A hunting adventure [unlimited]

Ye Yingting was also one of the people who suffered from insomnia last night. He got up at five o'clock, changed his clothes and ran along the coastline in the morning, so he was still wearing a loose sports suit, his temples and neck were soaked, and his whole body was sweating profusely.

He laboriously recounted what he had seen and heard in the previous two hours.

Except for them, everyone in the town had disappeared.

It was still dark when Ye Yingting went out, but the street lights had already been turned off. He walked across the street in the gray dawn to the pier, and jogged for an hour along the reefs and roads by the sea.

On the way back, he felt hungry and wanted to stop by the roadside bakery to buy a sandwich for breakfast; it was daylight and half the shops on the street were open, but no lights were on and no one was watching.

Hearing this, Zhou Lian lit a cigarette, and the ash shook into the empty plate.

"It's not open yet. The pace of this kind of place is slow. Who gets up so early to do business."

"The strange thing is this!" Ye Yingting slammed his fist on the table, his teeth trembling.

Yu Zhen went to the freezer to get a plate of fruit, including his favorite raspberry.He likes to poke his fingers into the belly of the raspberry, like putting a hat on five fingers, and eat the soft and delicate red fruit with a fork.

The disadvantage is that after eating, the fingertips are all bright red juice, which is not beautiful.

Yu Zhen held up her dirty hands and said, "Student Ye, please continue."

Ye Yingting saw that he put his fingers into his mouth one by one without being too dirty-this is a bad habit he developed in childhood, because no one helped him correct it, and he couldn't change it when he grew up.

Ye Yingting's throat was itchy, she moved her eyes, and continued:

He walked into the tobacco and alcohol shop where he bought drinks yesterday. The shop was still open, the wine cabinet was unlocked, and there was a bowl of leftover noodles, a half-bitten ham sausage, and a soup bowl at the cash register. Cooled, battered, and overnight food.

It seemed that the clerk was called away after eating half of the supper, leaving the mess behind and never came back.

He called several times into the house, but no one answered.

Then he went to the tavern where they played cards yesterday, and it was the same.The tables and chairs were placed randomly, the floor was full of cigarette butts and garbage, the broom was leaning against the wall, and the wooden barrel was filled with clean water. It was about to be cleaned and closed, but no one was there.

These small shops are run by residents of the town, with shops on the ground floor and houses upstairs.Ye Yingting stood on the street and looked around, and shouted to the windows on the second and third floors: "Is anyone there? Your store is open, so you're not afraid of thieves?"

He has a loud voice, and the purpose of shouting is to hope that someone will stick his head out to answer his doubts, even if he is scolded a few times.However, he yelled all the way, but none of the windows upstairs or downstairs were lit, and no one responded to him.

The whole street seemed to be dead, silent.

Ye Yingting was scared out of his wits, and ran back to the hotel. Fortunately, the hotel lights were still on. He ran to smash the door of Liu Min's room, knocking on the door of Liu Min's room, waking up the guests in each room, and ran to the restaurant on the third floor. to them.

"Impossible." Zhou Lian denied it, "No matter how small this place is, there are hundreds of thousands of people. Can you just disappear if you don't see it?"

Ye Yingting drank a glass of warm milk to suppress his shock, and said: "There is really no one outside. I went from house to house and called out. They all disappeared."

"The folk customs are simple, there are no thieves, the residents are content with having fun, and generally get up late." Zhou Lian snorted, smoking a cigarette, "You little devil makes a fuss, people may just be too lazy to pay attention to you."

Ye Yingting was sweating all over, with wet clothes sticking to his back. Now that his body temperature had dropped and he felt chilly, he shivered and said, "Go and see for yourself! I'll... go back to my room and take a shower."

Yu Zhen licked his fingers clean, and Zhou Lian despised him, "Are you stupid? Can't you use paper?"

Yu Zhen asked back: "Then why didn't you pass me the paper? Are you stupid?"

Zhou Lian pulled out a napkin in disgust and threw it to him.

Yu Zhen wiped her hands clean and said with a smirk, "Thank you, smart man."

He collected the dishes and trash and was leaving the restaurant.Zhou Lian said from behind him: "You don't really believe what that kid said, do you?"

"You'll know if you go and have a look." Yu Zhen threw the ball of paper that she wiped her hands into the trash can.

Du Yu got up half an hour later than him, met him in the stairwell on the second and third floors, saw him and Zhou Lian getting ready to go out, and asked, "Where are you going?"

