Published at 12th of August 2023 6:19 pm

Chapter 24 To Be Shocked

This chapter is updated by NovelFree.ml

Three people tragically died the last four days, which cast a layer of sadness in everyone’s hearts. But with the decrease of three able-bodied people, their problem as of now was that the others would need to shoulder the deceased people’s work.

Since Yang Qi was dead, Su Xiaoqian carried on working, compliantly taking her dead teammate’s place to clean the rooms.

Fortunately, the next two days at the villa were a breeze. The madam didn’t ask them to do other types of work.

On the morning of the seventh day, Bai Yan finally found an opportunity to ask the madam a question he desperately wanted to know the answer to. He was afraid that the madam would remember this, so he didn’t dare ask his question during the early stages of the game until today.

“Madam, about the employees who previously left, where did they go?”

“Didn’t I tell you this before? They were all sacked.” The madam intently looked at Bai Yan’s face, assuming that she completely understood what he meant, and started laughing amusedly, “You can relax. You have all worked diligently for seven days and I’m not someone who can’t let go of her money. Even if someone did something wrong today, I wouldn’t drive him or her away. As long as they weren’t sneaky little thieves, the fired workers even received some money from me. I was worried that you wouldn’t take your work seriously, so I told you all that you wouldn’t be receiving any compensation just to scare you.”

“It turns out the madam is actually a kind-hearted and magnanimous person.” Bai Yan praised.

After the madam’s usual routine, everyone gathered at noon and Bai Yan said something.

“Our theory from before was correct. The master and the madam took home a ghost, and it drastically altered the husband and wife’s memories. The master and the madam both don’t know that they are already dead. Moreover, the currently dead people no longer possess their ordinary cognitive abilities and have acted as if they weren’t violently murdered.”

After summarizing the information, Bai Yan regretfully said, “The Gu couple were originally kind-hearted and good people. They were extremely passionate about charity during their lifetime and took pleasure in helping others. After their deaths, their personalities drastically changed and they began to enjoy eating dead mice, but after all of this, they never withheld their employee’s wages. At the club, the master seemed to have remembered his first kill, while the madam took turns in visiting our rooms late at night, which I fear she doesn’t remember herself. In fact, they were also victims of these crimes.”

Bai Yan’s words made Li Hao’s heart feel regret. When the madam ordered him to dig up the Chinese rose in the garden a few days ago, he hated her for that, for easily throwing his life away. But when he got through the situation safely and understood the reason behind this event, he didn’t hate her as much. In the end, the madam was also a pitiful victim. She mistook an evil ghost as her son and brought it back home, not expecting this to harm their family.

“In short, we must not remind the master and madam that they had already died,” An Qing summed it up. “As long as no one exposes that they were murdered, we can maintain this superficial peace and spend the last day safe and sound.”

Everyone unanimously agreed with what An Qing had said. The door-knocking ghost had finished visiting everyone as of now and everyone was familiar with how to handle that situation. Its next visit will all be in vain.

Three people had already died, and on the last day, no one wanted to create new problems.

…

It was half-past six in the evening and the family had already finished their meals. The master and madam gathered them as they all quietly stood in the large hall. Everyone looked at each other in dismay.

It was the last day, shouldn’t they be going back to rest early? Why did they ask them to come here?

“You have all worked hard these past seven days. There’s not much left to take care of, we’ll just go over how you finish your jobs.” The madam had a wide smile on her face as she cheerfully said, “You all did well and were honestly the best employees I’ve ever had. Tonight, you all… “

The madam didn’t finish her sentence because the sudden ear-splitting sounds of thunder boomed from outside, interrupting her mid-sentence.

Along with the rolling sounds of thunder, a large downpour abruptly came out of nowhere.

Everyone could hear the numerous ‘pitter-patters’ of the raindrops from the wide-open window, causing their hearts to inevitably fall into despair.

For the weather to be unexpectedly raining cats and dogs on their last night, it surely wasn’t a good omen.

A lot of tragedies occur during these long rainy nights.

Unfortunately, tonight was no exception.

Without waiting for the madam to finish what she was saying, a series of urgent knocks resounded from the other side of the door. Because of this, everyone’s expressions changed into uneasiness.

Knocking sounds, don’t tell us that it’s the door-knocking ghost from the previous nights?

But isn’t madam the door-knocking ghost?

Or, could it be someone else?

With everyone increasing their guard and appearing as if they were birds startled by the mere twang of a bow(1), the eerie violent sounds continued. Bai Yan discreetly looked at the married couple at the corner of his eye and found out that they were also surprised at the situation as if these unexpected sounds came from an uninvited guest.

- A bird startled by the mere twang of a bow is a Chinese idiom that means being on edge or being on guard due to something threatening.

