Ji Mingxia looked at the intercom monitoring screen, and then at the black shadow. For a moment, he didn’t know which one to believe.

But he definitely wasn’t going to open the gate.

Ji Mingxia stood by the gate, but did not open it, and his hesitation seemed to have angered the shadow outside the gate.

The black shadow not only frantically rang the doorbell, but also directly smashed into the iron gate.

The sound of the doorbell and the sound of the iron gate being smashed intertwined, and the ear-splitting noise passed through the eardrums.

However, the miraculous thing was that the big noise did not attract any of the neighbors’ attention.

All the houses silently stood in the darkness as if they were abandoned and empty. Only Ji Mingxia’s house had bright lights inside.

Ji Mingxia was frightened by the eerie atmosphere, he felt goose bumps all over his body.

He unconsciously stepped to the side to let more light fall on him when suddenly, the light source behind him suddenly disappeared.

Ji Mingxia abruptly turned around and saw that the lights in his home were all off.

The moment the lights went out, the ringing at the doorbell also stopped.

The light from the street lights came in from outside like a hazy moonlight. The world was dead silent, so silent that Ji Mingxia could even hear his own breathing.

It was as if there was no living person in the entire village except for Ji Mingxia.

Ji Mingxia’s face was a little pale, and he couldn’t help but gently grip the ring in his hand.

At that moment, the sound of footsteps came from within the house and a stooped old woman slowly came out of the darkness.

Grandma Ji walked up to Ji Mingxia. With a streetlight illuminated face, Grandma Ji said to the dazed Ji Mingxia, “Come back in.”

With that, Grandma Ji turned around and walked towards the house.

Ji Mingxia stared at Grandma Ji’s back blankly.

He did not have the habit of carrying his phone everywhere, and the house was dark at the moment. The streetlights did not shine in, so Grandma Ji held a flashlight to illuminate the ground.

Seeing that Ji Mingxia did not follow, Grandma Ji turned back and said, “I turned off the main power so the doorbell will not ring again, come in first.”

With that, Grandma Ji took the flashlight and shone it towards the house.

Ji Mingxia's gaze stopped on Grandma Ji’s flashlight, and he finally lifted his feet and followed her inside.

The light from the flashlight was dim, but Grandma Ji and Ji Mingxia were very familiar with the house so although they couldn’t see very clearly, it didn’t affect their movements at all.

Ji Mingxia was about to enter the house but couldn’t help but turn back and glance at the courtyard gate.

After the power outage, the bell went off and the knocks on the gate stopped, as if they had been absorbed in the darkness and disappeared without a trace.

It was quiet by the courtyard gate and Ji Mingxia deliberately looked at the hollow position at the bottom of the gate.

The shadow had disappeared.

“Close the door.” Grandma Ji said.

There was an iron gate at the entrance of the courtyard and a wooden door to the house.

Ji Mingxia did as he was told, and then sat with Grandma Ji in the living room.

The house was dark and the only source of light was a flashlight. At the moment, its head was facing the ceiling and the dim light fell from overhead. Although it was not clear enough, they could vaguely see each other’s figures.

Grandma Ji sat down and let out a soft sigh.

She had a habit of coiling Buddhist beads, and as her fingers turned, the beads would collide, making a crisp, delicate sound.

Ji Mingxia did not like this dim and silent atmosphere, so he did not feel comfortable. It felt if there was something hiding in the dark corner where the light could not shine, staring at him in secret.

Ji Mingxia moved his body uncomfortably. Thinking of what just happened, he took the initiative to break the silence and say, “Did you unplug the doorbell on purpose?”

After returning home, he had taken advantage of the time Grandma Ji was cooking and briefly organized the entire home.

During that time, he discovered that the plug to the doorbell in the yard was broken. It was a smart doorbell and without power, was is similar to a decorative item.

He only thought that the doorbell was left unattended because Grandma Ji was too old to maintain it, so in order to make life more convenient for her, he found a brand new plug from the house and carefully reinstalled it.

As a result, he didn’t expect to get a ghost knocking on the gate during the night.

Grandma Ji’s aged voice came from the side: “You must have been frightened, right?”

“I’m okay……” Ji Mingxia shook his head.

If the Ji Mingxia of a few months ago had encountered such a thing in the place he found safe, he would have fainted from fear.

But after experiencing so much, he quickly recovered although he did get a shock.

