Through the thick, swirling fog, a battered old bus crept along a seemingly endless road.

Inside, seven passengers—three women and four men—sat in silence, their eyes fixed on the murky haze beyond the windows. Their expressions told different stories—confusion, disorientation, dread—but all shared the same ghostly pallor, as though they had encountered something unspeakable on their journey.

The bus rolled on, its engine groaning, until it finally stopped before a looming, ancient mansion. The building was enveloped in a thick shroud of fog, its dark, decaying walls exuding an air of mystery and menace.

With a creak, the bus doors swung open, as if silently urging the passengers to step out. One by one, the seven disembarked, each casting a fearful glance back at the bus. Their eyes widened with a quiet horror, for where the driver should have been... the seat was disturbingly empty.

Yes, the bus... was driverless. As the last passenger stepped onto the ground, the bus doors slid shut with a finality that sent a shiver through the group. Without pause, the bus rumbled back to life, rolling forward until it vanished into the fog, swallowed whole by the mist.

The seven remaining outside the foreboding black mansion looked at each other, their faces etched with a fear they couldn’t hide.

"We have no other choice. We have to go," said a slender man, breaking the tense silence. He adjusted his black-framed glasses, his composed demeanor a stark contrast to the others’ growing anxiety.

"Do... do we really have to go in?" A woman with striking gold earrings stammered, her voice quivering.

She wore little against the cold, her arms wrapped tightly around herself as she shivered uncontrollably. "What if... it’s not safe inside?"

The others said nothing, their fear muting any thoughts of protest.

At first, they’d all assumed this was some elaborate prank, or perhaps an invitation to participate in a twisted reality show...

But when they discovered there was no driver on the bus, their collective dread deepened, pushing them into a silence born of sheer terror.

They had always considered themselves unwavering realists, grounded in logic and reason, but what they had experienced so far... defied every rational explanation.

"So, are you really going to step into the fog?"

Ethan inhaled deeply, fighting to keep his voice steady, though his heart was pounding wildly in his chest.

Less than an hour had passed since he’d received that mysterious letter and found himself here, but in those brief moments, his entire sense of reality had been turned upside down.

"Have you forgotten about the fat man who jumped off the bus at the crossroads?"

At the mention of the fat man, terror clouded the woman’s eyes, her earlier defiance crumbling in an instant. Her knees buckled, and she nearly collapsed under the weight of her fear.

Not long ago, there had been eight of them on the bus.

Each had inexplicably appeared there after falling asleep.

Among them was a portly man who had cursed and complained incessantly throughout the journey, convinced that they were the unwilling participants in some twisted reality show.

He’d ranted about how their phones had probably been swapped out, how the bus driver was hidden beneath them, steering the vehicle, and how the fog was nothing more than a special effect created with dry ice, among other wild theories.

In the end, when the bus had stopped at a crossroads, the fat man had flung open a window, leapt out, and disappeared into the fog on his own...

Up until now, things had seemed almost manageable.

But as they reached the next crossroads, they noticed something strange hovering in the fog around the traffic light...

As the bus drew closer, the horrifying truth became clear.

Suspended from the traffic light was the flayed, blood-soaked skin of the fat man who had left them earlier!

The skin was grotesquely intact, and the fat man’s face was still twisted in a mask of terror, as if he had seen something indescribably horrific before he died.

Crimson blood dripped steadily down the traffic light pole, pooling on the ground in dark, sticky puddles.

The sight left everyone on the bus petrified with fear.

One passenger, unwilling to believe the nightmare before them, yanked open a window, only to be assaulted by the sickening stench of blood, which quickly filled the entire bus...

At the mere mention of the fat man, the group’s faces turned ashen, and some even began to gag.

"...If no one dares to enter that fog, then our only option is to go into the black mansion," Ethan said, inhaling deeply.

He was just as terrified as the rest, but strangely, his reaction to the sight of the fat man’s flayed skin and the overpowering stench of blood wasn’t as extreme as theirs.

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And beyond the horror, a nagging curiosity about the mysterious letter he’d received tugged at him. What was the sender trying to reveal?

With a resolve born of desperation, Ethan stepped forward, leading the way. The others followed reluctantly, staying close behind as they pushed open the iron gate of the mansion and entered the overgrown garden outside.

The silence was oppressive.

So thick and heavy it felt suffocating.

The group instinctively huddled closer, seeking comfort in numbers. The beautiful woman with the gold earrings felt someone’s hand brush against her, but she only frowned and kept quiet.

A little unwanted touch was far better than ending up skinned alive.

And so, they found themselves standing outside the door of the black mansion. Ethan raised his hand and knocked.

Thud, thud, thud—

Almost immediately, the sound of footsteps echoed from within. The others instinctively backed away, their eyes glued to the door, tense and on edge.

Creak—

The door opened slowly.

But instead of the nightmare they had expected, they were greeted by the sight of a delicate, beautiful young girl. She couldn’t have been more than fifteen or sixteen.

"You’ve arrived?"

"Come in."

As she spoke, the group quickly realized that she was, in fact... a boy.

His voice, though, was chillingly flat, devoid of warmth or emotion.

Ethan stepped forward, following the boy inside, leaving the rest to glance uncertainly at one another, caught in the grip of indecision.

"You should hurry up and come in..."

The boy’s voice called out again from within the mansion, just as they hesitated.

