Fu Songcheng and Yu Huaiting exchanged a glance. Before they could even summarize the deduction just now, a hurried knocking came from outside the door.
“Open up!”
It was Lu Xiao’s voice, lowered and somewhat anxious.
Fu Songcheng walked quickly to the entryway and yanked the door open.
Outside, Lu Xiao, Du Yunhao, and Zhu Xiang stood panting, Du Yunhao’s shoulder bearing the utterly unconscious Fang Yu, limp as a dead dog.
“Get in first.”
Fu Songcheng stepped aside, and the group quickly entered room 401.
Du Yunhao roughly dumped Fang Yu onto the living room floor and shook out his aching arm, looking around. “401’s door can only be opened from the inside. Where’s the female ghost?”
“The female ghost’s gone, but we’ve confirmed her identity.”
Fu Songcheng pointed toward the study. “The 401 tenant, a woman suffering from a mental illness—that’s the red-clothed female ghost.”
Hearing this, everyone immediately crowded into the study.
When they saw those manic complaint letters, the wall covered in soundproofing foam, and the empty antidepressant bottles, everyone’s expressions turned grave.
Lu Xiao glanced at the time on her system panel and reminded the others, “We’re about to hit the next hour. That male player who died in 402 died at the sixth hour after the instance started. Now the fifth hour is about to arrive—will someone else die?”
This countdown was like the sword of Damocles hanging over everyone’s heads.
Du Yunhao took a deep breath, forcing himself to calm down. “Let’s stay gathered together first. Even if someone’s going to die, at least we can look out for each other.”
The group began examining the items in the red-clothed woman’s study.
The bookshelf held many strange books, most of them obscure works on psychology, mind control, even philosophy exploring death and release.
And in the corner were piled several paintings, the style extremely eerie and oppressive, rendered in large swaths of black and glaring red.
Gurgle… gurgle-gurgle…
A sound rose in the living room.
Du Yunhao whipped his head around, his pupils contracting sharply.
Fang Yu—who’d been collapsed on the floor in a deep coma—had actually stood straight up!
Without using the strength of his arms at all, like a marionette forcibly pulled up by invisible strings, his movements stiff.
“Awake?”
Du Yunhao instinctively took a step closer and tentatively called out.
But Fang Yu ignored his voice entirely.
His eyes had rolled upward, showing only large expanses of red-veined whites, the corner of his mouth curved into an extremely eerie, faintly resentful cold smile.
Then he turned and, on stiff legs, walked step by step toward the balcony.
“Damn it, trying to jump again!”
Du Yunhao cursed under his breath, his eyes sharp and his hands quick as he lunged, grabbing Fang Yu’s arm dead and desperately dragging him back. “Are you insane! Get back here!”
However, the instant Du Yunhao touched Fang Yu’s skin, a thick, viscous black qi burst violently from Fang Yu’s skin, rapidly climbing up Du Yunhao’s arm.
Hiss—
Du Yunhao sucked in a sharp breath.
He felt as if both his hands were glued in place by superglue. An extremely cold, viscous sensation instantly invaded to the bone, all his strength seeming to drain away in an instant. His legs gave way, and he nearly dropped to his knees.
“Stop him!”
Seeing this, Lu Xiao halted her intended step forward and took an item from her system backpack—a specially made hemp rope.
She flicked her wrist, and the rope shot out like a nimble snake, precisely winding around Fang Yu’s waist.
Lu Xiao planted both feet dead on the ground and leaned her body backward, dragging Fang Yu back with all her might.
Everyone stepped forward to help, trying to physically restrain this ghost-possessed man.
Yu Huaiting’s eyes sharpened, and he backhanded the greatsword from behind him.
He stepped forward, and the massive greatsword, with a fierce howl of torn air, barred directly before Fang Yu’s eyes—the blade tip less than a centimeter from Fang Yu’s nose.
Yet Fang Yu seemed to have completely lost all sense of pain and fear.
Facing the blade so close at hand, he unknowingly kept pressing forward. Even as the blade edge cut his cheek, drawing blood, he didn’t care in the slightest, stubbornly wanting to cross that threshold and rush to the balcony.
The black qi on his body grew heavier and heavier, like a black hole frantically devouring the stamina of everyone around.
Though the group had stopped him, they couldn’t drag him back into the living room either. Everyone was locked in a standoff before the balcony’s sliding door.
Just in this tense, deadlocked impasse, Fu Songcheng’s calm voice suddenly sounded from behind the group.
“Let’s make a deal.”
Fang Yu’s stiff movements jolted to a stop.
Fu Songcheng stepped forward, his gaze passing through layers of black qi to look straight into Fang Yu’s rolled-back eyes, his tone certain and composed. “I know you’re listening. If you win, we’ll give him to you. We won’t interfere.”
The air seemed to freeze at this moment.
Fang Yu’s stiff neck gave out crack-crack sounds. Bit by bit, extremely slowly, he turned his head to look at Fu Songcheng.
He opened his mouth, but what came from his throat was not a man’s voice at all—rather an extremely plaintive, strained female voice, as if laden with blood and tears:
“Hmm…?”
The instant that sound fell, something changed abruptly!
Fu Songcheng’s and Yu Huaiting’s faces instantly went pale.
Almost at the same moment, strands of black qi suddenly emerged from both their bodies!
It was precisely the mark the female ghost had planted on them when they’d clashed with her on the third floor at the very start.
Fu Songcheng immediately felt his body sink heavily, as if an invisible mountain had instantly pressed down on his spine.
A violent, wrenching ache spread through every limb and bone—a continuous, dull pain seeping from the cracks of his bones, so agonizing that every nerve in his body spasmed and convulsed uncontrollably.
Then came a churning nausea and urge to vomit, as if something were frantically stirring in his stomach. Breathing became extremely difficult, as if the very air had turned viscous.
Somatization of depression.
Fu Songcheng’s mind was exceedingly clear at this moment, coldly analyzing his own state.
He didn’t feel sad, nor did he harbor any negative emotion of wanting to die—but under the erosion of the female ghost’s resentment, his body was uncontrollably simulating the extreme physiological agony a severe depression patient endures in despair.
Yu Huaiting’s condition was exactly the same.
His tall frame suddenly swayed, a muffled grunt escaping him, cold sweat instantly covering his forehead.
He quickly crossed the half-meter gap and grabbed Fu Songcheng dead, bearing most of the weight of his body.
“Gege…”
Yu Huaiting’s voice was terribly hoarse, his eyes full of anxiety.
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