Master Wuchen had helped Xu Chen once, which greatly relaxed him. The curse of not being able to go near water seemed to have been broken. As soon as he returned to the hotel, Xu Chen went to the restroom with his assistant.
There was no helping it. Ever since the car had gone out of control on the road, although he pretended to be calm on the surface, Xu Chen was still feeling a bit panicked inside.
If this show weren’t a livestream, he would have dropped out immediately.
It was just too eerie.
Jiang Meng had his camera assistant follow Master Wuchen while he stood off to the side, unscrewed a bottle of water, and took a drink. The video playing on his phone was none other than Han Fengchen’s livestream.
He looked down at the main figure on the screen, his expression unreadable.
Just then, Director Zhang Song walked over and patted Jiang Meng on the shoulder. “Jiang Meng, taking a break?”
Jiang Meng put away his phone and turned to Zhang Song. “Director Zhang.”
Zhang Song met Jiang Meng’s heterochromatic eyes and smiled a bit stiffly.
Jiang Meng’s gaze was dark and heavy. When he stared at someone without saying a word, it always sent a chill down their spine, quite frightening.
When Guess Where It Is was first being planned, the biggest difficulty Zhang Song faced wasn’t funding or guests, it was the cameramen.
Regular crew members were fine, but the cameramen had to follow the guests. No matter where the guests went to explore or hunt for ghosts, the cameramen had to go with them, and they even needed to be skilled at capturing the right shots. Since this was a livestream, there were no multiple camera angles and no post-production editing, so the cameraman’s role was crucial.
The guests had masters on their teams to protect them, and only if the masters had free time could they help the cameramen. But honestly, Zhang Song had created this supernatural show mostly for the hype, to get trending topics and such. As for whether ghosts actually existed in this world, it was hard for ordinary people to say.
Jiang Meng was someone he had hired at great expense. His actual profession was as an outdoor adventure photographer, and he had filmed many outdoor exploration teams.
Zhang Song glanced at Jiang Meng’s phone and asked, “So you’ve been watching Fengchen’s livestream too?”
Jiang Meng nodded without much expression.
Zhang Song immediately said, “Jiang Meng, the cameraman following Fengchen’s team just called. He said he can’t handle it anymore and hopes you can take over for Fengchen’s group.”
Jiang Meng paused mid-drink, his eyes brightening slightly. Still, his expression remained hesitant. “Would it be appropriate to switch cameramen like that?”
Zhang Song, seeing that there was a chance, quickly said, “Why wouldn’t it be appropriate? The guests certainly won’t mind, and the audience couldn’t care less. Don’t worry, if you’re willing, go over there right now.”
As he spoke, afraid that Jiang Meng might change his mind, he immediately took out his phone and had his assistant make the arrangements.
Thus, half an hour after Chu Mingjia had led Han Fengchen to follow the young woman, their team’s cameraman was switched to Jiang Meng.
Chu Mingjia seemed to sense something and glanced back. She saw the tall man with his baseball cap pulled down low, his head slightly bowed.
She looked away and continued following the young woman.
The livestream was quiet for a while, until someone finally timidly spoke up: 【Um… could some expert please explain what’s going on here?】
【Same question. Where is Sister Chu taking her brother?】
【This alley is pitch black. Are they about to do a late-night exploration?】
【I have to say, if this really is the show’s script, it does look genuinely scary.】
【To be fair, Mrs. Han and her brother are both acting pretty convincingly. That earlier moment really freaked me out!】
…
Chu Mingjia and Han Fengchen followed the young woman, walking farther and farther into remote areas. The streetlights grew dimmer and dimmer until there were none at all. They relied on the lights from nearby residential buildings as they walked along a long, dark alley.
They had been walking for a full forty minutes. Han Fengchen was dumbfounded.
He whispered to Chu Mingjia, “How could she have run so far? And her child is sick. There should be a clinic or something nearby, right?”
The woman had crossed several alleys and walked for over forty minutes, yet instead of finding a doctor, she had desperately turned to a street fortune-teller to check on her child. How could that be right?
