The ultimate result of watching those video clips over and over again at Song Nanshi’s place was that whenever I closed my eyes, that enormous face Song Nanshi had recorded would appear before my eyes.

Even though it only appeared for half a second, I could confirm that it definitely wasn’t a human face…

It was impossible for any living person to look like that, even with my high standards as someone who judges by appearance.

I asked Song Nanshi whether this bore any resemblance to the corpse of the previous tenant that their funeral home had handled before. However, Song Nanshi seriously told me that a drowned corpse wouldn’t present this kind of body state. After all, this thing was too “thin” – you couldn’t see any signs of the giant appearance that drowning victims show. Instead, looking at its hunched body condition, it more resembled the boxer’s stance that burned corpses would display.

I was better off not asking – once he said this, I became even more fucking terrified.

What a coincidence – before being renovated into a commercial district, Building 29 had experienced a fire, and people had died in it too.

In the end, I asked Song Nanshi to copy a video file for me, planning to discuss with Old Han and Bai Liu first thing in the morning about what kind of master we should find to perform proper rites for the diverse “residents” in this house. However, I had clearly overestimated my own nerve.

After lying in bed for two and a half hours, Xiao He was already dead asleep, while I had watched more than twenty fucking sleep-aid videos. Not only could I not fall asleep, I couldn’t even drive that enormous face out of my head.

You have to understand, that thing crawled into Song Nanshi’s room through the front door. In other words, it was right beside us – if it could crawl into Song Nanshi’s room, it could just as easily crawl into He Jian’s room.

Not harming Song Nanshi before was one thing, but with this thing looking like that, just appearing in Building 29 in the middle of the night would be more than enough to scare me to death, wouldn’t it?

I couldn’t control myself – every little while I had to open my eyes and check the doorway, afraid I’d suddenly see that ghastly pale face in the door crack. After repeating this countless times, I finally couldn’t stand it anymore.

What the fuck was I trying to sleep for!

I suddenly opened my eyes wide.

Rather than lying there giving someone an opportunity to take advantage, I might as well stay awake. Once daybreak came, I refused to believe that looking at the video wouldn’t help me find a way to deal with this damn thing.

The time pointed to 2 AM, and now the problem had changed.

There were ten thousand ways to stay up all night, but for me to relax, there was only one method.

Eat sweets.

This was a habit I’d developed since childhood. It started when Bai Liu bragged to me that she could eat her mom’s chili sauce with rice. I got upset and started hoarding all kinds of sweets like a hamster, and it got out of control from there.

Normally when renting outside, I would usually have my own little “treasury” stocked with pocky, jelly, chocolate and such. However, since moving into Building 29, various matters had come one after another without pause. I was still sleeping on the floor in Xiao He’s room, let alone having any treasury.

This was killing me.

Originally, in the middle of the night, appetite was the most vulnerable forbidden desire to provocation. We sweet-toothed people are just like this – think of chocolate and immediately think of brownies, Black Forest cake, hot cocoa, Magnum ice cream bars, molten lava cake…

In short, in just two minutes, I indeed stopped thinking about that thing in the video. In its place, an even more deadly thought appeared in my mind.

I had to go downstairs to get some chocolate.

For the first time in my life, I had some reflection on my sweet tooth.

After all, to get chocolate, I’d have to traverse the second-floor corridor at 2 AM, go down those stairs where two people had died, get to that kitchen where we’d had ghostly incidents before, and retrieve my peachwood sword reserves from the refrigerator that had been repeatedly opened and closed by who knows what.

Paying such a huge price just to eat some chocolate – was it really worth it?

After thirty seconds of hesitation, I threw off the covers and got up.

After all, without sweets, humans lose some of their beautiful qualities.

Opening the room door, I carefully observed the corridor situation, ultimately turned on the small light above the stairs, and slowly went downstairs.

During the day, the area around Building 29 was already deserted, and at this hour it was even more deathly quiet. Even the dog at the hotpot restaurant next door was probably asleep, yet here I was with my heart racing just to get a few chocolate bars I’d made myself.

Fortunately, nothing happened until I walked into the kitchen.

Anyway, chocolate froze quickly – worst case I’d make some more after the sun came up tomorrow.

I comforted myself while quickly grabbing a large handful of peachwood swords from the refrigerator. However, what I never could have expected was that the moment I closed the refrigerator door, the stairway light I’d turned on when coming downstairs also went out with a responding click, instantly plunging the entire first floor into pitch darkness where you couldn’t see your hand in front of your face!

“Shit…”

Thanks to the big heart I’d developed over this past month, when encountering this kind of thing now I only broke out in a cold sweat on my back – I didn’t even cry out.

In the pitch darkness, I quickly felt my way to the switch outside the kitchen, but no matter how I flipped it, forget about the stairway light not turning on – the kitchen and first-floor hall lights had no response either.

Building 29 had lost power.

If this had been over a month ago, suddenly encountering this kind of thing I might still have thought it was a coincidence. But having experienced so many bizarre troubles, my sucker radar was already top-tier.

Building 29 didn’t lose power early or late, but just happened to lose power when I came downstairs in the middle of the night. If this wasn’t ghostly, I should replace my brain with a mousse cake!

Thinking of that thing in the previous video, my heartbeat immediately became uncontrollable. However, I hadn’t even brought my phone when coming downstairs, so my current overall experience was even worse than that of a horror movie protagonist.

Did it really have to mess with me like this!

People under extreme panic easily fly into impotent rage. I felt around and grabbed the non-stick pan I used for making mille-feuille, thinking that tormenting me like this every day was really going too far. After this, whether it was a red-dressed female ghost or some big brother crawling on the ground, as long as it dared block my path going upstairs, I was definitely going to be fucking Red Wolf today.

