The Restless Spirit's Father

"Wuwuwu…"

A strange cry echoed in Liu Xiaodan's ears. When he opened his eyes, the place had gone rather dark. He reached behind him and didn't even feel Old Xiong. The bear wouldn't leave him for no reason, and so he realized that he was pulled into a nightmare.

He got up from the ground and started walking forward cautiously. Normally, he wouldn't have powers in a nightmare, and so he was easy to be picked on unless Guangru would show up.

Then again, without a hint of danger, Guangru wouldn't come.

Liu Xiaodan continued to walk until he saw a pinch of light up ahead. It seemed that there was a lamp on the ground and a figure of a woman crying at the side. Before her were the bodies of two people, a young man and a young woman.

Were they her children? Both bodies seemed to be intact, but they were undeniably dead.

"Wuwuwu..." she continued to cry in anguish.

Liu Xiaodan didn't have anywhere to go and so he just stood there to watch. From the sound of his footsteps, it was strange if the mother hadn't noticed him just yet. Was she waiting for him to ask about the scene or comfort her? Those two could be victims instead after all.

Soon, the mother stopped crying. Her head moved and bent at a strange angle. With half her body concealed in the dark, Liu Xiaodan couldn't see if her neck was already broken or not.

"Young man, why won't you run?" The woman asked him… which was strange, considering the picture.

"It's too dark around here. I don't know when I'll fall into a pit." Liu Xiaodan then gestured to the lamp. "If you want me to run so you can chase me, give the lamp to me."

"This lamp… it's important to me." The woman didn't seem to be trying to get his trust.

Liu Xiaodan then sat down on the ground, feeling comfortable having a source of light in his vision. He glanced at the bodies before the woman and then asked, "Did they get lost in this place, too?"

"You should leave this place. Monsters abound the darkness..." the mother whispered as she moved her head away from Liu Xiaodan's direction. Even her movement was strange like her head wasn't even connected to her neck instead.

"Weren't you the one who called me here?" Liu Xiaodan blinked, taking a few seconds late as the lamp seemed to be losing its fuel. "Why are you asking me to leave?"

"If you don't want to lie down next to them, you will leave this place."

Liu Xiaodan didn't speak anymore. The lamp had suddenly lost its light, and the young man tried to feel any strange movements in the dark.

Just like he thought, the mother had begun to move as soon as the darkness ate the light. She got to her feet… revealing her horrifying form.

The woman's head was connected to the palm of a third arm behind her left shoulder, which was concealed from Liu Xiaodan's view. Moreover, her feet were also two pairs of hands bound together at the wrists.

The young man could only make out the silhouette, but he slowly got up when the mother did. Right now, he was stepping backward slowly while the woman continued to stand before him.

"This is not a nightmare. I didn't bring you here. I called you to say… that you have entered a part of hell, Xiaodan."

…

Shock. The shock of seeing the woman lunged at him made Liu Xiaodan wake up from his sleep. When his eyes opened, he saw the ceiling of his white soundproofed room. He got to sit up and didn't find Old Xiong anywhere again.

"What?"

Liu Xiaodan looked down at his bed and saw the longest strands of black hair that he had ever seen. Actually, it seemed to be the same length as the multi-armed woman's hair from the nightmare. Wrong, she didn't even want him to call it a nightmare.

"A part of hell?" Liu Xiaodan picked up the strands and gathered them to dispose of them properly. "I have to find Guangru."

Noticing that he had sweated profusely from the nightmare, he changed into some clothes packed by his mother. The patients of the asylum didn't have uniforms; perhaps it was because it would be too bothersome to launder again and again.

He walked out of the room and heard a very soft click from the side. He eyed at the panel next to the door and removed a board. There was a locked panel in there, but he couldn't open it without a key. He put back the board and walked to the atrium.

Industrial-strength glass prevented the patients from falling down from the height. It's just that… when Liu Xiaodan looked down, he saw Old Xiang on the ground of the first floor and was surrounded by a few patients that wondered what it was. There was even one of them who was biting into the foot of the poor black bear.

"Did the mother throw him out?" Liu Xiaodan then looked around to find where the staircase was. However, it was locked by the security system. Only nurses could open those doors and access other floors.

