Every time the nurse passed by the single ward where the young student was staying, she couldn't help but take a second look.
Although most people who work in hospitals have experienced many ups and downs, this time things were indeed a bit strange and unusual.
A layer of white glutinous rice was artificially sprinkled on the door of the single ward.
The two men came quietly every night this week, brought a small stool, and stood on either side of the door like door gods, and then left quietly at dawn.
The nurse who took care of Li Xiu also knew that there were actually several talismans stuck under the boy's bed.
This situation inevitably made the nurses a little nervous, but on the night Li Xiu was brought in, they were told to ignore everything and not to ask too many questions, and not to tell Li Xiu about these strange things so as not to scare the child.
"Of course, this is also for your safety. Don't ask too many questions and don't delve too deeply into it, so you won't get into any trouble..."
The nurses shuddered as they considered the experienced head nurse's profound instructions. The naive young men in horror novels who, despite knowing there were dangers, chose to venture into the foreground were few and far between. The doctors and nurses who had been entering and leaving this ward had been perfectly obedient to their superiors, neither scrutinizing nor questioning, treating the strange arrangements as if they were nothing.
However, on such a quiet night, the nurses were still a little worried when they saw Nuomi at Li Xiu's door.
Avoiding surveillance, a nurse carefully took out her mobile phone and nervously mentioned it in a private group.
[Am I overthinking this? Why does it feel so cold in the corridor tonight?]
[Wow, playing with your phone on duty again. Aren't you afraid of the nursing department's inspection?]
Someone responded to her immediately.
"I'm not usually like this, but today is special." The young nurse couldn't help but glance at the door again. "...I'm especially scared today."
"You mean that room? Don't look at it anymore. It gets weirder and weirder the more you look at it."
[Yeah, didn't the boss tell me to stop asking?]
But something was really wrong today. When I passed by that ward, I felt something really hairy on my back.
[Actually...I am the same today.]
…
The more I read the discussions on my phone, the more scared I become.
It seemed as if something was approaching.
A chill came over the nurse, and her hands trembled. She suddenly turned off the screen and stuffed the phone back into the drawer.
It was completely silent, except that the air conditioner was turned too low, making her shiver with cold.
The young nurse subconsciously glanced at Li Xiu's ward. Although the two men guarding the door looked strange, she felt more at ease knowing they were with her in the night ward.
As a result, the nurse froze in place with just one glance.
What was going on? Why…why was the snow-white glutinous rice at the door of the ward now turning red at a speed visible to the naked eye?
"Woo woo—"
A faint whimper came from the tightly closed ward.
"not good!"
The moment the glutinous rice turned red, Xu Qinghe, who had been quietly guarding in front of Li Xiu's ward, suddenly jumped up.
"Li Xiu!"
The older man didn't hesitate and kicked open the door of the ward and rushed in with Qiao Yang.
The lights in the ward were dim.
The light from the corridor poured into the room, allowing Xu Qinghe to see everything inside the room clearly.
He saw a figure shivering and huddled on the bed, unable to move, covered only with a thin quilt.
There was a person lying on the quilt.
Of course, that thing only looked like a person.
Its entire body was red, soft, and wet, like a piece of flesh that had just shed its skin. It had long limbs and a huge body. When it lay on Li Xiu's quilt, it could almost occupy the entire bed.
And on its face, there was a tattered paper mask.
The pale cheeks of the paper mask were soaked with blood and became wet, and a dark red outline could be vaguely seen under the white paper.
The area below the eye sockets was dug out, and the area below the eye sockets was now wet with dark red blood.
It just looked at Teacher Xu and Qiao Yang who suddenly broke into the room.
The scarlet lips on the mask, which stretched from the ears to the bottom, moved slightly, as if smiling.
Then, a gust of wind blew, and the strange and twisted shadow disappeared like a nightmare.
"Oops!"
Teacher Xu's face changed drastically. He reached into his arms and when he raised his hand again, he had already scattered a handful of ashes from the freshly burned talisman paper.
The paper ashes scattered across the room, seemingly ordinary, but as the paper ashes fell, many light gray marks appeared on the walls of the entire ward.
One on top of another.
It vaguely looks like a palm print.
"Look at its mark—"
Teacher Xu shouted nervously.
