Downstairs

Obviously,

The open window on the balcony had been deliberately left by the other party to lure Luo Di over and make him turn his back on it.

No matter how fast his reaction was, it was already too late.

"Wu..."

He did not even have time to shout a single word,

Before cold, soft, damp hair crawled up Luo Di's neck and instantly sealed his mouth shut. Silence was maintained; any noise made indoors would never exceed the white noise of the torrential rain.

The black hair wrapped around his face was abnormally tough. He could not tear it apart with his fingers alone.

Luo Di could only turn around with all his strength,

The instant he completed the turn, several more strands of hair shot toward him, wrapping around his limbs and shoving him against the wall behind him.

The hair even possessed adhesive properties, like spider silk. Luo Di was stuck to the wall spread-eagled, unable to move, while the excess hair retracted.

Luo Di finally got a clear look at the "intruder"—the Pseudo-Human crawling across the ceiling, hidden in the shadows.

It was an incomparably ugly humanoid spider. Judging by its build and the length of what little hair it had, it was likely female.

Limbs: What should have been human limbs had become grotesquely elongated. Its palms could adhere firmly to surfaces, allowing it to crawl in all manner of ways.

Head: Ferocious, ugly, and covered in wrinkles, with severe hair loss. Its entire scalp was covered in rotten pits.

Torso: There were not many abnormalities in this part. It wore black clothes soaked through by the rain.

Tail: At the end of its torso, where a normal person's buttocks would be, grew a Special Organization that even made Luo Di physically nauseated.

Its tailbone had mutated and split apart at the end, connecting to two Girl heads that formed its so-called "spider abdomen," as well as this woman's trophies.

One of the Girls immediately reminded Luo Di of the portrait of the deceased he had seen in the apartment complex's mourning hall on the First Day of winter break.

Now it seemed that the chill wind he had sensed back then had likely been a warning from the dead Girl.

Both Girl heads fixed to its tail had pretty faces and smooth black hair. They even seemed alive, blinking and moving their lips, though their pupils had already turned cloudy white.

The Girl heads could be activated, causing their hair to grow wildly in a short time and granting them a certain degree of control over it.

It was precisely their hair that had completely restrained Luo Di and kept him from making a sound.

The wristband used to contact the outside world had also been taken away by the hair immediately.

Luo Di did not panic. Instead, he thought and analyzed as much as possible,

So this is the lurking Pseudo-Human the investigators were hunting, the source of the apartment complex lockdown... She has already killed two people. She is highly proficient at becoming a monster. The Mind Corner she formed has probably existed for nearly a year.

She's harder to deal with than a zombie—a true abnormal entity.

She should have left after the relocation complex was locked down, but on the eve of her escape, she unexpectedly saw the class monitor knocking on the door. Whether it was her face, age, or hair, she was superior to the previous two targets.

Was the temptation strong enough for her to take the risk, stay behind, and wait in the shadows for an opportunity?

Even using all his strength, Luo Di could not break free. His mouth was completely sealed, and he could only watch helplessly as the other party crawled toward the bedroom, toward the sleeping class monitor.

With no way to escape his current predicament, he could only close his eyes and recall that complex Hell Symbol.

However, just as his eyes closed, a shout rang out.

"Luo Di!"

He suddenly opened his eyes and saw something fly straight out of the bedroom. Even the Pseudo-Human itself failed to react in time and could not intercept it.

Whoosh!

It precisely sliced through the hair around Luo Di's right hand, and the blade wrapped in white cloth lodged firmly in the wall.

The one who had thrown the weapon was the class monitor.

She had long undergone sleep-related training. Any slight disturbance would wake her, and when Luo Di got out of bed in the middle of the night, she had opened her eyes and noticed the abnormality outside.

There was only one problem now.

The class monitor was still standing inside the bedroom, with the extremely dangerous Pseudo-Human between the two of them.

Even if Luo Di got hold of the weapon, it would still take him some time to free his limbs and neck.

Since the woman on the ceiling had already been exposed, she no longer hid herself and pounced straight at Wu Wen by the bedroom door.

Her fully spread limbs nearly sealed off every escape route.

Rustle~

The class monitor was completely unflustered. She had even prepared for this.

Her left hand, which had been hidden behind her back, suddenly swung out and hurled out all the bedding she had used for sleeping, blocking the way in front of her.

At the same time that the bedding obscured the other party's vision, the muscles in the class monitor's legs swelled and burst forth as she launched into an extremely fast diving roll.

Keeping low, she rolled just out of the monster's attack range and successfully reached the living room to join Luo Di.

Drip, drip~

However, when the class monitor rose from her roll, blood ran down her left arm. A clearly visible gash stretched from her elbow to the back of her hand,

Though it was only a superficial wound, it had cut through the wristband used for communication.

Now, both of them had been stripped of their means of contacting the outside world.

The spider-silk-like hair scattered across the floor, and Luo Di had regained his freedom. The two immediately exchanged a glance; they did not need to say a word.

They knew better than anyone that a Pseudo-Human that had achieved "Phobia-concretization" was not something students like them could fight, especially when the class monitor did not even have a decent weapon for self-defense.

There was only one thing they needed to do—and could do.

Run.

As long as they could rush out of the building, they could shout for help. A resident would definitely call emergency services immediately.

And most likely, as soon as the two broke through the warning tape sealing off the apartment building, some kind of sensor would activate, and the nearby investigators would arrive at once.

Run!

Both of them, among the best in athletics, sprinted toward the door at the same time.

They raced down the stairs at top speed,

Luo Di even braced himself on the railing with one hand and vaulted down the stairs like a hurdler.

Though neither of them looked back, they both knew that thing was behind them. They could even faintly feel damp hair brushing against the backs of their heads.

However, the chase did not continue.

Third floor.

Luo Di, who was running in front, suddenly stopped and sharply looked behind him,

Seeing this, the class monitor hurriedly shouted, "Why are you waiting for me? Run!"

"No... That thing stopped chasing us."

"Huh?"

The class monitor slowed as well and tilted her head toward the top of the stairwell. There truly was no sound of pursuit.

The class monitor offered a terrifying guess. "Maybe it crawled into someone else's home, then jumped out through a window. It plans to crawl in from downstairs and chase us in reverse from the bottom up."

"Is that so?"

Luo Di looked toward the lowest floor through the gaps in the railing,

He waited for a while, but did not see anything suspicious enter from below,

The class monitor continued, "It is also possible that it is hiding by the stairwell exit, waiting to launch a fatal ambush the instant we go out.

Since no one is in the stairwell right now, we can ask one of this building's residents to help us contact the outside world.

I remember that when we went upstairs knocking on doors one by one, there was a kind-looking old man living on the second floor. Let's hurry to his place and call the investigators."

Luo Di nodded.

The two walked through the stairwell back-to-back. Luo Di watched below while the class monitor watched above. If either side noticed anything abnormal, they would flee in the opposite direction.

They went down one floor without incident.

Just as they were about to knock on the second-floor resident's door, the class monitor froze, staring in disbelief at the somewhat blurry floor marker on the wall.

Three.

They had just been on the third floor. Now they had gone down one floor, yet they were still on the third floor.

A terrible premonition rose in the class monitor's heart, and she pulled Luo Di down another floor.

Sure enough, the floor marker still read three. Even the layout of the doors and the degree of peeling paint on the railings were identical.

"This is bad! This is the 'Corner Space' described in our textbooks."