Forgotten Photo Studio

Chapter 42 Imprisoned Eyes
Time seemed to stretch out and freeze. In the dimly lit bedroom of the photo studio, everyone's eyes were fixed on the dark opening and the eerie "eye" within it that seemed to be watching the outside world.

Xu Yan's arm was completely out of his control, as if pulled by invisible threads, and stretched steadily and slowly toward the cave entrance.

His reason was screaming for danger, but something more primal and cold deep within him overwhelmed everything.

Chen Zhiwei's exclamation caught in her throat.

A Zhe held his breath.

Zhou Wenbin's eyes were glazed over.

Xu Yan's fingertips touched that faint light.

Extreme cold instantly rushed in!

At the same time, the Soul-Suppressing Iron in his right arm reacted violently with the Ghost Hand Curse, colliding wildly yet both pointing towards the object in the cave.

"what!"

Xu Yan let out a suppressed growl as his right hand was firmly gripped!

The instant he touched the solid object—

hum...

The deep hum directly affects consciousness.

The "eye" in the cave shone brightly, turning Xu Yan's right hand into a strange, translucent bluish-black color.

The blood-red runes on the wall twisted wildly, and the dark red light and the ghostly light clashed fiercely, causing the entire wall to tremble violently.

"It's resisting the seal!" Chen Zhiwei exclaimed in horror, but what shocked her even more was the brushstrokes and rhythm of the runes. "This drawing technique... is almost exactly the same as what Grandpa recorded in his notes! Grandma... is from the same lineage as Grandpa? How is that possible?"

In that instant, the fear in her heart was torn apart by another kind of cold suspicion.

Were those few words left by my grandfather before his death not just accidental research, but rather a premonition of all this?
If the handwriting of the grandmother and grandfather is from the same source, then the notes she inherited... does that also mean that she has already been drawn into some inescapable situation?
She gripped the copper bell tightly in her hand, her palms sweating profusely.

Fear, confusion, and doubt intertwined, leaving her momentarily unsure whether she was an observer or an "inheritor" destined to be involved.

Xu Yan was completely powerless to break free.

Chaotic fragments of information were forcibly poured into his mind:
The old woman's trembling hands drew the talismans;

Endless darkness;
The loud slamming of the stone gate shut;
The grey, lifeless waters were filled with countless pale, distorted faces...

A severe headache and nausea struck.

A vast, ancient, and cold will filled with despair and resentment is trying to establish a connection with him through this "key"!

Just then, the sky outside the window suddenly darkened!
The pale moonlight seemed to be swallowed up by an invisible giant mouth and quickly extinguished.

The total lunar eclipse has begun.

As the last ray of light vanished, an endless crimson glow took its place, shining through the window frame like splashed blood, enveloping the trembling wall and Xu Yan's arm as he plunged into the cave entrance.

Under the illumination of this extremely yin red light, the dark red blood talisman on the wall seemed to be eroded, and its light quickly dimmed and faded.

“A blood moon hangs in the sky… Yin erodes Yang…” A Zhe’s voice trembled as the values ​​on the energy detector screen in his hand jumped wildly before returning to zero. “All conventional energy readings were suppressed… It’s this red light… It’s like a stronger ‘field’!”

As if the last obstacle had been completely shattered by the radiance of the blood moon, a sudden change occurred!
The lining of the closed compartment became translucent in the red light.

A blurry, aged figure of an old woman dressed in dark funeral clothes slowly emerged from the wall.

She was not a monstrous vengeful spirit, but rather a fleeting afterimage briefly awakened by the blood moon, about to burn out, her face blurred, yet exuding endless weariness and a sense of relieved sorrow.

Her lingering image didn't look at her son, but slowly turned to Chen Zhiwei. Her lips moved silently, and a faint whisper, yet it resonated directly in Chen Zhiwei's mind, flowed through her:
“Hold on… don’t let them… take away ‘Abyss’…” Her figure began to flicker violently, becoming extremely unstable, and her words were intermittent, yet resounding, “Your grandfather… he also… understands the price…” Before she could finish speaking, her figure began to flicker violently, becoming extremely unstable. The radiance of the blood moon seemed to be accelerating her dissipation, but the last trace of unwillingness in her obsession prevented her from leaving peacefully, instead showing a tendency to transform into an eternally wandering evil spirit.

"mom!"

Zhou Wenbin cried out.

Just as the lingering image of the mother-in-law was about to be completely devoured and transformed by her obsession, a critical moment occurred.

Despite the excruciating pain in his head and the tearing sensation in his arm, Xu Yan, almost instinctively, reached into his pocket with his free right hand and pulled out the old, dark silver camera.

A chilling thought flashed through my mind: pressing the shutter means permanently sealing a remnant of consciousness into a cold image. Is this liberation, or another kind of eternal imprisonment?

But at this moment, he had no other choice.

Without aiming or thinking, he simply pointed the lens at the lingering image of his grandmother, which was about to dissipate and then transform, and with all the willpower he could muster at that moment, he pressed the shutter hard!

Click!

A dull, mechanical sound, seemingly from a distant past.

A strange, grayish-white wave, not light, surged from the lens and instantly enveloped the old woman's afterimage.

"This fluctuation...!" The detector in A Zhe's hand suddenly emitted a series of garbled codes, then emitted a wisp of smoke and completely failed. He exclaimed in shock, "This is not any known energy spectrum... What the camera is emitting... completely distorts the laws of physics!"

The fluctuations carried a sense of absolute "preservation" and "freezing".

The mother-in-law's figure, which had been flickering violently and distorting, suddenly paused amidst the gray-white fluctuations, and then quickly became clear and calm.

In the final, frozen moment, her face no longer showed pain and resentment, but rather an extremely complex expression.

There was a hint of relief, a hint of deep regret, and a hint of... an unreadable warning as he looked at the "key" in Xu Yan's hand.

The next moment, the entire afterimage seemed to be sucked into the camera lens, instantly shrinking and disappearing.

The camera's heavy body shuddered slightly, as if it had swallowed something heavy.

The room fell silent, so quiet that even the breathing of a few people was amplified to an ear-piercing level.

The air still carried the scent of burnt cinnabar and the damp, musty smell of decay, but it was no longer turbulent.

Chen Zhiwei slowly raised her hand, as if to touch the half of the photographic paper, but stopped abruptly just before her fingertips touched it, as if afraid of breaking something fragile.

Within the viewfinder, a blurry, newly developed photographic sheet slowly emerges, revealing a half-length portrait of an old man with a calm yet meaningful gaze, against a backdrop of rippling, dark red moonlight.

The chilling atmosphere that had filled the room vanished without a trace.

The mother-in-law's obsession has been sealed away.

They were also freed.

The hidden compartment was completely closed, the blood rune disappeared, and the wall returned to calm.

Outside the window, the blood moon hung high in the sky, casting an ominous red light throughout the room. All was silent except for the heavy breathing of the people.

Xu Yan staggered backward and was helped up.

The cold touch of the camera and the weighty feeling of deciding one's fate when pressing the shutter remained in my palm.

Under the blood moon, a storm is brewing.

(End of this chapter)