Jiang Luo’s move was forceful.
The moment his lips pressed forward, it completely blindsided the malicious ghost.
Chi You bent slightly, head lowered, spine curved—his usual composure utterly shattered. The ever-confident killer was stunned.
The scent of blood mixed with the faint, cool fragrance on Jiang Luo’s body. After running for so long, his breathing was fast and hot. The smell of sweat mingled with post-shower freshness, falling against Chi You’s cheek.
The blood of several people had smeared onto the killer’s face—and now, rubbed against the youth’s cheek.
His lips were ice-cold.
Cold as stone, yet soft on the surface—smooth like skin. Just like their owner: clearly cruel and cunning, yet pretending to be a harmless gentleman.
After the kiss landed, Jiang Luo hesitated for only a second before ruthlessly prying open Chi You’s lips, tongue invading with force.
Fluids exchanged.
Just lip-to-lip wouldn’t do a d*mn thing.
The malicious ghost and human met inside the mouth.
Heat and chill tangled together. A strange sensation surged from the lips straight into Chi You’s brain, snapping him back to awareness. The malicious ghost stared strangely at the black-haired youth—and their eyes locked.
Even while taking the initiative to kiss him, the youth’s expression was terribly indifferent, even annoyed and impatient. He didn’t bother to hide it, locking eyes with Chi You with a look full of challenge and mischief, wrapping around the malicious ghost like a net.
Chi You’s Adam’s apple bobbed. He tried to speak, but only met the other person’s soft, pliant lips again. Sensations he’d never experienced before washed over him. His throat itched inexplicably, and he swallowed again.
In that fleeting—or perhaps prolonged—moment, something dark and hidden began to fester deep inside him. Like a surging ocean, igniting like burning oil.
The malicious ghost’s eyes darkened. He slowly lowered the hand holding the chainsaw, the sharp buzzing still echoing uselessly through the empty hallway.
Jiang Luo mentally repeated to himself that Chi You would be disgusted by this—feeling secretly satisfied at the thought.
His assault continued with no pause, clumsy yet wild, storming the gates. Jiang Luo kept count in his head, planning to end the kiss before Chi You could react—but unexpectedly, the malicious ghost’s hand wrapped around his waist. His chest trembled as a muffled chuckle escaped between their lips and tongues.
Jiang Luo glanced at him like he was insane. But Chi You pulled back slightly, lips brushing lips, breath heavy with ambiguity.
“This really is an interesting method,” he murmured.
Their lips stayed close, brushing and touching with each breath—stickier, more breathless than full-on kissing. The malicious ghost spoke again, deliberately grazing Jiang Luo’s lips: “A patient, kissing the killer doctor to survive…”
He smiled, voice low and close to the floor. “Classmate Jiang, I like it.”
Then he suddenly pulled Jiang Luo into his arms and kissed him back with even more ferocity, flipping their roles.
This kiss was entirely different from before. Caught off guard, Jiang Luo was pushed back again and again. His head pounded, tongue aching from the suction. The malicious ghost wasn’t human—his tongue reached impossibly deep. Jiang Luo glared at him, eyes full of fire, and retaliated fiercely.
Their tongues clashed in a deadly battle—resisting, lunging, biting, attacking—neither side willing to back down. The blood in their mouths grew stronger. Chi You gripped the back of Jiang Luo’s neck, while Jiang Luo yanked the malicious ghost’s collar, forcing him to bend low.
At some point, the chainsaw had stopped. In the quiet corridor, the sounds of kissing grew impossibly loud and hot.
Forty-eight seconds. Forty-nine…
With ten seconds left, Jiang Luo pulled away without hesitation.
As Chi You leaned in again, Jiang Luo wiped his mouth, curved his lips in a smirk—
—and shoved the malicious ghost forcefully off the sixth floor.
The next instant, the sixth-floor stairway lights went out. The malicious ghost fell into darkness, frowning in surprise, his eyes locked firmly on Jiang Luo, still standing in the hallway light.
Blood smeared Jiang Luo’s slightly swollen lips. He wiped them with a smile and looked down at Chi You from above.
“The correct answer to this game is Qin Fan, Chi You.”
His rose-red lips curled upward, and every breath he exhaled was still burning hot from their earlier struggle. He was like a venomous snake, cold-blooded and cruel, as he said, “You owe me a secret. I hope you’ll live long enough to tell me.”
The next moment, the faceless monster in the darkness lunged forward, dragging the bloodied, white-coated killer completely into the stairwell.
Jiang Luo let out a slow smile and whistled.
He walked easily toward the end of the sixth floor, ready to find Dead Ghost and Lu Youyi. But when he reached another staircase, he was surprised to see the two still hadn’t come up.
Where were they?
***
Lu Youyi and Dead Ghost were still struggling to flee.
Fu Yuaner’s strength was far greater than they had expected. They had already run up at least six floors, but the floor number still read “3”.
They’d hit a ghost wall.
