The heavy rain outside had long ceased. The water had yet to dry, leaving streaks across the glass doors.
Inside the increasingly cold building, scenes of extreme cruelty continued to unfold.
"Stop trying to save them!"
Fang Shenyan flexed his aching knuckles and halted Yu Guo, who was still attempting to help.
The two stood side by side, staring at the ten remaining workers.
Fang Shenyan's eyes grew more uncertain. At first, ten of the twenty-eight staff had died instantly.
No matter how hard they tried, nothing worked. Gradually, they accepted Ji Li's explanation: once possessed, there was no saving them.
But soon they discovered something stranger—if they moved closer to the staff, the survivors died even faster.
It was a new finding, but unsettling.
The pattern reminded Fang Shenyan of Ji Li's earlier speculation.
The closer workers got to staff, the quicker they died. This seemed to be the rule.
Yet what he couldn't understand was how the staff had all become possessed at once.
Before he could resolve that, the next bizarre event began.
The ten remaining survivors clutched their heads with both hands, but did nothing else.
It was as if they were frozen in that posture. Even with everyone else dead, they made no move.
Growing restless, Yu Guo fumbled in his pocket, pulled out a pack of cigarettes, and handed Fang Shenyan one.
"Teacher Fang, what's going on here?"
Fang Shenyan took a drag, his gaze dark on the unmoving ten, and shook his head.
"I don't know."
He checked his watch. It was 3:20 a.m.
Twenty minutes had passed since the chaos began on the first floor, and these ten had remained frozen for ten of them—locked in the same death pose, yet not striking.
"I feel the ghost is deliberately stalling. Maybe it's bound by the true task's constraints.
Only once some point is reached will it be free to kill us without restraint."
He frowned, thought for a moment, and tried calling Ji Li.
The call could not connect.
...
Meanwhile, Tongguan and Chang Nian had reached the third floor, searching for Ji Li to regroup.
"All this time, I've been thinking about the killing pattern.
The task content might be wrong, but the ghost's killing rule won't change.
If we study that, maybe we can reverse-engineer the real task."
Tongguan kept his head low, alert to his surroundings, unaware that the slaughter downstairs had entered a strange pause.
Chang Nian glanced up at the dim yellow light and murmured, "But what do all the dead have in common…"
Tongguan pulled out his hotel phone, opened the memo, and handed it to her.
"The phone!
Maybe Ji Li wasn't entirely wrong. The workers died because of their contact with us staffs.
But we weren't the source. Perhaps the hotel phones are."
Chang Nian hesitated, staring at the recorded list of twenty-eight workers.
"What do you mean… Could the task itself be correct after all?"
Tongguan shook his head and deleted every name from the memo.
"I only realized just now. Each of us workers carries a hotel phone.
Those who died before were all near us. But this final group on the first floor died even after we had left.
At first, I didn't understand. Then, when I picked up the phone to reread the task, I saw—my phone had recorded all the survivors.
The ghost's killing rule may be this: it kills anyone near the hotel phone, anyone who comes into contact with it.
That's how it judges."
Chang Nian froze, a chill spreading through her. "Then… the task was wrong after all?"
Tongguan nodded.
"Yes. First, the tone of the task was too subjective—not the hotel's usual style.
Second, the task was vague, as though hastily and clumsily written."
And the hotel phone being the source of the curse fits perfectly with the ghost's attempt to conceal the real task.
Finally, the most crucial point—
It proves the current task is fake!
Hearing Tongguan's step-by-step reasoning, firm in tone despite the dire moment, Chang Nian's eyes still softened with a faint smile.
"What do you mean?"
"Because at that time, there were still three hours left before the task ended.
On the first floor, my experiment with Guan Ping never began, never ended—it simply fizzled out.
My thought then was, if I died, it would mean the task had flaws, and the ghost's false task would be exposed.
Now we know the phones may be the curse's source, which means the ghost was likely lurking among us all along.
That plan would have forced the ghost's hand two hours earlier, exposing its setup with plenty of time left.
So it had no choice but to shut us down from the very beginning.
The strangest thing was, right before executing the plan, I tested it—the workers could still stiffly snap necks. Yet moments later, during the plan's execution, that sensation vanished.
That was the ghost's cover-up, far too obvious."
Chang Nian listened intently, nodding as she followed his logic.
"And when Ji Li's plan formed, the ghost didn't stop it directly out of caution. Instead, it dragged things out, delaying until the final moment before the task's end. By then, it no longer cared if we discovered the truth."
Tongguan nodded, about to reply, when his hotel phone buzzed. The screen read: "Fang Shenyan."
"Hello? Teacher Fang?"
"Tongguan, something's happening.
Since 3:10, ten workers remain alive on the first floor. But while everyone else has died, they still haven't broken their necks.
I suspect the ghost is stalling. It must be tied to the real task.
But when I called Ji Li, he didn't answer. I think something may have happened to him and Li Xing."
Tongguan's brow tightened. He had just said the ghost was delaying, and Fang Shenyan's words confirmed that even now, it was still waiting for something—holding back the final strike.
"Are we just supposed to keep waiting like this?"
On the other end, Yu Guo shouted hoarsely. Directionless, trapped in the ghost's pace, he was nearly frantic.
Tongguan's face darkened. He realized the ghost must have been planning this all along.
Even the so-called task of protecting staff might just be another way to stall.
As for the goal, Tongguan understood in an instant—it was simply that the ghost was bound by the true task.
And when the last ten workers finally fell, the ghost's hand would turn against the staffs.
"I understand. I'll go find Ji Li!"
Just as he said this, hurried footsteps echoed from the far end of the corridor.
A shadowy figure stood in the halo of light, body blurred, backlit and wavering.
A voice rang out—familiar at first, yet cold and strange upon closer hearing—resonating through the hall.
"Tongguan? Come over here. I've found the way out!"
You can read Eerie Overseer ahead by 60+ chapters ad-free and for free at htt ps://ravenarchives. com/book/eerie-overseer]. Bulk uploads are a bit tricky, so updates here might be irregular, but they'll keep coming.