Chapter 137: This is My Turf, and I Call the Shots.

Chapter 137: This is My Turf, and I Call the Shots.

The surveillance room was located right next to the security office of the main building.

Chi Shen began by politely knocking on the door, unsurprisingly receiving no response.

He waited by the door for a moment, then produced the key he had borrowed from the manager and unlocked the security room.

The room was empty; the surveillance monitors emitted a pale, grayish light, illuminating the cramped space.

Chi Shen detected the scent of blood. He looked down to find traces of blood on the floor and on the chair of the surveillance room.

The bloodstains were sparse, just a few scattered droplets. Chi Shen felt it wasn't significant enough to warrant his attention, so he feigned indifference, calmly taking a seat in the chair and focused on the monitors.

The camera setup in the hot spring hotel was not very comprehensive, covering only some crucial areas like the hotel's lobby, the main doors, elevators, and hallways.

Chi Shen quickly spotted his friend's whereabouts on one of the screens.

Bai Wan and the woman in red were circling the hotel's perimeter. It appeared they were playing some strange game where the woman in red would remove a part of herself, and Bai Wan would reattach it. Trailing behind them was a suspicious-looking chef wielding a cleaver.

"Is this some new version of a ghost-catching... ghost-catching-ghost game?"

Chi Shen stroked his chin thoughtfully, deeming their antics amusing. He decided not to intervene, shifting his attention elsewhere.

At the entrance to the outdoor hot spring dressing room, Chi Shen saw two male students walking alongside Gui Lian. Gui Lian was tall and donned a tattered, damp white robe over his slender frame. In the monochromatic surveillance footage, he looked even more eerie.

The two students seemed reluctant to approach Gui Lian, keeping their distance, yet not daring to truly leave. As Gui Lian appeared to be speaking, the students nodded in what seemed like a mix of trust and fear.

"Did he really look like this?" Chi Shen studied Gui Lian's visage. Through the screen, Gui Lian appeared more ghostly than human. However, his face, with its classical aesthetics of a broad forehead and square jaw, held a certain charm. Recalling Gui Lian's previous round face, Chi Shen felt the two appearances were utterly unconnected.

Chi Shen didn't linger on that for too long. His attention soon shifted to another old companion.

Zhong Jingzhu was in the hotel corridor.

He hadn't obediently stayed in his room. As an elder in their group, he felt he couldn't sit idly by and let the younger ones handle everything.

But soon after leaving his room, he seemed to encounter some trouble, approaching someone in the hallway who didn't seem quite human.

Chi Shen watched as the hotel employee's expression shifted dramatically, from a polite professional smile to pure terror. Then, his face began to melt, as if it were plastic exposed to intense heat, revealing a bloody interior.

Having his death exposed, he transformed into a monster.

Zhong Jingzhu tried to fend off the creature to no avail and promptly made a dash towards the exit.

Chi Shen felt that Zhong Jingzhu was not in immediate danger, but being pursued by one ghost was bad enough—what if he caught the attention of a second one?

In the brief moment he raised his hand, he saw Zhong Jingzhu sprinting into the hotel lobby, closely followed by the ghost that was chasing him. Subsequently, the dazed receptionist turned her head to look at them, her face turning to horror.

Shortly after, the receptionist's face began to melt.

Chi Shen had intended to switch the camera feed, but seeing this scene, he resignedly pulled out his phone and dialed the number for the woman in red.

"Yes... head to where Zhong Jingzhu is. He just left the hotel lobby. If you hurry back, you might catch him."

The woman in red, on the other end of the phone, promised confidently, assuring him that she would definitely save Zhong Jingzhu. Trusting that Bai Wan would make it happen, Chi Shen turned his attention to another screen.

Zhong Yi had already taken a hoe and broken out, appearing in the hotel lobby shortly after Zhong Jingzhu. He rushed to the reception desk, saw no one, but noted the eerie liquid on the table and chairs. Frowning, he then headed towards the inner section of the hotel, presumably in search of Chi Shen and the others.

