"This is the first haunted house I've ever seen that wasn't scary at all."
"The props looked so fake. We walked around the whole place, and not only were we not scared, we even felt like laughing."
"Materialists fear nothing!"
"I told you ages ago it wouldn't be any fun. We'd have been better off gaming in the dorm. My Kun is already level eighty."
Outside the Hanjiang City Western Suburbs Haunted House, several students hopped on shared bikes and rode off without a backward glance.
Watching them go, Chen Ge stood holding a promotional flyer for the haunted house, looking rather helpless.
Scaring people was a technical skill, but modern people had been through all kinds of horror movies and had nerves of steel. Going into a haunted house was like hanging out in their own backyard.
"Boss!"
A clear female voice came from behind him. Chen Ge turned and saw a petite "zombie" in a nurse's uniform storm out of the haunted house, looking furious.
"What's wrong, Xiao Wan?" The girl's name was Xu Wan, and she was one of the haunted house's part-time actors.
"Those little punks just tried to take advantage of me!" She bared her canines and clenched her fists.
So she'd come to complain...
"That's too much. They didn't even spare a zombie." As her boss, Chen Ge naturally took Xiao Wan's side. "I'll report it to the park manager and check the surveillance footage."
"No need to go to all that trouble. As soon as I realized what they were trying to do, I struck first and beat one of them up." Xu Wan shook the bloodstains on the hem of her nurse's uniform. "This isn't makeup, by the way."
"Uh, no problem. Girls should learn how to protect themselves." Chen Ge wiped the cold sweat from his forehead and glanced at the sunset. "That's it for today. There probably won't be any more visitors, so tell everyone else they can clock off early."
But the girl in zombie makeup didn't move.
"Is something else wrong?"
"Boss..." Xu Wan hesitated, then slowly pulled a letter from her pocket. "This is Tao Ming and Xiao Wei's resignation letter. You've treated them well, so they felt awkward telling you in person. They asked me to give it to you."
"They're leaving?" Chen Ge froze for a moment, then took the envelope. "Everyone has their own plans. You should clock off early too."
"Mm-hmm. I'm going to take off my makeup."
After watching the adorable, slightly dazed little "zombie" leave, Chen Ge silently lit a cigarette.
Half a year ago, his parents had mysteriously disappeared, leaving behind only this House of Horrors.
Unable to let go of the last connection to them, Chen Ge had quit his job and devoted himself to running the haunted house, hoping to make it better.
Unfortunately, times were changing too quickly. The haunted house business was fiercely competitive, rather niche, and subject to plenty of limitations.
The same horror scene became boring after people had seen it once, while constantly updating the attractions required a great deal of money.
For the past few weeks, the haunted house had been running at a loss. A day's ticket revenue wasn't even enough to cover a fraction of the utility bills.
"I wonder how much longer I can hold on."
After putting out his cigarette, Chen Ge was about to head back inside when a middle-aged man in a New Century Park work uniform walked over.
Seeing him, Chen Ge reacted like a mouse spotting a cat and hurried up his pace.
"Are you pretending you can't see me?" The middle-aged man grabbed Chen Ge by the shoulder. "Let's settle this today. You're two months behind on both utilities and rent for the venue. The higher-ups keep pressing me, and it's putting me under a lot of pressure!"
"Uncle Xu, it's not that I don't want to pay. I really am short on funds right now. Give me one more month."
"You said the same thing last month."
"I promise you, this will absolutely be the last month!" Chen Ge patted his chest, his face earnest.
"The haunted house business is struggling. You can't attract visitors, so if you ask me, you should stop trying to keep it going." The middle-aged man, whom everyone called Uncle Xu, glanced at the envelope in Chen Ge's hand. His grip gradually loosened. "You're still so young. You could do anything. Why make life so hard for yourself?"
"Uncle Xu, I know you mean well, but this House of Horrors means a lot to me. It's one of the few things my parents left behind." Chen Ge's voice dropped, as if he didn't want anyone else to hear.
As the park manager, Uncle Xu knew all about what had happened to Chen Ge's parents. He didn't reply. A few seconds later, he let out a sigh and softened. "I can understand how you feel, more or less. All right, I'll try to buy you a few more weeks."
"Thanks, Uncle Xu!"
"Don't thank me. Put some effort into selling more tickets."
After seeing the park manager off, Chen Ge went straight back into the haunted house and began his usual daily routine: inspecting the equipment for wear and tear, maintaining the props, and cleaning.
"The artificial blood in the Repair Room is almost gone. I'll have to buy another batch. If I tilt this passage inward a little, it might make better use of the visitors' blind spots. Someone's torn the Mannequin, so I need to patch it up. Damn it! Where's the decorative lamp I installed? Who stole it?"
In other people's eyes, he was the owner of a House of Horrors, a promising young entrepreneur. In reality, only he knew how hard things were behind the scenes.
A haunted house was a kind of "fear-based" entertainment. In a frightening environment, people's muscles and minds became highly tense. Once the tension was released, it was like getting a massage, giving them a sense of satisfaction that could last for a short time.