Thinking this, I murderously felt my way out the door in the dark, but before I’d even taken two steps, a hair-raising feeling suddenly shot up my spine.

Wait…

Building 29’s circuit breaker was clearly in the kitchen.

As I sucked in a sharp breath and whipped around, in that instant my neck suddenly tightened, and the sudden suffocating sensation almost made my vision go black. I instinctively released the frying pan in my hand and desperately tried to tear away whatever was strangling my neck.

Was it electrical wire?

The moment I felt that texture, my heart went cold.

Whatever had come, it really wanted to kill me! Could it be that what I’d said in the bathroom before had worked?

The cord tightened more and more, my throat couldn’t make any sound at all. In desperation I could only frantically reach behind me with both hands, originally wanting to find a gap where I could loosen it. However, in all that chaos, I suddenly touched an ice-cold hand!

You bastard!

Even while nearly suffocating, my anger completely flared up at this moment. I thought even if you’re fucking Sadako, I’m going to physically exorcise you today! I viciously used my nails to claw at it, and this actually seemed to work – the next second, the shackles around my throat loosened. I took the opportunity to shout loudly and drove my elbow backward with force, hitting something soft and knocking it back at least half a meter!

“Boss, are you alright!”

While I was still gasping for breath, another voice sounded in the darkness – it was He Jian.

He had come down with his phone, and as the bright white flashlight beam swept over, a black shadow flashed before my eyes, seemingly trying to escape outside.

“Xiao He, be careful!”

I urgently called out a warning, but clearly it was already too late.

That black shadow moved extremely quickly as it rushed out of the kitchen, immediately knocking the phone from He Jian’s hand. In an instant, the only light source in the house fell to the ground. Afraid that He Jian would suffer, I couldn’t care about anything else at this point and lunged forward in the dark. In the pitch blackness, I only felt a sharp pain in my wrist, and before my whole body could react, someone had already grabbed my arm in a reverse hold and pressed me against the table.

“Boss, what are you two doing in the middle of the night!”

At this time Han Sha’s voice came from the stairway, along with another flashlight beam shining around us. I desperately twisted my head around and only then discovered that the one holding me down was none other than He Jian.

“How is it you, Boss!”

When He Jian realized it was me, he immediately loosened his grip. By this time I could no longer feel my wrist and couldn’t help rolling my eyes dramatically: “Usually you worry about me giving you trouble, but you’re not worried now?”

He Jian didn’t have time to answer me – he was looking around, clearly still not having recovered.

Of course I knew what he was looking for, but at this moment, where was there any black shadow on the first floor? Once again, that “thing” that had just appeared before the two of us had vanished into thin air.

“Boss… did you see clearly what that was just now?”

He Jian picked up his phone from the floor and unwillingly searched around the first floor again, but indeed, there definitely wasn’t a fifth person in this place.

“I wish I knew what it was.”

It wasn’t until Han Sha pulled the circuit breaker and the first floor lit up again that I belatedly realized both my neck and wrist hurt terribly. I said irritably: “I’m really impressed. That thing just now couldn’t manage to kill me, but you nearly did… Xiao He, where did you even train this stuff? With skills like this, why didn’t you say so earlier? If I’d known, I would have had you come downstairs with me to get chocolate.”

“Sorry Boss, I trained in kickboxing at the gym. I was originally trying to grab him, didn’t expect you would lunge forward… so I used too much force.”

Seeing that my wrist had turned blue, He Jian felt somewhat guilty and wanted to come over and rub it for me, but I no longer trusted this kid’s hand strength. After all, with the force he’d used to pin me just now, if he kneaded dough, he could probably break the gluten.

I waved my hand irritably: “Alright, the main point isn’t with you anyway… the main point is here.”

I pointed at my neck – even without looking I knew that bastard had definitely left marks from strangling me, otherwise I wouldn’t be in pain just from talking.

Song Nanshi rushed over to help me check, his expression quickly becoming grave: “Boss… if this had been strangled any tighter, it would be a type of injury we see quite commonly at our funeral home.”

I sighed, not expecting that after several previous buildups, this time there had been a direct physical attack. I said viciously: “Damn it, I almost got to use my frying pan!”

As I spoke, I wanted to pick up the frying pan from the floor, but suddenly Han Sha rushed over and grabbed my wrist: “Don’t move yet.”

I was startled and looked in the direction of his gaze, only to discover that somehow there were red bloodstains on my left hand.

He Jian beside me also changed expression when he saw this.

“This is…”

I remembered clawing at the other party’s hand during the struggle and said in shock: “It can still bleed?”

Han Sha frowned and thought for a moment, then suddenly said: “Little Song, you should have clean cotton swabs, right? Bring two over. After that, Boss, you and Xiao He go report this to the police – after all, you both had direct contact with the other party.”

“Report to the police?” I was stunned.

Han Sha rolled his eyes: “Even I, a Daoist, am telling you to call the police – can you have a little faith in science? If there really was a ghost trying to harm you, do you think it could bleed?”

Suddenly, I felt a chill run up my spine as I caught on.

Indeed, this time was different from all the previous times – the other party had even turned off the circuit breaker beforehand.

And would a traditional malevolent spirit need to turn off the electricity and go to such great lengths to strangle me to death with electrical wire?

Watching Song Nanshi carefully wipe the bloodstains from under my fingernails, the more I thought about it, the more hair-raising it became.

If that thing just now really was human—

Then who would go to such elaborate lengths to come to my house in the middle of the night to kill me, and how did they manage to vanish into thin air afterward?

In an instant, I suddenly felt I had touched the door to the truth behind Building 29’s haunting, but the remaining matters were clearly beyond what we few people could handle.

At 3 AM, all members of Huangliang Yimeng went to the Guan Yinli Police Station.