"You... mmph!"
Before General Blue could finish speaking, Lin Fan and Xiao Chen reached out from the sides and clamped their hands tightly over his mouth.
"What's wrong?"
The elevator lady turned her head, asking with a "puzzled" expression: "Did something happen?"
"Mmph..."
General Blue instinctively struggled—the two idiots were gripping way too hard.
Xiao Chen stayed silent. Lin Fan kept smiling.
Saiki calmly stepped in front of the group and answered.
[They're fine. One of them just had a muscle twitch in his mouth, that's all.]
"Ah... oh, I see."
Ding!
The elevator reached the 1st floor, and the doors opened again.
The group rushed out first, holding their lanterns with the candles inside to illuminate the elevator entrance.
They didn't move forward. Instead, they stared tensely at the elevator lady.
Until the doors closed. In that final instant, they could see her facial features suddenly distort completely.
Her neatly tied ponytail turned into long wavy hair. Her clothes changed into a white patient gown covered in dust. Her face turned deathly pale, especially with huge dark circles around her eyes. Not only that—her eyeballs were rolled back, emitting a faint white glow.
(As expected, a ghost!)
Lin Fan and Xiao Chen only let go of General Blue after the elevator started moving and carried the ghost away.
"Mmph!... Ptooey, ptooey! Why'd you two squeeze so hard?!"
General Blue wiped drool from the corner of his mouth, eyes red as he asked: "You almost suffocated me just now!"
[Are you an idiot?]
Lin Fan snapped irritably: "You clearly noticed that thing wasn't human—the red string on her wrist! And you still wanted to call her out? Do you have a death wish?!"
Xiao Chen held his forehead speechlessly: "What a moron."
Hearing everyone's words, General Blue broke out in a cold sweat, his expression awkward. Yeah... they were probably right.
Even though they were right, General Blue still felt annoyed: "But did you have to go that far? I nearly suffocated. And with all of us here, are we really afraid we couldn't handle one elevator ghost lady?"
[That one didn't look like a small ghost at all.]
Lin Fan and Xiao Chen exchanged a glance, then sighed and explained.
"It's not that we couldn't beat her, but that ghost clearly wasn't simple. If we couldn't insta-kill her, it'd be a huge hassle."
"Plus, she felt really off—especially in the elevator. I don't think she'd be easy to deal with."
"..."
Saiki glanced at the two who were still explaining.
(These two definitely have ways to handle that female ghost. Speaking of which, I was kind of curious earlier... wanted to see how strong they actually are...)
[Anyway, we can't use this elevator anymore.]
"Yeah, I think that ghost deliberately took us down to B2."
Saiki nodded.
[Yeah, but that's not the only reason.]
Xiao Chen walked over and looked at Saiki: "You noticed it too."
[Yeah.]
General Blue looked confused: "What did you guys notice?"
"The elevator isn't the same as during the day, right!"
Lin Fan smiled and said: "I saw you two staring at the elevator the whole time."
[During the day, the elevator only goes from B1 to 6F. Did any of you notice it gained extra floors just now?]
Lin Fan: "We just went to... B2."
[Not just that. I saw a 7th floor and an 8th floor too. But now's not the time to talk about that. Let's go find some clues first.]
Saiki headed off on his own toward the patient ward area.
Lin Fan and the others hurried to catch up.
The group began moving forward.
The corridor was still pitch black and freezing cold. The hospital that had looked neat during the day was now dilapidated and ruined, with strange patterns crawling across every corner of the walls.
General Blue: "There sure are a lot of rooms here."
Lin Fan walked up beside Saiki and whispered: "Hey, where are you headed? Why go toward the patient side? Shouldn't we be searching on the 1st floor? That reporter you mentioned earlier was probably dragged to the morgue. Shouldn't we check B1 instead?"
[We can do that later. I'm curious about these extra rooms up ahead.]
Lin Fan: "There are more?"
"Hopefully."
General Blue scoffed from behind: "If we end up finding nothing, it'll just waste time."
He had originally thought with four people, they could split into pairs and cover more ground.
But seeing how tightly Lin Fan and Xiao Chen were sticking to Saiki, he knew saying anything would be pointless. If he ended up having to go solo, what was even the point of teaming up?
Saiki kept walking forward. When he'd scouted the 1st floor earlier today, he'd noticed the patient rooms went from 101, 102, up to 109.
But Room 106 was missing—after 105 came 107 directly.
There was even a gap where a door should have been, yet no door existed.
But after getting off the elevator just now, Saiki had seen it.
[Here it is.]
Saiki stopped in front of Room 106. The doorplate here was different from the others—while theirs were black, this one was blood-red.
He took a deep breath and prepared to open the door. At that moment, a cool, eerie female voice rang out.
"Excuse me~"
General Blue shivered violently. He suddenly pulled a shotgun from his pants pocket, aimed it behind them, and asked tensely: "Who's there!"
