The High-Ponytailed Woman walked cautiously ahead, holding the candlestick.
The fairly bright flame wavered slightly, lighting the dim corridor ahead.
Xu Xi followed behind, his ears perked up as he listened carefully to any movement behind them.
He was afraid that, like in some movies and novels, footsteps would suddenly sound behind the protagonist as they walked.
He glanced at the plaque on the room doors, 101, 103...
The High-Ponytailed Woman stopped and looked up, as if sizing something up.
Xu Xi suddenly realized that since the area that led in from the stairs to the right of the reception desk was the guest room area, the space to the left of the reception desk, hidden by the heavy cloth curtain, should be the kitchen.
"Go in?" the High-Ponytailed Woman asked the young man beside her.
Xu Xi looked at her, reached out, and took the key. "I'll open it."
She had just been leading the way with the candle, so he didn't want to simply stay behind her and take no risks.
Opening the door was quite fitting for him, and if there was some unavoidable door-kill...
Then he could reload and try again.
Xu Xi inserted the key into the keyhole and gently turned it. Room 103's door gave a faint click.
He slowly pushed the door open. The High-Ponytailed Woman immediately raised the candle she held into the room, dispelling about half of the darkness.
There was nothing grotesquely bloody inside. On the contrary, everything looked ordinary, just like a normal inn room.
The two exchanged a glance, and Xu Xi stepped in first.
The High-Ponytailed Woman followed and casually closed the door.
Neither spoke, but they instinctively split up to search for clues.
The room wasn't large; one candle could cover the entire space.
By the weak light, Xu Xi had just gone around the medium-sized bed when he kicked something at his feet, a hard object that rolled twice with a clatter when he nudged it.
He looked down and saw it was a flashlight. He bent to pick it up, pressed the switch, and found it still worked, with decent brightness.
Aside from the inn's supplied pillows and blankets, the bed held nothing else, and the blanket was neatly folded. A cup sat on the bedside table, and beside it was a toy robot.
The High-Ponytailed Woman also found something useful. She pulled a large cloth bag out from under the table containing gaudily patterned clothes for the elderly and short-sleeved shirts and shorts for a boy.
Those items weren't important. What mattered was that a diary was tucked among them.
They rifled through the rest of the room again, and after finding nothing else useful, they regrouped by the door.
"I didn't find much. Only this flashlight on the floor," Xu Xi said, holding the flashlight out to show his teammate.
The High-Ponytailed Woman nodded lightly. "I only found this diary. It seems useful."
Candlelight was hard on the eyes, especially when needing to read text, so Xu Xi turned on the flashlight.
The strong beam illuminated the contents of the diary.
The scrawny handwriting, like ants, was clearly a child's.
They skimmed past the mundane daily notes and only read the entries from the days they checked into the inn.
"July 27, weather clear"
"So tired, I can't walk anymore. When can we get to Auntie's house?
Grandma said it's too late today, so we'll stay here for one night and continue early tomorrow.
That strange uncle said when we hear knocking we shouldn't open the door, and we shouldn't go out at night. Then what do I do when I want to pee?
Grandma told me to sleep early, but I can't fall asleep. If I don't sleep, Grandma will scold me, so I pretended to sleep. I'm so smart, but so bored.
I heard knocking. It sounded like that weird uncle outside.
If they said we shouldn't open no matter what we hear, why did Grandma open the door?
Grandma slept, so I climbed up secretly and wrote in my diary.
That's all for today."
"July 28, weather clear"
"Why is Grandma acting weird today, even weirder than that uncle.
Grandma smiled at me again, and her smile was so scary. Also, why does Grandma have so many more teeth now? Do grown-ups really grow new teeth? Mom lied to me—she said kids don't grow new teeth after losing them. I get it now, Mom just doesn't want me to eat candy.
Grandma just sat there, and when I called her she ignored me.
Grandma's arms seem longer, Grandma seems taller.
Grandma told me to sleep.
Okay, that's it for today."
"July 29, weather clear"
"Grandma said she wanted to play a block game with me. I was the block.
Grandma tore off my head, my hands, my legs, but she didn't reassemble me, so I couldn't even finish writing my diary.
Why does Grandma's teeth have blood?
Oh, Grandma is eating my leg.
I'm hungry too, I want to eat.
I begged Grandma not to eat my hand yet, because I still wanted to finish today's diary.
I finished it, so that's all for today."
"……"
Reading the last three days' diary left both of them chilled to the bone.
If the first day at the inn had been relatively normal, the second day already showed abnormalities.
First, Grandma grew many more teeth; then she gradually grew taller and her arms lengthened—clearly a bodily deformation.
The reason Grandma changed was that she ignored the strange uncle's warning and opened the door when she heard knocking at night.
The third day's diary needed no further explanation; the eeriness became grotesque.
Judging from the content, the boy's cognition had clearly been altered, and after being dismembered he did not die, likely also mutated. His ultimate fate needed no elaboration: he was probably eaten clean by his grandmother.
"Take the diary with us. Let's go wait for them at the stairwell." The High-Ponytailed Woman closed the diary and broke the silence.
The diary was obviously an important clue; the entries helped clear up some of their earlier confusion.
There were still many questions left, so they had to hope the other three teammates had found more clues.
Xu Xi had no objections. After agreeing, he pulled open the curtain that had been covering the entrance.
But he had barely stepped out when he froze.
Not far away, a figure was slowly climbing the stairs toward the second floor. The darkness obscured details, but the silhouette appeared tall, with overlong arms.
Before he could warn anyone, the High-Ponytailed Woman had already stepped out from behind him.
The warm candlelight seemed to attract the figure's attention.
It slowly turned its head toward them, then...
walked toward them.
Xu Xi's mind raced. When he first stepped out, the figure hadn't noticed him. Only after the High-Ponytailed Woman emerged holding the candle did the figure spot them and instantly change direction, fixing on them as its target.
So... it was the candle that attracted it?!