"Good morning, Your Royal Highness." Yu Zhen raised two fingers of his right hand together to his eyebrows, "Good news, we have encountered a terrorist incident again."

***

Today's sun is well hidden by the clouds, occasionally leaking a ray or two of skylight, sprinkled on the cold and silent peak of Xuefeng, like a miracle.

The small town is silent and silent, and the pointed dark red roofs are like poisonous mushrooms, growing side by side at the foot of the snow-capped mountains.

At eight o'clock in the morning, the streets were deserted and there was little breeze.They checked the tavern, the tobacco and liquor store, and other open stores. What Ye Yingting said was true, and the strange situation was beyond imagination.

Yu Zhen got used to it, and instead of knocking on doors with Zhou Lian to inquire, he found a street lamp on the side of the road that was close to the balcony on the second floor, and climbed up to the balcony of the second-floor residents along the electric pole.

He deftly pushed open the window of others, and quietly sneaked into the room.

Zhou Lian raised his head and stared dumbfounded, and asked Du Yu, "What did he do before?"

Du Yu: "I don't know."

"What is the relationship between you two? He said you are his brother?"

Du Yu: "I'm not."

"Then were you the ones who made a fuss last night?"

Du Yu: "What's the fuss?"

A few minutes later, Yu Zhen came out from the flower shop on the first floor. He was carrying a broken jug with a sharp mouth, and the bottom of the jug smelled of burning coal.

"No one, no one in the whole building." He tossed the kettle to Du Yu, "They left halfway, the water in the kitchen boiled dry, the tea hadn't been brewed yet, and there was no bath water in the bathroom, it was freezing cold , it should have happened in the middle of the night last night."

Du Yu took the kettle without looking at it, and passed it to Zhou Lian.

Zhou Lian opened the lid and checked the bottom of the pot, and he was sure that the damage was caused by the drying of the water.

"What the hell is this? Is it haunted?" Zhou Lian threw the kettle on the side of the road, "What do you think?"

Du Yu and Yu Zhen looked at each other, but neither of them spoke.

For the rest of the houses on both sides of the street, Yu Zhen randomly selected a few houses to dig in and searched, but the result was still empty, not even a ghost was seen.

The common denominator is the trace, the trace of a life suddenly interrupted.

For example, coffee that has just been brewed without sugar and milk, half-peeled oranges, and music that is still playing.The furnishings of each room are as they were, some are neat and clean, some are sloppy and messy, but they are all full of routine life, without any traces of violent destruction or packing up and leaving in a hurry.

Just paused.

Could it be that everyone here dropped what they were doing and left halfway?

If they left by appointment, where did they go?

Neither explanation can rationalize the current emptiness of the town, as if someone had pressed the pause button, causing everyone to disappear together.

"What about the hotel? The same hotel as where we live, and no one there? It's reasonable for the locals to run away, and the foreign tourists also disappeared?"

"Yes." Yu Zhen said, "Everyone is missing, only we are still here."

Du Yu said, "Go back quickly."

***

Among the guests in the hotel, only Ye Yingting knew what happened.

They knocked on the door one by one, but fortunately most of them were up by this point.They gathered the rest of the hotel's tourists in the cafeteria on the third floor; after discussion, it was decided that Zhou Lian would come forward and tell everyone about the current situation.

Zhou Lian was reluctant, and asked, "Why did you ask me to talk?"

Yu Zhen pointed to Du Yu and said to himself: "He is like a scammer who relies on his face for food, and I am like an underachiever who is addicted to skipping classes. Only Brother Zhou, who is very reliable at first glance, is here."

Zhou Lian was praised as "reliable" for the first time, so he rubbed his chin.

Yu Zhen thought to himself, this person has a bad temper, but he is easy to deceive.

This hotel has two floors, a total of 25 rooms, and 17 people lived in it. Not all of them came, but [-] people showed up, and the entire restaurant was full.

Liu Min heard Ye Yingting tell the whole story, but she didn't care, these days she seldom got up early, couldn't bear the sleepiness at all, put on a mask and leaned against her friend to doze off.

Yan Chen just came back from walking his dog, and he was in good spirits, sitting in the first row.

The rest were strangers, mainly young people, with an even male to female ratio. The oldest man was a scholar-looking man in his early forties, with a beard and a strong physique.

Zhou Lian's appearance was rough and fierce, and the moment he stood in front of the crowd, the seriousness of the situation stood out.

"Good morning, friends. We are all here to travel, and it is fate to live in the same hotel. Let me tell you about our current situation. Weird things have happened on this island. Except for us who live in this place, There's no one out there..."