When you run into a ghost wall, the most important thing is not to panic and to stay focused. But Fu Yuaner was closing in, and the walls behind them were crawling with writhing, seemingly living strands of hair—how could anyone not panic?
Lu Youyi chanted incantations nonstop, but the more he chanted, the angrier Fu Yuaner seemed to get. Her hair had already brushed past his neck several times, slamming into the walls with heavy thuds.
Lu Youyi swallowed. “Holy cr*p.”
Dead Ghost ran ahead of him, lips set in a tight line.
He didn’t have his big blade and couldn’t think of a way to deal with such a deeply resentful spirit. And yet, something in him told him he should be able to handle Fu Yuaner. But reality was that he couldn’t even protect his friend—just keep fleeing, chased by a furious ghost.
The helpless feeling of being like a dog with its tail between its legs weighed heavily on him. The frustration built and built.
Am I really no match for this ghost woman?
Dead Ghost looked back at Fu Yuaner.
She looked both alive and dead. Her head lifted stiffly, and with each step, rotting chunks of flesh dropped from her body—only to regenerate again.
Dead Ghost suddenly said, “Was she made into a puppet?”
Lu Youyi froze.
Whenever puppets were mentioned, only the Chi family came to mind.
But the Chi family had no reason to manipulate Fu Yuaner to kill them… right?
Now wasn’t the time to overthink it. Lu Youyi threw another talisman behind them, just as he was about to say something—when a small figure appeared at the top of the stairs.
It was Little Pink, Ye Xun’s wraith doll.
Lu Youyi was overjoyed, assuming Ye Xun had sent Little Pink to help them.
“Little Pink! Quick, beat this ghost woman to the ground!”
But Little Pink only stared blankly at Fu Yuaner, unmoving.
Lu Youyi frowned and ran over, poking Little Pink’s cheek. “Little Pink?”
Little Pink said, “I found… her.”
Lu Youyi suddenly had a bad feeling. Little Pink had always listened to Ye Xun. Whatever Ye Xun said, he would do—after all, Ye Xun was his master. But right now, Little Pink’s intense gaze at Fu Yuaner seemed almost… self-aware.
“…Little Pink?”
He asked hesitantly.
Little Pink turned to look at him, black eyes blinking. “I can’t… hurt her.”
Lu Youyi swallowed hard. He felt something was very wrong.
Little Pink turned back to Fu Yuaner. But the next second, her hair coiled around him, wrapping the wraith doll from head to toe in jet-black strands.
Little Pink tilted his head, peering at her through the veil of hair.
Fu Yuaner strangled him hard, clearly mistaking him for a human and thinking this strength would be enough to kill him. After a moment, she released her hair and continued advancing toward Lu Youyi and Dead Ghost.
She walked right past Little Pink, whose dark eyes tracked her. The spirit that had once been Wang Xinhui had long forgotten many things, and once merged with the puppet, she no longer had her own consciousness.
But now, something inside her felt… sad.
Of course, she didn’t know this feeling was called sadness, nor where it came from. She had already forgotten the name “Wang Xinhui.”
And yet, straining her thoughts, she suddenly remembered another name.
“Fu… Fu…”
She said, “Fu Yuaner.”
Fu Yuaner stopped mid-step and turned to look at her.
A strange joy welled up inside Little Pink.
She wanted to say, It’s me.
I’m… who am I again?
I’m Little Pink.
A wraith doll.
My master’s name is Ye Xun.
He has many good friends.
The two you’re trying to kill are his friends.
Could you… be my friend too?
Little Pink said, “I—”
But before she could finish, countless strands of hair once again wrapped tightly around her.
As if realizing she had failed to kill her the first time, Fu Yuaner’s hair twisted tighter. The cloth at Little Pink’s neck tore open. In the next moment, he was about to be ripped in two.
Lu Youyi cried out, “Little Pink!”
He rushed forward and slapped his last talisman onto Fu Yuaner’s hair. The strands burst into flame and scattered like fish fleeing in water, freeing the puppet within.
Lu Youyi seized the opportunity to scoop up Little Pink and kept running upward with Dead Ghost, a chaotic mess of flailing limbs.
“Dead Ghost, hurry! I’m out of talismans!” Lu Youyi shouted. “I heard kid pee can break a ghost wall—should we just take a piss?!”
Dead Ghost’s eye twitched violently. He flatly refused. “I’m not doing that.”
“Come on, this is a life-or-death situation! What’s more important—your pride or your life?” Lu Youyi looked at him accusingly. Then he seemed to have an epiphany.
“Oh, I get it. You’re not a virgin anymore, are you?”
He looked jealously at Dead Ghost, then decisively handed over the wraith doll for Dead Ghost to carry, and began unfastening his pants. “If only Jiang Luo and Ye Xun were here—this job really suits the three of us.”
Dead Ghost turned to look at him. After a pause, he nodded and said, “You really are unconcerned with decorum.”
