I Forged the Myth of the Ancient Overlords
Chapter 159 - 159 158. Whats next_1

Chapter 159: 158. What’s next?_1 Chapter 159: 158. What’s next?_1 After noticing the anomaly in the mirror, Qin Tiantian’s heart raced. The camera work here was evocative, as if she were the one in the elevator, realizing that the person riding with her cast no shadow.

It was different from directly scaring the viewer; instead, it allowed the audience to discover the eeriness on their own, creating a stronger sense of immersion.

Moreover, the nurse who might have been a ghost didn’t suddenly turn her head to frighten someone; she remained as she was. In this slowly ascending elevator, the seemingly calm but actually turbulent environment heightened the sense of urgency, worry, and fear.

It was like being beheaded in a market—close your eyes, the knife falls, and the head rolls off, ending everything in an instant, possibly without even feeling anything.

But now, it felt like being placed on the guillotine, with the neck locked in the stocks, expecting the blade to fall the next second, yet the blade doesn’t drop no matter how long you wait, leaving you in a state of terrified anticipation.

Many people, when they see a horror scene, feel a sense of relief after getting a fright; what they really fear is being kept in suspense, placed in that creepy, unsettling setting where it feels like something is about to happen, but the final scare never comes.

In such cases, the audience remains afraid, continually fearful. What they fear is the shock they imagine or can’t imagine at the end. That’s why Lu Ban’s theory of horror from another world also said something similar: the unknown is the scariest thing.

Once that final scare comes, for the viewer, the terror of that sequence reaches its peak, and the emotions begin to subside.

In a sense, jump scare scenarios in horror films—where something suddenly appears to startle the audience—are also essential. After all, keeping the audience constantly tense and on edge could lead to sensory numbness, or even cause them to fall asleep from too much tension. Intermittent shocks stimulate the audience and are simple yet effective.

Qin Tiantian didn’t understand these horror theories; she just felt very afraid, especially since the nurse’s back was to her, and she couldn’t see her face. She now feared that the nurse would suddenly turn around with a hideous face, giving her a fright.

While tormented by this atmosphere, suddenly, the ding of the elevator reaching the desired floor sounded, making Qin Tiantian shiver as if she had been clicked upon.

Her taut nerves were instantly at their peak because of this unexpected sound and then relaxed; on one hand, the elevator doors had opened, so she didn’t have to stay in the same room with the nurse, who was possibly something else. On the other hand, this sudden noise was indeed a kind of jump scare, which allowed the previous fear to be released.

But when she arrived on the fifth floor’s corridor, Qin Tiantian didn’t feel much better.

The place was dim and quiet, with only a room at the end of the corridor lit up.

She saw the shadow-less nurse float ahead, with the camera following behind.

That sense of unknown fear rose in her heart once again.

Qin Tiantian’s toes clenched, and she curled up into a ball, sitting on Lu Ban’s chair like this.

Her eyes widened as she watched the nurse enter the room, while the main viewpoint of the camera, with the narrator’s voice becoming timid and reverent, didn’t dare to walk forward.

However, the viewpoint eventually, inevitably, looked towards that room.

Qin Tiantian leaned in slightly, hopeful that she could see what was inside the room.

Just then, the nurse gently waved from inside the door to the outside, like a marionette.

Ding—

The sound of the elevator reaching a floor rang out again, jolting both the main viewpoint and Qin Tiantian.

There were two more recordings to follow, both featuring the eerie experiences of doctors and nurses, with everything pointing toward the room at the end of the fifth-floor corridor. The first thirty-odd minutes of the opening had Qin Tiantian completely immersed in the film, drawn to explore the hospital like Lu Ban in the movie, by one recording after another.

But then, after the fifth recording played, the screen suddenly went black.

After a long wait, Qin Tiantian saw no sign of the screen lighting up again.

“Could it be…”

She moved the mouse and saw the progress bar.

Well, there you go— the real horror story; the progress bar couldn’t hold up; it had reached the end.

“What about the rest?”

She wasn’t as scared now and hopped off the chair, almost losing her balance and falling onto Lu Ban’s bed.

“My legs, my legs are numb…”

Having maintained a curled-up position and after being startled, her legs had long since turned soft and numb.

“Ow…”

Tiantian wanted to lie down a bit longer to catch her breath, but suddenly felt that her outstretched hand seemed to have touched something furry.

She lightly clasped her fingers and gave it a scratch.

“You’ve been secretly raising a cat behind my back?”

Tiantian thought Lu Ban had really made progress to actually start raising a cat.

When she turned her head to look, she saw a mass of black mist twining in the palm of her hand, like a wisp of smoke, or a tentacle-like monster made up of vines.

“!!!”

Tiantian felt a tingling sensation spreading from her palm that had touched the mist to her whole body. It was as if she had been doused with cold water; her legs were no longer numb, and her entire body shivered with alertness as she immediately got up.

“Help, help me!”

She hurried out of the room and saw Lu Ban playing video games in the living room.

It had to be said, Lu Ban’s gaming skills were just too terrible, and watching him play made Tiantian forget her fear.

“You’re really bad at this.”

She couldn’t help but scoff, and then quickly ran to a spot far away from the bedroom.

“There’s something in your room… there’s a mass of…”

She couldn’t find the right adjective and was momentarily at a loss for words.

“Didn’t I tell you? That’s our new housemate; looks like you’ve seen one of them. There’s another that might be sleeping under the bed.”

Lu Ban set down the controller.

“… Your house is starting to resemble the set of a horror movie more and more.”

Tiantian’s mouth twitched.

If it had been any other time, or anywhere else, Tiantian reckoned she would have bolted at lightning speed upon encountering such an incident.

But for some reason, encountering this kind of thing at Lu Ban’s house seemed so normal.

It was kind of like seeing someone covered in blood, staggering down the street, making crooked noises, and wearing tattered clothes; one might think a terrifying zombie event had occurred, but if it was in an amusement park, wouldn’t one just assume it was a cosplay with excellent makeup skills?

“So, you must have finished watching, right?”

Lu Ban asked again.

At first, he wanted to observe Tiantian’s reactions while she was watching the movie to adjust his own movie-watching pace, but after the plot of the first recording, Lu Ban found her curled up into a ball, seemingly completely immersed, so he simply went to the living room to play video games and relax.

“I finished watching…”

Tiantian replied, and then immediately asked.

“What about the rest? There’s no more???”

“It’s in the works, it’s in the works.”

Lu Ban immediately went back to create a new folder.

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