Chapter 1 The Departure

The cloth doll took Tang Qisheng away, back to the room where he had woken up outside, and simply pulled him towards a wall.

The wall was mottled, and the original layer of dark green waterproof paint had largely peeled off due to dampness. The instant the cloth doll's body touched the wall, Tang Qisheng involuntarily closed his eyes tightly.

When he opened his eyes again, they were back in the underground corridor. Looking at the blood vessel vines covering the walls and ground, breathing the air filled with the smell of blood, he had a sense of being separated from the world.

Turning his head, behind him was still a wall. Tang Qisheng reached out and touched it. The texture was exceptionally real, and a light tap with his knuckles produced no hollow sound.

Just as the boy had said, only someone with the director's eyes could find the doors here.

The moment he reappeared in the corridor, Tang Qisheng had observed that the corridor was now calm. The director and the children who had lost their eyes were not lying in wait for them.

As if sensing the doubt in his heart, the cloth doll lowered its head and placed its soft palm on Tang Qisheng's forehead. The next moment, an indescribable feeling was transmitted to his mind.

This door was alive, able to wander with the cloth doll's consciousness and open anywhere in the underground corridor, except for the mental laboratory hidden in the director's office. Therefore, blindly lying in wait was meaningless, and besides the director, few of the children were a match for the cloth doll.

Scattered information gathered bit by bit in Tang Qisheng's mind, further completing his understanding of this underground world of terror. The cloth doll told him to hide first, and it would open the door to lure the director and the children away.

Tang Qisheng retreated into the darkness. Soon after, he witnessed a scene he would never forget. The cloth doll, deliberately exposing its whereabouts, was discovered. The director rushed out of the director's office, and children jumped onto the director's body along the way. In the midst of piercing screams, the children's lower bodies twisted and connected with the rotten flesh on the director's body. If he had to describe it, the director now looked like a huge worm covered in fleshy tentacles.

The children used their hands to grab the vines on the walls and ceiling to help the director move forward. At the critical moment, the cloth doll entered the elevator, and as the elevator doors slowly closed, only the director's furious roar remained.

Soon after, the elevator descended and the director curled up and squeezed inside.

After a few minutes, when everything around was quiet, Tang Qisheng cautiously emerged from his hiding place and ran to the elevator, using it to return to the first floor of the hospital.

When the elevator doors opened, the area outside was empty. The marble floor was covered in bloody handprints, which led towards the hall.

Worried about Zhu Jie, Tang Qisheng walked cautiously along the corridor. It was already dark outside. He hadn't expected to stay in the underground world for so long.

The corridor was eerily quiet, and the doors on both sides were tightly closed. Tang Qisheng tried his best to lighten his steps, but footsteps still echoed.

As he passed a door before a corner, Tang Qisheng paused, then left as if nothing had happened.

After Tang Qisheng's footsteps had completely disappeared and half a minute had passed, the door slowly opened a crack. A person in a white coat and mask walked out and limped in the direction Tang Qisheng had left, wearing sneakers that were out of place for a hospital doctor.

But not far after passing the corner, a door beside this person suddenly opened. "Wife... wife, is that you?" Tang Qisheng looked in surprise at the panicked person in the white coat. He recognized the figure and the sneakers.

"It really is you. I... I thought it was those things disguised." The person in the white coat took off the mask, revealing Zhu Jie's face.

"What happened to you?" Tang Qisheng asked after looking her up and down.

Hearing this, a trace of fear flashed across Zhu Jie's face. "It's a long story. This isn't the place to talk. Come on, let's go inside and talk."

"Wait!" Tang Qisheng took a step back. "Just say what you have to say there." He put his hand on the doorknob, keeping himself in a position to close the door at any time.

Zhu Jie quickly recounted her experiences during this time, emphasizing the important parts, especially mentioning a terrifying existence. "After you left, the wound on my body wouldn't stop bleeding. I waited until dark, and I couldn't hold on any longer, so I thought about finding the staff member who handled the discharge procedures to see if I could get some hemostatic medicine from her. But when I returned to the hall, she was gone. And... and then I saw a strange person in the corner of the hall."

"A strange person?"

"Yes, he was standing in the shadows. I couldn't see his face, but... but he was staring at me and greeting me." Zhu Jie's face became very ugly when she mentioned this person, and her voice became unnatural.

"What did he say?" Tang Qisheng pressed.

"No, he... he didn't say anything. He was just waving his arms to greet me, but not with his palms. The back of his hand was facing me, shaking it back and forth."

Listening to Zhu Jie's account, Tang Qisheng got goosebumps. He imagined the scene at the time.

"I knew something was wrong, so I turned around and ran. Then I heard the sound of footsteps behind me. I couldn't help it and glanced back. That strange person... that strange person was actually chasing me! His hands and feet were reversed, and his head was also turned 180 degrees. He was facing away from me, chasing after me like that!"

"Luckily, I escaped into a room. There were several doctors' corpses in that room, soaked in formalin solution. The strange person outside began banging on the door. I was forced to a point where I had no choice but to drag out a corpse and put on the corpse's white coat."

"At the moment the door was kicked open, I wore the white coat and pretended to be a corpse. Fortunately, at the last moment, that strange person left."

Only after saying all this did Zhu Jie finally breathe a sigh of relief. It seemed that this near-death experience had left a deep psychological shadow on her.

The white coat on Zhu Jie's body was wet and indeed gave off the smell of formalin. Apart from being a bit bizarre, Tang Qisheng temporarily didn't find any loopholes in the story, but he still needed to confirm it. "Where is that room? Take me over there and take a look."

"Go back?" Zhu Jie's expression changed slightly. "Right, there's one more thing I haven't told you. Those... those corpses are strange. I suspect they're all alive. They're the doctors in this hospital!"

"After the strange person left, I struggled to crawl out. That's when I suddenly realized that the corpse I had dragged out and thrown aside was gone! I found wet footprints on the ground, footprints that extended all the way outside the door."