Chapter 86: Camping (2)

Sensing that something was wrong, Everly’s first reaction was to take out her phone and call Misha.

Although she still hadn’t figured out exactly what Misha might encounter, the most important thing was to make her give up the camping trip and come back immediately. Everly had a strong premonition that Misha had already become one of the protagonists in a horror movie.

However, when the call went through, the line only gave a busy signal. She hung up and sent a message, but it remained marked as “unread.”

Had something happened to Misha? Or had they gone deep into the mountains where there was no phone signal?

Ordinary mobile phones couldn’t directly connect with satellite phones. Everly tossed aside her mobile, ran downstairs, took out a satellite phone, and dialed the one she had told Misha to bring with her.

This time, the call finally connected.

“Hello? Everly, what’s up?” Misha’s voice came through the receiver. In the background, Everly could hear the laughter and playful chatter of the friends riding in the car with her.

Great. It seemed they were safe for the moment—they had just entered an area without signal.

Everly let out a sigh of relief and asked, “Misha, where are you now? Is it still possible for you to leave in time?”

“Let me check… We’re already in the Red Oak Forest. We saw a road sign earlier—it should be about five kilometers to the campsite.”

“Wasn’t it supposed to be evening when you arrived? How did you get there so quickly?”

“Because there was a long stretch of uninhabited road on the way. Hans suggested we take turns speeding, so during that part we drove really fast… We’re about to enter the campsite area. What exactly happened? Why do we have to leave?”

“Because I suddenly have a bad premonition. Once you get to the campsite, try to see if you can find someone to send you back, or at least take you to a nearby village to stay for a while. After I investigate and figure things out, I’ll call you again.”

“Okay.”

Although she was completely confused, out of the habit she had developed over time, Misha still chose to trust Everly without question.

After hanging up, Everly immediately opened the local forum for Viska City and tried searching for the keyword “Emerald Lake.” The result was nothing.

After thinking for a moment, she simply registered a forum account and posted a bounty thread, asking if anyone knew where “Emerald Lake” was. Anyone who could provide detailed information would receive a reward of ten dollars.

Personally, Everly tended to believe that “Mirror Lake = Emerald Lake,” but it was still only a guess. Whether it was true or not required further verification.

After posting the thread, while waiting for replies, Everly opened her notebook. Comparing it with the Chinese records written inside, she began searching for any location that might match.

She needed to investigate as quickly as possible what might happen at the campsite.

Anyone who watches horror movies regularly knows that the protagonists are often stubborn people who refuse to listen to advice. Unless bloody facts are placed right in front of them, they simply don’t know how to be afraid. Some of them even have an incredible death-seeking mentality—the more you try to persuade them, the more they insist on going against you, as if they’re afraid they won’t die quickly enough.

Although Misha wasn’t like that, she didn’t have a car. The nearest village to the campsite was more than forty kilometers away. If Misha wanted to leave, she would need the support of her companions.

Everly’s notebook was specifically used to record horror movies.

Just as psychics using spiritual vision couldn’t see Everly’s previous life, the water from the Memory Spring also couldn’t carry memories from her past life. After living in this horror-movie world for eighteen years, even though she constantly recalled them, some memories of her previous life had inevitably grown faint.

Fortunately, Everly had developed the habit of keeping notes from a very young age. She often recalled events from her past life and wrote down every film she could remember—in Chinese, a language that most people in this place could not understand.

One unfortunate thing was that this kind of record inevitably contained many omissions. For example, Everly had already forgotten the titles of many movies. She also couldn’t remember the names of the protagonists, supporting characters, or even the main villains, so she replaced them with placeholders like “Xiaomei,” “Xiaoshuai,” or “Yingzi.” In some cases, she had even forgotten the beginning and ending of a film and only remembered that a killer rampaged from start to finish. Sometimes, while writing, she would even realize she had accidentally mixed up several different movies together…

In short, aside from a few films that had left a particularly deep impression on her, most movies in Everly’s notebook only had a rough plot outline and a few common scare scenes. Everything else was extremely vague.

Since Everly herself couldn’t remember clearly, it was naturally impossible to find any information related to “Emerald Lake” in the notebook.

However, what Everly was really focusing on wasn’t “Emerald Lake,” but rather movies with themes like “camping” or “summer camp.” After eliminating films that took place in deserts or by the sea, her gaze swept across the remaining titles and quickly locked onto one of them—or rather, a whole series: Blood Camp.