Although Han Fengchen was young, seeing how worried the woman was about her child made him anxious for her. Deep down, he also felt a trace of an unspoken envy.
So this is what a mother who truly cares for her child looks like? When her child is sick and suffering, even if she doesn’t know what to do herself, she still walks nearly an hour to find a way to help, to find a doctor.
Han Fengchen’s expression fell, his face tinged with dejection.
Seeing him like this, Chu Mingjia hesitated as if she wanted to say something.
In the end, she decided against it. Forget it. I’ll explain the situation to him when we get back to the hotel. Otherwise, given how much of an image-conscious top-tier celebrity he is, if he gets scared and cries in front of the livestream, that would be really awkward.
The woman in the white slip dress lived in an old, dilapidated residential building. There was no elevator. They climbed up to the fifth floor through a narrow staircase cluttered with trash.
The woman stopped at her door, wiped her tears, and turned to Chu Mingjia. “We’re here. This is it.”
Chu Mingjia reached out and pushed the door open. It wasn’t locked and swung open easily. The woman said apologetically, “I was in such a hurry to leave that I forgot to close the door.”
Han Fengchen didn’t think much of it, and the group walked in.
The apartment was very small, probably only thirty to forty square meters. The narrow living room held just a TV stand and a small sofa, which already filled up most of the space.
Chu Mingjia glanced around the living room, and the young woman hurriedly led her toward the bedroom.
The bedroom was also very cramped, with no lights on. Han Fengchen reached the doorway and fumbled for the light switch.
Click. He pressed the switch, but the light didn’t turn on.
Han Fengchen was taken aback. “Huh? A power outage?”
The young woman said apologetically, “Our neighborhood is old. The power goes out often.”
Han Fengchen: “…”
He couldn’t help but ask, “What about your husband? Doesn’t he care about the child?”
At this, a trace of loneliness flickered across the white-dressed woman’s pale face. She wiped the corner of her eye and said, “He’s very busy. His career is taking off, so he has to travel all over the country.”
Han Fengchen was speechless. “My dad runs a huge company, and he doesn’t—”
He stopped mid-sentence, glanced guiltily at Chu Mingjia, and fell silent. If his father had time, he wouldn’t be going on business trips every few days.
Ever since Chu Mingjia had married into the family, she had probably seen his father only a handful of times.
The bedroom was small, with a bed pushed against the wall. On it, the shadowy figure of a three- or four-year-old child could be seen.
Chu Mingjia stopped Han Fengchen as he was about to follow her inside. She turned to look at him. “Wait for me at the door.”
Meeting Chu Mingjia’s serious gaze, Han Fengchen belatedly realized something.
His eyes widened slightly. He nodded. “O-okay. Then… be careful.”
The last words came out in a breathy whisper, he was just too terrified.
He stole a glance at the white-dressed woman. She hadn’t noticed anything and was staring intently at the child on the bed.
Chu Mingjia walked over. Lying on the bed was a little girl in a red dress. Her facial features were exquisitely delicate, and with her eyes closed, she looked like a porcelain doll.
Her complexion was also very pale, including the exposed skin on her arms and neck, all unnaturally pale.
Chu Mingjia leaned in without changing her expression. Getting closer, she could even see faint red veins on the girl’s face, which was pale with a greenish undertone.
After looking for a while, the more Chu Mingjia looked, the more the little girl’s features seemed familiar.
The white-dressed woman stood beside her, her voice full of worry. “Master, please take a look at my daughter. Has she been possessed by some evil spirit? What can I do to save her?”
Chu Mingjia glanced at the woman and said slowly, “This child’s condition isn’t too bad.”
As she spoke, the livestream audience grew even more panicked.
【Ahhh, help! What child? Where did a child come from? Can someone please explain?】
【If this really is a script, then Sister Chu’s acting is incredible. The Oscars should be named after her.】
【Wuhu, as expected of my Sister Chu. This is so intense right from the start. She told Chenchen to wait at the door and not go in, could it be because there’s a “child” inside?】
【Emmmm, everyone’s talking about that “child,” but isn’t anyone curious how they found this rundown rental apartment?】
【That’s why I think it’s a script. The production team rented the place in advance, purposely left the door unlocked, and when Mrs. Han and the others arrived, they just followed the script. We might as well treat it like a ghost movie and not take it too seriously.】
…
The audience was buzzing with discussion. Because Chu Mingjia and Han Fengchen’s “acting” was so convincing, the livestream’s viewership skyrocketed. The other two teams had finished their tasks early and gone back to the hotel to rest, with nothing interesting to watch, so all the viewers flocked to Chu Mingjia’s livestream.
