Li Xiu's body froze.
Something seeped into his nerves, isolating his mind from his body. Li Xiu felt as if he had transformed into some kind of animal, like a frog in the bushes or a stray cat that had strayed onto the road, frozen in place and unable to move once caught in the flashlight or car lights. Something bulged in his throat, a scream stuck in his vocal cords, but in reality, Li Xiu couldn't even utter a muffled groan.
His eyes were wide open, and in despair he uncontrollably stared at the "thing" beside him through the mirror.
That is definitely not the face of a living person.
Even a glance makes this clear.
Fortunately, it was not as swollen and nauseous as the ghost that appeared in Li Xiu's nightmare. The dead face belonged to a young boy.
That cold, sinister, and eerie aura seemed somewhat familiar.
Li Xiu stared at the mirror, thinking in confusion.
His mind was in a complete mess. The thing was so close to him that Li Xiu could even smell the odor emanating from it, a cold, mingled scent of earth, dust, and corpses.
Beads of sweat rolled down his temples, and the cheeks of the motionless boy were wet. It was hard to tell whether it was cold sweat from fear or tears.
"Fang…Fang…"
Time seemed to be stretched infinitely.
Li Xiu's pale lips moved in and out, and she almost used up all her strength to squeeze out a sound from her throat.
[Fang Qianan, save me——]
The other boy in the room became Li Xiu's only spiritual support and lifeline.
However, before she could even utter a cry for help, Li Xiu saw that the "it" reflected in the mirror suddenly raised its hand, raised its index finger, and gently touched Li Xiu's lips, making a gesture of silence.
It has no nails on its hands.
Then it stretched out its hand, and its fingers moved down inch by inch, climbing from Li Xiu's arm to his palm.
In extreme fear, Li Xiu vaguely felt a slight chill in his palm, as if something had fallen into his hand.
"Hula…"
At this moment, a strong wind suddenly blew up, and the air flow slammed into the room of the haunted house like an invisible giant. The window screens opened with a bang, and then were blown heavily against the wall by the wind.
"Bang!" The door of the room behind Li Xiu made a loud noise and slammed shut due to the wind.
"Aa ...
Just like waking up from a nightmare, Li Xiu suddenly regained strength.
The moment he finally screamed, the suffocating feeling, like a ghost paralyzing him, suddenly dissipated. Li Xiu flung his hand uncontrollably, throwing the extra object in his palm away. He screamed and fell backward, then fell heavily to the ground.
The object he threw caught the mirror on the dressing table, cracked it, and fell to the ground.
Li Xiu supported himself on the ground with his hands, breathing rapidly and staring blankly at the thing.
It was a very ordinary key.
The key fell not far from Li Xiu, but Li Xiu didn't have the courage to go forward and check.
"Fang, Fang Qianan, did you see it?"
The boy suppressed his tears and trembled as he called out to his companions.
But he did not wait for Fang Qianan's response.
"Fang Qianan?"
Li Xiu turned around and looked behind him.
He saw the salt and glutinous rice that Fang Qianan had scattered everywhere. A mobile phone was placed crookedly on the floor, and it was still playing the mantra of rebirth that he had copied from some website.
However, in the bedroom filled with the mumbling spell, there was no one else except Li Xiu.
"Fang Qianan! Where are you?!"
Li Xiu raised his arm and wiped his face with it. It felt like something was stuck in his throat, and his voice was hoarse when he shouted.
The blood drained from the boy's face, and he stumbled to his feet, his entire body trembling. Li Xiu looked around and pinched his thigh hard. The stinging pain in his flesh made him realize with despair that this time, he wasn't having a nightmare.
For a moment, Li Xiu even wished he was still having a nightmare.
Because Fang Qianan, who was behind him just now, had indeed disappeared.
At this moment, the scenes from the horror movies and novels he had seen before flooded into his mind. The chill continued to seep into Li Xiu's bones, making him weaker and more scared than ever before.
