Second Dead Person

Second Dead Person

Three o'clock in the morning.

Thud, thud-thud!

Heavy footsteps sounded outside the door, drawing closer.

Fang Zhi gripped the crowbar tightly. The plastic bag over his face hid his expression, but his trembling hands betrayed how he really felt.

"This patient is different from the previous one. The virus has caused his body to mutate, making him highly aggressive. He should be subdued before treatment."

Bang!

A huge foot kicked the door open.

Bang!

A massive hand grabbed Fang Zhi by the head and easily slammed him to the floor. His efforts couldn't budge the Great Wraith in the slightest, but he kept swinging the crowbar and hammering at its head.

He hurriedly opened the cupboard. Inside, he saw his parents' twisted bodies, crammed into the tiny space until there wasn't an inch to spare.

He wiped the handprint off Yue Mei's door, then rubbed his hand against the damp cement mark on the floor. Next, he pressed his hand against Room 402, where Qi Zhiyong lived, and touched it up a little with a pen. It ended up looking nine-tenths like Yu Yinghua's handprint!

A terrifying figure appeared in front of Fang Zhi. According to Qi Zhiyong, something like this couldn't be a weak Wandering Wraith. It had to be a Great Wraith, something no mortal could stand against!

Fang Zhi trembled like a leaf.

Wu Xian pondered for a moment, then began his Plan to Stir Things Up.

Aged Cypress Incense: Calms the mind and spirit, reduces swelling, and disperses blood stasis. Three sticks per set. Can be used to worship the gods.

That meant the corridor would be safe and secluded from then until dawn!

He wasn't a hundred percent certain, but for the sake of a greater reward, Wu Xian had no choice but to take the risk.

Wu Xian first surveyed all the rooms.

Scenes from his life even flashed through his mind like a montage, showing the moments that had left the deepest impression on him.

"Pfft..."

Wu Xian spread his hands with a mocking air. "I just thought of something funny."

"Otherwise, wouldn't that make it my fault?"

And that day...

His family, his love, the honors he'd earned.

"Why me? I've been careful enough. Wasn't I marked because that woman found me? Did I let something slip?"

The Great Wraith lifted its hand and shook it, looking a little confused.

When the scene appeared in Fang Zhi's mind, he stopped trembling. As if overcome with rage, he let out a deafening roar, raised the steel crowbar, and smashed it toward the Great Wraith's head.

Fang Zhi's door had been smashed open, and more than a dozen handprints covered it. It seemed Yu Yinghua held a deep grudge against him.

"Go back and get some more sleep. Rest up, then you can have some fun with Qi Zhiyong."

This time, Wu Xian didn't find a statue of a god. But beneath the mattress, he found three fragrant sticks of brown incense. Once he picked them up, new information appeared on the item page.

It was the reward!

This was the perfect chance to claim the reward in Fang Zhi's room for himself!

Entering Room 407, Wu Xian saw Fang Zhi's corpse, his skull smashed in. His hand was still clutching the crowbar tightly, clear proof that he'd tried to fight back until the very end.

It was the instinctive fear of a creature low on the food chain toward a predator.

If death was inevitable, Wu Xian would rather die like Fang Zhi than suffer the way Lu Yuzhu had.

"Tch..."

The corridor was gloomy, its floor marked with still-wet mud and water. A dim yellow light flickered overhead, lending the place a stifling, dreadful air. Just opening the door sent a chill straight through Wu Xian, as if every pore on his body had opened.

Wu Xian pursed his lips in disappointment. He'd thought the three sticks of incense could be used three times.

After finishing all that, Wu Xian didn't return to his room.

Two faces, crushed out of shape, wore eerie smiles.

He had three reasons for doing this.

His expression shifted between dark and stormy, his anger held in check like a volcano on the verge of erupting.

Wu Xian was the last to leave. Rubbing his sleepy eyes, he saw Qi Zhiyong's grim face and burst out laughing.

Fang Zhi was dead. Now came the critical part.

Wu Xian quickly searched the room.

Qi Zhiyong cursed, then turned away and stopped looking at Wu Xian. He didn't have the time or patience to argue with him.

Hearing Fang Zhi's roar, he shook his head.

Where had this coward found the courage to charge at him?

Qi Zhiyong had sent Wu Xian to investigate Lu Yuzhu's room so Wu Xian would take the risk while he gathered information. Wu Xian had been cursed as a result, yet afterward Qi Zhiyong had offered him no compensation at all. He'd even gone out of his way to treat Wu Xian differently.

It was creepy, sure.

"I know. I've always known it's all real... But I have to believe ghosts don't exist. Otherwise..."

A fresh handprint had appeared on the door of Room 408.

Beneath the massive hand.

Qi Zhiyong's attitude convinced Wu Xian that if they ever had to sacrifice someone, Qi Zhiyong would do it without hesitation.

So Wu Xian felt it was only fair to have Qi Zhiyong gather information for him and take on some of the risk.

This was Yue Mei's room. The timid nurse had been targeted by evil spirits early on.

Testing the evil spirits' patterns of behavior alone wasn't enough to make Wu Xian take such a huge risk. What had really driven him to go out before dawn...

But Wu Xian didn't care about Fang Zhi's family. He casually tossed the photo aside and soon finished searching the room.

Wu Xian stood up straight. As early as yesterday morning, he'd figured out from how long the cement marks took to dry that Yu Yinghua had left half an hour before dawn. Since dawn the previous day had been at six, he'd set his alarm for 5:30.

But he was only food.

Instead, he went to Fang Zhi's Room 407.

Pfft!

Fang Zhi's skull was crushed.

Fang Zhi's face twisted out of shape, tears and blood streaming down together.

After waiting a while, Lu Yuzhu's phone vibrated. Wu Xian had set an alarm on it beforehand. Without the phone, it would've been hard to keep track of the time.

While searching, Wu Xian found a photograph of Fang Zhi's family of three. The faces of both his father and mother had been rubbed blurry.

His parents didn't come out to welcome him as they usually did. Puzzled, he searched the house, and eventually found blood seeping out of a small cupboard.

"Son, you're home! This house was such a good buy..."

Wu Xian had always thought Fang Zhi was just a coward with a big mouth. He hadn't expected him to put up such a fight before he died.

Sitting against the wall, Wu Xian listened to every sound outside the door.

First, Yue Mei seemed like a decent person, and he wanted to try to save her.

Qi Zhiyong was furious.

But the corridor was empty. There wasn't a person or an evil spirit in sight!

"Just as I thought!"

"He died quickly. That's good—he was lucky."

Wu Xian sat up from the floor and cautiously opened the door. Since he'd greased it with pig intestines, the sound of the door opening was practically inaudible.

Second, he wanted to figure out the Great Wraith's logic for choosing its victims: Did it rely on handprints? Doors with handprints? Did it mark rooms, or did it simply mark people?

Finally, Wu Xian was fed up with Qi Zhiyong and wanted to cause him some trouble.

Wu Xian had taunted him on purpose.

After the way Qi Zhiyong had treated him, it would look strange if he weren't happy to see Qi Zhiyong in trouble. It might make the others wary of him.