Her supernatural yuri novel tells the story of a young Taoist priest who knows Taoist magic and her powerful but unskilled feng shui boss.
The young Taoist priest was unaware that the director also possessed supernatural abilities. He worked diligently during the day and "protected" the director who was being targeted by ghosts at night.
What she wrote yesterday was about the young Taoist priest Lin Luo and the director Mu Han arriving at a very quiet villa with an eerie exterior.
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It was a summer night, but all around was quiet; even the cicadas had fallen silent.
The two stood in front of the villa, but couldn't find the door switch.
Ring ring ring ring…
A gust of wind blew by, and the wind chimes on the withered tree behind the two suddenly rang, breaking the deathly silence around the villa.
Lin Luo subconsciously turned around and stared at the withered tree, shielding Mu Han behind her.
"It's just the wind, Lin, don't be afraid, I'm here," Mu Han put his hand on Lin Luo's shoulder and patted her comfortingly.
Director, this place looks anything but ordinary! Besides, I'm a Taoist priest! I'm not afraid!
Unfortunately, Mu Han couldn't hear Lin Luo's inner wailing. He even walked up to her and stared at a stone platform behind the withered tree.
The stone platform was hidden among the vines, and it looked just like the fountain in front of it. Two stone birds stood on it, one of which had red eyes.
"Is this some kind of new high-tech switch?" Director Mu fiddled with the bird, turning its head 180 degrees with a "click".
Lin Luo's heart leaped into her throat. She almost threw the talisman she was holding, but she didn't want to reveal her Taoist identity to the director—otherwise, the story of her pushing the director down would have to be explained in a different way.
I really don't want the director to know that I was doing it to exorcise a ghost!
Unexpectedly, Mu Han's twist opened the villa's door; she had accidentally activated the switch in front of the villa.
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Zhu Yao felt that what she wrote here didn't quite fit the supernatural label.
Perhaps the way these two people got in should be made a bit more fantastical.
How about letting the birds talk like humans?
The little bird will ask a question, and only those who give the correct password can enter!
Why not add a red-clad, white-haired vengeful ghost blocking the basement entrance in the villa? That would be the ultimate thriller!
Zhu Yao pieced together 10,000 words and uploaded this chapter.
"Dear readers, come and experience this 10,000-word essay from your author!"
After finishing, Zhu Yao reviewed the outline of the article and wrote another 3,000 words for the next chapter.
Suddenly, Zhu Yao realized it was already 2 a.m.
Time flies! I was writing and didn't realize how much time had passed until I looked up at my watch and suddenly realized.
Zhu Yao read the reader reviews for that 10,000-word chapter.
"That's fantastic! Author, could you write another 10,000 words tomorrow?!"
"The way this villa's door opens reminds me of a game I've played before!"
"Why is the female ghost white-haired! Aren't all the red-clad ghosts black-haired?!"
That's great!
Only when she reads readers' comments does Zhu Yao feel like she's not writing in a solo environment, and this is the only motivation that keeps her writing.
If she chose to write full-time after graduating from university because of her dream, then now she writes simply to support herself and not disappoint her readers.
Dreams sometimes have to compromise with reality, though she was never willing to accept that.
Fortunately, I have these lovely readers who have been with me all the way.
"Thump...thump...thump..."
Zhu Yao, who had just come to her senses after immersing herself in her writing, heard a sound outside. The sound was very faint, and if the villa hadn't been so quiet and if her hearing hadn't been so sharp, she probably would have missed it.
She froze in her chair, a chill rising from her heels and spreading down to her calves, making her legs feel weak.
Zhu Yao could hear her heart pounding wildly.
She held her breath, listening intently as the sound grew fainter and fainter until it disappeared completely…
Then, Zhu Dadan did something particularly reckless, like something out of a horror movie—
She stood up, supporting herself on the table, and slowly and quietly walked to the door, then carefully opened it.
The villa was quiet; there was no red-clad, white-haired female ghost, nor was there anyone else.
Suddenly, Zhu Yao's pupils dilated—she noticed that the plate of sushi that had been placed in front of the bedroom opposite was gone.
Zhu Yao cautiously stepped out of the room. She felt something under her feet, and not just one thing.
I groped around in the dark and picked it up; it turned out to be three White Rabbit milk candies.
It's like something a child would like to eat.
Could it be that Li Yue's daughter returned while she was writing?
