Guai Dao Hu Zong Ren

  This sudden silence made me feel very uncomfortable. Hu Zongren and I stared at the hair strands on the air vent, Hu Zongren took out a small card camera from his bag and took a few photos of the hair, then he reached out and pulled those hair strands, finding them to be quite dense, but with a bit of force, they could still be pulled off.

  The elevator continued to ascend floor by floor. Hu Zongren handed me the strands of hair, asking me to take a look and see if I could find any clues. He himself remained vigilant, watching for any anomalies in the elevator. I spread the strands out on my palm, examining them carefully. They were several dry yellowish strands that seemed oily. What was noteworthy was that when Hu Zongren and I first inspected the elevator, we had thoroughly checked this ventilation opening, but there hadn't been any hair strands then. There was only a faint breeze blowing from the opening. After Hu Zongren and I changed into women's clothes and put on wigs, we re-entered the elevator and checked again. This meant that these hair strands must have appeared around 7:51. I thought for a moment, wondering if it could be that when Hu Zongren and I were wearing our wigs, they got sucked up and stuck in the opening due to our struggles, causing some of the fake hair to break off. But I quickly dismissed this idea because I looked at the wigs on the ground - both mine and Hu Zongren's were pure black. Moreover, as professionals, if we needed to buy wigs or other simulated items, we would never purchase ones made from real human hair. Who could guarantee that the original owner of the hair was alive or dead? It was already confusing enough; there was no need to look for more trouble.

  The wig we bought was black, but the hair in my hand was yellow. This actually tells me that the hair sticking out of the air vent and the wig we bought are not the same, which means this hair is from the air vent of the elevator. Although I don't know why, my intuition tells me that this hair must have a great relationship with the ghost in this elevator.

  I stood up, took out the lighter, and lit a strand of hair in my hand. A pungent smell rose, similar to the smell of burning plastic when I was naughty as a child. So I said to Hu Zongren, this strand of hair must have been brought by that ghost for some reason, and it's also a wig.

  At this moment, the elevator had already reached the top floor. Hu Zongren looked at me and nodded, saying "pull down some more hair, don't throw it away". Then he directly pressed the elevator to minus one floor, saying "let's go to Zhang Dajie's office, let's take a good look at the video again, now that the scope has narrowed down, it shouldn't be too difficult to find". So we went all the way down, without stopping in between, and safely arrived at the property management office. As soon as we walked in, Zhang Dajie immediately called the monitoring room to copy the video, which she handed over to me and Hu Zongren.

  Because of the initial strong downward force in the elevator, the black dress I was wearing ripped open a large hole under my arm. Thinking it's okay, anyway, I didn't want to go back to that costume rental place again, so as not to be mistaken for being gay by the store owner. In the video, when the elevator was between the 9th and 10th floors, I saw a pair of white, slightly transparent hands slowly extending from above Hu Zongren's and my heads. However, when the hand touched our wigs, it suddenly seemed to grab our hair with great force and pull upwards. Since I was prepared, I immediately pulled back and ducked down. In the video, I could clearly see that the hand grabbing my hair was entangled by my red rope, but because of this, it dropped the two wigs from its hands, grabbed my red rope with one hand, and broke it off with both hands.

  I have to say, the way it snapped my rope looks like a very unpleasant feeling. Because it could have escaped after breaking free, but instead it deliberately snapped my rope in a fit of pique, which to me is a manifestation of great malice.

  The video afterwards was just like what we saw in the elevator, nothing unusual. It's just that at the moment when I burned my hair, there was a slight disturbance in the elevator screen. After watching it, Hu Zongren said, this problem must have occurred between the 9th and 10th floors. As for what exactly happened there, we still don't know.

  Hu Zongren instructed Zhang Dajie to call the female owners and elderly people who had previously encountered similar events, according to their registered phone numbers. Since it was already evening, most of them were at home. Although they didn't find everyone involved in the incident, they found almost all of them. According to their accounts, the strange phenomena that they could remember mostly occurred around the 9th and 10th floors. Hu Zongren asked Zhang Dajie, "What kind of people live on these two floors? Can you find them?" Zhang Dajie replied, "This building was originally used for both commercial and residential purposes. The entire 9th floor was rented to a technology company as an office space about a year ago, and the 10th floor has a small beauty salon, but the rest are all residential households." Hu Zongren asked, "Have there been any strange occurrences on these two floors that you know of?"

  Sister Zhang furrowed her brow and thought for a moment, saying no, it's fine, except that the company on the 9th floor moved out. Hu Zongren asked why they moved out, so who lives on the 9th floor now? Sister Zhang said that I heard they changed offices, so they terminated the lease here, and the entire 9th floor is empty now. The landlord had also looked for a house before, but the landlord couldn't rent out the house, and it's been vacant for almost a year.

  Hu Zongren and I exchanged a glance, we both knew that the scope had narrowed down even further. If strange things often happened on the 10th floor, then the owner would definitely have some rumors to spread. But the 10th floor was extremely peaceful, which meant that the people on that floor hadn't been disturbed by any paranormal phenomena at all. So the problem must be on the 9th floor. However, before it's confirmed, this will always be just a guess, and Hu Zongren and I could only hope that we weren't wrong this time.

