Welcome to the Haunted House, My Sisters

"No... no!!" She finally made a sound, but it was a scream filled with terror.

Hadn't she already escaped? Hadn't she already become "Esther" of the Coleman Household? Why had she returned to this Hell?!

"Lina, quiet down." A stern-looking woman in a nurse's uniform walked over, holding a thick syringe. "You're acting up again. It seems yesterday's sedative dosage wasn't enough."

"I'm not Lina! I'm Esther! Let me go!" She struggled madly, but the restraints only tightened, digging into her bones with agonizing pain.

"Poor child, you always imagine yourself as someone else." The nurse wore a practiced expression of sympathy, but the needle in her hand mercilessly pierced her arm.

Icy liquid entered her veins, and a powerful wave of weakness and drowsiness swept over her.

But she couldn't fall asleep! She knew that once she did, she would never wake up again!

Just as her consciousness was about to fade, a childish voice with a smile in it sounded beside her ear.

"Do you like the 'nostalgia package' I prepared for you, Sister Esther?"

Lily appeared beside the hospital bed out of thin air. She still looked like a ten-year-old girl, but she held a thick medical file with "Lina Kramer" printed across it in bold letters.

"This was... your doing?" Esther's mind cleared for an instant. Looking at Lily, she finally understood.

This wasn't reality. It was an incomparably realistic nightmare.

"Now tell me, what are you?" Lily closed the file and looked down at her.

"I... I'm Esther..." Lina stubbornly refused to yield.

"Wrong answer." Lily shook her head and snapped her fingers.

The surroundings changed in an instant. She was no longer tied to a bed, but standing in an art studio, facing her "father," Allen.

Allen was looking at her gently, but in the next second, his wife Tricia and son Gunnar appeared behind him, glaring at her with venomous eyes that seemed to want to tear her to pieces.

"You monster! You seduced Allen!"

"Kill her! We have to kill her!"

The mother and son charged at her with knives raised!

"No!"

The scene shifted again, and she returned to the psychiatric hospital, to that cold bed.

"Now answer me again. What are you?" Lily's voice rang out once more.

Fear completely shattered Lina Kramer's last psychological defense.

"I... I'm an adult psychiatric patient pretending to be a nine-year-old girl..." She used all her strength to force out those humiliating words.

"Very good." Lily nodded in satisfaction. "Remember who you are. From now on, be a good little 'Esther.' Don't entertain thoughts you shouldn't have, or we can play this game every day."

Meanwhile, Emma's experience was no better.

Her world hadn't turned into a psychiatric hospital. Instead, it had become a frozen wasteland.

She stood on an ice-covered lake. Before her was a former classmate.

"Emma! Give me back my medal! It's mine!" the classmate shouted angrily.

"You were too useless to win it yourself. What makes you think it's yours?" Emma held the golden medal in her arms, her face wearing a disdainful smile.

This was one of the proudest moments of her life.

Not only had she stolen the other girl's glory, but she had also completely dealt with that troublesome nuisance.

"You thief!" Her classmate lunged at her in fury.

Emma lightly sidestepped, then stuck out her foot to trip her with perfect precision while shoving her hard.

"Ah—!"

Her classmate slipped on the ice, smashing the back of her head heavily against a jutting ridge of ice. Blood instantly poured out, staining the white ice red.

Emma watched as the girl twitched and slowly fell silent, a satisfied smile appearing on her face.

Then, in the next second—

"Emma! Give me back my medal! It's mine!"

The exact same words. The exact same scene.

Her classmate stood before her completely unharmed and lunged at her again.

Emma froze for a moment, then instinctively repeated her previous actions.

Push her down, smash her head, blood, death.

"Emma! Give me back my medal!"

It was happening again!

Push her down, death.

"Emma! Give me back my medal!"

Once, twice, ten times, a hundred times...

The initial thrill gradually turned into numbness, then finally into irritation and fear.

The "masterpiece" she had once taken such pride in had now become an inescapable curse of endless repetition.

"This is so damn annoying! Just die already!" Emma finally broke down. Screaming, she stopped knocking the girl over and instead pounced on her, strangling her with her hands and biting her with her teeth.

But every time the girl "died," everything reset.

Just as the endless loop was about to drive her insane, Lily appeared nearby.

She said nothing. She simply watched Emma quietly, a trace of pity on her face, as though she were watching a small animal struggling futilely in a trap.

Emma stopped moving. Panting heavily, she looked at Lily. She wasn't afraid. Instead, a strange fire burned in her blue eyes.

"This is your power?" Emma's voice was hoarse.

"Do you like it?" Lily asked in return.

Emma didn't answer. She merely stared at Lily, then an utterly brilliant yet sickly smile slowly bloomed across her face.

"Mm."

With a soft hum, the illusion shattered like glass.

Emma and Esther returned to reality at the same time. Both collapsed on the living room floor, drenched in cold sweat and gasping for breath.

Lily sat on the sofa, her little legs swinging as she noisily drank strawberry milk through a straw.

She looked at the two of them on the floor, tilted her head, and revealed an innocent smile.

"Welcome to this home, my dear little sisters. From now on, we need to get along well."

Emma was the first to climb to her feet. She straightened her princess dress, sat on the sofa beside Lily, picked up another carton of milk, and began drinking it just like Lily did.

Esther struggled to stand as well. She looked at Lily, then at Emma beside her, who seemed utterly unconcerned. Her heart turned cold.

She had escaped the wolf's den only to enter the tiger's lair.

And there was more than one tiger in this lair. There was also a little demon who delighted in tormenting others, and a little lunatic who relished evil.

Things seemed to be getting more and more interesting—and more and more dangerous.

Emma took a sip of milk, then turned to Lily, her eyes sparkling.

She felt that this new "home," this new "sister," was far more interesting than she had imagined.

This pure, undisguised evil—she liked it.