My House of Horrors

“Xiao Lin‽” After walking into the corridor, Wang Xiaoming’s face suddenly paled. His bulging eyes looked around as if he could not believe that he had physically entered the staff dormitory.

“It is too dangerous for you to stay at the entrance alone. I’m the one who wanted to come here to find the key, so how could I put you in such danger?” Chen Ge made it sound like it was all for Wang Xiaoming’s own good. No matter how hard the latter tried to shake him off, Chen Ge refused to let go.

“I…”

“Shush, the door in front appears to have been left ajar.” Chen Ge walked while sticking to the wall. When he reached the middle of the corridor, he noticed that one of the doors was slightly open. The lights inside the room were on, and pale white light filtered out. Afraid of attracting the attention of the people inside the room, Wang Xiaoming stopped resisting and allowed Chen Ge to drag him to the side of the door.

“What do you plan to do?” When Wang Xiaoming saw Chen Ge lean against the wall next to the door to peer inside it. He felt like his scalp was about to explode. This man before him had no idea what the meaning of fear was, and he insisted on bringing him to experiment with stuff at the edge of danger.

“Shh, the light in the room is on, and I believe I see a shadow projected onto the wall. There is someone inside the room.” Chen Ge waved at Wang Xiaoming. The two silently slid past the door. Being dragged by Chen Ge, Wang Xiaoming stopped resisting. He had surrendered to his fate. The maintenance room was at the end of the corridor—it took them a very long time just to locate it.

“The door is locked.” Chen Ge wiggled the doorknob but failed to get the door open.

“You have to be gentler! You are going to wake the entire building!” Wang Xiaoming cowered with fear, his face anxious.

“The door is locked. Do you know who has the key?” They could not stay there long, so Chen Ge tried to move things forward.

“It should be with the maintenance worker, but he will have gotten off work by now!” Wang Xiaoming tugged on Chen Ge’s sleeve. “How about we leave this place now and go to the canteen. I promise to treat you to a good meal. I guarantee that you will definitely ask for more.”

“Do you mind piping down? I need some quiet to think about this.” Chen Ge’s eyes scanned the corridor and the many doors. “When a person hears a strange sound, the brain will need about two seconds to react, and they will need several seconds to come down the corridor from the rooms. In other words, if I break down the door, I will have to crack the door, find the tools, and escape the scene in under half a minute. No, that’s impossible. There’s not enough time.”

“Xiao Lin? What did you say? Break down the door?”

“This building only has one exit and a staircase. The staircase is situated next to the exit. Even if I successfully find the tools I need, there is nowhere to hide.” Chen Ge very rationally abandoned the idea of breaking down the door. “The maintenance room is on the first floor. I already know the location of this place. Compared to breaking down the door, slipping in through the window might be a better solution.”

Without anything to arm himself with, Chen Ge was greatly unsettled. Other than that, he had a different plan in mind. The nails in Room 413 pinned the human shadows onto the wall. Chen Ge planned to make a deal with these human shadows. He would remove all the nails from the walls to help them escape, but in return, he would ask a favor from them.

If everything went well, this would be a win-win situation, but the plan was easier said than done. He would need to be careful at every step, and on top of that, he needed to ensure that the shadows would not betray him. Chen Ge actually did not wish to do so, but unfortunately, he did not have much of a choice. This world behind the door did not give him much chance at survival, so he would have to work hard to create the chance for himself.

Suddenly, an intense shot of pain came from his stomach—it felt like he had been stung by a bee. Chen Ge pulled up his shirt, and a short nail fell to the ground.

“This time the wound is deeper, but how come there is still no blood?” Normally, when one was hurt by a nail, the wound would definitely be bleeding when pressure was applied, but no matter how aggressively Chen Ge dealt with the wound, there was no blood. The sound that the nail made when falling to the ground was not loud, but since the corridor was so quiet, both Chen Ge and Wang Xiaoming heard it very clearly.

“What are you doing?” Wang Xiaoming was understandably spooked.

“Nothing.” Chen Ge picked up the nail, and when he was lowering his head, he saw a bright light coming from the building’s entrance. Someone had just entered the staff dormitory with a flashlight!

“We’ve been discovered!” Wang Xiaoming clamped his mouth with his hands as he leaned his body against the wall. “It was the sound of the nail. That alerted him to our presence!”

“This corridor is about twenty to thirty meters long. Do you think the person can hear the sound of a nail dropping from so far away?” Chen Ge maintained his rationality; he was very calm. “It is a coincidence that this person is showing up. Trust me!”

“Then what do you suggest we do now? They are coming here!”

“Stick close to the wall. They are relying on a flashlight. It means that their eyes won’t have the time to get used to the darkness. As long as we hide in the shadows and the flashlight doesn’t hit us, we won’t be discovered.” Chen Ge was making a bet. Normally, people used the flashlight to light the immediate path before them, they would not shine it into the distance.

“What if the flashlight catches us?” Cold puffs of air came out of Wang Xiaoming’s lips, and his eyes were filled with terror.

“I will repeat myself. They are holding a flashlight, and their eyes are not used to the darkness. If the flashlight happens to catch us, the first thing we need to do is to charge at this person, grab the flashlight, and run out through the exit.”

“What kind of lousy plan is that?”

“Shush, take your spot in the corner. Be prepared to make a run if the situation calls for it.” Chen Ge narrowed his eyes and used the bag to cover the lower half of his face. In the darkened corridor, the light teetered left and right. It slowly approached. Both Chen Ge and Wang Xiaoming held their breath. After a few difficult seconds, the light stopped before one of the rooms. The room door was pushed open, and the light soon disappeared.

“The person has entered the room!” Wang Xiaoming’s voice was shuddering from the overwhelming relief.

“Stop wasting time, we need to go!” Chen Ge had a feeling that things were not that simple.

The person was not led here by the sound of the nail falling. Could it really be a coincidence? No, I must have missed something very important, but what is it?

Running ahead, Chen Ge thought back to what had happened to him after he entered the door.

The first time I ran into mortal danger was inside Room 413. With the degree of fear Wang Xiaoming showed toward the teacher and the dormitory manager, something terrible will happen if you run across them after dark.

Chen Ge concluded that from the two incidents that he had encountered, and his brows slowly creased.

It appears that the moment I stay in a specific place for too long, something bad will happen.

He had no way of affirming his speculation. He knew that things were not looking up. The difficulty and danger level of this school was far beyond the danger level of the normal nightmare missions given by the black phone.

I am being too passive. What can I do to turn things around? The black phone will not give me a mission that I cannot pass. Where or what is this crucial item or incident that will help me survive?

While Chen Ge used all the energy in his brain to think, the door not that far away from him suddenly opened again!

That was the room where the light disappeared inside earlier! Has the person been waiting for us‽

They had nowhere else to run. Chen Ge and Wang Xiaoming were currently trapped in the middle of the corridor.