His eyes flew open. Han Fei slammed the frame against the ground. He picked up the shard to carve out his name and number of deaths. “That’s my 11th death! I have to deal with the ghost inside the bathroom as soon as possible. That sea of hair goes after everything indiscriminately. If I leave it be, it’ll cover the entire room in under 10 minutes.”
With the information he gathered from each death, Han Fei came up with a more detailed plan every time he initiated a new loop. ‘I have to take the clues from the patient’s records into account in spite of, or perhaps due to, how peculiar they are. After all, this whole mission is a grotesque reconstruction of the patient’s state of mind.
‘Other than that, the mission requires me to kill all the ghosts and save all the humans. I wonder if the sleeping boy is considered a human in this case… Do I need to keep him safe as well? I probably should.’
When he was ready, Han Fei pushed open the door to Room 1091. The brazier was used to block the girl’s head, the ring of keys was swiped from the woman’s apron and entry was made into the main bedroom. Now that he knew what was inside the bedroom, Han Fei modified his plan slightly. He deliberately waited for the girl’s head to lag behind the mother before he entered the bedroom. Once the mother followed him in, Han Fei slammed the door to shut the head outside. He tricked the mother into the bedroom alone and then overpowered her to grab her knife.
He sliced through the boy’s binding and used the rope to tie the mother to the bed. Then he exited the bedroom with the remaining rope. He lured the girl’s head into the kitchen. The girl’s head was missing a body and the body inside the fridge was missing a head, they’d be a perfect match for each other. Han Fei neared the fridge. He could hear the fridge rocking harder as he ventured closer. As the girl’s head pitched itself at Han Fei, the latter side-stepped and yanked the fridge door open. The headless carcass jumped out for the head to slam into it. Using this momentum, Han Fei banged the fridge door close. While throwing his weight against the fridge door, Han Fei tied the rope around it.
Wiping the blood off his hands, Han Fei collected himself and continued with the mission. After dealing with the girl, he exited the kitchen. ‘I’ve followed the boy’s actions in his patient’s records, and so far they have proven useful. Perhaps that’s the way to succeed at this Manager Mission, to gain the previous manager’s approval. The other thing mentioned in the records was that the patient had once shattered a mirror to kill the ghost inside it. The most conspicuous mirror here is the one inside the bathroom.’
Han Fei noticed that the hair had pooled around the bathroom. Instead of heading towards it, he picked up the vase from the living room and flung it at the mirror inside the bathroom. A woman’s scream escaped from the cracked mirror. The surface bled. The woman appeared to be connected to the black hair because after she was injured, the knots of hair twisted as if in pain. Han Fei turned to head back into the kitchen. He moved the fridge and placed it before the bathroom door. He undid the ropes. Once he did, the fridge door flew open immediately. Han Fei was glad to see that the girl had reunited with her estranged body. Though it was a shame that she tumbled right into the pool of hair and was soon consumed by it.
‘So this is how I can kill these ghosts. The imageries in the patient’s records are more than just symbolic…’ Han Fei stared at the mirror. With the table finally turned, a dangerous smile appeared on the young man’s face.
This was the first time Han Fei attempted a manager mission so he was making up solutions as he went.
Han Fei picked up the ashtray from the living room and lobbed it at the mirror inside the bathroom. ‘I must take care to not shatter it completely. I still have use for it.’ Han Fei aimed the tray at the sides of the mirror, to slow down the cracks’ recovery speed. As the woman inside the mirror screamed, Han Fei dragged the fridge away from the bathroom door and turned it to face the nursery instead. ‘According to the patient’s records, there might be a very scary demon inside the toddler’s body.’
Han Fei was very cautious but he made sure not to idle for too long either. The room was changing at every moment. Ghosts and monsters could jump out from any shadowy corner to claim his life. Holding the knife, Han Fei pushed open the nursery door. Learning from his previous experience, the moment he did, Han Fei jumped to the side. Two extended arms reached out from the shadows but this time, they missed. Han Fei countered immediately. “Kill me once, shame on you! Kill me twice, shame on me!”
