Chapter Six: Li Juetian’s Astonishment

“Hallucinating?” The Fatty blinked in confusion. He figured it must be a vision brought on by sheer exhaustion from constantly evading the police lately, so he paid it no mind and turned to head back.

He hadn’t gone more than a couple of steps when, glancing back by chance, he suddenly saw that the doll seemed to be peeking at him from behind a nearby pillar.

That one glance was enough to scare him stiff. He twisted himself around, eyes wide as saucers in disbelief.

“No way, no way, it’s just an illusion! It must be a hallucination!”

He looked back again, but now there was nothing behind the pillar.

So it was a hallucination after all!

Even so, his steps quickened unconsciously until he was nearly running. But he hadn’t gotten far before he tripped over something and fell flat.

Getting up and turning to see what had tripped him, he suddenly realized it was the back of a doll!

This time he didn’t look away. He stared fixedly at the doll, determined to see clearly whether this was a hallucination or not.

But as his eyes grew sore and he blinked reflexively, in that instant, the doll’s face turned to him, grinning as it locked eyes with his.

“My god! It’s a ghost!”

Now he was sure—this was no hallucination, but something truly unknown entangling him.

He fled in a blind panic and soon reached the crowd.

“What’s wrong, Fatty? Did you spot the police?” a man asked, seeing him bent over, hands on his knees and gasping for breath.

Fatty grabbed the man’s shoulder, his voice trembling. “It’s worse than the police! A doll! It’s a doll!”

Worse than the police? The group was baffled. In their line of work, what could possibly be scarier than the police?

One of them eyed Fatty, then pointed at his shoulder. “Fatty, is that the doll you’re talking about?”

Hearing that, Fatty’s heart nearly stopped. He slowly turned his head, praying silently: Please, don’t let it be on my shoulder. But when he looked, there was nothing there.

Seeing his reaction, the man burst out laughing, clutching his stomach. “Fatty, you’re really something. Scared out of your wits by a doll?”

A surge of anger flared in Fatty’s chest. He reached out, ready to teach the kid a lesson, but the next moment, his hand froze in midair.

“You… you… The doll is right behind you!” Fatty’s face was a mask of terror as he stared past the joking man’s back.

“Me? I’m not afraid of some doll,” the man scoffed, sure Fatty was just trying to scare him.

But before the words were out of his mouth, a sharp pain tore through his back. He reached for the spot, then stared at his hand—now slick with blood. Looking down, he saw a gaping wound in his abdomen.

“Ah—” He barely managed a scream before collapsing forward, landing directly atop the petrified Fatty. Behind him, at some point, an unbelievably terrifying doll had appeared.

“The doll’s killing people!” someone finally realized.

Panic erupted as everyone rushed toward the exit. But as soon as they reached the door, a small figure barred the way—it was Long Mengting, ordered to block the entrance.

Long Mengting raised her hand, which instantly grew enormous, and with a casual swipe, she smashed a man’s head to pulp.

The remaining survivors scattered like headless chickens. Meanwhile, Feng Tianlin issued a command to Long Mengting: “Spare the children—kill everyone else!”

Three minutes later, the air was thick with the stench of blood. The abandoned garage was strewn with corpses. Feng Tianlin led five children out, removed their blindfolds, and walked away without looking back.

He needed those children to tell the police who was responsible.

Once he was far enough away and sure there was no one around, Feng Tianlin began to check his Fear Points.

He now had 1,300 Fear Points, just enough to boost his strength.

“Let’s see… Upgrading Nightmare Body to Level 2 costs 500 points. Do it!”

After the upgrade, Feng Tianlin felt noticeably stronger and faster. All in all, the improvement was impressive.

But upgrading to Level 3 would require 1,000 points!

“Never mind, let’s check the skills.”

He shifted his focus from Nightmare Body to the skill tree.

All the skills required between 500 and 1,000 Fear Points. He settled on one called Phantom, which could project a ghostly double identical to himself. It might seem useless, but it could be quite effective for scaring people.

After a moment’s hesitation, he spent 800 Fear Points to learn it.

Feeling the new power coursing through him, Feng Tianlin clumsily guided it and activated the skill.

In the next instant, two dolls identical to him appeared before his eyes. He tried to control them, but no matter how he tried, he couldn’t direct their actions.

Damn, what a rip-off! Nowhere did it say he couldn’t control them beforehand!

Then again, it never said he could…

He dismissed the two phantoms, refusing to dwell on being scammed by the system, and looked ahead with determination.

He needed more Fear Points.

...

Outside the abandoned parking lot, Captain Wang stood with a deep frown, surrounded by a group of retching police officers.

It wasn’t that their nerves were weak—the scene inside was simply too horrific for any ordinary person to stomach.

He dialed his phone with practiced ease. “Yes, it’s that doll again…”

Soon, a car pulled up—the same one Li Juetian and his brother had driven earlier.

Li Juetian got out, his face tight with anger, a far cry from the smile he’d worn before. He hadn’t expected the doll to cause so much trouble again so soon.

After getting a briefing from Captain Wang, he quickly set about his investigation, with Han Zhen frantically taking notes behind him.

“Interview the police, interview the children, examine the scene, and then…”

The more he learned, the more shocked he became, his anger melting into utter disbelief.

“How is this possible? There are actually two of them working together? And they deliberately spared the children? Could they have a conscience?”

This was no longer merely intelligence—this was practically humanity!

He had personally eliminated at least a hundred such bizarre entities, but never had he seen them cooperate, let alone intentionally leave survivors. Such behavior was unheard of.

He turned to Han Zhen, face grave. “Record this at once—this entity is no ordinary anomaly.”

Though puzzled, Han Zhen dutifully wrote: “Suspected anomalous entities working in tandem; survivors left at the scene; possibly possess high intelligence…”

When he finished, Han Zhen stared at his boss in disbelief. “Is this… is this really true?”

Li Juetian smacked him on the forehead. “Would I joke about something like this?” He waved him on. “Hurry, get in the car and deliver this report to headquarters. This can’t wait.”

The report soon reached Team Leader Xiao’s desk, but after a single glance, he shredded it to pieces.

“Damn it, if you don’t want to catch this doll, just say so! No need for this kind of protest! What a far-fetched excuse!”

He didn’t believe a word of it. After all, humanity had been dealing with anomalous entities for decades, and all research showed them to be utterly chaotic beings. Even the most exceptional among them had the intelligence of a five- or six-year-old child at best, with no sense of cooperation—often they were even hostile to one another.