Chapter 83: Wang Family Funeral Home
There was no doubt that she had been targeted by a ghost.
Lu Jinzhao confirmed this.
And tonight had only just begun.
Lu Jinzhao’s footsteps were very quick; she could have gone faster, but her injured body limited her speed.
Meng Ning followed closely behind, trying to conserve the light from her flashlight, but when they reached the door of the mourning hall, Lu Jinzhao suddenly stopped and said to her, “Light the candle, or turn on your mobile phone light. I’m about to turn off my mobile phone.”
Meng Ning hesitated for a moment, with many doubts rushing to the tip of her tongue, such as why turn off the flashlight and instead light the candle, but she hesitated for a second and didn’t voice them, instead obediently taking out a candle and lighting it.
She thought that earlier it was Lu Jinzhao who had pushed open the door of the service hall, and Lu Jinzhao who had used her own mobile phone for lighting; now that they had reached the agreed mourning hall where it was her turn to open the door, naturally it was her turn to provide the lighting resource.
After the power outage, the only two lighting resources became especially precious.
Meng Ning chose not to use her mobile phone light, but instead lit a candle.
The white candle was no different from those sold on the market; there was no difference in smell or appearance.
After being lit, the candle emitted light that could barely illuminate the two of them and a small area around them.
The candle’s glow was yellowish, not particularly bright, but sufficient.
Although she hadn’t used candles much since growing up, with childhood memories to draw on, Meng Ning took a look and found that the candle’s burning speed was also normal.
This made her breathe a slight sigh of relief; at this burning speed, six candles would definitely be enough for tonight.
Realizing that it was now her turn to push open the door, Meng Ning’s heart suddenly raced, but it wasn’t her first patrol, so although she was nervous and afraid, she could temporarily overcome it.
She also knew that the most important thing to do now was to quickly complete the dangerous patrol mission, so even though her legs were a bit weak, she still quickly walked to the mourning hall door.
Just approaching this place made the temperature seem to drop.
When she placed her hand on the mourning hall door handle, she felt an even more bone-chilling chill.
It was as if it were winter right now, and the door handle had been exposed in the snow for a long time.
Or perhaps… this was the morgue, and what she was holding was not the mourning hall door handle, but a freezer handle.
Meng Ning shuddered, shook her head to dispel this terrifying fantasy, then held up the candle and pulled open the mourning hall door.
At first, she didn’t notice anything.
Her attention was almost entirely on the opened door crack.
Her movements were cautious, but definitely not slow.
When the door was opened, Meng Ning quickly swept the weak candlelight over the inside of the mourning hall, and then, all the blood in her body turned cold.
She saw two figures.
Standing in front of the seats in the back row of the mourning hall, looking at the platform.
It was just their backs, just a quick glance, but Meng Ning instinctively recognized that one of the backs belonged to Chen Hai, who had died on the first night!
And the other back had long hair; it was a woman!
She immediately thought of the corpse they had seen when they first arrived that day; that was also a woman.
That means one person was still missing.
Could it be that Lu Jinzhao’s action of cutting off the bell was really correct?!
These thoughts flashed quickly through Meng Ning’s mind; the next second, she suddenly felt her hand burning hot, so hot that she immediately turned to look at the hand holding the candle.
Then, she saw a scene that filled her with horror.
The candle, which had been burning normally, seemed to have been doused with gasoline and was now burning at an unscientific speed!
The molten wax from the burning fell onto her hand, scalding her.
In just one second, the candle seemed to have already burned for ten minutes!
Meng Ning whipped her head back, unhesitatingly closed the mourning hall door, and then quickly walked outside!
Damn it, she shouldn’t have had such a naive thought that the candle burning normally could last until dawn; this was the platform, how could anything be normal?
Meng Ning felt extremely annoyed; her action of closing the door and leaving had still been too slow.
Her footsteps were very fast; the flame flickered in the wind from her quick movement but never went out.
Meng Ning’s forehead was already covered in dense beads of sweat from tension; when she moved away from the mourning hall, the candle’s burning speed gradually returned to normal, but this candle was now left with almost only a bit of the base!
She didn’t dare to think that if she had been even a little later, even one second longer, whether this candle would already have gone out?
Why had the candle suddenly burned so fast?
She turned to look at Lu Jinzhao, wanting to communicate something with her, but saw Lu Jinzhao’s thoughtful expression.
Then, she saw Lu Jinzhao take out her mobile phone and open the notes app; not long after, the mobile phone was handed to her, and Meng Ning looked down to see a line of text.
[When the candle burned quickly, it seemed like a figure in the darkness was trying to approach us.]
That figure wouldn’t be Xiao Ping.
Meng Ning had this premonition.
Then, she thought of that body drawer that had been open from the beginning with almost no sense of presence; the corpse lying inside had already left the morgue from the moment they entered the platform.
It… where was it?
Was that the one that had tried to approach just now?
Meng Ning only felt a chill on her back; the hand holding the candle was covered in a large amount of molten wax, leaving only a short stub of candle, which was a bit hot to hold, but she didn’t dare throw it away.
Power outage, useless flashlight, unscientific consumption speed of the mobile phone battery, and the candle’s rapid burning—all of this was telling the two that tonight’s greatest danger might come from the darkness.
Or rather, the ghost lurking in the darkness!
[Perhaps, this ghost’s killing method is when a person is completely in the darkness.]
Lu Jinzhao’s words were simple, but Meng Ning understood her meaning.
Clearly, the two had already assumed that tonight’s ghost was far from the ones they had encountered in the previous two days.
And when they lost their hearing, the danger didn’t disappear with it, but instead lurked in the shadows, waiting for the right moment.
There had been no power outage in the previous two days, so they didn’t know about this ghost or this killing method.
It was also possible that because this was only a [C]-level platform, the most dangerous moment was only on the final night.
But if it was really as Lu Jinzhao thought, and this ghost’s killing condition was when a person was completely in the darkness, then it could kill without restraint…
Then tonight would be far too dangerous!
[How long until sunrise?]
Lu Jinzhao typed out another string of words.
She was willing to consume mobile phone battery; she had to get the answer to this question.
Last night, she had passed out, so she had no idea at all!
But Meng Ning remembered, only because the time of sunrise was too special.
[Exactly 5:00 a.m.]
It was as if it were some predetermined rule; when the time reached 5:00!, light would rise in the funeral home, though very faint, just a sliver, but enough to see by.
Lu Jinzhao nodded, gaining some clarity.
This platform’s end time was at 5 a.m. this morning.
And now, it was just past 12:00.
