47: Forty-seven.

Freak 47: Forty-seven.

Freak The curtain of the carriage was lifted slightly.

Anna peeked out from behind the curtain with caution.

She seemed to forget that she didn’t have a physical body, keeping her posture as if she were a cat that had arrived in unfamiliar territory, wary of her surroundings.

But apart from the occasional crackling of torches, the night was silent and serene.

The air, however, felt more oppressive than before, as if rain was about to fall soon.

“Huh?”

Anna, who had been looking around, suddenly let out a light exclamation and stared towards a corner of the garden.

A carriage lay hidden in the darkness, nearly blending into the overgrown wild grass, making it difficult to notice.

“Could there be someone here?”

Anna scratched her head in confusion.

…

Page One

[I’m not crazy!

I am a normal person!

Why did they insist on sending me here…

Am I not their daughter!

What kind of parents can bear to send their own child to an asylum!

I must escape…

I must escape!]

Page Two

[I don’t know what my parents have told them, but it’s clear the medical staff look at me in a strange way…

not just strange, but I can feel that they are watching me, restricting my freedom.

Those mentally ill patients are free to wander the garden, but not me.]

Page Three

[That trick didn’t work, I merely took a fork during lunch, and they actually found out it was me who took it after just an hour and a half…

Why does every member of the medical staff here act like prison guards!

Is this place a hospital or a prison!?]

Page Four

[Something is very wrong…

They injected me with a needle this morning, and after the injection, they took me to the basement…

Why?

There are many empty rooms upstairs.

I told them I have claustrophobia, but they said strange things like how confinement can treat claustrophobia.

Something is very wrong…

What did they inject me with?

Why do my joints feel itchy…

is it an allergy?

I feel very wrong…]

Page Five

[It’s both painful and itchy…

It’s not cold at all, but my fingers seem to be frozen, they can’t even bend…

It took me half an hour or more to write these words.

Why should I suffer this punishment…

I’m only mentally quest…

No!

I am not sick at all!

I want to sunbathe…

Who will save me…]

Page Six

[There is a problem…

there must be a problem.

They came to give me another injection of that drug, and every time they inject it, my joints become stiffer…

What are they doing?

Human experimentation?]

Page Seven

[I tried to resist, but I failed.

After the injection, they wanted me to wear a straitjacket, lying on the bed without moving.

However, finally, they compromised temporarily under my threat of death, temporarily.]

Page Eight

[I can’t take it anymore…

I can’t go on…

My fingers can no longer bend, I am holding the pen with both hands to write these words, and I am even beginning to lose my hair, a lot of it…

How long have I been sent here?

A few days?

A week?

Or ten days?

It feels like it’s been a year…

Tomorrow when they come to give me the shot, I have to find a way to escape…

Otherwise, I will definitely die here.]

Page Nine

The handwriting on this page was drastically different from the previous increasingly sloppy script, as if written by someone else, and the entire page had only five words.

[You can’t run away.]

The content on the notebook ends here.

Lu Li put down the notebook; he needed to organize his thoughts.

First of all, this is reality, not a horror movie or a horror game—even though it’s another world.

If this diary appeared in a game, given its absurd content, it might serve as an important clue for players to analyze the plot, but if brought into reality, it seems… slightly contrived.

Just like the phrase “Oh, I’m going to kick your ass” only exists in fiction; no one would seriously say it in real life.

Of course, there might be exceptions—but the probability of that happening is probably even lower than bumping into a ghost.

Especially since the notebook was placed so conspicuously, as if afraid that someone coming in wouldn’t see it.

In the midst of his silent contemplation, a slight and odd noise suddenly came from the room.

Lu Li’s gaze shifted from the notebook to the vent at the end of the footprints.

Inside, the sound of something scraping and moving echoed slowly…

An animal couldn’t make such a sound of heavy crawling.

The fingernails on his right hand hanging by his side twitched slightly, deftly unhooking the gun holster behind his waist.

Rustle rustle—

The movement in the ventilation duct suddenly sped up.

The thing crawling inside was coming quickly and then all but stopped as it was about to emerge!

The eerie silence in the room lasted for a few seconds before a bang exploded, and the vent cover was forcefully knocked open, flying out.

A disheveled figure staggered out from the narrow ventilation duct, its stiff body crawling on the ground, moving towards Lu Li.

“Why didn’t you come to save me… Why didn’t you come to save me…” it moaned.

Lu Li grasped the handle of his gun and drew it from the holster, only to put it back the next moment.

He didn’t feel any ghostly presence from the “ghost” opposite him.

Also—he couldn’t understand why a “ghost” would carry around an oil lamp.

Without a word, the disheveled figure suddenly stopped crawling, swiftly climbed to its feet, wiped its messy hair from its forehead, and pointed dirty fingers at Lu Li: “Wait a minute, where did this guy come from?”

“…?” The sudden contrast stunned Lu Li for a moment, but then he regained his composure and slid the Spirit-Calling Gun back into its holster.

“Wrong—” came a shout from the side.

A closet in the corner was pushed open, and a burly man wearing a newsboy cap, holding an oil lamp, jumped out.

He waved away the dust in front of him, coughing and spitting: “Cough cough cough… ptui!

Your expression is all wrong here, and so is the action.

I remember telling you, when you see a ghost, you have to scream and fall back, hey wait a minute…”

Finally noticing something was amiss, the burly man sized up Lu Li a few times, his tone suddenly rose several notches: “Who are you!?”

“Detective, hired to investigate some things here.”

“What’s there to investigate in such a broken place?” The burly man scoffed, looking up at the cobwebbed ceiling with contempt.

Lu Li wasn’t interested in explaining, and slightly lifted his eyes: “What are you doing?”

The burly man pointed at the person playing the ghost: “Just as you see, writing a novel.”

“What I see has nothing to do with a novel,” Lu Li calmly debunked the other’s lie.

“Location scouting and staging scenes are essential skills for a writer,” the burly man expounded, displaying delicate consideration and lofty aspirations that belied his rough exterior: “Great works are often born from reality, even if it’s a fictional one.”

Indeed, that does make sense.

Otherwise, it couldn’t be explained why someone would come to an Abandoned Asylum in the perilous depths of the night, have a companion dressed as a ghost, while he hides in a closet secretly observing everything.