Livestream: 【This script is thrilling and exciting, better than a movie!】
【As expected of Mrs. Han and the young master of the Han family co-starring. Looks like the production team really went all out to please the Han family.】
When Zhang Song saw these comments, he was utterly speechless.
He directly reposted a comment with his official account: 【@ZhangSong: You guys really think too highly of our production team. Smirk jpg.】
Not to mention a writing team, they didn’t even have the budget to hire a B-list screenwriter. Did these netizens have any idea how much it cost to invite a feng shui master?
The show hadn’t originally had a master staying behind at the base. It was only after Chu Mingjia agreed to be a guest that the master originally paired with Han Fengchen was reassigned to the rear.
From the very beginning, Zhang Song had only budgeted for three masters’ appearance fees.
Chu Mingjia did a quick, casual check on the child, and the little girl suddenly opened her eyes. Her eyes were bloodshot, as if soaked in blood, and paired with her pale, red-veined face, she looked especially eerie.
Chu Mingjia said calmly to the white-dressed woman, “She’s awake.”
The woman immediately hugged her child, crying tears of joy. “Baby, I’m so glad you’re okay.”
The little girl lay on her mother’s shoulder, staring directly at Chu Mingjia.
Chu Mingjia looked at the mother and daughter and asked, “Has your daughter encountered anyone recently? Her forehead looks like someone hit her with a stick.”
The woman was startled, then turned to her daughter. “Baby, where have you been recently? Who did you meet?”
The little girl’s expression turned fierce. “Mommy, I went to a bridge and met a Daoist priest. He hit me with a stick.”
As soon as the little girl finished speaking, Chu Mingjia fixed her gaze on the woman’s face. The woman looked shocked and angry. “Why did he hit you? Do you remember what he looked like? Come on, tell Mommy. Mommy will go confront him!”
Furious, the woman held her child and was about to head out the door.
Chu Mingjia stopped her.
“I suggest you don’t go looking for him,”
Chu Mingjia said, blocking the woman’s path. “He’s not easy to deal with. If you go, you might not come back.”
At this point, Chu Mingjia didn’t yet know that the person who had hit the little girl was Master Wuchen. She was only guessing that any Daoist priest capable of striking a child like this with such precision must have considerable skill.
The little girl stared at Chu Mingjia with chilly eyes and asked the woman, “Mommy, who is this pretty older sister? Why is she in our house?”
The woman said gently, “She’s a very powerful master. Mommy invited her to save you. You just got sick and scared me to death.”
The little girl looked at Chu Mingjia coldly and smiled faintly. “Can this older sister really save me?”
There was a heavy, malevolent energy in the little girl’s eyes. Jiang Meng, who had been standing off to the side, suddenly stepped forward, aiming his small camera at the mother and daughter while slightly shielding Chu Mingjia behind him.
Although no one present noticed anything unusual, the livestream audience was completely confused.
【What the hell? Why is the screen all black? What’s happening?】
Someone said nervously, 【I have a bold thought! Is it possible that what’s in front of the camera isn’t a black wall, but…】
【…a child standing there?】
【…Oh no, oh no, I can already picture it!】
…
Chu Mingjia’s team was simply too eerie and terrifying. The livestream’s viewership skyrocketed, gaining over a million viewers in just one hour. Some came from the other two livestreams, while others clicked in through trending topic links.
Ever since Chu Mingjia had led Han Fengchen to the woman’s house that night, their livestream had been trending.
The headline was eye-catching: #HanFengchenLivestreamEncountersSupernaturalIncident!#
Because the woman’s apartment had no electricity and the lights wouldn’t turn on, both Han Fengchen and Chu Mingjia were using their phones for illumination. Coupled with the fact that they were talking to empty air, the eerie atmosphere was maximized!
