Translator-Rhapsodite
Editor-Pierce, Proofreader-adjective
Ji Dong slept very soundly and didn’t even have a dream.
When he woke up, he groggily reached out and found half of the bed empty. It seemed that Ren Jianmo had already gotten up. Meanwhile, he noticed that he had pillow creases on his face and a small puddle of saliva on the pillow.
By now, the room was shrouded in darkness, with the evening glow streaming in between the two-fist-sized gap, opened window, illuminating the silhouette adjacent to it.
“Awake?”
Hearing the rustling on the bed, Ren Jianmo turned around and looked at Ji Dong.
Ji Dong quickly sat up.
He saw Ren Jianmo was wearing light-colored home clothes, nestled in a single sofa chair. His long hair was loosely pinned up with a banana clip; his back enfolded by the gleaming moonlight, giving off a stunning brilliance of golden imagery.
In front of Ren Jianmo was a small coffee table, with a coffee cup and a stack of documents and books. There were also a few pages spread out on his lap.
“What time is it now?”
Ji Dong asked while getting out of bed.
“It’s about ten minutes to six, so it’s almost time for dinner,” Ren Jianmo replied.
“What are you doing?”
“I’m looking at the information about the haunted place I’m going to tonight,” Ren Jianmo answered.
Ji Dong was astonished, “You’ve already gathered this much information so early?”
He suspected that Ren Jianmo might not have slept at all.
“I woke up a couple of hours earlier than you,” Ren Jianmo replied.
It seemed like Ren Jianmo understood Ji Dong’s implied meaning and explained further, “After waking up with nothing to do, I decided to gather some information.”
“Are you going to retrieve the ‘7’ alone tonight?”
“Won’t it be too risky?” Ji Dong dragged a stool from the dressing table and sat next to him.
Ren Jianmo shifted his gaze and looked at him, “What, you don’t believe in my abilities?”
We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.
“No, no, no!” Ji Dong quickly shook his head, “I know you’re amazing!”
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“Thank you for worrying about me.”
He reached out and ruffled Ji Dong’s head, feeling that the soft curls were great to the touch, like rubbing a well-behaved and gentle little lamb.
Ji Dong remained silent, allowing Ren Jianmo to stroke his hair, his eyes fixed on him without blinking.
“I am more worried about you guys.” Ren Jianmo’s gaze appeared even softer.
“I always feel uneasy if I’m not keeping an eye on you…”
However, Ji Dong’s attitude was very firm, not allowing Ren Jianmo to easily divert the topic with sweet words.
“I’m serious!”
Ji Dong stared at Ren Jianmo intently, “What kind of place are you going to tonight for the strange tales? Can one person clear it?”
He didn’t doubt Ren Jianmo’s abilities, but he was just worried about him encountering a situation where it would be impossible to clear the challenge alone. They came across such situations before, and given the shamelessness of the [Films] arranged by the [Peach Blossom Spring], it was possible.
It seemed that the worry in Ji Dong’s eyes was too transparent and straightforward that Ren Jianmo saw through it at a glance.
Although he couldn’t remember his past experiences at all, Ren Jianmo always had a kind of “intuition,” or rather, his body memory was telling him that his former self had never joined any team or had the concept of companions.
So, what would he do when he encountered a similar [Film] back then?
Ren Jianmo thought for a moment and easily concluded.
Back then, he definitely wouldn’t pay attention to the others in his group and would rely solely on his thoughts to venture into the strange locations.
But now, Ren Jianmo suddenly felt that having a few companions might not be a bad thing.
He smiled slightly, withdrew his hand from Ji Dong’s head, and picked up a few pages of A4 paper from his lap, handing them to his team captain.
“Forget it, I’ll just show you directly.”
Ji Xiao’niao took it and started reading.
What Ren Jianmo gave him were several printed web pages.
In the study downstairs, there were not only computers but also a series of machines equipped with an abundant supply of consumables, such as printers and scanners.
Ji Dong saw that the mysterious location Ren Jianmo was about to go to, with the poker number “7”, had a resounding nickname on the internet called the “Legend of the Mysterious Hidden Tunnel.”
Its original name was “Longxing Mountain Tunnel” and it was located in the south of the city. It was approximately three kilometers long and was built through the mountains. It was in a very remote location, and apart from the residents of nearby villages, very few cars chose to pass through there.
According to legend, after midnight, as long as someone drove into the tunnel, honked the horn, and said “Follow me,” they would disappear from the world.
The earliest version of this urban legend that Ren Jianmo was able to find was a post on a supernatural ghost story forum in an online community eight years ago.
