As Chen Shang got closer, the pale face behind the counter was fully revealed. It belonged to a gaunt woman who appeared to be in her thirties, dressed in a nurse's uniform. Her pitch-black eyes were locked onto Chen Shang.
"You must be the new night guard?" she asked, her voice grating, like nails on a chalkboard.
"That's right. That's me," Chen Shang nodded. Seeing that she was capable of communication, he relaxed his grip on the knife a bit.
"You can call me Nurse Zhang. I work the night shift here. Patrol all three wings of the hospital on schedule. If you see anything unusual or if a patient escapes, write it down in this log. That's your job," Nurse Zhang said, her voice still grating on the ears. She handed Chen Shang a black notebook, its cover cracked and faded, with a black pen clipped to it.
After taking the notebook, Nurse Zhang sat back down in her chair, her gaze fixed blankly on the registration counter in front of her. She didn't move again.
"Wow, Nurse Zhang. How good does the pay here have to be to keep you working? You're all skin and bones... or should I say bones with a bit of skin hanging on?" Chen Shang teased.
"And Nurse Zhang, have you seen a hulking machete-wielding maniac around here on your way home?" he added, joking as he leaned on the counter.
But Nurse Zhang didn't react at all to Chen Shang's banter. Even as he leaned halfway over the counter, her gaze didn't waver. She just stared straight ahead.
Seeing that she wouldn't respond, Chen Shang decided to vault over the counter to see what she was so focused on. But to his surprise, there was nothing there—no paper, no computer, nothing. She was staring into empty space.
"Hey, Nurse Zhang? Are you practicing the art of sleeping with your eyes open?" Chen Shang tried calling out to her again, but there was still no response. Finally, he gave her a gentle push, only to feel that her body was ice cold.
Frowning, he applied a bit more pressure, and Nurse Zhang fell over, still stiff as a board, her eyes wide open, staring blankly ahead.
[She was just talking. How is she dead now?!]
[What were you watching? She never said a word!]
[Is she still warm? Better check.]
[Dude, you're messed up.]
Chen Shang rolled up Nurse Zhang's sleeve. Not because of any inappropriate thoughts—there was nothing appealing about her appearance—but because he suspected something. Sure enough, her arm was covered in large patches of livor mortis.
"Livor mortis, body stiffness... she's been dead for over 24 hours. Looks like she might have run into our friendly neighborhood machete-wielding maniac on her way home," Chen Shang muttered to himself, standing up and raising an eyebrow at the sight of the corpse.
"Well, that was quite the surprise," he remarked, now certain that Nurse Zhang wasn't going to give him any more trouble. He hopped back over the counter and made his way towards the hallway on the right.
While Chen Shang briefly considered chopping up the likely-to-reanimate corpse of the nurse, he decided against it. There was no guarantee she'd attack, and making the wrong move could turn a passive entity into an active threat. Better not take unnecessary risks.
At the entrance of the hallway hung a red digital clock, much like those found in every hospital. Its blood-red numbers showed that it was now exactly midnight. Chen Shang took note of the time and entered the hallway.
As he walked, he flipped through the black notebook.
The first few years of entries were fairly mundane—patients jamming their heads into toilets, or wetting themselves because they couldn't find the restroom at night. But about three months ago, things started to get weird. The logs took a sharp turn towards the bizarre.
Reports of strange laughter echoing through the halls with no identifiable source. Patients turning up dead, becoming so common it was almost routine. Some were found hanging from ceiling fans, still spinning. Others had their heads separated from their bodies, their heads dangling out of windows.
Chen Shang also found entries about the mysterious fourth floor of B-wing. Footsteps echoing at odd hours, patient records scattered around, scrawled with "Let's play hide and seek."
And it was around the same time that C-wing started appearing in the logs. Before that, there had been no mention of C-wing at all. It was as if that entire part of the hospital had suddenly materialized three months ago.
Closing the notebook, Chen Shang felt like he was beginning to get a clearer picture of the madness of this asylum.
This book comes from：m.funovel.com。