Li Xiu even felt that there seemed to be something behind him watching him.
His hair stood on end and he was sweating profusely, but he didn't dare to look back at the dressing table.
Li Xiu picked up the phone on the ground and turned off the audio.
In an instant, deathly silence enveloped the room.
Li Xiu didn't dare to stay in the bedroom any longer. He grabbed Fang Qianan's cell phone, staggered, and walked out helplessly.
The second floor of the Xiao family villa was still cold and quiet. Every time Li Xiu took a step, she could hear the creaking sound of her weight on the old floor.
"Prosperous, strong, democratic, civilized and harmonious..." Li Xiu, with a pale face, tried very hard to calm himself down.
"Fang Qianan, where are you?"
After reciting the core socialist values, Li Xiu adjusted his center of gravity so that he could stand more steadily. Then, he mustered up his courage and shouted loudly on the second floor.
"Bang, bang, bang—"
Suddenly, there was a fierce knock on the door.
"A Xiu! Save me! A Xiu ah ah ah ah wu wu wu wu——save me——I'm here! I'm here, let me out! Let me out ah ah ah ah——A Xiu——"
Immediately afterwards, Fang Qianan's tragic cry for help came from the deepest part of the second-floor corridor.
"Fang Qianan?!"
Li Xiu took a deep breath and limped towards the direction of the sound. Fang Qianan's voice came from a room at the end of the corridor. As he got closer, Li Xiu could almost hear Fang Qianan's crying voice.
"Let me out! Ah Xiu! Let me out, wuwuwu..."
Li Xiu didn't know why Fang Qianan was in this room. Without thinking, he put his hand on the doorknob, but no matter how he twisted it, the door didn't move.
"Fang Qianan, the door is locked! Wait, I'm right outside, I'll let you out!"
The door of this room was locked.
So, how did Fang Qianan get in?
Li Xiu had no time to think about all this, because just as he was standing at the door of the room looking at it helplessly, Fang Qianan's cries from inside the door became more and more shrill and sharp.
Li Xiu didn't dare to think about what Fang Qianan had experienced in the room.
He tried to bang his shoulder against the door, but half his body was numb and the door was still locked tightly.
"Ah Xiu…Ah Xiu ah ah ah ah…"
Fang Qianan's voice has changed.
"Fang Qianan! Wait! Wait for me!"
Li Xiu was breathing heavily, and amid Fang Qianan's wailing, he couldn't help but cry out.
A terrible intuition hit him. If he couldn't open the door in time, Fang Qianan...
Fang Qianan might have died here.
However, with his physique, it was impossible for him to use brute force to break open the door. The door was locked too tightly, and he would have to find the key to open it.
Wait, keys?
Li Xiu suddenly remembered what the "boy" with a pale face had placed in her palm.
The key he threw on the ground!
"Fang Qianan, hold on a little longer. I'll go find the key and come to rescue you right away—"
Li Xiu swore he had never run so fast before, even though his right foot hurt like crazy and he seemed to have fallen several times on the way back, he didn't remember much. He was so scared that he was almost going crazy.
His chest ached and he was wheezing.
Li Xiu felt very scared before returning to his room. He was worried that the key on the ground would be gone when he returned, just like the ghost he saw in the mirror.
Thank God, the seemingly ordinary key was still on the ground until he returned.
Li Xiu grabbed the key and rushed back to the room at the end of the corridor.
When inserting the key into the keyhole, Li Xiu's hand slipped several times because of blurry vision and shaking hands.
At this moment, Fang Qianan's wailing suddenly stopped. A breath of death suddenly enveloped him.
"Fang Qianan! What's wrong with you?! Don't scare me! Answer me!"
Li Xiu's face was pale and he sobbed.
"Crack—"
Finally, the key was aligned with the lock, and there was a dry sound when the lock was opened.
The door was finally opened.
…
The room was dark.
