My House of Horrors

“There were no other roads. When I controlled Xiao Bu to walk past the bus, I saw a woman standing at the bus stop, a woman in a red raincoat.

“The whole world was gray, so the woman’s red raincoat was very conspicuous. I used the cursor to click on the woman, and a message popped up—Have you seen my child?

“That should be the woman’s speech bubble, and no matter how many times I pressed, she kept repeating the same question.

“The game changed too much, and I was feeling scared. I continued playing simply because I was curious. I ignored the woman and wanted to move forward, but Xiao Bu refused to follow my control; her body stopped moving.

“I leaned closer and saw that the woman in the raincoat had grabbed Xiao Bu’s arm, and the scary thing was that the woman’s body was shaking. A bug seemed to have corrupted the game because the windows kept popping out saying—Have you seen my child?

“I clicked on the cursor crazily. Finally, I clicked on the bus, and the girl managed to get away from the woman by running into the bus. The vehicle started and drove down the road.

“I had no idea how long it had been driving when Xiao Bu, who was wearing her Mummy’s Pajamas, started to pace inside the bus. She heard the sound of children crying.”

Fan Chong did not continue for a moment. His emotions were jangled, and his hands held his chest. “It was from then on that I started to hear the voice clearer. That day, I played until 3 am. I was afraid, so I turned off the computer directly. However, after I crawled into bed, I could still hear the crying of the child. The sound seemed to come out from the computer, but when I turned to look, the source changed direction again. It felt as if the child had crawled out of the computer and into my room.”

“When did this begin?” Chen Ge took out his phone to exchange WeChat IDs with Fan Chong.

“Around one or two weeks ago. No wait, I can’t remember clearly.” Fan Chong’s face scrunched up in pain. “You can come over to Eastern Jiujiang to find me next time, and we can talk this out.”

“Okay, where is your home?”

“The first apartment at Eastern Jiujiang’s Li Wan Town’s West street.”

Chen Ge memorized this address and left after chatting for a while longer with Fan Chong.

Recently, all the strange things have been happening in Eastern Jiujiang. Looks like that place is quite messy and not as quiet as it appears on the surface. Chen Ge returned to the Haunted House to work. A few visitors were scared dumb, but no one complained or argued with Chen Ge.

For those real adrenaline seekers, they would never be angry because it was too exciting; they would only complain when it was not exciting enough. However, there were few such visitors. Most of the visitors would regain their senses after trying out the one-star or two-star scenarios. In their eyes, only those who had lost their mind would challenge three-star scenarios.

Chen Ge’s House of Horrors ended its business at 6:50 pm. After sending away the last batch of visitors, the few employees could finally leave their own scenario.

“Thank you for your work today. The weather forecast said that there could be rain tonight, so you’d better leave while it’s still bright.” After cleaning the place, Chen Ge followed Xiao Gu and Xu Wan out the haunted house.

“Boss where are you going?”

“There are some materials left at the workshop. I plan to make some extra limbs; the new scenario still needs some more additions.” Chen Ge locked the door.

“More additions?” Xiao Gu widened his eyes. “Boss, I heard you scared nine visitors until they fainted today. That is enough to get you on the news. Are you sure you want to add more stuff to the new scenario? Why don’t you show some pity to the visitors?”

“I can’t do that.” Chen Ge denied it without thinking. “You don’t understand the human heart. The more they could not get it, the more they wanted to fight for it. We must be able to guarantee that we have a scenario that can never be cleared at our Haunted House. With this scenario, the visitors will return to challenge it again and again. If all our scenarios could be cleared easily, then our Haunted House would be no different from all the others on the market.”

“Yes, to create a Haunted House that the visitors will never clear, that should be our focus.” No matter what Chen Ge said, Xu Wan would support it unconditionally. She walked next to Chen Ge with her head lowered and concurred with Chen Ge’s words every so often.

“I seem to understand it now.” Xiao Gu nodded with a semi-blank expression.

“Make sure not to leak this information to outsiders—this is the secret of our Haunted House,” Chen Ge reminded with a light smile.

“Of course.”

The three walked down the road and soon reached the workshop. Xu Wan and Xiao Gu did not leave and wanted to stay to help Chen Ge. Chen Ge had already informed Boss Qian, so the three walked into the workshop directly.

At 8 pm, considering his two employee’s health and the fact that they still needed to work tomorrow, he told them to go home first. “I still have too few members of staff. There is too much pressure on Xiao Gu and Xu Wan. After the impact from the futuristic park is over, I should bring all of my employees out for a trip.”

Boss Qian had already left, so Chen Ge closed the door. He planned to spend a whole night there. After all, the materials would have gone to waste left at the workshop, so he planned to give them a new ‘life’.

After Xu Wan and Xiao Gu left the workshop, since their homes were at different place, after saying goodbye, Xiao Gu walked to the countryside alone.

“It’s only 8 pm, so there should be enough time for me to catch up to the last bus.” Xiao Gu walked to the nearest bus stop to look at the bus stop. “The place I’m staying at is too far from the city. After I get this month’s pay, I should find an apartment closer to New Century Park. But if I move out before finishing the three months, I probably won’t get my deposit back…”

Calling a taxi would waste too much money. Xiao Gu looked at the bus route as he waited for the bus to arrive. As he stared at the glass panel, he suddenly realized that the panel reflected the shadow of a woman. The woman was standing at the opposite bus stop, and she was silently looking at him.

“She sure is dressed strangely. The weather forecast did mention rain, but it’s not yet raining, so why is she wearing a raincoat already?” Xiao Gu was uncomfortable being stared at by the woman. He took out his phone, wanting to snap a picture of her. However, when he turned around, the woman had already disappeared.

“Her reflection was in the glass, so she was just there. Where did she disappear to?”

Xiao Gu held his phone and looked left and right. The woman disappeared like she had never been there in the first place.

The thunder rumbled in the night, and the rainclouds hung low in the sky. There would probably be heavy rain that night.

Just as Xiao Gu was spacing out, a bus came toward him from afar. The bus was driven slowly, and there were few passengers.