Between love and fear. Who can you trust now?

1. - Arrival

... "Damn it, get that camera out of my face! You know I hate that."

"Listen little brother. We're here on a once-in-a-lifetime adventure vacation. And we should capture everything." Replied my brother Hai Kuan to my near outburst of anger.

"I know OK? That's why I decided to write down everything that happens here." I gave him back as an answer.

We are on the road since two days. On Monday we went to the airport very early in the morning, where we first had to leave half of our equipment, which was also very expensive, because otherwise they wouldn't have let us board the plane.

After a flight of almost three hours we landed and rented a minibus. We took turns driving through half the country, through a small town, through villages and countryside areas that look like no one has ever been there.

It was not until late in the evening that we reached our second destination for the day. A small town where we booked two rooms in a hostel. And with we, I mean my big brother Hai Kuan, his best friend Leni, his very best friend Meng Yao and me. None of the other two I can stand.

Leni is the typical girly and already finds a little dust disgusting. However, she not only wants to spend two nights in the forest with us, but also wants to explore a cave, if we can find it.

Meng Yao is very full of himself and thinks he is all-knowing. I think he secretly has a crush on my brother and that's why he hasn't left his side since they were young. It's too bad that my brother doesn't feel the same for him, but has already given his heart to someone else.

By the way, I am Yibo, I am 23 years young and would prefer not to be here at all. But my brother somehow managed to persuade me. And now I'm here with him and these two other idiots.

Our actual goal is to find a cave in a large dense forest area and explore this cave. There are an incredible number of posts on the internet about this cave. It is written about ghosts and about the fact that already many who have entered this cave have not come out again. I'm not a scaredy cat, but I don't like all these Internet articles. After all, it is said that in every lie there is also a grain of truth.

Well, so my brother decided to film everything on our trip. He emptied his savings account and bought two new super cameras. In addition, many spare batteries and lots of memory cards.

I for my part bought only this diary and some pens. I will document our trip this way. And I have the advantage that I don't have to stick a camera to my forehead all the time and hold one in my hand just to not miss anything.

Our hostel is in a small town that somehow seems to take me back to the days when there were knights. There are these ancient buildings everywhere that look like they've been there for centuries. Street lighting is apparently also a foreign word here, because it's pitch black here in the streets. Really creepy!

The hostel operator advised us not to walk around the place in the evening or at night. "It's too dangerous." Said he to me, with his, only four teeth left.

The hostel itself looks run down and shabby. Everywhere it smells of old air, dampness and I'm sure I can spot mold here somewhere too. Many of the lights do not work and therefore there are candles everywhere. This makes it seem even more like you're in an old castle.

Eerie pictures hang on the walls, right next to the prepared heads of dead animals and a mass of spider webs. In the wooden railing of the brick staircase, several wooden rods are already missing.

The rooms are gloomy, every door squeaks and creaks, even those of the closets. Candles everywhere and their candle wax even drips on the old wooden floor, whose floorboards creak.

The bed, a large double bed, has a sky that is equipped with musty curtains. Dust wherever you look. The windows cannot be opened even a millimeter. There are clear traces of water damage on the ceiling. And around this water damage, the paint is already peeling. The wall color is divided into a gray and a reddish brown. I mean, they just painted the bricks.

At the moment I am sitting on a sofa, which is covered with a dark red dirty fabric and has a wooden frame. My brother just noticed that from the faucet in the tiny bathroom, comes only a stinky yellowish to brownish liquid. The same goes for the shower. Damn, where the hell did we end up here?

*~*~*

After a more than restless night, again and again the wooden floor creaked in front of our room door, something rustled constantly in the room, we went downstairs to the operator and expected our also booked breakfast. But when I saw it, it completely passed me by.

There was an indefinable gray mass in the bowls. There was mold on the bread. The sausage was really shiny and the cups looked as if they had never been washed.

Besides, even now, during the day, it's just dark in this hostel.

While the others don't want to be rude and at least pretend to eat, I went back to the room. Fortunately, I got myself a large supply of energy bars and can now stuff myself with them. Of the stuff down there, I definitely won't touch any!

