By the time the two of them arrived, Lin Ting realized this ghost wasn’t the one she had expected.
With Halloween approaching, Jingbei’s largest theme park had already started its festivities.
Crowds gathered at the entrance, and Lin Ting spotted several familiar faces—Lu Hesheng had clearly come with friends today.
Most of them were dressed in Halloween cosplay.
Shen Xiao wore a tight Batman suit, Nan Sanning and Nan Jiyun dressed as Remy from Ratatouille, and a few others were in abstract costumes—hospital patient outfits smeared with fake blood.
Lin Ting tugged on his sleeve and asked, “Aren’t we too normal? Will that be a problem?”
Lu Hesheng’s tone was casual: “Who says? We’re cosplaying The Emperor’s New Clothes.”
Lin Ting: “…….”
He always managed to make nonsense sound completely reasonable.
She no longer felt out of place.
Nan Sanning’s eyes lit up as she ran over, shoving the handmade candy Lin Ting had prepared into her hands:
“My brother said you’d come. I guess he really wasn’t lying!”
Shen Xiao clenched his teeth in irritation, glancing at the two latecomers who were clearly guilty of some mischief.
He sarcastically said: “Lu, quite early today, huh?”
Lu Hesheng remained expressionless: “Yeah, only half an hour late.”
At that moment, a boy and a girl suddenly leapt from behind, moving quickly toward Lu Hesheng and Lin Ting, respectively, their costumes covered in poop and toilet paper.
“Hehehe, Surprise! Happy Halloween!”
“We didn’t mean it!”
After the prank, they immediately ran off.
Shen Xiao laughed so hard he could barely stand straight: “Now that’s more like it! Hahaha!”
Catching Lu Hesheng’s murderous glare, Shen Xiao added teasingly:
“Your outfit needs to look noble on the outside, basic on the inside.”
“Perfectly balances your handsome-and-her-beautiful aura.”
The group walked on together.
Lin Ting felt completely normal here; she saw plenty of people in bizarre costumes.
Lu Hesheng, however, was scowling—the young master was probably wearing a compromising outfit for the first time in his life.
Passersby couldn’t help but glance, asking for photos with them.
They even got several free instant photos inexplicably.
“Thank you!” After saying goodbye to the friendly ladies, Lin Ting tried to stash the photos in her bag for safekeeping—but a large hand above snatched them all away.
Lu Hesheng effortlessly pocketed them.
Lin Ting glared, tiptoeing to retrieve them: “Hey! There’s my solo photo in there—give it back!”
He, relying on his height, refused to let go. They struggled for several minutes, but she couldn’t reclaim her photos.
She guessed he had a severe idol complex—no way he’d let any black history leak out.
Feigning generosity, Lin Ting waved her hand: “Forget it, a good girl doesn’t fight with a bad boy!”
She ran ahead, looping her arm around Nan Sanning’s in a show of friendship.
The two shared interests, chatted for a while, took photos together, and even posed with the park’s scary NPCs.
Nan Jiyun had been pushed to the back.
He popped a candy into his mouth and strolled beside Lu Hesheng, pretending to chat casually:
“I heard the Lin and Ji families plan to announce an engagement at the end of the year.”
Lu Hesheng’s tone remained unreadable: “What, is your entertainment company failing and you’re switching to gossip now?”
Nan Jiyun laughed: “You don’t even like gossip, how boring.”
Lu Hesheng: “Not that I don’t like it—you just report it too slowly. I knew three days ago.”
Nan Jiyun didn’t argue, giving him a look that said, Message delivered. Your call.
Noticing the candy in Nan Jiyun’s mouth, Lu Hesheng reached for it: “Got any more? One for me.”
Nan Jiyun covered his pocket: “This was made by my wife. Do you have the right to eat it?”
In the end, he handed Lu Hesheng an electronic cigarette, which the man casually puffed on.
The two men silently trailed the two girls, who bounced along ahead.
Clearly, they had no common topic, and in this fairy-tale amusement park, boring work talk was out of the question.
After taking photos with Nan Sanning and watching the park staff doing their best to act scary, Lin Ting remembered she needed to rejoin the main group.
Some had already bought snacks and drinks, waving her over.
The group grabbed a quick bite on the roadside and queued to enter the theme haunted house.
Just as they reached the entrance, terrifying background music played, and the seemingly endless hallway loomed before her. Lin Ting instinctively felt fear.
She reached out for Nan Sanning’s hand—but the girl had vanished.
Without her noticing, Lu Hesheng had moved behind her.
He whispered: “Not going in?”
Lin Ting glanced at the crowd surging ahead, took a deep breath, and bravely stepped into the haunted house.
Luckily, it wasn’t pitch black—dim lighting allowed her to barely see the floor.
Her tense heart slowly began to relax.
But just when she felt at ease, the real scares came.
Suddenly, lights flickered violently. A female ghost, blood-stained and masked in white, crawled out of an old toilet.
“Ahhh—!” Lin Ting screamed and instinctively stumbled backward.
Her back collided into a warm, strong body—and at the same time, Lu Hesheng covered her eyes.
Amid the chorus of screams, his voice sounded unusually clear and pleasant, sending shivers down her spine:
“Such a timid one, huh?”
Still shaken, Lin Ting nodded slightly, leaning into his warm palm.
What she didn’t say: compared to these artificially created scares, the invisible protection and closeness from him made her heart race far more.
For the rest of the haunted house, she gave up struggling and simply clung to his back.
Her hands gripped his coat hem, maintaining a slight distance, half-closing her eyes as they walked through the attraction.
They went on to explore several other haunted houses.
With her first experience behind her, Lin Ting grew noticeably braver.
By the time they exited the park, night had fully fallen.
A girl approached Lin Ting, realizing she also attended Jing University, and asked to exchange WeChat to be friends.
Lin Ting nodded. They were heading the same way and decided to take a taxi together.
Her gaze instinctively shifted toward the parking lot.
Lu Hesheng drove up.
Shen Xiao sat in the passenger seat, rolling down the window and waving excitedly: “See you next time, sis!”
Lin Ting’s eyes passed over Shen Xiao, landing on Lu Hesheng’s slightly cold profile through the car window.
Afraid they couldn’t hear her, she raised her voice slightly: “See you next time!”
Perhaps it was the excitement of the day.
Once home, Lin Ting even posted on social media for the first time in a while, captioning it: Cute ghosts are here!
Not long after, comments and likes poured in.
Nan Sanning: The copy was borrowed, the style learned, the roses stolen, the tone borrowed, but the love for Ting Ting is innate.
Shen Xiao: Good evening, two beauties.
Fang Zhixiao: Confess! Whose hand is on the edge of the photo? Is there a handsome guy next to you?
Lin Ting scrolled through the comments, then returned her gaze to the likes. Her fingers instinctively pressed harder.
The long-disappeared account, 111, had liked her post.