"A psychopathic killer has recently appeared near Tianfu Road. Three victims have been confirmed so far, their faces mangled beyond recognition. Residents are advised to limit outings and watch out for suspicious individuals!"
"A family of five has been brutally murdered in Changhe Residential Complex. The case is under investigation, and danger may still be present in the surrounding area!"
"A skinning murder has occurred at Kangzhuang Tower..."
"..."
"What the hell is going on? Three to five murders almost every day in Jiangbei City alone?" Inside his rented apartment, Jiang Chen stared at the news on his phone, his brow tightly furrowed.
"And they're reporting them before the cases have even been solved."
"Or do these reports have another purpose? Are they discreetly warning people to stay away from these places? Are these so-called killers... not human?"
A strange thought crept into his mind. It wasn't groundless speculation, because Jiang Chen had experienced something supernatural himself. For instance-he wasn't from this world.
He still remembered dying of cancer in his previous life. When he opened his eyes again, he was back in the body of his three-year-old self, facing a completely unfamiliar world.
At first, Jiang Chen had been thrilled. He thought he was the chosen one, that with a second chance at life, he would surely reach the top. But he soon realized that heavy snow was falling all around him, and there wasn't a soul on the streets.
Before Jiang Chen could freeze to death, an elderly man who lived alone took him home and said, "Call me Grandpa, and from now on, this will be your home."
After that, Jiang Chen finally had a guardian.
But two years ago, just after he got into Jiangbei University of Finance and Economics, the old man had left.
Not died, mind you.
The old man left a letter weighed down by a bank card containing a hundred thousand yuan, then left the city. No one knew where he had gone.
"A day or two before he left, the old man kept muttering some strange nonsense about his sect being in trouble. Could a ghost have gotten into his head?"
The abnormal number of murders over the past month had given Jiang Chen some unsettling ideas.
Knock... knock... knock...
Just then, a sudden knocking came from outside.
Jiang Chen froze and glanced at the time on his phone.
02:44
"Who's looking for Sister Hong after two in the morning?"
The knocking came from across the hall, where Jiang Chen's landlady lived-a voluptuous woman in her thirties.
Knock... knock... knock...
In the building's predawn silence, the sound was especially jarring.
"Could something have happened to Sister Hong? Or is something wrong with the person knocking, and she's afraid to open the door?"
When no one answered the door, Jiang Chen frowned, got up, and walked over to his own.
Through the peephole, he saw a woman from behind. She wore a white dress patterned with dark red blotches and was still knocking on the security door opposite his. Under the hallway light, her outstretched hand looked deathly pale.
Something about the woman's movements felt wrong to Jiang Chen. Her wrist didn't move as she knocked. Instead, her entire arm swung like a beckoning cat's.
"Her arm joints seem really stiff..."
After knocking for a while, the woman suddenly stopped. But she didn't leave. Instead, she pressed herself against the security door and tried to peer inside through the peephole.
"What is she trying to do?"
Her behavior was so strange that a terrible sense of foreboding rose in Jiang Chen's heart.
"I know you're in there. Open the door. Hurry up and open it!" After peering inside for a moment, the woman suddenly spoke in a sinister voice. It was hoarse, as though a lump of phlegm was stuck in her throat.
As she shouted, her knocking grew more frantic. She was practically hammering on the door.
Jiang Chen's pupils constricted, and that strange feeling grew stronger.
He figured the woman was most likely mentally unstable-or perhaps she was one of the psychopathic killers from the recent reports.
He took out his phone to call the police, but a message came in.
"Whatever you do, don't open the door!"
"Sister Hong?" Jiang Chen thought for a moment, then typed, "What's going on?"
"The thing outside... might not be human!" Sister Hong quickly replied.
"Chen, you probably don't know this, but something really horrifying happened in our complex. About a year ago, a college student named Sun Fang rented an apartment in Building Four."
