The group stood frozen in the doorway, utterly bewildered. What was happening? She spat out the beef porridge but swallowed the plain rice porridge without complaint?
After the old woman finished the bowl, Ning Qiushui handed it back to Liu Chengfeng and retreated from the room.
"Kid, what… what's going on?" Liu Chengfeng whispered urgently as they stepped into the corridor.
Ning Qiushui shook his head. "Complicated. Later…" He scanned the group. "Where's Yamo?"
His question snapped them back to reality. The girl who had fled downstairs in terror moments ago… was gone. Vanished.
"Yamo!" Liu Chengfeng bellowed, his voice echoing through the unnervingly silent villa.
No response. Only a heavy, suffocating stillness.
A wave of cold dread washed over them. They fanned out downstairs, searching frantically. Ning Qiushui stopped at the villa's main entrance. The door stood ajar. He stared out into the curtain of rain.
"Don't bother," he said, his voice flat. "She ran. Out there."
"Ran? Out there?" Liu Chengfeng moved closer, peering into the grey deluge. An involuntary shiver ran through him. Instantly, everyone's mind flashed to the fat man who'd jumped from the bus—and ended up skinned alive.
Their task was to care for the old woman inside this villa for five days. What happened if someone left?
As Ning Qiushui turned back towards the foyer, his gaze snagged on the shoe cabinet by the door. A thought struck him. He crouched down, rummaging through its contents.
"Kid? What're you looking for?" Liu Chengfeng asked, hovering nearby.
Ning Qiushui's eyes narrowed. "No men's shoes."
Liu Chengfeng blinked. "Huh?"
Ning Qiushui's mind raced, processing connections with unnerving speed. "The mistress mentioned her husband was away on business. But there are no men's shoes in this house!"
Liu Chengfeng stiffened. "So you mean…"
A sharp, calculating gleam lit Ning Qiushui's eyes. "Two possibilities. One: her husband moved out for some reason. Two…" He paused, meeting Liu Chengfeng's gaze directly. "…She never had a husband."
Liu Chengfeng frowned. "No husband? But… what about her daughter? She—"
Ning Qiushui cut him off, his voice dropping to a chilling whisper that sent ice down Liu Chengfeng's spine: "What makes you think that little girl was her daughter?"
He let the question hang, heavy and ominous.
"Just… because she was holding her hand?"
Liu Chengfeng stared back, the implications hitting him like a physical blow. Cold sweat beaded on his forehead. He swallowed hard. Ning Qiushui was right. There was zero proof the child was the woman's daughter.
"…Let's get back inside," Ning Qiushui said after a tense moment. He glanced once more at the rain-lashed gloom beyond the door. A sudden, primal sense of being watched prickled his skin—something malevolent lurking deep within the storm. He slammed the door shut, checking the lock multiple times before rejoining the others in the foyer with Liu Chengfeng.
The mood downstairs was grim. The large villa felt cavernous and hollow. Seven people had brought some semblance of life; now, with Wang Yuning's gruesome death and Yamo's desperate flight into the storm, only five remained.
Xue Guize, his face pale but composed (a resilience perhaps born from his past work as a mortuary cosmetician), addressed Ning Qiushui. "Ning Qiushui… what did the old woman actually say? Back there?"
All eyes fixed on Ning Qiushui. He answered plainly: "She said… 'The meat isn't cooked.'"
A collective pause. Not cooked?
"Bull-fucking-shit!" Liu Chengfeng exploded, his face flushing with indignation. "Don't tell me I don't know when meat's cooked! I've handled more raw and cooked meat than you've had hot dinners!"
His outburst, loud and profane in the oppressive silence, paradoxically eased some of the tension. The sheer, angry normalcy of it was a small anchor in the madness. The bearded man's bluster felt like a shield against the villa's encroaching dread.
Amidst the palpable fear on the others' faces, Ning Qiushui's unnatural calm stood out starkly. It was as if he'd navigated horrors like this countless times before. His next words, delivered with quiet certainty, cut through Liu Chengfeng's outrage and the group's unease:
"Therefore… those three words she kept repeating… they weren't 'The meat isn't cooked.'"
He paused, letting the chilling implication sink in.
"They were a warning."
The murmuring group fell abruptly silent.
"What do you mean?" Xue Guize frowned.
Ning Qiushui raised an eyebrow. "The old woman upstairs… she's very old, frail, and mentally unstable. Her speech is slurred." He paused, letting the point sink in. "And we were biased from the start. Wang Yuning's panic skewed our perception. We jumped to the conclusion that the first two words she mumbled were 'meat no'."
He met their eyes. "But I don't think that's what she was trying to say at all."
Beidao scoffed dismissively. "Who cares what that murderous thing says? Didn't you see the knife and fork beside her this morning?" His voice dropped to a fearful whisper as he glanced nervously towards the second floor. "Obviously, she killed Wang Yuning last night!"
He shuddered, adding with macabre emphasis, "Hell… the chunks of flesh missing from Wang Yuning's body? Probably eaten! By her!"
His tone was chillingly ominous. Yan Youping shrieked and instinctively clung to Liu Chengfeng beside her.
Liu Chengfeng, startled by Yan Youping's sudden grip, cursed. "Beidao! Cut the ghost story crap! Look what you did to her!"
Beidao's own face was pale and strained. He wrung his hands, muttering with nervous energy. "I don't want to die… Not like Wang Yuning… You saw her… she was eaten… It's too horrible… too horrible…"
Xue Guize's patience snapped, irritation warring with his own fear. "Enough!" he barked. "Shut up! Who wants to die? Huh? We're all trying to figure this out!"
Liu Chengfeng turned his focus back to Ning Qiushui, whose intense concentration offered a strange anchor. The man's unnerving calm was becoming their psychological bedrock.
"Kid," Liu Chengfeng asked, his voice tight but hopeful. "You got anything?"
Ning Qiushui glanced up. "A theory. But testing it tonight… will require someone brave."
The word tonight hung heavy in the air, instantly conjuring the horrors of the previous evening. A thick, apprehensive silence descended.
After a long pause, Liu Chengfeng gritted his teeth. "Kid… why tonight? Can't we do it in the daylight?"
Ning Qiushui's answer was firm. "No."
Liu Chengfeng flinched. He opened his mouth, perhaps to retreat into silence, but something in Ning Qiushui's steady gaze compelled him. The words spilled out before he could stop them: "Alright… I'll go with you!"
The moment he said it, Liu Chengfeng mentally kicked himself. Damn it! Why can't I keep my big mouth shut?!
"Good. You're with me tonight," Ning Qiushui confirmed.
A bloodcurdling shriek ripped through the villa from the second floor, shattering the fragile tension.
"NO! DON'T!!"
"PLEASE… I KNOW… AAAAHHHHHH!!!"
Every hair on their bodies stood on end. They stared at each other, faces etched with identical, chilling recognition.
That voice… they knew it all too well.
It belonged to Yamo. The girl who had fled the villa… only minutes before.