As they were momentarily distracted, the hair behind them struck again. This time, it was dangerously close—two thick strands shot directly at their foreheads with ferocious momentum. Lu Youyi’s pupils contracted; at this life-or-death moment, the doll in Dead Ghost’s arms suddenly opened its mouth and fiercely swallowed both strands of hair.
Lu Youyi let out a breath of relief, only to grow tense again. “Little Pink, you can’t just eat random stuff!”
But Little Pink didn’t listen. Chewing on the hair, it jumped out of Dead Ghost’s arms and walked up to Fu Yuaner. Its big mouth opened wide—and it swallowed Fu Yuaner whole.
Any vengeful spirit swallowed by the wraith doll becomes a part of the doll itself. Little Pink thought, now we can be together forever.
“It’s over,” Lu Youyi took two steps back and muttered, “Little Pink ate something it shouldn’t have.”
Dead Ghost was puzzled. “What happens when it eats something it shouldn’t?”
As soon as he said that, dense hair began to sprout from Little Pink’s body—like a tidal wave, it surged to engulf the stairwell. Lu Youyi and Dead Ghost both slipped on the hair and tumbled down.
“When it eats something random, it inherits some random trait from the spirit it ate,” Lu Youyi shouted, “and no one knows how long it’ll last!”
Before he finished, the thick hair had already swept them down the stairwell.
Lu Youyi’s head spun from all the crashing. He nearly cracked his skull several times, and only when he finally stopped sliding did he realize he’d reached the first floor. Staggering to his feet, he wiped his forehead—his hand came away bloody. His head was gashed open from the fall. He hissed from the pain, then suddenly remembered, “Dead Ghost?”
***
Dead Ghost had been flung headlong by the wave of hair, smashing into a sharp stair railing.
The point gouged a huge bump on the top of his head. A stone shard embedded in flesh shifted loose and slowly fell from the wound.
The injury healed in an instant. A moment later, Teng Bi slowly opened his eyes.
He found himself buried in a mass of hair.
Expressionless, he tore through it and stood up. His hand moved instinctively to grasp a weapon—but there was no broadsword. Teng Bi glanced around, sniffed the air, and caught several faint human scents.
Not just humans—his master’s scent was here too.
Teng Bi lowered his gaze to the floor covered in hair. He stepped forward, following the trail toward his master.
But suddenly, his footsteps paused.
In his memory, a certain foolish human had also been buried here with him.
Teng Bi stood still for three seconds, then continued walking.
The ghost maze had dissipated. When he exited, he found himself on the first floor.
His master was on the sixth floor. But Teng Bi thought for a moment—he should retrieve his weapon first before looking for his master.
He had already caught the scent of his weapon, but it was outside the illusion.
I’m only retrieving my weapon—not helping those humans.
With that thought, Teng Bi’s face remained impassive as he gathered his strength and struck the wall with full force.
The entire space rippled like the surface of a lake. Soon, like shattered fragments peeling away, the corpse-strewn hospital illusion disappeared, revealing the quiet dormitory building for trainees.
Teng Bi turned to look at the empty corridor behind him. He stared for a long time, then turned and headed to the second floor to retrieve his weapon.
***
In the stairwell between the fifth and sixth floors—
The moment Chi You was shoved into the darkness by Jiang Luo, the faceless monster targeted him.
He landed unscathed, but the faceless monster’s arms—reaching past its knees—wrapped around his neck, gnawing at his shoulder. Chi You ignored it. After the initial shock, his expression darkened like dripping ink.
Chi You was too smart—not a second passed before he understood he’d been played.
He touched his lips. The scent of Jiang Luo still lingered, along with the heat from their struggle, and the taste of Jiang Luo’s blood.
No—this wasn’t just being played.
Chi You thought grimly—he had been used. Jiang Luo had made him a scapegoat to deal with the faceless monster.
The killer in the white lab coat curled his lips in a cold smile. After the fury peaked, he laughed in spite of himself, licking the blood from his lips.
The blood was faintly sweet, and the taste made him narrow his eyes.
A flash of Jiang Luo pushing him into the darkness passed through his mind.
The raging fury inside twisted briefly.
Chi You stared blankly for a moment. Only when the faceless monster bit into his neck did he return to his senses.
The ghost tattoo on Chi You’s body crawled up to his neck, wriggled out of his skin, and grabbed the faceless monster.
The ghost tattoo reversed the predator-prey roles, devouring the creature. Chi You tilted his head, quietly watching the monster and murmured, “It’s because of you… that he needed to find a substitute.”
He smiled, but his eyes were ice-cold. “I really have you to thank. This is quite the gift.”
The vengeful ghost reached out and crushed the faceless monster’s head.
With a pop, it exploded in his hand like a blood mist.
Chi You retreated instantly. After the ghost tattoo finished consuming the monster, he calmly climbed to the sixth floor, stepping into the light.
But Jiang Luo was no longer there.
