Mu Shan shuddered violently. She bit her lip to ensure she wouldn’t cry out.
Those pale little feet were in the fourth-layer wooden compartment, right next to the ladder her feet were on. If she climbed down just like that, she would end up face-to-face with the little imp inside.
After the supernatural phenomenon appeared, the temperature in the room plummeted.
Suddenly, eerie “creak creak” sounds emanated from the other wooden compartments around her.
Shrill, tiny, and irregular.
…Just like children scratching the inner layer of a coffin with soft nails.
As the sounds grew louder, Mu Shan hesitated no longer. She didn’t climb down the ladder but leaped straight down from the height of the fourth-layer compartment.
With a “thud,” the scratching and slapping noises vanished the instant her feet hit the ground.
But in the next moment, the flashlight in her hand suddenly went out.
The room was enveloped in a uniform red glow. This red light wasn’t from any lamp; no one knew where it came from. Row after row of wooden coffins was shrouded in the terrifying bloody hue, casting chaotic shadows.
Mu Shan tapped the flashlight repeatedly, but it showed no response.
The red light wasn’t bright,
yet it made it impossible to see surroundings clearly. The environment turned gloomy and eerie, like a scene from a horror movie.
She felt someone dart past her side quickly, but her eyes caught no trace.
One, two.
Bare little feet thudded across the ground, “thump thump thump.”
Sometimes, she felt the children brush past her from behind, hiding behind the wooden compartments, playing hide-and-seek with her.
As the footsteps grew louder, as if they would stomp through the floor, Mu Shan pulled a camping lamp from her backpack.
“Pa—”
The moment the pale yellow light flickered on, the horrifying red glow in the room vanished.
The camping lamp’s light was dimmer than the flashlight’s, but it illuminated a wider area.
Mu Shan stood up holding the lamp, her breathing slightly disordered.
“Hee hee.”
She whipped her head around. Outside the red door curtain at the entrance, she saw many tiny shadows swaying.
They clung to the curtain, peeking inside, their little hands and faces casting shadows on the door. From behind the curtain came the shrill, suppressed laughter unique to children, nonstop.
“Hee hee—”
“Ha ha ha—”
Mu Shan didn’t dare fire her gun easily. Using force would mean making enemies of all twenty-three little ghosts in the nursery.
But with one bizarre event after another, she couldn’t help feeling her hair stand on end.
The instant her attention was drawn to the ghostly shadows outside the curtain, she failed to notice a full-length dressing mirror that had appeared on the empty ground in front of her.
Rectangular, with a bright, spotless mirror surface, it stood in stark contrast to the long-abandoned nursery.
She didn’t want to approach this eerie dressing mirror, but more and more little ghosts wandered outside the curtain, making escape impossible.
The dressing mirror was the next plot development on this floor.
Thus, Mu Shan could only go along with the system. She activated the laser sword, holding the camping lamp in one hand as she slowly approached the mirror.
When she could fully see the scene in the mirror, she froze.
The mirror reflected the nursery before it was abandoned. All the children wore beige pajamas, lying head-in, feet-out in the wooden compartments.
Blurred adult figures counted the children in the compartments. If one or two dissatisfied them, the adult would grab the exposed little feet outside the compartment, yank the child out upside down, and spank their buttocks and back like one would a cat, while the children sleeping in the other coffin-like compartments remained utterly silent.
A few seconds later, her own reflection appeared in the mirror. But it wasn’t Mu Shan’s front view… it was her back.
The her in the mirror held a sword in one hand and the lamp in the other, showing only the back of someone in combat gear.
Mu Shan jolted and instinctively wanted to look behind her, but she forcibly held back.
Sure enough, seeing she hadn’t taken the bait, the back view in the mirror vanished, replaced by two short figures—two little ghosts.
One male and one female, they didn’t look six or seven; they seemed only four or five, frail and scrawny. Big heads on tiny bodies, they wore the same beige pajamas from the illusion, tattered and filthy at the hems.
Their enormous heads bore dark green lips and pitch-black eye sockets, their pale skin bloodless. The two little ghosts stared fixedly at Mu Shan. She didn’t move, and they showed no intention of coming out.
Until the camping lamp flickered, and Mu Shan saw their lips moving, voices overlapping.
“You, who, are?”
She didn’t answer immediately. A system prompt appeared before her.
