Wang Hai had no idea what had transpired in the bathroom, but he certainly heard the shriek filled with terror; he was certain the sound had come from Zhang Xiaohui. Yet, seeing her emerge from the restroom unharmed, he merely glanced her over curiously before dismissing it.

“Did you see a cockroach or something? I definitely heard you scream,” Wang Hai joked, pulling a comically frightened expression.

Zhang Xiaohui shot him a mock-angry glare and drifted past him with light steps. For a fleeting moment, Wang Hai thought his eyes were playing tricks on him, as he glimpsed a faint, eerie green luminescence flash in her eyes, much like the glow of a wolf’s eyes in the dark night.

Wang Hai instinctively rubbed his eyes, then looked up at Zhang Xiaohui again; everything seemed normal.

He couldn't help but shrug self-deprecatingly. Was he just overly tired? He turned and casually shut the bathroom door, which was still ajar. Zhang Xiaohui had specifically warned him about this—the door must be closed, or the rising dampness would foul the air in the room with a terrible odor.

“Hey, you didn’t close the door,” he finally found an opportunity to tease her.

But when he turned back, Zhang Xiaohui was gone from the living room. Wang Hai froze, looking around, only to discover that in the blink of an eye, she had moved silently to the window on the far side of the room, seemingly admiring the night outside.

To be honest, the night offered little worth admiring. Hardly any stars were visible, and thick clouds obscured the moon. Beyond the oppressive blackness, the only things visible were scattered lights in the distance.

Wang Hai pursed his lips, wondering what was on Zhang Xiaohui’s mind now. He drifted closer and peered outside. Far in the distance, where some sort of activity seemed to be taking place, a vague, pale green curtain of light shimmered against the sky. However, the color of that light deeply unsettled Wang Hai; it was a sickly, ghastly green, one that immediately brought to mind the spectral lighting effects often seen in horror films.

“What are you looking at?” Wang Hai asked casually, raising his hand to rest it on Zhang Xiaohui’s shoulder. In his mind, standing shoulder-to-shoulder with her by the window would have been quite lovely.

When his fingers touched her shoulder, he distinctly felt her tremble slightly. A chill, sharp as ice, shot through his fingertips, as if he weren't embracing a person, but a frozen statue.

“Are you cold?” Wang Hai tilted his head toward her, only to find her staring blankly out the window, seemingly oblivious to him.

“It’s very quiet out there,” Zhang Xiaohui suddenly said. Her voice sounded as if it were traveling from a great distance, elusive and intangible.

Wang Hai leaned over for another look. The bright streetlamps illuminated the residential area and the streets below, preventing utter darkness. But just as she said, barely any figures could be seen moving around. The sheer emptiness, when stared at for too long, gradually bred a sense of profound loneliness.

Suddenly, from somewhere deep within the complex, a chorus of dog barks erupted. A few initial yelps soon escalated into a scattered but continuous clamor. The sounds were profoundly unnatural; they sounded more like the howls of wolves in the wilderness described on nature shows—piercing, drawn-out, and chilling to the bone. Wang Hai had the unsettling feeling the sounds were gradually closing in beneath their building.

This sensation made him deeply uncomfortable, yet the Zhang Xiaohui beside him seemed utterly unaffected, still fixed on the view outside. If Wang Hai had looked closely at her then, he would have noticed a vacant bewilderment in her gaze—a total lack of focus. Unfortunately, Wang Hai didn't pay attention. He felt the oppressive darkness affecting him, sending shivers down his spine and a cold prickling sensation across his back.

He was just about to suggest they leave the window and sit down in the living room when, at that very moment, the normally steady indoor lights flickered several times. In those brief seconds of alternating light and dark, Wang Hai saw, to his utter astonishment, that reflected in the window glass—which was currently shrouded by the overwhelming darkness—were three figures. Two were clearly him and Zhang Xiaohui; standing right behind them, not far from their bodies, was a third shadow.

This realization made Wang Hai gasp internally. He whipped his head around violently. Just then, the room lights returned to normal, revealing an empty space behind him and throughout the living room.

He involuntarily pulled his hand back and took a few steps forward, scanning the area, finding nothing unusual.

The succession of strange illusions made Wang Hai swallow hard, a knot of tension tightening in his chest. He turned back, ready to pull Zhang Xiaohui to a seat, but when he looked again, she was already facing him, tilting her head slightly as she stared. Wang Hai felt a momentary blankness. He couldn’t tell if it was the interior lighting or the contrast of the deep night outside, but Zhang Xiaohui’s face was radiating an indescribable allure. The darkness of the night made her skin appear extraordinarily pale. Even though her features weren't conventionally stunning, the captivating charm she exuded at that moment was undeniable. The slight upturn of her lips, the way she held her hands clasped before her in a delicate posture—everything about her radiated a seductiveness he had never witnessed before.

It was little wonder Wang Hai was mesmerized. Since they had met, he had never seen her possess such a spectacularly bewitching quality. Poor Wang Hai couldn't help the thought crossing his mind: Did she have some new scheme? Still, this vision certainly sparked the primal urge to consume her.