(Where the hell did you pull that shotgun from?)
Footsteps approached from behind Saiki and the others. A girl in white clothes slowly walked forward.
"Another ghost! Let me blast her!"
[Calm down.]
"Die!"
[I said calm down.]
Saiki slapped General Blue across the face, forcibly calming him. The force nearly made General Blue spit blood.
"You!"
[I know this person.]
Lin Fan and Xiao Chen weren't as panicked as General Blue. They had noticed the girl was also holding a lantern identical to theirs—she was just gripping her weapon tightly.
"Saiki-ge, is that you?"
Saiki stepped forward. The other person recognized him too.
Yao Yao hurried over happily: "Great! I was thinking it was dangerous coming out alone, but I didn't expect to run into you."
[Why are you here, Yao Yao?]
"Of course to look for clues. I originally wanted to ask Akiyuki-neesan to come with me, but she kept saying we had to play it safe and absolutely refused."
[She... would never come with you.]
Lin Fan elbowed Saiki: "You know her?"
[Sort of.]
Yao Yao: "Are you all out here doing a mission together?"
[Something like that.]
Yao Yao asked nervously: "Can I join?"
[Sure.]
"I know it's a lot to ask... wait, what?"
Yao Yao's prepared explanation cut off abruptly. She genuinely hadn't expected Saiki to agree so decisively.
Not just her—the other three hadn't expected it either.
Lin Fan whispered: "Hey, Saiki, aren't you being a little too casual?"
Xiao Chen stepped forward: "You don't like her, do you?"
General Blue snorted coldly, looking displeased: "Don't let yourself get swayed by beauty."
[No. She just has a really useful skill. Lucky Aura. Its ceiling is extremely high.]
"How high?"
[About three or four floors high.]
"..."
Saiki said he'd take responsibility for looking after her, so the others agreed.
[Ready?]
Saiki prepared to open the door.
Lin Fan pulled out an iron hammer and stood to Saiki's right. Xiao Chen suddenly drew an axe and stood to his left.
General Blue: "Let me do it."
Saiki paused, then stepped aside to let him go first.
General Blue shot Saiki a fierce glare and moved to the front. With a girl in the group now, of course he had to show off his strength.
Whoosh.
General Blue yanked the door open. The group raised their lanterns to light up the entrance and looked inside.
It was somewhat messy. There were two hospital beds. One was partially collapsed, as if someone had struggled violently on it. There were also several ropes.
Other than that, it looked like a normal patient room.
It just appeared older than the others, but not as filthy as expected—almost like it had been used recently.
The group went in and started searching. Scattered files lay on the floor. Saiki picked one up.
The date was from five years ago.
What they found while searching weren't just dropped files—there were sedatives, syringes.
After searching for a long time, General Blue sighed: "Nothing special here!"
[Is that so?]
Xiao Chen: "Even though this room feels pretty creepy, we didn't find anything."
"Maybe there's some kind of mechanism?"
Yao Yao casually said while feeling along the wall. She accidentally pressed something. A box suddenly popped out from the wall.
"..."
Lin Fan couldn't help but complain: "Holy crap, your luck is insane!"
Saiki had been right beside Yao Yao—he'd clearly searched the same spot earlier.
Saiki raised his lantern and opened the box. Inside was a notebook.
Lin Fan: "Damn, people still write diaries these days?"
Everyone crowded around and opened the notebook.
May 11.
I woke up and the village chief had sent me to the hospital. He told me he'd already paid all my medical fees and not to worry—just stay here and recover.
I agreed clearly. For some reason, I feel like I'm awake very little. Half the day I'm sleeping, and I faint from time to time.
May 12.
This is clearly a ghost hospital. So scary. Good thing the director is human.
Plus, the village chief told me that as long as I follow instructions, I'll be fine. So I just gritted my teeth and endured.
May 13.
I've been here so long and taken tons of medicine. The effect is so-so, but better than before.
The doctors and nurses clearly told me the rules here: try not to use the elevator much. The hospital only has floors -1 to 6.
They repeated clearly that there are no extra floors. No extra floors.
Hearing it repeated like that made me feel something was off, but I still remembered the village chief's words: trust what the doctors and nurses here say.
"..."
May 18.
Something's wrong. This hospital is getting scarier.
There's a bright lamp by the headboard. They require me to keep it on at all times—no turning it off.
While I was sleeping, they closed all the doors and windows in my room. Even scarier—I heard someone calling my name. I didn't dare respond.
May 19.
A guy dressed like a reporter suddenly came running, screaming madly that I had to leave this hospital right away—I had to escape.
Though security quickly dragged him away, seeing his terrified face left me deeply uneasy.
Even though the doctor explained not to listen to outsiders besides security, nurses, and doctors.
"..."
June 1.
No! No!! No!!!
I was wrong. That reporter was right. I was wrong. That reporter was right!
I have to leave!
I must leave!
The next page was soaked in blood-red. There were no further entries.