【Please choose one of the following three options:
1. I am the parent
2. I am the chef
3. I am the teacher】
Mu Shan didn’t want to pick any option. She tried saying she was just a passerby, but the system imposed a temporary “mute” status on her.
No choice, she spoke: “I am the teacher.”
The words fell, and she saw the eyes of the male and female little ghosts across from her widen abruptly.
Once the little ghosts got the answer they wanted, Mu Shan’s mute status lifted. But almost instantly, red light flashed around her.
【Health -1
Protective Shield (9/10)】
The two little ghosts, who had seemed normal moments ago, mutated at a speed visible to the naked eye. They grew fangs and sharp teeth as blood trickled from all around the dormitory.
Mu Shan retreated while shouting, “But I’m not the teacher of this nursery!”
“I’m a zookeeper at the zoo! Kids, want to go play at the zoo?”
The little ghosts paused, their bleeding eyes gazing at her curiously.
She lowered her voice: “The zoo has elephants, tigers, pandas, lions, and cute little ponies. Have you been?”
The two little ghosts stared straight at her like statues, neither moving nor speaking.
The plot clues in the nursery were simple. This was just one floor among many in the skyscraper’s 666th level; the monsters had independent settings.
An illegally run nursery where parents dumped toddlers for long-term care, shirking all parental duties, never checking in.
The chef skimped on proper food, feeding the children bran like livestock.
The teacher/dean managed them like a prison. The nursery’s teachings were solely for better control, allowing no childish whims or nature—not even sparing them beatings. That was why the toys and children’s drawings were all torn and destroyed.
They were denied any right to a normal childhood.
Parent, chef, teacher.
Mu Shan guessed the three options led to three player endings.
1. Death
2. Grisly death
3. A fate worse than death
Even as ghosts, they were still just six- or seven-year-olds.
Mu Shan pulled two cards from her pocket and chose to materialize them.
【Item Card: One toy balloon, one toy basketball】
The colorful rubber basketball rolled across the floor, while the red balloon floated up.
The toys instantly drew the attention of all the little ghosts in the room; gasps even came from behind the curtain.
But the male and female little ghosts in the mirror were clearly the strongest. They darted out of the mirror and snatched the two toys.
Mu Shan gave what she thought was her kindest, most amiable smile: “Big sis isn’t a bad person. Kids, just answer two questions for big sis, and these toys are yours to play with.”
The male little ghost hugged the basketball, staring at her with unblinking eyes: “What do you want to ask?”
Mu Shan secretly breathed a sigh of relief.
“Where is the 18th floor of this building?”
The words fell, and the female little ghost let out a shrill laugh. Clutching the balloon, she zipped around the room: “Skyscraper! Skyscraper! 18th floor, 18th floor! You can’t go to the 18th floor!”
Mu Shan’s eyes flashed with alarm, but she quickly calmed down.
“Why can’t I go to the 18th floor?”
This time, the male little ghost spoke, lips splitting wide: “The elevator doesn’t stop at the 18th floor.”
Mu Shan wanted to ask more, but the two child ghosts were already heading out with their toys.
The other twenty-one little ghosts, toy-less, darted around her, making “hiss hiss” sounds of greedy desire, but they only harassed without any real attacks.
The moment she stepped out of the dormitory area, the originally red door curtain behind her began dripping black liquid “drip drip drop.”
The nearby kitchen and office were already inundated with an oil-like substance.
Not only that, the outer classroom walls showed varying degrees of “melting.”
Black shadows danced in the dim light of the camping lamp. Mu Shan didn’t dare linger and bolted toward the elevator door three steps at a time, slapping the upward “△” button.
The male and female little ghosts didn’t follow. They stood before the blackboard reading “Filial Piety, Sibling Respect, Endurance,” silently watching her with their toys.
The other twenty-one formless, featureless little ghosts turned into vague shadows, waving at her.
This was a forgotten, abandoned nursery.
Now, it was about to “melt” away forever, disappear, and be forgotten.
The elevator didn’t arrive quickly. Under the unrelenting stares of the crowd of little ghosts, Mu Shan waited. Just as the nursery’s environment reached its limit of distortion, the elevator “dinged” and arrived at the 23rd floor.
She dashed inside and hit the close button.
In the instant the silver elevator doors slowly closed, she saw the male little ghost open his mouth.
“Thank you, big sis.”