Free Web NovelLi Weiyi sat in the living room, staring at his phone for over half an hour.
His curious and somewhat flustered face was reflected on the darkened screen.
He felt like he was being watched by his phone.
This kind of surveillance wasn't the type where certain apps collected data through search records, chat keywords, and things occasionally mentioned, and then pushed advertisements and shopping information.
That phenomenon wasn't strange; many American TV shows had plots where secret agencies specifically eavesdropped on information.
Li Weiyi had also experienced receiving advertising pushes after his girlfriend added a certain item to her shopping cart.
But the situation Li Weiyi was currently facing was completely different.
That kind of surveillance was like the phone was hiding something terrifying, secretly observing his every move, and even blocking the camera and microphone, or even changing phones, wouldn't help.
Li Weiyi felt he had encountered a urban legend event; it all started when he applied to join that damned Monster Story Chat Group.
...
When Li Weiyi was young, he would stay at his Grandpa's house in the countryside during the winter and summer holidays. In that fringe area of scientific popularization, many people still maintained ancient customs passed down for thousands of years.
Things like fortune-telling, temple rituals, breaking hell, etc., which were called magic, were widely spread, and there were also many special professions like spirit mediums, shamans, and Taoist priests.
And Li Weiyi's Grandpa was a famous spirit medium in their hometown area.
Although he was called a spirit medium, Li Weiyi had never seen his Grandpa fight ghosts and monsters from childhood to adulthood. Most of the time, Grandpa did things like helping people with fortune-telling, feng shui, and presiding over funerals.
Grandpa had also thought about passing on his skills to Li Weiyi, but he found those things dry and boring. He learned a little here and there and then stopped paying attention, and over time, he even sealed those things away in a dusty corner of his memory.
It wasn't until many years later, when the nights began to grow long, urban legend events surged, and videos, forums, and chat groups about urban legend events also sprung up like mushrooms after rain on the Internet.
Against this backdrop, Li Weiyi, who was originally not particularly outstanding in appearance or ability, managed to thrive like a fish in water, living a very happy life, relying on the little bit of knowledge he possessed. freewebnøvel.coɱ
Soon, Li Weiyi unknowingly became Li Master active on the Internet.
After gaining some fame, he simply quit his job and started running an online store, mainly selling items like talismans, prayer beads, and exorcism items.
As for whether those things were effective, Li Weiyi himself wasn't very sure.
Anyway, most people bought these things just for peace of mind. If they really encountered a urban legend event, he could always use reasons like the urban legend being too strong or the talisman not being high-grade enough to evade responsibility.
In short, urban legend were nothing more than a tool for making money and picking up girls for him.
While tinkering with his online store, Li Weiyi frequented various video Websites and chat groups, deceiving people with those mysterious things that he himself didn't necessarily understand.
In half a year, he used methods like urban legend intimidation to go through four or five girlfriends. He would occasionally perform "consecrations" and engage in satisfying dual cultivation. When he got tired, he would say, "Our fate is sealed; further entanglement will surely bring Disaster," and then walk away.
How to put it... Lewd!
However, such days came to an abrupt end half a month ago.
...
One evening half a month ago.
The sky was just starting to show hints of darkening. The entire world was silently filled with a strange atmosphere in the dim sunset.
Li Weiyi, who had gone out to purchase materials, returned home. After a simple makeshift dinner, he sat alone in the living room, mixed cinnabar, spread out a stack of yellow paper, and buried himself in work, following the things his Grandpa had taught him from memory. He worked until late at night.
As the saying goes, a dead pig doesn't fear boiling water; the later the night, the wilder I get. Whenever it was late at night, Li Weiyi was always particularly energetic.
After finishing a batch of talismans, Li Weiyi turned on his computer, ready to browse various platforms to see if there were any suitable targets among the beautiful girls.
He skillfully logged into a certain messaging software using a alt account. Before he could even enter the chat groups he had recently joined, a notification caught his attention.
The message was sent by someone with the ID 【One Hundred and Two-Thirds Cats】, and the content of the message was a group invitation.
