FEG | Chapter 20

Chapter 20, Ghost Security Guard

“Ah——”
A scream rang out through the fifth floor, startling the people who had not even dared to sleep soundly in the first place.
Zhou Xin tightened the bedsheet wrapped around her body, her voice clearly trembling. “...It sounds like Jin Qiao’s voice?”
“It should be her. I remember the two of them live diagonally opposite each other...” Bureau Chief Chen frowned, his expression taking on a bit of authority.
Old Du leaned against the sofa, his eyelids half-lowered. “What? You still want to go take a look?”
Zhou Xin shook her head quickly. “Going out now may not necessarily save them. We might even end up getting ourselves killed.”
Bureau Chief Chen hesitated a little. “But... just leaving it alone like this... that doesn’t seem right either.”
Old Du gave a cold laugh. “If you want to go, go by yourself. I’m not going to take the risk and meddle in this kind of thing.”
Bureau Chief Chen was silent for a moment, then still stood up. “Let’s first look through the peephole and see what’s going on.”
The three of them came to the door. Bureau Chief Chen leaned up to the peephole and looked outside. The corridor was dimly lit. The area directly in front of him was visible, and everything outside the door looked normal, silent and still.
“It doesn’t seem dangerous...” Bureau Chief Chen said softly, and his right hand grasped the doorknob.
Old Du grabbed his wrist and questioned grimly, “What are you doing?”
Bureau Chief Chen said, “I’m going out to take a look.”
“You’d better stop meddling in other people’s business right away!” Old Du stared at Bureau Chief Chen. “No one knows what will happen if you open the door. It doesn’t matter if you die yourself, but if we get dragged down with you, who are we supposed to blame!”
The two of them faced off. Zhou Xin wavered. On one hand, she felt Old Du was right, better safe than sorry. On the other hand, Bureau Chief Chen wanting to extend a hand to help others was not wrong either...
While she hesitated, Zhou Xin seemed to hear a rustling sound. When she listened closely, it was gone again. Suspicious, Zhou Xin leaned up to the peephole and looked outside.
At that glance, she sprang back as if electrocuted, her whole body stiffening. Her lips trembled, and her eyes stared fixedly at the door. She could not get a single word out.
Her abnormal reaction drew the attention of the two men. “What is it?” Bureau Chief Chen asked concernedly.
Old Du then copied her earlier movement and looked outside through the peephole.
In the dim corridor, a man wearing a security guard uniform staggered past. His gait was like a patient suffering from the aftereffects of a cerebral thrombosis, one step, one drag, one step, one drag.
His shoes scraped the floor, making a rustling sound.
The security guard’s face was bluish-purple, dried blood caked on his face, and his eyeballs bulged. Under the magnifying effect of the convex lens, he looked even more horrifying.
Even though Old Du had prepared himself mentally, he still felt his heart skip a beat from fright.
He swallowed, stepped back two paces, and said in a breathy voice, “Stay quiet, keep your distance.”
The other two understood. The three of them tiptoed back to the center of the room, vigilantly watching the doorway, each clutching their own soul weapon for self-defense.

In the latter half of the night, Sun Fangchi was dazed, not even sure whether he had fallen asleep at all. When he got up in the morning, his thoughts felt like they had been soaked in water, moving sluggishly.
Only after the surviving players gathered did Sun Fangchi realize he was not the only one who had not rested well.
Bureau Chief Chen and the other two looked dispirited, with obvious dark circles under their eyes. Jin Qiao was like a frightened bird, and the terror on her face had yet to fade.
Zhang Xu and Wei Tao did not appear.

