False evidence

Chapter 55 Getting Lost (Part 2)

The previous rooms and lights were gone, replaced by a long, dark corridor, just like the second floor.

"What are you doing?" A hand landed on my shoulder.

I slowly turned my head and met Meng Chao's gaze.

Meng Chao lowered his eyelids, withdrew his hand, and stepped back again.

"Twenty-one, are you alright?"

He spoke while hiding his other hand behind his back, his shoulders shrugging slightly.

I saw his vest flipped up over his stomach, and I breathed a slight sigh of relief, but still asked:

"What do you have in your hand?"

"Guess?" Meng Chao's eyes also showed a wary look.

"Retrieved from the bottom of the well?"

"call……"

Meng Chao let out a breath and showed his right hand.

What he was clutching in his hand was the Heavenly Ruler.

"What happened to you just now?"

What happened to you just now?

He and I asked each other the same question at the same time.

I shook my head: "Let's talk about you first."

"The door is locked! I can't open it! I just turned around and you told me to go with you!"

"and then?"

Meng Chao sighed: "When I got to the second floor, I felt something was off. What's our relationship? I know every single hair on your body. Given Gu Haitao's experience, I knew that bastard definitely wasn't you. So I swung the stick at him, and that bastard vanished!" As he spoke, he waved the ruler in the air twice.

Having confirmed that this was his style, I briefly recounted my previous experiences.

After hearing this, Meng Chao spat to the side and said, "Damn it, this is really a ghost!"

The two looked at each other and smiled bitterly.

"What do we do now? Find a beautiful lawyer first, then leave?"

I shook my head and looked to my left and right: "What did you just see?"

Meng Chao looked conflicted: "I beat that bastard to a pulp, and I've been looking for you guys upstairs and downstairs. I just got to the third floor and there you are! Who was that punch aimed at? Was your eyes blocked by that 'dirty thing' too?"

"Probably not."

I put my arm around him and we walked downstairs.

As I reached the corner, I turned around and looked up: "Wait for me here."

Meng Chao nodded. "I'll protect you from behind."

Although they followed closely, the faint sound of their footsteps was still clearly audible in the silence.

"Shh..."

"Den!"

I paused in my tracks.

Looking down, the cement steps that were originally tiled have been transformed into a wooden structure!
"you……"

I quickly gestured to Meng Chao to keep quiet.

Looking up again, the third floor had returned to the way I had initially seen it.

However, the small windows on the doors of both rooms were letting in light, but it wasn't from lamps; it was more like daylight filtering in.

I kept gesturing behind me, afraid that Meng Chao would make a noise and cause me to lose sight of the scene before me.

I went up to the third floor again and immediately peeked into the room I had been in before.

The windows were bright and clean, the floor was spotless, there was no one there, and no blood.

"Huff...huff..."

In the other room, however, came a faint, very strange sound.

Attracted by the noise, I carefully moved over. I covered the curtains again and peeked through the gap at the room. I instinctively turned my face away.

It was just an instinctive action, but the next second, I felt a wave of dizziness and several images flashed through my mind.

These images eventually merged with the nightmares he had been having before...

"What is he doing?" a voice asked.

I woke up with a start and turned my head to see Meng Chao at the corner below the stairs, with one index finger in front of his mouth and the other hand holding a ruler, gently tapping Bai Jing's arm.

I came to my senses completely, and when I looked again, the third floor had transformed back into a modern residential building.

The view outside the window was chaotic, still shrouded in thick fog at midnight.

Bai Jing glanced at me across the distance, then turned her face away, lowered her eyelids, and finally noticed Meng Chao's little action. "Where did this thing come from?"

"I found it!" Meng Chao looked relieved, put away the Heavenly Ruler, and tapped it in his palm.

Bai Jing's eyes flashed, she pushed him away, and strode up to the third floor. "Did you find anything?"

I shook my head.

"What are you waiting for? Hurry up and find someone!"

I grabbed her arm. "No need to look anymore, the person is definitely not up there."

"How do you know the person isn't up there?" Bai Jing asked.

I pointed to the window: "The third floor isn't that high. With your skills, if you get lost in this building and it takes a long time, would you choose to stay here or open the window and risk it?"

Bai Jing said, "I'm not talking about the people who went missing before. I'm talking about the mountain king... oops, I mean Gu Haitao!"

"Mountain King? A screen name?" Meng Chao raised an eyebrow. "How come I don't know that? An alternate account?"

“He’s even less likely to be on the third floor,” I said as I walked downstairs.

Bai Jing followed and asked, "You're not just planning to leave like this, are you?"

"Do you have a way to get out of here?" I asked back.

Bai Jing frowned and shook her head: "Being a shaman isn't a panacea; there are actually many taboos. I just tried it, and it seems that once you enter this building, the Huang family is no longer effective."

When I got down to the second floor, I raised my foot and kicked the stainless steel railing hard.

Then, he took out a disposable lighter and threw it forcefully at the window facing the stairs.

With a crash, the glass shattered.

"You want to jump from the second floor?" Meng Chao asked.

“There’s no need for that.” I shook my head. “It’s just a marker. We still need to find Gu Haitao first.”

Bai Jing asked, "You think he's on the second floor? I just looked, he's not there!"

"He might not be on the second floor, but if we try a different approach, we'll most likely find him!"

I walked straight to the end of the corridor on the right, turned around and asked, "Have you ever seen a vertically formatted book?"

Meng Chao shook his head: "What era are we living in? There's no such thing as a vertical version anymore."

"What do you want to say?" Bai Jing looked at me with a puzzled expression.

I said, "Once a person gets used to a certain way of reading, they will mostly be able to read quickly. Although vertical books are old, their advantage is that they allow people to read each word carefully."

As I was speaking, I kicked open the door on one side, glanced around the room, and casually pulled open the wardrobe behind the door, taking down the horizontal bar used to hang clothes.

He stepped out the door, gestured for Meng Chao and Bai Jing to step back, and with a flick of his wrist, smashed the window at the far end of the corridor with a wooden bar.

Meng Chao swallowed hard: "I...I roughly understand what you mean, but...isn't this a bit too violent? If their family makes us pay compensation, it'll be a lot of money..."

Before he could say anything more, I smashed two more windows and kicked open the door to the second room.

"Damn it! Today is today!"

Meng Chao gritted his teeth, rushed ahead, and kicked open the door to the third room.

When he kicked the fourth room, his expression clearly froze.

I slowly walked up to it, shining my flashlight inside. It was another standard room, but on one of the beds, the blanket pulled up to the ceiling was bulging out, clearly revealing the shape of a person.

"Could it be another 'dirty thing'?" Meng Chao glanced at me sideways, his voice trembling involuntarily.

I gestured towards the bed with my lip: "Go take a look, I'll protect you from behind."

(End of this chapter)