*~*~*

We are back in our minibus. Meng Yao is not feeling well. He said he has a stomach ache and that is why we are going to look for a pharmacy first. Leni also looks pale and my brother has drops of sweat on his forehead. I think it's from breakfast. But the three of them deny it.

After more than two hours we have reached the next place, a normal and modern place with even three pharmacies. But before we went to one of the three pharmacies, I took the three to the doctor. Because suddenly my brother and Leni also felt very sick. They complained of stomach pain and nausea.

When the three of them told the doctor what they had eaten for breakfast, he shook his head and said that he would actually have to give all three of them a head-nut now. "How could you guys be so stupid and eat that?" He asked. Yes, I wonder the same thing, though.

The doctor prescribed something to help the three of them. But made it clear that we shouldn't go anywhere today, because the three of them should go to bed and rest. He then referred us to a guesthouse.

I drove the three to the guesthouse and then got the medicines prescribed by the doctor from the pharmacy. I also got some stomach-protecting food from a small supermarket.

In a kiosk I stopped also again, in order to get me the newest daily paper. On a wall in this kiosk were several pictures of missing persons. The owner told me that he didn't know much more than that these young people had all disappeared in the same area. "Adventurers who underestimated these woods here, I suppose." He said.

That's exactly what I'm afraid of. We also want to go to this area where all these people disappeared. And we don't know anything about all this. I for myself have never been in a cave and I don't know how to use a compass. Or know how to get out of a dense forest by myself in an emergency.

But for the latter, we have Meng Yao, who claims to have profound knowledge of how to find your way in a forest, even at night. He also claims that he has been in caves several times and therefore knows them very well.

Back in the guesthouse, I gave the three their medicine and looked around a bit in the cozy and clean rooms. I also talked with the 70 year old operator of the pension. She runs it because she can earn a little money in addition with her guesthouse. She does not want to be dependent on her children and grandchildren.

The old lady told me that the forest area where we want to go is haunted. Well, typical ghost stories. And then she told me that next to the cave, which she herself has never been to and never seen, there is also supposed to be an old decaying insane asylum.

"In the old days, when people didn't understand about disabilities and mental illnesses, they used to pack up all these poor people and take them to this insane asylum. There they did medical experiments on them, which were all cruel, because even during operations, they did not even anesthetize the patients. Patients who were aggressive or otherwise somehow conspicuous, they locked up in the basement of the main building. There had been three buildings where they kept these people like cattle. And because of the rumors about the angry ghosts in that forest, no one ever dared to go there, except the doctors and nurses." She told.

"How did all this come out?" I wanted to know.

"One of the doctors wrote diaries about the patients and the experiments on them. According to rumors, he had wanted to put an end to the torture of these people and get help. His colleagues found out about it and didn't let him leave. They wanted to lose their own playground for their sick fantasies. The only thing he could do was to hide his diaries in an empty barrel. Because once a week they got a delivery of food. And every time, the delivery man was taking the empty barrels back with him. So this doctor hid the diaries in a barrel and hoped that help would come quickly. But the problem was, the delivery man couldn't read. He didn't know what to do with these diaries and left them lying around in his home. At some point, however, this man got a visitor and this noticed the diaries, he read them through and then informed the police. But all this took more than 1 year and by then not only most of the patients had died under agonizing circumstances, but also the doctor who wrote the diaries."

"And what happened to the other doctors and staff?"

"The head doctor knew what he would face for what he had done to the patients and took his own life. He died in his treatment room. Many of the nurses got away with it, because they said they were just following the doctors' orders. And the other doctors, well, only one was hanged, the others bought their freedom. And that is why it is said that the ghosts of the deceased are angry that their tormentors were not punished. The ghosts are said to attack anyone who comes to this forest. They have also never been properly buried."

I found that this story was really fascinating and wondered if there were records of it somewhere or maybe even if these diaries still exist somewhere. I also wonder if the doctor who tried to get help was killed by his colleagues. The old lady, at least, didn't know.

All right, I think for today I'll put my diary aside and take care of the three sick people, so that we can go on tomorrow.

Oh yes, the old lady told me she didn't know the place where we spent the last night. Strange.

A/N: I try to write one chapter a day. Tell me what you think about the content of the book in the comments. Thanks :)