667 Ghost Marriage
“Come!” Xiao Yu’s mother’s phone rang. The bloody woman grabbed Xiao Yu’s body and led her out of the room. It must be very dangerous for her to appear. Xiao Yu and Xiao Jia grabbed Han Fei, who was still thinking. “We need to leave this place first!”
The soul bells on the door chimed on the three’s hearts. They heard something slamming into the front door. Something was trying to come in!
“Quick!” Once they exited the room, the front door was slammed through! They looked down through the stairs. A wave of redness dyed the whole building instantly. It moved so fast that one couldn’t tell what it was. However, wherever it had been, there would be red.
“It’s coming!” No one knew what it was. The pressure frightened even Xiao Yu’s mother. “Go to the 7th floor! Its target is the paper craftsman’s room!”
The soul bells chimed. It was a warning and a calling for the unknown monster. The three ran downstairs. They had no other choice. They reached the landing between the 8th and 7th floor when the redness spread to the 4th floor!
“Get into the room!” Xiao Yu’s mother pulled Xiao Yu into the 7th floor. She was followed by Xiao Jia. Han Fei ran at the back. He leaped into the door and closed the door behind him. Just as the door clicked, the blood swept through the 7th floor. Strange noises came from the door. It sounded like several thousand worms crawling past. The sound alone was terrifying. The three hid on the 7th floor and didn’t dare to breathe too loudly. They were thankful that the red monster wasn’t looking for them. If they had to face such a scary thing, Han Fei had no idea how they could survive.
“Has it left?” Xiao Jia asked softly. Xiao Yu’s mother and Han Fei glared at him. He was glared at by a ghost and a human. He realized Han Fei’s glare was scarier than the ghost’s. Xiao Jia astutely closed his mouth.
About ten seconds later, the sound of chewing and tearing came from the ninth floor. The old man living there seemed to anticipate this, so he went into his bedroom to hide. After a long time, the soul bells stopped ringing, and the oppressive pressure receded. Han Fei slowly stood up. He leaned on the peephole and looked out. He saw a person encased in blood. The person was covered in wounds, and all the wounds had smiling faces growing out of them. It had no legs, but it moved through the blood wave. The monster was different from anything Han Fei had met. Han Fei couldn’t sense any resentment from it. It was different from the boy and the hanging man or even the clown. It was something that grew from the despair in this world. ‘If human despair is left to fester, it’ll only lead to deeper despair…’
The monster seemed to sense something. It slowed down and turned. Han Fei knelt down. ‘It’s so sharp! Can it sense even a gaze?’ Han Fei closed his mouth and nose with his hand. If he made any sound, the monster might come in!
This was very clichéd in horror movies. The monster was leaving when the character accidentally knocked a prop over. To prevent that from happening, Han Fei controlled his muscle so that he could freeze in place. Seeing how alert Han Fei was, Xiao Jia and Xiao Yu also didn’t dare to ask anything.
Fifteen minutes later, the sound in the corner faded away. Han Fei took a deep breath and crawled towards the peephole again. When Han Fei glanced outward, a murky eye was looking into the house too!
‘It hasn’t left!’ The cold sweat broke. Han Fei’s body froze. He didn’t have the power to face such a monster. After a temporary pause, Han Fei suddenly realized something. With the monster’s power, it could easily kill Han Fei. It wouldn’t give Han Fei the chance to be frightened… unless it wanted to toy with Han Fei.
“What’s going on? Has it left?” Xiao Jia asked. He noticed Han Fei’s expression was rather strange. He had a strange feeling. “Is it still there?”
“I can’t tell.” Han Fei held Company. After some hesitation, he slowly opened the door. The chill wind brought a horrible scent of blood into the room. The three retreated. They saw a lifesize wooden doll at the door. The male doll wore a chef’s uniform. He held a bone cleaver in his hand. His face was scorched until his two glassy eyes remained.
“When did this thing arrive?”
The corridor had returned to normal. However, there were more cracks on the wall. The blood monster left, but this strange thing appeared at their door.
“He looks like the man we met on the fifth floor this morning.” Xiao Jia reminded, “The man is also a chef. His face is ruined by fire, and he is about the size and height of this doll.”
“But why is it here?” Han Fei stared at the doll’s cleaver. He slowly approached. He tried to remove the cleaver, but the cleaver appeared to have grown into the doll’s hand.
“This is strange! In real life, the man made a wooden doll for his wife to summon her ghost. After dark, there is a wooden doll bearing his resemblance running around with a cleaver.” Xiao Jia was scared. He didn’t dare to look into the doll’s eyes. He didn’t dare to get too close to the doll. After a tension-filled moment, Han Fei noticed the doll couldn’t move. He believed they shouldn’t waste any more time. “The paper craftsman is right. We have other things to do.”
Han Fei was the first to walk past the wooden doll. He wanted to return to the 9th floor to check on the old man. However, he just came to the 9th floor when the soul bells tingled again. The living didn’t appear to be welcomed on the 9th floor anymore.
“The blood monster is probably still close by. We shouldn’t attract its attention.” Xiao Jia persuaded. “The elder has more experience dealing with this than we do. We better his advice and leave this place.” Xiao Jia was scared. Han Fei didn’t force it. When they returned to the 7th floor, the chef doll was still standing there, in the same position.
