I loaded the Mysticism panel.

In the last week of the month, something strange happened at Greenwald.

The school has a janitor named Perkins, who is responsible for cleaning the underground passage every morning.

My daily task is to carry a bucket and a mop down the stairs on the east side and drag them all the way to the exit on the west side.

He's been doing this job for years; he could do it with his eyes closed.

But on Tuesday morning, when other school staff arrived at their posts, they found Perkins curled up on the stairs at the bottom of the stairwell.

The mop lay overturned three steps away, the bucket overturned, and dirty water flowed down the steps.

Perkins was trembling all over; his shirt was soaked with cold sweat and clung to his back.

Someone helped him up and gave him a sip of hot tea.

He kept repeating the same sentence: "There's something breathing down there."

When asked what it was, he said he didn't know.

When asked what he saw, he shook his head and said he didn't see anything.

The school doctor diagnosed it as a stress reaction caused by mental tension and recommended that the patient go home and rest for two weeks.

Perkins was helped home, and his body was still shaking even after he left the school gate.

The students saw this, and by lunchtime, half the restaurant was talking about Perkins.

Richard had just finished his oxtail soup when Warren came over from across the street.

He was holding a yellowed piece of paper in his hand, which was folded several times and had frayed edges.

"I'm asking you... do you guys know what's buried under Greenwood's playground?"

He slammed the paper on the table.

"Here we go again." Mason chewed on his bread, seemingly used to Warren's gossip.

"No, this time it's the real deal." Warren tapped the paper with his fingertip.

"My cousin found it in the old archives of the municipal library and made a photocopy of the original newspaper."

Grey put down her knife and fork, her blue eyes glancing at the piece of paper.

Xiu lifted his face from his plate, and several classmates eating nearby heard the noise and moved over to his side.

Mason said he wasn't interested, but he didn't want to leave his seat.

Warren flattened the photocopy.

The lead type printing above has become quite blurry due to the reprinting, but the main title is still legible:

The Briston Evening Post was published in November 1862.

"About fifty years ago." He pointed to the text circled in red pen:

"The land east of Greenwood, which is now the playground and the new gymnasium, used to be a textile factory."

One night shift, a female worker named Beth suddenly stopped breathing in the silk reeling workshop.

"Her death was strange; there were two holes in her neck."

Warren picked up a fork from his plate and gestured twice to the side of his neck:

"Like a nail being pierced and then pulled out, it's round and deep, but it doesn't bleed."

He put his fork down: "Have you ever seen dried meat that's been sun-dried all summer?"

The effect was such that a robust female factory worker was transformed into a dried-up corpse weighing less than half her normal weight.

Grey frowned slightly.

Mason forgot to chew the bread in his mouth.

"The police classified it as a 'death from unknown causes' at the time." Warren flipped to the middle of the clipping:

"The body was sent home to prepare for burial. In those days, poor families didn't go to funeral homes; the coffin was kept in the main room of their own house."

"But on the third night..." He slammed his fork on the table, "Beth's body crawled out of the coffin."

The surroundings fell silent instantly, and everyone listened intently.

"The coffin lid was pried open from the inside, and the creaking and scraping sound woke up the people sleeping in the next room."

Beth's mother heard the noise and came out to see her daughter standing beside the coffin.

Warren stopped his imitation of scratching the table: "But that's not her daughter anymore."

"She killed her own mother first."

Someone at the table gasped.

"The method of murder was the same as the way she died: two holes in her neck, and her body was drained."

After draining her family dry, she left home and walked all the way back to the textile factory, where the night shift was still in session.

"That night, the female workers tried to resist."

Some people hit her on the head with iron shuttlecocks, others poked her back with large cloth shears... but nothing worked.

A sharp weapon cutting into her body is like cutting into a block of iron; it doesn't draw blood or break the skin.

The background noise in the restaurant suddenly seemed particularly jarring.

The loud clang of the cafeteria lady's spoon hitting the metal bucket startled a younger girl nearby, who shrank back in fright.

"And then what?" someone asked.

"Later, the authorities sent people over." Warren turned to the back of the clipping:

"The newspaper called it a 'Special Health Inspection Team,' such a strange name. After they arrived, they sealed off the factory, but two inspectors died during the process."

"How did you finally kill her?" Mason finally swallowed the bread in his mouth.

"They didn't kill him."

Warren turned the photocopy around so everyone could see the smaller text on the back.

The newspaper ended with only one sentence: "It has been properly handled."

But the factory buildings were demolished, and the foundation was sealed off; the official explanation was "hygiene hazards."

He pointed his fingertip to the bottom line of the photocopy, where a messy handwritten annotation was written:

"There's a long-standing rumor that this thing wasn't destroyed; it's sealed deep within the foundation, along with all the people it killed..."

He held the "wronged spirit" on his tongue for a moment before releasing it.

"The land changed hands several times before Greenwood bought it to expand the school, and the playground and gymnasium were built on the original site."

"So the playground where we run in PE class..." Warren pointed to the ground with his fork, "...there's probably that thing sealed off underneath."

There was silence around the table for several seconds.

The younger girl, who had just been frightened, quickly stood up, holding the tray and saying repeatedly, "I don't want to hear it anymore," before hurrying away.

Warren wanted to laugh but didn't, quite pleased with the effect of his storytelling.

"Believe it or not, that's what's been happening in the basement lately..."

He gestured with his chin: "Old Perkins was so terrified, and I heard there were even machines that lined up themselves in the middle of the night... Do you think it's a coincidence?"

Richard held his teacup and drank the last drop of tea.

He extracted several key words from Warren's story one by one:

Two holes in his neck, his body drained of its contents, his corpse resurrected, he possesses immense strength, and sharp weapons can strike him without drawing blood or breaking his defenses.

In Appendix C of that book, in addition to a general overview of what lies behind the veil, some common evil creatures are also mentioned.

One of the records is about "vampires".

Vampire Strain, a blood-sucking species.

They are not native species behind the veil, but rather mutants produced after being deeply contaminated by the ether.

Vampires feed on life force, and their feeding method usually involves piercing their prey with their teeth to extract both ether and blood simultaneously.

People killed by vampires will have etheric contaminants left in their bodies from when the vampires fed on them.

In most cases, the residue will dissipate along with the host's vitality after the host dies.

However, in extremely rare cases, if the host itself possesses unactivated ether affinity, residual contaminants may react with the corpse.

It's not considered resurrection; the corpse will not regain life.

Etheric pollutants will occupy the empty shell, driving it to move, feed, and hunt.

The text refers to this creature as Ghoul.