This film series was incredibly famous. Even people who had never watched the movies had definitely heard the name.

And the moment she saw the title, Everly finally remembered the origin of “Emerald Lake”: it was the setting of the Blood Camp film series, the place where the villainous killer Gary appeared!

So had Misha accidentally wandered onto the set of Blood Camp?!

As if confirming Everly’s guess, a ding notification sounded from her computer—someone had sent a private message to her forum account.

[I know the Emerald Lake you’re talking about. That’s another name for Mirror Lake. Only locals use “Emerald Lake” to refer to that lake, because when the water is completely still, the thick aquatic plants in it make the lake look like a piece of beautiful emerald.]

!!!

So that’s it!

Everly quickly recalled the plot of the film series and picked up her phone to call Misha again.

“Misha, I’ve figured it out. Near the campsite, there’s very likely a wandering killer… After you hang up, tell the campsite manager about the killer first and have them call the police for backup. Then try to persuade everyone and see if the whole group can leave the campsite together…”

But as she spoke, Everly found herself unable to continue.

This situation was very tricky.

Aside from Misha, no one at the campsite would give up their trip just because someone said, “There’s a killer,” unless Everly could provide solid evidence. But the problem was that she had none. And by the time the killer started acting and the bloody evidence was finally laid out before everyone’s eyes, it would already be too late to run.

Misha was already inside the campsite. If she couldn’t find companions willing to leave with her, then even if she secretly managed to get the car keys, Everly wouldn’t dare let her drive away alone—because Horror Movie Survival Rule #11 was: don’t split up or act alone.

Driving away alone from a killer’s hunting ground was practically the same as delivering herself to him.

Looking at it this way, Misha was essentially trapped in Red Oak Camp tonight.

Thinking about this, Everly hissed softly and pressed a hand to her forehead, feeling troubled.

“Everly, don’t panic yet. What’s that killer you mentioned like? What weapon does he use? How does he operate? Does he only come out at night?” Misha asked.

After spending so much time together, Misha had already vaguely realized that her good friend seemed to have a special intuition about danger. So even though Everly’s explanation sounded abrupt and confusing, she still chose to believe her. She immediately shifted her thinking and began looking for ways to protect herself.

“The killer’s name is Gary. He’s a tall man wearing a white mask, usually holding a large machete, though he sometimes uses other melee weapons. However, he never uses firearms…” Everly pushed aside her distracting thoughts and began explaining the details of the movie’s setting to Misha.

The Blood Camp film series had many installments. Everly’s memories from her past life were already incomplete, and naturally some movies in the series were good while others were terrible. The well-made ones were widely discussed on Chinese internet forums, and the resources were easier to find, so Everly had watched them and remembered them more clearly. As for the bad entries, she might not even have heard of them, so she knew nothing about their details.

In any case, the group of nine people traveling with Misha—including Red Oak Camp itself—didn’t trigger any memories for Everly at all. Considering that before Red Oak Camp was built, the place had been nothing but wilderness, meaning there couldn’t have been an earlier version of the campsite, she strongly suspected that what Misha had gotten involved in was likely a prequel to Blood Camp that she had never seen.

Although it was called a prequel, the film had actually been produced after the first and second Blood Camp movies. It was a follow-up cash-grab made by the producers after the first two films became popular.

The movie’s goal was to reveal the origin of the killer Gary and dig into the reasons why his personality had become so cruel and twisted. Because of that, it spent a great deal of time depicting his miserable childhood, with only a brief killing scene featuring the adult Gary near the end.

But the producers had completely forgotten why audiences liked Blood Camp in the first place. People watched it to see Gary lurking in the darkness, hunting people like prey, slaughtering them with weapons amid terrified screams, and chopping the foolish group of protagonists to pieces. Who the hell cared about Gary’s tragic past?

As a result, the film became one of the most infamous failures in the entire series. There weren’t even any Chinese-subtitled versions available online—only a few content creators who specialized in reviewing bad movies occasionally talked about it.

Everly had never seen that terrible film, nor had she watched any commentary videos about it, so she had absolutely no idea what the Blood Camp prequel was actually about. The only piece of good news was that because the movie dealt with Gary’s past, later installments sometimes included brief flashback clips from the prequel. Thanks to that, Everly still remembered some of Gary’s general characteristics and settings.