At the same time, haunted houses were a one-time experience. Many places in the industry moved from city to city, constantly bringing in new visitors. A fixed-location haunted house like Chen Ge's could only last if it became famous enough to draw people from far away.
It was already no small feat that he'd managed to keep it going by himself for so long.
Dragging the torn Mannequin, Chen Ge entered the Repair Room. He had majored in toy design and manufacturing at university, and he'd designed many of the Mannequins and mechanisms in the haunted house himself.
The repairs were complicated and tedious. He had to stitch the Mannequin's skin back together, repaint it, and give it a weathered look.
"I'm short on blood. I think there's still some stored in the attic." The haunted house had three floors. The first and second were used for the horror scenes, while the third was a Utility Room.
He pushed open the dusty Wood Door. The attic was crammed with all kinds of discarded equipment, most of it left over from the days when his parents had run the haunted house.
The place brought back too many memories, so Chen Ge rarely came up here.
"More than half a year has passed in the blink of an eye."
Looking at the familiar equipment, Chen Ge thought back to his childhood.
Back then, his parents ran a traveling haunted house. They took him with them as they went from city to city. When the young couple got busy, they'd leave Chen Ge alone backstage, surrounded by all kinds of props made to look like ghosts and monsters. Growing up around them had made him very brave.
After all, while other kids his age were playing with alphabet puzzles, he was already running around with a Human Head model in his arms.
"Those were the days."
Without realizing it, Chen Ge had wandered over to the wooden box holding his parents' belongings. Inside lay a crude Ragdoll and a black phone.
The Ragdoll was the first toy Chen Ge had made as a child. He had no memory of the phone at all.
The police had found the two items at an abandoned hospital in the suburbs. No one knew why Chen Ge's parents had gone there in the middle of the night.
"So much time has passed. Where are you?" Chen Ge picked up the Ragdoll and squeezed its face, then sighed softly. "I should hurry up and find some artificial blood. If I can't make it through the off-season, the House of Horrors might really have to close and be put up for transfer."
Chen Ge was only talking to himself, but when he mentioned closing the place and transferring ownership, the black phone in the wooden box—which had been silent until then—suddenly lit up, its screen giving off a faint, cold glow.
"What's going on? Some kind of black technology? A paranormal phenomenon?"
Anyone else might have felt their heart race, looked around nervously, or started sweating. Chen Ge's reaction was much more straightforward. He picked up the phone, held it in front of his eyes, and checked it again.
"I tried a hundred times to turn this phone on, and it never worked. Why did it suddenly start up by itself today? It was found where my parents disappeared. Could they know how much trouble I'm in and be contacting me?"
Suppressing his excitement, Chen Ge swiped the screen. There was only one app on the black phone's home screen, and its icon was a haunted house.
"This isn't what I expected. But that icon looks familiar. Isn't it the entrance to my own House of Horrors?"
Frowning, Chen Ge tapped the app. A line of bloody text appeared on the screen: Do you believe that ghosts exist in this world?
Whether ghosts existed was a metaphysical philosophical question. For a science and engineering guy like Chen Ge, it was a tough one.
"I guess they do..."
Chen Ge made his choice. A few seconds later, new text appeared on the phone screen.
"What you believe in your heart is the answer. From this moment on, you will officially take my place as the new owner of the House of Horrors. Of course, this isn't something worth celebrating. In the final stage of the tutorial, I'd like to leave you with one piece of advice: suicide is the most cowardly act. Please fight to stay alive!"
"That's a lot to take in! But that over-the-top way of talking sounds a bit like my dad."
Chen Ge tapped the House of Horrors app again, and a completely new interface appeared:
Hanjiang City Western Suburbs Haunted House Status: On the Brink of Closing Review Rating: None Visitors Today: Four Visitors This Month: Ten Members of My Ghost Team: None My Prop Collection: None Achievements Unlocked: None Current Attractions: Zombie Resurrection Night (Terrible props, awful actors, no story or logic to speak of. Scream Index: None); Unlockable Horror Scenarios: Midnight Escape (A dangerous mental patient has moved into a run-down Apartment Building. He is holding scissors and a hammer, pacing outside your door. Scream Index: One star); Third Ward (This abandoned hospital makes strange noises every night. You are a newspaper reporter entering to investigate. Scream Index: Three stars); Death Hearse (The hearse carrying the dead is already on the road. If you can't get off within an hour, you'll be trapped inside forever. Scream Index: Two stars) Daily Tasks: Complete the House of Horrors' daily tasks to receive corresponding rewards and unlock more horror scenarios. House Expansion Requirements: Monthly visitors exceed one hundred, and the positive review rate reaches at least sixty percent. (After three expansions, the House of Horrors will upgrade to the Trembling Labyrinth.) Horror Roulette (Use the fright value generated by visitors in the haunted house to spin the wheel): Life and death are fated; wealth and honor are in the hands of Heaven. Here you'll find spirit fruit that can extend your life, as well as Vengeful Spirits steeped in resentment! Other Functions: Locked
Before you continue