"Senior, why do I feel like these paper mannequins are watching us?" He San clung to the wooden doorframe, refusing to cross the threshold. "I'm serious—something's off! They look too alive. What if they're real people in disguise? Shit, I swear they're about to move!"
Chen Ge's touch with Mortician's Makeup had imbued the paper figures with an uncanny spark. Lifeless, yet brimming with a strange vitality, they blurred the line between prop and phantom.
Gao Ru Xue shot He San a withering glare. Why did I drag him along today? she fumed silently. Fear's contagious—he's rattled me when I was perfectly fine. "Keep your paranoid theories to yourself," she snapped. "One more useless peep, and I'll ditch you here."
She strode into the Main House first, scanning the dim expanse. The windows were mere ornaments—sealed, offering no glimpse of the outside world.
"Senior, let's bail," He San urged from the doorway. "This place reeks of yin energy—too closed off. The exit's not here."
"The owner's a puppet master, playing our minds like strings," Gao Ru Xue countered. "Normal people would flee a spot like this—so that's exactly why we dig deeper." She prowled the room, her steps stirring gusts that sent fallen mannequins scraping across the floor with eerie, unnatural rasps.
He San's pulse hammered, his throat tight as he hovered outside. "But there's nowhere to hide in here—everything's in plain sight. Where could the exit be?"
"No hiding spots? Says who?" Gao Ru Xue planted herself at the room's heart, raising one long, snowy leg—lush and sculpted, yet gracefully lean. Her white skirt flared, flashing a sliver of underwear she didn't notice, and with a bold stomp, she mounted the red coffin. "Get over here—we're cracking this open!"
"Open that?" He San's lips quivered, ghostly pale. "Isn't that… disrespectful?"
"What, you planning to camp out in this haunted house forever?" Gao Ru Xue's relentless prodding dragged him forward, inch by reluctant inch. He skirted the mannequins, bending to grip the coffin lid's edge, keeping his distance from the paper figures.
"On three—pull!"
"Got it."
"One, two—"
Dong! A jarring thud cut her countdown short.
"What the hell was that?" He San jolted, his nerves fraying.
"Shh!" Gao Ru Xue pressed a finger to her lips, eyes darting before settling on the coffin. "It came from inside."
He San's face drained to ash, his Adam's apple bobbing wildly. His hands trembled on the lid as if it scorched him. "Senior, please—there's nothing here. Can we go?"
"Calm down. The noise only hit when we moved to open it—odd, right?"
"Odd? It's a coffin making sounds—that's beyond odd!" Black Friday's insidious strains had sunk claws into He San's fear, urging him to bolt.
"Think," she pressed. "Two possibilities: a worker's hiding in there to jump us, or it's rigged with a mechanism that'll shift this Minghun setup. Either way, this coffin's the key. To escape, we open it." She smacked the lid twice. "No hesitating—pull!"
"I don't follow half of that, but it sounded smart," He San muttered.
Together, they heaved. The heavy lid slid, creaking open a quarter of the way—then, with a deafening bang, the ancient coffin erupted. Paper mannequins and cash burst forth like a geyser, a woman's shrill laugh slicing through the air. The Main House door began to swing shut on its own.
"Move—now!" He San didn't pause. Closest to the exit, he sprinted, forgetting Gao Ru Xue in his panic. But as he neared the threshold, a woman's face loomed before him—pale, exquisite, and hauntingly beautiful.
"Fuck!" He swung a fist, but the visage dodged with eerie grace.
"Ghost! Help!" He San crumpled, scrambling in a frantic half-crawl across the floor.
"He San, don't run blind!" Gao Ru Xue's shout echoed as a red shadow trailed him into a side room.
"The wings are for the heirs—that's her old haunt! This is bad!" She lunged for the door, only to find it locked. Pounding the wood, she cursed, "Divide and conquer? For a damn haunted house gimmick? That's twisted!"
The coffin lay shattered, paper figures strewn about. Gao Ru Xue, trapped, shed her cool facade, kicking the door until it gave a minute later. But outside, the world had shifted.
"Xiao San? He San!" she called. Silence answered, save for Black Friday's haunting loop and the rustle of paper money.
What's happening? This place isn't that big—he should've heard me. Unless something got him? A crime scene flashed in her mind, unbidden. She traced her memory down the corridor to the West Wing, where He San had fled.
The old door groaned open, white celebratory scrolls fluttering down. Inside, a bridal chamber awaited—white, not red, draped in funereal hues. Unsettling didn't cover it.
Where'd he go? The air felt wrong, lit only by a pale lantern swaying outside. Cold drafts nipped at her skin, like unseen fingers brushing her bare arms. Paper crunched beneath her boots; her toe struck something solid in the dark, its shape lost to shadow. Gritting her teeth, she pressed on.
She yanked the drapes wide, letting faint light spill in. The room held a bed shrouded in a mosquito net and twin bronze mirrors facing each other—nothing else.
I saw him run in here. Two minutes tops—he can't vanish that fast. Unless… the exit's here, and he stumbled through? Gao Ru Xue steadied her breath, stepping forward to investigate. But as her foot fell, a second set of steps echoed behind her.
"Who's there?" She spun, facing only the bronze mirror—and her own reflection staring back.