# Chapter 155: The Wooden Doll on the First Floor
The girl in the white dress smiled first, then said, "You actually believe fairy tales? How could people not age. If you want to hear the original stories of Block Fairy Tale City, you'd have to find the elderly folks. But the old people in Block Fairy Tale City either died of illness, moved to other cities, or are staying home to retire and don't like going out."
"The owner of Block Muffin Shop and the boss of Long Nose Nut Pie are both former residents of Block Fairy Tale City, but if you go looking for them, they might not be there."
"I was just asking casually," Xu Huo said, buying two umbrellas and handing one to her. "Let's have dinner together."
The girl in the white dress smiled shyly.
The two of them had dinner together and then parted ways. The girl in the white dress held her umbrella and left the noisy main street, entering a complex maze of narrow alleyways. But no sooner had she walked in than a man and a woman blocked her path. The woman pressed a dagger against her neck. "What did that man ask you?"
The girl in the white dress looked panicked and pulled out the tour guide fee Xu Huo had paid her. "All my money is here..."
"Who wants your money!" the man growled, but the woman snatched the money first and glared at him. "Why not take it? It's our money anyway!"
The man grabbed the girl's shoulder, his expression fierce. "I'll ask you something, and you'd better tell the truth. I promise I won't hurt you."
The girl in the white dress swallowed hard. "That man was just a tourist. He asked where he could find elderly people from Block Fairy Tale City."
"Tell me! Where!"
"Block Muffin Shop and Fresh Meat Sausage Shop..." the girl said softly.
"Besides those two places, where else can we find elderly people?" the man pressed.
"There's nowhere else, nowhere else... Most of the old people in Block Fairy Tale City died of illness..." the girl said quickly.
The man finally released her, exchanged a glance with the woman, and hurried away.
After they left, the girl in the white dress picked up the umbrella that had fallen on the ground, wiped the dirt off her skirt, and continued walking.
She hadn't gone more than a few minutes when a hand suddenly reached out from a corner, grabbing her throat. "What did those two people ask you?"
The girl in the white dress struggled to breathe, stammering, "They wanted... to know where the guest... I was guiding was going?"
"The location."
"Bear Claw Restaurant... and Fresh Meat Sausage Shop... nothing else..."
Just as she was about to suffocate, the hand suddenly released her. The girl in the white dress knelt on the ground, coughing incessantly. At that moment, a tall, burly man jumped down from above and handed her a handkerchief.
The girl looked at him fearfully. "Do you also want to ask where that guest is going?"
The burly man gave her a stack of cash.
The girl hesitated for a moment before reaching out to take it. "He wanted to find elderly people from Block Fairy Tale City. I told him about Fresh Meat Sausage Shop and Block Muffin Shop."
The man nodded and left.
The girl stood up again after a while, put the money in her bag, picked up the umbrella, spun it once in the air, then rested it on her right shoulder. She walked briskly out of the alley and headed toward the residential area.
In a dessert shop several streets away, Xu Huo finished listening to the three rounds of interrogation—from Wang Qiao and Gao Baimei, a stranger, and then Shen Tai—that had been directed at the girl in the white dress. He watched the dot on the anti-theft surveillance monitor he'd bought from the shopping mall move steadily deeper into the residential area, finally stopping at the Bear Claw Restaurant location.
He tapped his finger on the screen a few times, then turned off the anti-theft device, paid his bill, and left the dessert shop. He headed straight for Bear Claw Restaurant.
By now it was dusk. Block Fairy Tale City had already closed its gates, and tourists were starting to look for places to stay.
Although some diners tirelessly warned outsiders about how terrifying Bear Claw Restaurant was, there were still plenty of tourists checking in.
Xu Huo followed the waiter to register. In the item basket on the fifth-floor corridor, he saw the umbrella he had given to the girl in the white dress.
A faint, almost imperceptible smile crossed his face as he opened the door to his reserved room.
Not long after he had checked in, Tao Chengxin, carrying a backpack, slipped into Bear Claw Restaurant in the last few minutes before closing time.
The sky quickly darkened, and Block Fairy Tale City gradually became quiet and deserted.
Late at night, when even the waitstaff had stopped moving around inside, a creaking sound echoed through the fifth-floor corridor. The sound passed by Xu Huo's door and headed downstairs.
Not long after, the aroma of food drifted up from below.
"Is there still a midnight snack this late?" A guest who hadn't fallen asleep came out of their room, muttering as they headed downstairs.
A moment later, Xu Huo also came out. He glanced at the room diagonally across from his, then headed toward the stairs.
As soon as he left, the door across the way opened, and Tao Chengxin cautiously followed him.
The first and second floors of Bear Claw Restaurant were dining areas. No lights were left on at night on these two floors, but Xu Huo's eyes had evolved night vision, so he could clearly see the situation in the restaurant.
Besides the guest who had passed by his door earlier, there were already six people sitting in the restaurant. Each occupied a separate dining table, their expressions somewhat wooden, but their hands were suspended above the tabletops, as if they were drawing something.
He watched for a few seconds at the entrance, then turned and continued down the stairs to the first-floor dining area.
The first-floor dining area was also shrouded in darkness, but there was a short figure stiffly cleaning the floor stains. As it moved, it neither bumped into any objects nor made a single sound.
As if sensing the gaze behind it, the figure suddenly turned its head. Xu Huo first hid to the side of the door, then grabbed a string and hung upside down from the first-floor ceiling. At the same time, a kitchen knife flew out from the doorway, half of its blade embedding into the wall. A shadow then pounced out from the door, leaping onto the knife handle, crouching there, its head rotating a full one hundred and eighty degrees!
It was a wooden doll.
Its limbs were made of wood, connected at the joints by a soft white material that allowed it to turn without resistance or sound. Its eyes and mouth were made from two beads and two wooden slivers. It wore a hat on its head. Though somewhat stiff, its hands and feet didn't bump into things when imitating human movements.
The wooden doll had no ears, and its glass-bead eyes didn't seem to have the function of sight either. After turning its head three hundred and sixty degrees without finding its target, it jumped down from the wall and pulled the kitchen knife out as well.
Just as it was carrying the knife, wobbling awkwardly, back toward the first-floor dining area, a serving bell rang from the second floor. The wooden doll twisted its head backward, the two wooden slivers of its mouth curving downward into an angry expression, and it charged backward up to the second floor!
Soon, sounds of chopping and screaming came from upstairs. But within just ten seconds, the killing—along with the sound of tables and chairs crashing—abruptly ceased. It had erupted suddenly and stopped just as suddenly.
Xu Huo stayed where he was, not moving. Suddenly, as if sensing something, he looked up and met the gaze of a wooden head that had silently appeared at the corner of the second-floor stairway.
The wooden doll was leaning crookedly against the railing, its head resting sideways on its shoulder, its two bead eyes staring straight at him.