Chapter 197: Swaying Left and Right
"If you have nothing to hide, you won't fear the knock of ghosts at your door. In the end, you all just want to use Xu Zhenzhen to make money."
Chen Ge had figured out the whole story. Tian Teng Hospital had originally only wanted to create an atmosphere by fabricating a nonexistent ghost, but they never expected that ghost to actually appear.
"Stop! Don't come any closer!"
The actress let out a scream, but her voice was quickly cut off by a heart-wrenching male voice.
"It hurts! It hurts so much!"
The man's voice rang out again. This time, including Chen Ge, everyone in the room froze.
"Brother Lin, am I hearing things?" The actress's arm trembled. "That voice just now seemed to come from the tape recorder."
The actor was completely panicked too. He was certain that the voice hadn't come from the recorder.
Both actors wobbled as they looked behind Chen Ge, making his skin crawl. "Is there something behind me?"
He reached into his pocket, gripping the ballpoint pen, his leg muscles tensed.
"It's not behind you..." The haunted house actor stepped back to the corner of the corridor, keeping a distance of nearly three meters from Chen Ge.
"Not behind me, then why are you running?" Chen Ge gritted his teeth, forcing the words out. These people sure were quick to flee when trouble hit.
Back when his own haunted house had problems, whether it was a real ghost or a fake one, he was always the first to charge in.
"It hurts, it hurts so much..."
Something even more astonishing happened. The man's voice came from a different spot every time!
The sound seemed to be moving forward bit by bit, like a man covered in wounds slowly dragging himself across the hallway.
"It hurts, it hurts so much!" After the man's voice disappeared for two or three seconds, it suddenly appeared right in front of the actress!
"Ah!"
Her scream felt like it could pierce eardrums. The actress, never expecting something like this to happen, turned and fled down the corridor without looking back.
"Aqin!" The actor was too scared to move. He pressed himself against the wall. If they were scared together, now he was all alone.
Chen Ge picked up the tape recorder. The indicator light was still on, like a red eyeball, and the tape was still spinning inside, but the man's voice had moved out into the corridor.
"It left the tape?" Based on his past experience, Chen Ge had a rough idea of the tape ghost's strength.
Residual thoughts and the lowest-level ghosts couldn't leave their possessed objects. For example, Xiao Xiao had never left her doll.
Slightly stronger than Xiao Xiao were the Mirror Ghost and the Spirit Pen. They could occasionally leave the objects they inhabited, but only for a very short time.
Above them were the lanky shadow figures from the Third Ward. Most of the time, they rode on people's shoulders, but they could survive for a long time even without a living host.
The highest level was naturally the Red Clothes. They didn't need to rely on anything. They could be considered "ghosts" in the truest sense.
"The tape ghost's strength should be between the Spirit Pen and the lanky shadow figures—stronger than the Spirit Pen, but not as combat-capable as the lanky shadow figures."
The man's screams occasionally echoed through the corridor. He seemed aimless, not bothering the actor whose legs had gone weak with fear, nor chasing after the fleeing actress.
This ghost was very strange, as if it were searching for something.
"Keep saying it hurts—what did he suffer before he died?" Chen Ge had drawn the Crying Tape. The best way to make the tape ghost obey was to help it resolve its obsession.
Since he couldn't find the tape recorder before, Chen Ge had never had a chance to communicate with the tape ghost. This was their first meeting.
"It hurts, it hurts so much..."
The man's voice lingered in the corridor for a while, then slowly moved toward the entrance of the haunted house.
"Did he find something?" Chen Ge's gaze sharpened. The tape ghost might have sensed the real ghost hiding in the haunted house!
The thought flashed through his mind, and Chen Ge ran out of the room with the tape recorder.
The actor at the door also heard the sound fading away. He pulled out his phone, opened the group chat, and pressed the voice key to shout: "The ghost is heading your way! Run! Get out through the entrance!"
The actors in the earlier scenes weren't too scared at first, but hearing the actor's frantic shouts, they panicked. They were all haunted house employees—there was no reason to trick each other.
"Hurry! Hurry! That thing is already there!"
After saying that, the actor ran in the opposite direction from the ghost, not even bothering to check his colleagues' replies.
"What good is just shouting?"
Chen Ge chased after it, keeping a distance of two or three meters from the ghost's voice.
Passing by the nursery, as Chen Ge walked past the cart, a petite girl suddenly ran out of the room ahead where organs were piled up.
As soon as she opened the door, she heard the ghost's voice.
"It hurts!"
The agonizing scream was right at the doorway. The girl stared at the empty corridor in front of her, stumbling back several steps before falling into the pile of organs. "Who's talking? Come out, come out!"
Her shrill voice was choked with tears. She held her phone, sending messages to the group, but no one replied.
"It hurts! It hurts so much!"
The ghost's voice entered the room. The girl could only hear it, not see anyone. The makeup on her face was ruined from fear.
With nothing around her, the girl shrank into the pile of organ models, grabbing them to bury herself.
Chen Ge had been following the ghost the whole time. When he walked in and saw this scene, he was stunned by her behavior.
Striding into the room, Chen Ge pulled the girl out of the organ pile. "Tell your people to leave through the entrance."
Feeling the warmth of Chen Ge's palm, the girl pulled herself together and stumbled out.
The ghost's voice didn't chase after her. After circling the room, it entered the dissection room.
Chen Ge was now certain that this monster was searching for something.
At the end of the corridor, the sound of a wall turning echoed. The girl had notified the actors in the earlier scenes, and they had already left. The haunted house now probably had only Chen Ge as the sole living person.
"Let me see what you're really looking for."
Gripping the ballpoint pen and carrying the tape recorder, Chen Ge followed the ghost's voice all the way to the entrance of Tian Teng Hospital.
On the narrow corridor, a green light flickered on and off, casting an eerie glow over the entire hallway. At the end of the corridor, a female mummy was swaying left and right.
"It hurts..."
The ghost's agonized cry stopped in front of the female corpse. Chen Ge also walked over to the body model, staring at the mummy hanging in the middle of the corridor, a chill of fear running through him.
When he first entered the haunted house, after helping up the staff member from the iron cabinet, he felt something brush his shoulder. Turning around, he realized it was the "female corpse" swaying.
One more chapter is coming. It might be a bit late.