter 14: No Going Upstairs!
11:45 PM.
Zhao Mingyue stood at the corner of the stairs between the fourth and fifth floors, leaning against the fifth floor wall with her eyes tightly shut. She knew that once she stepped over those thirteen stairs, she’d be entering a different world.
“Don’t be scared, just go up. No matter what sounds you hear, keep your eyes closed.”
Two slender arms appeared from her side, embracing her gently. Zhao Mingyue cracked her eyelids open a tiny bit and caught a glimpse of Bai Yu’s profile. She thought, “I must be out of my mind playing this game in the dead of night with a ghost hugging me from behind!”
She closed her eyes again, trying to ignore the icy chill running down her neck—strangely enough, that made her feel a bit steadier. After all, the ghost behind her was one she was familiar with, not some strange entity.
Covering Zhao Mingyue’s eyes with her hands, Bai Yu guided her backward onto the first stair, and suddenly everything around them changed.
The creepy, mottled walls began to be replaced with black burn marks, and the air filled with a nauseating, charred smell. It was as if her vision was shrouded in red fabric, casting everything in a bl**d-red filter. With that influence, the blackened walls twisted in a nightmarish way, leaving one utterly confused about whether it was burn marks or splattered bl**d.
As Zhao Mingyue retreated to her fifth step, grayish-black wisps of something started swirling in the air, and countless bl**d threads wormed their way out from the cracked walls, resembling maggots clinging onto the walls and stair railings.
Bai Yu heard the crackling of flames and also the frantic sound of nails scratching at a door from some room on the fifth floor. It sounded urgent, as if something terrifying were on the other side.
It was reminiscent of the day of the fire—when the room was ablaze and the door wouldn’t budge, only desperate pounding and clawing at the wooden door, watching helplessly as the flames closed in.
Bai Yu’s eyes sparkled with excitement; she hadn’t felt this thrill in ages.
Her little hands kept Zhao Mingyue’s eyes shielded, which some might call “ghostly eye-covering,” but in reality, she was protecting Zhao Mingyue—making sure she didn’t catch a glimpse of that bl**d-red world. God knows her little heart might not withstand it.
The fourth and fifth floors were two entirely different realms, especially when one was stepping backward onto the thirteenth step.
There could be no interruptions during this backward journey; the midnight hour was vastly different from the daytime.
Bai Yu suspected something foul would come to interfere.
On the sixth step, then the seventh, and as Zhao Mingyue took her eighth step, a loud “bang!” sounded from a room on the fourth floor, as a door was kicked open from the inside, accompanied by rapid footsteps barreling towards the stairs. The most obvious sign was a wave of foul smell that approached at high speed.
“Drip.”
bl**d splattered onto the ground from a man whose face was unrecognizable. He stood at the stair corner, and if it weren’t for the bl**d dripping from his clothing and the rancid stench, one might mistake him for a tenant.
The man wore a heavy black cotton nightgown, had no hair, and his face was horrifically scarred from the fire.
He seized the stair railing, swiftly ascending, and upon reaching the corner, he looked up to see Zhao Mingyue, who was walking backward up the stairs, along with the white-dressed girl embracing her.
“Nobody is allowed upstairs!” the man croaked, gravelly and unpleasant.
With a few mighty strides, he lunged upwards, his dark hand nearly grasping Zhao Mingyue’s wrist.
“Get lost!” Bai Yu suddenly opened her eyes wide, and from the bl**d threads behind her, a spiked chain shot out, the force of it sending the man crashing down the stairs.
With a fierce shout, the man vanished into the hallway, and the foul odor retreated quickly.
“No going upstairs!”
Unaware of what had happened outside, Zhao Mingyue quivered, her pace quickening as she climbed.
Every floor had twelve steps, and she had previously noted that while wandering up. Except for the fifth floor, which had a thirteenth step.
As she landed the final step, Zhao Mingyue felt an even greater chill, as if her body was submerged in ice water. Having had the experience before, she dared not touch the railings—she dreaded coming into contact with something slippery and gross.
“Can I open my eyes now?”
“Go ahead.” Bai Yu released her hands, and as Zhao Mingyue fluttered her eyelids open, she was greeted by a world that looked like it was drenched in a bl**d-red tint.
The layout of the fifth floor was similar to the fourth, but the oppressive atmosphere was in a whole different league.
Feeling a sense of panic, Zhao Mingyue pulled out her phone. To her surprise, it felt like only five minutes had passed, yet the time read twelve-oh-three.
“Don’t just stand there, go find the room and retrieve that woman’s corpse.”
“Room?”
Reminded, Zhao Mingyue recalled something. Her dark phone had a sub-task titled “Room 506.”
From downstairs, she learned that the bl**d staining the walls came from a corpse; this bl**d was likely linked to the task’s completion. Finding the corpse would surely raise that percentage.
Bai Yu had said the corpse was in a certain room, so Room 506 was probably the one she needed to find.
But just as she took a step out, lightning struck outside, illuminating the dark hallway for a brief moment. In that flash of light, she saw a figure standing on the fourth floor.
Gaining courage, Zhao Mingyue leaned over the handrail to take a peek. A wrinkled, age-spotted hand suddenly appeared on the cold railing, and from the posture, it was clear that the hand’s owner was going downstairs, but the person was moving slowly upward!
“Someone walking backward…”
Remembering a post she’d read online, Zhao Mingyue turned on her heel and tried to lighten her step.
The way back was blocked, leaving her no choice but to seek Room 506.
Zhao Mingyue moved quickly, noticing that in the hallway, each door had a small incense burner at the entrance, with some burnt incense sticks inside.
Rooms 501 through 504 all had them, except Rooms 505 and 506.
“506.”
“Right inside.” Bai Yu appeared beside Zhao Mingyue, as she sensed something—there was definitely something in that room.
“But the door is locked! Bai Yu, can you get in?”
Zhao Mingyue gripped the iron gate door, shaking it with all her might, but alas, it wouldn’t budge.
The chill intensified, and the footsteps grew nearer.
“I need to find a key! Should I go downstairs to find the landlord?”
“No, just head to the fourth floor. The key for this door should be in one of the rooms up there; it’s unlocked.”
Upon hearing Bai Yu’s words, Zhao Mingyue had another realization.
“The husband’s room!”
The woman had been locked in here by her husband before being burned to d*ath. He wouldn’t let anyone upstairs, always bringing her meals himself.
And that raspy voice she’d encountered earlier while climbing must have belonged to the husband who died in the fire.
