Chapter 2 : Haunted House Vlog

“Cough, cough…”

Hua Qi’an gently covered her mouth with her hand and coughed a few times.

Once she recovered, she licked her somewhat dry lips.

Had the temperature dropped recently?

For some reason, she always felt a bit cold.

The room had seemed fine temperature-wise just moments ago, so how had it changed the instant she stepped out…

Subconsciously, she pulled her jacket tighter around herself.

Not only that, but the air was thick with dust.

Her coughing earlier hadn’t just been from the chill; getting choked was the main culprit.

Hua Qi’an frowned and waved her hand in front of her face, as if trying to dispel the dust hanging in the air.

When she’d arrived at this house yesterday via subway and a long walk, it had already been late.

So she’d hastily found a room with a bed, cracked the window for some quick ventilation to clear the dust, tidied the bedding, and gone to sleep.

She hadn’t bothered exploring the rest of the house in detail.

Hua Qi’an descended the stairs to the living room, first opening every window she could find, then pushing open the house’s old, rusted front door.

Sunlight streamed in through the doorway; it was now around seven or eight in the morning, and though the light wasn’t as intense as midday, it was plenty bright.

The moment she opened the door, the dust inside rushed outward.

She’d gotten choked pretty badly when she first entered yesterday.

Now, with the windows open for ventilation, things were noticeably better.

She’d looked up the address of this haunted house online beforehand.

A few years ago, this area had been a wealthy enclave.

But when Hua Qi’an arrived, all she saw along the way was desolation.

Not a soul in sight, not even a single bird.

By the time she got there, it was evening, and though there were plenty of residential buildings, not one had a light on.

Clearly, the nearby residents had all moved away…

Yet online, there wasn’t a scrap of news about it, as if someone had deliberately scrubbed it clean.

No news was news in itself.

It made sense, though—if there were real details out there, a grand mansion like this, hyped as a “haunted house,” would’ve long been overrun by internet ghost-hunting streamers, and it wouldn’t be this dust-choked.

Whether that was good or bad, she wasn’t sure.

She’d half-worried the job was a scam, but after seeing the place in person, everything about it screamed eerie…

Maybe the recruiter hadn’t been pulling her leg.

But… how was she supposed to film a “haunted house vlog” in a place with zero backstory?

This part-time gig wasn’t exactly her wheelhouse, and it felt pretty weird to boot…

Still, Hua Qi’an was determined to do her best with it.

So on the ride over, she’d watched a bunch of similar “ghost-hunting” videos en route…

They all followed the same formula: kick off with a creepy ghost story intro, then dive into exploring some dilapidated, abandoned building.

But her spot had no known backstory, and it hardly qualified as “dilapidated”—would anyone even watch a video like that?

Aside from the dust, this house was downright lavish and exquisite, the polar opposite of rundown.

It even came with a courtyard spanning a good thousand square meters, though overgrown with weeds and wild shrubs, clearly neglected for years.

Hua Qi’an had nearly gotten lost just finding the place.

You could tell the original owners had been loaded, if not outright elite.

What kind of event could’ve emptied out an entire neighborhood like this?

Hua Qi’an knew she wouldn’t figure it out just by mulling it over.

She’d even tried asking the HR who sent the job posting, but they’d brushed it off as confidential info.

Sigh.

Maybe she should just treat it like a regular vlog and wing it.

Unbeknownst to herself, Hua Qi’an had already crossed the front yard and reached the main gate.

A tangle of vines lay scattered on the ground beside it, remnants of what had once clung to the door.

With everyone long gone from the area, there were no security guards or gatekeepers to stop her.

She’d simply climbed over the iron fence to get in.

The vines must’ve gotten trampled then.

Hua Qi’an pulled out her phone, cleared the background apps, and opened the camera, panning it around to check the lens quality.

If she was filming, she’d need to start from entering the yard and capture everything along the way.

She hadn’t brought any pro gear; her phone was her only tool.

Who shells out for equipment on a job like this, anyway…

Especially when she hadn’t even gotten her first paycheck yet.

For now, as long as she could record something to submit, that should suffice.

It was a haunted house vlog, after all—maybe lower resolution would amp up the creep factor.

The camera took in the full view of the overgrown, desolate courtyard.

“Hello, everyone. It’s about eight in the morning now, and today I’ll be spending the day in this mansion rumored to be a haunted house, to see what happens.”

Hua Qi’an had zero experience filming this kind of content, so her intro came out stiff and straightforward.

The HR hadn’t demanded she be some smooth-talking host.

“As you can see, this is right at the courtyard entrance.”

“Now, we’ll cross the courtyard and head to the main house.”

Her voice was clear and crisp, like pristine spring water, devoid of any inflection.

It was as if she were describing not a haunted house, but just some everyday family estate.

Though at the moment, that spring sounded a touch parched, laced with a hint of hoarseness.

Not that the estate was exactly “everyday,” given its size.

Hua Qi’an held up her phone, filming as she walked, capturing the scenery on both sides of the path in full.

The courtyard was vast—easily a thousand square meters—so there were forks in the road everywhere.

But she already knew the route from the gate to the house, so she didn’t take any detours and soon reached the front door.

It had been too dark last night, and this morning she’d headed straight out from the yard entrance, so Hua Qi’an hadn’t even gotten a proper look at the house itself.

Now that she did, it was genuinely striking.

The main door stood firmly shut.

The antique door bore ornate, intricate patterns.

Hua Qi’an couldn’t make out what kind of designs they were.

The outer walls were a cool gray, with a spiral staircase leading up to a second-floor balcony, where floor-to-ceiling glass windows gleamed under the sunlight.

From the outside, there was no hint this was a “haunted house” abandoned for years.

An average person probably couldn’t earn enough in a lifetime to buy a single brick here.

Hua Qi’an had no intention of chatting up her future “viewers” in the video.

She held her phone steady and walked straight to the mansion’s entrance.

Reaching out, she tugged at the closed door, but it didn’t budge an inch.

“…”

Something had felt off earlier.

Hadn’t she remembered leaving the door open to air out the dust before heading out?

But now it was shut again?

Had a gust of wind blown it closed?

Hua Qi’an chalked the door’s closure up to the wind.

She tugged at the handle again, but it still wouldn’t yield.

Stuck?

Considering the possibility, she didn’t waste more energy on the door and turned instead toward the other first-floor windows.

If the door wouldn’t open, she’d go in through a window.

“…”

“The wind must’ve just blown through and shut all the doors and windows.”

Gazing at the similarly sealed windows, Hua Qi’an pressed her lips together.

Having walked while filming, her focus had been entirely on the camera lens.

In the frame, the closed window’s glass reflected her face, partially obscured by the phone.

Hua Qi’an shifted her gaze from the screen to the actual window behind it.

She reached out and tried pushing the pane.

Luckily.

Unlike the door, the window wasn’t jammed.

“Screeech—”

It opened with a grating, scraping sound.

Something like a shadow flitted past.

The musty scent of long-uninhabited dust mingled with that familiar salty dampness, wafting out from the room beyond the open window.

A sudden chill gripped her arm.

As if something had dropped from the top of the window frame.

Hua Qi’an shuddered all over, yanking her hand back to her chest like she’d been shocked.

“This is…”

A strand of waterweed, still carrying a hint of damp moisture, had just draped itself across her wrist.