He glanced at the flashlight placed on the coffee table and said, “Grandma, when did this start?”

From Grandma Ji’s actions, whether it was turning off the main power at a critical moment, or holding a flashlight the whole way to illuminate, or even entering the door and reminding him to close the door as a reminder, everything showed that this was not the first time she had encountered this kind of thing.

Ji Mingxia had no memory of the original owner, so he didn’t know if the original owner had encountered this kind of thing as well. If it were as usual, Ji Mingxia would certainly have found a way to ease into the topic and slowly get the information.

But after experienced such a terrifying thing, and then looking at Grandma Ji’s gray hair, he couldn’t help but get straight to the point.

His intuition told him that these things had a connection!

“It started long ago, shortly after you went to live at school. One night, someone suddenly knocked on the gate……” Grandma Ji said slowly, her aged voice ringing out in the dim room.

Banana Leaf Village was a small village with less than a hundred people. All the neighbors were familiar with each other.

During the day, everyone’s courtyard gate was wide open, and neighbors freely walked in and out. They were just like a big family and everyone took care of each other.

Until one day, things suddenly changed.

First, there was a car accident at Ji Mingxia’s home. Both parents died, leaving only Grandma Ji and Ji Mingxia, an old woman and a young boy.

Immediately after, two couples in their eighties did not survive that winter, both had died in their sleep.

Spring came and then there was a family of three where two of them were diagnosed with cancer.

With so many incidents happening, the small village was plunged into grief, and everyone was shrouded in the gloom of death and disease.

Fortunately, the mother and son who had cancer soon came with good news.

After several chemotherapy treatments, the cancer cells did not spread and the mother and son recovered together and returned to Banana Leaf Village to continue their lives.

In order to celebrate the two of them coming back from the gates of hell, the whole Banana Leaf Village went into a carnival, trying to take advantage of this happy event to wash away the bad luck of the past.

At that time, everyone welcomed the arrival of a new day with expectations, but no one expected that the nightmare of Banana Leaf Village would officially start from that day.

The village held an event to congratulate the mother and son for regaining their health, and to wish the folks of Banana Leaf Village better days.

As a result, no one expected to find two bodies early the next morning.

“After the forensic examination, it was said that the two middle-aged people were drunk and burned themselves to death.” Grandma Ji said.

“Burned to death?” Ji Mingxia was surprised, “Didn’t they make a commotion in the process of getting burned?”

“No, no one in the whole village heard a sound.” Grandma Ji said, “Two days later, another person reported that his relatives visiting from Vietnam, two young and strong young men, were missing. The police immediately began to look for people, but they haven’t been found until now.”

The death of two middle aged men and the disappearance of two young and strong men was much more serious than the previous car accident and cancer scare.

The whole Banana Leaf Village was once again in a panic.

At this time, the village began to be haunted.

Auntie Cheng’s house was the first one to be knocked on by the ghost. 

Every night, someone would knock on her gate, but when she went downstairs to check, she wouldn’t find anyone outside.

At first, Auntie Cheng thought it was the village children playing pranks, until one day, Auntie Cheng put on all the house lights and pretended that she was resting inside. Meanwhile, she actually squatted in the grass outside the gate, secretly watching to see who was actually harassing her every day.

The time was approaching, but there was no trace of people walking around.

Just when Auntie Cheng had lost patience, the knocking suddenly started.

Auntie Cheng immediately perked up and carefully stared at her gate to see who was there.

However, there was no one at the gate, but the “knock knock knock” but was incessant ……

“According to the old generation, opening the door after the ghost knocked on it is allowing it into the home …… from then on, every household gate was knocked on and everyone was terrified. Since then, everyone shut their gates, and won’t open when they hear the knock or ring of the bell. “ Grandma Ji said.

After listening, Ji Mingxia finally realized why he felt that this Banana Leaf Village and the one in his memory were completely different.

It was cold and quiet, and all the courtyard gates were closed. It turned out that they had been haunted for such a long time.

Although Grandma Ji’s words solved a lot of his doubts, a lot more questions also popped up.

When the ghost knocks on the door and you open it, it means that you are allowing in into your home.

And what if the door is not opened?

Would the ghost leave on its own?

The appearance of the ghost outside the gate flashed through Ji Mingxia’s mind, and he was inexplicably uneasy.

