Under the Bed

After hearing that Jiang Cheng didn't sleep on the bed, Xie Yu scooted over and felt around on the blanket. The bed felt incredibly comfortable.

Unlike Jiang Cheng, his back was bad, and he couldn't sleep on the floor.

"What are you touching?" The Fatty pointed at Xie Yu and barked, "That's not for you to covet! Take your hand off it and stand up straight!"

He also had little patience for fence-sitters like Xie Yu.

"If you don't want to share a bed, take turns sleeping," Jiang Cheng said indifferently, turning his head. "Fatty, you stay up with me. You take the first three hours, then I'll take over."

Jiang Cheng figured Xie Yu's watch was useless to him, so he took it.

"What do you need me to do?" Xie Yu asked, wrapped completely in the blanket with only his head sticking out.

"I need you to shut up."

Having made a fool of himself, Xie Yu curled back up. This time, he pulled the blanket over his head and wrapped himself into a silkworm cocoon.

Although the villa had electricity, the voltage grew unstable at night. The incandescent bulb overhead flickered incessantly, occasionally crackling.

With the setting and those lighting effects, it was practically a horror movie.

Jiang Cheng had no choice but to turn off the light.

The moonlight coming in through the window made it just possible to see the room.

The Fatty leaned against the sofa. He was fine for the first hour, but gradually his eyelids began to droop. He knew it was dangerous, yet, strangely, he couldn't stop himself. At last, his head lolled to one side, and he fell into a deep sleep.

He slept heavily, though probably not for long. At least, when he woke groggily, the room was still pitch-black.

He rubbed his eyes, suddenly feeling a little shaken.

Someone was lying beside the bed: Jiang Cheng. On the bed, Xie Yu had curled himself into a silkworm cocoon.

For now, everything seemed normal.

The Fatty was sleepy, but he didn't dare fall asleep again. Worse, he'd drunk too much water and needed to use the bathroom.

There was a bathroom in the bedroom, about five meters from where the Fatty sat. It was tiny, with translucent glass all around it.

But ever since the middle-aged man had died mysteriously in the bathroom, the Fatty had developed a deep-seated aversion to it, both mental and physical. He didn't want to go in.

He couldn't even bear to go near it.

Then he remembered how Jiang Cheng had handled things earlier.

A mineral water bottle!

But he soon sank into a new wave of despair.

Before going to sleep, Jiang Cheng had thrown the bottle into the trash can, and the trash can—

The Fatty swallowed hard. The trash can stood silently just outside the bathroom door.

He had no choice but to inch toward it, each step like testing the edge of danger.

At last, he reached the trash can and quickly managed to retrieve the empty water bottle.

But before he could celebrate, something in the corner of his eye seemed out of place. He mechanically turned his head and saw an arm sticking out from behind the bathroom's glass door.

Upstairs, in the master bedroom.

Fan Li abruptly sat up from the sofa, then quickly went to the door and pressed his ear against it.

"What's wrong?"

Sister Nuan and Chen Xiaomeng, who were lying on the bed, sat up too. To prepare for danger that could arise at any moment, they hadn't even taken off their clothes, and they hadn't dared to sleep too deeply.

Fan Li raised a finger to his lips and gestured for them to be quiet.

Sister Nuan and Chen Xiaomeng immediately fell silent. It was as though the air itself had stopped moving.

About a minute later, they heard a faint creak.

It sounded as if a door had suddenly opened.

A few seconds later, slow footsteps came from the corridor outside.

Tap. Tap.

Each step sounded as if it were landing in water.

There was also a strange scraping noise, as though someone were dragging something heavy along the hallway floor.

The footsteps headed in one direction, growing fainter until they disappeared.

Fan Li and the two women turned pale. The sound had vanished at the end of the corridor, where there was nothing but a locked room.

Something had happened.

Something had definitely happened!

Who was it this time?

The chubby man who could cook, the timid clerk named Xie Yu, or... that strange Hao Shuai?

In the other room, inside the cramped bathroom.

The Fatty stared in terror, his whole body trembling uncontrollably.

He didn't make a sound.

A hand clamped tightly over his mouth.

Jiang Cheng crouched beside the Fatty. The hand covering the Fatty's mouth belonged to him.

Both of them stared fixedly out through the doorway.

The bedroom door stood open, moonlight spilling in through the window.

The bed was empty. Even the blanket was gone. Thinking of what he'd just seen, the Fatty's teeth chattered with fear.

The figure lying on the floor beside the bed swayed as it rose to its feet. Its movements were bizarre, its body twisted, and its build abnormally bulky. It clearly wasn't Jiang Cheng.

Of course it wasn't.

Jiang Cheng was hiding behind the bathroom door, having dragged the Fatty inside and clamped a hand over his mouth.

The two of them crouched on the floor, barely daring to breathe as they watched through the translucent glass.

The bulky figure stared at the bathroom for more than ten seconds before turning around. It crawled into the bed from a corner, following the edge of the blanket. Xie Yu inside either didn't notice or was asleep. The figure moved so violently that the bed creaked as though it might collapse beneath its weight, yet Xie Yu didn't react at all.

Then the blanket shook violently a few times, and the room suddenly fell silent.

Jiang Cheng and the Fatty didn't dare move.

The figure crawled out from under the blanket, then slowly walked toward the door, one step at a time. Water sounds kept coming, especially clear in the silent night.

In the faint moonlight, Jiang Cheng saw a blanket trailing behind the figure. Inside the blanket—

He turned to look at the bed. It was empty.

Even after the sounds of water and something heavy being dragged faded at the end of the hallway, Jiang Cheng and the Fatty still didn't move.

They held their positions for who knew how long, until the door finally opened.

Fan Li came in first, with Sister Nuan and Chen Xiaomeng following behind him. All three crept along the wall and entered cautiously.

Only then did Jiang Cheng release the Fatty, and the two of them came out of the bathroom.

The Fatty's lips were trembling, so Jiang Cheng had to explain what had just happened.

He'd been asleep when a chill suddenly woke him. In his haze, he'd spotted a dark shadow beneath the bed where Xie Yu was sleeping.

The shadow was on all fours, its joints bent the wrong way, and it was slowly crawling out.