Was It Meat They Ate-or Their Own Selves?

For the first time, Ghost Mom's younger daughter had won someone's approval. Delighted, she linked her arm through Wan Qiu's.

The room reeked, but as Wan Qiu looked at the younger daughter's smiling face, he felt dazed. He no longer seemed all that willing to leave.

Shadows gathered around Wan Qiu's body. Suddenly, footsteps sounded outside, followed by the sound of someone touching the lock.

The younger daughter's happy smile stiffened. She looked at her older sister. "Those bad people are back."

Wan Qiu ran to the door and peered through the peephole. Two people in Investigation Bureau uniforms were skulking down the hallway, marking each apartment.

"Investigators?" Wan Qiu noticed that the Investigators outside were different from Gao Ming. Strange black characters were branded on their bodies, and their expressions were frantic, as though they would die if they failed to complete certain tasks.

"They came before. They killed the man across the hall who liked spying on people." The younger daughter was furious.

"The Investigators are hunting the residents? Where did they get the power to fight ghosts?" Wan Qiu was baffled.

"They ate meat. Not the kind Mom makes—the meat from the Ancestral Hall Restaurant." The older sister took her younger sister's hand. "Don't run around. Be good and stay home."

The moment the older sister finished speaking, someone knocked on the door.

Gao Ming had been inside the Sishui Apartments for quite a while. He had heard no arguing or fighting, nor any cries for help. The building seemed no different from an ordinary apartment block.

"With Yan Hua's short temper, she should have caused some kind of commotion. Did they encounter a danger they had to hide from?"

Gao Ming knew the "teammates" he had recruited well. The building had its own rules, but apart from Zhu Miaomiao, no one on his team liked following rules.

The stairwell grew quieter and quieter. Other than Gao Ming and his two companions, few residents seemed to come downstairs.

Greasy stains gradually appeared on the steps. By the time they reached the first floor, Gao Ming could clearly smell Meat Fragrance.

It was strange. Even someone like Gao Ming, who had little interest in food, was starting to feel hungry.

They did not need Gong Xi to lead the way. The aroma drifting into their noses guided their steps.

Anyone who was not a longtime resident of the Sishui Apartments might never have known there was another floor hidden beneath the building.

They stepped out of the stairwell. There were no rental apartments on the basement level. Signs with red frames and white backgrounds hung on the walls on both sides of the passage.

"Restaurants in the basement?"

The lettering on the signs was no longer legible. Their paint was badly flaked, and their edges were cracked. They looked like coffin lids mounted upside down over the doorframes.

Farther down, restaurants lined both sides of the passage. This was where the enticing Meat Fragrance came from.

Looking at the old advertising signs crowded together at uneven heights, they felt a surge of fear, as though they might be sucked into some unknown place.

Zhu Miaomiao slowly took a step forward. As she inhaled Meat Fragrance, her hand involuntarily touched a restaurant door.

Someone moved behind the wooden door. Then it opened, and an old man wrapped entirely in black cloth stepped out.

He had not expected Zhu Miaomiao to be standing right outside, and they collided.

The black cloth fell to the floor, revealing the old man's body. He had no ears or right eye, and only one arm remained.

The old man looked horrifying, with obvious wounds where his ears had been. Yet his face was filled with satisfaction, as though a problem that had troubled him for a long time had finally been solved.

He picked up the black cloth, covered himself again, and hurried upstairs.

"Come in and have a seat." A man's voice came from inside the restaurant.

Gao Ming nodded to Zhu Miaomiao. Carrying Zhao Xi on his back, he entered first.

The restaurant, converted from a rental apartment, was small. There were no customers or servers, only wooden tables and plastic chairs.

Built underground, the room had neither windows nor ventilation. It was thick with Meat Fragrance.

"Don't just stand there. Come inside." The man's voice seemed to come from the Kitchen. He urged them again, sounding a little impatient.

All three entered and sat at a wooden table. They picked up the menu and found that it listed only the names of dishes, with no prices.

