Chen Ge accompanied the father and daughter and played all the rides in the park. At around three or four in the afternoon, the girl felt a little tired.
She sat next to her father in the lounge outside the haunted house.
With her eyes closed and a bottle of water in her hands, there was still a hint of smile on her face. It was obvious that she had a lot of fun today.
The father's facial features were crooked, and he looked at the little girl lovingly. He gently touched the girl's head and suddenly found that someone had braided a very naughty little braid on the back of the girl's head. He didn't know who did it, but with this little braid, the girl seemed to become a little more lively.
The father and daughter leaned against each other. Although they both had physical defects, it had to be said that the scene was very warm.
"You guys take a rest here for a while, don't run around. I'll go to the haunted house to say hello to the other employees, and then I'll take you home." Chen Ge remained rational. One of the main reasons why he agreed to let the woman accompany the father and daughter to the amusement park was because he could use this opportunity to get closer to them and let them relax their vigilance.
Of course, Chen Ge never intended to harm them, he just wanted to find out the truth of the matter.
The girl leaned on her father, looking very sleepy, and she could hardly open her eyes.
There was still a long time before the time agreed with the woman, so Chen Ge decided to take them home and take a look at their family situation.
He had a hunch that there must be a connection between this girl and the water ghost.
Back at the haunted house, Duan Yue and Lao Zhou had completely adapted to their new identities. After Chen Ge gave them some instructions, he found Xu Wan and told her that the house would close at six in the evening.
After arranging these things, Chen Ge found his backpack and put the repeater and comic book in it.
Xiao Gu was using the skull crusher, so Chen Ge did not bring it this time.
"Let's go. I'll take you home." Chen Ge held the bag in one hand. His sincere expression made it impossible to refuse.
The man scratched his head, as if hesitating: "My sister won't let others go home."
"Doesn't your sister allow you to bring strangers home?" Chen Ge smiled and said, "I understand. She's worried that you two might bring thieves into the house, but I'm not a stranger. How much fun did we have playing together today?"
After much persuasion, the middle-aged man finally agreed.
After sending the two people out of New Century Park, Chen Ge called a taxi and got in with the father and daughter.
The little girl fell asleep soon after getting on the bus. In order not to disturb her, Chen Ge and the middle-aged man tacitly did not speak.
According to the address given by the middle-aged man, the taxi arrived at a somewhat shabby-looking residential area on the edge of the eastern suburbs.
This place is full of old-style buildings that are six or seven stories high. The wall paint is severely peeling, and you can't even tell what the original paint color was.
"It looks like it's been built for 20 to 30 years, right?"
After paying the fare, several people got out of the car.
"You live here? Didn't you say Donggang before?"
Chen Ge specifically asked the driver in the car that this residential area is still a long distance away from the Donggang Reservoir.
"I live at home." The man uttered a few incoherent words, and Chen Ge didn't know what he wanted to express.
Holding the sleeping little girl in his arms, the middle-aged man walked in front alone. The other party did not chase Chen Ge away, so Chen Ge followed behind naturally.
The middle-aged man had intellectual disabilities, but he still had basic common sense. He walked through the dilapidated old buildings, came to the innermost residential area, and entered the first staircase.
The sun was hanging low in the sky, about to set. The surroundings were somewhat deserted. It was not yet dark, but Chen Ge felt that the surroundings were somewhat dim. Perhaps it was just an illusion.
The ceiling of the corridor is relatively low and can be reached with a light jump. After entering, the first feeling is depression.
Led by the middle-aged man, they came to the third floor. The man reached his hand around his neck and fumbled for a long time before finding the key hanging around his neck.
Like a little child, he held the key in front of his eyes, looked at it carefully, and then opened the door.
"Can I go in and take a look?"
The man did not answer. He opened the door, carried the little girl into the house, put her on the sofa, and then trotted into the bedroom, as if looking for something.
The house was very clean, unlike the dirty and messy one Chen Ge had imagined. Although it was simple, everything was neatly arranged.
