Have you ever heard of a corpse-born child?

After Lu Yanting's reminder, Jian Ran thought back carefully. It seemed he really hadn't heard it before.

Not only had he never heard it before, he also thought the person's voice sounded particularly strange, as though they had deliberately pinched their throat to disguise it.

After a brief pause, Jian Ran suddenly smiled. "Oh, so you're trying to play me?"

"It wouldn't be any fun if I didn't take the bait."

"Shall we go down and have a look?"

Jian Ran glanced back at Lu Yanting with keen interest.

Lu Yanting had intended to stop him, but at the sight of those bright, clear eyes, which seemed so sure of themselves, he slowly nodded.

"All right."

"Let's go down and have a look."

And so, the two tall figures went downstairs side by side.

Li Yuan, who had just changed his pants in his room, opened his door and shouted, "Jian Ran, wait for me!"

"Don't leave me alone-"

The Mountain Villa was still shrouded in white fog, blocking out the scenery of the Taihang Mountains. Through the first-floor picture windows, all they could see was mist drifting like cotton wool, along with-

Paper figures of all sorts of bizarre designs, male and female, dressed in both ancient and modern clothes.

Their smiles were sweet and horrifying, their hollow eyes staring fixedly at the windows.

As though afraid their food would escape.

"Jian Ran, why did you come down? The food isn't ready yet." Du Yunmeng's voice trembled. Her face was bloodless, and she braced a hand against the wall, seemingly barely able to stand.

Jian Ran pressed his lips together. His sly gaze landed outside the window before returning to sweep over everyone in the lobby. "Someone said the paper figures had gotten in and asked me to come downstairs to help."

"Who said that?!" Du Yunmeng looked around. "How come I didn't see any paper figures come in?!"

"Mm, must have been a false alarm." Jian Ran propped his chin on his hand, speculating to himself. "But what was that person after?"

"Could it be..."

Before he could finish, someone shouted, "Why does it smell like something's burning upstairs?! Is there a fire?!"

Everyone hurried up to the third floor and discovered that Jian Ran's bedroom door was open, with white smoke rising from inside.

Du Yunmeng ran at the front. "Jian Ran, your room's on fire!"

"Shit, go get water!"

Calling everyone into action, he rushed straight into the bathroom, filled a basin with water, and poured it onto the floor. The others did the same, running back to their own rooms to fetch containers of water.

Only after a great deal of effort did they get the fire under control.

Du Yunmeng was drenched in sweat from exhaustion. When she walked out of the room, she saw Jian Ran leaning against the wall, a strange smile on his lips.

He froze, stammering a little. "J-Jian Ran, the fire's out, but the talisman paper on the floor seems... unusable now."

"What do we do? Should we draw them again?"

Jian Ran's smile didn't reach his eyes. "Draw them again?!"

"Would you leave me any cinnabar?!"

Du Yunmeng's expression stiffened. "Jian Ran, what are you talking about? I don't understand."

He wasn't the only one who was confused. The other crew members and the two idiot guests were utterly bewildered too.

Ji Yuanming hadn't recovered yet, but when he heard the commotion in the hallway, he forced himself to come out. Though sickly and weak, his voice was still irritable.

"Jian Ran, if you've got something to say, say it clearly. Stop being so cagey!"

Beside him, Yu Fengyi shot him a sidelong glance.

Having grown up with him, he naturally knew what Ji Yuanming was thinking.

Speaking up with no regard for the circumstances was merely his way of trying to get Jian Ran's attention.

The cameraman was extremely dedicated. Even under these circumstances, he didn't forget to shoulder his camera and film their faces. Naturally, he gave Jian Ran a close-up too.

"Weren't you the one who started the fire? Still playing dumb?" Jian Ran didn't spare Ji Yuanming so much as a glance, treating him as invisible as he addressed Du Yunmeng with a faint, ambiguous smile.

He paused, then made sure to remind him, "No refunds on transfers. And since you burned the talisman paper, you'll have to bear the risk."

Hearing this, Li Yuan rushed forward. "Du Yunmeng, you started the fire?! Do you have any idea how dangerous that is?!"

"What if you'd set the whole Mountain Villa on fire?!"

Du Yunmeng shook her head. "Jian Ran, assistant director, how could it have been me! Look at me, scared out of my wits every day. How would I have the guts to start a fire?!"

"I just want to get out of here as soon as possible. I don't want to stay a moment longer."

"When I'm so desperate to leave, how would I have any mind to start a fire?!"

Everyone was gathered in the hallway. Not a single crew member or guest was missing. They surrounded the eye of the storm, their faces full of confusion as they waited for what came next.

The moment Du Yunmeng finished, Jian Ran laughed. "I didn't expect that. You've got quite an eye."

"You had your sights on me back on the bus."

"You've kept up the act all the way here. Should I give you a thumbs-up?"

"Jian Ran, I-" Du Yunmeng hurriedly opened her mouth, seemingly about to explain.

But Lu Yanting, who had remained silent all this time, spoke up and interrupted him. "You started testing him on the bus, because with just a light pat, Jian Ran brought back the driver's soul after it had been lured away."

"You were afraid he had real ability and would ruin your plans, so you asked for talisman paper as soon as you got off the bus, intending to test it."

"You didn't expect it to force Li Zongsheng back into his room on the very first night."

As Lu Yanting laid it out, Du Yunmeng's expression shifted. "You're making all of that up."

"Do you have any proof?"

Jian Ran raised a hand to brush up his bangs. "You were the one who set up the cameras every night, weren't you?"

"What were you trying to expose?"

"Me, or the village's past?"

Du Yunmeng: "..."

Jian Ran said, "What exactly do the three of you have to do with the village?"

Three?

There were accomplices?

The cameramen covering the separate feeds immediately hoisted their cameras and aimed them at the other guests.

Except for Ji Yuanming and Yu Fengyi.

Those two big stars had suffered plenty. Anyone with eyes could see that they definitely weren't accomplices.

And Lu Yanting had a close relationship with Jian Ran, so naturally, he was ruled out too.

That left only two.

Yang Ruoxi.

Shen Jiafei.

"Why are you looking at me?!" Yang Ruoxi snapped. "I didn't do anything!"

Shen Jiafei put on an equally innocent expression. "Don't go making wild guesses and accusing innocent people!"

Before their protests had even faded, crazed laughter suddenly rang through the hallway.

"Hahahahaha!"

"Forget it, forget it!"

"Why keep pretending at this point?"

"Today's the Seventh Month Fifteenth anyway. No one's getting away. Everyone has to die!"

Everyone looked toward the voice and saw that Du Yunmeng had abandoned her timid, cowardly demeanor, her expression exaggerated and hideous.

Li Yuan cried out, "It really was you!"

"That's right! I burned the talisman paper. Who told this guy to be so capable that he even dared to hit ghosts?!" Du Yunmeng raised her hand and pointed at Jian Ran, a complicated look of bitter malice lurking in her eyes.

"For a while, I suspected your production team was deliberately messing with us."

"That you'd deliberately brought this guy here specifically to suppress the village's wronged souls!"

"But when I saw what complete cowards you were, I realized we were just unlucky..."

Jian Ran narrowed his eyes and cut her off coldly. "I don't want to hear your bullshit."

"Get to the point. What's your connection to the Deserted Village?"

Du Yunmeng's expression suddenly grew even stranger. "Have you ever heard of a corpse-born child?"