The Eighth Person

He San pleaded, voice trembling like a first-year facing a boggart, but his seniors stood unmoved—stone-faced, scoffing at his warnings as coward's bluster. Seeing's believing, they reckoned, and minutes in the Haunted House had shown naught but dim corridors and stale air. No terror… yet.

"Xiao San, if you're quaking, tuck behind your big sis," Sister Hui taunted, striding ahead into the next room alone. Her dyed locks gleamed like a rogue spell in the gloom. "Same drab trappings everywhere—better thrills in a crime flick abed."

"Then we split as planned," Monkey chirped, scampering after her. "Let's hunt that exit—I'm yawning here."

Lao Song and Shi Ling—a wisp of a girl, silent as a ghost—trailed them, leaving He San, Brother Feng, and Lao Zhao in the corridor's shadowed clutch.

"Bit of a letdown, this," Lao Zhao huffed, his plump frame glistening with sweat after mere steps, pale as a potions apprentice too long from sunlight.

"Save your wind—move," Brother Feng snapped, waving him onward. Lao Zhao lumbered behind, leaving He San solitary, a lone sentinel in the murk. His nerves hummed, taut as a wand under strain. Something's brewing—foul and close.

Two steps, and he froze. The music's shifted—familiar, but why? Before he could pin it, a sharp clack sliced the air—fleeting, gone as he strained to catch it. Down the corridor it whispered, a predator's tease. Someone's stalking us? Panic spurred him, boots slapping as he raced to his seniors. Black Friday unfurled then—the scenario's true pulse—lights guttering low, props stirring like restless poltergeists. From the stairwells rose a clinking—a chain's dirge, cold and deliberate.

"Found something!" Sister Hui emerged from a room, a ragdoll dangling from her grip—tattered, eerie. "Look—this was plonked dead center."

"Senior, don't shift the props!" He San's voice cracked, echoing his past doom. "Last time, moving the coffin sprang a trap!" But his pleas dissolved, ignored, leaving him a forlorn shadow at the group's edge, watching them tread deeper into the abyss.

"Must be a clue—smack in the middle like that," Monkey mused, hoisting the doll to the faint light. A girl, five or six, stared eyeless—her frame charred, a relic of some infernal blaze. "No eyes for darkness, burns for hellfire?"

"Or arson-murder?" Brother Feng pressed its belly—firm, not soft. "Something's inside—hard. Rip it open."

Monkey tugged the back zipper, spilling shredded paper—childish scrawl bleeding across each scrap. He plucked one, face darkening like a storm over the Black Lake. Wordless, he flattened it in his palm for all to see: All of you have to die!—six words, jagged and raw.

"Every shred's the same," he muttered.

"What grudge carves this deep?" Lao Song whispered, voice a thread.

"Stuff it back—creeps me out," Shi Ling rasped, her quiet shattered. She recoiled, eyes flicking from the doll as if it might blink.

"Just a prop—Haunted House fluff," Monkey scoffed, jamming the paper in and tossing the doll aside. It thudded into a corner, limp and accusing. "Next room, come on." Yet his bravado quavered, a crack in his mask betraying the dread gnawing within.

"Hold up," Xiao Hui called, her left hand unfurling a crumpled scrap—yellowed, fragile as a cursed parchment. "Found this too, back in that room. Looks like a diary page."

"Gimme," Lao Zhao grunted, snatching it. His eyes narrowed as he read aloud, voice a low rumble: "I swear someone's hiding in the house. Under the bed? In the wardrobe? Told Mummy, Daddy, big sis—but they're fretting over something else, deaf to me. Night came; Daddy bolted every door, every window, scared of what's out there. Why fear the outside when someone's in here?"

"Bloody hell!" Lao Zhao broke off, thrusting the page back at Xiao Hui like it burned. "Mind games—rubbish to rattle us. Don't bite."

"Detail's sharp—props to that—but it'll take more to spook me," Xiao Hui sneered, tossing the paper back where it lay. They pressed on, blind to the doll—discarded in shadow—twitching once, a spasmodic jerk like a puppet on unseen strings.

"Let's quit dawdling—find the exit," Brother Feng urged. Five rooms scoured, nothing gained, they hit the corridor's rightmost end—a dead-end wall, charred and silent.

"This floor's a sprawl—twenty minutes won't cut it," Brother Feng mused, sharp as a Ravenclaw dissecting a riddle. "Exit's likely not up here. If I ran this haunt, I'd split entrance and escape—different levels."

"Split again, then?" Monkey piped.

"No!" He San yelped, voice cracking. "Scatter across floors? We'll be picked off—divide and conquer!" His plea hung, ignored—a whisper against a storm.

"Ten minutes in, and what?" Lao Zhao wheezed, mopping sweat from his brow. "Eerie vibes, sure—but scary? Nah. I'm for splitting. Don't forget why we're here—exit on time, reclaim our uni's pride!"

"Spot on—original groups it is," Brother Feng nodded.

He San surged forward, desperate. "Listen, please!" He stabbed a finger down the corridor. "Few minutes back, I caught it—odd noises from the stairs. Something's trailing us!"

His words pierced the bravado. A clinking rose—chains rattling, crisp and deliberate—drawing nearer, a specter's knell. Eyes widened, ears pricked.

"Boss dubbed it Murder by Midnight—gotta be a killer," Lao Zhao said, clapping He San's shoulder with a forced grin. "Some worker in a mask—nothing real. What's to fear from an act, eh?"

Laughter rippled—brittle, mocking—dismissing He San's dread as a child's fancy. "We've got you, Xiao San—don't fret," Lao Zhao chuckled, fishing out his phone. "Oh, and that video—to roast the Boss online? This spot's gold. Face the lens, all!"

He swung the camera, hunting the perfect frame—faces in grim tableau. His gaze flicked to the screen, and a chill erupted—icy tendrils snaking from his boots to his skull. His doughy frame quaked; the phone slipped, flung from trembling hands, clattering like a dropped wand.

"Fatty, you mad?" Monkey snapped.

"You jolted me!" Xiao Hui barked, glaring.