Lin Mo wore a military coat and felt the chilling presence behind him disappear.
Looking down at his feet, he saw nothing.
"Has that ghost already left?" Lin Mo wondered.
He reached back to feel, but touched nothing.
It seemed the pale ghostly shadow had truly departed.
Thinking about it, it made sense. After waking up in the real world, he would naturally vanish from this realm. That ghostly shadow couldn't wait here forever, though its current whereabouts were unknown.
Lin Mo had previously explored the second floor. Except for one locked room he couldn't enter, he had checked everywhere else and found no danger.
Walking to the stairwell, Lin Mo pushed the safety door open a crack and peered outside.
The mass of black fog that had been blocking the third floor was gone.
The hanging female ghost had also disappeared.
Looking down, Lin Mo frowned.
The spider web on the first floor was still there, and had nearly spread to the second floor. As Lin Mo watched, a black shadow suddenly darted up from the first floor at extreme speed.
He immediately closed the safety door.
The next moment, there was a loud bang as something slammed into the door frame, causing it to deform slightly.
Without a word, Lin Mo hurriedly ran back.
He had seen clearly that what crawled up from the first floor was a gigantic spider.
Though he only caught a glimpse, Lin Mo saw that this spider was larger than an adult human. Its body was covered with all sorts of human faces, twisted and crowded together, expressing pain and constantly screaming in agony.
The sight alone would have terrified a normal person into wetting themselves.
Lin Mo was fine though. His mental fortitude was strong, his legs didn't wobble, and he ran incredibly fast.
The stairwell's safety door wasn't locked, and even if it had been, Lin Mo doubted it could stop that giant spider. If this creature burst in, the situation would be extremely dangerous.
But to Lin Mo's surprise, the human-faced spider didn't enter the second floor.
It only pushed the safety door open a crack and peeked inside.
In the darkness, several eyes of different sizes peered through the gap. The sense of pressure was immense.
After looking for a while, the spider retreated back to the stairwell. From the sound, it seemed to have returned to the first floor.
Hiding in the shadows, Lin Mo saw everything clearly.
"Why didn't it chase me in?"
He naturally grew suspicious.
This was clearly abnormal.
When something is abnormal, there must be a reason. Lin Mo considered several possibilities. The most chilling one was that there might be something on the second floor that the human-faced spider feared.
That's why it didn't enter.
It could be understood as a territorial concept.
Re-examining the second floor corridor, there was a hint of eeriness in the gloom.
At that moment, the door of the room at the very end of the hallway creaked open.
The sound wasn't loud, but in the silent corridor it was quite jarring.
Immediately after, a wave of darkness flowed out from that doorway. The floor and walls seemed to be swallowed by a tide of blackness that surged forth.
The temperature in the corridor instantly dropped.
Lin Mo sensed danger.
But he quickly noticed something and stopped his preparations to flee. Instead, he turned around, with his back to the approaching black mist.
Lin Mo had seen clearly - within the black mist was a pale ghostly figure.
Almost instantly, Lin Mo felt that familiar chill behind him.
It was the pale ghost that killed anyone who turned to look at it.
It had come again.
So it hadn't left the second floor, but had been hiding in the room at the very end.
No matter what, this pale ghostly figure had set its sights on Lin Mo again, once more following behind him.
But for Lin Mo, who was already familiar with this ghost's killing method, this might not necessarily be a bad thing.
It's no exaggeration to say that at this moment, Lin Mo wasn't afraid at all. On the contrary, there was a hint of excitement in his heart.
He had extremely rich experience in completing horror games.
Just like now, the exit on the second floor was blocked by that spider. Under normal circumstances, it would be impossible to get out.
But if his previous speculation was correct - that the spider didn't enter the second floor because it was wary of something - then if he could find what it feared, he might be able to use that to intimidate the spider and safely escape.
Lin Mo thought that what the human-faced spider feared was very likely this pale ghostly figure.
However, whether this was true or not still needed to be verified.
Lin Mo didn't rashly walk out of the corridor right away. After careful consideration, he decided to continue exploring the second floor first.
He had already searched the other rooms on this floor before and found nothing. Only one household's door was locked, which he couldn't enter.
Now, Lin Mo walked up to this door.
To his surprise, he found that the door had been broken. The lock was no longer effective, and with one pull, the door opened.
Lin Mo had seen this method of forcibly opening doors before.
The pale ghost had done it this way.
Could it be that it was responsible?
It's possible that during the time Lin Mo was away, it had done some things and entered this room.
During this process, the pale ghost behind kept trying to lure Lin Mo to turn his head, but Lin Mo's willpower was as strong as a rock. No matter how the pale ghost struggled, he simply wouldn't look back.
It was cold, but with his military coat, Lin Mo could still endure it.
There's nothing difficult in the world if you get used to it.
Pulling the door open, Lin Mo looked inside. The decor of this household looked normal, just like an ordinary family's home, filled with all sorts of everyday items.
"Is anyone there?" Lin Mo asked at the doorway.
The answer was affirmative.
There were no living people, but there was a corpse.
In the room inside, Lin Mo discovered a young girl. She was lying on her side on the floor, her expression extremely twisted. Both hands were clutching her own neck, veins bulging, her manner of death horrifying.
It looked as if she had strangled herself to death.
This was somewhat bizarre.
Under normal circumstances, this would be impossible. Halfway through, one would lose consciousness due to lack of oxygen and the hands would lose their strength.
Next to the girl's corpse was a small table.
On the table were a pen and a piece of paper.
Lin Mo leaned in to look. There were many words written on the paper, among which the most eye-catching sentence was: "You will strangle yourself!"
"Was this girl playing with a spirit writing board earlier?"
This wasn't a wild guess by Lin Mo.
Because questions like "Are you the spirit of the pen?" were written on the paper.
Lin Mo looked around. There was only one corpse here.
"Doesn't spirit writing require at least two people to play?"
Lin Mo knew some of these basic facts. He had played horror games with similar horrific elements, so he considered himself a semi-expert.
First, Lin Mo put the girl's hands down and arranged her in a more comfortable position.
This was out of respect for the deceased.
Then Lin Mo thought for a moment and sat down on the chair nearby.
This chair was probably where the girl had been sitting before. Eerily, there was another chair placed opposite.
Lin Mo reached out and picked up the pencil on the table.
The pencil looked ordinary, but it seemed to have been stained with something. The stain looked dried up now, very dark, a sort of deep red color.
He brought it close and sniffed.
The smell was pungent.
It smelled a bit like dried blood.
Lin Mo knew that these spirit writing things were essentially lonely ghosts, but they seemed to know many things.
Basically, they would answer any question asked. This was quite magical.
Coincidentally, Lin Mo had many questions right now.
For example, what exactly was this nightmare world all about?
Where did these monsters come from?
There were too many similar questions.
Looking at the old pencil in his hand, Lin Mo wondered if he could also ask the spirit of the pen.
Once this idea emerged, he couldn't suppress it.
He had to try!
Using game completion theory to explain Lin Mo's current reckless behavior, he was unwilling to miss any opportunity to obtain clues.