Eli crouched to pat Ren's head after he talked about the option of talking to a destructive and seemingly unstoppable Gao Ming. Ren was using his soaked shirt to wipe off the heavy sweat from his forehead. What he just said was quite dumb and very risky, but he had an idea. The Professor was coughing out black blood; something was really up with him. They were still in room 2322.
"Are you okay, Professor?" Eli asked while checking on Ren, who hadn't said a word yet. The Professor couldn't talk as he was still coughing, but he gave a thumbs up. Things weren't looking good for him. Ren was still contemplating his options. Renu wasn't here to help; where she was is a mystery. Eli was mentally useful, but she and the Professor were older adults who couldn't do things like they used to when they were young. He was alone in this now.
He had a suspicion of all the things that were happening, so he exited the group chat and went to browse through Gao Ming's gallery out of curiosity. There were a lot of photos labeled depending on the subjects: pigeons, cats, dogs, his sister-in-law cooking with joy, and his mother-in-law dancing with a smile. The rare happy moments of Gao Ming's life were in it, but it was the video of Gao Ming talking to the phone like it was a person- expressing his desire, view of life, and desires still his heart, that was what struck Gao Ming the most. He showed Eli, who sped through the whole thing.
"He took these photos without his family being aware." She said, showing him the photos again, to which Ren noticed was true. This phone had an importance to Gao Ming similar to how the phone was essential to Skip in Ren's game: THE ONLY FAMILY ONE CAN DREAM OF.
"Look at this guy, he went through a lot, but no matter what, he always controlled himself, and tried to help people," Ren said, trying to see how his theory sounded to Eli.
"But he is dead, and now he is a monster that slaughters people," Eli replied, to which Ren couldn't deny.
"But if he is a monster, he would have directly attacked us, right? Why the scary videos and the illusions?" He asked, as he felt that this was something worth considering.
Eli was in deep thought, processing what he had said, as she was still checking the gallery.
She frowned at him. "You think he is still in there?"
Ren wasn't so sure of that, but what if this was Gao Ming's way of asking for help, loathing himself. I have seen similar things to this."
Eli was curious. "Similar things where?"
Ren had forgotten to mention his occupation. "I worked in prison as a mental health specialist. I have seen things like this."
"And the prisoners were not just lying to reduce their sentence?" Eli asked, and Ren nodded in agreement; the results were mixed, with some being serious and others being lies.
"I need to solve this, you don't understand, but I need to just talk to him. I know him well, and I don't need the Professor being in trouble." Ren said, his body tensing as it didn't agree with what he was saying.
"And if you fail?" The Professor asked. He had stopped coughing but was crouching.
Ren never thought about a backup plan, and he most definitely needed one. He looked to Eli for any ideas, as she was the calmest among them.
Eli huffed. "I have done something similar to what you are about to do, except the person to be talked to wasn't a walking corpse. However, what we did was that while I was talking with the person at a balcony-like structure. My teammates were waiting with a rope and a ladder, ready to draw me out of there." Eli said, which sounded good, and right now the only solution was to wait, as they couldn't attack it or speak up to kill it; could it even die? But there were various issues.
The Professor was one to pick up on them. "Say we do such, which I think both of us can do well, believe it or not, I feel capable of strength. But we don't have any real rope here, so we will have to make a rope out of something here."
Ren had an idea, "Bedsheets, are they going to be strong enough to hold me?" If they reached the stage where he was in such a scenario.
The Professor looked around, mumbling something to himself before looking at Ren. "We need to tear the bedsheets and tie them together to make them thicker while also tying other fabrics to make certain that you won't drop, but we can still use them."
Ren huffed as his breathing became ragged, and the worst scenarios entered his mind, and he was already panicking a little. Eli patted the back of his head; he didn't like this at all, but it had to be done quickly, as it wouldn't be long before Gao Ming crawled to him. His movements were random and made no sense at the moment. But based on the way things were moving.
Eli and the Professor rushed to make a long, knotted rope of bed sheets and pillowcases, after a few tug tests that showed it to be strong.