  Hu Zongren suddenly said to us, "You guys wait for me, I'll go out for a bit and come back." After finishing speaking, he opened the door and left, leaving me in the office continuing to watch the video, thinking of ways to crack the case. About ten minutes later, Hu Zongren returned panting, indicating that he had run back. Indeed, he told me, "The matter has more or less taken shape. I just asked the old man who collects fees on the second floor below ground level, and he said that a year ago, a woman died in this building, specifically the vice president of the company on the 9th floor, who was also the general manager's wife." And because the elevator in this building can go directly to the garage, the funeral home's car came to pick up the body directly from the second floor below ground level, which is how he knew.

  I was a bit puzzled, so I asked Hu Zongren, "Do you mean that the woman died in the company?" Because this 9th floor is the company. Hu Zongren said, "It seems to be the case. The old man told me that she had a heart attack, and since there was no one else in the company at that time, she wasn't discovered until the next morning, and her body had already stiffened."

  So I realized that if my guess was correct, the time of death of the female deputy general manager of that company should be on a weekend or after working hours when no one was in the company. According to the current clues, the frequent occurrence of paranormal events is almost always around 7 pm, which coincidentally is also the time when people get off work. Therefore, this possibility is very high, because based on past experience, many ghostly apparitions are related to their own time of death, just like if an old fortune teller tells you that you will die on a certain day and month, then this time will be remembered by you whether you believe it or not. And when the time comes, even if you haven't died, you won't forget this date, but if you really did die, the meaning of this time is self-evident.

  I told my idea to Hu Zongren, and he also agreed with my speculation. Because he also knew that many ghosts would reappear at the time of their own death, regardless of any purpose or motivation, this appearance was unreasonable in our eyes. And the root cause of all this unreasonableness must be that there is still some thought in its heart, which prompted it to leave reluctantly and stay behind.

  At this point, Hu Zongren asked Zhang Dajie, so can you still contact the other people in the company that moved away? Zhang Dajie said, he only had the phone number registered at the beginning, which was the phone number of the general manager of that company, but it's been over a year now, and I don't know if the phone is still working.

  Hu Zongren thought for a moment and said, "Alright, you give me the phone number, we'll go find that general manager, and try to resolve this matter within tomorrow. Before we solve it, don't open that elevator temporarily, because we might need it later." Zhang Dajie copied down the number for Hu Zongren. Hu Zongren asked Zhang Dajie again, what kind of business did their previous company do? Zhang Dajie said, "That company specialized in making natural and non-toxic paint coatings. When our building first opened, they even held an event on the outside platform, and several of their bosses drank the coating in front of everyone." I was shocked and said, "You can drink paint?" Zhang Dajie said, "Yes, that's what they do. You know how it is with modern paints - this one exceeds standards, that one exceeds standards, bad for human health... That's why companies like theirs have a chance to develop." I didn't say anything else. Hu Zongren thought for a moment and then told Zhang Dajie, "You should be free tonight, just go home and rest," and threw the wig and clothes into the office, taking me with him back to the platform on the first floor.

  I asked Hu Zongren, why didn't you just make the call in the office? He looked at me and said, how could I tell him that your wife's ghost is still appearing in this building? Then he probably won't answer our calls from now on. I thought so too, so I asked him what to do next. Hu Zongren said, I'll call him now and say I want to order a large batch of their company's products, and try to arrange a meeting to discuss these things in person, it's better than not being able to find the person later. I agreed, but after Hu Zongren dialed the phone, he handed it over to me and smiled, saying you're better at lying than I am, and your mouth is more eloquent, so this kind of thing is left to you.

  I silently wished his mother well after I picked up the phone. The call went through, indicating that the other party had not changed their number yet, and this number was probably very important for his work. After the call connected, a middle-aged man's voice sounded from the other end of the phone, and I could still hear the TV sound, so he should also be at home during this time period. I greeted him politely, and since I learned from Zhang Dajie earlier that the general manager's surname was Yang, I had to address him as General Manager Yang.

  I told General Manager Yang, I knew you from a friend. Is your company still doing coatings and other businesses?

  I asked this because I was worried that the company might not be doing well or had changed its business nature, and if I didn't know, it would be easy to get stuck in the conversation. He said on the phone, "Yes, the company is still mainly engaged in coatings, but recently we have developed some new businesses similar to non-toxic organic materials." When he heard me asking about this, he surprisingly skipped over not asking who introduced me as a friend.

  As soon as I heard that, I quickly told him that our company is a new development project in Jiangbei District, and we are the project manager. Our houses are all high-rise buildings, and because of the high level, when we hand over the house, we will sell it according to the standard of decorated house, including painting and installation of some home appliances. However, one of our previous partner companies suddenly broke down, so we had to change partners temporarily. Since we have to change anyway, we want to change to a healthier brand, which is also a selling point for both your company and ours.

  He said that I was a big business he couldn't lose, and his tone became very polite. I thought it was time, so I said let's meet tomorrow at noon to discuss this matter. After saying this, I looked at Hu Zongren, who gave me a thumbs up. Yang agreed readily and then hung up the phone.

  After hanging up the phone, Hu Zongren smiled and said, "If he sees that his big business has turned into a ghost story tomorrow when we meet, what a blow it will be!" I spread my hands and returned the phone to him, saying this is also an unavoidable thing. Then I asked Hu Zongren, why don't we call out Pei Yunni to eat and drink something? Anyway, we have to wait until tomorrow for an answer. But Hu Zongren shook his head and said, "Don't rush, let's put on those hair ribbons now and go find Old Lady Huang."

  What's the point of finding her?

  Hu Zongren said, "Walk in the shade."