"Door?" Men Nan's voice changed noticeably the moment the word left Chen Ge's mouth. It wasn't just surprise—there was a sudden tightening, a crack in his usual calm composure, as though something long buried had been struck with force. The photograph Chen Ge had sent him was one Men Nan already possessed, though he kept it hidden at the very bottom of a drawer, buried beneath several heavy books. It was never displayed, never framed, never acknowledged openly. Chen Ge had noticed this strange detail back at Hai Ming Apartments: this was the only picture Men Nan owned of his mother, yet he treated it like a secret shame rather than a cherished memory. The conflict inside Men Nan's heart had been obvious even then—he could not bear to throw the photo away, but he also refused to face it directly.
When Chen Ge had first seen that picture at Hai Ming Apartments, confusion had immediately set in. Why would someone hide the sole remaining image of their mother in such a secluded, almost ashamed corner? Why not place it proudly on a nightstand or shelf where it could be seen every day? Now, hearing Men Nan's reaction over the phone, Chen Ge finally understood. The photo wasn't just a memory—it was a wound Men Nan had spent years trying to ignore.
"Where did you get this picture?" Men Nan's voice came out hoarse, almost cracked. His usual measured tone had slowed dramatically, each word weighed down by something heavy and reluctant. Chen Ge had dragged into the light something Men Nan had worked hard to keep buried. There was no running from it anymore.
"I found it inside the mental hospital," Chen Ge answered directly. "I've already gone into the exact room your mother once stayed in—Room 3 of the Third Sick Hall."
"Leave that place immediately!" Men Nan's sudden scream cut through the line before Chen Ge could finish his sentence. The raw panic in his voice was unmistakable, sharp enough to make Chen Ge pause mid-step.
"Leave?" Chen Ge repeated slowly. "So you've remembered something after all."
Another long silence stretched across the phone connection. Several seconds passed before Men Nan spoke again, his voice quieter, almost defeated. "I don't know why I said that. But my instincts… they're telling me that place is extremely dangerous. I can feel it even now."
"The mental hospital is completely locked down," Chen Ge explained, keeping his voice low. "I can't leave even if I wanted to. If this weren't urgent—if lives weren't hanging in the balance—I wouldn't have disturbed you at all." He shifted his grip on the cleaver and glanced down the corridor. The blood vessels in the walls were still creeping silently toward Zhang Ya, pulsing faintly like veins feeding a wound. "This has gone far beyond just you and me. Those madmen who refused treatment—they've all returned here, carrying their twisted ideologies with them. They've detained living people, experimented on them with axes and saws. Can you even imagine what else they might have done in the years since the hospital closed?"
"There are… victims still inside the hospital?" Men Nan's voice trembled with uncertainty. He sounded as though he were doubting his own memories, wrestling with something he wanted desperately to say but lacked the courage to voice.
"I can confirm at least one thing," Chen Ge said firmly. "There is more than one victim. I've found plenty of evidence scattered throughout the building—dolls with real names, medication bags labeled for the dead, records marked 'Confirmed Dead.' All of it points to something systematic and ongoing." He paused, trying to gauge Men Nan's reaction. "I'm in serious danger right now. Monsters and possessed patients are hunting me with axes. I can't reason with them. I can't outrun them forever."
After another long silence, Men Nan finally spoke again, his voice soft and filled with complicated emotions. "How exactly do you expect me to help you?"
"Awaken the other persona inside you!" Chen Ge said urgently. "The child version—the one I'm looking for!" The stench in the air intensified suddenly, as though a massive mouth had just opened somewhere nearby. "He knows how to close the door in Room 3 of the Third Sick Hall. Awaken him! I know what happened to you when you were young. I understand your pain—I relate to it more than you know—but you can't run from it forever!"
"Close the door…" Men Nan echoed softly, almost to himself. Then, after a pause: "I'm sorry, but I'm afraid I can't help you."
Chen Ge felt the words like a physical blow. He had not expected such a direct, brutal rejection. "Why not?"
"Because he's not with me anymore," Men Nan answered quietly. He took a deep, shaky breath before continuing. "He locked himself away behind the door."
"Your childhood persona is trapped on the other side of the blood door?" Chen Ge's brows furrowed deeply, shock rippling through him.
