Global Collapse-Chapter 555 - 523: Startling Sitting up from the Bed of Death, Another Short and Feeble - _1

Chapter 555: Chapter 523: Startling Sitting up from the Bed of Death, Another Short and Feeble Chapter_1

"How can he run so fast!" Xia Jianren gaped, looking in the direction Gu Mian had disappeared.

In this cold, horrifying instance, everyone trod carefully, fear in each step. Only Gu Mian would spontaneously decide to abandon the group with words like, "I have to go ahead for a bit; you guys take your time," only to reappear unscathed when the others, who had expended all their mental energy, encountered him again.

"Is he really human?" Xia Jianren couldn’t help but voice the thoughts he had harbored for a long time.

Cang Yue also had an expression as if she’d seen a ghost. "Honestly, he doesn’t seem to be."

Wang Chuan looked upwards. "So, do we continue up?"

Cang Yue nodded. "Since Gu Mian went up, it’s like he cleared some danger for us. Following him should be safe."

Xia Jianren, however, had other worries. "But what if the danger wasn’t triggered by him and targets us instead?"

This frightening idea was so strong, he almost felt it was bound to happen.

"We’ve already come this far; there’s no point going back," Cang Yue also looked up the staircase. "Let’s continue up."

Being near Gu Mian felt safer—a conclusion she had reached after several hours in the instance.

So, the group continued upwards, their pace slightly faster than before. Fortunately, though the stairwell was dark, no strange entities jumped out at them.

They quickly groped their way up several more floors. As he climbed, Xia Jianren thought of Gu Mian. "I still don’t understand how he ran off with a ghost and came back alive... By the way, when we were in the car, you all saw that thing on the roadside, right? That human-looking thing, the clothes on it looked very familiar!"

Silence filled the stairwell for two seconds before Wang Chuan spoke, his expression strange. "I saw it. That looked like the driver who drove Gu Mian away..."

There was no doubt that the driver was a ghost.

"Was that really a ghost?" Xia Jianren shivered as he lifted his foot to the next step. "Can a ghost end up looking like that?"

Lying motionless on the street like a recent robbery victim, anyone who saw it would sigh at how pitiful it looked.

If someone with a poetic inclination happened by, they might even look at the ghost’s corpse and recite something like, "Wine and meat rot behind vermillion gates, while bones of the frozen litter the roads."

"What we know now is that the driver was a ghost. He drove off with a person, and in the end, the ghost was gone, but the person returned." Cang Yue quickened her pace slightly, silently marveling at how absurd the situation was.

Thinking of the driver sprawled by the roadside, Xia Jianren’s teeth chattered. "That couldn’t really be Gu Mian’s doing, could it?"

He would rather believe the driver had been driving too fast, was thrown from the vehicle, and died from the fall, than believe Gu Mian had done something to him.

Wang Chuan was quite accepting of strange occurrences. "It’s a vast world, full of wonders. Perhaps Gu Mian has a special item that can suppress ghosts. I think that Saw in his bag is likely a precious special item, capable of subduing ghosts."

"I think so too," Cang Yue nodded. "If it were just an ordinary Saw, he wouldn’t carry it on his back all the time; he could simply put it in his item slot."

Gu Mian, who lacked an item slot, was unaware the other players were speculating on how rare his Saw was. He moved quickly, reaching the thirteenth floor while the others were still trudging slowly up the stairs.

This building had a staircase on the east and west sides, with four elevators in the middle, facing each other in pairs.

Zhao Shuang’s company was on the eastern side of the thirteenth floor. Gu Mian had just come up the eastern staircase. Directly opposite him was a locked office, and to his left, at the easternmost end of the floor, was a restroom.

Restrooms were classic haunted hotspots in horror films and novels, after all. Gu Mian unhesitatingly walked to his left. Just inside the restroom entrance was a large mirror, reflecting Gu Mian’s figure as he held his flashlight.