"The fog outside... isn’t safe."

The mention of the fog sent a fresh wave of terror through them, memories of the fat man’s grisly end flashing in their minds. With fear driving them, they rushed into the house, pushing past each other in their desperation to escape the cold grasp of the fog.

The mansion's grand hall was vast and elegantly furnished. To the left, orderly bookshelves lined the wall, while to the right, a wooden staircase spiraled upwards. In the center of the room, three large sofas surrounded a brazier where flames crackled and danced.

Four people sat around the fire, staring into the flames, their expressions vacant, as if lost in some distant, troubling thought.

The air in the room grew colder, the silence more oppressive.

"Excuse me... where are we?"

"Why were we brought here?"

"What’s the deal with the fog outside and that bus?"

Finally, after a moment of tense silence, Ethan found the courage to ask the three questions that had been gnawing at him.

But still, no one answered.

The four figures by the fire didn’t even acknowledge his presence.

Ryan, the bearded man standing behind Ethan, lost his patience.

"Hey! We’re talking to you!"

"Are you all deaf or just too scared to speak?"

His voice echoed through the room, loud enough to make their ears ache.

At last, the man in the suit, seated directly across from Ethan, spoke.

"I understand you have many questions..."

"If you survive the first Blood Door, I’ll answer them."

A wave of dread swept over the group at his words.

"Blood Door? What’s that?" Ethan asked, his mind flashing back to the mysterious phone call from the woman earlier.

The man in the suit didn’t bother to look up, merely pointing toward the third floor.

"Your time is short. In less than five minutes, the Blood Door will open. When it does, you’ll enter a world of terror, where you must complete the tasks it assigns."

"Only when you’ve completed the task will the bus return to pick you up."

As he finished speaking, Emma, the petite woman with pigtails, asked in a trembling voice, "What if... we don’t complete the task?"

The man in the suit slowly raised his head, locking eyes with Emma.

The cold, detached look in his eyes made her shudder.

"You’ll die."

"And it won’t be... a pleasant death."

The group felt their knees buckle, the reality of the situation sinking in.

They wanted to dismiss this as some sick joke.

But the seriousness in the man’s expression extinguished their last flicker of hope.

"Is there... any way we can avoid this?" a young man with dyed blond hair asked, his voice shaky.

The man in the suit glanced at him.

"You can."

"But... you’d better never sleep again."

The blond man froze, his eyes wide.

"W-why?"

The man in the suit gave a sinister smile.

"Because if you don’t go through the Blood Door to complete the task, then... something will come out of the Blood Door to find you."

"No matter where you run, it will find you."

"And then..."

The man in the suit didn’t need to finish his sentence—the grim conclusion was all too clear to everyone.

Ethan glanced up at the third floor, then turned to the man in the suit.

"Is there anything else we should know before we go in?"

The man in the suit hesitated briefly, then met Ethan’s gaze. Seeing the calmness that set Ethan apart from the others, a barely noticeable glimmer of respect flickered in his eyes.

"Advice... yes, I have some."

"Although the world behind the Blood Door is fraught with danger, there’s always more than one path to survival. If you can find that path, completing the task and staying alive... won’t be as difficult as you might think."

Ethan nodded.

"Thanks."

With that, he took the lead, climbing the stairs to the third floor.

Ryan, the bearded man, watched Ethan’s boldness with a mix of admiration and fear. After a brief internal struggle, he clenched his jaw and followed.

"Damn, man... you’ve got guts," Ryan muttered as he caught up to Ethan.

He’d noticed Ethan earlier—how could he not? Whether it was the sight of the fat man’s flayed skin or the sickening smell of blood, Ethan had barely reacted.

"Guts?" Ethan let out a dry laugh, laced with a hint of irony. "Do you really think we have a choice?"

Ryan, towering over most people, found that even a step below Ethan, they were almost eye-to-eye.

"When you saw the fat man’s skin... you didn’t even blink. Were you... in that kind of work before?"

"What kind of work?"

"A butcher."

"You’ve been watching too many movies. Assassins aren’t as common in real life as you think."

"Uh... then..."

"I’m a doctor."

"Oh~ That makes sense. A forensic pathologist?"

"Close. A veterinarian."

Their conversation faded as they reached the third floor.

The moment they arrived, they stopped talking.

The air was thick with the metallic scent of blood, mingling with the musty odor of rotting wood.

The third floor of the mansion was completely bare, except for a single wooden door, soaked through with dark, crimson blood...

On the wooden door, stained a deep crimson, a line of blood-red text was scrawled:

"Care for the bedridden elderly for five days."

"So, taking care of an elderly person... that’s our task," Ethan muttered, his eyes narrowing as he considered the implications.

The others slowly gathered at the top of the stairs, each one freezing as they read the ominous message on the door.

"Is it... really that simple?" Olivia, the woman with the gold earrings, asked, her voice trembling with disbelief.

A murmur of hushed conversations spread through the group, but it abruptly ceased as an unspoken sense of dread washed over them. All at once, their eyes snapped back to the wooden door.

Creak—

From within the room, a faint sound echoed, as though something was pressing against the door.

Moments later, the door was slowly pushed open by a pair of ghostly pale hands!

As the blood-drenched door creaked open, the world around them plunged into darkness, and they all slipped into unconsciousness...