The ragdoll stained with fake blood arced through the air before knocking into the shadow. Weirdly enough, when the formless shadow was hit, it stopped at the door, the doll biting on its arm.
"Well done!" Chen Ge aimed his flashlight at the shadow. Under the bright light, the shadow started to twist, and its color dimmed. Without the refuge of the mirror, the monster was weaker than Chen Ge had expected. It abandoned part of its body and escaped into Room 302.
The parts that the monster abandoned soon disappeared; it was unclear whether it had dissolved into thin air or been eaten by Xiaoxiao.
Eating these things appears to be beneficial to Xiaoxiao. Chen Ge placed Xiaoxiao into his pocket and used the mallet to bang on Room 302's door lock.
"Come out!" The old steel door shook, shedding dust and rust; even the frame itself was shaking. The commotion was so loud that all the nearby tenants were alerted. The door to Room 301 opened a sliver.
"What is all this commotion about?" the middle-aged man roared with the beer bottle in his hand, but he did not step out completely from his room. The door to Room 302 was suddenly pulled open from within, and the young man living in it held a cleaver in his hand and slashed at Chen Ge madly.
The mirror monster has entered his body? The corridor was narrow, so there was only so much room for Chen Ge to maneuver. Chen Ge took a step back and realized that the door to the middle-aged man's room was open. He fell into it and slammed the door shut.
The sound of a cleaver chopping on the door was eerie. The young man had completely lost his sanity; his eyes were filled with streaks of blood. His face was in a mad grimace, and he said no words, like all his energy was being channeled into cleaving the door of Room 301. It felt like he was planning to chop Chen Ge into pieces.
Then again, it was understandable. It had planned this for weeks, and finally, it had almost gotten into Men Nan's body but was stopped by Chen Ge at the last minute. On top of that, it had lost parts of its body in the struggle. The corridor was filled with the sound of the cleaver slashing on the steel door.
"What's going on?" The middle-aged man inside the room was stunned beyond belief. His calves weakened, and he collapsed onto the shoe racks.
"Help me!" The room door was not locked, and the young man could have burst through at any moment.
"I… I'll call the police!" The middle-aged man did not dare go near the door. He placed the bottle on the table and hurriedly went looking for the phone. In his hurry, he knocked over the empty bottles, and they clattered noisily.
"I said come help me with the door!"
As the sound of the cleaver reverberated through the halls, the rooms lit up one after another, and many tenants leaned their heads out the door.
In Room 304, after Doctor Gao deposited Men Nan on the living room sofa, he heard Chen Ge's cries for help. He ran out of the room with a stool in his hand.
The young man from Room 302 had gone berserk; his focus was fully on Chen Ge. Doctor Gao made use of this opportunity to sneak up on him from behind. When he was one meter away from the man, he raised the stool to knock at the upper part of the young man's spine. Doctor Gao's target was probably the head, but for some reason, his aim was off.
The young man lost his balance and staggered forward, his body knocking into the door. Gripping the cleaver, his neck twisted unnaturally around, and the young man glared at Doctor Gao with bloodshot eyes.
A roar bubbled from his throat. As the young man planned to turn to attack Doctor Gao, Chen Ge saw this opportunity and kick the door open. The door slammed into the man, and without giving him the chance to recover, Chen Ge picked up a bottle from the floor and swung it at the young man's head.
The bottle shattered, and blood flowed down the man's head. Chen Ge charged forward and knocked into the young man, holding him down on the floor. Doctor Gao also ran forward to grab the cleaver away from the young man.
The young man tried to resist until the other tenants also came out to help detain him. It was then that he finally gave up on his resistance. With his cheek pressed into the cement floor, the young man's eyes focused on Chen Ge, like he was trying to memorize Chen Ge's features.
Three minutes later, the young man's pupils rolled backwards, and he fell unconscious. At the same time, the young man's shadow that was reflected on the wall suddenly moved and dashed down the stairs.
Many people present saw that, but before they could react, the shadow had disappeared into the night.
"What was that?" Doctor Gao's eyes widened; many strange things had happened that night.
"I'm not so sure." The vengeful eyes that the young man had shot Chen Ge before he fainted were very familiar; it reminded him of the Haunted House's mirror monster. Could it be that both of them came from the same world inside the mirror?
Chen Ge climbed up from the floor and was about to give chase when he stopped at the staircase. The landlady blocked the staircase with a stern face.
Has this person been taken over by the monster? Chen Ge took several steps back. Then again, he was the cause of the problems that had happened that night at her apartment, so he was feeling rather unsettled.
"What are you guys up to so late at night?" The landlady walked up to the third floor, and a few of the elder tenants followed behind her. Just as Chen Ge was wondering what to say, the middle-aged man in Room 301 ran out with his phone. He had been hiding in his room until then.
"Sis! It feels like brother-in-law has returned," the man whispered into the landlady's ear. "Xiao Du in Room 302 used the cleaver and attacked people indiscriminately; it was completely the same as brother-in-law's situation."
When he said that, the tenants who had gathered around started to disperse. A few ran back into their rooms and locked the door tight.
"Wasn't everything going just fine?" The landlady looked at the chaos in the third-floor corridor. She had her brother carry the young man to the hospital while she moved to talk to Chen Ge and Doctor Gao.
"We were merely defending ourselves; the kid from Room 302 almost killed me."
"I know." The landlady paused before saying directly, "I still need to rent this place. Making this more complicated than it is will not be good for business, so how about we let this be? I will pay the child's medical bills, and we will not get the police involved; the child is still young, and I don't want to ruin his future."
Hearing the landlady, Chen Ge realized that she knew a thing or two about the secret in Room 303 as well as the reason behind Room 302's young man's madness.
After balancing the pros and cons, Chen Ge realized there was no benefit to pressing this further. After all, he had completed the black phone's mission. Chen Ge discussed this with Doctor Gao, and both of them agreed with the landlady.
After the landlady left, Doctor Gao returned to Room 304 to look after Men Nan while Chen Ge waited in the living room. He still had plenty of questions left for the young man.