"Help... help me... ugh..."
The man cried out to the guesthouse for help, but all that answered him... was deathly silence.
Ning Qiushui carefully got out of bed, went to the wooden door, and locked it. Only then did he make his way to the window, step by step, to look down in the cold moonlight.
He saw a dark figure stumbling out of the woods, clawing frantically at his neck!
It was the man who had been crying for help!
The man screamed desperately toward the guesthouse as he scratched madly at his neck, as though... something was there.
He tried to reach out toward the guesthouse, but his hand seemed to draw back against his will and resume clawing at his neck!
He kept circling around the courtyard, seemingly unable to get any closer to the guesthouse.
His screams grew more and more agonized, making Ning Qiushui's scalp crawl!
Yet not a single person came out of the guesthouse to save him.
Perhaps no one had heard him.
But even if someone had, no one dared to help.
Everyone knew how terrifying the world beyond the Blood Gate was!
Rushing out to save someone might not only fail to save them, but cost you your own life!
Finally, after ten minutes or so, the man outside stopped screaming.
Ning Qiushui had thought that would be the end of it, but what happened next made his eyes widen. He nearly cried out!
Under the pallid moonlight, he saw the man kneeling in the open courtyard. With a violent pull of both hands, he tore his own head clean off!
Blood spurted out in such a torrent that it reached the second floor!
More horrifying still, even after tearing off his own head, the man hadn't died. His mouth continued to utter chilling pleas for help:
"It hurts... save me... please... save me..."
"It hurts so much... it hurts..."
"Why... won't anyone save me... why..."
As he spoke, he suddenly turned slowly toward the guesthouse, holding his own bloody head as though he were inspecting the rooms one by one!
Ning Qiushui reacted instantly, pulling his gaze away and returning to his bed one step at a time!
He could feel his heart pounding furiously!
Only after a long time did the sounds outside finally stop.
And at last, Ning Qiushui drifted off into a hazy sleep.
The next morning, a knock at the door woke Ning Qiushui.
He got up and opened it to find Bai Xiaoxiao, already dressed.
She looked the same as always, wearing almost no makeup except for a vivid touch of red on her lips.
"Get dressed. After breakfast, we'll take a look around the nearest attraction. Maybe we'll find a useful clue to a way out alive."
Ning Qiushui nodded without saying anything more.
He quickly got dressed, then went downstairs to find Liu Chengfeng and Bai Xiaoxiao waiting by the entrance.
A large crowd had already gathered there.
Ning Qiushui counted them and suddenly frowned.
Three people were missing.
Had they already left, or were they still asleep?
Or could it be...
"What happened?"
Ning Qiushui asked as he approached Liu Chengfeng and Bai Xiaoxiao.
Neither answered. Bai Xiaoxiao tipped her delicate chin toward the open space farther out in the courtyard, motioning for Ning Qiushui to look.
A corpse lay there.
A mangled, bloody mess.
Headless.
It was the man Ning Qiushui had seen the night before.
He pushed through the whispering crowd and walked toward the corpse.
The man's head was gone, leaving only his headless body. Crimson scratch marks covered his neck, and bits of flesh still clung to his fingernails!
"Does anyone know him?"
Ning Qiushui suddenly turned and asked the crowd.
A young woman stepped forward, her face deathly pale, and answered in a timid voice:
"He... he looks like my friend... but I'm not sure, because his head is gone."
Ning Qiushui beckoned to her.
"Then come over and take a closer look."
Hearing that, the young woman panicked. She hurriedly waved her hands, her voice trembling with tears:
"No... I... I'm not going..."
Ning Qiushui was speechless.
After thinking about it, though, he seemed to understand.
This was his second Blood Gate, so most of the people matched with him were newcomers too.
Seeing such a gruesome corpse for the first time was bound to leave them shaken.
Just then, someone in the crowd seemed to shove the young woman. She screamed, stumbled forward a few steps, and fell to her knees in front of the headless corpse!
She hurriedly covered her eyes, not daring to look at the body before her.
Fortunately, a night in the wind had weakened the smell of blood. Otherwise, Ning Qiushui feared she might throw up on the spot!
He stood up and positioned himself at an angle, then said to the young woman covering her eyes:
"All right, I've blocked the bloody parts for you. Look at his clothes and the other details now. Can you confirm who he is?"
At his words, she cautiously opened a gap between her fingers. After looking for a few seconds, she nodded and said shakily:
"It's... it's him!"
Ning Qiushui frowned.
Just as he'd thought.
The dead man was one of them.
"Do you know what he went to do yesterday?"
The young woman took a deep breath. It took her a long time to get her fear under control.
"Last night... he... he wanted me to go with him to the Temple in the hills behind the village. He said that NPC called Hou Kong wouldn't let us go there because the way out alive had to be there. But I was scared, so I didn't go..."
"He went alone, and then... then he never came back!"
The Temple?
Hearing her words, Liu Chengfeng paled in the crowd.
Clearly, he'd had the same idea before.
He simply hadn't put it into practice because Bai Xiaoxiao had stopped him.
Otherwise...
There might well have been another headless corpse lying in the courtyard now!
"See? This is what happens when you act rashly at night..."
Bai Xiaoxiao's voice was soft, but it sent a violent shudder through Liu Chengfeng beside her.
"All right, let's go eat at the dining hall."
Her red lips parted in a yawn. With that, she led the way out of the guesthouse, skirted the corpse, and headed toward the village dining hall.
Someone in the crowd behind her stared wide-eyed and said:
"Wait, we're just leaving the corpse here... without doing anything?"
Bai Xiaoxiao didn't look back.
"If you feel like it, you can bury him. But there's no point."
"Inside the Blood Gate, the bodies of those who die... disappear very quickly."
After examining the corpse closely, Ning Qiushui seemed to discover something. He took an object from the corpse's clothes and quietly concealed it in his palm. Then he stood up and followed Bai Xiaoxiao and Liu Chengfeng to the dining hall...
PS: Two more chapters later tonight.
Before you continue