The corridor was silent.
"Are you the owner of the house?" he asked, putting down his bowl of food and stepping out. But the hallway was still shrouded in darkness.
He turned on his phone's light, but the hallway remained just as dark. Then he noticed the moon casting shadows of swaying trees on the wall opposite."It must be the shadows of the trees that made me think someone was there," he thought, retreating back into the kitchen to check again. Indeed, it was just the elongated shadows of the trees mixed with the dim indoor light, resembling a tall shadowy figure.
"Don't scare yourself; eating comes first!" he whispered to himself, finding a spoon as quickly as possible and taking his first bite. The warm rice and fragrant cured meat instantly filled his mouth with satisfaction. The blend of lean and fatty meat melted in his mouth, the salty soy sauce and mild black pepper creating a comforting, familiar taste with a hint of garlic.
This simple dish of cured meat fried rice made him realize how a warm meal can bring strength and hope to a tired, lonely person.
After a while, he slumped over the kitchen table, looking up with a satisfied sigh.
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw a shadow cast on the wall behind him, causing his heart to skip a beat—it seemed like there were two shadows, with one shadow appearing to be lying on the other's back, watching his head.
Mo Wen shot up, quickly turning around, but there was nothing—only one dark shadow under the light, and the shape of his head was the reflection of several round pans.
"There's no way it's a ghost; I must be seeing things,"
Mo Wen reassured himself, forcing himself to sit back down and eat. Yet he couldn't shake the feeling of an icy gaze piercing through his back, watching him closely. He kept glancing around, but the kitchen remained silent and the hallway dark, though his fear continued to grow, as if he were prey being stalked by a hidden hunter.
Luckily, the delicious food brought him some joy, and the fullness in his stomach made him exhale deeply. Mo Wen felt a bit more energized and decided to explore the big house, hoping to find a place to sleep.
Back in the hallway, the wooden floorboards creaked louder, like an old, unlubricated machine. Even after he left the kitchen, the shadow on the wall seemed to stay behind, still hunched over as if eating.
The creaking grew louder, and Mo Wen worried about the floor beneath him. He noticed a large hole in the corner of the hallway floor, revealing the space below—what looked like a laundry room, with an old boiler faintly reflecting in the moonlight. Startled, he quickly stepped away from the shaky floor.
Mo Wen wanted to return to the front hall and began to retrace his steps. After several twists and turns, he pushed open a door, finding moonlight and a breath of fresh air greeting him. At the bottom of a short staircase lay an abandoned tool shed and a dried-up vegetable garden.
The withered stems on the ground silently spoke of long-forgotten times. Mo Wen's eyes scanned the garden, suddenly reminded that the front lawn was moist, yet this place was so dry. Was this really the villa's backyard? Something felt off, his instincts warned him.
Just then, a sharp"crack" sounded ahead, like a pot breaking, shattering the night's silence.
He stopped abruptly, his eyes scanning the direction of the sound, his voice hoarse as he asked,"Who's there?"
Dead silence followed, as if even the air had frozen.
-----------------
Mo Wen frowned, his throat dry as he tried to calm himself. He walked forward slowly, the soles of his shoes making a faint rustling sound on the ground, like some unknown creature whispering in the shadows. Behind the tool shed, rows of wooden shelves stood in the dark, their long shadows intertwining like an altar dedicated to some unknown deity, covered with jars of all sizes.
He approached the shelves, brushing his fingers lightly over the jars' surfaces. They were cold and rough, as if they'd been sealed away for ages. The larger jars could swallow him whole, while the smaller ones… were eerily the size of human heads. As Mo Wen's fingers accidentally touched beneath one jar, he felt a piece of paper. He pulled it out, frowning, and inspected it under his phone's light—it was an old, yellowed newspaper, edges tattered, thick with dust, as if it had been asleep for years.
"Several missing cases reported in one year, fifteen residents unaccounted for."
Mo Wen's Adam's apple bobbed as he scanned further down the page, finding that the photos of the missing people had blurred with age. One could just barely make out a woman wearing a worn straw hat, standing in a field. Smaller text appeared at the bottom of the newspaper:
"...Police found numerous human remains at a farm site, and not far away, in a hollow of an old locust tree, they discovered a female corpse..."
A chill crawled up Mo Wen's spine as he instinctively turned to the silent jars. Moonlight streamed through a broken window, casting long shadows of the jars, like countless bowed spirits listening intently.
He slowly climbed the shelves, trying to peer inside the jars—they had indeed been here a long time, weathered and cracked, with gaps at their bases filled with countless locust tree seeds.
"Plop—"
A plump locust seed fell from the shadows behind the shelves, landing with a dull thud on a jar.
Mo Wen froze, his eyes scanning the direction of the sound, his breathing quickening. He began to move through the gaps between the shelves, only to find after several turns that the surroundings were identical.
Every corner looked familiar, the passages between the shelves sometimes wide, sometimes narrow, some even slightly tilted, like a deliberately designed maze trapping him in endless repetition.
"Why did the owner collect so many jars? Is it a small workshop? But they don't match the villa's atmosphere at all..."
Continuing forward, he unwittingly reached a corner where an old locust tree stood.
Its twisted trunk resembled a struggling body in the moonlight. Deep grooves snaked like arms, exuding an ancient, oppressive aura. A gentle breeze rustled the leaves, and a dry pod split open with a"pop," a locust seed rolling to his feet.
Mo Wen looked down, his scalp tingling—the ground was covered in locust seeds, their cracked shells like countless squinting eyes silently watching him.
"Thump... thump... thump..."
A faint noise came from a nearby jar rack.
It sounded like something tumbling inside the jars, hitting the inner walls urgently, intermittently, as if some creature was eager to break free.
Mo Wen's stomach tightened, a chill climbing from his spine to the nape of his neck. He fought the unease, trying to find an exit from the maze of shelves. However, as he turned, something moved on his pant leg quietly—
The locust seeds were slowly crawling up his pants, his clothes, like countless tiny eyes clinging silently to his back!