"Some people use physics to expel ghosts, some use chemistry, and now the former Building Chief’s workbook is telling me that even math can drive away ghosts. Is he implying to me that knowledge is power?"
Big Head had been captivated by the workbook. The veins on his head slowly returned to normal, no longer violently resisting.
Under the dim light, a very diligent child was struggling through a sea of problems. If it weren’t for the strong stench of a corpse emanating from his body, this scene might have looked quite inspiring to onlookers.
Han Fei sat next to the boy, waiting for him to completely lose himself in the cursed homework before trying to speak again.
"Big Head. Everyone calls me Big Head," the male student murmured as if talking to himself, his eyes fixed on the workbook.
"You used to live with Jin Sheng, right? What impression did you have of him? Did he ever bully you?"
"I didn’t like him. He always told some very scary stories, and even when he talked in his sleep at night, he would say frightening things."
"Talk in his sleep? Do you remember anything he said?" Han Fei was very curious.
"He said we were all dead already. He said the school was full of ghosts. He also said a butterfly flew into a student’s brain, and that student would prevent us from even becoming ghosts; we had to find that student quickly."
"Do you believe what he told you?"
"At first I didn’t believe, but later I saw ghosts in the school too. There really are a lot of ghosts hidden there!" Han Fei’s question seemed to make him recall something dreadful, and his emotions once again became agitated, nearly breaking free from the curse’s control.
"It seems that Jin Sheng and Jin Sheng are indeed the same person. His character hasn’t changed at all; he still likes to tell some very terrifying stories. Only, in reality, what he tells are ’stories’, but here, everything he says is the truth."
Han Fei had come to the hotel mainly to find Yinglong. Gleaning information about Jin Sheng was merely an unexpected bonus.
Without continuing to provoke Big Head, Han Fei waited to deal with the hotel matters before bringing both Big Head and his mother back to Happiness Residential Community.
He glanced around and noticed that there was a picture frame on the boy’s desk.
Within the frame was a family portrait of three— and the boy in the picture didn’t have such a big head.
"Is that middle-aged man your dad?"
"Yeah, my dad works elsewhere, but he loves me and mom a lot. He calls us every night."
"Another phone call?" Han Fei stood up and walked towards the telephone on the bedside table, but as soon as he moved, the door to room 301 opened.
Big Head’s mother, looking anxious, came in: "Teacher Meng, how is my child doing? Is there still hope?"
"You were hiding behind the door listening to the conversation between me and your child, weren’t you? Why ask when you already know?" Han Fei smiled faintly: "Your child becoming is largely related to that student named Jin Sheng. I’ll help you investigate clearly."
"Thank you, Teacher Meng!"
"If you really care about your child, it would be better not to keep renting a room in this hotel. This place is a hive of mixed characters, which can easily interfere with a child’s studies. I suggest you rent a room across the street in Happiness Residential Community. The environment there is good and the residents have high quality, which would be very beneficial for your child’s future growth."
"I’ll consider it." The woman had just agreed when the telephone on the bedside table rang.
Upon hearing the ringing of the phone, the woman, who had been looking worried, unexpectedly showed a glimmer of hopeful smile. She didn’t avoid Han Fei and ran straight to the bed to answer the call: "Husband, you hadn’t called all evening, I was almost worried to death."
"The police have been checking more thoroughly, I didn’t dare to call you at will. Just stay at that hotel for now and don’t wander around; I’ll be able to fetch you soon."
"Okay, you also be careful."
"Is our son doing better? Does his head still hurt?"
"It seems to have gotten worse, but I found a kindhearted teacher who is willing to help me."
"Don’t trust others too easily. Have you forgotten why I was framed as a murderer? Hang up now, take care of yourself."
The man on the other side of the phone seemed to suspect something and quickly hung up the call.
"Was that call from your child’s father just now?" Han Fei asked casually.
"Yes... My child’s dad is busy with business outside."
"Busy he may be, he should not neglect the family. All you parents should really take some time to properly accompany your children." Han Fei kept on the topic of family and education, prompting the woman to nod in agreement continuously.
"It’s getting late, I should be heading back."
"Take care, Teacher Meng." The woman personally escorted Han Fei to the door.
Upon leaving room 301, Han Fei reviewed everything he had seen, "The woman is lying; her husband is likely an escapee, always hiding from the police. But the thing is, how does her husband know the hotel’s telephone number? Could her husband also be hiding in this hotel?"
"I had just invited the woman to leave with her child when the husband immediately called. This doesn’t seem like a coincidence."
Han Fei looked around quietly; there seemed to be something in this hotel that kept watching him.
"Is the husband making the phone calls necessarily the real husband? Could it be a ghost in the hotel making the calls?"
After giving it some thought, Han Fei realized that there was a serious problem with the telephone in the hotel.
As soon as he entered, he saw the Boss wearing a raincoat and talking on the phone with his wife. After entering his room, he received a call for help from a strange woman. Later on, he discovered that the woman in room 301 also kept in touch with her husband through telephone.
