Chapter 17: Campfire (2)

  At some point, the moonlight appeared, and I saw him, that person was me, but his face wasn't ferocious, nor cold, it was calm, I could even see some blood on his face, from his eyes, I knew that I would be dead soon, he was going to kill me.

  That person, who looked just like me, raised the axe in his hand and swung it down at me. I couldn't move, couldn't dodge, and could only stare as he struck my left leg. Blood stained the ground red, and I was terrified. I don't know how to describe my emotions; all I knew was that he lifted the axe again, with not a flicker of emotion in his eyes.

  Then, he started chopping from my leg upwards and I fell to the ground, overcome with pain, fear and my body was filled with it. I wanted to use my hands to defend myself but they were severed from my arms and fell beside me.

  Until he raised the axe for the last time, chopping towards my head. I stared blankly as the sharp axe swung towards my head, and my paralyzed body finally let out a loud scream due to the fear of death.

  When I regained consciousness, I found myself in my own bedroom. As my body recovered, my back was covered with cold sweat, sticking to my clothes, feeling very uncomfortable. But this feeling made me feel much more at ease, knowing that everything earlier was just a dream, a nightmare.

  But the nightmare didn't end there, I thought it would be over after a day, but I couldn't forget the content of the dream, couldn't forget that person who looked just like me, those emotionless eyes. In the following days, I didn't have that dream again, but in my dreams, I kept vaguely seeing that person who looked like me, doing the same thing, picking up an axe and chopping towards that person, only he couldn't see me.

  This nightmare has been going on for days, and I'm almost tortured to death by him. But I don't know who to talk to. I'm the only child at home, my parents are busy with work and don't care about me. In college, I was too busy playing computer games and didn't have any friends. The only thing I can think of is to speak out online, anyway no one knows who I am.

  But this matter is not over, I was tormented by this nightmare and couldn't bear it, so I wanted to go out for a walk and clear my mind. Because there is a forest near my district, during the day, it's sunny and full of vitality, I thought it should be able to wash away the darkness in my heart. But I regretted this decision even more after entering the forest.

  I was strolling along the edge of the forest, listening to the birds chirping beside me, and the rustling sound of leaves as the gentle breeze blew through them, making me feel a long-forgotten serenity. Since those birds were calling out from within the forest, I wanted to hear more clearly, so I walked towards the forest. At that time, it was around 1 pm, although the forest was vast, I didn't worry about getting lost inside at all.

  All the way, I followed the bird's chirping. At that time, under the gloomy mood, listening to such pleasant sounds, with nature by my side, it was actually very comfortable and peaceful, if not for that one thing.

  It was a house in the forest, all made of wood, looking very old and ancient, with moss growing all over its edges. I had never seen this house before, but I felt a sense of familiarity. Yes, I had seen this house in my dreams.

  I don't know what I was thinking at the time, but instead of leaving, I walked towards the wooden house. As I got closer to take a look, there were some bloodstains on the ground, in the same position as in my dream, where the chopped person was. However, there wasn't much blood and it had already dried up.

  My body is trembling, and there are still many signs of movement on the ground. It's very clear that I have a premonition that something will happen in that house.

  Dragging my trembling legs, I walked hard towards that wooden house, with only a simple wooden door. A strong premonition surged up in my brain, I pushed open the door and saw what was inside made me fall directly to the ground.

  A person lies on the ground with a knife stuck in their abdomen. The blood has flowed over time, and now it's mixed with dust and clothes on top of them.

  I propped myself up against the door frame with trembling hands, and my fingers gradually turned white from excessive force. I plucked up the courage to walk towards that person, only then did I see his appearance clearly.

  She was a girl, seemingly of middle school age, with long hair scattered all over the ground, covering her face. Judging from her appearance, she was a beautiful woman, but at this moment, her face was twisted in agony, and her eyes, which were not closed, still showed intense despair. I don't know why I didn't run away, my intuition told me that she must have been dead already.

  But I didn't believe it at the time, and slowly stretched out my hand to her nose to check if she was still breathing. It's always like that on TV. My hand hadn't even reached her yet when I sensed a cold feeling emanating from her body. When my fingers approached her nose, they just stopped for a moment, and I knew she was dead. I fell to the ground again, and my hand somehow touched her body.

  I was so scared that I slid backwards on the ground, I was too afraid, never been so close to a dead person before, I wanted to run but my legs went soft.

  It seemed like a while had passed, and I regained my strength. I finally stood up, slowly backing away to the door. At that moment, all I wanted to do was escape, but I didn't dare turn my back on the female corpse. Until I backed out of the door, turned around, and sprinted forward in the direction I came from.

  I soon reached the edge of the forest, but then a flock of birds flew out in another direction, and it seemed there were other sounds, human voices, and very close!

