Everyone's field of vision changed. Normally, when an object came too close to someone's eyes, it took a moment for them to adjust to the distance, and they couldn't see the object in its entirety. But when the group turned around or looked up at the sound of the bells, a giant ghost face, several times larger than normal, completely filled their vision. They could feel something pressed against their faces, but the face in their field of vision warped and shifted like a reflection in a curved mirror, as if their eyesight were being distorted along with it!
The five people present—Xu Huo, the painted woman, Old Mr. Xi, the metal-card Player, and another Player from District 001—instinctively tried to retreat. But their limbs and bodies suddenly seemed disconnected from them, no longer responding to their will. Then everything went black. Something pressed against their faces, and something else seemed to burrow into their heads. Without realizing it, they had been made to wear head coverings!
But knowing what was happening didn't mean they could escape. They now knew what it felt like to wear one of those head coverings. Something was burrowing into their heads, and the coverings, which looked more than spacious enough, had tightened against their skin. Even breathing had become difficult.
That wasn't all. Their vision through the mask-like coverings was blurry, but they could see their hands flailing wildly. When they looked down, their feet were doing the same. As their bodies began to sway, more feet appeared all around them—front, back, left, and right. Those feet were dancing too, dressed in the ghostly costumes worn by the Night Tour procession and topped with ghost masks.
The jingling bells, the distinctive rhythm of the dance, the faint chanting that seemed to come from nowhere,