Sun Fangchi let out a soft sigh. “Zhang Xu... is gone?”
Jin Qiao spoke in fear, “He died. It was when I went to take a shower... when I came out, I saw his feet being sucked into the wall...”
As expected.
Sun Fangchi thought to himself that, with Yueyue’s reminder last night, he had already confirmed this apartment building’s method of killing. It was just a pity for Zhang Xu.
“Does anyone know what happened to Wei Tao?” Sun Fangchi looked around. Wei Tao still had not shown up.
“I warned him a long time ago, but he just wouldn’t listen. He’s probably dead too... This apartment is so dangerous, the walls eat people, and there’s also a ghost security guard...” Zhou Xin said in despair.
Ghost security guard? Something flashed through Sun Fangchi’s mind, but he could not catch it. “The security guard Huang Haoyu who was scared to death? He turned into a ghost?”
Bureau Chief Chen said, “I didn’t see it with my own eyes. The two of them said he was wearing security guard clothes.”
Zhou Xin said fearfully, “It was him. The first night, the one I ran into with Lao Hongli was him!”
Sun Fangchi pondered. “That’s a little strange...”
Old Du lifted his eyelids. “You think so too?”
Bureau Chief Chen and Zhou Xin did not understand what riddle they were speaking in, and looked at the two of them in confusion.
Sun Fangchi nodded. “On the first night, Zhou Xin and Lao Hongli ran into the ghost security guard. Lao Hongli disappeared, and Ma Daobin also disappeared. Now we can tell that Ma Daobin and Lao Hongli should have died in the same way, just like Zhang Xu, swallowed by the wall.”
Old Du continued, “Right, the three of them all disappeared without a corpse or any other trace. It can be inferred that they died in the same way. But among them, Lao Hongli saw the ghost security guard, while the other two did not encounter the ghost security guard.”
“That means this attack was not initiated by the ghost security guard.” Sun Fangchi said.
Zhou Xin was emotionally unsettled. “How can you be sure? Maybe Ma Daobin and Zhang Xu ran into him too? Didn’t we see the ghost security guard pass by the door last night?”
Old Du shook his head. “There was a time gap. Last night, we first heard Jin Qiao’s scream, and only after some time did we see the ghost security guard. I already asked Jin Qiao just now, and she did not hear the ghost security guard’s footsteps.”
Sun Fangchi also offered corroboration. “Yueyue also only made a gesture of being swallowed by the wall. Also, I have some idea about the precursor to people being swallowed by the wall.”
“What is it?” Bureau Chief Chen and Zhou Xin asked in unison.
“It’s the sound of knocking on the wall.” Sun Fangchi said. “On the first night, I heard the thumping sound made by the wall being knocked. I thought it was something the neighbors had accidentally made. Last night, I heard it again, and wanted to go closer to check, but Yueyue stopped me. I think Ma Daobin was killed this way, by using the wall-knocking sound to lure people closer. Once they touched the wall, they would be swallowed.”
Bureau Chief Chen said he understood. “So that’s it. What you said was strange refers to?”
“According to this inference, what is the point of the ghost security guard’s existence?” Sun Fangchi asked in return.
Yes, if the apartment building used the wall to kill people, then what was the ghost security guard for?
For a moment, everyone fell silent.
Sun Fangchi lowered his head and looked at Yueyue, who was stubbornly holding his hand while trying with difficulty to hug the cloth doll with one arm. “There is one urgent question right now,” the others were drawn by his words and all looked at him. Sun Fangchi said solemnly, “What are we eating for breakfast?”
Everyone: “...”