【"One Hundred and Two-Thirds Cats" invites you to join "University Town Ghost Story Chat Group"】
Confirm/Cancel】
"Heh!" Li Weiyi stared at the group invitation and smiled meaningfully, "University Town Ghost Story Chat Group, huh? Won't there be a lot of female university students in that group? Interesting."
He muttered to himself and clicked 【Confirm】 without hesitation.
【Welcome "Li Master Who Goes Up To Heaven And Down To Earth" to the chat group.】
【You have successfully joined the University Town Ghost Story Chat Group. You can now start chatting with everyone.】
Online Lecher 0: Newcomer? Male or female? If male, send spicy pics; if female, send photos. GKD!
【Online Lecher 0 has been muted by the administrator for 1 hour.】
Standing Alone Guarding The Street Corner: @Li Master Who Goes Up To Heaven And Down To Earth Newcomer, you don't need to pay attention to him! He lives up to his name, he's a Netizen Laosepi!
Li Weiyi, "..."
He had been active on various Websites for several years, and this was the first time he had encountered a situation where he was being teased by others instead of him teasing others.
Standing Alone Guarding The Street Corner: The newcomer arrived just in time. Today happens to be the group's urban legend story night. You're in luck; you can hear the administrator tell the most real urban legend events in this city.
Li Master Who Goes Up To Heaven And Down To Earth: Oh...
The most real urban legend event? Li Weiyi scoffed inwardly, I've been in this line of work for so long, and that's the phrase I've heard the most.
For the next hour or so, Li Weiyi didn't pay much attention to the University Town Ghost Story Chat Group. In his opinion, the things the group members discussed in the chat group were completely lacking in substance. The various pieces of knowledge about urban legend were full of holes, and the mistakes were so basic that he didn't even bother to point them out.
Time flew by, and it was nearing midnight. Just as Li Weiyi was about to turn off his computer and go to sleep, a new message in the University Town Ghost Story Chat Group caught his attention.
One Hundred and Two-Thirds Cats: @All Members Today's urban legend story night will begin in five minutes. Everyone will be muted after five minutes.
So-called most real urban legend event is about to begin? Li Weiyi smiled meaningfully, straightened up, and waited in front of his computer.
In the past, in other urban legend-related chat groups, it was Li Weiyi's usual routine to let the person with the most authority in the group speak first, and then jump in, using what he knew to refute their points and gain popularity.
His purpose in accepting the invitation to the University Town Ghost Story Chat Group was not pure from the start. Now that he saw such an opportunity, he was planning to use his old tricks again.
【The Group Owner has enabled global mute】
One Hundred and Two-Thirds Cats: This story happened in a corner of Hua City. The protagonist of the story is named Xiao Zhang. The story begins with him picking up money one morning.
On the first day, he picked up one yuan at the entrance of the residential area and didn't pay much attention. The next evening after work, he picked up a ten-yuan note in the same place.
But on the third evening, after picking up that bright red hundred-yuan bill, he was even happier and felt that he was quite lucky, picking up money consecutively.
...
"That's it?" Li Weiyi shook his head with a look of disdain when he saw this, "Isn't this just a story about someone picking up 'ghost money' out of temporary greed and finally being sought out by a vengeful spirit to claim their life?"
"How many years has this been a cliché? It seems the level of this chat group isn't high!"
Li Weiyi muttered a few words to himself, closed the University City chat group, got up and went to the bathroom, planning to come back later to check the reading record.
Ten-plus minutes later.
After washing up, Li Weiyi sat back in front of the computer, wiping his hair while reopening the University Town Ghost Story Chat Group.
After opening the chat group, he found that the person with the ID "One Hundred and Two-Thirds Cats" had not finished telling the story, and he couldn't help but frown.
"I'm done! This broken story can be told for over ten minutes?"
Li Weiyi had heard this story from his Grandpa more than twenty years ago. He said that the amount of money a person earns in their lifetime is fixed; once you spend it all, your life is pretty much over.
If something wants to harm you, it will send you the money you are supposed to earn in advance. Once you spend it all, you are not far from death.
Li Weiyi wasn't very scared when he heard it as a child. Now that he was older, he even more felt it was an allegory to teach children not to pocket found money and didn't take it to heart at all.
...