The knife was stained with blood and the stains probably possessed some kind of curse. The knife cut through the arms like butter. However, Han Fei did not slice the arms right off. Instead, he yanked on the knife handle and tried to pull the owner of the arms out from behind the door. While he wrestled with the arms, the toddler turned around from the commotion. When the scarred face saw Han Fei, it cried immediately for help. The piercing cries echoed inside the house. Banging sounds came from the main bedroom, that was the mother struggling against the binding to come save her child.
‘The woman will do anything to protect her children. Looks like in the boy’s impression, his mother will always be there for her kids.’ Han Fei knew the mother had struggled loose from the binding because he could hear slamming against the bedroom door. ‘Since the mother is so protective of her children, perhaps I can try to bring this toddler out from the nursery and then hand him to her. Hopefully, with her child in her arms, she’ll calm down.’ With this temporary change to his plan, Han Fei abandoned the fight with the arms and dashed into the nursery instead.
“Give me your hands!” He planned to rescue the toddler out from the nursery but to his shock, just as his hands were about to reach the toddler, the child who was sobbing suddenly stopped. The tears dried and a wicked smile bloomed on the ruined face. He pulled out a dagger that was planted among the pile of toys and stabbed it right through Han Fei’s palm.
“He he.” The little monster’s sharpened nails dug into Han Fei’s arms as it climbed onto Han Fei’s body. With unnatural accuracy, the nails punctured Han Fei’s aorta. Blood sputtered everywhere. Han Fei knew that he was dying. With the last breath that he had, he tumbled and knocked against the closet. The closet door swung open. A bloody pair of clothing cowered at the corner like it was alive. It emitted a horrible smell.
Han Fei collapsed to the ground. The last moment before his consciousness faded, Han Fei’s eyes were pointing at the space under the bed. To his surprise, there was another toddler hiding under there. The toddler’s face was also ruined, he looked just like the child sitting amidst the pile of toys!
‘The real toddler is hiding the bed?! The one outside is a disguise taken on by a ghost?’
…
His eyes flew open. Shattering the frame, Han Fei grabbed the shard to gouge out his name and number of deaths on his arms. He took some time to arrange his plan. ‘The real toddler is hiding under the bed. If I want to keep the mother relatively stable, I need to rescue him first.’
That was Han Fei’s 12th death. Each death brought him immense pain and the process was subtly reshaping Han Fei. ‘The system warns me that with every death I will lose parts of my memory but how come I don’t feel like that’s the case? I still have all of my main memories intact. My name is Han Fei, I am a down-on-my-luck actor. I am trying to complete a Manager Mission inside the cryptic world of the game Perfect Life. I remember Xu Qin, Meng Si and Weep. I remember everything that I’ve done inside the game. So what did I miss? What was taken away from me?’
At this point, Han Fei’s mind suddenly throbbed in pain. A thought fluttered into his mind inexplicably, ‘Wait, am I a down-on-my-luck actor? I have to be, because I was let go from my agency. I am too much of a loner to form any connections to save my hide in real life. I am an orphan and thus I have no family or friends to depend on in real life…
‘I did have a brief interaction with the law enforcement due to the human jigsaw case but that was merely through emails, I did not have any actual contact with them… Or did I? Am I remembering wrongly or there was an officer who was particularly kind to me?’
Han Fei racked his mind anxiously. He came up with nothing. Soon the 5 minutes were up. When the girl’s head exited from the front door, Han Fei already had the brazier raised. Like a programmed machine, he went through every step smoothly and precisely. After he dealt with the girl, Han Fei dragged the fridge to the nursery door. He knew the ‘toddler’ inside the room would start to cry once it saw him so this time Han Fei planned to lure it out instead. ‘The thing does seem to like toys a lot.’
Han Fei found a few toy models under the living room’s television set. Han Fei arranged them in front of the nursery door before he opened it. Soon, the confused toddler waddled out from the room. It was not until he picked up the models that he noticed Han Fei who was hiding in the shadows. The ghost let loose a wail immediately. However, it was still too late. Han Fei’s knife was already coming for it.
“He he? Come, let me hear you giggle again!”
After it was injured, the tiny ghost’s body turned illusive. It phased through Han Fei’s knife and flickered away to make its escape.
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