Chapter 1

The fact that all the parents were saying the same thing left my mind completely blank.

“David, can you tell me again what happened during naptime?”

I crouched down in front of him, keeping my voice as calm and neutral as possible so I wouldn’t lead him toward any particular answer.

But David shrank back slightly. When he looked up at me, there was fear in his eyes.

“It was a teacher dressed all in white. But her eyes were red like a rabbit’s, and when she looked at me, they narrowed into little slits.

“Mommy, I was scared, so I squeezed my eyes shut really tight.”

My fingers curled into a fist.

In the security footage, there really had been a moment when David suddenly squeezed his eyes shut.

Then a message popped up in the class group chat.

“I heard this preschool was built on an old cemetery. You don’t think the kids saw some kind of ghost, do you?”

A chill crawled up my spine.

“Oh, and Mommy,” David added, “that strange teacher smelled really bad. Like dead fish. It was gross.”

My hands trembled as I typed everything David had told me into the group chat.

The other six parents went silent.

Then the chat exploded.

“Vivian said the strange teacher was wearing white too. She also said the teacher floated instead of walking.”

“My kid said she was hovering in the air like a kite while she watched him sleep!”

“Ms. Watson, what exactly is going on? Seven children are all saying the same thing. You need to give us an explanation!”

But Ms. Watson, who had been responding almost instantly before, suddenly went quiet.

About five minutes later, she added the principal to the group chat.

“Our preschool has been operating for twelve years, and we’ve never had any paranormal incidents. Please don’t frighten yourselves over this.”

“You can all view the classroom security footage yourselves, and there’s nothing unusual in it. Children at this age have vivid imaginations, and when they talk to one another, it’s very easy for them to blur the line between imagination and reality.”

“We’ll make sure the teachers keep a closer eye on the children from now on. We already have a field trip planned for tomorrow, so while the children are out, we’ll also do a thorough cleaning and disinfecting of the entire preschool.”

Several teachers quickly chimed in, promising they would pay closer attention to what the children talked about and telling us not to worry.

Even so, I deliberately took David to school half an hour early the next morning.

I wanted to speak to the teacher face-to-face.

To my surprise, Vivian’s mom had had the same idea.

She lowered her voice.

“You don’t know this, but ever since Vivian was little, she’s had times when she’d suddenly cry and scream that there was something in the corner. Every single time, she’d come down with a fever afterward. We’d have to bring in a spiritual healer before she got better. But this time, she isn’t sick at all.”

“I watched the security footage over and over all night. During naptime, aside from Vivian and David, the other five kids never even opened their eyes. So how could they possibly have seen anyone?”

She paused, suspicion filling her eyes.

“Do you think someone deliberately taught the kids to say all this? Otherwise, how could all seven of them give such similar descriptions?”

My stomach dropped.

I couldn’t understand why anyone would teach a group of children to say something like that.

But compared to the idea of a ghost, I was much more inclined to believe someone was doing this on purpose.

So I immediately gave up on asking the teacher about it.

Instead, I secretly hid a tiny camera inside the school badge pinned to David’s shirt.