So where was Liu Haoyu?
Qin Liu hurriedly looked around, trying to find the ghost-catching master Liu Haoyu.
"Did he go downstairs?"
When she reached the stairwell, a small black shadow was standing there, watching.
Qin Liu saw the black shadow too.
But after their eyes met, the shadow looked even more frightened than Qin Liu. It let out a shriek, then scrambled and rolled all the way downstairs.
Qin Liu watched where the shadow had gone, her nervousness refusing to settle.
What should she do?
Should she go downstairs? Or wait here?
Qin Liu was a little scared, but she hadn't forgotten Liu Haoyu's words.
When faced with supernatural events, running away wouldn't solve anything.
Besides, she was already a ghost herself. What was there to fear?!
Charge!
"There's no better way to overcome fear than to face it! Uraa!!"
Mustering her courage, Qin Liu chased after the shadow.
When the shadow saw Qin Liu coming after it, it let out an even sharper scream.
It was as if it had seen a ghost.
"What's going on?" Qin Liu was bewildered. "I'm the one who ran into a ghost... well, a person who ran into a ghost. So why are you even more scared than I am?"
Despite what she said, Qin Liu didn't stop chasing. She pursued it all the way to the first floor.
"Don't run! You're a ghost, and I'm a ghost too. Rounded up, doesn't that make us fellow villagers?"
But once they reached the first floor, the black shadow completely disappeared. Qin Liu stared blankly at her surroundings.
"What is this place?"
She discovered that she had been led to the entrance of a basement.
The basement in front of her didn't have the blood-red metal door Liu Haoyu had described.
But even this rotten, dilapidated wooden door looked extremely eerie!
Should she go in?
Qin Liu began to lose her nerve.
Perhaps the shadow was inside this basement right now. If she went in...
No, no, no. Judging by the usual descriptions in horror stories, something deadly was bound to happen if she entered a place like this alone.
So... she should find Liu Haoyu first.
Ten minutes earlier, while Qin Liu was absorbed in reading the diary.
After hearing Liu Haoyu's request, Sima Cai and his companion went pale with fright. They shouted over each other.
"I'm going! Are you trying to get yourself killed?!"
"Wait, wait, big brother, let's talk this out! Don't do anything rash!"
"I have parents above me and children below me! I don't want to die at the hands of a ghost!"
The two wailed and tried to run upstairs, but Liu Haoyu grabbed them by the shoulders. His hands clamped down like iron pincers, holding them fast no matter how hard they struggled.
Liu Haoyu's voice was deep and heavy. To the two of them, it sounded like the low call of an evil ghost from hell.
Even more terrifyingly, he was carrying a bloodstained Fire Axe. Looking at the blood on it, they could almost smell a faint tang of blood in the air, and the sight made the two college students' scalps prickle.
Although Liu Haoyu hadn't said anything else, his appearance made them feel as if he was threatening them.
If they refused to go, he would send them to meet King Yama.
Seeing this, Sima Cai immediately changed his tune.
"Of course. Since big brother is going down into a mountain of blades, then I naturally have no choice but to follow you into a sea of flames."
As he spoke, the two of them headed downstairs.
While they descended, Liu Haoyu didn't remain idle. He said, "Don't worry. You only need to point out where you encountered the ghost, and I'll naturally take you out."
To Liu Haoyu, the two of them were only obstacles if they stayed here. It would be better to learn what had happened, then let them leave from the first floor.
Perhaps because it seemed Liu Haoyu wasn't going to kill them for the moment, Sima Cai took a deep breath to calm himself before recounting everything they had encountered in detail.
The two were first-year students at Jiangquan City University.
Since they belonged to a club called the Supernatural Society, they had come to a place like this to look for inspiration for their credits, hoping to write some ghost story or another and bluff their way through.
But after arriving at this haunted place, they had barely gone through the entrance when the door slammed shut behind them. No matter what they tried, they couldn't open it.
To find the key, the two of them had no choice but to search through the rooms one by one.
They hadn't found the key yet, but they did see a small black shadow.
Only after looking closely did they realize that it was... a child with an eerie smile.
It was a ghost! It definitely was a ghost!
After seeing the ghost and finding themselves unable to open the door, the two could only scramble upstairs in a panic, where they happened to encounter Liu Haoyu coming down.