Then, as if returning the favor, the child accepted her sushi and, as a return gift from the homeowner, gave her three pieces of milk candy.
At this moment, the three pieces of milk candy became extremely hot in Zhu Yao's hands.
Holding three pieces of candy, she mustered her courage and walked towards the "child's" room, gently knocking on the door.
Zhu Yao comforted herself, thinking that even if the child's schedule was in the underworld, he should still be awake by now after putting away the sushi. The sound she heard just now might have been the child leaving the house.
However, there was no response.
Zhu Yao felt as if a bucket of cold water had been poured over her head, plunging her into an ice cave.
Despite it being a sweltering summer day, she was shivering all over.
The air around her felt bone-chillingly cold, and the door to the child's bedroom seemed like a black hole leading to hell, about to drag her down to the eighteenth level of the earth.
As if guided by some strange force, Zhu Yao walked down the stairs and stood in front of the basement entrance.
Unlike yesterday when the main door was tightly shut, today the basement entrance was slightly ajar, as if inviting Zhu Yao to open Pandora's box.
Zhu Yao gently pushed open the basement entrance, and what came into view was a dimly lit corridor. A little light shone through the crack in the door of the third room from the left.
As if bewitched, she walked into the corridor and stood in front of the door of that room.
By the dim light of her phone, she saw countless dark handprints on the door, as if they were about to leap out, grab her, and drag her into the abyss.
Among those countless handprints, there were also two lines of English text.
Death
Stranding
As an English major, Zhu Yao subconsciously read out those two words.
Death...stagnation?
Zhu Yao's mind raced through recent events—the cheap villa, the strange mother, the eerie child, and the basement room with "death" written on the door.
Taking a deep breath, Zhu Yao pushed open the door.
The room was dark, except for an enormous screen that was emitting light.
The red-clad, white-haired female ghost sat cross-legged in the center of the room with her hands in front of her, staring intently at the screen in front of her, while a faint "tap tap tap" sound emanated from her body.
On the screen, a monster is opening its blood-red maw, lunging to bite off the screen.
Zhu Yao instinctively dodged to the side, kicking an empty can placed on the floor next to the door, which made a loud "bang" in the quiet basement of the villa.
Zhu Yao saw that it was an empty can of strawberry beer, next to which was the plate she used when delivering sushi, with a wad of plastic wrap placed in the center of the plate.
The next second, the female ghost, like a cat startled by a cucumber, let out a hysterical howl, and was thrown into the air before crashing heavily to the ground.
A white object flew out of her arms, hit the ground, and made a metallic sound.
The bracelet on the female ghost's left wrist suddenly began to flash brightly and emit a rapid, loud "beep beep beep" sound.
Immediately afterwards, Zhu Yao heard the clicks of all the room doors unlocking, as well as the frantic alarms from the equipment in her bedroom on the second floor.
Zhu Yao took a deep breath and walked towards the "female ghost" who lay motionless on the ground.
Great, now she understands everything completely!
At this moment, Li Yue, who was far away in the east of the city, received a message—Yu Nan had suffered another heart attack less than 24 hours after being discharged from the hospital.
Chapter 6 I won't listen, Xiao Li keeps chanting.
Yu Nan has been very depressed lately.
A few days ago, she stayed up for two nights straight to work on the development of a new game.
However, a bug appeared during game testing.
She wanted to rest, but instead she started painfully modifying the code. However, no matter how she modified the code, it was not correct, and the number of bugs kept increasing.
Enraged, she deleted all the code where the bug occurred and rewrote it from scratch, following the same logic.
After another test, the part that initially had the bug was fixed, but then a new bug appeared.
But she didn't touch the code where the new bug appeared at all!
So she painstakingly rewrote the code for the new buggy section.
Rewriting is definitely faster than revising...
I tested the part with the new bug, and there were no problems. That's great.
Then Yu Nan went downstairs to make herself a bowl of instant noodles, and then returned to the basement.
It wasn't convenient to write code while eating noodles, so she tested her game from beginning to end with the mindset of "appreciating the work".
It turned out that the original bug had reappeared.
She suddenly felt dizzy, and when she woke up, she was in a hospital room with a familiar ceiling.
Gu Wanqiu was wearing a white coat, with a ballpoint pen clipped to her chest and a blue clip tucked under her arm, and she was standing in front of her hospital bed.