"Welp, I just have to be fast..." Liu Xiaodan took a deep breath and closed his eyes.

Just like what he did back in the hospital, he walked through the glass wall and dropped from the height.

He controlled his fall and safely arrived at the first floor. Even if he suddenly appeared at a side, the people didn't care much about him. They were more curious about the black bear.

Liu Xiaodan walked amidst the group of patients whose sanity had left them. He picked up the bear and hoped that no one had been hit from its fall.

However, the group began reaching out and trying to touch and even grab parts of the bear. Liu Xiaodan could only pause time momentarily to get away from the center.

What made it hard was escaping from the first floor of the Rooms Hall. If he phased through the wall again, would he end up bringing Old Xiong with him?

"AAHHH!"

The time freeze f.o.r.c.i.b.l.y broke, and Liu Xiaodan felt like something there didn't want him to escape. The patients who wanted a piece of the black bear stuffed toy screamed and began to run towards Liu Xiaodan.

The young man loudly cussed as he ran around to evade them, but the space outside the rooms could only be so big. With more than twenty people running to chase him, he was bound to get caught and even scratched by them. The black bear was also being pulled apart, but the fabric held.

"Let go!" Liu Xiaodan tried to jab the people to get away, but their enraged behavior was too much for him. One grabbed his ankle while another grabbed his arms. Someone bit into his toes while another bit his wrist.

"What are you doing?!" Liu Xiaodan tried to shake them off, but the teeth only sunk deeper.

Teeeeeeeeng! The siren on the main door blared, and the bulbs flashed in red circling lights. The patients screamed as they quickly retreated back to their rooms in fear. Liu Xiaodan was swept away for a while and saw the door open.

Even if his foot and arm stung in pain from the bites and the hives, he had no choice but to leave hastily.

"Huh? The black thing disappeared?!" The leader who actually saw Old Xiong was shocked to see it vanish the next second. However, he noticed a trail of bloodied footsteps slipping past the gaps they made.

"Captain, blue slippers..." Another of them picked up the slipper Liu Xiaodan left. He then looked up at the fourth floor and saw no broken part. "How could the slippers of a Tier Four get in here?"

"Trail on the floor. Five, Seven, check the patients. Six, Four, with me." The captain then walked back to follow the trail of blood. The one called Six then scratched his head. "Didn't we go this way? It wasn't here before, right?"

"Tch, an experiment probably escaped again." Captain snorted as he looked around, wondering if someone could have seen anyone going that way.

…

Liu Xiaodan couldn't get far because of his foot. He couldn't heal himself without hurting someone; Guangru was the only one who could store energy and souls.

In the end, he found a secluded nook to rest. He sat on Old Xiong's belly and checked his foot that had been bleeding. The bite was so deep that if positioned wrongly, he would have lost his toes.

"What's up with those people? Why would they bite me?" Liu Xiaodan was pissed. His intense itch was making his hands tremble in a craving to scratch the wound. However, it would only make it more infected than it should be by now. The same with the wound on his forearm.

"Damn, I'm so terrified..."

Liu Xiaodan then looked down at his shirt and saw loose threads from the scratching he received. Some of them even went through his shirt and left red lines on his c.h.e.s.t and abdomen. He took a deep breath and wiped his forehead with his uninjured hand.

This place was scarier than a prison. Back in the prison, the people were still rational and would not attack relentlessly. However, the ones here… wouldn't even spare his foot from being chomped.

It was no wonder that the ghosts here were more powerful; the kind of negative vibes coming from the deranged patients fed them real well.

The young man ended up lying on top of Old Xiong. He had lost the energy from running around shitless. However, thinking about it made him laugh out. It's been a long while since he behaved like a normal human person, scared and running for his life.

"Someone..."

Liu Xiaodan twitched when he heard a voice. When he looked in the direction of the light, he saw a woman in a blue hoodie dress standing there. She seemed to be interested in him and his black bear. The man only watched her as he continued to lie down. The woman had gone to his side, only to squat to look at him from a lower eye level.

She then smiled, with her hands supporting her head. "Cute..."