"There were only two pairs of slippers, one large and one small, and there were only two toothbrushes in the bathroom. It seemed that the man's sister did not live with them. Usually, it was this mentally handicapped man who took care of the child."
Chen Ge was somewhat surprised that a person with intellectual disabilities, who raised a child with lower intelligence than ordinary people, could still organize everything in an orderly manner.
He looked towards the bedroom and saw the man kneeling on the floor. He opened the bedside table and took out a towel blanket.
As if he was afraid of messing up the things inside, he moved very carefully. After taking the quilt, he tidied everything up before walking out of the bedroom.
The middle-aged man seemed to have only the little girl in his eyes. He gently covered the girl with the quilt and sat on the other side of the sofa, looking at the girl lovingly, completely ignoring Chen Ge who was still standing in the room.
"No wonder your sister doesn't allow you to bring strangers back. If you meet a bad guy, your house might be emptied and you wouldn't even know it." Chen Ge walked around the house. The room was not big, with only one bedroom and a very small living room. It was simple, but cozy.
"He has a family genetic disease and was abandoned by his only normal wife, but he is still alive and strong. It's amazing."
Chen Ge walked into the bedroom and when he glanced at the bedside table, he unexpectedly saw a photo.
He reached out and picked up the photo. There was something strange about the photo in the frame.
On the sunny grass, a middle-aged man is grinning foolishly, and a little girl is chasing butterflies. There should be another person standing next to them, but that person was cut out, leaving a human-shaped gap in the photo.
"Is that the girl's mother?"
He wanted to find more clues, so he opened the bedside table and found a notebook under some clothes.
Flipping through the notebook casually, Chen Ge found that there was not a single word in it, but it was obvious that many pages had been torn off.
"Whose notebook is this?" Looking at the notebook, Chen Ge thought of something else. Although the little girl suffered from a genetic disease and her intelligence was lower than her peers, she could write. In the haunted house, Chen Ge saw her write the word "sister" with his own eyes.
"Who taught her to write? Her father, or someone else?"
When the middle-aged man's sister heard the word "sister", her expression became intense. These two words should be taboos that cannot be mentioned in their family, so the person who taught the little girl to write these two words should not be her relative.
Chen Ge closed the notebook and put it back in its place. He closed the cabinet door and stood up to leave when he found that the middle-aged man was standing at the door of the bedroom without him knowing when.
It seemed that because of the compression of brain nerves, his facial features were tilted, and there was a hint of incomprehension in his eyes when he looked at Chen Ge.
"Photos..." Chen Ge didn't know how to change the subject, so he picked up the photo frame on the bedside table.
Before he could think of a reason, the man had already walked in. He didn't seem to care what Chen Ge did. He just walked past Chen Ge silently and picked up the **'s pillow.
He didn't say a word to Chen Ge during the whole process. After getting the pillow, he walked out and placed the pillow behind the girl's head.
After a false alarm, Chen Ge continued to walk around the house, but he didn't find anything valuable.
"I feel relieved now that I have brought you here safely. If you want to come to New Century Park again in the future, or need help, you can come to me." Chen Ge found a pen and paper, wrote down his phone number, and placed it on the coffee table.
The girl fell asleep on the sofa. For a whole day, there were no messages from the black phone. The mission carried by this special tourist was not triggered by Chen Ge.
But Chen Ge was not in a hurry. He had already confirmed the other party's identity and address, so there would be plenty of opportunities in the future.
After saying hello to the middle-aged man, Chen Ge left.
After closing the door, Chen Ge was about to go downstairs when a voice suddenly came from the corridor.
"Hello."
Chen Ge stopped and looked around. He found that the door of the house opposite the middle-aged man was opened a crack, and the sound came from there.
"Are you calling me?"
"If you don't want to get into trouble, you'd better stay away from their family."
This time Chen Ge heard it more clearly. It was an old lady who spoke, and her voice was very stern.
"I'm not afraid of trouble. Their family looks so pitiful. It's better to help as much as possible." Chen Ge took a few steps towards the door of the room where the old man was.
"There must be something hateful about pitiful people. I advise you not to get too close to them, or you may get into trouble."