"If all the guests in the hotel are puppets, then the telephone is the thread that connects them. Could it be that the ghosts making the calls have bewitched them?"
Han Fei noticed that there was something off about the condition of the guests in the hotel, and he had been trying to find the underlying reason. Now, he was slowly narrowing down his target.
Looking down the corridor on the third floor towards the end where the rooms were, Han Fei moved his feet.
Yinglong had checked into room 304, and he hadn’t come back until now. There must be something hidden in that room.
The dark corridor was filled with the smell of mold. Just as Han Fei passed by the door of room 302, the door next to it suddenly opened a crack from which a fat arm extended.
It seemed as though the person had been waiting for a long time, and they grabbed Han Fei in an instant.
"It’s that fat woman who threw the flower pot at me!"
With a Physical Strength of ten, Han Fei was unable to resist in front of that woman. His body was slowly dragged into the room.
"My strength is still too weak."
As the gap in the door opened wider, the woman’s heavily made-up face appeared behind the door. She was chewing on a bone, her gaze at Han Fei was extremely frightening.
"Coming to this place, you would have died sooner or later. You might as well die by my hands." Her face fat trembled with excitement—her strength was much greater than Han Fei’s, and just as she was about to pull Han Fei into the room, she suddenly exerted all her force!
Han Fei didn’t expect that the other party had been hiding her true strength. Caught off guard, he was dragged into room 302.
The reinforced door of the room slowly closed, and the last sliver of light vanished before Han Fei’s eyes.
"This crossroad is busy with countless people passing by every day, but you are different from them. The first time I saw you, I really wanted to kill you. The impulse was so uncontrollable that I felt your blood would look more beautiful than theirs when splattered!" The room 302 guest’s mouth split open, revealing brownish-yellow teeth.
Han Fei collapsed on the ground, silent as if he had been scared stiff.
"So cute, I really want to kill you! I will kill you bit by bit, I want to extend this process for a whole day! No, I’m kind of reluctant, I will take a week to slowly kill you." The room 302 guest pulled open the drawer and took out a whole box of thin blades, laughing excitedly.
"Let’s start with your calves, so you can’t even run." The room 302 guest’s flabby body trembled as she walked toward Han Fei with the blade that looked completely mismatched to her size: "I will do it very cleanly."
The woman rolled up her sleeve, and Han Fei then noticed a black and red Butterfly scar on her wrist.
"Why do all these crazy people seem to have a Butterfly mark?"
Han Fei was still lying on the ground, trying to recover his wits as he watched the woman approach step by step.
The room 302 guest was much stronger than Han Fei; with a wider grin, she laughed even more unscrupulously after making sure Han Fei had nothing dangerous on him.
Her thick arm reached for Han Fei’s calf, and as she prepared to drag him into the kitchen, Han Fei, lying prone on the ground, exploded with unprecedented strength.
He used the secret of touching the depths of the soul and kicked the guest hard in the abdomen.
As the guest bent over in pain, Han Fei took the blood-colored paperman out of the Item Bar and shoved it directly into the guest’s mouth!
The child from the Spiritual Altar appeared above the woman’s head at some point, and their little hands caused the woman’s consciousness to become confused. The Paperman that had just been stuffed into the guest’s mouth seemed to come alive.
Veins penetrated the body of the room 302 guest, and the cracked blood-colored paperman unexpectedly vanished!
The room 302 guest collapsed painfully to the ground, desperately clawing at her own throat but unable to make any sound or spit anything out.
Soon her body started to swell irregularly. She attempted to muster her last bit of strength to attack Han Fei, but the thin dark shadow sitting on her neck kept disrupting her judgment.
The room 302 guest, like an insane beast, crashed madly into the furniture around her. She panicked and soon began vomiting black blood that was full of paper scraps.
After ten minutes, the body of the room 302 guest turned pale, and as the last hint of color vanished, she collapsed in the center of the room like a Paperman drained of life.
The eerie rustling sound began to emerge, and a hand slowly emerged from the chest of the guest. The blood-red Paperman wobbled out of the guest’s body. Seeing Han Fei, it smiled happily and then wobbled over to him.
"Is this what an F-class Curse Item is?"
Just being on the side watching was spine-chilling for Han Fei, who was now very glad that the paperman’s consciousness had been shattered.
He reached out to collect the blood-colored Paperman back into the Item Bar and discovered that many of the cracks on the Paperman’s body had disappeared—flesh and Dark Souls seemed to help the Paperman recover quickly.
"Curse Items are more terrifying and troublesome than I imagined."
Looking at the guest on the ground, Han Fei had thought of asking her some questions.
"Don’t feel wronged; after all, you were the one who attacked me first."
Han Fei closed the guest’s wide-open eyes. When he touched her skin, he felt no elasticity, as if he were touching a sheet of paper.