The Medical Students Wept

"Senior, why do I feel like these Paper Figures are watching us?" He Shan gripped the door frame, refusing to step into the room no matter what. "I'm not joking! There's definitely something wrong with those Paper Figures! Could they be people in disguise? Damn it, I keep feeling like they're going to stand up from the floor the moment I get close!"

The Paper Figures, having been treated with Chen Ge's Corpse Makeup skill, all carried an indescribable sense of eeriness; despite being inanimate objects, they exuded a faint trace of vitality.

Gao Ruxue glared fiercely at He Shan, dying to call him a dead weight. Fear is contagious; she hadn't been that scared initially, but after hearing He Shan, her own heart began to race. "Can you stop talking? If you keep blathering, I'm going to leave you here by yourself."

She entered the room first and scanned her surroundings. The window on the wall of the main room was merely decorative and did not lead to the outside.

"Senior, let's go quickly. This house is wicked, and it's sealed on all sides. The exit definitely isn't here."

"The owner of this Haunted House is skilled in psychological suggestion and understands how to read people, so we must do the opposite. The more impossible a place seems, the more carefully we must search it." Gao Ruxue walked through the room, the breeze from her movement causing the Paper Figures on the floor to sway.

He Shan watched from outside the door, terrified. "But there's no cover in the room, it's all in plain sight. Where could an exit be hidden?"

"No cover? Who told you that?" Gao Ruxue stood in the center of the main room, lifted her long, snow-white leg, and stepped onto the Red Coffin. "Come over and help; I'm going to open the coffin!"

"Open the coffin?!" He Shan's mouth twitched, and he felt completely unwell. "Isn't that a bit inappropriate..."

"Or do you plan on staying in this Haunted House for the rest of your life?" Under Gao Ruxue's coercion, He Shan shuffled into the room inch by inch, carefully avoiding the Paper Figures on the floor, and bent down to support the other end of the coffin lid.

"I'll count to three, and we'll push together."

"Okay."

"One, two..."

"Thump!"

Before Gao Ruxue could even finish counting, an strange noise erupted from inside the room!

"What was that sound?" He Shan hugged the coffin lid, shivering in fright.

"Shh." Gao Ruxue made a gesture for silence. She looked left and right, finally fixing her gaze on the Red Coffin in front of her. "The sound seems to have come from inside the coffin."

Once she said this, He Shan's face turned pale, his Adam's apple bobbing. His hands, clutching the coffin lid, felt as if they were gripping a red-hot iron plate. "Senior, you're like a sister to me, let's just leave, please."

"Calm down. Don't you find it strange that a sound came from inside the coffin just as we were about to open it?"

"It's not strange that a sound came from the coffin, it's life-threatening!" Under the influence of the Gloomy Sunday atmosphere, He Shan's inner fear was magnified infinitely; he just wanted to leave as soon as possible.

"Think about it carefully. There are only two possibilities for a sound coming from a coffin: first, there's a staff member hiding inside, and the moment we open it, they'll jump out to scare us; second, there's some kind of mechanical device inside that triggers a third variable when the lid is opened. Either way, the coffin is a crucial prop in this Ghost Marriage scenario. If we want to escape, opening the coffin is a necessary step." Gao Ruxue patted the lid. "Don't hesitate, just open it."

"I don't know what you're talking about, but it sounds reasonable."

He Shan and Gao Ruxue pushed simultaneously. As the heavy lid slid open to a quarter of its length, a loud bang erupted from the dilapidated coffin without warning!

"Boom!"

The coffin body tipped over, countless Paper Figures and paper money burst out from within, a strange woman's cackle echoed through the room, and the room's door slammed shut automatically!

"Run!" He Shan was close to the door. Terrified, he didn't care about his senior at all and bolted for the exit. But before he could even stick his head out, a woman's face appeared from outside the door!

Pale, exquisite, and breathtakingly beautiful!

"Holy crap!!!"

Caught completely off guard, He Shan swung his fist at the face. But the owner of that face seemed to have anticipated his reaction, as if they had rehearsed it countless times; she dodged before his fist could even land.

"There's a ghost!" His punch missing, he scrambled away in a panic, crawling toward the other side of the courtyard.

"He Shan! Don't run around!" Gao Ruxue shouted. She happened to see a flash of red following He Shan into the West Wing Room.

"The side rooms are for the younger generation to live in. Oh no! The place He Shan ran to is the room where this vengeful spirit lived!" Gao Ruxue rushed to get out, but the room's door was already locked; she was trapped in the main room. "Are they trying to separate us and pick us off one by one? It's just a Haunted House tour, is it really necessary to be this insane?!"

The coffin lay in pieces and the Paper Figures were scattered everywhere. Trapped in the middle, Gao Ruxue's heart was in chaos. She kicked and shoved at the door, finally forcing it open after more than a minute.

In that single minute, however, the outside world seemed to have changed drastically.

"Xiao Shan? He Shan!" Gao Ruxue called out twice, but there was no response. Aside from the eerie background music, the only sound in the Haunted House was the rustling of paper money scraping against the floor.

"What's going on? The Haunted House isn't that big; He Shan shouldn't be unable to hear me. Did something happen to him?" Images of crime scenes flashed through her mind, though Gao Ruxue didn't know why she was suddenly thinking of such things.

She followed the veranda, guided by her memory, and arrived at the West Wing Room. "Xiao Shan ran in this direction just now."

"Creak..."

Pushing open the dilapidated wooden door, the paper-cut 'double happiness' character on it fell away, and Gao Ruxue entered the side room.

The room was decorated as a bridal chamber, but awkwardly, everything was white. Instead of feeling festive, it was bone-chilling.

"Where did he go?" The atmosphere in the room was bizarre. The only light source was the white lantern hanging outside the door. Gao Ruxue moved slowly, cold winds blowing at her back. She felt a chill on her exposed skin, as if an invisible little hand were gently brushing against her.

Her shoes crunched on the paper money, and her feet were occasionally brushed by strange objects. The light was too dim for her to see clearly, so she gritted her teeth and quickened her pace.

Lifting the curtain to the inner room, Gao Ruxue stopped at the threshold. The room was empty; aside from a bed draped in curtains, there were only two Bronze Mirrors placed facing each other against the walls.

"I saw He Shan run into this room with my own eyes. How could he have vanished in just a minute or two? Could the exit be hidden in this room? Did He Shan stumble upon it and escape?"

Thoughts flashed through Gao Ruxue's mind. She took a deep breath and stepped into the room. As she moved, two sets of footsteps echoed in the room simultaneously!

"Who's behind me!"

She whipped her head around, but saw only a Bronze Mirror, reflecting her own image.