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Chapter 45
Early in the morning, with no morning classes scheduled, most students were resting on campus and there weren't many people at the tourist spots yet.
Jiang Yan came to play in one of the haunted houses. This was a reward for her fans who had crossed the million-subscriber mark, a collaborative effort from all her fans, so she couldn't miss out.
The atmosphere at the entrance of the haunted house was already eerie, with an old hospital theme, dim red lighting, sinister and creepy music, and walls splattered with blood stains. There were even two little girls crying after being scared.
Jiang Yan bought a ticket, confirmed she could record, and pretended to be calm as she headed straight in.
[Wifey, don't be afraid, don't be afraid.]
[But I'm different, I want to see my wifey cry.]
[A beautiful woman dropping golden tears would surely be a sight to behold.]
[Both fearful and anticipating! Wifey, my staying here hinges entirely on your lovely face!]
"What's there to be afraid of? It's all fake. It's meant to scare you, but if you don't get scared, you won't be afraid..." Inside the haunted house, it was pitch black. Jiang Yan turned on her flashlight and followed the uneven white arrows on the walls, leading her further in.
[I've got that feeling now.]
[I can already anticipate the upcoming twist.]
But how could Jiang Yan be proven wrong so quickly? As she entered the first room, a female ghost wearing a white gown suddenly appeared.
The female ghost had long, disheveled black hair and wore a white mask. She lunged toward Jiang Yan with a menacing growl.
The camera shook uncontrollably for a moment.
Thanks to being mentally prepared, Jiang Yan took a few quick steps and ran out of the ghost's range.
It was the viewers in the live stream who got the real scare.
"See, those were just small scares. I wasn't scared at all, but you guys got scared from so far away. Did you really think you could scare me?" Jiang Yan bravely boasted to cover up her inner fear.
Perhaps fed up with her arrogance, another ghost caught wind of her and appeared in front of her with a bloodcurdling shriek. Its face was deathly pale, revealing a skeletal fake leg that swayed as it twisted its body toward her.
Jiang Yan: !
She clung tightly to her phone and ran for her life.
The live stream was filled with a barrage of comments, some expressing their own fright while others marveled at the host's courage for not screaming.
Jiang Yan ran all the way to the end of the hallway, panting heavily before finally checking the comments.
"I told you all before you voted that haunted houses aren't much fun. I'm not afraid, so it's not very interesting, right...? What was that sound?" Jiang Yan was still brazenly talking when she suddenly heard heavy breathing, growing louder with each breath, followed by the sound of dragging chains, reminiscent of rats scurrying in a dark sewer, sending a chill down her spine!
The background music also picked up with a frantic, shrieking wail.
Jiang Yan stood at the end of the hallway, with a locked hospital room to her left and a deep, cold staircase to her right. It was desolate, without a single footprint.
An unseen chill seemed to blow through, making her bones shiver.
Jiang Yan gulped, her hand holding the flashlight trembling as she turned around, only to come face-to-face with a pair of icy, hollow eyes.
The ghost had been silently clinging to the wall the whole time.
Jiang Yan stared blankly at it as its eyeballs rolled, and it suddenly opened its large, tongueless mouth as if to bite.
"Ahhh!" Jiang Yan's scalp crawled as she let out a scream and dashed up to the second floor.
Only after no longer hearing the dragging chains did Jiang Yan stop, crouching down.
Her mind was flooded with the harrowing image of the ghost, shattering her previous mental preparation. She didn't even have the presence of mind to read the comments, covering her mouth to avoid making any noise, only thinking of how to get out.
Unfortunately for her, the haunted house staff were determined to give her the full experience. One moment it was a large doll with a hole in its stomach, the next a crazed killer with a chainsaw. Then there was an old woman with a gaping maw, ready to devour her, and a rigid, white-clad Sadako with long black hair...
Jiang Yan's voice grew hoarse from screaming as she went up and down the stairs, hiding in rooms only to be scared out again.
At one point, she accidentally hit the flashlight's switch, plunging everything into darkness. A ghost in a red dress reached out to grab her, and a demure voice said, "You can hide behind me..."
Unable to see anything, Jiang Yan treated them all as ghosts, running desperately without even daring to pick up her dropped phone.
Shang Lu picked up the phone, its screen still flooded with comments:
[Did Jiang Yan drop her phone? Why is the screen black?]
[That ghost just now scared me to death!]
[I was screaming right along with my wifey at home.]
[But I wasn't scared by the ghosts, I was scared by the host's screams.]
[You're all tough guys.]
[Why is there no sound now?]
...
Shang Lu turned the phone around, searching for a long time before finally finding Jiang Yan in a small corner.
His movement startled the person inside.
Jiang Yan was so scared that she'd lost all reason, even though she knew nothing would really happen. Still, she was afraid, her nerves frayed to the breaking point. She trembled as she spoke, "Don't come any closer! If you keep scaring me, I'll hit you! I can hit hard..."
Seeing that she was genuinely terrified, Shang Lu carefully turned on his own flashlight while holding her phone out to her, "I'm not a ghost, Jiang Yan, look at who I am. I'm Shang Lu, and I picked up your phone. Look, isn't this your phone?"
Jiang Yan blinked in the flashlight's beam, repeating dazedly, "You're Shang Lu."
However, at this moment, both Shang Lu and the live stream viewers were entirely focused on her face.
Her complexion was unnaturally pale, a sickly beauty rarely seen. Her curled lashes fluttered, her eyes glistening with the threat of tears. Yet her lips were a deep red, slightly wet as if she'd bitten them to avoid making noise, exuding a delicate fragility that begged to be shattered.
The live stream was immediately inundated with lewd comments.
Shang Lu didn't dare dwell on it, his voice hoarse, "It's me."
Jiang Yan seemed to have been too overwhelmed, bursting into tears, "Wah wah wah, baby, why did you come so late? I was almost scared to death, they kept... kept scaring me wah wah, they only know how to scare me..."
The phone she had failed to notice fell to the ground once more.
Shang Lu asked stiffly, "You called me baby?"