"A wall?" Zhou Diao looked up as well.
Feng Ling could move freely in the dark, but Zhou Diao could not, so he had brought a small flashlight.
The flashlight cast a circle of harsh light onto the wall, immediately drawing Zhou Diao's attention.
"What the hell..." Zhou Diao leaned closer and sniffed. "Has this building grown mold?"
Some substance had stained the pale walls in vivid colors—red, yellow, blue, and green, a dazzling riot like blooming flowers. But flowers usually evoked pleasant associations, while these things only brought to mind rotten mold.
The higher they climbed, the more mold there was, and the thicker it became.
When they reached the fourth floor, Feng Ling saw that the entire ceiling overhead was covered in mold, crisscrossing in bold, heavy swaths. It came in all sorts of shapes, sprouting leaves and blooming flowers, creating a hallucinatory visual effect.
"Could this stuff be poisonous..." Zhou Diao muttered.
Things with colors that bright always seemed dangerous.
"I'll go take a look upstairs," Feng Ling said.
"Aren't we going to Room 414 to rescue people?" Zhou Diao asked in a low voice.
Feng Ling looked toward the stairs above. "I'll be right back. Keep watch for me."
"Then hurry up!" Zhou Diao replied.
Feng Ling lightened her footsteps and ran upstairs. When she reached the fifth floor, she discovered that the mold was no longer a thin layer clinging to the walls and ceiling. It had swollen into thick masses, squeezing the once-straight, open hallway until only a narrow gap remained.
How should she put it? It was as if she had entered the body of some creature, surrounded by organs and tumors of every color.
Feng Ling continued upward, but halfway up the stairs, the path became impassable.
The sixth floor had actually