louisehourcade Chapter 104 The Smiling Face
Chapter 104 The Smiling Face
Just then, a faint sound drifted from deep within the teaching building.
It sounded like the low, intermittent, mixed laughter of many people... like a murmur.
The four stopped under a dim, flickering old streetlamp. Without a word, they immediately began to prepare.
Evelyn took out the "Red Dragon" she had collected first, and everyone else took out their peach wood sticks.
Evelyn skillfully used thin rope to firmly bind the two red dragon pieces to the top of the peach wood stick, completing a simple "enchantment".
Vassim, Anna, and Lin Feng followed suit and quickly completed their weapon preparations.
The orange cat, which had been lazily perched on his shoulder, suddenly twitched its nose, showed a look of disgust on its face, and even turned its head to the other side forcefully.
A thought, clearly tinged with displeasure, came through:
"Meow~! What's that weird smell! It's pungent and irritating, it smells awful! Get away from me, orange tabby! Be careful that rotten thing doesn't touch my fur!"
Seeing the orange cat's obvious rejection, Lin Feng felt a sense of relief.
Even an orange cat would dislike something like this, but it would definitely be effective against those low-level monsters!
Once ready, Vassim took the lead, carrying a peach wood stick with a red dragon tied to it, and charged towards the half-crooked, rusty main entrance of the teaching building.
"Wait, Vassim!" Lin Feng grabbed his arm just in time.
Amidst the puzzled gazes of the crowd, Lin Feng closed his eyes, concentrated, and silently recited in his mind:
"System, I want to be exempt from the 'must travel alone' rule here!"
A cold, audible notification sound, only he could perceive, rang in his mind: [Rule 'Entering the teaching building alone' has been waived. Valid for 24 hours.]
Lin Feng opened his eyes, nodded to his companions, and whispered:
"That's fine."
Although he didn't know what had happened, out of trust in Lin Feng, Vassim nodded vigorously and then used a peach wood stick to push open the half-closed, dilapidated iron door.
"Squeak—"
A dry, scraping sound broke the silence, and darkness surged in from behind the door like ink.
Without hesitation, Wasim stepped into the thick shadows.
Evelyn followed closely behind, Lin Feng carried the orange cat on his back and stepped in third, Anna gripped the peach wood stick, took a deep breath, and was the last to step in.
The world inside the door seemed completely isolated from the outside world.
The air was stagnant and cold, carrying a heavy smell of dust and mildew, as well as a deeper, indescribable stench of decay.
The eerie, delirious laughter became even clearer here.
Wasim switched on his powerful flashlight, and a beam of light pierced the darkness, illuminating the scene ahead.
This is a long corridor with mottled walls on both sides, and the original slogans and propaganda posters are now just blurry remnants.
What sends chills down your spine the most are some "things" floating and drifting in the corridor.
They resembled floating, semi-transparent masks, each face frozen with the exact same expression—an exaggeratedly unnatural smile, the corners of their mouths almost reaching their ears.
"This is... 'The Smiling Nightmare'?" Wasim's voice was very low, with a hint of tension.
Lin Feng nodded solemnly: "That's right."
These eerie smiling faces floated silently in the corridor, sometimes gathering and sometimes dispersing. The continuous, chilling murmurs and soft laughter emanated from their open mouths.
"Instructor Su warned us that they would attack people who didn't have a 'smile' on their faces."
"Fake smiles! We need to fool them with fake smiles. Follow me, turn right, and find the archives!"
The four of them immediately tried to force smiles onto their faces.
Wasim's smile looked like a snarl, Evelyn's smile was calm but stiff, and Anna's smile was full of fear, with her lips trembling slightly.
Lin Feng quickly put on a formulaic smile – the curve was perfect, but it didn't reach his calm eyes.
The orange cat remained perched on Lin Feng's shoulder, its amber eyes scanning the "smiling faces" without making any comment, seemingly acquiescing to this "lurking" strategy and unwilling to alert the enemy prematurely.
Lin Feng took a deep breath and took his first step to the right.
When he reached the sixth step, a "face" with an exaggerated smile suddenly slid in front of him without warning, so close that his vision could barely focus.
Lin Feng's heart leaped into his throat, and his grip on the peach wood stick tightened abruptly.
But he still maintained that stiff, fake smile on his face.
Time seemed to stretch out infinitely in that instant.
The empty "gaze" lingered on his face for three or four seconds before slowly moving away and continuing to drift silently forward.
Only after that smiling face had floated two or three meters away did Lin Feng finally let out a breath he had been holding for a long time.
It seems that Su Wan's method was indeed effective.
The four dared not slack off, maintaining their "smiles" as they cautiously moved deeper into the corridor.
A classroom window ahead was broken, and Wasim couldn't resist quickly shining his flashlight beam inside.
The classroom was packed with "students".
Their bodies were stiff, motionless like wax figures.
Every face wore the same frozen, exaggerated smile as the "Smiling Nightmare" in the corridor, and all the empty eyes stared at the dilapidated blackboard in front of them.
........................
Studio:
"Holy crap, this scene reminds me of 'House of Wax'!"
"Wait! I think I just saw the eyeball by the window move!"
"Don't scare me, upstairs! I'm too scared to sleep!"
"If any streamer dared to go in and stream for one night, they would definitely become a viral sensation!"
"It's terrifying, it gave me goosebumps..."
"What if they all suddenly turn around and look at us...?"
"Screenshot taken, I have material for tonight's nightmare."
........................
The back door of the next classroom was ajar, and Lin Feng tentatively pushed it open.
Throughout the entire process, the orange cat on my shoulder did not stop me, indicating that there was no imminent danger inside.
This place appears to have been converted into a temporary photo studio.
In the center of the room, an old-fashioned large camera stood quietly, its body covered with a dirty black cloth.
The enormous lens stood out starkly in the darkness, reflecting the flashlight's beam with a chilling light. It didn't resemble glass, but rather the moist, cold eye of some living creature, silently gazing at the uninvited guest outside the door.
Behind the camera, several wooden racks were placed close to the wall, densely packed with transparent glass jars.
As the beam of light swept across, the contents of the jar were revealed—
Each clump contained a blurry, faintly glowing gaseous substance.
They wriggle and tumble slowly inside the container as if they were alive, occasionally coalescing into a distorted, pained human face before disintegrating again, in an endless cycle.
The orange cat's thoughts, tinged with undisguised disdain, came through:
"These bottles contain fragments of human souls that have been stripped away, intended for consumption or the creation of vile concoctions."
"Tch, deriving pleasure from devouring human souls—how is that any different from the lowest form of drug addict? Utterly utterly tasteless!"