The Voice Behind Me

4:04 a.m.

Following the game rules, Zhang Ze turned off all the lights, faced the wall, closed his eyes, and began counting silently.

The surroundings instantly became pitch-black, so dark he could not see his hand in front of his face. At four in the morning, even the streets of the western suburbs saw few passing cars. The air was quiet and oppressive.

As Zhang Ze's movements slowed, a chill gradually crept up from the soles of his feet and climbed his spine.

"One."

"Two."

"Three..."

As the numbers continued to rise.

Zhang Ze clearly sensed a sound coming from within the hotel that did not belong to him.

People were actually extremely sensitive to their surroundings.

Haunted houses, escape rooms, and horror-themed murder mystery games all created fear through their environments. The human brain automatically processed external information.

If something unreasonable appeared.

For example, a person who did not belong, or something that resembled a "person."

It would trigger the brain's fear response.

Zhang Ze counted while trying to calm himself down.

Ever since he had transmigrated, he had never truly seen a ghost.

This was very likely his first time seeing one.

Even though he had prepared himself mentally, when Zhang Ze silently counted to seven, he suddenly heard the sound of a water droplet hitting the ground from the bathroom behind him.

It was not just one drop.

"Drip, drip..."

"Drip, drip..."

One after another, the dripping sounds merged into a continuous patter.

Zhang Ze froze for a moment.

"Is it raining?"

"The weather forecast said the western suburbs would have plenty of cloudy, rainy nights these next few days. Am I overthinking it?"

Zhang Ze really wanted to turn around.

He wanted to look through the window and see whether it was truly raining outside.

But reason restrained him, keeping him from acting rashly. Until the game was over, he had to maintain this posture of facing the wall and could not change it lightly.

"Drip, drip..."

The familiar sound of dripping water.

But it was getting closer and closer.

Zhang Ze continued counting silently.

"Seven."

"Eight."

"Nine..."

He tried not to pay attention to the dripping.

But no matter how he cleared his mind, the sound did not disappear. Instead, it drew closer, becoming clearer and clearer.

It was a sticky set of footsteps, as though something had stepped through water and mud, crawled out of the bathroom behind Zhang Ze, and slowly approached him.

With every little bit it came closer.

Zhang Ze's heart gave a violent tremor.

He was certain now.

That thing was definitely not the sound of rain.

Something had truly appeared—perhaps from the sewer, perhaps from the drain, perhaps from the showerhead. In any case, it had come from somewhere.

Even the dripping sound might not have actually been water.

It was...

Zhang Ze's mouth twitched.

"Ten."

When he counted to ten.

Theoretically, the game should have ended.

Yet the dripping did not disappear. It continued closing in on Zhang Ze.

Zhang Ze panicked.

"Holy shit?"

"The system never said how to end it!!"

Then he realized.

[Please start a livestream at 4:04 a.m., turn off all lights in the room, face any wall, and count silently in your heart. When you count to ten, if you hear any sound that does not belong to you, the game is a success. Otherwise, the game is a failure.]

He had counted to ten.

And he had heard that wet sound behind him.

The game had succeeded.

Which meant he had successfully invited a ghost in.

Then what?

The system had not told him what came next!!

"It's over, it's over. Easy to invite Buddha, hard to send him away."

"Even summoning the Pen Fairy has a step for sending it away. How the hell do I deal with this thing?"

A bead of cold sweat squeezed out on Zhang Ze's forehead.

His mind raced as he tried to find some way to remedy the situation.

The dripping sound was already very close. From more than ten meters away at first, it was now less than two meters from him. He could practically hear every drop striking the floor.

They were not ordinary water droplets.

The liquid flowed thickly, like malt syrup or some other boiled concoction, dragging across the carpet with a rustling sound.

At the same time.

At some point.

A strange stench began filling the air, as though something had gone moldy, mixed with the smell of rusty water.

Calling the guest room phone now would obviously be useless.

Zhang Ze had already counted to ten.

That thing did not intend to leave. It had definitely set its sights on Zhang Ze.

Zhang Ze took a deep breath.

Still keeping his eyes shut, he reached toward the switch on the wall according to where he remembered it to be.

No matter what.

He needed to turn on the lights first.

No matter what he saw when he opened his eyes, he would at least be able to react.

"Tap, tap..."

The wall was completely bare.

Zhang Ze broke out in even more cold sweat.

He clearly remembered that the light switch was right there.

After starting the livestream, he had deliberately memorized the locations of the switch, the bed, the bathroom, and everything else, precisely to handle a situation like this.

But what he had not expected was.

He was certain he had only taken two steps.

The light switch could not possibly be that far from him, yet he had felt along the entire wall and still could not find it.

At some point, the wall.

Had become somewhat damp.

Like the wall of a bathroom.

Had he somehow reached the bathroom with his eyes closed?

The hotel room was only forty or fifty square meters at most. Could he get lost in a place like this?

"Found it!"

Zhang Ze suddenly felt a hard bump.

He pressed it down sharply.

The next second, Zhang Ze opened his eyes.

Contrary to the brightly lit room he had imagined, the room remained pitch-black. Zhang Ze was standing directly in front of the bed, with neither a wall nor a light switch before him.

It was still completely dark.

Faint moonlight shone in through the window.

There was nothing in the room besides Zhang Ze.

Zhang Ze hurriedly turned on the lights.

The lights instantly illuminated every corner of the room.

The first thing Zhang Ze noticed was that the bathroom door had somehow opened. It had been pushed open from the inside, and a trail of water stretched from the pipe connection into the bedroom.

It ended beside the wall.

There were traces on the ground as though something had been dragged across it.

Zhang Ze even spotted some long strands of hair. They were not his; he did not have a habit of keeping his hair long.

The strange smell vanished the moment Zhang Ze opened his eyes.

"What the hell?"

Zhang Ze could not make sense of it.

His gaze shifted to the phone on the bedside table.

"Right, I'm still livestreaming!"

Zhang Ze hurriedly pulled up the backend.

The first thing he saw was an endless flood of comments.

"Oh my god, can this thing really be acted out??"

"Holy shit, this is even scarier than that haunted house owner's stuff just now!!"

"Help, I can't watch this anymore. I called the police. I know this hotel—Peace Hotel in the western suburbs of Hanjiang City. Officers, hurry and save the streamer!!"

What was strange was that every comment Zhang Ze saw had been posted half an hour ago, and even the newest one was from ten minutes ago.

After that, Zhang Ze's livestream had been shut down.

"No, man, what the hell happened?"

Zhang Ze did not know whether the comments about calling the police were real, but judging from their reactions, things seemed absurdly intense.

He replayed the livestream footage from just now.