Chapter 48: Please, Let Me Go!
Chen Ge’s expression twisted with disbelief as he recalled Zhang Peng’s stubborn glare and fierce look in the surveillance footage. “This guy’s really a ‘god-tier’ opponent!”
The sound of cutting within the Midnight Escape scene didn’t stop when Zhang Peng entered. The mirror monster probably never expected someone to charge in so bluntly.
“I can’t keep waiting. I need to see the mirror monster enter Zhang Peng’s body with my own eyes to feel at ease.”
After a quick glance at the monitor to confirm Zhang Peng’s location, Chen Ge removed the iron chain from the Skull Cutter’s coat and tossed it to the ground. He draped the bloodstained coat over himself and put on the human skin mask.
He swung the iron hammer a couple of times, and a brutal, malevolent aura radiated from him.
“Why does it feel like I’m the biggest villain here?”
Grabbing the keys and phone, he tucked the cloth doll into his chest and picked up the grotesquely designed iron hammer before stepping out of the surveillance room.
…
Inside the Midnight Escape scene, Zhang Peng felt the knife in his hand growing heavier. He had prepared for this day for a long time, but who could have predicted that things would go wrong the moment he entered?
It was already past one in the morning. At this hour, a normal person would be asleep or at least in the bedroom. He had gotten excited when he saw the staff break room sign earlier, taking a long time to calm himself down.
He kept psyching himself up, stoking the hatred in his heart, and finally mustered the courage to break in.
After charging into the break room, he slashed wildly at the bed, going so hard that he even injured himself.
The blade was stained with blood, but when he realized the bed was empty and the only blood on the sheets was his own, his resentment turned into sheer frustration. His murderous intent grew stronger, and his reason was consumed by rage.
“Destroying the Ping An Apartment and sending Juan to jail—that meddling bastard, I’ll kill him!” The more Zhang Peng thought about it, the angrier he got. The cutting sound echoing through the building buzzed in his ears like a fly, making him even more irritable.
He tightened his grip on the knife and moved closer to the source of the noise, staying cautious every step of the way to avoid being discovered.
“I’m close now, it’s on this floor!” Zhang Peng peeked out from the stairwell. Without any lighting tools, he pressed his body against the wall and entered the third-floor corridor.
“This haunted house is eerie and gloomy, with a maze-like layout. Once I take him out, I’ll stash the body somewhere, and it’ll take outsiders at least ten days to find it.” A cruel smile crept onto his face.
“The sound’s just ahead! But I wonder what this guy’s doing in a haunted house late at night—fixing props?” Zhang Peng crouched down, relaxed his body, wrapped his sleeve around his wound, and crept forward with the knife.
At the end of the third-floor corridor, near the main entrance of the Midnight Escape scene, Zhang Peng spotted a blurry shadow.
The figure stood in the center of the doorway, holding something and scratching at the door.
“Strange, why isn’t he turning on the lights either?” Only when he got close did Zhang Peng sense something off, but he didn’t dwell on it. His mind was flooded with the thrill of revenge.
The air grew heavy with tension. He slowly raised the knife above his shoulder, his body taut like a drawn bow, the blade aimed at the shadow ahead.
“Die!”
He lunged at full speed, his face twisted, and drove the knife deep into the shadow!
A triumphant grin spread across his face, but it vanished in a split second.
The knife passed straight through the shadow—he had stabbed nothing!
The momentum sent Zhang Peng crashing into the door, nearly throwing his back out.
“What the hell?!”
He couldn’t accept this outcome.
Scrambling to his feet, he slashed wildly at the air. “Where is he? Where is he?!”
After venting his rage, a strange feeling began to creep into Zhang Peng’s heart.
“I clearly saw a shadow standing here with its back to me! There’s no way I mis-saw it!” No longer caring about staying hidden, he pulled out his phone to illuminate the area. The wooden door was covered in fine scratches, and several sharp-edged mirror shards lay on the ground. “That shadow left these—I’m a hundred percent sure someone was standing here!”
How could someone standing right there vanish in the blink of an eye?
Zhang Peng shuddered involuntarily. The fire of anger in his chest was doused, replaced by a helpless dread as he stared at the silent corridor.
“People don’t just disappear unless… it wasn’t a person.” His throat tightened. The phone’s light offered no comfort; instead, it made him more anxious, as if every shadow hid a monster.
“The haunted house owner isn’t human! There really are ghosts here!” Sweat poured down Zhang Peng’s forehead, and his grip on the knife grew slick. Thoughts of revenge and murder were forgotten. He turned and ran, desperate to escape this cursed place.
Phone in hand, he sprinted faster and faster, not noticing that the angle of the safety door at the stairwell had changed.
“I’ll deal with revenge later—I can’t stay here.” Clutching his arm, Zhang Peng had just entered the stairwell when a shadow from behind the door swung at him.
“Crack!”
The sound of bone breaking was unmistakable. Zhang Peng stared at his limp, numb right hand, his mind going blank.
“Sorry, I missed.” Chen Ge stepped out from behind the door, the terrifying human skin mask twisting into grotesque expressions as he spoke. “I was aiming for your shoulder blade.”
His calm tone made it sound like a trivial matter. Zhang Peng looked at Chen Ge and felt like he was suffocating!
Why are you so fierce?! I’m the damn murderer here!
Zhang Peng wanted to fight back, but the moment his eyes landed on the forty-centimeter-long iron hammer with a blood groove, his hand holding the knife refused to obey.
A blood groove on a hammer, and the handle shaped like a spine—are you trying to make sure everyone knows you’re a psycho killer?!
Without giving him more time, Chen Ge swung the hammer at Zhang Peng’s thigh. He needed a helpless victim to serve as the mirror monster’s vessel.
“Bang!”
The stair railing bent under the force, and Zhang Peng barely dodged. With one hand bleeding and the other broken, he had no will to resist. He dropped the knife and bolted down the stairs.
“With such little courage, who gave you the nerve to visit my haunted house alone?”
Hammer in hand, Chen Ge chased after him. The two fled and pursued until they reached the first floor of the haunted house.