This one seemed to be in no immediate danger.

Chi Shen continued to scan the surveillance footage, searching for the last of his companions.

He checked every screen but couldn’t find his last companion.

Ji Xingchen had vanished from the surveillance feed.

Chi Shen remained calm, leisurely pulling up the dining hall footage, rewinding back in time until he found the moment Ji Xingchen was led away by the manager.

Checking the timestamps, he switched to cameras covering various corridors and soon discovered that Ji Xingchen had been taken to the office building. The last clip showed Ji Xingchen and the manager entering the surveillance room.

Chi Shen subtly straightened up, his gaze landing on the bloodstains on the floor.

He then fast-forwarded through the hallway footage outside the surveillance room. He saw the manager leaving shortly after but Ji Xingchen never emerged.

From Ji Xingchen's arrival to his own, only about twenty minutes had passed, yet Ji Xingchen was nowhere to be found.

It wasn't just Ji Xingchen who was missing. Judging by the way Ji Xingchen had entered the surveillance room initially, someone had opened the door for them. Thus, there should've been another person in the room. Yet that person never appeared on camera or left the room, at least not until Chi Shen's arrival.

Where had they gone?

Upon entering, Chi Shen had taken note of the room’s layout. There were no windows, only one door to enter or exit, and even the ventilation shaft seemed too small for an adult to pass through.

Since they didn't leave, the most plausible explanation was — they were still here.

Without turning around, Chi Shen displayed a smirk of intrigue.

He had encountered situations like this before, more than once, in that death game.

Upon entering a room and checking the time log, he found that a ghost entered and never left. Turning around, he discovered the ghost standing right behind him.

Or while flipping through photos, he noticed that a timestamped photo captured the shadow of a ghost entering the room. However, in the subsequent photos, there was no sign of the ghost leaving, and one of them had been replaced by this specter.

Over time, he had grown accustomed to such encounters, no longer finding them astonishing or terrifying.

Now, faced with a similar situation again, Chi Shen couldn’t help but smile. He seemed contemplative but didn’t act, leisurely rising to leave the surveillance room.

“Not here.”

Chi Shen nonchalantly headed towards the office building's exit.

“It’s already gone.”

The door to the surveillance room closed gently on its own behind him.

Without turning back or even blinking, Chi Shen continued on.

As he stepped out of the office building, the glass door seemed to warp momentarily. Unperturbed, he mused aloud, “Not here, not there. Quite a hide-and-seek game. No matter, I need to find Ji Xingchen. He’s too vulnerable. I really should keep him closer.”

Returning to the hotel entrance, he saw from a distance a swarm of ghosts chasing Zhong Yi. Meanwhile, Gui Lian led two male students towards him.

Seeing the chaos, the students went pale and tried to flee, only to find the hotel's main exit already closed.

Zhong Yi, noticing Chi Shen, shouted, “Hurry, help me open the door!”

Instead of responding, Chi Shen looked up towards a streetlight-mounted camera, giving a soft, familiar smile, "Found you—Jiang Haotian."

Back in the surveillance room, where Chi Shen had sat, another figure appeared. Judging from the silhouette, it was a young man. Though the feed was silent, as Chi Shen’s face appeared on the monitor, he stiffened, his face contorting with terror.

“No... I won’t fear you again.”

The man sounded youthful, but his face resembled that of an aged man with graying hair. The room's dim light made his face ghastly. He bit his own hand violently, muttering manically, “I don’t need to fear you now. This is my domain, my world! What are you in comparison? Even in that realm, you’re powerless. You can't shatter those worlds, nor mine. I am the master here.”

Releasing his hand, with wounds rapidly healing, he typed furiously on a keyboard.

With a sardonic smile, he declared, “The you now isn’t the you from before. You have vulnerabilities.”

Caressing the fresh bloodstain on the chair, his smile grew even colder, "Come, let’s see who's stronger now. I’ve longed to consume you for a very, very long time.”