The old man's words aroused Chen Ge's interest. The other party seemed to know a lot of things.
"Grandma, their family has a genetic disease, it's congenital..."
"I think you have a kind heart, so I reminded you. As for how you want to do it, it's your own business."
The old lady was about to close the door when she finished speaking, but Chen Ge grabbed the door first: "Grandma, don't leave your words half-sentenced! It makes me feel uneasy."
The old lady probably saw that Chen Ge looked kind and was really doing a good deed, so she paused for a few seconds and then opened the door completely: "Come in and talk."
"Okay." Things took a turn for the better, and Chen Ge would of course seize this opportunity.
After entering the old lady's house, Chen Ge realized something was wrong. The old lady's house was full of talismans from various people, and various evil-repelling items were taped to the door.
This room is completely different from the middle-aged man's room.
"Grandma, your house..."
"Don't be afraid, these spells are used to deal with evil spirits and are harmless to humans." The old lady's tone was very affirmative, but Chen Ge shook his head. The ghosts in his body had no fear of these spells at all. It was certain that the old lady was deceived.
"You've gotten involved with that family, and you might get entangled with dirty things in the future. I can give you two when you leave."
"Dirty things? Are there really ghosts in this world?" Chen Ge touched his chin and said, "Grandma, have you seen it with your own eyes?"
"What a sin, what a sin." The old lady pondered for a moment and nodded: "In this building, after midnight, there will be a sound of water dripping in the corridor, just like it is raining. Then you will hear the sound of a wet mop sliding on the ground, but think about it carefully, at one or two o'clock in the morning, who would mop the floor in the corridor with a wet mop for no reason?"
"Is there really a ghost?!" Chen Ge cooperated with the old lady very well and showed a surprised expression.
"One time I couldn't sleep because of the noise, so I looked outside through the peephole on the door."
"What do you see?"
The old man seemed to recall something horrible. The wrinkles on his face were squeezed together and his expression was very solemn. "I'm not lying to you. I saw a woman who was soaking wet coming up from downstairs. She stopped at the door of the opposite room. Her skin was white from being soaked. It was not the skin of a living person. There were some water plants and strange things wrapped around her body. Her hair was dragging on the ground. She kept muttering the name of the girl next door."
"A woman soaked in water? Mumbling Wenwen's name?" A thought flashed through Chen Ge's mind, and he blurted out two words: "Sister?"
The old woman didn't expect Chen Ge to say these two words. Her expression softened a lot: "It seems that you also know about his family's affairs."
"I don't know." Chen Ge took out the white paper that the little girl left in the haunted house from his pocket: "I am an employee of New Century Park. Our park saw that the father and daughter were not in good health and were worried about their safety, so they sent me to send them home safely. The reason why I know the sister is because the girl once wrote these two words in one of our entertainment facilities."
Looking at the crooked words "sister" on the white paper, the old lady tightened her lips and signaled Chen Ge to stay away from the door.
The two walked into the living room, and the old man lowered his voice and said, "I won't hide it from you. In fact, many people in the old building know about this. Their family used to plant seeds, and now they are suffering retribution."
"Have you planted seeds?" Chen Ge didn't quite understand.
"The first 'zhong' means to plant, and the second 'zhong' means seed. Their family has a genetic disease, and it is said that boys cannot wear girls' clothes, but their family just wants a healthy boy to continue the family line. In the end, they found a folk remedy, and someone gave them advice and asked them to plant 'zhong'." The old lady explained to Chen Ge the meaning of 'zhong': "The method sounds a bit cruel, that is, first find a child, use her as a seed, and then plant it in another child. I don't quite understand the specific operation method, I only know that their family has planted seeds, but failed. Not only did they not give birth to a boy, but the girl they gave birth to also suffered from the genetic disease."
"But what does this have to do with the ghost you saw?"
"The one his family regarded as a seed was their first child, that is, his elder sister. They used their first child as a seed, and the second child born from the seed was Wenwen."
Chen Ge took a deep breath after hearing what the old lady said. He vaguely understood why the trial mission was called Twin Water Ghosts.