The World Below Surface

[Attention, the following text is only lightly edited MTL that I tossed in Grammarly multiple times and corrected characters' names. I'm posting this to draw attention to this novel, hoping someone else will translate it properly. Plus, I want to see how others view such text. Like and comment on what you think. For now, I'll post 10 chapters. If there is enough response, I could post more if people like this.]

"It seems that it is indeed true." He Lou's heart was racing with excitement.

They had lost so many people, and they were only now making headway. He Lou felt conflicted for a moment and took a deep breath to calm himself down.

'Four more days, relax..... four more days.'

This was just the start.

He Lou's heart was clouded with anxiety following the excitement.

Could they really make it?

Usually, the first stage of the mission was easier. At the very least, the ghosts were restrained. They could not kill at will, so players could sleep soundly. The ghosts' restraints will gradually be relaxed as time passed, especially once they have made some progress. They might see ghosts even while eating and drinking by then, as in horror movies. Every move could result in death.

When the lift arrived at the fourth floor, Lu Yan volunteered to adjust the camera and exited the building. He placed the camera in an inconspicuous location, and the group returned upstairs.

Little by little, time passed, and the fifth floor became quiet and shrouded in darkness.

The sound-controlled lights did not turn on, and the short corridor was empty and silent, with only the soft breathing of a few people audible.

It was peculiar. During the day, many residents were clearly still present in the building. What was the cause of the late-night silence? There was no noise coming from any of the houses. Had they all gone to bed so early?

A thin layer of sweat seeped out on He Lou's forehead.

This dark space seemed to become airtight, with a cold aura surrounding everyone. That aura grew thicker and thicker, leaving people almost breathless.

What was it?

The sound of "bang, bang, bang" suddenly rang out, and He Lou shivered violently. Still, it was because of the sudden sound that the sound-controlled lights came on, and the whole building instantly brightened up.

After a moment of recognition, the sound did seem to be coming from a different floor.

So it really was on the fourth floor - that extra fourth floor?

They didn't dare to go down immediately. According to the pattern of the previous days, the one on the fourth floor was ready to start at zero o'clock every day. The fact that they heard the sound now meant that it was already past zero o'clock.

Another day had passed.

There was another layer of less restraint on the ghosts.

......

Ground floor.

"I can't stand it any more, it's noisy every day, every day, and the kids have to go to school."

"Ugh, stop it. The police can't even do anything about him. What can we do?"

"No! Are you still a man?" The young wife pushed her husband awake, "I don't care so much, carry a knife over there. Anyway, this guy is chopping meat again. I really want to chop him up too. What kind of psycho chopping dumpling filling at night ......"

The young woman got angry and got out of bed, put on her slippers and ran to the kitchen and drew a kitchen knife, standing in front of the room with an angry face: "Are you going?"

"Fine, fine, I'll go, can't I?"

"That's more like it." The young woman muttered.

The two entered the lift in their pyjamas and pressed the lift button before the car door closed.

She didn't know if it was the lighting, but the young woman always felt that the lift door was not the right image of the two; their faces were pale, and they looked very bad, like dead people.

"This air conditioning is too high, isn't it, husband? Do you feel a bit cold?"

"A little. It'll be fine when we get out later."

"Why is it so slow? Does it take so long on the fourth floor? Is it broken?"

"I'll go and talk to the property tomorrow."

"Honey, do you ever feel ...... like someone is watching us."

"......"

"Honey? Hubby?"

The woman nudged her husband, and the other man's bleak, lifeless face turned to look down at her.

"You, who are you? Husband? Husband?!"

"Help-"

"Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!"

A scream was followed by the numbing sound of tearing.

On the fourth floor, here it was.

A pool of blood slowly flowed out of the lift doorway, and soon, as if alive, the pool of blood all gushed towards a specific door and was sucked cleanly, leaving no trace on the floor.

The lift door then opened immediately. A large mass of fresh raw meat froth was quietly placed in the lift's centre. It's red and white, like a raw meat dumpling filling from a vegetable market. Unexpectedly, it was gradually pressed into a flattened shape by some invisible pressure the next moment, like a piece of paper being lightly sucked into the crack of some door.

The sound of chopping meat paused and then became more and more ferocious.

......

Ground floor, 101.

The young man yawned and opened the door to his home. He entered the room and looked at his wife and children. Seeing them both asleep, a smile lifts the man's weary face, followed by the tantalizing smell from the kitchen.

His wife must have known he was working late and had left it for him.

The young man's heart swells with warmth, and he gingerly enters the kitchen and switches on the light.

Even the sound of chopping meat upstairs was less annoying with the late-night food.

He ate the dumplings with satisfaction.

