"I just have this feeling, I’m not sure," Song Yan confessed.
"Why?" Yang Xiao asked.
"I don’t know, it just feels like we escaped too easily."
"Yu Mi is staying separately from us; if that ghost really cos, the likelihood of Yu Mi being attacked is much higher than for us," Yang Xiao analyzed. "What we need to be wary of is that, if Yu Mi is killed, the ghost might disguise itself as Yu Mi to trick the two of us. The mont we open the door, we won’t be able to escape our fate."
"That’s exactly it. If we leave Yu Mi behind, once the ghost cos, we are likely to face it directly. To be honest, I’m really a bit scared," Song Yan admitted with a bitter smile.
When facing absolute danger, abandoning teammates or using them as a shield is a very normal choice; this is very common in the Nightmare World.
The reason Song Yan chose to save Yang Xiao while abandoning Xiang Xiaolin was because he valued Yang Xiao’s abilities.
His acting skills were good, and he was relatively familiar with the situation. Most importantly, he was the male lead handpicked by Director Ding.
As long as the two of them joined forces, the first and second male leads, they would have enough influence in the crew, which was crucial for their ultimate survival.
Ti ticked away, and although both of them were tired, they didn’t feel much desire to sleep. With so many complicated things happening recently, Yang Xiao kept testing various possibilities in his mind, hoping to piece together the fragnts into a complete story.
Now, it seed that the death of the male teacher was unusual, and the title of the Beast Master of the Mountain Village was likely not reflective of the truth.
"Bang!"
"Bang! Bang!"
The door suddenly knocked, startling Song Yan who was resting on the bed. Yang Xiao signaled him to be quiet with a gesture, then walked to the door alone, "Who is it?"
"It’s ." A sowhat muffled voice ca from outside, the voice of the innkeeper.
"What’s the matter?" Yang Xiao beca alert, worried that Song Yan’s premonition might co true.
"Nothing much, just wanted to ask about... your room fees. If you’re staying another night tonight, then tomorrow the ti is up," the innkeeper reminded from outside.
"Room fees?" Yang Xiao truly hadn’t thought about this, "How were the previous fees calculated?"
"Oh, your room fees were settled by the teachers from Ru Lin Middle School; they paid in advance for two days."
"Let’s wait until tomorrow, I’ll ask then," Yang Xiao only wanted to get rid of the innkeeper quickly.
At this mont, Song Yan had already tiptoed over, slowly squatting down, and finally half-kneeling on the floor, bending over so that his face was almost against the ground, peering through the gap between the door and the floor to look outside.
Initially thinking that the innkeeper would find another excuse wanting them to open the door, to Yang Xiao’s surprise, after hearing his response, the innkeeper simply said "Alright," and then walked away, his footsteps gradually fading.
Once the footsteps had completely vanished, Song Yan stood up from the ground.
"Any problems?" Yang Xiao inquired.
Song Yan had a sowhat odd expression, "I don’t know, I just peeked through the gap beneath the door and could see his shadow, but that still doesn’t confirm whether he’s a human or a ghost."
Yang Xiao imdiately walked to the telephone and dialed Yu Mi’s room landline.
The phone was quickly connected, and Yu Mi’s voice ca through, full of panic, "What has happened?"
"It’s okay, did the shop owner co looking for you?" Yang Xiao got straight to the point.
"No."
"Well, that’s good. Rember, don’t open the door for anyone who knocks tonight," Yang Xiao stressed again, "We won’t be coming either."
After hanging up the phone, Yang Xiao didn’t explain too much to Yu Mi, because there was no need.
As usual, they took turns keeping watch at night, with Yang Xiao on the first shift.
The next day, when Yang Xiao opened his eyes from the bed, the sky was already bright outside. Song Yan was joking by the side as he boiled water, congratulating them on surviving another day.
Around 8 a.m., after breakfast, without any notice of filming, Song Yan took the initiative to call Director Ding. When the call connected, a woman’s voice ca through, explaining that Director Ding had been taken away early in the morning and that filming would be rescheduled.
"Taken away?" The word ’taken’ gave Yang Xiao a bad feeling.
The voice of the woman on the other end of the phone dropped even lower, as if she couldn’t speak freely, "Director Ding was taken away by the police for questioning. It seems a teacher from the school had reported to the police. After your disappearance yesterday, Director Ding called in so people from the school to question them, suspecting that they were involved in your kidnapping. Then a disagreent escalated into an argunt, and it even turned physical."
After hanging up, Yang Xiao suggested they go to Ru Lin Middle School to take a look. Without Director Ding’s restrictions, they might find so clues.
When they left the guesthouse, they coincidentally ran into the shop owner returning from grocery shopping. Song Yan approached to make conversation, indirectly probing whether he had co by last night. The shop owner admitted it naturally, which seed like a false alarm.
The trio returned to Ru Lin Middle School, not taking the main entrance but instead making a long detour to a secluded spot, where they climbed over a low wall to get in.
Soon, they found the row of faculty dormitories where they had been filming the previous day.
Yang Xiao decisively bypassed the dormitories and headed towards the small mound behind them.
Since it had rained last night, the ground was wet and slippery, leaving footprints with every step.
Seeing Yang Xiao heading towards the mound at the back, Yu Mi beca anxious, "There... There was a ghost there last night. I heard what Nie Hexiang said, she really saw it!"
Yang Xiao didn’t think so. He had escaped from the ghost car last night, thanks to that goose egg stone, also known as the Wish Stone, which had imdiately drawn the ghost’s attention after appearing.
This was highly unusual; if the ghost had discarded the stone itself, there was no reason for such a strong reaction.
Yang Xiao’s hunch turned out to be correct. At a remote spot on the mound, they found a series of footprints.
At the place where the footprints were most concentrated, Yang Xiao took a look and saw they were directly facing the dormitory below, the very one they were filming at last night.
In other words, this location was perfect for observing the dormitory below.
Looking around, Yang Xiao picked up a stone from the ground, approximately the size of the goose egg stone from his mory, and threw it down towards the dormitory, easily hitting the wall.
Aside from being slightly off-target, everything else was almost exactly the sa as last night’s situation.
Yu Mi understood as well, eyes widening in realization, "There are footprints... the person who threw the stone last night wasn’t a ghost, it was a human!"
"The person who threw stones at the classroom windows before was also a human!"
Yang Xiao examined the direction of the footprints and followed the trail. Fortunately, the area was remote, with no miscellaneous traces to confuse them.
Eventually, they followed the footprints to an old, grey-white, two-story building. Although it was also dilapidated, it was much better than the row of low dormitories. The footprints beca chaotic here.
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