Kaleidoscope of Death

Chapter 131: Ghosts

Behind the elevator door was a dim corridor that looked no different from normal. Yet, dispersed through the air was the faint, identifiably gamy scent of blood. It was reminding Lin Qiushi that things weren't as simple as they seemed.

Lin Qiushi took a step forward, wanting to get out of there as soon as possible. When he got outside of the apartment, however, just as he turned a corner, he saw three identical little girls in dresses standing before him.

They stood around a huge birthday cake, on which was stuck a thicket of white candles. The cake appeared to be on the verge of melting, and the red liquid that kept dripping out of it was precisely the source of the scent that Lin Qiushi smelled. Worse was that on the top of the cake, a woman's severed head had been placed. Her eyes remained open, watching Lin Qiushi and refusing to be resigned to her fate; she even batted her eyes at Lin Qiushi.

The tableau was grotesque and chilling. Seeing them, Lin Qiushi remembered the door he'd passed with the Fitcher's Bird hint. Without question, these were the triplets that Lin Qiushi had once met inside the door...

The triplets stood in the entrance, heads twisting about to face Lin Qiushi. Stiff smiles tugged up their faces, and from their lips poured the little happy birthday ditty. One of the girls slowly lifted a hand and pointed at the top of his head, and she said, "Xiao-gege, won't you eat cake with us?"

Hearing her question, Lin Qiushi didn't dare answer. He turned around and left for another exit.

Good thing that the triplets only watched him go with no intent of pursuing.

Lin Qiushi ran quickly. It was a moment's work to get to the door, but just as he was about to go out, he recalled what one of the triplets had done—she'd pointed to the top of his head. What did this gesture mean? Could there be something on the ceiling?

Honestly, under circumstances such as these, nobody would be happy to look up at the ceiling. Yet Lin Qiushi still got out his cell phone, turned on the flashlight, and slowly looked up, casting the beam of light in his hand toward the ceiling. He kept his motions slow, ready to run at any moment, but what made him breathe out a sigh of relief was that the ceiling was completely clear. There was nothing on it—

When he saw this, Lin Qiushi put his phone away, exhaled, and left the building. But right before he let the foyer, a sense of danger that was difficult to describe suddenly assaulted the top of his head. On instinct, Lin Qiushi's feet stepped back. And it was precisely at this second that a corpse fell straight down from the building rooftop, smashing onto the ground at Lin Qiushi's feet. It was obvious that had he not stayed his feet right here, he'd have been hit by this corpse.

The corpse fell from above and broke into pieces. The skull looked like a watermelon dropped from up high, splattering all over the ground. But judging from its outer apparel and the thing in its hand, this was precisely the man who'd blockaded the door of Lin Qiushi's apartment with an axe. Lin Qiushi didn't know why he'd fallen.

Lin Qiushi skirted around his corpse and quickly entered the residential district. He stepped across the gravel path and cast a glance back at the apartment behind him. There he saw, crouched against the outer wall of the apartment, a human figure crawling slowly downward from above, unheeding of gravity. Through the faint light coming from the hallways, Lin Qiushi could just manage to make out who the person was...it was Wang Xiaoyi, who'd had her skull split clean in half. Wang Xiaoyi clambered slowly down from the wall to where Cheng Wen's corpse had fallen, burying her face in that body and beginning to chew, as if a beast that had spotted a meal.

Lin Qiushi only took one look before turning away. Perhaps it was the hot weather, perhaps it was the sheer intensity of the developments so far, but all up and down his body he was covered in sweat. Perspiration dripped from his chin as Lin Qiushi walked along the district, taking in his surroundings. For a moment he felt struck; he sensed that there was no safe place here, and out of every shadow-wrapped corner a monster could emerge.