IWBL: Chapter 193
At this time, the little boy mentioned by Xiao Li was nestling in the soft quilt of his home in Styland. He was all curled up with his head buried in the quilt. His body trembled constantly like he was afraid of something.
His name was Xu Jiaheng and he was the one who appeared in the eyes of the reincarnators in the CG. In the beginning, Xu Jiaheng dismissed the so-called ‘rules’ and didn’t care at all. He went to the toilet to pee.
He hadn’t closed the door when he went to pee. He left the door open and started peeing. Then once he finished peeing, before he had time to pull up his pants, he heard the cubicle door suddenly slam shut. The unprepared Xu Jiaheng was taken aback by the sound and accidentally spilled a few drops of urine on his pants.
“Damn, the wind is blowing.”
Xu Jiaheng still didn’t think about ghosts. He just thought that the blowing wind had closed the door. In fact, if he had paid attention then he could’ve easily found that the window in the toilet was closed. There was no wind at all.
After Xu Jiaheng went to the toilet, he suddenly didn’t want to go back.
After all, he was at a rebellious age. Since he had already broken the ‘rules’, he might as well be more thorough and simply escape from here to go play. He didn’t believe in those strange things. He felt that the only thing to worry about was not letting his teacher discover it. At present, only his neighbour and tablemate Sun Bing had seen him. He believed that the other person wouldn’t betray him.
There was no handle on the door of this building. He bent over and walked on tiptoe past the door of the room he had come out from. He saw that there was no one around and slipped out very happily.
He walked alone on the street and the excitement of doing ‘bad things’ made him extremely happy. Xu Jiaheng took out the only small coin in his pocket and happily bought ice cream at the supermarket. Then he ran to the only basketball court in town to watch the others play.
At this time, the people on the basketball court were mostly unemployed people. Xu Jiaheng often saw them stopping students after school and usually avoided them. However, watching them play and collide with each other was quite interesting.
Before he knew it, night had arrived and it was time for his parents to close the store. Xu Jiaheng glanced at his watch and didn’t dare delay. He jumped down from the audience seats and prepared to leave.
However, when he wanted to leave, he inadvertently saw a strange person in the distance. This person was wearing a weird, tall hat and had a hand in his pocket. It was just that his face couldn’t be seen clearly from this distance. Strangely, his eyes weren’t looking at the court. He was looking at Xu Jiaheng.
Xu Jiaheng found it a bit strange and instinctively looked back, but he found no one. He scratched his head and didn’t think too much. Seeing that it was getting late, he hurried home.
His family lived behind the car repair shop. It was a small, three-storey house. Due to the need for quietness during studying and the desire for concealment, Xu Jiaheng lived in the attic on the third floor. The roof windows and the attic were huge and the entire third floor was his territory.
Xu Jiaheng’s mother didn’t notice any abnormality. She saw that he was back at this point and thought that he went home normally. She complained about the dirt on his nails and cheeks and asked him to wash his face and hands before eating.
Xu Jiaheng nodded and didn’t dare to reply. The sink in his house was outside of the front door of the car repair shop. He ran out, opened the tap and started washing. However, just like before, the person on the basketball court had appeared in the distance. It was the same outfit and the same eyes. He was always looking in Xu Jiaheng’s direction.
This type of weird clothing and gloomy eyes made Xu Jiaheng feel scared. After staring at the person blankly for a while, a cold wind blew through and he shivered. He turned his head and shouted, “Mom!”
No one answered his first call. At his second call, his mother walked out impatiently with a spatula. “Why are you calling me so late? You’re like a ghost.”
Xu Jiaheng ignored his scolding and stretched out a trembling finger in the direction the man appeared. “He followed me—”
Before he could finish, he found that the man was gone.
“Who? I didn’t see anyone. You are feeling paranoid every day.” His mother was concerned about the food in the pot. After a few more glances, she didn’t see anyone. Still, she hesitated when seeing Xu Jiaheng’s panicked expression. “Come in as soon as you finish washing your hands. Don’t delay. If something is really going on these days then let your father send you to school.”
Xu Jiaheng still felt uneasy but seeing that there was nothing strange, he finally didn’t say anything. He stiffly followed her words, ate and went back to his room.
The school might’ve had activities in the afternoon but the teacher still gave a lot of homework. He placed the most troublesome mathematics first. He spread out the exercise books and textbooks and started to struggle.
“Heng Heng, eat fruit.” As he was doing homework, the familiar voice of his mother was heard behind him.
Xu Jiaheng was struggling to do his homework and didn’t look up. “Put it outside. I’ll come down to get it later.”
“No, it’s better to… hand it over to you,” his mother said.