Further inside were two small doors.

The left door depicted a pink figure in a skirt; the right, a black stick figure.

Gu Mian stood before the ominous entrance to the women’s restroom, lost in thought.

Although his gender was marked with a "?", and even the girls’ dormitory in the college entrance exam event had allowed him entry, however, a person should still adhere to some moral principles, he thought.

He stood at the gloomy doorway for a long time, waiting.

However, five minutes passed, and still, nothing had happened.

"That’s not right," Gu Mian said, swinging the flashlight in his hand. "According to horror novel tropes, shouldn’t this be the part where ’a pitch-black hand suddenly shoves his back, catching him off guard and pushing him into the women’s restroom; when he frantically turns around, he finds the restroom door has been shut, and he can’t get out no matter what’? Isn’t that how the plot should go?"

Unfortunately, no dark hand came to push Gu Mian, who was trying to uphold his moral bottom line, which meant he still hadn’t entered the women’s restroom.

Gu Mian pondered for a few seconds, seemed to understand something, then turned off his flashlight beam and continued to stand at the doorway, waiting for the dark hand.

A few minutes later, still, nothing happened.

Only the sound of the wind brushing against the windowpanes could be heard, as if mocking Gu Mian for standing there alone in the dark, as if being punished.

"Alright then..." He resignedly turned on his flashlight and took a large stride inside. "I wasn’t very moral to begin with, anyway."

The women’s restroom was very clean; it was clear the cleaning staff here loved their job. Gu Mian meticulously checked every stall, one by one, finding nothing.

No little girl crying in a stall, no female ghost constantly washing her hair, no school principals skilled at climbing over stall partitions.

Finding nothing in the women’s restroom, Gu Mian, not giving up, explored the men’s restroom as well, but again, found nothing.

"There are really no ghosts in the restroom?" Gu Mian muttered to himself as he left.

Soon, he turned his attention to the office across from the restroom.

Their company had three offices, each about one hundred square meters. Additionally, next to the restroom and opposite the offices, there was a small storage room for unused desks, chairs, and miscellaneous items.

Although Gu Mian hadn’t brought the office keys, these small doors wouldn’t stop him.

Soon, Cang Yue and the others, who had reached the eleventh floor, heard a deafening sound from upstairs, as if someone had brought a motorcycle up and was starting it.

The group climbing the stairs was startled by this sound; Xia Jianren, in particular, slipped and nearly tumbled down.

"What’s that sound!" He stared wide-eyed at the ceiling, his heart beginning to race.

Cang Yue and Wang Chuan were also startled but quickly composed themselves.

Keke looked up, then at the others beside her, and hesitated before speaking, "That sounds like a Saw, doesn’t it? Is someone using a Saw to cut something?"

Hearing this, the others immediately understood.

"Gu Mian?" Cang Yue felt a headache coming on. "Making such a loud sound, he really isn’t afraid of dying... But what is he cutting with the Saw?"

Wang Chuan guessed, "I bet he didn’t bring the keys."

"That’s just like him!" Xia Jianren quickly climbed a few more steps amidst the sound of the Saw. "Even if the ghosts didn’t know where we were, they do now! Making this sound, aren’t we just painting a target on our backs?"

"Let’s hurry," Cang Yue also quickened her pace. "We need to tell him to tone it down."

Amidst the noisy sound of the Saw, the group felt a bit bolder, and their speed climbing the stairs increased considerably.

When they reached the thirteenth floor, they happened to run into Gu Mian, who had just finished his work.

"You’re here?" Gu Mian had just sawed open the small lock on the storage room when he saw the group standing at the top of the stairs, their expressions varied. He waved an arm towards the offices opposite. "Look, I’ve opened them all."

Wang Chuan’s eyebrow twitched. "But we have the keys."

"It doesn’t matter. The result is the same anyway," Gu Mian said, opening the storage room door. "Let’s see what goodies are in here."