Chapter 7 - Corpse (1/2)

Su Min’s eyes followed Lin Xiao Yan’s.

When they had entered the washroom, Zhang Yuan’s body was laying on sink. No one had touched it, yet it was now missing.

Damp patches of water scattered around the sink. The faucet was still slightly open; water droplets were trickling out and plopping into a small pool.

If it wasn’t for the wet mess before their eyes, there would’ve been no indication that Zhang Yuan was ever there.

“Did it run away?” Horror coated Lin Yiri’s voice.

“That’s unlikely…” Lin Xiao Yan whispered.

But, no matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t think of any other explanation. Liu Lili’s corpse shouldn’t have been able to move, but it did. It wasn’t a stretch to say that Zhang Yuan’s corpse really did got up and ran away.

“No, we should have heard it,” Su Min rejected the idea. “I didn’t hear two sets of footsteps. It’s not possible for it to have left by itself.”

Corpses were still solid matter. Unlike ghosts, their footsteps would produce noise.

“Then who knocked on the door just now?” Lin Xiao Yan asked, “Whose footsteps were those?”

Su Min thought of the discrepancy, and his mind raced to fill up the holes. “It’s impossible for Zhang Yuan to have been the one knocking.”

After the words left his mouth, Su Min was even more convinced.

The sound of those footsteps started from a distance and then got closer. At that time, Zhang Yuan’s body was still at the sink, so it couldn’t have been her.

Lin Yiri scratched his head. “What if the person knocking was Liu Lili?”

Both had met a mishap while playing Kuai Xian, and both had died in this school.

Something flashed in Su Min’s eyes. “It’s possible.”

Because of the darkness, they were unable to see the clothes or features of the figure that stood by the door.

“Now that I think about it,” Lin Xiao Yan said, “the silhouette did look a bit like Liu Lili’s. We were roommates for several years, I’d recognize her back.”

She hadn’t made the connection a moment ago, but when Lin Yiri mentioned it, she could see the similarity.

“Wasn’t Liu Lili taken away by the police?” Lin Yiri asked.

Su Min was aware that this was a horror movie, and in horror movies, walking corpses weren’t all that surprising. Maybe Liu Lili’s corpse didn’t want to enter the morgue and ran back here. Whatever the case, it was a setting decided by the director. Common sense couldn’t be used during situations like these.

“If it was her, why did she knock on the door?” Lin Xiao Yan asked.

If you’re dead, you’re dead. Why do you still need to knock on the door? It nearly made them faint from fright.

Su Min’s eye twitched. “I don’t know, but the most important thing to do now is find Zhang Yuan’s body.”

The missing corpse was like a ticking time bomb.

Out of nowhere, Lin Xiao Yan exclaimed, “Su Min, your wink just now was really handsome.”

Su Min: “…”

Lin Yiri said as a matter of course, “You’re too naive. He looks handsome even if he doesn’t wink. I’m used to it.”

Su Min really wanted to roll his eyes at the two people.

He silently maneuvered his way around the puddles on the floor, intending to go upstairs. “We haven’t gone to the seventh floor yet. Maybe it’s there.”

The seventh floor was very peculiar. There were definitely secrets waiting to be uncovered.

Lin Xiao Yan and Lin Yiri naturally followed.

Having them stay in the washroom where a ghost had just appeared was asking for the impossible.

The echoes of footsteps disturbed the quiet of the staircase.

Walking up the stairs is terrifying during the night time. There is the feeling that someone is following you, trailing your every move. However, when you turn around, you are only met with the silence of darkness.

Su Min’s sixth sense was exceptional.

When he was in high school, he would stay in after class for additional studying and usually head home at around nine in the evening. As he walked through desolate roads and empty alleyways, there was always a strange feeling in his gut that he was being followed.

That feeling would persist even after he entered the outdated building of his home and passed through dark corridors and pale yellow flickering lights.

Fortunately, that odd feeling disappeared once he had moved into a new house.

As Su Min trod carefully up the stairs, however, the same familiar feeling arose in him. It felt strange, like he had returned back to the past.

Behind him was Lin Yiri and Lin Xiao Yan.

Lin Yiri glanced back from time to time and nervously asked, “Do you know the story of the staircase?”

Lin Xiao Yan’s face was cold and detached. “Don’t know, don’t care, don’t say.”

He promptly shut his mouth.

His silence didn’t last long. A few steps later, Lin Yiri began to feel the restlessness stir up inside of him again, and the urge to share his thoughts grew stronger.

“I heard that these stairs have 12 steps, but sometimes, they will become 13 when you walk,” he whispered.

Lin Xiao Yan, “…”

Having reached the top, Su Min turned back and said, “What are you thinking? There’s 12, I’ve counted.”

In this frightful ambience, counting the number of steps made him feel a little better.

“That great,” Lin Yiri sighed.

He promptly skipped up three steps and hopped beside Su Min.

“The ghost stories aren’t the same for every school.” Su Min pointed out, “See, none of the things you’ve said actually happened.”

A ghost never touched their heads, and there was no extra step in the stairs.

Lin Yiri, “It’s easy for me to associate… It’s not my fault my brain is like this. If I had known earlier, I wouldn’t have read so many ghost stories.”

Who would’ve imagined that they’d be in this kind of situation?

Su Min didn’t wait for him to continue talking and advanced up.

However, halfway up the stairs, he could faintly distinguish a shadow of a person lying on the ground of the seventh floor.

The black doors into the corridors were locked.

Su Min halted. “There’s Zhang Yuan’s corpse.”