One Hundred and Two-Thirds Cats: After Xiao Zhang finished washing up, he sat in front of the computer. Just then, a sudden knocking sound rang out.
He tentatively asked towards the door, "Who is it?"
There was no answer from outside the door, only the faint knocking sound continued. The sound was very light, mixed with some metallic scraping noise, sounding like hands with very long nails were tapping on the door.
...
Friendly reminder: The Website is about to be revised, which may cause the reading progress to be lost. Please save your book shelf and reading record in time (screenshot saving is recommended). We apologize for any inconvenience caused!
Seeing this, Li Weiyi slightly furrowed his brow. He didn't know if what the protagonist in the story was doing was quite similar, but he always felt a bit uncomfortable.
...
One Hundred and Two-Thirds Cats: Little Zhang had always been a very bold person. After hearing the knocking sound, he didn't think much of it, got up, went to the door, and looked out through the peephole.
With one look, he almost lost his soul. Outside the door, a white dress was "standing," headless, handless, and footless...
...
"Tch! How boring!"
The long and tedious story wore out Li Weiyi's patience. He spat at the screen, turned off the computer, got up, went back to the bedroom, lay on the bed, played with his phone for a while, and fell asleep without realizing it.
Li Weiyi was woken up by the urge to pee.
When he woke up, his head was spinning, and he couldn't remember where he was for a long time.
After lying in bed for a while, Li Weiyi came back to his senses and glanced at the alarm clock by the bed. The time was exactly 2:22 AM.
It was chilly in the room; he didn't know when the temperature had dropped.
He rubbed his throbbing temples, slowly sat up, put on his slippers, and went out to pee. Just then, a knocking sound entered his ears.
"Knock, knock... knock, knock..."
The knocking was very light, mixed with the scraping sound of metal, sounding like someone was knocking on the door with hands that had very long nails.
Hearing that knocking sound, Li Weiyi instantly sobered up, and goosebumps appeared all over his body with a "whoosh."
Immediately after, he concentrated on listening to the sound coming from the dark living room and furrowed his brow.
The house he lived in was an old tube-shaped building left by his parents. The area wasn't small, and transportation was quite convenient. The only drawback was the terrible soundproofing. If someone had an argument or hit a child, the sound would travel far. Even through the door, the entire floor could hear it.
At this moment, after listening carefully, Li Weiyi was surprised to find that the knocking sound was not coming from his own door; it sounded like it was coming from the other end of the corridor.
After discovering this, he mustered his courage and went to the door, looking through the peephole into the corridor. His gaze passed through the dark corridor and saw a white dress standing under the dim yellow light on the other side of the corridor...
In an instant, Li Weiyi's hair stood on end, and he stumbled back two steps.
After calming his frightened emotions slightly, he looked outside the door again and finally saw clearly that it was a white dress hanging on a clothesline.
The moon had moved to a strange direction, and the dim yellow moonlight quietly shone down.
In the corridor facing the atrium, it was pitch black, and the windows on both sides were unfathomable.
The white dress was dripping water. It seemed like it had just been washed. The water droplets fell on the metal sheet on the ground, making a very light sound, but it was particularly noticeable in the quiet night.
"Knock, knock... knock, knock..."
The sound seemed like someone was knocking on the door.
Li Weiyi breathed a sigh of relief and muttered, "I knew it was like this." After saying that, he rubbed his head and went to the bathroom.
After a refreshing release, he came out of the bathroom and, as he passed the living room, he didn't know why, but he glanced at the direction of the main door again.
The room was pitch black, with only a faint light cast by the streetlamp outside the window. The outline of the main door also seemed to have become somewhat strange and distorted.
The story he saw in the chat group, for some reason, reappeared in his mind, and Li Weiyi felt a faint sense of unease.
He turned around, grabbed a handful of prepared talismans from the coffee table in the living room, went back, and stuffed them under his pillow before finally sleeping peacefully.
...
He didn't know if it was because he caught a cold from getting up in the middle of the night, but after that day, Li Weiyi caught a bad cold. Relying on the food reserves in the refrigerator, he lay at home for several days.
It wasn't until three days later, when his condition improved, that he left the house. As soon as he stepped out, he smelled a strong scent of incense and candles. In the empty corridor, wreaths leaned against the wall, and a few wisps of ash from burned paper money danced with the breeze.