After making do with breakfast, Sun Fangchi held Yueyue’s hand and planned to continue exploring the apartment building.
Bureau Chief Chen and Old Du’s group had split into differing opinions. Old Du believed they should look for more clues and make more thorough preparations. Zhou Xin, however, felt that since they already knew how the apartment building killed people, they should not keep taking risks. They should just protect themselves according to the current method. Jin Qiao was absolutely unwilling to go looking for clues, and only wanted to return to her room and hide. Bureau Chief Chen also agreed with Old Du’s opinion, but was worried about the safety of the two women.
Sun Fangchi sighed. “People’s hearts are scattered, and the team is hard to lead.” Then he turned and walked away with Yueyue. They could discuss their own matters themselves.
He planned to investigate the sales office and the security guard dormitory. He still felt that there had to be an important reason for the ghost security guard’s existence.
The security guard on duty today was a long-faced man close to fifty years old. He spoke with a heavy accent, and was very surprised by Sun Fangchi’s request to see their dormitory. His gaze carried some wariness.
Sun Fangchi raised a smile full of truth, goodness, and beauty. “Uncle, I don’t mean anything else. It’s just that Huang Haoyu was so young, and now he’s gone. I think it’s a pity, so I want to donate some money to help his family. Uncle, do you know where his hometown is?”
As soon as the security guard uncle heard this, he immediately relaxed his guard. “You really are a good person. Hao Yu underground will thank you.”
Uh, lately he kept getting good-person cards from men.
For once, Sun Fangchi felt a little ashamed. “No, no, I just hope Huang Haoyu has his hometown address among the things he carried.”
The security guard uncle led Sun Fangchi toward the security guard dormitory. “There is, there is. I’ve seen it before. Hao Yu had a little account book, and every month’s expenses were all neatly calculated...”
Sun Fangchi held Yueyue’s hand and followed behind him. Yueyue was very well-behaved, quietly following Sun Fangchi without any willful demands or actions.
The security guard’s residence was actually the apartment at the very end of the first floor. In the forty-square-meter room, five security guards lived together. After three bunk beds and some daily necessities were put in, the room looked extremely cramped, with almost no room to move.
Huang Haoyu’s bed was the upper bunk on the outermost side, and the bedding on it had already been rolled up, waiting for unknown handling.
The security guard uncle reached into the bedding roll and rummaged for a long time before pulling out a cheap notebook. The paper looked like withered yellow leaves. “This is Hao Yu’s account book. Take a look. Hao Yu’s important things are tucked inside it...”
Sun Fangchi opened it and looked. It really was an account book. On every page, the expenses for the entire month were written down. Huang Haoyu was a frugal young man. Every month, aside from a very small amount for necessities and meals, more than 80 percent of his salary was left over.
There were about a dozen pages of records. Judging from it, Huang Haoyu should have been working here for more than a year. Sun Fangchi quietly flipped further back. Besides the accounts, there was something else in the notebook.
‘Resident 419.’
‘Sales office Manager Li.’
‘The statements are inconsistent...’
Sun Fangchi suppressed his surprise. Was Huang Haoyu investigating something?
Behind the notebook was pasted a newspaper clipping about the apartment building, “Shoddy construction exposed, construction team flees.” If nothing unexpected happened, the development mentioned in it should be this place.
“Anything?” the security guard uncle leaned over and asked.
Sun Fangchi said regretfully, “It seems there isn’t...”
“Ah, then what do we do?” The security guard uncle also frowned. Suddenly, he slapped his forehead. “I remember, the sales office has it.” The uncle pulled Sun Fangchi toward the outside.
“Hm? Why would the sales office have it?” Sun Fangchi instinctively felt that something was wrong, and resisted the security guard’s force while shielding Yueyue behind him with one hand.
The security guard uncle kept tugging at Sun Fangchi, not looking back. “Of course. As long as it’s Hao Yu’s things, the sales office wants them. This account book can also be exchanged for quite a bit of money...”
Sun Fangchi planted his feet and struggled against him. “I think I’ll pass. I don’t force things that have no fate.”
The security guard uncle suddenly turned back. His features were ferocious, and vicious light flashed in his eyes. “Pass? Today, it’s not up to you! Are you in league with Huang Haoyu?”
Sun Fangchi said sincerely, “You’ve misunderstood. I don’t know Huang Haoyu at all. I’m just a kind-hearted person.”
The security guard uncle sneered and, without another word, swung a punch at him. Sun Fangchi barely dodged it, then another punch came in. Sun Fangchi raised his arm to block, and used his right foot to kick back at the other man’s knee attack.
“Uncle, to be honest, I’m pretty good at fighting. How about you don’t keep trying?”
Like one bewitched, the security guard uncle launched a fierce attack on Sun Fangchi. Sun Fangchi dodged and blocked as he could, controlling the security guard uncle and pinning him against the wall.
“You little brat! Let go!” the security guard uncle said viciously.
Sun Fangchi sighed. “Uncle, we have no grudge against each other. Why are you doing this? You tell me why Huang Haoyu really died, and I’ll let you go...” Sun Fangchi could not continue.
Because he saw that on the wall behind the security guard uncle, an eye covered in red veins had opened.