My House of Horrors

“You guys don’t know how cunning the boss of this Haunted House is. Only by staying together do we have a chance of clearing the scenario.” Bai Buhui had confirmed that the two students were played by actors, so he let his guard down around the middle-aged man and his wife. “You wouldn’t want your wife to go through such torment, right? We’re here to play in a Haunted House, not to be played by the Haunted House.”

“Okay, we will follow you for now.” The middle-aged still did not quite believe Bai Buhui. “But we’ll warn you first. If anything serious happens, the two of us will not follow you guys anymore.”

The more cautious the middle-aged man was, the more Bai Buhui believed that he was a normal visitor. “Don’t worry.”

The camera focused on Bai Buhui. The host had changed, but the chatroom was still happily rumbling. There was even a user called Wine for Moonlight that opened a bet to see how long this new host could last.

“Ol’ Liu, you’ll man the camera; Sister Ghost, you’ll be responsible for contacting Liu Gang and follow their movement; Small Ghost and I will lead the way, and the rest will follow behind.” Bai Buhui was obviously more organized than Liu Gang. He issued tasks for everyone within a short period of time based on his understanding of everyone’s personality and ability.

“We’re going to find Liu Gang now? But we don’t even know where the library is.” When Small Ghost heard that he was assigned to lead the way, he was a bit stung.

“Listen to my arrangements,” Bai Buhui replied coldly. “We will start to search around the area where the camera was dropped. I will give everyone three minutes. After that, whether we find anything useful or not, we will have to move after that.”

“What can we achieve in three minutes?”

“Less talking, more working.” Considering that there were other visitors, Bai Buhui added some explanation. “My colleagues once visited this Haunted House and gained some valuable experience after paying a huge price. Do not stay at one place for too long; if you do, the ghosts will come and get you.”

As brash as Bai Buhui’s attitude was, he had the ability to back it up, so no one argued with him, and they followed his orders. Opening the nearby rooms, it did not take long for them to get results. Small Ghost found the birthday greeting card that Mr. Bai had given his daughter and the seventh report of the supernatural phenomenon observation club. Big Ghost found the thirteenth report of the club inside Mr. Bai’s bedroom.

“The seventh report recorded the location of the art club. It appears to be situated in heaven. But the thirteenth report is even more curious. It says that there is a wishing well at the school. You make your wish in the morning and only by jumping into it at midnight will your come true.” Big Ghost reported his findings to Bai Buhui. The more they investigated, the deeper they sank. The complexity of this scenario was far larger than he had anticipated; the many side quests overlapped, so sixty minutes was not enough time to explore all of them.

“Heaven? Wishing Well?” Bai Buhui memorized these two key words and had Sister Ghost call Liu Gang as the group started the search for the library. Passing through the staff dormitory and office block, Bai Buhui’s group took a long detour before they arrived at the center of the school. After passing an eerie garden, they finally found a tattered map of the school taped to a sign.

“The library is behind the education block!” With his sharp eye, Small Ghost found the library’s location immediately. Bai Buhui nodded lightly, but his gaze moved to the corner of the map. At the edge of the field, there was the symbol for a well.

“Inside this school filled with ghost stories, the supernatural observation club should be on the same side as the visitors. Their investigation reports should be the most important clues.” Bai Buhui considered it quietly. “The seventh report says that the art club is inside heaven, and the thirteenth report mentions the wishing well. Since these two reports were placed in the same room, there has to be a connection between them!”

A brilliant light crossed his eyes, and Bai Buhui pushed on his glasses.

“Could the well be the entrance to heaven? Only by jumping into the well can one enter the art club?

“Which normal person would consider the well as an exit? The hidden path behind the library should be fake. That is a trap laid down by the actor. This path that I discovered should be the real one.”

Bai Buhui sighed in relief.

“This Liu Gang is impossibly dumb. The clues were right before them, but they couldn’t even see it.”

Memorizing the location of the well, Bai Buhui had Sister Ghost call Liu Gang, but for some reason, no one answered.

“Looks like he’s really in trouble.” Bai Buhui was helpless. He had everyone follow him to enter the education block in the middle of the school. Inside the deadly quiet corridor, the dim lights kept flickering. The visitors walking down the corridor could see the empty classrooms on both sides. The classrooms that were once filled with reading and laughter had only broken tables and chairs left in them. But the words that were carved into the tables proved how boisterous this place used to be.

“What the f*ck!” After turning the corner, the Small Ghost in front suddenly cursed.

“What did you see?” Bai Buhui hurried over.

“There was something standing in that classroom.” Small Ghost pointed at the classroom at the side. Looking from outside, this classroom was no different from the others; nothing stood out about it. But when the visitors planned to pass it, they suddenly discovered there was something standing inside the room. He was wearing a strange uniform, with his head lowered, keeping silent.

“Is he a Haunted House actor?” Small Ghost’s expression turned from the initial fear to excitement. “I’ve been here for almost half an hour already, and finally, we’ve found the actor. I thought they’d continue to be cowardly and hide from us.”

“Our current mission is to find Liu Gang. Let’s not waste time here,” Bai Buhui and Big Ghost advised him.

“Until now, they’ve been creating this mysterious atmosphere to terrify others. Now that they’ve shown themselves, what is there to be afraid of?” Small Ghost seemed to like pranking others. “Let me go pull off his mask and see what this actor looks like.”

Liu Guangming astutely turned the camera to focus on Small Ghost. He did not use the front door but slunk toward the back of the room. He probably planned to ambush the actor from the back to scare him. The livestream continued. Bai Buhui probably wanted to see the actor being exposed, so he did not stop Small Ghost. Small Ghost silently pushed open the backdoor, but as he prepared to enter, his body seemed to freeze. “Where is the man?”

The classroom was empty. The male student that he had seen earlier disappeared.

“He ran into the hidden path?” Sister Ghost and Big Ghost were confused. Liu Guangming moved to Small Ghost’s side. He was not a professional, so the camera had been shaking, and the quality was not good.

“Get out now! There is something wrong with this classroom!” Bai Buhui shouted from behind them. Ol’ Zhou shared a look with Duan Yue. They saw confusion in each other’s eyes. This was not part of the script! Who was that student?

With the signal from Ol’ Zhou, Duan Yue silently messaged Chen Ge, and soon, she got the reply.

“They’re allies. There is a very special building in the four-star scenario called the Ghost Story Classroom. It will randomly appear inside the School of the Afterlife and generate a ghost story related to a haunted school every night. This ghost story will not harm anyone, but the higher the collected screams at the Haunted House, the scarier the generated ghost story will be, so I suggest the two of you avoid it.”