It was a large luxurious forest. The further they were into the woods, the less decent paths there were. Luckily, there were signs directing the way, so Su Bai managed to know where they were going. After about half an hour, they arrived.
On the map, their destination was marked as "Hilton Vacation House". Ego and Fatty had been picturing how gorgeous this place might be, or how many maids dressed up as Bunny Girls would there be, but with the car going further and further into the woods, they gradually gave up on that fantasy. But it wasn"t a strong desire anyway; although the two of them were sometimes full of amative thoughts, they understood where they were going and what they would be facing. They were just fancying, like an old farmer lying on his deserted dry land fancying a good harvest after wind and rain.
However, even though they were prepared, Fatty and Ego widened their eyes with surprise when Su Bai pulled over. In front of them, there was the most obsolete wooden house that could ever exist. But there was a brand-new wooden board saying:
"Welcome to Hilton Vacation House"
Such a shabby cabin with such a ravis.h.i.+ng name. With an awkward look, Fatty started to unload their luggage and then moved them into the house.
Ego just stared at the vacation house while slouching in the seat hopelessly.
Su Bai walked to a river beside the house and stood on the small wooden wharf, which was a little rotten. There was a small boat tied to it.
The river was not very clear, but it was not polluted by industrial waste either. Probably because the water was not active enough and could not rapidly flow from upstream into downstream, it seemed somehow dusky.
He raised up his head and looked at the sky. It was gloomy, partly because it was already sunset, and partly because it was going to rain.
"This is just the right atmosphere…"
Su Bai crouched down and stared at the reflection of himself in the water. For a moment, he was lost in his own thoughts, but then, all of a sudden, he saw another face emerging from the bottom of the river, overlaying with his reflection and staring at him.
His eyes suddenly widened. But the next moment, the water surface rippled and everything was back to normal.
Under such circ.u.mstances, anything could be possible. It would be silly to consider anything he saw as merely a phantom.
It made Su Bai a little depressed that Fatty had hardly moved their stuff in when an ill omen showed up.
It appeared that they couldn"t have even one peaceful night.
Su Bai stretched out his hand, held some water and felt the coldness. Then he took a last look at the river, stood up and walked to the wooden house.
There wasn"t much dust in the house. On the contrary, different from its shabby outlook, the set of furniture inside was fine and exquisite. The floor and most of the fainters here were covered in dust, but for the three of them who were not here for any vacation, it was some sort of a good place to stay for the night.
"So… we"ll have to put up with all this. There are several rooms, but we should sleep by the fire together, just for safety. We can look out for each other just in case anything happens."
Su Bai and Ego knew that although Fatty said "just in case", in fact, it would be a surprise if nothing really happened.
Fatty set up a fire in the fireplace, and Ego roughly cleaned up the tea table and some chairs while Su Bai prepared the food they bought from the convenient store.
At nightfall, they sat around the fire with beer. Fatty rudely put some sausages over the fire to bake.
They were cautiously enjoying the moment of peace, because no one could know when anything would happen to them. But one thing was for sure, something would definitely happen.
"It"s done. A little burnt though, sorry about that."
Fatty picked up the sausages and handed them out.
Su Bai took a bite. Honestly, it wasn"t very tasty, but at this time, warm food would certainly satisfy them to an indescribable extent.
Just then, a flop came from the river outside the window.
The three of them, who were still alert even during the meal, immediately put down the sausages and beer, stood up and rushed out of the door quickly. Under such circ.u.mstances, it was better for them to make the first move and cope with the emergency together than to stay inside separately and wait for what was coming for them. In most horror films, the roles were killed one by one because they separated from each other even if they had known there would be danger.
The sound before was clearly from the river. They immediately went to that small wharf.
Fatty was holding a flashlight. He turned it into the river. Soon, they found something s.h.i.+ning.
"What"s that?" Fatty asked.
Ego frowned and tried to sense that thing with his willpower. But he had to shook his head.
"Too far. Out of my willpower"s reach."
"That seems to be a reflected light of gla.s.ses," Su Bai suddenly said.