If it was so easy to keep the ghost outside the gate, why did it continue to stay in Banana Leaf Village and harass the residents night after night?

Thinking of the Banana Leaf Village that was shrouded in gloom, the vicissitudes of Aunt Chen, the gray-haired Grandma Ji, and then of her house, where no matter how much cleaning is done, the ubiquitous dust and gloom just won’t dissipate….

Ji Mingxia pondered silently, and after a while, he suddenly felt that something was wrong.

It was a little too quiet.

After Grandma Ji finished speaking, he was full of questions, and as he was thinking, he didn’t say anything and at some, the sound of Grandma Ji’s Buddhist beads had stopped and he was surrounded by silence.

The flashlight was shining on the ceiling so except for the roof, Ji Mingxia’s surroundings were shrouded in darkness.

That feeling of being spied on became even more obvious and Ji Mingxia could not help but look around.

Who was hiding in the darkness?

Who was watching him?

Ji Mingxia searched around, but could not find anyone, so he slowly retracted his eyes.

Just when he was about to give up, he suddenly sensed something and he immediately looked in Grandma Ji’s direction.

His eyes suddenly met a pair of resentful eyes.

Grandma Ji was sitting beside Ji Mingxia. She was leaning back into the sofa with her Buddhist beads. Her torso tilted to the side and her back was to Ji Mingxia.

However, in the back of Grandma Ji’s head was an additional pair of eyes.

Taking a closer look, the eyes were actually embedded in a translucent head that was hanging on Grandma Ji's shoulders.

The head had eyes, a nose, and even lips, but together, it was extremely strange, as if a human face had been mounted on a flattened plane.

It had a lazy eye and at that moment, one eye was looking at Ji Mingxia, while the other eye was skewed and was looking up. It had a crazy look in its eyes but there was resentment as well.

It’s large mouth, which was facing Grandma Ji’s neck, was chewing something greedily.

The surrounding light was too dim and the head was too translucent for Ji Mingxia to see what it was eating.

Seeing Grandma Ji sitting motionless and completely silent, Ji Mingxia was enraged and he overcame the fear in his heart. 

He got up to drive the head away but just when his hand was about to touch Grandma Ji, she suddenly turned her head and looked at him.

She seemed to have just woken up from an exhausting nightmare, and as soon as she opened her eyes, she saw Ji Mingxia standing in front of her with his hand stretched out. 

“What’s wrong?” Grandma Ji asked.

Her voice was aged and tinged with fatigue and hoarseness. Her eyelids, which were already drooping, were now almost covering her eyes. Even in the dimness, the wrinkles on her face were extraordinarily clear and obvious.

Compared to her during the daytime, Grandma Ji looked as if she had aged several years again.

She had aged even more.

“Mingxia?” Seeing that Ji Mingxia was staring at her, Grandma Ji called out again.

The head had disappeared and Grandma Ji came to her senses. The scene that had happened just moments ago felt like an illusion.

“It seems like you fell asleep.” Ji Mingxia whispered.

“Asleep? I was awake the whole time.” Grandma Ji said suspiciously. She then revealed a look of understanding and said, “Did the incident in Banana Leaf Village scare you?”

She expression suddenly softened: “Although ghosts often knock on the gate, there haven’t been any accidents in a long time. As long as you do not open the gate, everything will be fine.”

With that, Grandma Ji got up and turned the power on. The whole house was instantly brightened up.

The darkness was dispelled, and Grandma Ji stood in front of Ji Mingxia.

She had the form of a human being, the shadow of a human being, and a normal body temperature, so Ji Mingxia could confirm that the Grandma Ji in front of him was a living person.

In this way, the scene from earlier became even more unbelievable.

But Ji Mingxia knew that it was not his illusion.

Through previous experience, he knew that he could see ghosts.

Whether it was the ghost knocking at the gate or the ghost that had just possessed Grandma Ji, no one else can see it, but he could.

Ji Mingxia’s eyes fell on Grandma Ji’s body.

The bright light reflected every detail, making Grandma Ji’s aged appearance even more prominent.

Grandma Ji also seemed to be extraordinarily tired and she said to Ji Mingxia, “It won’t come back after knocking once, so you can go back to sleep.”

With that, she took hobbled steps and slowly went upstairs.

The light was dim around the corner, and Grandma Ji walked up step by step. Her thin, hunched body walked farther away, and was gradually swallowed by the endless abyss of in the darkness.