“How did it go?” Fatty jogged over. “Did it go well?”
Jiang Cheng was silent. He suddenly asked, “How long was I gone?”
Fatty thought about it, “About twenty minutes.” He added, “I know it’s not long. This place is so cold at night. I just got up to change into thicker layers. And… I heard noises coming from downstairs. I came to look, and it was you.”
Hearing that, Jiang Cheng had a better understanding of the nightmare realm. He definitely did not spend twenty minutes in the nightmare realm. After all, he did sleep for a bit before entering the door. After eliminating that time, Jiang Cheng probably only spent a few minutes in the nightmare realm. However, he had spent days in the realm. Clearly, the time flow of the two realms was different. The channel that connected them was the black iron door. Fatty stood beside Jiang Cheng. He noticed the change in Jiang Cheng’s emotions. He appeared to be in a low mood, and he didn’t even wish to chat.
“Doctor,” Fatty swallowed and probed cautiously, “Are… you alright?”
“Did something happen when I was gone?”
Fatty thought about it and answered seriously, “No.”
“After you entered your bedroom to sleep, I stayed guard outside your door. I didn’t notice anything.” He continued, “I didn’t even see you leave your bedroom, but you showed up here.”
Jiang Cheng took another sip of the water. “What about sounds?”
“Just try your best,” Jiang Cheng prompted.
“Doctor, actually… I kinda predicted when you were about to leave the nightmare realm,” Fatty stuttered.
Jiang Cheng frowned. His hand that held the water paused, “Continue.”
“I don’t know how to describe it. It was like a shot of electricity phased through my brain. It was… weird. In any case, I knew that something must have happened. Considering you were already in the nightmare realm, I suspected you were about to exit it.”
Jiang Cheng narrowed his eyes.
Fatty’s mouth opened like he remembered something. However, his voice lowered involuntarily, “Doctor, when I was a taxi driver, I used to get very sleepy on the night shift. At night, I purposely searched for a broadcast that discussed the supernatural. I thought it could help keep me awake. That night, their topic was ghosts, or rather, how to encounter them.
“They had a few guests on. They all had seen ghosts before. I remember the first guest was a student. She said she encountered a ghost by inviting the ghost over using the Pen Spirit game. Then, her friend who played with her broke her leg the next day. Apparently, it was related to the game.
“I didn’t believe that.” Fatty explained, “This person said she was a student, but she sounded about 40. I believed she was an actor found by the radio station.”
Jiang Cheng didn’t interrupt him. He knew Fatty must have his reasons to say these things.
“The second guest said he carried a bowl of half-cooked rice and waited at a road junction. He tapped on the bowl continuously.” He swallowed, “He said he saw ten thin shadows. They suddenly appeared. They all died from hunger. He even stressed that the tapping mustn’t stop, or the ghosts would attack the summoner.”
Then, Fatty mentioned other urban stories like chanting the name before a mirror at midnight, using an umbrella at home and so on.
Jiang Cheng frowned. His patience was running thin. He was not there to listen to these stories.
“Doctor,” Fatty pouted, “Let me finish.”
Jiang Cheng looked into his eyes and swallowed his words. He rarely saw Fatty use this gaze before. He caught fear in Fatty’s eyes.
Fatty took a deep breath. “Then, the hosts called the last guest.
“It was a senior. I could hear that he was physically ill. He had to stop to take breaths when he talked.
“The method he talked about was…” Fatty lifted his head to look at Jiang Cheng, “Brain waves.
“I did some research on this later, and he… No…” Fatty frowned as he picked his mind. His logic became confusing, “Until now, I’m not sure if the senior is a he or a she. They have a damaged voice box. The person spoke very slowly, but it was hard to understand their words. I only caught the last few words they said.
“They said, if you want to see ghosts, you have to match the wavelength of their brain waves.
“In other words…” Fatty raised his head, “When you wish to see a ghost, a ghost might be right by your side already.”
Fatty remembered how the hosts and guests who were making fun of the senior caller suddenly became so silent when they said that. Because… the topic of their program that night was how to meet a ghost. Based on this caller’s logic, they might have incidentally summoned a ghost to their side!
“Doctor,” Fatty’s expression was hard to describe. He looked at Jiang Cheng and uttered heavily, “After a long time after that, I realised something.
“That night, the senior’s speech was unclear. I thought it was their voice box. But…” Fatty shook from fear, “Thinking back… It could be because something was close to them and due to their similarity in brain waves…”
“It caused a disturbance to the radio waves,” Jiang Cheng said coolly.
“That’s right!” Fatty nodded vehemently.
To Fatty’s surprise, Jiang Cheng’s face also took on a strange countenance. This was because he was reminded of something.
In the recording with Hu Yan, who came to seek assistance at the very start, there was a lot of static in it as well!