The Professor wasn't mean at all to Gao Ming, so it made sense for Eli and the Professor to enter his room above 2422, and wait at the balcony for Ren to come out in case of an emergency, then toss the knotted sheet rope and yank him up. Ren didn't like it one bit, but he hoped things would work out, and he was fairly certain that being in the neighbour's room was another reason to attract Gao Ming along with himself as bait. He stood outside the door, waiting and humming a slow tune to calm himself.
The sound of flesh crawling came from behind; he wasn't shocked at all that such a mechanic conveniently allowed the game villain to find the MC, but this wasn't a game.
He turned back, and Gao Ming's scattered face and twisted body were dragging themselves towards him at a rapid rate. He didn't feel that running or attacking was the key to solving this situation, as shown by the previous neighbours who had tried and failed.
He put on a smile and opened room 2322 for Gao Ming, flipping the switch to turn on the lights. It was working, which was nice, although the velvet-colored place was quite dusty.
"Welcome Gao Ming, how are you feeling?" He asked, entering the room, which the corpse followed inside. Inside the living room, Ren noticed a mirror that, just like in Gao Ming's room, showed a reflection of the world upside down.
The Gao Ming crawled inside the apartment, his head being supported by his jaggered shoulder with his tongue fully extended to lick the floor. Ren took a step back.
"Gao Ming, now I can't lie that I understand you. You've experienced a pretty low life from birth to now. Your sister-in-law and pretty much everyone else threw stones at you." Ren said, and Gao Ming was still crawling.
Ren had already reached the balcony as rain began beating him.
Ren still believed in himself. "But you still pulled through, and deep down you feel you failed because you jumped down from this balcony but I tell you, and I know you can read me that I am not lying when I say that you endured something that many wouldn't live that long to see, you still smiled and even the fact that you jumped down made everyone shocked, even your own family that messed you up, why? Because they were used to seeing you go on and on, and on, no matter what life splashed at you."
Gao Ming began to raise its bloody self up, its body pouring with pus and blood; it was slow in the transition.
Ren smiled at him. "Gao Ming, look at me now. You got me cornered, but I am not going to because I don't think you are a monster like the others think you are. I know you want revenge, and you deserve to. I won't judge you or halt you, why? Because I want you to be happy, and you deserve happiness and a family that won't spit on your face because they want to, you don't deserve friends or families that just abandoned you, nor a mother that would abandon her baby at a random neighbor's doorstep."
The rain was beating Eli and the Professor as they saw Ren's back already against the balcony, and they lowered the rope down.
Ren sensed the rope was behind him, but he ignored it. He went all in on his gamble and took a step forward, with an outstretched hand toward Gao Ming.
"You don't deserve those people. How about you make me your family? Come on, Gao Ming." Ren pleaded as the wind was now blowing against him. Eli screamed for Ren to grab the ropes, but the rain muffled it.
Lightning flashed across the sky, and thunder roared.
That last brief sentence about Ren wanting to be a family member made Gao Ming stop in his tracks for the first time.
Then Gao Ming's injured arms stretched and wrapped around Ren, who didn't struggle. Gao Ming's body then began to expand again, wrapping around Ren, but since he didn't struggle, the wrapping was merely for the sake of grabbing, as Gao Ming was now pushing against the windowsill. Rain poured on them both as it washed blood out of Gao Ming's wound, which Ren stuffed the phone into a wound that was the correct size.
Eli screamed for Ren as she shook the rope to alert him, but Ren was still not resisting as he stared at Gao Ming's eyes that showed so much suffering and pain.
As Gao Ming tilted to fall, Ren exploded and used his hands and legs to push Gao Ming back into the room, causing the phone to slip out and fall, thereby simulating the game's ending. Ren, on the other hand, fell but managed to grab onto the rope.
Eli and the Professor grabbed onto it and held on as Ren fell, smashing against the wall, which caused his arm to be bent, his face to be scraped, and blood to flow out.
Eli screamed at him. "You fool!"