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Chapter 47 Everyone, please stop tearing up the tickets!

When the old men tell stories, they always like to drink a few jugs of wine and then crunch on a plate of peanuts.

The old man was initially unwilling to say much to them, but Gu Mian managed to coax him out with a few words.

The group is now seated in a nearby restaurant of moderate size. The old man is sitting at the table, completely absorbed in his meal, no longer even looking towards the entrance.

He picked up a peanut, threw it into his mouth, and chewed it incessantly, making several people around him swallow hard.

"Speaking of Zhou Guanglei and Zhao Wen, they both passed away two years ago, but there has been a gap of more than two months."

"Let's start with Zhao Wen. He stopped working here before he died. At the time, everyone in our factory thought he had gone somewhere to make a fortune, but we never expected to hear that he was gone in less than three months."

"Life and death are common occurrences. Although the people at the factory were surprised when they heard about it, they didn't remember it for long."

"It wasn't until two months later, when Zhou Guanglei, who was very close to Zhao Wen, also died, that people began to suspect that their deaths were not normal. They didn't even know how Zhao Wen died, but Zhou Guanglei's death was quite suspicious."

"Before he died, he kept saying that someone was knocking on his door, and he even suspected that we were the ones who did it. Later, he didn't do anything else at night but just made phone calls. I also received calls from him..."

"Later, I heard that he died in his own house, strangled by a telephone cord while lying in bed. Isn't that strange? How can a grown man be strangled by a telephone cord while lying in bed?"

“We all know his death was unusual, and we don’t usually dare to talk about it much. There are always people who feel that Zhao Wen and Zhou Guanglei’s deaths are suspicious, but they can’t find any connection between them.”

"But they don't know how Zhao Wen died, but I, the old man, do! My nephew works at the police station."

"My nephew told me that when they were investigating Zhao Wen's family, they said that Zhao Wen kept hearing knocking on the door before he died."

Gu Mian and the others already knew all this, but they didn't interrupt the old man and let him continue.

The old man picked up another piece of snack, took a sip of wine, and continued, "As for the source of this knocking, others might not know, but I do. My nephew works at the police station, hehe."

Upon hearing this, Yuwen Hao and Qing Huan exchanged a glance, finally uncovering the origins of the knocking ghost.

"Speaking of this knocking sound, I have to mention the fire in our factory seven or eight years ago. One person died in that fire. Tsk tsk tsk, I was here at the time, and I watched as that person was carried out, charred black."

When Yuwen Hao and his team were investigating Zhou Guanglei yesterday, they heard from others that three people had died at this factory: one died in a fire, and the remaining two were Zhao Wen and Zhou Guanglei.

"Seven or eight years ago, around 95, our factory had only been built for a short time. It was very new, and getting a job there was highly sought after. Many young people were eager to get in."

"The one who burned to death back then was a young man named Yu Hai. I heard he came from a rural area not far from here, wanting to try his luck in this small county town, but he lost his life as soon as he arrived."

"The fire happened at night. It was a new factory then, and the leaders were also new to leadership. They were so petty, afraid that someone might sneak in at night and tear down the factory gates."

"Then our manager arranged for a few people to work the night shift. I was also at the factory that night; I was the gatekeeper."

"Yu Hai, that young man, works the night shift in the office. The office has a small bedroom with a bed, and there are even people watching over him in the workshop."

"I was dozing off when the fire started, it must have been around 2 a.m. I was woken up by the people on night shift in the workshop."

"When I woke up, the fire was already raging! I rushed over there and saw that the entire row of offices had been burned down! It was so fierce..." The old man clicked his tongue and shook his head as he said this, seemingly still marveling at the ferocity of the fire back then.

"That was in 95. Telephones weren't even common in our small county, let alone cell phones. Only the leaders had those big mobile phones, which were about the size of a newborn baby."

"We couldn't call the police, and we didn't know where the fire station was. The police station was too far away, so we had to run out to find a leader so he could use his mobile phone to call the police."

"But it was too late. The person who went out to find the leader told me to guard the row of offices that were on fire. After he left, I heard noises coming from those offices..."

"That's Yu Hai's voice inside... Sigh, he must be trapped in the small bedroom in his office."

"I heard him screaming inside, screaming horribly! He was banging on the door, like the bedroom door was locked and he was screaming desperately inside."

"I wanted to rush in and save people, but the fire was too big at the time. It flooded the entire row of offices, and I couldn't even see where the doors were. Going in would have meant certain death."

"I could only listen from outside as Yu Hai kept banging on the door, banging on and on, but he couldn't open it no matter what he did. Eventually, his voice got softer and softer, but he was still desperately banging on the door from inside..."

"By the time the fire truck arrived, there was no sound coming from inside. The fire department had a lot of trouble putting out the fire, and when the person was found, they were already as black as charcoal..."

"The factory has seen a lot of staff changes over the past seven or eight years, so they don't know much about the fire anymore. They only know that one person died in the fire."

"But I remember it clearly. I remember that night when Yu Hai was desperately knocking on the door in the fire, trying to get out. So when I learned about Zhao Wen and Zhou Guanglei, the first person I thought of was Yu Hai."

At this point, the old man put down his chopsticks, sighed deeply, and could no longer swallow what was in his mouth.

Gu Mian stroked her chin. It seemed that Yu Hai was the ghost who had been following her around. However, Yu Hai's death was suspicious, and he might have been killed by another ghost.

He looked at the old man and asked, "What did the police say later?"

"My nephew said the fire was very strange; it didn't seem like an accident, nor did it seem like it was caused by someone. It was more like a fire that appeared out of nowhere..."

"Did Yu Hai experience any supernatural events before he died?"

Now that the ghosts corresponding to the five of them have all appeared, it seems that we are not far from the source. It is possible that the ghost that killed Yu Hai is the source of the curse.

"How would I know? He's a bachelor. I heard his parents died a long time ago. He grew up eating food from many families. He's a big, simple-minded guy and doesn't talk to people much. But I don't think he's ever encountered any supernatural events before, otherwise he would have been scared to death."

"Has anything strange happened at this factory before?"

"When Yu Hai died, this factory was still very new, it had only been built for a short time. How could it have experienced any supernatural events in such a short period of time? If you want to find you, you have to start from when this factory was not built. I heard that this land used to be a textile workshop."

The Lunar New Year was so busy! I finally managed to write a chapter while visiting relatives (o(╥﹏╥)o)

Everyone, please stop tearing up the tickets! Don't give them all to me!

Thank you to sty1999, 药在不成长, Fairy, 幻城月影, 林凤寒, 莘子锅锅, 黎杰, 书友 with the last four digits 5621, and 加油吧113 for their generous donations.
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(End of this chapter)