As soon as he finished speaking, the handprint that originally only appeared on the wall began to spread at an alarming speed.
Everyone in the room heard the strange and subtle clapping sound.
The palm prints extended from the wall to the ceiling.
"Teacher, I can't move anymore——"
Xu Qinghe rushed towards Li Xiu on the bed. Just as he was about to reach out to pull Li Xiu out from under the quilt, a chill suddenly spread from his wrist to his entire body.
Something crawled up him.
There was clearly no entity, but Teacher Xu suddenly became unable to move.
His joints were crackling all over and his shoulders felt as if they were carrying a thousand pounds.
"Li Xiu... take this and run..."
Xu Qinghe bit the tip of his tongue, a sharp pain piercing his mouth, leaving a sweet and fishy taste. The man swallowed a mouthful of blood, then spoke with difficulty to the figure beside him.
As blood spurted out from the tip of his tongue, the man regained some of his meager strength to move. He slowly handed a paper talisman to Li Xiu.
However, he soon heard Li Xiu's trembling cry.
"Teacher Xu, I'm not in bed... Who are you talking to? Wuwuwu..."
Only then did Teacher Xu realize that Li Xiu's voice came from under the bed.
The boy's face was as white as paper. He carefully poked his head out from under the bed and looked at the motionless man above with great horror.
During the fright just now, Li Xiu hid under the bed to avoid "that thing" that was following her like a shadow.
…
Xu Qinghe gasped and moved his eyeballs with great difficulty.
Unable to change his posture, his vision was limited, and he could only catch a glimpse of a pair of bluish-white hands with bloody fingertips stuck tightly on his arm.
The thing was hiding under the quilt, pulling at him tightly.
The talisman paper spontaneously combusted at Xu Qinghe's fingertips without any fire.
However, the life-saving talisman that was supposed to restrain the dark things did not cause any harm to the thing in the room except for a slight burning sensation on Xu Qinghe's fingertips.
…
Xu Qinghe's face darkened slightly, and another mouthful of blood spurted out from the tip of his tongue.
"Qiao Yang!"
He shouted.
However, Qiao Yang, who was supposed to protect him, did not respond to his call.
["Hahahaha… Xiao Qiao…"]
"We're all brothers. Qiao Yang, if you don't play with us, you're no longer a friend."
"Come on, it's not far ahead. Come over and have a drink."
…
There were clearly only three people in the ward, but at this moment, several faint male voices could be heard.
Laughing and lingering behind Xu Qinghe and beside Qiao Yang.
The light from the door shone in, stretching the shadows on the ground very long.
Next to Qiao Yang's shadow, there were several hazy figures gathered.
Judging from their shadows, they seemed to be playing with Qiao Yang, arm in arm.
Before he knew it, Qiao Yang was already dragging his feet towards the ward window, pushed by the shadow.
Now, Teacher Xu could see the shadows around Qiao Yang without much effort - how could that be Qiao Yang's friend? They were simply the people who had died or disappeared in Qiming Middle School before!
Song Cheng's entire body was torn open from the chest to the lower abdomen, and his internal organs were scattered all over the ground.
Wang Rongfa's body was completely twisted and no longer in human form.
Ouyang's body was only tied to the rope with his neck, and the lower half of his body had fallen off due to severe decay.
…
Seeing that those voices were about to tempt Qiao Yang to jump out of the ward window, beads of sweat the size of beans appeared on Teacher Xu's forehead.
His lips were moving rapidly, and a trace of blood was oozing from the corner of his mouth.
However, the scriptures that Teacher Xu kept reciting could never be transformed into sounds and uttered from his mouth.
Qiao Yang was in imminent danger, and Xu Qinghe's condition was not much better.
His body was shaking, and the "weight" pressing on him was getting heavier and heavier...
Strands of black hair hung down from the man's head, obscuring his vision.
A vague and resentful female voice kept mumbling in his ear.
"They all deserve to die..."
The bloody cheek was pressed against the side of Xu Qinghe's face.
Because her tongue always fell out of her broken jaw, every sentence the terrifying female ghost spoke was extremely unclear.
"I've been begging you to save him... I've begged so many people..."
"Save him, he's my child, he's still so young..."
"Ayu... my poor Ayu... how could anyone treat him like that..."
"But why won't you help me?"
…
The room was filled with cold wind and resentment.