Gary’s maternal grandparents were devoted followers of a certain cult—yes, another cult. The United States was really doomed; why were there cults everywhere?

On Gary’s mother’s sixteenth birthday, ignoring her protests, they forcibly held a “sacred marriage ritual” for her.

They tied Gary’s mother to an altar, brought in a black goat, and forced the two to mate. During the ritual, a circle of devout believers surrounded her, including her own parents and the cult’s leader. They watched the entire process, believing that through such a ritual, a pure virgin could give birth to the child of a god.

Gary’s mother had been drugged and fainted halfway through the ritual. When she woke up, she discovered that she was indeed pregnant. After enduring ten difficult months of pregnancy, Gary—born with an innate antisocial personality and unable to feel either joy or sorrow—came into the world.

Not long afterward, the evil cult was dismantled by the police. From the leader down to the ordinary followers, all of them were thrown into prison. After being rescued, Gary’s mother took the compensation money, changed her identity, and moved to live in seclusion by Mirror Lake—also known locally as Emerald Lake.

Of course, a black goat couldn’t possibly get a human pregnant, so Gary’s mother firmly believed she had been assaulted by the cultists. She harbored deep resentment toward her son, almost to the point of feeling disgusted whenever she saw him. Yet perhaps because of a biological maternal instinct, she also felt a painfully conflicted tenderness toward the child.

As a result, she locked Gary in the basement. Sometimes she would show care and affection; other times she would erupt in rage and beat him. Under this twisted upbringing, Gary slowly grew up.

Then one day, the iron chain binding Gary loosened.

Taking the opportunity, Gary escaped from the basement and killed his unsuspecting mother.

She was the first person Gary ever killed. From the act of killing, he felt an unprecedented sense of pleasure and excitement. His body, which had long been weak and gaunt from years without sunlight, seemed to absorb a surge of vitality after her death—his muscles filled out, and his limbs grew strong.

Yes—he could grow stronger by killing people.

The more brutal the method of killing, and the more intense and desperate the victim’s emotions were before death, the more power Gary could absorb. Because of this, Gary followed the unwritten rules common in American slasher horror films: he never used firearms like pistols or bombs. When he killed, he relied only on cold weapons or his bare hands.

Gary greatly enjoyed the dying screams of his prey. Armed with his weapons, he began wandering through the forest, starting his hunting journey.

The area around Emerald Lake was sparsely populated. After killing the few nearby neighbors, the insatiable murderer gradually turned his attention to the nearby campground…

“I don’t know whether he’ll show up tonight. Anyway, try persuading everyone to leave first. If you can’t convince them, call in more police—reporting a false alarm is fine if that’s what it takes. Also, tonight you should stay somewhere brightly lit, and make sure there are always at least three companions around you. If possible, try not to sleep so you don’t miss the chance to escape…” Everly instructed her point by point, carefully listing each precaution.

Even slasher films follow the “four-stage” principle of movie storytelling, where the plot develops gradually.

At the beginning of the movie, before the killer’s existence has been exposed, he usually hides in dark corners and targets people who are alone. This both builds the killer’s sense of mystery and prevents the main group of characters from immediately panicking and scattering at the start of the film.

Later on, as the number of survivors dwindles and people finally begin to notice traces of the killer, the movie naturally enters the third and fourth stages. Only then does the killer openly appear and begin a full-scale massacre.

Although in the prequel the chase and killing scenes only happen in the latter half of the film—while the first half is mostly dialogue and story—the basic logic of filmmaking should still remain the same. Since Red Oak Camp was still operating normally, it meant people hadn’t discovered the killer yet. Using this pattern common in horror films, Misha could hide within the crowd and keep herself safe.

“I understand. I’ll try… The camp manager is here, I’ll hang up for now. We’ll talk later.”

After Misha hung up, more than an hour passed without any further contact.

Everly couldn’t just stand by while her friend was in danger. After ending the call, she quickly went to find Old John and told her grandfather about what might happen at Red Oak Camp.

“I have a really bad feeling. Misha is trapped there right now, and I’m worried about her… Can I go over there and take a look?”

Old John stretched out his broad hand and gently patted his granddaughter’s head in reassurance.

“Yes, of course. Come with me to the underground shelter first. The ‘big guys’ we spent so much money on—it’s about time they came out and saw the sunlight.”

After saying that, he set down the wooden bucket in his hand, took Everly with him, and the two of them walked through the passageway together into the increasingly crowded underground shelter.