After another week of shop closure day, I went to see Manager Hu, who had sold me the house at the time, and brought him some cakes along the way.

No matter what, even though No. 29 was still quite restless in my hands, at least it could make money. This week the second floor hadn’t caused any trouble, and watching my Alipay account daily made me able to eat an extra bowl of rice each day. When it came down to it, I still had to thank Manager Hu for introducing me to this house.

I carried the cakes to his door. The small real estate agency was lifeless inside. Except for Manager Hu, the other two property managers were taking afternoon naps.

I only learned afterward that the previous wave of commercial expansion in Guan Yinli had been quite grand in scale, but the newly developed commercial areas in these past two years hadn’t been operating very prosperously. In terms of popularity, they still couldn’t compare to the food street ahead, so the shops next to No. 29 still hadn’t been rented out to this day. The tattered sign of Dongzi Hotpot remained in its original place.

And with houses unable to sell, the real estate agency’s days were obviously not easy either.

Manager Hu reeked heavily of cigarettes. Seeing me, he forced out a smile and welcomed me outside: “Mr. Bai, how do you have time to come over? I saw you were so busy you couldn’t get away these past few days.”

I smiled: “Today is shop closure day… Even if I don’t want to rest, the staff in the shop have homes to return to, so I came over to have a look.”

After saying this, I handed him the cake. Manager Hu thanked me and praised: “Mr. Bai, your craftsmanship is really good. I’ve been wanting to patronize your business, especially since my hometown is in the south, and everyone in my family likes sweets.”

Since no one would come to the real estate agency anyway, Manager Hu simply walked a bit further with me, choosing an outdoor spot to sit and chat.

I bought Manager Hu a cup of coffee and made small talk: “Still no one asking about the nearby shops?”

Manager Hu was helpless about this: “The main issue is that besides No. 29 having some hard flaws, the other shops haven’t had so many incidents, yet they still carry the name of Guan Yinli. Even if we want to persuade the property owners to lower prices, they’re unwilling.”

I asked curiously: “So the rent for the shops next to No. 29 is…”

Manager Hu lit another cigarette, his face full of headache: “Three to four times that of No. 29. To be honest with you, Mr. Bai, when the expansion was happening, the developers were very optimistic about this area. Who could have thought these past two years would be so poor? Very few people come asking, and several of our property owners have given up hope.”

Compared to this, No. 29, this rebellious son, was still quite capable. It wasn’t in vain that his father had suffered so much for him.

I felt very comforted inside, but obviously couldn’t say this in front of the worried Manager Hu. I quickly got to the main point.

I asked carefully: “Manager Hu, I wonder if it’s convenient for you to help me contact some of No. 29’s previous tenants?”

Manager Hu was stunned: “This…”

I immediately began my sob story: “Manager Hu, I know you also have a family to support, so when you were selling the house, you still concealed some things from me… I can understand. If it were me, finally having someone ask about No. 29, this old problem, I wouldn’t dare tell them the house was haunted either. But now that I’ve already bought this house, can’t you help me?”

As soon as I mentioned haunting, Manager Hu’s face changed dramatically. I knew this meant I was right, and said helplessly: “Didn’t people hear noises coming from that house regularly long ago? Even the Guan Yinli officials don’t dare publicize this matter. I understand everything, but look, four people have already died before. If Manager Hu doesn’t help me, I might well be the next one.”

I stared pitifully at Manager Hu, imagining I had droopy ears.

Fortunately, from childhood to adulthood, I had always been good at playing the victim. Finally, as if compromising, Manager Hu sighed: “Mr. Bai, this indeed doesn’t quite follow regulations, but… I’ll help you.”

Immediately after, Manager Hu returned to the agency to find materials for me. After thanking him, I didn’t dare delay and immediately rushed back to No. 29, only to find that Song Nanshi, who had gone home early in the morning, had already returned and was sitting on the first floor in a daze.

“Come, Xiao Song, help me with something.”

I couldn’t care about anything else, only wanting to quickly verify my previous speculation.

I tried contacting the emergency contact for the first deceased, Ms. Xue.

It had been eight years since Ms. Xue had fallen on the stairs. Ms. Xue’s husband had long since remarried, but when asked about the situation then, the man’s memory was still fresh.

“I remember that house… From the beginning, I had a bad impression of it and didn’t want my ex-wife to rent it. As a result, something indeed happened later.”

“A bad impression from the beginning? Why?”

“Although Guan Yinli was famous at that time and the houses in that area were selling quite well, the overall layout of that shop was very strange. It seemed like the developer wanted to save on design fees and directly used the original residential layout for reconstruction, even saying they wanted to create some retro district to attract customers. The result was terrible—a small duplex from around 2010, with stairs so steep that my ex-wife was literally killed by those stairs!”

The man became more and more indignant: “My child was only three years old then. My ex-wife had retired from her work unit and rented a place to open a clothing store for the convenience of taking care of the child. Every time I went there, I felt those stairs were too steep. I didn’t dare let the child go to the second floor and reminded my ex-wife many times, but we never had money for renovation. It wasn’t until the shop had been open for more than a year that she had saved enough money, and we prepared to properly fix up the house.”

Here it comes.

This damned renovation!

My heart tightened: “You did some renovation at that time, didn’t you?”

The man gritted his teeth: “We did. We had agreed with the property owner at that time and did a complete renovation of the first floor. But because the stairs and second floor situation was more complex, the workers said if we wanted to modify them, the shop would have to close for business, so we waited. Who would have thought that this wait…”

I understood the rest without him saying it.

