They reached the stairwell.
The iron door leading to the third floor stood wide open.
A putrid stench, thick and cloying, rolled down the stairs – identical to the decomposition sludge that had dripped through their ceiling.
The reek of rotting flesh.
Liu Chengfeng gagged, clamping a hand over his nose and mouth, his face contorted in disgust. Fighting the urge to vomit, he followed Ning Qiu Shui upward.
On the third floor, the stench intensified into a physical assault. Liu Chengfeng's stomach convulsed violently. He stumbled, doubling over as he retched onto the floor.
"Ugh—!" He vomited, his skin waxy and pale.
Ning Qiu Shui steadied him with a hand on his back. After emptying his stomach, Liu Chengfeng managed a shaky breath.
They moved down the pitch-black corridor. The floorboards felt sickeningly viscous beneath their feet. Even without light, Liu Chengfeng knew what coated the floor: more of that foul sludge. It covered the entire third floor.
A cold dread seized them both. How many corpses had decayed here to flood an entire floor?
"Just as I thought…" Ning Qiu Shui murmured, eyes narrowed. The smell revolted him, but his stomach held. He'd anticipated this horror.
Slogging through the ankle-deep muck, they reached the first room reeking of decay. Ning Qiu Shui turned the knob.
The sight inside froze them.
Moonlight spilled into the room, illuminating a nightmare: hundreds of decaying corpses, piled like grotesque cordwood. Some were freshly slaughtered, glistening with raw, exposed muscle. Others were skeletal ruins, little more than bone and clinging strands of hair. Yet every single one retained a near-intact head. On those faces still bearing flesh, frozen, rictus grins seemed to beckon them inside.
Thud. Liu Chengfeng stumbled back, hand clamped over his mouth, trembling uncontrollably. With shaking hands, he pushed open the next door.
"Jesus fucking—" He choked back a scream.
Every room was identically packed. A charnel house. Every corpse bore the same mutilation: organs meticulously carved out, flesh crisscrossed with deep gouges from blades and forks – the unmistakable signature of something that had feasted here. Among the remains, they spotted Wang Yuning and Yamo.
Liu Chengfeng's legs gave way. He slid down the wall, his face bloodless in the moonlight. "So… that's where the sludge dripping onto our ceiling came from…" His voice was a raw whisper. "But… where did all these people come from? Unless…"
Ning Qiu Shui's gaze cut through the window, scanning the dark cluster of villas beyond. "I suspect… these are all the original residents of this villa complex."
Liu Chengfeng swallowed hard, cold sweat beading on his forehead. The thing haunting the third floor… it devoured an entire community?
"And we're likely not the first 'caretakers' lured here," Ning Qiu Shui continued, his voice icy calm. "The rooms downstairs, the private bathrooms… they weren't for the old woman. They were traps laid for us."
Every word from Ning Qiu Shui hammered against Liu Chengfeng's nerves, making his heart lurch violently.
"Brother... maybe we should go back," Liu Chengfeng urged, voice tight with dread. "If it returns while we're here..."
He wanted to retreat, but Ning Qiu Shui remained rooted, his gaze fixed deeper into the corridor.
"We're close to the truth," Ning Qiu Shui said quietly. "Big Beard... aren't you even a little curious? About what thing devoured every soul in this villa complex?"
Liu Chengfeng stared, his mouth twitching. "Seriously, Brother? You've got a death wish! Is the truth really worth more than staying alive?"
Ning Qiu Shui turned, his eyes sharp in the gloom. "You can leave this floor. But can you leave the villa? The complex? Who knows what other kill conditions it's woven into this place?" His voice dropped lower, colder. "Maybe we triggered its hunt the moment we stepped inside. Maybe we're just... waiting our turn." He paused, letting the implication sink in. "And right now, it's downstairs. Feasting. With every death, the noose tightens around those left."
Liu Chengfeng's face paled, then flushed with grim resolve. "...Alright. I'm with you."
They moved past the charnel rooms, stopping before the innermost door. A study. Unnervingly clean—no bloodstains, no sludge. An island in a sea of decay.
Their eyes met. This is it.
They pushed the door open. Dust, thick and ancient, billowed out.
Inside stood a skeleton, small and fragile—a girl of fourteen or fifteen, long dead. Clutched in its bony fingers was a stuffed bear, its button eyes unnervingly dark, seeming to watch them.
Ning Qiu Shui knelt beside the remains, examining them with detached precision. "...She wasn't eaten." He traced fingers over the bones. "No cut marks on the ribs, sternum, or throat cartilage." He'd seen the others—Wang Yuning, Yamo—their bones scarred by blades and forks. These were clean.
"Not eaten?" Liu Chengfeng breathed. "Then how...?"
Ning Qiu Shui studied the skeleton. "Starvation. Or dehydration. That thing outside couldn't get in here... but she couldn't get out." His gaze shifted to the window—crisscrossed with thick, rust-eaten steel bars. "Her family barred these windows long ago. To protect her from falling." A bitter irony laced his words. "They never imagined those bars would cage her... with a monster prowling outside. She died trapped. Waiting."
A cold wave of horror washed over Liu Chengfeng. He could almost hear the girl's final, desperate cries echoing in the dust.
"Hey, Brother!" Liu Chengfeng's voice cracked, pointing. "Behind the body... something's poking out!"