Jiang Meng stood in front of Chu Mingjia, his small camera aimed at the mother and daughter. His gaze was deep and his expression cold and stern.
Under his staring eyes, the little girl’s eyes widened in terror. She buried her face in her mother’s chest, trembling all over.
It seemed she was very afraid of Jiang Meng.
Chu Mingjia said, “Of course I can save you.”
She said “you” in the plural, but neither the mother nor the daughter understood the distinction.
The woman was more concerned about her daughter and asked urgently, “Master, could my daughter have any aftereffects? Did that Daoist priest use some kind of evil magic?”
She felt that her daughter had been acting very strange lately.
“She keeps sneaking out in the middle of the night,” the woman said worriedly. “She also screams in anger, and these red veins have appeared on her face.”
The woman was truly terrified, but she didn’t know what to do. There was no one to help her.
Chu Mingjia said, “I can help, but we need to find her father. He needs to cooperate.”
As soon as she heard this, the woman’s eyes started darting around evasively. “He… he doesn’t have time…”
Chu Mingjia looked at her. “No, he has time right now.”
The woman: “…”
Chu Mingjia, in front of millions of livestream viewers, looked at the little girl and said, “If I’m not mistaken, the child’s father is Xu Chen, isn’t he?”
The woman: “!!!”
Livestream: 【!!!】
【What?! What did I just hear?!】
【Sister Chu just said to the air that the child’s father is Xu Chen. Is there a possibility… that the child is already…】
【Someone exposed years ago that Xu Chen domestically abused his girlfriend in the industry! Wasn’t his girlfriend a trainee at some company who later disappeared without a trace?】
【No way… could it be that he actually had a child back then?】
【MD, can you Han family people please stop leeching off our brother’s popularity?! Even your script is this ridiculous. Can your greed be any uglier?】
…
Because of Chu Mingjia’s single sentence, the livestream predictably erupted into chaos again.
However, the production team knew this wasn’t a script. Even Director Zhang Song, watching from behind, was trembling as he wiped cold sweat off his forehead, scared out of his wits.
Chu Mingjia sat on the sofa in the small living room, looking at the woman holding her child. “The way things are going between you two can’t continue. You need to call him over so this matter can be resolved. Otherwise,”
Chu Mingjia glanced at the little girl, “if you let her keep running around like this, who knows what might happen. I’m sure you don’t want that, do you?”
The woman’s pale face showed a flicker of emotion.
Anything else could be negotiated, but when it came to her child, she couldn’t remain calm.
Seeing that the woman wasn’t speaking, Chu Mingjia turned to Han Fengchen. “Call Xu Chen. Tell him to come over.”
Han Fengchen: “…”
Han Fengchen was sticking close to Chu Mingjia, sitting right beside her. He felt that the little girl looked a bit strange, especially her blood-red eyes, which sent a chill down his spine.
But he didn’t think too much of it. After all, he was wearing the bracelet Chu Mingjia had given him. Besides, it would never have occurred to him that one day, he, who had never believed in the supernatural, would be able to see those things.
He grumbled in a low voice, “You know how tense things are between him and me. Why do I have to be the one to contact him?”
Just hearing Xu Chen’s name annoyed Han Fengchen to no end, let alone having to call him and talk to him.
Wasn’t this deliberately torturing him?
Unexpectedly, Chu Mingjia said, “When your elder tells you to do something, you do it. Why so many questions?”
Han Fengchen: “…”
He had nothing to say to that. He took out his phone and called Xu Chen. The two were artists under the same company. When Han Fengchen had first returned, their relationship hadn’t been this hostile yet, and they had even exchanged contact information.
Xu Chen was currently at the hotel chatting with the third team of guests. Although their tasks were complete, it wasn’t time to end the livestream yet, so they couldn’t go back to rest just yet.
Luo Mengmeng and Li Zhende were both easygoing people, especially Li Zhende, who was talkative and lively. This only made Master Wuchen, sitting to the side, seem particularly quiet and aloof.