Before Ms. Xue could start working on the second floor and stairs, she had an accident on the stairs and died on the spot, leaving behind her daughter who was just over four years old.

After briefly comforting the caller, I dialed the second tenant, Mr. Wang’s phone.

This time it was Mr. Wang’s sister who answered. Six years ago, Mr. Wang had died of gas poisoning in the second-floor bathroom six months after moving into No. 29.

Hearing that I was now living in No. 29, the woman’s voice immediately became tense: “How dare you still buy that house! That house has ghosts that harm people, don’t you know?”

Ha.

I thought, how could I fucking not know? Living in No. 29 during this period could be said to have used up all the courage I’d accumulated in the first half of my life. I said helplessly: “Ms. Wang, can you tell me specifically? I’m indeed encountering some strange things in No. 29 now.”

The woman tremblingly recalled: “You must be careful, be careful of that second-floor bathroom… Before my brother’s accident, he told me once that he wanted to install a window in the bathroom because he felt it was always gloomy when bathing inside, and then he died of gas poisoning…”

…Installing a window.

I frowned: “So Mr. Wang also had the idea of renovating the second-floor bathroom before his accident?”

The woman said fearfully: “Yes, my brother rented No. 29 to open a coffee shop. The upstairs was his studio, and he usually lived there. He told me several times that he felt the second floor was too depressing and wanted to change the decoration, but before he could change it, the accident happened.”

Renovation again!

Suddenly, my heart was pounding, and I could almost hear Conan’s BGM in my ears.

The famous detective turned out to be me!

After hanging up, I looked eagerly at Song Nanshi. She had already finished her contact and said: “The third person who fell downstairs, Ms. Song, was in the crayfish business. The accident happened three months after she moved in. Her family said she had made good money during peak season and was considering renovating the shop and hiring people, but then had an accident when she went downstairs at night.”

“So every person who died wanted to renovate No. 29, and moreover, they had accidents faster and faster.”

My palms were sweating.

Ms. Xue had an accident after opening her shop for a year, Mr. Wang after half a year, Ms. Song after three months, and Yang Ping had said that Yang Juan had an accident before she could even open, in probably just over half a month…

Whatever was in No. 29, based on the timeline, if it wanted to kill me, it should be soon.

Not to mention, that day I had said at the house entrance that I was about to renovate. Given No. 29’s past behavior, doing this was basically equivalent to directly provoking it, saying “come get me.”

Thinking of this, that big face under the bed was fucking there to warn me!

Thinking of this, a chill suddenly ran up my back. I had to clench my fists to force myself to calm down and think about what the most likely direction currently was.

If the other party’s taboo was renovation, then the house itself was the root of the problem. If it wasn’t that No. 29 had become a spirit, then there must be an existence that extremely treasured this house.

For example… someone who had lived here in the past.

“They say four people have died in this house, but actually it’s far more than that. When it was still a residential area, there was a fire that burned people to death. The original site of No. 29 is built on ruins…”

In an instant, I remembered the anonymous comment I had seen not long ago and hurriedly had Song Nanshi look for it, but that comment had already disappeared without a trace.

Han Sha had also said that the Guan Yinli officials definitely wouldn’t want rumors about haunted houses to appear online, so the deleted comment was very likely stating the truth.

No. 29 had indeed caught fire and people had indeed died.

If this matter couldn’t be found out online, then there was only one remaining method.

After hesitating for a moment, I immediately pulled Song Nanshi along, brought the remaining cake inventory, and went out to start asking the merchants near No. 29.

Facts proved that a beautiful girl plus sugar was equivalent to a sugar-coated bomb. What Conan couldn’t find out, Ran could definitely discover.

Although most of the surrounding shop owners were just tenants, faced with an eager Song Nanshi plus the cakes in my hand, each shop ultimately provided as much “rumors” as they knew.

Among them, the most useful intelligence came from that “Tea Something Moonlight” shop near Huangliang Yimeng.

The bubble tea shop owner said: “When our family came three years ago, we also asked about that place. The price was already very cheap then. My husband felt there was a problem, and when we asked the real estate company, sure enough, it was a haunted house. At first I didn’t believe in evil and wanted to rent it, but later the people at the real estate company saw I was pregnant and couldn’t bear it, so they secretly told us this house had bad foundations.”

“Bad foundations?” My heart skipped a beat.

The woman nodded and said quietly: “That is, when the developer wanted to acquire houses from the original residents, it wasn’t particularly smooth. There were even forced demolitions. They say No. 29 was a nail house back then, and the developer couldn’t reach an agreement on conditions. Later, mysteriously, No. 29 caught fire, and the people trapped inside couldn’t get out—they were burned alive inside.”

I felt chills down my spine as I listened, and thought again of Old Han’s nonsensical theory about escaping via stairs and bathroom, yet felt it made some sense.

After No. 29’s reconstruction, it hadn’t changed the original house’s structure. In other words, the current No. 29 was exactly the same as in the past. If it really was people who had lived here in the past who still refused to leave…

I couldn’t help but shudder, and the bubble tea shop owner seemed to see that my complexion was off, adding: “Why don’t… you go ask at the hot and sour noodle shop ahead? Their old lady is from here in Guan Yinli. When No. 29 was sold before, the old lady reacted quite strongly. A couple days ago when we went there, their boss was still talking about it, saying when you opened, he felt sorry for you buying that house, so he couldn’t help but give you two extra scoops of chili and noodles, afraid you wouldn’t be able to eat them again afterward…”