Zhou Lian didn't have any language skills in his speech, but his level of stirring up the atmosphere was very high. He told the process and results of Ye Yingting's morning run this morning and the three of them's investigation in the town. Everyone present showed expressions of fear, worry, and disbelief. .

Only Yan Chen remained calm, with a leisurely smile on his lips, as if he was listening to a ghost talk show.

The people sitting were whispering and chatting, and the noise filled the restaurant.

"Why should we believe what you said?" A boy wearing black-rimmed glasses asked, "What if it's some prank? Maybe it's a reality show, and a camera crew is hidden in the dark to observe our reactions and actions."

"If you don't believe me, go outside and watch it by yourself. If you can find a living person or a video camera, I'll take your last name." Zhou Lian's eyebrows twitched, and his face looked unfriendly. "I believe this is the first time you have encountered this situation. I hope you don't panic. Let's discuss countermeasures together and what to do next."

Ye Yingting raised his arms.

Zhou Lian: "Alright, let's invite the first discoverer, Classmate Ye, to speak."

Ye Yingting stretched his fingers, he squeezed his earphones, and said: "I have taken pictures and videos and uploaded them to the police, and I have also contacted the local tourism bureau. A ferry will come to pick us up at six o'clock tonight."

Yu Zhen and Du Yu were sitting at a small table in the corner. He was holding a red apple and had just taken a big bite. Seeing Zhou Lian's red-faced embarrassment, he giggled vaguely.

"Uh... I think the best option is to call the police when encountering an unsolvable situation." Ye Yingting put down his hands in embarrassment.

"That's right." A rich-looking young woman stood up gracefully, holding a paper-thin reader in her hand, "I also notified my family and friends, and posted location information on my personal homepage. There is no one on this island, and people from outside will come in and look for us."

"Then, I'll excuse you first." She smiled coquettishly, turned and left, with an unforgettable figure.

Yu Zhen whispered in Du Yu's ear, "Is she prettier or is your sister prettier?"

Du Yu didn't answer, but gave him a vague look, not to be fooled by him.

The news that Ye Yingting has called the police is like a reassurance, which dissipates the tense and uneasy atmosphere at the scene. Since there will be a ferry arriving in the evening, the island has not lost contact with the outside world. The disappearance will be investigated by the police. Dry.

Everyone got up and went back to the room.

A few girls came forward to thank Zhou Lian, saying that they were grateful for his reminder, otherwise they would not have known such a big thing happened on the island.

Yu Zhen gnawed at the apple, puffed his cheeks and said, "I suggest that you don't leave this hotel until the ferry arrives at the pier."

The disappearance of Erica cast a color of conspiracy in his heart.

Why do the townspeople disappear en masse?Why is it that the people who live in this hotel are so nice?

And, what to do with the haunted mirror in their room?

The suspicious factor in his nerves was beating excitedly, reminding him that this matter is not that simple, and it cannot be easily ended.

The people in the restaurant gradually left, leaving messy tables and chairs and cold food on the dining table.

The chef of the hotel should have disappeared along with the front desk, not to mention the restaurant on the street.Therefore, eating became Yu Zhen's first problem to solve.

"Can you cook?" he asked Du Yu.The two of them were the last ones left.

Du Yu: "Yes."

"I knew it." Yu Zhen finished eating the apple, wiped his hands with a paper towel, and pushed Du Yu to the kitchen, "Let's cook."

The back kitchen is next door to the restaurant, entered through a small door.

The moment Yu Zhen pushed open the door, his eyes were burned by the bright and hot flame behind the door.

He got used to the light, and then stared at it—it was a candle, the light was so dazzling that the ten-square-meter kitchen was filled with burning white candles.

The specific grease smell of melting wax oil mixed with the strong smell of blood rushed straight to his forehead, and the high temperature condensed by hundreds of candles surrounded his whole body.

What are you doing?Suicide or attempted arson?

No, this is...

In the center of the circular pattern surrounded by candles is a flat-lying male corpse, wearing a chef's apron and white hat, with a kitchen knife stuck in his chest. A three-inch-deep pool of blood formed under the corpse, soaking half of the male corpse's body.

Yu Zhen retreated to the door and hit Du Yu's chest with his back.

He asked: "...the magic circle?"

Du Yu said, "It's more like a sacrifice."

The author has something to say:

I wish everyone a happy Lantern Festival, have you eaten glutinous rice balls~