The atmosphere at the hotel was warm and cheerful. Xu Chen noticed that it was already 9:30 PM, yet Han Fengchen still hadn’t returned. He joked to Li Zhende and the others, “Looks like Fengchen’s team has run into some trouble. They’re still not back. I wonder if they need help.”
What he really meant was to mock Han Fengchen and Chu Mingjia for being incompetent. If they couldn’t handle it, they shouldn’t have forced their way onto the show to chase clout, especially after rejecting the master the production team had arranged for them. Now, they had certainly failed their task and were too scared to come back.
After all, if they returned, they wouldn’t be going to their hotel rooms, they would have to stay in a haunted house.
A truly haunted house.
Luo Mengmeng didn’t catch his underlying meaning. With concern in her eyes, she said, “I hope they haven’t run into any real trouble.”
She paused, then added, “Do you think Mrs. Han and the others might have gotten lost?”
Although Wushi Town was small, it was an old town with dilapidated buildings and many narrow, winding, dimly lit alleys. People walking through them could easily lose track of which alley was which.
Outsiders got lost there all the time.
Li Zhende laughed heartily. “Don’t they have GPS? Don’t worry, they won’t get lost.”
Just as they were saying this, Xu Chen received a call from Han Fengchen.
He didn’t want to answer it, but with the livestream watching, he thought that Han Fengchen might also be calling in front of his own livestream. If he didn’t pick up, it would make him look afraid of Han Fengchen, damaging his reputation.
Xu Chen kept his composure, even maintaining a smile, and said to Luo Mengmeng, “Speak of the devil. Look, Fengchen is calling. He probably wants me to rescue him.”
Luo Mengmeng gave an awkward smile.
She wouldn’t touch that topic with a ten-foot pole. Everyone knew how bad the relationship between Han Fengchen and Xu Chen was, they had even come to blows in public.
Han Fengchen would sooner pray to Buddha than ask Xu Chen for help.
Xu Chen answered the call. “Hello, Fengchen?”
Han Fengchen’s brow was furrowed, his voice cold. “Something’s come up. It’s serious and it concerns you closely. You need to come over.”
The smile on Xu Chen’s face faded slightly. He couldn’t imagine anything that would concern him.
“Fengchen, if you’ve run into a problem, just say so. I can ask Master Wuchen if he’d be willing to come and help you out.”
Han Fengchen lost his patience. “I don’t have a problem. This concerns your wife and daughter. Aren’t you going to come and see them?”
Xu Chen: “…”
Xu Chen was so angry he laughed. In front of the livestream audience, he couldn’t even be bothered to maintain his facade.
“Han Fengchen, what the hell are you talking about?”
Xu Chen’s voice was icy. “I’m not married, and I certainly don’t have a daughter. Even if you don’t like me and want revenge, there’s no need to smear me like this.”
Xu Chen sneered. “You don’t actually expect anyone to believe a joke like that, do you?”
Xu Chen had been focused on his career for years, and his fans all knew he wasn’t married.
Han Fengchen said quietly, “You’re not married, but whether you have a child, that’s another story.”
Xu Chen: “…”
Xu Chen’s face twisted with rage. “Han Fengchen! Don’t go too far! We’re live, are you really going to sling mud at me like this?”
Xu Chen had no idea whether Han Fengchen was genuinely stupid, had lost a game of Truth or Dare, or had a knife held to his throat by the production team forcing him to follow such a melodramatic, idiotic script.
Otherwise, no sane person would do something like this.
Han Fengchen couldn’t be bothered to waste any more words. He directly gave Xu Chen an address and said, “You said it yourself, millions of viewers are watching. If you have a guilty conscience, you don’t have to come. But if you don’t, why are you overreacting like this?”
Xu Chen: “…”
“If you really have nothing to hide, come over quickly so we can get this over with, and I can go back and rest early.”
Han Fengchen finished impatiently and hung up the phone.
Chu Mingjia asked, “Will he come?”
Han Fengchen was certain. “Definitely!”
If this provocation had been in private, Xu Chen might not have come. But in front of millions of viewers, he would definitely show up.