It was a very cramped room, its only windows two narrow transoms high in the wall. Light was scarce, and the air was thick with a musty, damp smell. Several graffiti, drawn on scraps of paper torn from the text, were plastered on the walls. Most of the drawings depicted a child holding hands with a woman. Compared to typical children's drawings, the colors used were minimal, just red and black, as if the artist had only these two colors of paint.
In the corner of the painting, you can see very childish large characters.
"Mom and me."
The edges of the drawing paper were already stained with mold.
A children's mattress was crammed into a corner of the room with difficulty, and messy quilt covers were piled up together. Perhaps no one had touched them since the tragedy more than ten years ago. Now, clumps of black mold had grown on the outdated cartoon prints.
Behind the mattress was a chamber pot - if Li Xiu had not grown up in a poor urban village, even she probably wouldn't have known what it was.
After placing these things, there was almost no place to stand in the entire room.
Fang Qianan's huge body curled up into a ball. He squatted in the corner of the mattress with his back to the door, his hands on his head, and muttered incoherently.
"Wuwuwu… Wuwuwu… It's so dark in here… I'm so scared… Let me out, please let me out…"
Li Xiu heard Fang Qianan's frightened cry.
"Fang Qianan, it's okay."
Without thinking too much, Li Xiu rushed into the room and hugged Fang Qianan.
"Let's go, let's leave this damn place right away. Everything will be fine once we get out. Fang Qianan, calm down! I can't hold you..."
Li Xiu hugged Fang Qianan, and her hands couldn't even wrap around the big guy's shoulders.
Even under normal circumstances, the young man, who was naturally much thinner than others, would not be able to drag a big guy like Fang Qianan, not to mention that at this time, Li Xiu himself was so scared that he was exhausted and had no strength at all.
However, the incomprehensible coldness and horror in the haunted house are so clear.
Li Xiu could almost feel that the invisible and extremely twisted thing was approaching him little by little.
Not to mention Fang Qianan, even Li Xiu himself was now unconsciously crying as he shouted.
"Let's go quickly, Fang Qianan, let's go quickly..."
Just when Li Xiu fell into despair, heavy footsteps suddenly sounded, and an angry voice suddenly came from outside the door.
"A Xiu? Fuck, where the hell have you been? Do you know I'm going crazy looking for you?"
Li Xiu suddenly turned around and looked at the tall figure approaching outside the door.
Fang Qianan didn't have any of the arrogance and rebelliousness of the former school bully.
The 1.9-meter-tall man now looked pale and his lips were white. He was breathing heavily, as if he had just gone through an intense exercise.
At this moment, he was standing in the corridor panting. It was not until this time that Fang Qianan seemed to suddenly realize that something was wrong.
"Wait, wait a minute, Xiu, who were you talking to just now?"
Li Xiu's pupils in the room suddenly constricted.
"laugh..."
"Fang Qianan", who was held tightly in his arms, nestled in his chest and let out a long, satisfied chuckle.
In extreme fear, Li Xiu lowered his head little by little.
He saw the face again, the bloodshot, deep red eyes, the dead man's cheeks stiffly pulled apart, his lips lifted.
It gazed at Li Xiu greedily and contentedly, and its hands, whose knuckles had already been exposed, gently held the boy's cheeks.
"So obedient."
Li Xiu heard the creature whisper softly. Its dry lips touched his forehead, leaving a kiss that smelled of rotting flesh and blood.
"I like Ah Xiu the most. My Ah Xiu is so good..."
In a trance, Li Xiu seemed to hear the roar from Fang Qianan. Who was he asking to let him go?
It was as if someone had rushed into the room, trying to tear him away from the monster's slimy, cold embrace.
But for Li Xiu, all this has become vague, chaotic and distant.
The exhausted boy's body completely collapsed, and everything in front of him twisted and turned into a wriggling, expanding mass of black smoke.
The black smoke enveloped his entire consciousness.
Li Xiu fainted.
The author has something to say:
Brother Gui: Big brother can't speak, but big brother loves you.