Paintings of Terror

Chapter 49: The Story of Room 402

Translated by Eve

Edited by EB

There were odd scorch marks inside Room 402.

The ceiling and four walls were all tinged black but the furniture was untouched.

The room was very dark. There was a cement wall on the other side of the large window facing the road outside as well. Few people were surprised at this sight. It was only Wei Dong and Zhu Haowen who seemed confused and alarmed by the weird cement wall.

Two of the three sets of bedding on the large bed had been torched to ashes. The last set was perfectly intact.

Wei Dong’s face paled. He stood next to Ke Xun and said, “How…did they catch on fire? Did the bedding spontaneously combust? That’s too weird.”

Mu Yiran looked at the unaffected candle sitting on the desk. It was completely unaffected. He also felt like something was fishy.

Everyone noticed this oddity quickly. Zhi Shao picked up the half melted candle that was sitting in a small teacup. Half of the tea cup was filled with solidified wax. “Was…this candle the source of the fire?”

Qin Ci looked at the black ceiling and the walls. “Judging by the marks on the wall, it looks like the fire was huge last night. It even spread to the outer room.”

“No, the walls have always been black.” It was Xin Miao who had spoken up. Sha Liu stood next to her at the entrance to the apartment.

“It’s always been like this?” Qin Ci was confused.

Xin Miao was certain. “The three of us…it was black when we first opened the door to this room. We had gone down to ask the gatekeeper uncle if we could change rooms but he said that we couldn’t. He said it was up to us whether or not we lived in that room…. We asked him to open the main entrance for us but he refused.”

“Aside from the fact that the walls are charred black, were there any other weird things you noticed about the unit?”

Xin Miao had just barely managed to calm down. After listening to Sha Liu’s persuasion, her desire to survive had prevailed over her fear. Now, all she wanted was to gain the group’s protection by cooperating. “At that time, we had examined the room before going downstairs to eat at the restaurant….” Xin Miao gazed into the room, falling onto the mostly scorched bed. “Those two were braver than I am. They were convinced that we had transmigrated. They were better at adapting then I was.”

“We went back to our room after the lights went out. We all played games on our phone for a while. Then…the two of them said that they wanted to go to the washroom. When they came back, they didn’t seem well….” Xin Miao recalled what had happened last night.

Sha Liu asked, “How so?”

“When they came back, they said that they saw a ghost in the communal washroom’s window…. Since Tina loves pranking people by scaring them and loves to tell ghost stories, I thought they were purposely trying to scare me, considering how timid I am,” Xin Miao said. She started to sob, “They said that we couldn’t live here, that they wanted to talk to you guys. They wanted to talk to the gatekeeper uncle as a group….”

“I was skeptical, I was also really scared and it was also dark outside. That’s why I didn’t want to go out! None of us really remembered where everyone was located. But we did faintly recall that the other two girls were likely in Room 410….”

That was why they had knocked on 410’s door last night. When no one answered, they might have left out of fear. They probably planned to leave the next morning, after spending one night in the apartments.

Everyone had heard them knocking last night. As long as the angle was right, some of them would also have seen the candlelight emitting from their room.

“What happened after they came back?” Ke Xun pictured Tina in his head. Her head was dyed an ash blue and she had seemed fearless. He didn’t think that she was the type to settle down after returning to their room.

As expected, Xin Miao said, “None of us could sleep. We were all restless. In the end, Tina started to pack her bags. She wanted to leave that night. Actually, we had all left the unit again….”

Xin Miao’s expression turned ugly. She glanced in the direction of one of the washrooms: “That staircase…we had come up from that staircase before lights had gone out. They were clearly next to that washroom…. But who would have expected that the staircase would disappear when we tried to leave in the middle of the night.”

“What?!” Qiu Lu was the first to exclaim in shock. “The stairs disappeared?!”

Xin Miao’s lips were pale. “They’re back now…but they really did disappear last night! The communal washrooms were still around but the ground was flat where the stairs were suppose to be! It was like the stairs had never been there to start with….”

“Did you guys head back to your room because you were afraid afterwards?” Ke Xun asked.

“Yeah, none of us dared to go out afterwards. Even after shutting the door tightly, we still didn’t feel safe. We then all crowded together in the bed and fell asleep…. The next morning….”

Sha Liu patted Xin Miao on the back, comforting her. She then looked at Mu Yiran and Ke Xun: “I’ll go check out the female washrooms with Qiu Lu. Maybe the ghost face is still there.”

Qiu Lu was afraid. She hesitated and didn’t walk over right away.

Shou Zhu said, “If there’s no one in the female washroom right now, we can all head in together.”

No one had any objections. Xin Miao also followed along. She felt that it was safest to stay in a populated area, even if it was currently day time.

Mu Yiran was at the back of the group. He didn’t go into the female washroom. Instead, he headed towards the staircase Xin Miao had mentioned. Ke Xun stood behind him: “I believe her. The staircase probably did disappear last night.”

Right now, the stairs were right in front of their eyes. The mottled handrails had Saint Seiya posters stuck on them.

No one could predict what could or could not happen in a painting.

Mu Yiran stood at the top of the staircase, seemingly lost in thought.

Ke Xun looked at the four points along the circular walls. Every point was an exit. The staircases were the exits for solid things and the washroom/water room was the exit for liquids.

“Say, do you think all of the staircases disappeared after lights out? If that’s the case, the gatekeeper uncle wouldn’t have needed to warn us against taking the stairs.” Ke Xun shared his thoughts.

Mu Yiran’s slightly cold eyes paused on Ke Xun’s face for a moment. “Do you think the stairs will disappear every night or only on specific nights?”