"Don't look at me. I've never been here either." Gong Xi pushed the menu toward Gao Ming. "Should we just order something?"

"Things without a clear price are often the most expensive." Before Gao Ming could decide, the restaurant door was yanked open, startling all three of them.

They looked toward the entrance, their eyes full of surprise.

An Investigator clutching a broken incense stick walked into the restaurant. His mental state was extremely unstable. He looked dazed, drool ran from his mouth, and the whites took up four-fifths of his visible eyes.

The Investigator ignored everyone else completely. He grabbed a menu, lifted the thick black curtain, and ran into the Kitchen.

The room instantly fell silent. A few minutes later, the Investigator emerged carrying a piece of meat in his left hand. His right hand was gone.

His eyes were fixed on the meat on the plate. It was translucent and glistening, trembling as he walked.

He chose a seat at random and sat down. Without even using chopsticks, he gently picked up the meat.

Sauce trickled down his hand. The Investigator swallowed, pressed his lips together, then slowly bit into the meat.

His teeth pierced the tender outer layer, sending juices spilling out. He bit deeper, into fat that melted in his mouth, silky and delicately tender.

Gradually, the Investigator reached the lean meat beneath. He sucked at its juices.

The reason in his eyes dwindled. He began tearing into the meat savagely. Not only did he eat it, he also bit into his own sauce-covered hand.

Blood mixed with the meat juices. The Investigator stared blankly at his palm. Black characters seemed to crawl inside his eyes.

He stood without a word and staggered toward the restaurant door.

"Should we leave too? See where he's going?" Meat Fragrance was tormenting Zhu Miaomiao. It was not just her appetite—the Meat Fragrance seemed to stir every desire within her. She did not dare stay in the restaurant any longer.

They put down the menu and were about to follow the Investigator when the restaurant door suddenly shut on its own.

The old wooden door looked perfectly ordinary, but no matter how hard Gong Xi pushed, he could not open it.

"We can't leave without eating?" Tormented by Meat Fragrance, Zhu Miaomiao was growing dazed. She raised the Fire Axe and hacked viciously at the door.

A dull thud sounded. The axe did not seem to have struck wood. It felt more like it had struck a thick slab of fat.

The door remained shut. Bright red blood seeped from the spot where the Fire Axe had hit.

Zhu Miaomiao was about to swing again when Gong Xi hurriedly stopped her. "Look at the walls! After you hit the door, the restaurant's walls seemed to move a little closer to us! The room got smaller!"

Blood dripped from the door, without the slightest metallic smell. The Meat Fragrance inside grew even richer.

"What would you like to eat?" The man's voice came from the Kitchen again. He did not seem at all worried about his customers escaping. "If you want to order, just bring the menu into the Kitchen."

Meat Fragrance kept washing over them. Gao Ming, too, felt unbearably hungry. It was not merely physical hunger, but psychological hunger as well.

Desires and cravings filled his mind, like arms tearing at his soul, making it impossible for him to remain who he had been.

Zhu Miaomiao's eyes gradually became bloodshot. She stared at the plate the Investigator had used, her lips trembling. Almost unable to control herself, she picked it up, wanting to taste the meat juices left on it.

"Zhu Miaomiao!" Gao Ming knocked the plate away, shattering it, then restrained both her hands.

"Why insist on holding yourself back? Whatever you want to eat, just come into the Kitchen and look. You'll come to love this place!" The man's voice was full of temptation.

"What kind of meat are you actually selling?" Gong Xi was frightened too. Because of Grandma, he had never eaten meat in the building. But now he could not stop himself from craving it. He even wanted to eat himself.

"Have you noticed that most of the residents are missing body parts? Aren't you curious where those missing parts went?" The man laughed loudly. "No one forced them. They all volunteered. They willingly made the trade."

"The meat they ate... was their own flesh?"

"No. What they gave up was their flesh. What they consumed was their desire." The laughter stopped, and the man's voice from the Kitchen turned sinister and terrifying. "If everything can be traded, then once people have nowhere left to turn, they'll dare to try anything. That's human nature."

(End of chapter)