I'll move out when I make more money to avoid this disgusting neighbourhood and chopping dumpling filling? Who are you kidding?

405 That damn bald guy!

He bit into the dumplings angrily, as if he were biting into the flesh of that other man. After finishing his meal and drinking, the man washed up and went into his room to lie down on the bed, carefully reaching out to wrap his arms around his wife so as not to wake her up.

"Was it good?" The young woman's voice rang out in the darkened room.

The wife's voice seemed a little grim. No, her voice and whole being breathed an icy coldness that seeped throughout her body along the stiff skin his hands touched.

"You ......" The man froze in place.

......

On the fifth floor, a few people waited for the bang, bang, bang sound to completely disappear before they were ready to go downstairs.

'I don't know why, but today the sound was longer than usual, as if ...... it had new ingredients.'

He Lou made a note of this anomaly. In the darkness, he glanced once again in the direction of Lu Yan. The other side seemed to sense his gaze and smiled sideways at him with some reassurance.

He didn't feel any comfort at all, but there was a big stone weighing heavily on his heart.

What was the way of life, what was the way of life?

The strange station. The actress who keeps zombies. The extra fourth floor. The weird neighbours and the sound of chopping meat in the middle of the night. The marine park was named after the actress whom the neighbours often visit ......

Everything seemed unrelated, but He Lou always felt as if he had overlooked something, and what he had overlooked was the clue that would tie everything together.

Also, what role does Lu Yan play in all of this? Why was he safe and sound until now?

Even though Lu Yan was acting as cowardly and stupid as ever, he no longer dared to underestimate him.

Fortunately, they made it back to Lu Yan's house without a word to each other, washed up and went to their rooms to sleep.

With Huang Mao and Feng Chu Chu dead, the room was naturally empty. They had occupied Lu Yan's room, but now the original owner could finally return to his own room to rest.

He Lou watched Lu Yan enter his room, his eyes flickering. Only after seeing the light dim in the doorway of the other party's room did he return to his room.

Instead of resting, he turned on his computer and surfed anonymous websites.

Here, he initially found out about Lan Zhi Yu raising zombies and the method of their elimination. Because he had posted some of Lan Zhi Yu's hidden news, he had several more people following him. Some private messages asked him if he had any other news about zombies.

Seeming to see that he didn't know much about zombies, some others were kind enough to tell him something about them.

In the darkness, He Lou reviewed them one by one at a rapid pace, and his gaze suddenly froze.

Immediately afterwards, he started searching for messages like a madman.

"...... If a zombie has been sleeping for many years, it needs fresh flesh and blood to wake up ......"

Sleeping for many years ...... Yeah, his search these days showed that he hadn't seen any news of zombies running amok. It wasn't that the relevant authorities had stepped in to squash it—he'd browsed several top-secret documents. He had yet to find similar information in recent years.

Why had zombies popped up in the underground as soon as they arrived? Was it because of their mission?

The computer screen released the surveillance footage, which was clearly the underground station where they had arrived that night. He Lou worked his hands on the keyboard, immediately tuning into the corresponding station, zooming in, and focusing.

He adjusted the speed, and the picture changed rapidly ...... Immediately afterwards, he found the figure of Lu Yan. Before entering the station, he first pulled something white out of his bag and dropped it on the ground, then, with a kick, kicked it onto the billboard opposite.

Oddly enough, just because there weren't many people late at night didn't mean there wasn't a single passenger. The object that should have been ejected by the reaction force did not fall out even after he kicked it onto the billboard as if it had been sucked in by the billboard.

He Lou, on the contrary, calmed down at this moment, intercepted the screen and zoomed in to look carefully.

The surveillance was one-way, and he could not see clearly what the opposite billboard looked like. But He Lou could already imagine that on the billboard opposite, it was bound to be Lan Zhi Yu!

A cold chill rushed to his heart and then spread throughout his body. Perhaps He Lou didn't even realise it himself, but now he was trembling, not knowing whether it was anger or fear or perhaps both.

He Lou had never imagined that it was Lu Yan who had awakened it.

Why? Why had he done this?

Did he know something?

How could he still put on such an innocent face and make peace with them?!

Even if their mission this time might have something to do with the zombies, what could he gain by involving himself in it?

A hint of blood bubbled up in his mouth. He Lou returned to his senses, only to realise that he had unknowingly pushed himself so hard that he had bitten his lip. He tried to take a deep breath to calm himself down, so he wouldn't rush next door and kill the other side with a single blow.

Since Lu Yan had awakened the zombie, what else had he done?

The zombie ...... right, the day Huang Mao almost turned into a zombie, the next day at noon up to find that they had disappeared. Lu Yan was clearly just in the living room sleeping. He really did not know anything?