  I don't know what kind of mentality it is, but I quickly hid and waited quietly for something to happen, yet didn't want anything to happen, a very painful emotion.

  Perhaps it would have been better if I didn't have this mentality at the time. The rustling in another direction of the forest only lasted for a few seconds, slowly calming down. Just when I thought I could catch my breath, the rustling continued and the sound was closer, as if it came from beside me. I was so tense that I didn't even dare to breathe, making no sound at all, keeping absolute silence, and I could even hear my own heartbeat.

  I'm sitting here listening to the sound of heartbeats, silently counting time, this period of time feels like it's been a century long.

  The movement over there didn't get closer to me but went in another direction instead. However, I don't dare relax as I don't know when they will come back again.

  The commotion from that side gradually faded away, until it was completely inaudible. My suspended heart finally calmed down, and my entire body went limp. Due to excessive tension, my body had stiffened, and I slightly moved my body, but didn't dare to exert too much force.

  It was just that some scenes suddenly flashed through my mind, my hands were supporting the door frame, and there must be fingerprints left there, and when I fell to the ground and moved backwards, there must be traces of me left behind. What's even more frightening is that I don't know if I left any of my belongings or anything like that when I was looking at the corpse just now.

  Then the police will find me, how can I explain it to them, they definitely won't believe me, and they'll think I'm the murderer, then they'll arrest me. It's always like this on TV, the police always arrest the first person who discovers the body and torture them for a confession. No way, I don't want to be the one who discovers the body.

  After having such an idea, it has been lingering in my mind, just keeping the idea of not letting people discover this body.

  I took action, and once again walked into the wooden hut. The corpse was quietly lying inside, I didn't go to look at her again, but instead searched around for some tools. This wooden hut seemed to have been built by villagers from a nearby village in the past, and they had left behind some tools. I found the most important shovel.

  Then I casually chose a place and buried the corpse, using a shovel to loosen the soil on the surface of the bloodstains, covering up the traces. Inside the wooden house, there were only bloodstains in the position where the corpse was, so I used a shovel to scrape off the bloody area from the wooden board and bury it together with the corpse. The dagger on the corpse was not touched by me. By the time everything was taken care of, it was almost dusk.

  I bowed a few times in front of where the body was buried, and then I hurried back home. To this day, I have not returned to that forest again.

  This happened several months ago, but I didn't tell anyone about it. I just felt a little regretful and wondered why I didn't report it to the police at the time. Now that I'm reporting it, it's probably useless. The police definitely won't believe me. Otherwise, why wouldn't they have reported it? Why would they bury the body? In those few days, I kept paying attention to newspapers and news to see if anyone had discovered a body in that place. Until now, I've been living in fear and anxiety, so I'm telling this story to make myself feel better.

  Lin Fang let out a soft sigh, the article gave him an unbelievable feeling, the article ended here, and below were some netizens' comments.

  "Is it true? Are you kidding me?"

  "Come on, it's not that mysterious, we should believe in science."

  "The owner of the building should surrender quickly and strive for leniency."

  For these meaningless comments, Lin Fang quickly browsed through them and noticed that the posting time of this article was exactly ten years ago. The owner of this post did not respond to all netizens, but only replied when someone asked him a question.

  "Ask the owner to reveal the address."

  "X City Jinghua District." This is the owner's response.

  After this sentence was replied, there were many meaningless posts again, and the mysterious owner of the post didn't say anything else.

  The username of this owner is just a string of numbers and seems to have no meaning. The information inside shows that the last time he was online was several days after that.

  "How did you find this thing?" Lin Fang frowned and looked at Zhou Yi.

  "I was also bored and searching online for Jinghua District when I stumbled upon this article. It's really hard to tell what's true or false," said Zhou Yi.

  "Ding, ding." Lin Fang's cell phone rang.

  "Xiao Fang, where are you?" came Ye Wei's voice from inside.

  "At a friend's house," Lin Fang said.

  "How come you're still in touch with friends from Jinghua District?" Ye Mei seemed very happy.

  "Just an old classmate, what's up?" Lin Fang didn't feel like talking much.

  "We're planning a bonfire party tonight, just letting you know, remember to come back early." Yemeng said.

  "Bonfire party? Alright, what time is it?" Lin Fang imagined the word bonfire in his mind, as if he had never experienced it before.

  "At 8 o'clock in the evening, after finishing dinner, I started preparing," said Ye Mei.

  "Alright, let's talk about it then," Lin Fang said.

  Because of this phone call, Lin Fang didn't think much about the article from earlier, just treating it as an interesting piece.

  "By the way, Lin Fang, last time Quan Ge said that he is now traveling with his girlfriend and will come to our place in two days. You were drunk at that time and didn't hear it." Zhou Yi suddenly remembered something.