From Zhang Yiming, Chen Mo had learned that this cursed game, as long as the rules weren't broken, would grant the cursed person seven days. Starting from the moment they received the cursed game until the end of the seventh day, the ghost hidden within would appear and take that person's life.
In other words, this game was also known as the "Seven-Day Death" curse.
But these rules only applied under normal gameplay. If the recipient smashed the phone, discarded it, or deleted the game, they would be seen as breaking the rules and suffer the curse's "punishment"—the ghost attacking without regard for the seven-day rule. However, the attacks during the first six days weren't absolute death sentences; the game would provide clues for escape. Only on the seventh day would the absolute death curse take effect.
Simply put, whether or not the rules were broken, once someone received this "Seven-Day Death" cursed game, their life entered a seven-day countdown. So far, absolutely no one had ever escaped the ghost's fatal pursuit.
That meant, starting now, my life only had seven days left?
With a full half-month remaining until the story's given end time, for Chen Mo, the only chance at survival lay in uncovering the curse's origin and breaking it.
The only clue in hand was that one address, that old house. But Zhou Xiaomi and the other two boys had all triggered the curse while "exploring" that old house. It was easy to imagine that within it lurked an extremely dangerous ghost and immense peril.
Thinking this, Chen Mo couldn't deny feeling fear. But as participants in the story, they had no choice but to seek life through death.
"Hey, we're here."
The driver's voice from up front snapped Chen Mo back to reality. He'd been so lost in thought that he hadn't even noticed the car had stopped. Beside him, Dai Minghan cast a worried glance his way.
"I'm fine, don't worry."
With that, Chen Mo looked ahead again. That familiar alley was exactly as it had been in the "dream," but he didn't see the two-story building from his memory.
"Driver, we're not there yet, are we?"
"Go into this alley, take a turn, and you'll be there. Walk the rest yourselves—my car can't get out easily once it's in there."
Chen Mo nodded and looked up at the sky. After all the fuss and the journey, they'd arrived just at dusk. The sky was filled with clouds, bathed in an orange glow, strikingly similar to the scene in his "dream."
The alley was lined on both sides with high walls and some houses slated for demolition. It seemed this area had already been marked for redevelopment and might be leveled soon.
"Let's go, take a look inside."
The two silently steeled themselves and followed the path the three boys had taken, deeper into the alley. Watching their retreating figures, the taxi driver shot them a puzzled look, as if wondering why anyone would take a cab to this completely abandoned, soon-to-be-demolished residential area.
After walking a short way down the alley, a crooked signpost came into view. Just ahead of it, Chen Mo finally saw the house marked with a "demolish" character again. Against the fiery clouds of dusk, it was dyed a painterly orange.
Everything was exactly as in the "dream."
"This is it."
Chen Mo stopped and looked up at the two-story building. Untended for years, the iron gate was overgrown with weeds, and the roof and walls were covered in ivy. As he looked up, he noticed the second-floor window was open, as if someone had just been standing there watching him.
Just as he was about to push open the iron gate, Chen Mo hesitated and turned to Dai Minghan. "Maybe you should wait outside for me."
This old house might seem ordinary, but in stories, the calmer the surface, the more dangerous the hidden danger.
Chosen by this cursed game, Chen Mo had no choice. His only chance at survival was to find a way to break the curse within seven days. And even during those seven days, it wasn't a safe period—neither Feng Wenxuan nor Li Kai had waited for the Seven-Day Death curse to take effect; they'd died in ghost attacks along the way.
So it was the same for him. From the moment he received that eerie game, his life was in constant danger. Whether he entered this old house or not made little difference.
But Dai Minghan was different. This time, the cursed game hadn't spread to him. And whether this old house was a hint from the story or a trap meant to kill them, Chen Mo had no idea. If entering it meant triggering a dead end, there was no reason for the other to die with him.
"What are you thinking? I've come this far, and you want me to wait outside?"
As if completely ignoring Chen Mo's meaning, Dai Minghan stepped forward and pushed the rusty iron gate. It creaked open.
As the door swung open, thick dust stirred up, dancing in the twilight sunlight, making both of them cough repeatedly.
The scene inside was exactly the same as in the dream. The hallway led to the living room, with a kitchen and storage room on the side. Behind the sofa, a staircase stretched up into the dimmer second floor.
Up there, though Zhou Xiaomi hadn't gone, he'd learned from the other two boys that there were two bedrooms.
The layout was clear at a glance, and nothing seemed particularly strange.
But perhaps because it had been uninhabited for so long, the air carried not just dust but a stale, musty smell.
Following his memory, Chen Mo walked to a wall. Like the boy in the dream, he reached out and touched it. Flakes of peeling plaster fell away, revealing a dark brown surface.
It was indeed dried bloodstains!
Could this old house really be, as Zhang Yiming said, the site of a bloody incident?
Had that man named Yin Xiong really killed his wife and child here before committing suicide?
Though now just black stains, the blood on the floor stretched deeper into the room. Chen Mo followed the trail with his eyes, when suddenly, out of the corner of his vision, he caught sight of something at the top of the stairs, on the second-floor landing.
A pale-faced little girl was crouching there.