Chapter 101: Warmth and Fear
The clown make-up was washed away. Zhang Ding’s arms were filled with small wounds. He tried to maintain his balance in the water as he held the ladder.
“Go!”
Zui Suisui and the newbie didn’t expect that the ghost would put them first at this dangerous moment.
“Hurry up!”
The two investigators climbed into the vent as the windows shattered. The door was ruined by the rushing water. The flood slammed Gao Ming into the shelf. The storm and murky water came from all sides. People were swept by the waters. If not for the God of Flesh and Blood, Gao Ming would have been swallowed.
“Xiao Gao, grab my hand!” Zhang Ding tried to move towards Gao Ming, but as he turned around, the water knocked over the ladder, and it fell on his shoulder. Gritting his teeth, Zhang Ding reached towards Gao Ming.
“Ignore me. Get out first!” Gao Ming held his backpack close. If he lost the other death portraits, he would be stuck in the nightmare. Using the God of Flesh and Blood, Gao Ming fixed the stairs. He pushed Zhang Ding up the stairs. They moved up towards the vent. The dark entrance of the vent looked so close and so far. After Zhang Ding disappeared from Gao Ming’s sight, he felt that something was wrong. The vent had no sound of wind and rain. Did it really lead to the top of the supermarket?
The God of Flesh and Blood couldn’t hold on much longer. Gao Ming didn’t hesitate and followed Zhang Ding. Once Gao Ming left the supermarket, something was broken. The sound of water and wind disappeared. Gao Ming found himself standing on firm ground suddenly. Gao Ming looked around. He realised Zhu Suisui and the bespectacled newbie were standing there dumbly. They seemed to have woken up from a nightmare, covered in cold sweat.
“Where is this?” Looking at the walkie-talkie on the table and the cameras scanning the supermarket, Gao Ming tried to understand everything.
“Was everything a nightmare? Did we successfully escape and enter the surveillance room?” Gao Ming realised that there were many cameras in the supermarket, but there was no security room. “Was the supermarket owner controlling everything from this place?”
Before they could understand anything, the remaining four newbies in the breakroom received the order to leave the breakroom.
“Did you not tell them to leave with us?” Gao Ming grabbed the bespectacled newbie’s collar. The man was shocked too.
“I went to the breakroom. It was empty.” The man explained.
“Empty?”
Gao Ming turned to the cameras. The four newbies followed the rules closely. Three minutes passed, and they hadn’t discovered the work table at the cashier. The bell chimed. Uncle Li walked into the supermarket with a naked chest. He said the same thing. He looked scarier from the camera.
“Are they trapped in the nightmare? Or are they waiting for the true salvation?”
It felt strange watching everything in the security room. Gao Ming’s eyes wandered between the many monitors. He still had a question: what did dealing with the children’s corpses mean?
The four newbies had no experience dealing with ghosts. When they saw a drowned corpse walking towards them, their first instinct was to hide. Before they entered the anomaly, Bai Xiao told them that the first thing they needed to do when in danger was to listen to the seniors. Without a senior, the newbies panicked. They started to play hide-and-seek with Uncle Li inside the supermarket.
“A drowned victim looking for humans inside the supermarket…” Zhu Suisui looked at the scene from the cameras. She then realised Gao Ming’s ability to turn the scenario into a light-hearted one.
Uncle Li hadn’t found the investigators when the female livestreamer came in. The four newbies’ range became more limited. They were forced by the dead bodies to the corners.
As more dead people arrived at the supermarket, the four investigators were found. Time was wasted just like that. Zhang Ding went to find the kids, and the flood came. The water rose, and the four still didn’t know what to do. This was their first time running into an anomaly. This didn’t happen in their rulebooks. The supermarket was chaos. Zhang Ding took a long time to find the kids. The shelves tipped over. The elders were washed away. Screams and cries echoed in the supermarket. The countdown ended, and the flood came. The escaped customers were forced back into the supermarket. The murky water was like a muddy dragon, dragging everything towards an unknown location. Without warning from the God of Flesh and Blood, the cameras were showing the scene from 10 years ago.
The shelves slammed the customers. The backdoor was blocked. Zhang Ding tried his best to carry the ladder from the warehouse. He shouted anxiously that the vent was the only way to leave the supermarket. The crowd moved towards him. They tried to set up the ladder, but people couldn’t even stand in the water, much less the ladder.
After a long time, they finally got the vent open. Water fully entered the supermarket. Everyone was scared, but they still allowed the kids to go first.
Everyone tried to shield the ladder. Zhang Ding carried Le Jia and Le Ren onto the stairs. After the two kids escaped through the vent, Zhang Ding wanted to carry Zhang Fendou up. However, someone fell in the flood and knocked the ladder over.
The neighbours were instantly swept away. Zhang Ding held onto Zhang Fendou with his life. His body was stuck between the shelves. His arms were bulging with veins. Beside him, Uncle Li used his head and body to hold up the fallen shelf. He was holding the ladder too.
Without any sound, the videos were heartbreaking.
No miracle happened. The water overwhelmed Zhang Ding. His hands that held his son weakened. He wanted to use his last energy to get Zhang Fendou closer to the vent, but as he moved his body, he and his son were dragged away by the water.
The videos were covered in water and mud. This was probably what happened back then. In the end, only two kids survived. When the others were found, their bodies were bloated and white from drowning.
The cameras shattered one after another. Gao Ming heard fighting outside the door. He walked to the only door in the security room.
“We just experienced a nightmare. It should be a ghost’s special power to pull us into their pain. What we’ll see next is real.”
The rain from ten years ago paused. However, ten years later, the rain continued.
Gao Ming opened the security room door. The shelves were torn about. The products were scattered. Blood stained the walls.
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