Teacher Xu's face was ashen and he was having difficulty breathing.
In his gradually congested vision, some very blurry images appeared -
A woman.
A woman who is extremely thin due to serious illness, but still beautiful.
She knelt in front of some people and begged them to help her rescue the abused children.
However, after being asked for countless money and other costs, the people who had promised to help her expose the matter and regain custody of the child broke their promises without exception.
When the woman's outburst becomes more and more violent, and it seems that the situation may really get out of control...
Someone lifted her off the bed and pushed her out of the ward window.
…
As his soul was invaded by the evil spirit, black blood gradually seeped out of Xu Qinghe's eyes, nose and ears.
Even the blood on the tip of his tongue oozing from his mouth was turning from bright red to pitch black.
The man's body began to shake, and at the moment he was about to fall down -
"Prosperity, democracy, civilization, harmony, prosperity..."
Li Xiu's voice sounded with tears in her eyes.
The boy mustered up the courage to crawl out from under the bed, reciting the core socialist values while crying, while grabbing the exercise book on his bedside table and smashing it at the dark shadow surrounding Teacher Xu.
What was surprising was that even the black shadow, which was difficult to be affected by the Xuanmen spells, let out a shrill wail after being hit by Li Xiu's exercise book.
The female ghost's figure spread out slightly, and the power suppressing Xu Qinghe relaxed for a moment - Xu Qinghe naturally did not miss this fleeting opportunity.
"Tianfeng's disciples, the demon-slaying immortal, crush demons and slay evil, with hawks and dogs leading the way. The two generals, upon hearing the summons, stood before the altar, obeying the law and orders. The emperor proclaimed his divine power, slaying all demons and ghosts without limit. The supreme holy power is vast and boundless. Hurry and obey the Northern Emperor's orders—"
With a loud shout, two balls of fire suddenly emerged from Teacher Xu's hands.
The shadows that had originally trapped him suddenly dissipated in the firelight.
Then, he took a quick step and rushed to the window.
Qiao Yang already had one foot on the windowsill, falling forward, about to leap from the ward window. Xu Qinghe grabbed Qiao Yang by the collar and threw him back to the ground.
"Let's go... let's go... let's have a drink... but we've got a deal. Only one drink, my teacher needs me..."
After being pulled back into the room, Qiao Yang's eyes were still empty, he kept muttering, and he tried to climb back onto the windowsill.
Xu Qinghe did not hold back and slapped Qiao Yang in the face several times in front of the panicked Li Xiu.
Qiao Yang's face swelled up at a speed visible to the naked eye.
Finally, the young man suddenly stretched his neck and spat out several mouthfuls of black blood. He suddenly lost strength and fell directly into Teacher Xu's arms, motionless.
"Xu, Teacher Xu..."
Li Xiu stared at the motionless young man in Xu Qinghe's arms. Her knees went weak and she sat down on the ground uncontrollably.
"Not dead."
As if he had guessed the reason for Li Xiu's panic at this moment, Xu Qinghe wiped the tears from his face, patted the limp student in his arms, and murmured an explanation in a hoarse voice.
"It's just that the Yin energy has impacted his soul, and he has temporarily lost his strength. It's okay, he will wake up soon."
As he spoke, Xu Qinghe covered his mouth and coughed several times, with black blood dripping from between his fingers.
"Luckily, fortunately you helped me, otherwise I really don't know what to do now..."
The man looked at Li Xiu and spoke softly.
After saying that, he used the hand that was not wet with blood to hand over the exercise book with the pages scattered on the ground to Li Xiu.
Li Xiu stared at Teacher Xu blankly for a long time before taking the exercise book back and holding it tightly in his arms.
"I, I thought it was useless."
The boy spoke incoherently.
"But I didn't know what to do, so I just read those—"
"Ahem, it works." Teacher Xu coughed and laughed, "I've told you all, if you study hard, you won't have to be afraid of these ghosts."
*
"What's wrong?"
"Oh my god…"
"what happened?"
…
There was a noise outside the door.
Li Xiu opened her eyes wide and looked towards the door, only to see the nurses and security guards crowded at the door, looking at them in the room in surprise.
So many things had happened just now, but they came over as if they had just realized that something was wrong.
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By the way, the Five Thunder Curse that Teacher Xu recited came from the Internet!