Ego and Fatty looked at each other. They immediately reasoned back from Su Bai"s a.n.a.lysis to a possible conclusion: if there were gla.s.ses, there should be a person.
Fatty continued trying to light it up with his flashlight. He found a shadow around the reflecting gla.s.ses. With the prejudiced impression, he could immediately figure out that it was the body.
"F*ck, what should we do? There"s a dead body floating on the river!" Fatty asked.
"Get into the river and fish it out. There are twenty audiences here; brave ones will get much more than cowards. Just face whatever we meet. No matter what the Dreadful Radio is up to this time, we just face it and fight back. Let"s find out who can last to the end."
Su Bai started to untie the boat while talking. The boat was timeworn, but it could still work.
"That"s nice to hear. It"s nothing but a horror story. See a tomb we"ll dig it up, pa.s.s a temple we"ll tear its door… Actually, it may be a good way to survive." Fatty also got into the boat. But he was too heavy; the boat had still been floating on the water, but it was now sinking and shaking. Su Bai had to crouch down to maintain the balance.
After Ego got aboard, he and Fatty picked up wooden oars and started to paddle.
The small boat was loaded too much, so it wasn"t fast. It was not until they had reached a curve did they realize that the body was hiding from them and floating at a different speed from the water.
Around the curve, there was a cliff. It was no higher than four or five meters, but it perfectly blocked their sights. When the boat approached the cliff, Fatty turned off the flashlight. They all quieted down and stopped paddling.
From the other side, there came a voice. It wasn"t very clear, but it was indeed a human voice.
"Sofia, please don"t be mad. Jack didn"t mean to embarra.s.s you."
"I know, I know, Lawrence. I"m not a kid. I know I did a wrong thing, I shouldn"t have washed my clothes with drinkable water for everyone."
"You don"t have to…"
"I"m just here to rinse our clothes. Then I"ll put them on the gridiron by the fire, so we can have some dry clothes to wear when we start off tomorrow. Everyone"s exhausted after the long trip this afternoon."
"But it may be dangerous here. Those three eastern demons may appear anytime. Jack even believes that they are watching us from nearby, looking for opportunity."
"We"re just a couple of meters away from our camp. Besides, Lawrence, both you and I are enhanced, we"re different from those experiencers. Even if those eastern demons are to try to approach and attack, we won"t give in without putting up a good fight. What"s more, we can be baits; we can lure the eastern demons here. All we need to do is to hang in for a little while until the others can encircle them. If we still can"t handle those three eastern demons, then we will hardly make it through this story world, because we have tried our best."
"You"re right, Sofia. You have such a big heart."
"It"s nothing… I"m just trying to comfort myself. After all, I just made a mistake, didn"t I?" Sofia turned around and smiled sweetly at Lawrence.
Then…
…the next moment…
A hand stretched out from the water and grabbed Sofia"s neck. Sofia was caught off guard and was immediately dragged into the water.
"Sofia! Sofia! Sofia!"
"Sh*t, what"s that noise? Water sound and human scream…" Fatty murmured.
"Fatty, where"s your flashlight? Turn it on and check out," Ego reminded.
"Right! Eh? Why isn"t it working? Bad contact or water damage?" Fatty took the flashlight and started waving. "Ha… It"s working now."
"Lawrence, Lawrence, what"s wrong?"
"What"s going on?"
"Lawrence?"
A group of western young people rushed out from their camp.
Lawrence was pointing to the lake, still suffering from the shock.
Just then, Fatty"s flashlight worked again. Because Fatty was moving it up and down, when the light came out, it happened to be s.h.i.+ning on Fatty"s face from below.
Most people must have such experience and memory: putting a flashlight near one"s chin in darkness and suddenly turning it on, such image would definitely scare anyone else to death if he or she didn"t see it coming.
Of course, such image startled the western people on the sh.o.r.e. Someone immediately called out in fear,
"It"s the demons! The demons with yellow skin! They"re here… to kill us! Poor Sofia has become their first victim…"