Figures in the Mist
Xu Huo stopped washing the dishes and pointed toward the window. "I just saw someone walk by, but there hasn't been a knock for quite a while."
The woman's expression changed when she saw his gesture. She hurriedly lowered her voice. "Don't speak!"
The other two people in the house tensed up as well. They rushed into the room, brought out the two children, and covered their ears.
While Xu Huo and the painted woman looked on in confusion, someone knocked on the door:
"Knock, knock, knock."
The evenly spaced knocks came twice in succession. Xu Huo patted the woman's sleeve, then pointed to the door, asking with his eyes whether she should open it.
The woman pressed her lips together and glared at him, then shook her head emphatically.
Xu Huo obediently stayed where he was. The knocking sounded once more, then everything fell into endless silence.
Only after the others had relaxed did he ask, "Who was knocking just now? Are there any... bad people living here?"
He deliberately kept his question vague, but the old woman understood. "No one else. There are no bad people here. And even if there were, they wouldn't dare come out at night."
Xu Huo sat down at the table, making it clear he was eager to hear more.
Meanwhile, the painted woman shared two fruit candies with the children. They tugged her over to sit with them, then begged the old woman to tell them a story.
The old woman finished her tea, chewed up and swallowed all the leaves in her cup, and only then began telling a story passed down through the generations.
"The Friend in Hiding."
It was much as the game's background information had described. Several generations ago, figures had begun appearing in