Chapter Fourteen: Messages and the Young Girl

After a full night’s sleep, Chen Qing finally shed the fatigue that had lingered for so long. Only once he was certain that both his body and mind had returned to peak condition did he smile and power on his phone, which had been shut off for three or four days.

There wasn't much to read on his phone. Aside from two messages from his teacher asking about his absences, there was little else worth his attention.

He deleted the messages one by one, but as he reached the more recent ones, a particular text caught his eye.

“You did well... but some things must come at a price…”

Chen Qing was silent for a moment. He copied down the phone number on paper.

It was a private call. Was it disdain for using a burner phone? Or perhaps just a misdirected message?

After pondering for a while, he dialed Jiang Wan’s number.

“Hey? You’re awake? Have you been to the hospital?”

“You know I’m fine,” Chen Qing replied, shaking his head.

“Good timing... I was looking for you too. Are you free right now?”

“You need something?” he asked, surprised.

“Yes, but it’s not convenient to talk on the phone. I’ll come pick you up.”

Before Chen Qing could say more, she had already hung up.

Half an hour later, Jiang Wan appeared at the door of his rented apartment. When he answered her call, Chen Qing was somewhat surprised.

“You actually found me? I thought you’d go to...”

“Your other place?” Jiang Wan shook her head. “I checked all your records yesterday. The rental is officially registered.”

Chen Qing paused, his face darkening slightly.

“What’s wrong? Why the sudden visit this early?” he asked.

Jiang Wan waved for him to follow her, and the two made their way to the car downstairs.

“The Inspector’s Office got a call, but our supervisor thought the caller should seek out a psychiatrist, not us. Apparently, this family has called many times before, but their requests were always dismissed. Coincidentally, they called again today. After hearing their story, I believed it was more than mere delusion. So, I applied to take this case.”

She got into the car, handing Chen Qing a breakfast from the passenger seat. “Given the principle of investigating every case, the higher-ups were more than happy to assign this one to me.”

“You think it’s connected to that organization?” Chen Qing was caught off guard.

“Yes. But maybe, as you said... it could be the little girl stumbled into the Backrooms just once.”

He frowned, nodding. “Let’s make a deal. I’ll help you get to the bottom of this case, but if we uncover anything valuable in the process, I want seventy percent.”

She nodded, indifferent.

“That’s just the condition, not the content of the deal,” he said seriously, gazing at her. “I need your help to find out who registered my rental information in the Inspector’s Office system.”

Jiang Wan was taken aback. “Your identity...”

“I didn’t use my real credentials.”

His eyes held a trace of fear as he looked at her.

When did he start being watched?

“You...” she hesitated, then heard Chen Qing continue, “And... help me check this number. It might be connected to the person we’re after.”

Jiang Wan nodded, her eyes sweeping over the note before typing something into her phone.

Another half hour later, the two arrived at the home of the person who reported the case.

A haggard couple greeted them at the door. The wife, clearly unkempt for days, didn’t seem to care about appearances, even with guests present.

Their surname was Zhang. The husband was Zhang Derong, the wife Zhang Yan. They had a daughter, fifteen years old, in secondary school.

The trouble began after their daughter came home from school one afternoon.

According to Mr. Zhang, after coming home that day, their daughter acted secretive, clutching her backpack and locking herself in her room. No matter how much her mother called her to bathe, eat, or even use the bathroom, she refused to respond.

After a day of this, Mrs. Zhang’s patience broke. She forced the door open, and what she saw would haunt both parents forever.

They found their daughter suspended in the center of the room by ropes tied to her limbs. Black-brown wooden splinters pierced all ten of her fingers, and iron spikes pried open her toes.

Astonishingly, after they freed her, all the wounds vanished. The girl herself seemed to have just come to her senses, bewildered and a little angry, demanding to know why her parents had entered her room and left such a mess.

When they explained it was all her doing, she froze in disbelief.

She looked at them and asked, “How could that be? I just got home.”

Her parents showed her their phones, proving she’d been home an entire day.

Since then, the girl’s mind often drifted, and strange things began to happen around the house.

Chen Qing frowned, glancing at the villa’s decor. The ceiling—supposedly the cleanest part of the house—was tinged with faint pink, as if something had been painted over.

Was it blood? Chen Qing frowned again.

“Miss Jiang… and this is?” Zhang Derong asked, surprised at the unfamiliar Chen Qing. He’d been told only one investigator would come.

“Oh, him.” Jiang Wan smiled coolly. “He’s a ‘specialist’ hired by our team, surname Chen. Call him Chen Qing, or just Chen, as you like.”

“Oh?” Chen Qing was a bit surprised.

But the couple simply nodded, not pressing further.

“Tell us what happened,” he said.

“Didn’t I explain over the phone?”

“But I haven’t heard it yet.”

“Alright…”

With a sigh, Zhang Derong led them upstairs.

“Since that day, my daughter’s like a different person… as if… there are two of her.”

“Split personality?” Chen Qing asked.

“Something like that, maybe,” Mr. Zhang replied. “When she has an episode—pardon me, but that’s the only word I can use—she remembers nothing afterward.”

“We took her to every hospital we could, but…”

Chen Qing and Jiang Wan exchanged a look, curiosity in their eyes. “What happened after that?”

“After that…” Zhang Derong faltered on the stairs, glancing at his wife’s exhausted face before making a decision.

“After that, strange things kept happening—at first, just some broken dishes. Then it was as if there was someone else in the house. More food consumed, more things used. You know? Food meant for three people for three days would be gone in two.”

Chen Qing frowned slightly, thinking the reasoning rather bizarre.

Seeing this, Mr. Zhang grew agitated. “And! Anything you can count—our door locks, our…” He fell silent, fear filling his eyes. “It’s like there’s someone else… someone knocks on the bathroom door, food goes missing at dinner. He lives right under our noses…”

Chen Qing listened, then went to Mr. Zhang’s side and patted his shoulder. “Don’t worry. Could we see your daughter first? We’ll handle it.”

Mr. Zhang gritted his teeth, his expression uneasy. “This is already the third place we’ve moved… If this keeps up, I…”

He didn’t finish. The four of them now stood before the girl’s room. But the door was not what one would expect for a teenage girl.

Thick iron chains locked the door, and the food slot was tightly bound with rope.

“Trust me, sir…” Mr. Zhang said softly, “If you were me, you’d do the same.”

He looked pale, pulling an old brass key from his pocket.

“Your house keys are so old-fashioned?” Jiang Wan asked.

“No… no. My daughter insisted on it.”

He lowered the key, clutching his wife’s hand, and quietly stepped back.

Jiang Wan pointed at the door, then at his forehead and legs, her meaning clear.

“It’s possible, but maybe not,” he said, inserting the key into the chains.

As the chains clattered to the ground, someone inside seemed to awaken. With a thud, a pair of filthy hands gripped the food slot’s edge.

“Let me out! Let me go! You’ll all die for this! Die for this!”

Her voice was hoarse and weak, but her words were charged with fierce conviction.

Chen Qing frowned, crouching to peer through the slot.

“You’re ill.”

Before the girl could answer, he stood and pushed the door open.

As Jiang Wan and Chen Qing swung the door wide, the room inside finally came into view.

Grotesque red symbols covered the walls. Beneath them, heaps of decaying matter formed mountains, at the center of which crouched the girl, her hand still trapped in the door slot.

Chen Qing paused, meeting the girl’s cloudy gaze. He raised his palm. “Hi?”

Jiang Wan looked from one to the other, stunned for a long while.

“Are you serious?”