It was really annoying. She didn’t let him finish his homework at all. Once he stopped, he would want to play for a while before continuing. Xu Jiaheng threw down his pen and turned to take the fruit plate from his mother. However, he turned around and froze on the spot.
His mother was originally a petite woman. She was 1.6 metres tall and wasn’t much taller than him. Now the person standing at the door was very tall. Her head had almost hit the ceiling and she needed to tilt it to avoid being caught by the door frame.
His ‘mother’ at the door held a plate of cut apples in her hands and urged him, “What’s the matter? Aren’t you going to take it?”
Xu Jiaheng no longer knew how to react and his limp legs fell from the chair. “You… you…”
“You aren’t my mother! Who are you?!”
His mother wondered, “What are you thinking? Have you gone crazy? Aren’t you coming here to get it? Is there anything strange?”
It was damn strange! Xu Jiaheng naturally didn’t dare to go over. He had fallen on his ass and couldn’t get up. His mind was blank and he didn’t even have time to scream.
Ding dong, ding dong.
The doorbell downstairs rang at just the right timing. His mother looked downstairs and placed the plate of fruit on the small partition. “Who is it? Why are they coming at this time? I’ll go take a look.”
Xu Jiaheng didn’t feel alive until her back disappeared down the stairs. He didn’t know how he had reached the door. He didn’t grab the plate of fruit. He just directly locked the door to prevent anyone from entering.
The conversation downstairs passed into his ears through the door panel. It seemed that the person who came was a young man. The voice was unfamiliar. After a few words, the door was closed. Xu Jiaheng remembered the appearance of his mother just now and was worried. He could no longer disbelieve…
That ‘rule’ was true! As long as you broke it, you would be retaliated against by bad luck…
What should he do? The person downstairs was definitely not his mother. What should he do? Where was his mother?
Xu Jiaheng’s mind was a mess. He fumbled for his phone, wanting to discuss things with his classmates or directly call the police. However, at this time, there was the sound of knocking from his window. The sound was dull and continuous. It didn’t sound like a stone and was more like an object constantly knocking. but he lived on the third floor!
Xu Jiaheng leaned against the door and faced the window that didn’t have the curtains drawn. Therefore, he only needed to squint to see what was hitting the window. It wasn’t a hand or a long stick. It was a bunch of hair. The hair was very long and circled under the eaves. The wavy hair tips were beating rhythmically against the window.
Knock, knock, knock.
Xu Jiaheng couldn’t bear it anymore. He rolled his eyes and felt that the entire world was spinning. He thought he had fainted from the fright. Then the next second, his body shook suddenly and he raised his head from the desk!
Xu Jiaheng realized that he had been sleeping on the desk. There were still red marks on his face from his sleeping position. Just… everything that just happened was a dream?
Xu Jiaheng rubbed his eyes.
Great! He knew that there weren’t such mysterious things in reality. There were clearly no ghosts. It must be because Sun Bing had told him too many ghost stories, causing him to have nightmares!
Xu Jiaheng wanted to stand up and cheer happily. Then he raised his hand and saw that the hair was still outside the window. The owner of the hair seemed dissatisfied about being ignored. It increased the number of hairs and also increased the banging force. This time, the strand also brought a small piece of paper with it. There were neat and upright block letters written.
[I’m here to help you. Let me in.]
It was written like this but who the hell would believe it? A wolf giving New Year’s greetings to a chicken and black hair giving people a letter— it obviously had bad intentions! In addition, this living hair was still banging on the window… it wasn’t a dream?!
Under the sudden shock, Xu Jiaheng’s heart couldn’t bear it. His eyes rolled, his consciousness blurred and he fainted.
***
Xu Jiaheng fainted. Meanwhile, Xiao Li waiting downstairs had to go back first because there was no response. It wasn’t that he didn’t think of going in forcibly. It was just that the little boy’s mother didn’t allow it and he had no means to handle such women. He had to give up temporarily.
Wen Wenwen listened to Xiao Li recall up to here and couldn’t help interjecting, “You didn’t have your Tan Li check what was going on inside the room?”
Xiao Li replied, “I finally had her go up in person. She said that the little boy had fallen asleep.”
Wen Wenwen tried to simulate the scene at the time in his head and he took a deep breath. “…Are you sure he wasn’t scared by you?”
“How could that be?” Xiao Li frowned and denied Wen Wenwen’s hypothesis. “I wrote a very friendly note at that time and sent it up.”
According to normal human beings, they encountered a ghost and were in a helpless situation. Under such circumstances, such a note was sent and they should happily open the window to greet the person.
Wen Wenwen, “……”
He didn’t have any evidence but he always felt that something wasn’t right. His chest was full of complaints but he didn’t know where to start.
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