The Landlord

Fatigue, numbness, and frailty were Chen Ge's first impressions of Wang Qi.

They passed each other, and Chen Ge returned the Missing Person Notice he had just picked up from the ground. The man softly thanked him.

It was the first time he had spoken. His voice was hoarse and hard to make out.

"You're welcome. It's no trouble."

Chen Ge smiled and followed the Lame Man to the second floor.

Compared to the first floor, the second was damper and darker. Cobwebs filled the corners, and the walls were mottled, as if someone had gouged them with a carving knife.

The Lame Man led Chen Ge all the way to the end of the corridor before stopping. He opened the door at the Deepest End of Second Floor Corridor and took out a long string of keys. "It's fifty yuan a night. Pick any room on the second floor."

"Isn't fifty a bit steep?"

"I'm the only one with an Apartment Building for several kilometers around here. Fifty is already cheap." As the Lame Man spoke, his eyes kept darting backward, as if he were looking at something.

"Fine, but why can I only pick a room on the second floor? Are the first and third floors unoccupied?"

"Why do you ask so many questions? If you can't stay there, you can't stay there!" The Lame Man took the fifty yuan from Chen Ge and casually handed him a key. "The room number's on the key. Find it yourself."

He then went into his room. As the door closed, Chen Ge heard an old man inside mumbling and groaning, as if food had gotten stuck in his throat.

Chen Ge sensed that something was off and reached out to hold the doorknob. "Wait a moment."

"What now?" The Lame Man's tone was unfriendly. He sounded annoyed.

Chen Ge peered through the gap in the door. The rental room was small. Besides the Lame Man standing by the entrance, there was an old man sitting in a wheelchair with his back to the door. The sound had come from him.

"I'm a little thirsty. Do you sell water or drinks here?"

"No!"

"Good manners bring good business. Why are you getting so angry..."

The door slammed shut. Standing alone in the corridor, Chen Ge felt increasingly uneasy.

"Normally, an Apartment Building's reception would be by the entrance, but this one's hidden at the Deepest End of Second Floor Corridor." He looked at the key in his hand, his mind filling with questions. "Why can't anyone stay on the first or third floor? And who's the old man living with the Landlord?"

The key had a label marked Room 208. By coincidence, the room it opened was right next door to the Lame Man's.

"Whatever. I'll move in first." After traveling for more than two hours, Chen Ge was getting tired.

He opened the door, and a faint musty smell drifted out. The room looked as if it hadn't been occupied for a long time. Dust covered the furniture, and the damp bedsheets felt unpleasant to the touch.

"Could anyone even sleep in this bed?" Before Chen Ge could set down his bag, he heard a sharp crack from the room next door, as if a rice bowl had been smashed.

He shut the door and pressed his ear to the wall to listen. The Lame Man soon began cursing. He sounded so furious that he even slipped in a couple of dialect words while insulting the old man. His accent didn't sound local.

The old man could only mumble and groan, unable to speak. The Lame Man cursed for several minutes before stopping. Then, oddly enough, the volume of the television next door suddenly went up.

"What's going on? What's he doing? Why turn up the volume?" Chen Ge kept listening for a few more minutes, but the TV was too loud to make anything out. He gave up. "Forget it. I'd better worry about my own problems. Tonight's bound to be a sleepless one."

Chen Ge tossed his backpack onto the dressing table and took out a Fruit Knife, hiding it in his pocket. "The complaint section of a secondhand housing website said there were traces of blood behind the walls, and that a Foul Stench could always be smelled late at night. That's why people suspect this place is haunted. But I searched online for everything related to Ping An Apartment, and couldn't find a single murder case that took place in this Apartment Building."

Chen Ge knew full well that Ping An Apartment must be hiding some unspeakable secret to have been chosen by the Black Phone as a trial mission location.

He hid the Fruit Knife, took out the Tool Hammer, and tapped and checked every corner of the room, but still found nothing.

It was an ordinary guest room. Aside from being shockingly run-down, there was nothing unusual about it.

"The Landlord only let me choose a room on the second floor at first, which means those rooms probably aren't a problem. Otherwise, he wouldn't rent them out. So if I want to find anything, I'll have to check the first or third floor." The trial mission would begin at eleven tonight. There were still more than three hours to go, and Chen Ge didn't want to waste time. He put away the Tool Hammer and quietly went to the door.

With his hand on the doorknob, Chen Ge had just pulled the door halfway open when he suddenly froze.

His palm was sweaty, and a chill ran up his spine.

The Lame Man was standing right outside his door! Who knew how long he'd been there!

The other man hadn't expected Chen Ge to open the door so suddenly, either. The two of them, separated by a half-open door, both jumped.

"Landlord, what are you doing outside my room?" Chen Ge's expression darkened. He was becoming more and more certain that something was wrong with the Landlord.

"You said you were thirsty, didn't you? I came to bring you this." The Lame Man set the thermos in his hand down in front of Chen Ge's door, looking somewhat uneasy.

"Thanks." Chen Ge didn't call him out on it. He simply picked up the thermos and carried it inside. "Do you need anything else?"

"No. Get some rest." The Lame Man glanced into the room, then added, almost as if speaking to himself, "There are no lights in the corridor. It gets very dark at night, so you'd better not wander around."

He turned and left. Chen Ge didn't let out a breath of relief until the Lame Man had returned to his own room and shut the door.

"The Landlord was ugly, hot-tempered, and taciturn. Though he had a slight disability, he was well-built and could easily shove over the middle-aged man I'd seen earlier." Chen Ge wasn't much of a detective. He was just drawing on the murder movies he'd watched to let his imagination run wild. "He was born with a limp and bullied from childhood, so he might be deeply insecure. Once those feelings reached a certain point, they could twist and erupt into a desire to destroy others and himself. Holy crap. When I put it that way, he sounds like he has every personality trait of a Murderous Maniac!"

Chen Ge set down the thermos and tried to think through one question. "If the Landlord really is a Murderous Maniac, does that mean I'll be spending the night in a haunted house, right next door to a killer?"

The thought made his scalp crawl. That old freak might even stand outside his room all night! Worse, he was the Landlord, so he probably had spare keys to every room!