Everyone had different thoughts on the matter, but the madam broke the stillness in the room and ordered Su Xiaoqian to open the door.

Hearing her task, Su Xiaoqian’s face was quickly filled with reluctance.

No one knew if this visiting guest was a person or a ghost. If she followed the madam’s orders and opened the door, the first one to suffer casualties would definitely be her. However, she had no other choice but to follow it. Despite her heart packed with fear, her quivering steps still slowly inched towards the door, clenching her teeth as she cautiously opened and pulled the knob.

The door opened.

The other side showed a man with messy hair and an unkempt appearance, not at all the door-knocking ghost they had assumed.

The man’s head was still firmly intact to his neck, but looking closer, everyone thought that his face looked weirdly familiar.

This uncanny familiarity made everyone naturally feel restless.

“Are you…?”

Su Xiaoqian hesitantly voiced out her question, but the man didn’t need to answer because the madam covered her mouth with her hand and yelled in shock, “Son! How did you get out?”

After hearing these words, An Qing’s expression immediately changed. She didn’t care if the master and the madam were beside her, instantly shouting, “Don’t! Don’t let him say anything!”

As soon as the words left her mouth, Lu Tianyi rushed forward to subdue the man at once and tried to forcefully cover the man’s mouth with Su Xiaoqian by his side. Sadly, they were both a step behind.

“Dad! Mom! I’m not crazy! My little brother died a few years ago! I don’t have a brother anymore!”

“Stupid child, what nonsense are you sputtering out? Your brother is not…” The madam stopped mid-sentence and stared blankly ahead. Where was he?

For the past six months, the madam had always thought that her eldest son had gone insane, completely forgetting about his little brother from his corrupted mind.

But today, the madam’s previously neglected memories had all come flooding back into her, exuberantly exciting the eldest son. Her eyes immediately flashed bewilderedness as she gradually recalled her old memories…

Half a year ago, she and her husband went out but on their way back home, they saw a faceless child on the side of the road. Seeing that the couple was approaching him, the child suddenly obstructed their path. From someone else’s point of view, the scene was incredibly shocking.

But for some odd reason, the couple didn’t feel scared at all and even remembered their poor youngest son who died an early death because of this.

She couldn’t help but call him her son, bringing him home with them later on. They benevolently took him in and nurtured him as if he were their own.

Afterward…

What happened after?

Recalling until this point, the madam suddenly felt a sharp burst of pain coming from her neck as if it were preventing her from continuing her flashback. But, she couldn’t control what she remembered and carried on, leading the madam to become more and more horrified.

She remembered! She finally remembered!

Following that incident, the eldest son started to declare that his younger brother was already dead and due to his difficult attitude, the madam and master thought that he turned insane and locked him up in the cellar.

On the night the eldest son was locked up, the faceless ghost entered the master’s study and ominously gave the couple an ax. As a result, the master slowly lifted the ax and suddenly chopped down his wife’s head. He then waved the ax and also forcefully chopped off his head…

Finally remembering this, the madam’s head promptly fell off of her neck with a loud ‘plop.’ Simultaneously, the master’s head also helplessly rolled over to the floor…

The scene of his parent’s head falling off made the man extremely upset. He seemed to have remembered something, fear instantly emerging from his eyes.

With his parent’s decapitated heads slowly rolling towards him, his eyes turned red, his tongue began to swell, and his eyelids began to flip over, his eyeballs disgustingly falling off of their sockets.

Seeing such a horrific scene, Bai Yan quickly raised his hand and inconspicuously picked up a table knife from the dining table. He then immediately dashed to the man’s front and inserted the table knife deep into his throat, sending him away to reunite with his family.

Before the man breathed his last breath, Bai Yan saw his eyes shed tears of gratitude. After being trapped in the cellar for so long and being fed with his beloved parent’s favorite rotten meat, his body was already similar to a malicious ghost’s. The man probably wanted to die since before but with a hair’s breadth, he was able to escape his prison and tell his parents the truth. And now that he saw his parent’s miserable deaths, he completely lost his will to live.

Honestly speaking, watching a gory sight unfold in front of his eyes made him feel sick.

Killing this half-human and half-ghost entity did not only leave a bland taste in his mouth but also made him want to vomit his guts out.

However, there was no time to be nauseous in this dangerous situation. As soon as Bai Yan buried the knife into the eldest son’s throat, he immediately ran outside without a second thought, not even advising his teammates to do the same.

“Bai Yan! What did you do?” The alarmed Lu Tianyi dreadfully questioned Bai Yan’s reckless actions.

“Idiot, why are you still staring at it? Run!” An Qing readily threw her crutches away and grabbed Lu Tianyi in the process, indicating for him to follow her, “Run away or else there won’t be time to escape!”

Share