Xue Tingtao's mind was in turmoil.
After just a brief delay, it seemed there were no living people left anywhere in the stairwell.
No matter how fast he rushed downward, he could not catch sight of Xie Zheng or Luo Xian ahead of him.
Not only had the living vanished, but the dense fog seemed several times thicker than before. It was as though he had entered a completely isolated world.
He stretched one hand forward, straightening his arm, yet could not even see his five spread fingers.
Throughout the stairwell, the only sounds were his increasingly labored breathing and his rapid, erratic heartbeat.
Xue Tingtao grew more and more panicked. He knew a ghost must have set its sights on him. He could not catch up with the others because something had happened to him.
But he was no longer the man he had once been. Standing alone in the stairwell, he began forcing himself to calm down.
Barely able to move through the dense fog, he leaned against the cold wall and felt around for the numbers marked on it.
A crooked, hand-drawn black "10" appeared directly above his head.
He had reached the Tenth Floor.
Xue Tingtao's throat felt dry. Rather than charging recklessly ahead as before, he now moved with extreme caution.
Luo Xian and Xie Zheng had most likely already entered the Tenth Floor.
He knew there was an old woman surnamed Hu on the Tenth Floor, supposedly the spirit medium of the Black and White Building.
Of course, Old Madam Hu was no benevolent soul either. Under these circumstances, she might well have become the Tenth Floor's Tower Suppressing Ghost.
Luo Xian had claimed she had come here to find her, to pit one supernatural force against another.
Distant memories gradually surfaced. From Xue