“This doll looks so creepy. I’m scared that it’d suddenly move to cut me.” Xiao Jia hid behind Han Fei and Xiao Yu.
“Hush. Don’t taunt it.” Han Fei led them to the 5th floor. Xiao Yu, who held her mom’s phone, suddenly stopped.
“What’s wrong?”
“I remember I dropped my phone here. But I can’t see it.” Xiao Yu looked at the empty corridor, and she was confused. Xiao Jia shrugged. “Does it really matter? Something very scary just passed by. Your phone was probably swept away.”
“It’s quite a pity. That phone has many pictures and videos of me with my mom.” Xiao Yu was disappointed. She held her mother’s phone tighter and swore not to lose this phone. “It’s okay. Let’s go.” That was what she said, but Xiao Yu kept looking around for her phone. When she passed by the 5th floor, her eyes twitched when she looked into one of the rooms.
“Huh?” Xiao Yu pointed at the room with shock. “Look at the wooden doll in the wedding dress!” Han Fei and Xiao Jia stopped. They looked into the room. In the mourning hall decorated like a bridal suite, there was a dining table. The table was filled with various meats. The doll in the wedding dress sat beside the table. It was exquisitely dressed. It was entangled with red threads. Its wooden left hand lay on the table. Its clean right hand held Xiao Yu’s phone.
“Did the doll pick up my phone?” The doll was very life-like. It was creepy. The three paused. After a moment, Xiao Yu walked towards the room. “The phone has the memory of my mom and me. I have to take it back.”
“I’ll go.” Han Fei stopped Xiao Yu. “I also want to examine the dolls closer to understand the mechanism behind it.”
Holding the broken red doll and Company, Han Fei stepped on the wedding posters and entered the room. Then, his ears twitched. Han Fei had very sensitive senses. He caught the soft footsteps. He turned back, and his eyes trembled. He shouted, “Be careful!”
Xiao Jia and Xiao Yu jolted before they turned around. The chef doll had silently moved to stand behind Xiao Jia. It stood on the step. Its large shadow loomed. The giant cleaver was raised. The next second, it could carve through Xiao Jia’s neck!
“The fuck!” Looking at the sharp blade, Xiao Jia’s legs weakened. Everything happened too suddenly. He fell to the ground. While the trio was distracted by the chef doll, Han Fei felt a prick of pain on his arm. He turned around and realized the bride doll had left the table and stood before him. The bride doll held a pair of chopsticks in her right hand. When Han Fei turned around, the chopsticks stopped right beside his temple. The doll was very close. Han Fei could see the perfect makeup on her face.
“She looks so real. It’s like a human face has grown out of the wood.” Han Fei stared at the bride doll. “Be careful! They wouldn’t move if we looked at them. We have to ensure that they’re always in our sight!”
After giving them the warning, Han Fei reached for the phone in the doll’s right hand. When she was being stared at, the bride doll was just a normal doll. Han Fei got the phone back easily. Han Fei told Xiao Jia to help him stare at the bride doll while he used this opportunity to examine the room.
“The tenant on the 5th floor manages to marry himself off to a ghost. If I can learn this ritual, perhaps I can find that missing person too!” The craftsman said that people who studied rituals were very dangerous, but Han Fei didn’t dare. He didn’t side with any of the five types of people. He only did things that he believed were right.
“It feels like we’re playing the puppet game with this pair of doll couple.” Xiao Yu stared at the chef doll outside the door while Xiao Jia looked at the bride doll fearfully. Han Fei searched through the room.
“Has the chef succeeded? After the night fell, he would enter the chef doll’s body to reunite with his dead bride in the afterlife?”
The ritual inside the room at night corresponded to the ritual inside the room in the day. The things were similar to the ones prepared by the living chef in his room.
When Han Fei visited the 5th floor in the morning, the bride doll was wrapped up tightly inside the sheet. She couldn’t even see the sun.
At night, Han Fei entered the bedroom again. The man they saw that morning was lying naked on the double bed. Various strange symbols were painted on his body. “Is he controlling the soul of the chef doll now?”
Han Fei used his superhuman memory to memorize all the symbols. He planned to try them on himself after he left this place.
“Han Fei, are you done? I don’t think I can do this further. I feel like this doll is going to kill me!”
“Just a while longer!” After memorizing the symbols, Han Fei turned to the headboard. The giant wedding picture was covered by a black cloth. “I found the wedding picture strange in the morning. I wonder how it’ll be when it’s at night.” Han Fei removed the black cloth. The people in the wedding picture disappeared. Only two bloody holes remained. “The people in the pictures have come out?”
He moved the frame, and a yellow page fell out. It recorded in detail the process of ghost marriage. “Ghost marriage requires the memory between the couple as the bridge. It consists of three steps, Soul-Guiding, Soul-Calling, and Soul-Resurrecting. You also need an important thing of the victim as a medium…”
Han Fei was reminded of many things. “The chef’s medium is their wedding picture. My medium…” Han Fei looked at the red doll in his hands. He felt like everything had been carefully arranged. “The woman taught the chef ghost marriage, and I came here to witness everything. I obtained the paper doll here, the key item I require for the ritual.”
This looked like a coincidence, but it was a chance traded with endless deaths. Han Fei held the paper doll tightly as he recited the name in his heart.
