Chapter Thirty-Two: The Factory

“Could those scratches have been made by the corpses themselves? I suppose only the dead wouldn’t feel pain,” Fan Beixiao suddenly remarked as he gazed at the wounds on the body.

Lin Ran, who was examining the footprints, abruptly froze. He turned to look at Fan Beixiao, a trace of shock flickering in his heart. For some reason, Fan Beixiao always seemed to hit the nail on the head, whether intentionally or not. Guo Ting, too, glanced at Fan Beixiao in surprise after hearing his words.

Watching Fan Beixiao concentrating on his photography, Lin Ran and Guo Ting realized they had overlooked something crucial. The few of them were now part of a paranormal crime investigation unit, so when confronted with cases that defied logic, they could no longer view things from an ordinary perspective.

“Where does this road lead?” Lin Ran asked, having come to a realization.

“There’s an abandoned mine inside this mountain. Beyond that, there’s no road—just deep, wild forest. There might even be wild boars,” Li Feng replied.

“All right. Captain Li, please take your team and search for any suspicious vehicles at the foot of the mountain. We’ll check out the mountain,” Lin Ran said.

“Suspicious vehicles?” Li Feng looked at Lin Ran, puzzled.

“Yes. Vehicles that could transport corpses,” Lin Ran nodded, then gave Guo Ting and Fan Beixiao a look, urging them to head up the mountain. It was best if as few people as possible knew about the corpses reanimating in the forensics department.

“Ran, are you really going to check out that factory up there?” Once they’d walked a distance, Fan Beixiao couldn’t help but ask, his expression uneasy.

“You mean you don’t want to go? Are you scared?” Guo Ting shot Fan Beixiao a look of disdain.

“I am not!” Fan Beixiao’s fair face flushed bright red, like a boiled crab.

“If you’re not scared, why not go? And why the red face?” Guo Ting found his embarrassment amusing.

“I—I’m just worried about you! Last time you got possessed, and Ran nearly—” Fan Beixiao’s words were abruptly cut off by Lin Ran.

“Are you two coming or not? If not, you can both go back and check the vehicles!” Lin Ran’s face darkened as he glared at them.

“Going!” At Lin Ran’s irritation, the two immediately fell into line.

Lin Ran couldn’t be bothered with their bickering. He pressed on ahead, sweeping his flashlight across the ground, searching for useful clues. Reaching behind to touch the hard object tucked into his waistband, he felt his anxiety ease, a sense of security settling over him. What he carried was the mourning staff his third aunt had given him last time.

At first, Lin Ran could follow the parallel set of footprints, but as they neared the summit, the prints vanished.

“There’s no path ahead—what now?” Guo Ting looked worriedly at Lin Ran where the footprints ended.

“I think whoever moved the bodies chose this path precisely because it’s unmarked, to cover their tracks. But if there’s a mine, there must be a road—even illegal mines have access. We just need to keep searching up ahead,” Lin Ran said, frowning at the dense forest before them.

Fan Beixiao looked at the woods, raised his camera, and took a photo of the spot where the tracks disappeared. As he pressed the shutter, he noticed something strikingly yellow in the viewfinder.

Curious, Fan Beixiao walked over and discovered it was a talisman, wedged in the grass. Ordinarily, it would be hard to spot—it was only the camera’s flash that had revealed it.

“Ran, look at this!” Fan Beixiao hurriedly handed the talisman to Lin Ran.

“A yellow talisman? Why does it look so familiar?” Lin Ran examined the paper, certain he’d seen something like it before—likely used to suppress corpses.

“Where did you find it?” Lin Ran immediately asked.

“Just there, to the left,” Fan Beixiao pointed to where he had taken the photo.

“Let’s go—over there!”

Following Fan Beixiao’s lead, they made their way through the overgrown mountain path. The area was wild and remote, the grass thick and tangled, rarely traversed—especially at night. Their progress was slow, but the broken branches and trampled leaves offered Lin Ran ample clues.

After nearly an hour of climbing, they found an abandoned mine halfway up the mountain. At the entrance, the original outline was barely discernible—it had clearly lain deserted for years.

“I’ll go take a look!” Guo Ting said, about to walk in.

“Don’t!” Lin Ran grabbed her arm. He couldn’t say why, but the mine made him deeply uneasy.

“Why not? The bodies might be hidden inside!” Guo Ting protested, stubbornness flaring.

“There’s something off about this place. We should wait until daylight,” Lin Ran replied, glancing at his watch—only to discover the hands had stopped at exactly midnight.

He recalled that it was already ten o’clock when they’d been eating barbecue, and so much had happened since—at the very least, it should be one or two in the morning. So why had the time frozen at midnight?

“Check the time,” Lin Ran instructed urgently.

“Twelve o’clock sharp.”

“Twelve o’clock sharp.”

Fan Beixiao and Guo Ting, acting on instinct, took out their phones and checked their watches.

“Twelve? That’s impossible,” Guo Ting immediately realized something was wrong. Three or four hours had passed—it couldn’t possibly still be midnight.

“My phone has no signal either! What’s going on?” Fan Beixiao started to panic.

“We might be in trouble,” Lin Ran muttered, his brow furrowing as mist began to creep in around them. Regret gnawed at him—he knew this wasn’t ordinary fog, but the chill of the netherworld itself!