The corridor seemed to have turned into a memorial hall.
Someone had died in the corridor. Within three days, three people had died. The first person to die was named Zhang. It was said that when they died, they were all clutching a handful of crumpled banknotes.
After hearing this news from the aunt at the street corner, Li Weiyi broke out in a cold sweat on the spot. He ran home like crazy, turned on his computer, logged into the chat software, and tried to find that University Town Ghost Story Chat Group.
However, that chat group seemed to have dissolved as if it had evaporated from the earth, disappearing without even a single notification message.
Li Weiyi's mood instantly plummeted to the bottom.
That night, he had a Nightmare. He dreamed that he woke up in the middle of the night and, by the faint moonlight outside the window, saw a strange woman beside him.
She was wearing a white dress, lying face up, flat and straight, like a corpse, her face even paler than the dress.
"Who is it?" he asked tremblingly.
The person didn't answer. Their body slowly rose, hovered in mid-air, and slowly moved towards him.
His entire body instantly went limp, and he slowly turned his head to stare at her, already stunned.
The person, stiff like a corpse, hovered in the air above Li Weiyi, her face still upwards, her arms pressed against her sides, her thick black hair hanging down, and a smell of decay wafted over.
Suddenly, her body flipped over.
Li Weiyi saw her ghastly pale face and a pair of cloudy, pale eyes, and heard her say, "How much money do you have left?"
...
Waking up from the Nightmare, Li Weiyi piled all the talismans, prayer beads, and other such items in his house onto his bed, like building a nest, accompanying them every night, finding {N•o•v•e•l•i•g•h•t} it difficult to sleep.
As soon as he closed his eyes, he could see the face of that terrifying woman.
He spent several days in a state of daze and fear, until he received that group invitation.
【One Hundred and Two-Thirds Cats invites you to join the "New University Town Ghost Story Chat Group Review Group"】
【Confirm/Cancel】
Fear amplified in his heart, his pupils slightly constricted. Before Li Weiyi could click 【Cancel】, the cursor on the computer screen moved as if by some strange force and clicked 【Confirm】.
【You have successfully joined the New University Town Ghost Story Chat Group Review Group. You can now start chatting with everyone.】
The entire chat group was dead silent. Over two hundred people, their avatars were all gray. Only his avatar and the person with the ID called One Hundred and Two-Thirds Cats were lit up.
Just as Li Weiyi was panicking and preparing to leave the chat group, he received a message from "One Hundred and Two-Thirds Cats."
One Hundred and Two-Thirds Cats: @AscendingToHeavenDescendingToEarth Li Master, congratulations on passing the preliminary offline review and joining the second review group. Please change your ID to one that suits your identity.
One Hundred and Two-Thirds Cats: @AscendingToHeavenDescendingToEarth Li Master, we will organize your final group entry review soon. Please be prepared to wait. Currently, there are 19 people ahead of you.
Li Weiyi, "..."
...
Since joining that so-called review group, seven or eight days had passed, and Li Weiyi was close to despair.
He had tried countless ways to get rid of that chat group, which was like a Nightmare, but it always managed to reappear in his life through strange and bizarre methods.
Based on his observations over the past few days, the number of people undergoing review decreases by two to three every day. As of yesterday, there were only two people left ahead of him waiting for review.
This meant that today, or at the latest tomorrow night, he would be reviewed by that eerie chat group.
Amidst the long wait and torment, the sky unknowingly turned dark.
Li Weiyi's phone vibrated softly, buzzing faintly, like the whispers of a devil.
He picked up his phone and glanced at it, a miserable smile appearing on his face.
The phone screen displayed: 【@Humble Little Li Please Let Me Go, tonight you will undergo the second review to join the group. Please go to the South Suburb Slaughterhouse at midnight and stay there alone until dawn.】
"South Suburb Slaughterhouse... Heh... Slaughterhouse..."
Li Weiyi muttered to himself, his eyes numb and hollow, like a death row inmate waiting for execution.
The South Suburb Slaughterhouse in Hua City was abandoned three years ago due to urban legend events.
It is said that a group of animals that keep humans as livestock live there...