"Not long afterward, a man followed her here. At first, he brought her breakfast and flowers every day, like he was trying to win his girlfriend back."
"When none of that worked, he started blocking her doorway and shouting abuse. It went on for a long time."
"From his yelling, we gathered that they'd been together for three years. Sun Fang had hooked up with a rich man and wanted to break up with him. That was how it all started."
"Then one of Sun Fang's close friends came over. That girl had a sharp tongue. She tore into him until he couldn't get a word out, and he slunk away."
"Everyone thought it was over, but that night, he came back. He seemed to have been drinking and kept pounding on Sun Fang's door. Her friend was still there, so she rushed out and started cursing him again. This time, he pulled out a knife."
"Sun Fang's friend was terrified and turned to run back inside. But Sun Fang was scared out of her wits too. She actually slammed the security door shut, locking her friend outside. No matter how hard her friend pounded on the door and begged for help, she did nothing."
"Her friend was stabbed to death right there in the hallway. The police took the young man away."
"The strange thing was, seven nights later, Sun Fang died in her rented apartment."
"According to the neighbors in Building Four, they all heard knocking that night, along with a woman's faint cries for help. But the problem was, Sun Fang died inside her own apartment. She shouldn't have been knocking on anyone's door for help."
"Everyone began to suspect something awful. Maybe it hadn't been Sun Fang knocking that night."
"The residents all silently agreed never to mention it again."
"But do you know who I just saw through the peephole? Sun Fang's friend! It took me ages to recognize her face. Back when they were making a scene, I'd only gone over for a quick look."
"Someone who's clearly dead is standing outside my door, knocking nonstop. Chen, whatever you do, don't come out. I've already called the police. Stay hidden somewhere safe. If anything happens to me, you have to tell the police all of this!"
After reading the messages, Jiang Chen looked at the woman outside again and felt a chill shoot up his spine. This woman was someone who had already died!
Did that mean the red blotches on her dress weren't a pattern, but blood splattered on her when she died?
Click-
Suddenly, the sound of a lock turning came from outside. Jiang Chen's eyes widened slightly. The security door across the hall had opened!
"No! Sister Hong knows there's something wrong with that thing outside. She wouldn't open the door."
Through the peephole, Jiang Chen saw that no one stood behind the security door. Some uncanny force seemed to have unlocked it.
Just then, the woman, who had kept her back to him the entire time, suddenly turned her head. Her ghastly pale face gave Jiang Chen a grotesque grin. Inside her gaping mouth, her teeth were bright red, with scraps of flesh still caught between them.
"She's here! She's inside! I didn't open the door, but she walked right into the living room!"
Sister Hong sent another message.
But Jiang Chen had no attention to spare for it. The instant the woman looked at him, a chill shot from the soles of his feet to the top of his head, as though a wild beast had fixed its gaze on him.
Only after the woman entered Sister Hong's apartment could Jiang Chen move again. He wiped the cold sweat from his temple, then froze. His left hand felt as cold as a block of ice.
He held it up in front of his face. A cloud of black vapor curled around it. It seemed to be the female ghost's mark, meaning she had set her sights firmly on him.
"Heh. I've already died once, and now you want my life again?"
A flicker of madness flashed in Jiang Chen's eyes. He turned and ran toward the kitchen. He would open the gas valve and give this ghost a taste of explosive art when she came in.
He didn't know whether it would work, but he was dead either way. With his temperament, Jiang Chen would never just sit and wait to die.
But after only two steps, he abruptly froze in place.
A clear, synthesized female voice had suddenly sounded inside his head.
"Ding. Ghostly presence detected. Activating the Monster Transformation System." "10%... 50%... 100%" "Ding. System activated successfully. Awarding 100 initial points of ghost qi." "Ghosts feed on human qi; monsters feed on ghost qi. The host can obtain ghost qi by provoking emotional fluctuations in ghosts and use it to draw Monster Transformation Cards."
Before you continue