What happened next made Wang Hai feel as if his brain were momentarily short-circuiting. Her hands moved to the buttons of her trousers, and they slid down, revealing a pair of snow-white, shapely legs. Almost deliberately, she slightly parted and then softly closed her legs. Combined with glimpses of her lithe figure and the gentle tremor in her waist, she exuded a lethally intoxicating aura.

All of this happened in a flash, and it was clear Zhang Xiaohui had no intention of stopping there. Sensing Wang Hai’s stirring arousal, she raised a hand, her slender fingers touching the top button of her blouse. With a slight flick, the garment parted, exposing a broad expanse of tempting intimacy to Wang Hai’s eyes.

For some reason, Zhang Xiaohui, whom he knew intimately, now seemed like an entirely different person in his eyes—one with devastating power. After just a few moments, his mouth felt dry, his throat parched, and he was fully prepared to lunge forward.

But before he could move, Zhang Xiaohui preempted him, throwing herself into his arms. They instantly locked together, and because her movement was so sudden, Wang Hai stumbled back a few steps, managing to pull her down onto the long sofa with him.

It was Zhang Xiaohui again who initiated the kiss, pressing her mouth tightly against his. Her arms and legs wrapped around him like an octopus, almost suffocating him. With her soft warmth cradled close, Wang Hai responded eagerly, though for one brief instant, a sliver of rationality warned him that something was deeply wrong with Zhang Xiaohui.

Having been together for so long, Wang Hai knew her too well; she was not a woman prone to such overt advances. Tonight, it felt as though he were holding someone other than Zhang Xiaohui—as if she were a stranger.

However, this fleeting doubt was quickly drowned by the surging tide of physical need. Only when they both reached climax and their bodies collapsed weakly did Wang Hai let out a long breath. Just as he was about to whisper some tender words, he suddenly noticed Zhang Xiaohui’s head resting against his ear, and a chillingly cold voice entered his hearing: “The baby is about to come out…”

Wang Hai’s face went instantly ashen, not because of the words themselves, but because he was certain the voice in his ear had not been Zhang Xiaohui’s. It was a completely unfamiliar sound.

He couldn't help but turn his head slightly, lowering his gaze to the face cradled beside him. The face was still Zhang Xiaohui’s, yet in his eyes, it was not the face of a normal person. Her entire visage was somehow illuminated in a ghastly, pale green. She stared at him with eyes that showed almost nothing but the whites, a wicked, knowing smile curling at the corners of her mouth.

Wang Hai felt as if a bucket of ice water had been dumped over him on the coldest day of winter. His entire body seized up. The arousal that had just begun to surface vanished instantly. On pure instinct, he pulled his hand away, somehow tumbling off the sofa onto the floor, but successfully putting distance between himself and Zhang Xiaohui.

Sitting on the floor, supporting himself with his hands, Wang Hai crouched up, his eyes wide with terror, staring at Zhang Xiaohui, who lay sprawled on the sofa. Facing this unknown horror, his robust physique and hard-earned muscle offered little defense.

Zhang Xiaohui slowly sat upright, looking at Wang Hai with a coy expression that was unnervingly stiff, as if carved from stone. Though her naked body remained startlingly alluring, it could no longer stir any desire in Wang Hai.

“Baby, my baby…” Zhang Xiaohui whispered the words softly, but in the room saturated with latent sensuality, her voice was incredibly sinister and chilling, dropping the ambient temperature in the entire apartment to near freezing.

Wang Hai had no comprehension of what was happening, nor why his girlfriend had suddenly become so spectral. His every movement was purely reflexive; he pushed himself backward with his hands, trying to put as much distance between himself and the sofa as possible.

This action seemed to enrage Zhang Xiaohui. She tilted her head, fixing him with a cold stare. In just a few minutes, the transformation was shocking: Zhang Xiaohui’s face was now white as paper, her lips red as blood, looking less and less like a living person. Her menacing expression was enough to make anyone shudder at a glance, and the words she uttered pushed Wang Hai’s terror to an unbearable peak.

“Don’t you want my baby? Our baby…” Her head was tilted, her dark pupils rolled upward so she was essentially looking at him with only the whites of her eyes.

Finally, Wang Hai snapped. Almost losing control, he shouted, “Who are you? What do you want?!”

Unexpectedly, Zhang Xiaohui ignored his question entirely, speaking only in a cold monotone: “I knew it, you don't want the baby, you don't want…”

She lowered her head, appearing to examine her abdomen, and slowly placed her hand there. Simultaneously, her lower belly began to swell at a rate visible to the naked eye. He could clearly see something writhing and churning inside. The movements were so violent that the skin over her navel pulsed and rose into distinct knots, looking as if whatever was inside might burst through at any second.

Wang Hai desperately wanted to scramble to his feet and flee, but fear had rendered his limbs weak, and his mind was almost completely blank, effectively stripped of the ability to reason. Aside from a constant, slight tremor, he was utterly panicked and paralyzed.

Clearly, this ordeal was not going to end easily. A strange smile suddenly bloomed on Zhang Xiaohui’s shadowed face. Her hands smoothed over her abdomen, which was now the size of a woman in full term, before she abruptly raised one hand and curled her index finger, dragging it across the surface of her belly…