My House of Horrors

“Boss, you’re looking swell this morning.” When Xu Wan arrived, she saw Chen Ge arguing with the white cat, which was perched at the top of the tree. Instead of being surprised, she found this to be quite normal.

“Xiao Wan, go and put on your make-up first. Today, the people from Tian Teng Medical School will be visiting us for a cross-study. You’re my only presentable worker, so I’ll be counting on you today!”

“Okay.” Xu Wan pointed at the white cat munching on Chen Ge’s jacket. “Do you need my help?”

“It’s alright. I can handle a mere cat.”

Long story short, when Chen Ge woke up that morning, he had realized that there was still time for laundry, so he had collected the dirty clothes that needed washing. While he was not paying attention, the white cat had dragged the jacket in which the kittens had once been wrapped up in to the tree. “I’m not going to wash that jacket! Please come down!”

New Century Park opened at 9 am, and it was quite obvious that almost half of them headed directly to the Haunted House. “Today’s visitors are even more numerous than yesterday.”

Chen Ge’s Haunted House was by far the most popular attraction.

“Boss Chen!” There was a small group of familiar faces at the front of the crowd. When Chen Ge saw them, his face lit up. Seeing Chen Ge’s smile, the proprietor from Tian Teng Medical School shivered involuntarily. He lowered his head and coughed. “We came with a few friends from within the circle, and everyone wishes to visit your Haunted House.”

The proprietor winked at Chen Ge, and the inherent meaning was quite clear. They came with their fans and friends, so hopefully, Chen Ge could save them some face. “Friends from within the circle?”

Chen Ge looked behind them and discovered the weird atmosphere. Other than the few actors from Tian Teng Medical School, the rest of them did not seem like they were there to play.

“Let me make some introductions. This is Han Qiuming, our district’s best Haunted House designer. He has worked with many international teams and is the brain behind Tian Teng Medical School. When you visited us, Mr. Han was overseas.” The proprietor leaned sideways to show a tall, thin man with thick spectacles. The man’s attitude was cold.

“The short-haired girl next to Mr. Han is Ye Xiaoxin. She’s a famous online blogger with more than 600,000 followers. Her focus is reviewing Haunted Houses, and she has reviewed more than fifty Haunted Houses throughout the country.” The proprietor’s face froze. “When she heard about you, she reached out to me because she was curious and stated her wish to come along.”

“Nice to meet you.” The girl looked like she was only slightly over twenty and had very fair skin. She was about 1.74 meters tall, and her long pair of legs grabbed everyone’s attention. Her style was very unisexual. With cropped hair, she looked as handsome as a young man. This kind of girl going into a Haunted House alone would be entertaining, so it was no wonder she had a huge following online.

“Boss Qian, don’t underestimate her.” The proprietor seemed to have suffered at the hands of the young woman before. “She has a high tolerance for fear. When she first entered Tian Teng Medical School, she played some nasty prank on our workers. Unfortunately, she was very bad with directions and requested us to lead her out after she wandered about the Haunted House for a full forty minutes.”

“That’s wonderful. I admire people with big hearts.” Many female visitors said that they were not afraid before entering the Haunted House, like the initial Gao Ru Xue. Chen Ge smiled kindly on the surface, but internally, he wondered if his Haunted House had scared this type of female visitor before.

“Oh well. If you’re fine with it, then alright.” Tian Teng Medical School’s proprietor saw how unfazed Chen Ge was, so he waved and said, “Come over here, we should be preparing to enter the Haunted House now.”

Three more people departed from the crowd, two boys and one girl. The girl looked familiar to Chen Ge. He remembered seeing her in the line when he visited Tian Teng Medical School. She had a cute face, very girl next door.

She walked forward to greet Chen Ge. “Do you still remember me? We met each other in the elevator at Tian Teng Medical School. My name is Su Luoluo.”

“Luoluo is a Haunted House aficionado, and most of us know her. The main reason she’s here is because of a lucky draw. She was chosen to experience your Haunted House with us,” the proprietor explained awkwardly. He could not bring himself to say the truth. His own workers had refused to come along, and since there were not enough people, he had to come up with this fan service, a “lucky draw”.

“Is that so? Then she sure is ‘lucky’.” The sun hit on Chen Ge’s face, and his smile was like a spring breeze, calming and soothing. Su Luoluo looked at him before lowering her face embarrassedly.

“You’ve met the other two. They’re the workers from my Haunted House.” The proprietor pointed at the two men who stood at the back. “The large one is Song An; he was the security ghost. The smaller one is Du Chaojin; he was the one hiding inside the steel box.”

Since Song An was not ‘attacked’ by Chen Ge, he came forth and greeted Chen Ge politely. However, Du Chaojin reacted differently. He had been hiding inside the steel box to scare Chen Ge, but he had instead been shocked by the ‘Wedding Dress’ tune that suddenly appeared behind him. To make matters worse, Boss Chen moved to block the front of the box, so he could not escape even if he wanted to. He had screamed and yelled before being allowed to crawl out of the steel box with half of his soul gone.

Meeting his ‘nemesis’ again, his face turned paler and paler. Chen Ge walked to Du Chaojin and was surprised. The young man was at most eighteen, and he was incredibly thin and youthful. He was probably working at Tian Teng Medical School part-time. “Without the make-up, I barely recognized you. Who would have thought you’re the patient who was yelling so desperately to get out from the box?”

Before Xiao Du exploded, the proprietor pulled Chen Ge aside swiftly. “Boss Chen, six of us are visiting at the same time, so we’ll depend on your arrangement.”

The proprietor stood facing away from the other guests and kept winking at Chen Ge. Chen Ge understood what he was getting at. “Currently, my Haunted House has four themed scenarios. Minghun, Murder by Midnight, Mu Yang High School, and the newly added Third Sick Hall. The difficulty for Minghun and Murder by Midnight is just normal, and Third Sick Hall is the most difficult, so I suggest you take the moderately difficult Mu Yang High School.”

“Alright, we’ll visit that one.” The proprietor nodded, but the people behind him had things to say.

“Boss Chen sure is being unkind.” Han Qiuming pushed on his thick glasses. “Before we arrived, we asked around, and people told us your Haunted House’s most difficult scenario. The one that no one has solved to this day is Mu Yang High School. This is already the most difficult challenge, and you are trying to pass it off as moderately difficult? Isn’t that a bit too much?”

“I’m being unkind?”

“Are you afraid that letting us clear the most difficult scenario will make you lose face? That’s why you made up this scenario that is supposedly more difficult?” Han Qiuming smirked. “Designing a large themed scenario takes two to three months. Mu Yang High School has only been open for less than a week; where did you find time to design a new set?”

His thin lips continued to rise. “But no matter, the result will be the same. The reason we’re here today is to clear all of your scenarios!”

“Qiuming, don’t be silly. Boss Chen is not that kind of person.” The proprietor pulled on Han Qiuming’s arm. A bad feeling surfaced in his heart. Chen Ge listened to the man quietly and did not retort. Uncle Xu had once said, as a theme park worker, he should try his best to satisfy the visitors’ need.

He thought about it, and the smile returned to his face. “In that case, how about we start with the Third Sick Hall? If you can still manage to walk after that, we’ll go to Mu Yang High School.”