Chapter 724: 724

Chapter 724: Midnight Is Coming

Zhang Heng returned from the grocery store with a bag full of useful items . He walked through the lobby of the Gilman Hostel, backpack on his back . Although the rifle clearly protruded out of it, the surly-looking male staff didn’t say a word, pretending he hadn’t noticed it at all .

After that, Zhang Heng stepped on the broken stairs to get to his room located on the top floor . Every step he made creaked loudly, as though the old wood under his feet was protesting the sudden increase in burden .

The lights in the corridor were no better than the ones on the street . Although turned on, the distance the light could reach was sorely limited . The long shadows it cast on the walls made the whole place look even eerier .

Zhang Heng could clearly hear Fabericotte’s footsteps thumping around in his room . And he could tell from his pace how upset the young traveler was now . After a while, he sat down and took a book out of his luggage . Zhang Heng could hear the sound of flipping papers . Fabericotte was trying to calm himself down by reading a book .

Wasting no time in the corridor, Zhang Heng reached out and opened his room’s door .

Instead of resting upon returning to his room, he began to organize the things he brought back from the grocery store . He attempted to make a few Molotov cocktails using methods the Finnish guerrillas had taught him during the Soviet-Finnish war . However, there wasn’t enough alcohol in commercial whisky to be ignited . Hence Zhang Heng distilled some high-purity whiskey and added tinder as a fuse .

Once that was done, he loaded all three guns with bullets and tied the claws to the front of the rope . With the makeshift grappling hook, he would be able to use it to climb the wall . After that, Zhang Heng picked up the fishing lines strung them all over his room . Under the dim light, these threads were so thin that they were barely visible .

Only Zhang Heng knew where he had laid those lines .

WIth limited sharpness and toughness, Zhang Heng never expected fishing lines to kill his enemies . These, however, served as an effective method to block uninvited guests that might barge into his room . Since the enemies wouldn’t expect the trap, whatever they were about to do would be immediately put to a halt .

Zhang Heng paid particular attention to the positions of several doors and windows . After planning an escape route for himself, he blocked all the other places with the fishing lines .

Upon making sure that the room was secure, he put up a chair against the doorknob and finally laid himself on the bed . After a few tosses and turns, however, he was still denied sleep . First, he couldn’t tell if he was in a dream or reality, and second, he really didn’t feel very sleepy . So, with his mind unable to come to rest, Zhang Heng took out the Shadow-set items and gave them a once over .

After coming to this place, he could clearly feel that the power the Shadow-set items contained had recovered to a certain extent . However, they felt different when he used them . Pulling out his favorite Shadow Moment, he and started to think about the crow in his mind .

Unfortunately, he saw no crow in the dark . He then tried the Shadow Foot, but it yielded no result too . Just when Zhang Heng wanted to use the Shadow Key again, he heard something .

The floorboards under the stairs and corridors started creaking . Someone was coming upstairs, and it was no new guest nor employee . Whoever it was, though, the person had deliberately attempted to tread as lightly as possible .

In other words, the person did not want his presence to be known .

Earlier, Zhang Heng spent a long time distilling the whiskey and arranging the traps . It was past midnight, and most people should be asleep by now . Suddenly, the only source of light in the room cut-off, as if proving his speculations right . The room instantly plunged into complete darkness . Of course, it wasn’t because the lightbulb had exhausted its lifespan . Someone had cut off the power on purpose .

Zhang Heng knew that the show was about to begin .

The townsfolk kept mentioning a celebration in the evening, but the streets were still empty until now, and nobody was outside their houses . The residents had been so busy preparing for the celebration for such a long time, but instead of proceeding with it when the time came, they had all gone home to sleep .

But Zhang Heng was not in a hurry . He lay silently on the bed, waiting to see what the person in the corridor would do to him .

Unexpectedly, the person headed to Fabericotte’s room first . He stood in front of the door for a while as though listening to the movements inside the room . After that, Zhang Heng heard the sound of a key being inserted into a keyhole .

Fabericotte was not ready to face a circumstance like this . His increasing bouts of anxiety had forced him to do something about his safety . Although he disagreed with Zhang Heng’s plan to arm himself, he appeared to have made some preparations after returning to his room . To Zhang Heng’s surprise, the intruder failed to unlock Fabericotte’s room with the key . So, he went to the next room .

The rooms of Gilman Hostel were fascinating . Zhang Heng’s room, a single room, for instance, had a front door and two side doors . Fabericotte’s room should have a similar layout .

The intruder wanted to find another way to enter Fabericotte’s room after discovering that he could not open his room’s door . In the end, after spending a long time trying to unlock both of the side doors, his attempts were all but fruitless, and he still failed to find a way to enter Room 428 .

Initially, Zhang Heng thought that the intruder would give up entering room 428 for now and try his room instead . To his surprise, the sound in the hallway disappeared, and the person appeared to have retreated downstairs .

After that, Zhang Heng heard footsteps in Room 428 . Fabricotte was not asleep either . At this point, he should be terrified . He did not allow himself to be immersed in fear for too long, though . He knew that this was a rare opportunity . Since the other party was determined to harm him somehow, they would definitely not give up so quickly . Staying in the room any longer would prove unwise . This was the time to take advantage of the situation and attempt escape .

Fabericotte did not dare to open the door and run down the stairs . The intruder would be able to capture him if he did so . So the other thing that crossed his mind was to escape through the windows . Unlike Zhang Heng’s unit, there was a dilapidated impluvium outside the windows, and there were some short and abandoned masonry buildings surrounding it . Then, to the west was a swamp .

The window was too high from the ground . Fabericotte thought about jumping to the masonry building’s roof beneath his room, but after a visual inspection, he figured a successful jump from this distance wouldn’t be possible . It would work if he entered the room two rooms away from him . So, he first tried the door on the south but found something was stuck behind it . In the end, he could only try to open the door on the north side .

Suddenly, the creepy footsteps sound came from the stairs again . Goosebumps sprouted all over Fabericotte’s skin . Soon after that, the person began banging violently on his door . It seemed the intruder had given on concealing his presence .

As Fabericotte trembled in fear, a strange look appeared across Zhang Heng’s face . Because no one had come to him until now . It looked like they had forgotten about him .

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