The poster’s ID was minning332, who claimed to be a native villager from a village near the Longxing Mountain Tunnel.
In his village, there has always been a legend that after dark, one should not enter the tunnel. If one must pass through from inside, they must remain quiet and not make any noise, especially not whistle, knock on objects, or say anything like “follow me,” “come with me,” or “let’s go together.” Otherwise, they would be taken away by the Mountain God and never be found again.
However, curiosity killed the cat, let alone humans who were particularly fond of taking risks.
Later, minning332 attended a university in the city. By chance, he mentioned this legend of the Longxing Mountain Tunnel to his roommates. Surprisingly, a few young people became very interested in it and were exceptionally driven. That very night, they planned to form a team and explore it.
That day, the six of them drove two cars and entered the Longxing Mountain Tunnel in the middle of the night. They parked the cars in the center of the tunnel and playfully honked the horns a few times. Then, they all got out of the cars and shouted phrases like “Come on, follow me!” and “I’m here, come with me!” It felt like a late-night party, and the atmosphere was quite lively.
At that time, only minning332 remembered the teachings of the villagers and never said a word.
At first, there was nothing unusual in the tunnel. The college students were joking around, not taking the legend seriously. Someone even jokingly suggested bringing beer and having a good drink right there.
However, soon enough, minning332 realized something was wrong.
Because one by one, his roommates started disappearing.
Just like mice attracted to cheese, they unknowingly walked into the dark tunnel one by one, without anyone noticing, and never turned back.
When minning332 finally noticed, there was only his buddy dazedly standing next to him.
But that person’s gaze went blank, staring straight into the pitch-black tunnel.
minning332 was confused and panicked. He grabbed the person’s arm and kept asking what was going on, where did the others go?
But his good buddy didn’t answer him. Instead, he shook off his hand, took a step forward, and walked toward the depths of the tunnel.
According to minning332’s post, he immediately chased after him, but he was tripped by something invisible, fell face-first into the mud, and almost broke his front teeth.
By the time he got up, his good buddy had already disappeared.
The entire tunnel was empty, with only him alone and two cars without owners.
Scared out of his wits, minning332 didn’t care about much anymore. He quickly got into one of the cars, turned on the high beams, used the brightest light to dispel the darkness ahead, then stepped on the gas, started the car, and slowly drove forward, searching for his lost roommates along the way.
But even when he drove out of the tunnel, minning332 couldn’t find any of his buddies.
His five roommates disappeared into thin air.
What made minning332 even more overwhelmed was that, due to his fear and the darkness inside the tunnel, he didn’t notice anything unusual about the car.
When he left the tunnel and looked at it in a well-lit area, he discovered that there were numerous scattered gray-black handprints on the car body and windows!
Afterward, minning332 quickly reported to the police. After hearing the details of the incident, the police wanted to find the missing college students while they were still nearby.
So they searched the nearby area all night long—not only did they not find the five living people, they couldn’t even find a single fresh shoe print.
The police began to suspect that minning332 was lying and that there were no college students who disappeared after entering the tunnel.
However, there was only one person who reported the incident at the scene, yet there were two cars, and the surveillance at the highway intersection before entering the tunnel captured the footage of two cars carrying several passengers together.
As for the handprints left on the two cars, after analysis, it was found that they contained a large amount of coal ash and ink components—but knowing this didn’t help the police find the missing students.
Later, the police contacted the fire department and the forest patrol team, and they searched the nearby mountains and forests for several days, but still couldn’t find any sign of the missing students.
Unfortunately, this case had to be classified as a mystery and left unresolved.
After reading this post, Ji Dong flipped through a few more pages.
In the following years, some curious young people went to test the authenticity of this post. Many teams lost members, and there were even cases where no one returned.
Later, some people summarized a set of “Vanishing Theories” and told players how to effectively meet their demise, such as the highest success rate being between 1 a.m. and 2 a.m., the requirement of honking the horn three long times and two short times, and so on.
After quickly browsing through it, Ji Xiao’niao furrowed his brows deeply.
“This… looks mysterious…” he said, turning to Ren Jianmo. “Do you have any leads?”
Unexpectedly, Ren Jianmo nodded and responded, “Hmm.”
Ji Dong: “????”
——That was fast!
“The presence of coal ash and ink in the handprint gave me a big clue.”
Ren Jianmo said, leaning back against the sofa, hands clasped together, elegantly crossing one leg.
“So, I think I know how to deal with the ‘Legend of the Mysterious Hidden Tunnel’ now.”
The author has something to say:
Because the main perspective is with Ji Xiao’niao, that’s why Mr. Ren’s side of the strange story is like this, I won’t go into the details~
I want to knooooow QAQ