But as a ghostbuster who upheld the principle of breaking feudal superstition and publicly promoted the idea that nothing could become a monster after the founding of the nation, Liu Haoyu naturally denied it.
"A ghost? How can you be sure it was a ghost?"
"Big brother, don't doubt me!" Sima Cai said confidently. "I saw her with my own eyes. Her face was covered in corpse spots, and her neck was twisted! How could a normal person survive in that condition?!"
When Sima Cai recalled the Fierce Ghost smiling at him, a chill instantly spread through his entire body. He spoke with lingering fear.
"I'm really not lying to you, big brother! My own brother, hurry up and get us out of here. If we run into a ghost, we'll really die! Besides, do you think there could be a child in a place even dogs wouldn't come to?"
Faced with Sima Cai's wails, Liu Haoyu remained unmoved.
"Even dogs wouldn't come here?"
"Uh..." Sima Cai said sheepishly, "No, no, I wasn't talking about you, big brother."
"No dog would come here, so don't come next time either."
Seeing that Liu Haoyu wasn't going to pursue the matter, Sima Cai let out a sigh of relief and said, "The ghost was in the kitchen on the first floor, big brother... can we leave now?"
"Don't be in such a hurry."
Liu Haoyu entered the kitchen, while the two stood at the doorway, not daring to set foot inside.
Just as Liu Haoyu was observing the kitchen, a head covered in blood slowly rose from the black pot behind him.
Its face was swollen from being soaked in broth, making its features completely unrecognizable. A pair of eyes that were nothing but white stared maliciously at Liu Haoyu.
Because it was behind Liu Haoyu, Sima Cai and his companion nearly felt their scalps explode when they saw it.
The head was less than three meters from them. The terror rising from the depths of their hearts made them tremble uncontrollably.
At that moment, Liu Haoyu was still focused on examining the kitchen, seemingly unaware that the head had appeared. But the two could feel an unbearable pressure closing in. With trembling lips, Sima Cai shouted, "A ghost... a ghost... big brother, there's a ghost behind you!"
Before the two could finish, Liu Haoyu spun around, raised the Fire Axe high, and chopped straight down, cleaving the pot and the table beneath it in half.
The pot's foul-smelling contents spilled across the floor, dark-brown and yellowish-white substances mixing into a heap.
Sima Cai and his companion broke out in goosebumps from head to toe.
Was it blood? Or brain matter?
"What's the big deal?" Liu Haoyu didn't seem bothered by the stench at all. Crouching beside the split pot, he said, "It's only a rotten pig's brain. Is there really any need to make such a fuss?"
A pig's brain?
Sima Cai was completely dumbfounded.
You called that round, wide-eyed thing a pig's brain?
After holding it in for a long while, Sima Cai finally managed to squeeze out a sentence.
"Big brother... you're scarier than a ghost."
Liu Haoyu had already left the kitchen and reached the front door.
The two didn't dare delay and hurried after him.
Although the man wearing the gas mask looked highly suspicious.
At least he was still a person, right?!
When Sima Cai saw Liu Haoyu stop at the front door, he reminded him, "This door won't open. We tried all sorts of methods just now. We probably have to find the key before we can open it."
As a member of the Supernatural Society, Sima Cai had watched plenty of horror movies and played plenty of horror games.
Following the usual logic of those horror films and games, they had to find the key and solve the mystery of this haunted house before they could leave.
But Sima Cai had also heard the commotion Liu Haoyu had made earlier. This masked man had clearly entered the house using a rope.
So if they used a rope... perhaps they could escape.
While Sima Cai was thinking, Liu Haoyu raised the Fire Axe in his hand and said, "There's no need to go to so much trouble."
After saying that, he brought the Fire Axe crashing down on the door.
"Bang!!"
With that single blow, the lock on the door was forcibly split with a crack.
Liu Haoyu didn't stop. He raised the Fire Axe again.
One chop... two chops... three chops. After hacking the lock to pieces, he gripped the doorknob and gave it a gentle pull.
The door opened.
"See? There was no supernatural event. The lock was simply broken."
Liu Haoyu patted the two on the shoulders and said, "There's nothing left for you here. Be careful on your way back."
"Okay, okay, okay! Thank you, big brother! Thank you, big brother!"
The two fled outside as if they had been granted a reprieve.
Liu Haoyu watched their retreating figures grow more distant.
More accurately... neither of them was human.
They were both dead.
Before you continue