Ke Xun perked up at the attention. Feeling refreshed, his mind cleared quite a bit. “What you’re suggesting is that the staircases disappearing might have to do with last night’s death. The mode of death last night was by fire. If the two girls woke up while being burned, they would probably try to escape. Stairs are considered emergency exits so they would be the first choice for many people.”

Mu Yiran nodded slightly. “Based on this reasoning, we can assume that the entire apartment complex is involved with the designing of each death. It will change according to each mode of death. This time, only the structure of the building was affected, Next time, the people might also get involved.”

Mu Yiran’s tone was calm but the content of what he was saying was terrifying.

The others came out from the female washroom. The results of their investigation was as follows: there was indeed a ghost face outside the window. It turned out to be graffiti on the cement wall outside. The face was approximately the size of the window. At first glance, it was really scary.

“Ke er, why is there a cement wall outside the windows?” Wei Dong walked over to Ke Xun’s side, “Is it the same for everyone on the fourth floor?”

Ke Xun nodded. “Is there no wall on the sixth floor?”

Everyone headed to the first floor as they chatted. It was time to congregate at Wu Mei’s Restaurant.

“The windows on the sixth floor are bright, but for some reason, I feel suffocated up there.” Wei Dong looked at Zhu Haowen who was at the front of the pack. “My roommate’s head hurt all night. My chest also felt heavy. It felt like something was pressing down on my chest, making it hard to breathe. Luckily, I had the nasal inhaler you gave me. Otherwise, I would probably have had to go to the hospital and get oxygen therapy.”

Wei Dong pulled the nasal inhaler out and took another inhalation. “No wonder the gatekeeper uncle had said that the pressure was crushing. I get it now.”

Mu Yiran suddenly asked, “Aside from the physical discomfort, was there any other abnormalities in your room?”

Wei Dong scratched his head. “We slept like the dead last night. Our head and chest still hurt respectively in the morning so we rushed out of the room.”

“How is it now?” Ke Xun asked.

“It’s weird. It was fine as soon as I left the sixth floor.” Wei Dong was also befuddled.

Qin Ci went to help Li Taiyong out of Room 307 as they passed the third floor. After considering the elderly man’s age, no one told him about the deaths at once.

The gatekeeper uncle was already waiting for them at the entrance to Wu Mei’s Restaurant. “Let’s talk about Room 402 before we eat.”

Did the NPC want to talk to them about what had happened last night of his own accord?

The gatekeeper uncle twirled the circle of keys in his hand. “Ever since Liao Xinchuan started to cut off electricity at night, we had no choice but to fumble around in the dark. A pretty boy used to live in Room 402. He was a high school student preparing for his university examination. Every night, he was left with no choice but to study under candlelight. One day, he fell asleep from exhaustion. He accidentally knocked the candle down and his books lit on fire. As a result, he died from the blaze. of course, this all happened last year.”

While everyone tried to figure out what the NPC’s motive for telling them this was, they heard the gatekeeper uncle say: “That’s why we all have to pay careful attention to fire safety and control! All right, we’ll stop here. Go eat.”

.

Wei Dong couldn’t stop himself from asking, “What’s our mission during the day?”

“You tenants can do whatever you want! I don’t care!”

“Can we leave through the main entrance?” Qiu Lu asked in a fluster.

The gatekeeper uncle’s face chilled. “The developer has blocked the main entrance. He even had a cement wall erected. Anyone who leaves the Spring Bamboo Dormitory will be considered a traitor!”

Everyone promptly forced out laughter as they entered the restaurant. Sha Liu reminded Qiu Lu from behind: “Our goal is to find the signature. Only by finding the signature can we leave this world!”

Qiu Lu already had no choice but to believe that what they had said was true. “But so many people live here. Are we going to have to search every single unit?”

“The signature is unlikely to be in someone else’s home. We have to find the relationship between the deaths and either figure out the underlying story or trigger. The signature is likely hidden in a place that is connected to those things.” Sha Liu’s voice gradually got louder so that all the newbies could hear her.

The owner of the restaurant, Wu Mei, brought everyone into the only private room inside. There was a large round table inside the room and a simple breakfast was laid out on top. There was millet congee, mantou and cold side dishes.

After the ‘slop’ they were served in the last two paintings, Ke Xun and Wei Dong thought that the treatment here was great.

Wu Mei said, “If you’re willing to pay extra, there are also eggs, fried dough cakes, steamed buns and preserved egg and shredded pork congee.”

No one really had an appetite, let alone were in the frame of mind to order food.

Ke Xun glanced at Wu Mei: “How much would it cost for everyone to have a boiled egg?”

It was precisely at a time like this that they should eat their fill. Searching for the signature was exhausting.

“One egg costs fifty cents. There’s eleven of you. I’ll cut you a deal and give you eleven for five yuan!” Wu Mei was a straightforward person.

Ke Xun handed Wu Mei the money and smiled. “The elderly gentleman from earlier mentioned a Liao Xinchuan. What kind of person is he?”

Wu Mei rang the cash register while answering him. “He was the previous factory director here!”

Everyone was shocked by this. They had originally thought that Liao Xinchuan was the Hong Kong developer mentioned before. They didn’t expect him to be a factory director.

This time, Old Man Li Taiyong, who had been silent this whole time, was the one to speak. “Young lady, is the factory still around?”

“It is, but it’s different from how it was in the past. I don’t get how stocks work. They just go ‘round and ‘round. Right now, the factory belongs to those stockholders. Even the land that the factory is on and our Spring Bamboo Dormitory belongs to them! Factory Director Liao has the biggest share!”

Li Taiyong once again fell silent.

Eve: Happy New Year, my dears.