"Yes," Men Nan confirmed. "To be honest… he is the real main persona. My own memories only began after I turned four years old." He revealed this shocking truth with a kind of weary resignation. "The main persona was born inside the mental hospital. He saw the twisted world there as normal—because it was the only world he knew. His perspective was completely different from everyone else's. Before he turned four, he tried desperately to fix his own broken view of reality. His only pillar of support was his mother. But when he was four, his mother was murdered right in front of him. After witnessing that, the main persona simply gave up on the so-called normal world.
"Perhaps the normal world had never shown him any kindness at all. So he decided the world we live in is the truly twisted one. He sealed himself away inside his own mind, and then I appeared. He didn't communicate with me again until the day the director from the mental hospital and a Doctor Chen came looking for me. They begged for my help to close this 'door.'
"At that time, I was still so small. I didn't understand anything. They brought me back to the mental hospital—to the place where the main persona had spent his entire early childhood. They asked me many questions—questions I still can't answer clearly even now."
"That night, they arranged for me to sleep inside Room 3," Men Nan continued, his voice growing quieter and more strained with every word. "I don't know exactly what happened after that. There were probably sleeping pills mixed into the water they gave me because I fell into a sleep so deep it felt almost unnatural—like sinking into black water with no bottom. It was probably during that heavy, drugged slumber that they summoned the main persona."
"When I finally woke up, it was already midnight. I opened my eyes slowly, everything blurry and dreamlike. I saw myself lying in the bed, but the entire room around me had turned blood red—walls, ceiling, floor, everything drenched in that deep, pulsing crimson. The strangest thing, though, was that the main persona was standing right beside me, looking down at my sleeping body."
"He spoke to me very quietly. He told me to keep everything a secret from everyone else and pointed toward the clock visible through the small window in the corridor outside. He instructed me to stay awake no matter how exhausted I felt. Then, without another word, he sent me out of the room. He remained behind the door and closed it himself from the inside."
"After that night, he stopped appearing completely. But sometimes—rarely—memories that don't belong to me would surface in my consciousness. Fragments of things I never experienced, feelings that weren't mine. I planned to carry these secrets with me to my grave because, even now, I'm still not entirely sure whether they're real or just hallucinations born from trauma."
"My condition is very similar to schizophrenia in many ways, but everything feels so real—too real. I grew up trapped in a constant state of self-doubt, questioning every memory, every thought. That's the main reason I chose to study psychology. I needed to understand what was happening inside my own mind before it tore me apart."
There was deep, raw pain woven through every word Men Nan spoke. Chen Ge, listening as an outsider, could feel the weight of that pain pressing against his own chest. Pretending to be a normal person and forcing oneself to live a normal life had been an enormous, exhausting challenge for the young man—one that had clearly left lasting scars.
"This explains why he couldn't resist the mirror ghost back then," Chen Ge realized aloud, gripping the phone tighter. His heart quivered with anxiety as the implications sank in deeper.
"Men Nan should be telling the truth," Doctor Gao interjected, taking the phone back from Men Nan. "When I conducted a deep diagnosis of his psyche, the third persona did appear like shattered, episodic memories—randomized fragments rather than a cohesive identity. It's consistent with severe early trauma creating a protective split that later sealed itself away."
"Yes," Chen Ge agreed softly. "He's telling the truth."
The only person capable of closing the blood door had spent the last decade or more trapped on the other side of it. The door itself had remained sealed for that entire period—until the hospital officially closed five years ago and the door reopened. Could the real Men Nan—the childhood persona—have suffered some kind of accident or catastrophe behind the door during those lost years?
Chen Ge felt a powerful urge to retreat. This building was far too wicked, too deeply corrupted. Even with Zhang Ya fighting at his side, he no longer felt truly safe. "It's safer to retreat for now," he decided.
He turned to look back down the corridor. The cold draft fluttered the edges of Zhang Ya's vivid red outfit, making it ripple like fresh blood caught in wind. Her long black hair melted into the surrounding darkness and pierced repeatedly through the bodies of the three monsters, tearing and shredding with merciless precision. Of the three grotesque creatures that had surrounded him only minutes earlier, two had already been ripped completely apart—reduced to scattered, dissolving fragments that twitched once or twice before fading entirely.