...and then he disappeared at the corridor...
However, I noticed a shadow passing over the wall...
The shadow was so bloated and tall...
It was completely unlike the appearance of He Changli himself...
An inexplicable coldness was seeping into my body...
The footsteps of He Changli also vanished.
The discomfort felt did not disappear, but became even more intense...
The shadow was the true self.
A corpse without a soul has no shadow.
He Changli's shadow... is not him.
In fact, He Changli had also died...
Just, he wasn't killed by a zombie-immortal.
He was a ghost-cultist, and had much in common with Zhao Xi of Guikanni Temple, keeping ghosts inside his own body.
It was because he overly relied on the abilities of his ghost that he was punished, and even his body's shell was taken over by another...
I haven't found Xiao Yan yet, but my mindset is starting to crack.
Three men came in. In such a short time, only one Ling Dao Ren remained...
Is Xiao Yan really all right?
By some strange coincidence, I turned my head and glanced at her.
The woman's statue, which was originally staring down coldly, had her eyes seemingly moving slightly upwards, fixating on me.
I got a sudden case of goosebumps.
I have a feeling that this thing is also quite bizarre, and I dare not stop in my tracks. I quickly stepped out of the large room.
Another small courtyard.
It was similar to the layout in front of the large house.
The passage behind is also similar...
The feeling of sharp barbs on the back persisted.
After I walked out of that passage, two steps to the right, and not having my back facing the passage, the sensation of being watched finally faded...
My heart was beating fast and fast, and I looked around the environment.
In front of me, there was a peach orchard.
The peach orchard was divided into two sections, with a path that left an opening in the middle, about ten to twenty meters after which there was an arch bridge, under which a stream flowed.
And then, a tall hall!
I could vaguely make out the layout inside the hall.
A crimson red coffin!
Something was still hovering above the coffin, making my heart extremely uneasy.
It was too far away for me to see clearly. Was that a wedding certificate...?
My intuition told me that if it was a wedding certificate, shouldn't I pick it up? Even if it meant breaking through the nightmare?
Just, I haven't seen Xiao Yan yet even though I've walked this far.
Did I choose the wrong direction?
If I had gone in the opposite direction after leaving that room, I wouldn't have ended up here, would I?
Xiao Yan, is it possible that she might be on the other side?
Just as I hesitated in my heart whether to return to the original path, I...
What I saw before me was a figure gliding across the high hall!
It's still because of the distance that I couldn't see clearly the figure's appearance!
My heart pounded once again.
I have seen all of Xiao Zhili, Ling Dao Ren, Zombie Immortal, and He Changli.
And there's another figure... that could only be Xiao Yan!
With a great weight lifted from my heart, I hurriedly crossed the peach orchard, walked over the arch bridge, and headed towards the grand hall.
That grand hall, with the crimson red coffin, is exactly as it appeared in my dream.
It's just that there are some differences outside the grand hall.
In a moment, I reached the inside of the grand hall.
Inside the house, it was extremely elegant. There were two chairs in the master suite, a tea table in the middle, and cabinets on either side. Inside were various ornaments.
The crimson red coffin attracted my attention extremely.
But what was hovering above the coffin was not a wedding certificate...
It's a talisman!
The talisman was very strange, and the script was even more abstract.
The only thing I could recognize directly was the words written in the center of the talisman.
Post-earth, Qi Yaoao.
Without warning, my eyelid twitched again.
An instinctive intuition told me that this talisman should not be touched lightly.
I swept the room four times, but the figure had disappeared.
With the zombie immortal already diverted, my fear was actually much less. In a deep voice, I shouted, "Xiao Yan!"
And then, I heard a faint reply.
However, it was not an answer to my call or a response to my name.
But it was: "Shhh..."
That hiss... I instantly recognized it as Xiao Yan's!
The direction of the sound... should be the ceiling?
Instinctively, I wanted to look up, but my body stiffened again.
Xiao Yan was on the ceiling, so she must have seen me long ago.
That's because she must have seen me long ago, but why she didn't react or come down earlier is still unclear.
There's something wrong here!
Is it because there's another danger in this grand hall, and Xiao Yan is hiding her presence?
In the moment when I thought everything through.
I didn't look up anymore. Every inch of my body was tightened.
"Cough... cough... cough... cough..."
The hacking cough sounds, coming from outside the house, are disjointed.
In the strangeness, there was a faint familiarity.
How could that sound like He Changli's cough?
He walked away, didn't he?
He didn't leave. In fact, he followed me back?
No... I still feel something is off.
If he followed me back, then Xiao Yan's hiding on the ceiling before was unnecessary. She didn't need to know that He Changli was following me...
I feel like my mind is not enough.
"Xiao Yan, the youth who reveals spirits." The somewhat heavy-sounding voice echoed in my ears.
My shoulder was patted twice.
My heart skipped a beat.
But I didn't turn around...
Behind me, it is indeed He Changli, but the voice sounds very empty and light.
Although He Changli didn't make any sound while walking earlier, his tone was very "solid".
That "solid" was a realism, a sound that could only be produced by a real physical body or a zombie.
I am indeed careless, it's hard to tell the difference between humans, ghosts, and corpses.
But the contrast between He Changli's before and after is too obvious. If I still can't tell the difference, it's not an issue of having a "heart" but a problem with my head.
"Xiao Yan, the youth who reveals spirits?" He Changli called out again, his tone slightly deeper: "Brother Shao is dead. Ling Dao Ren's neck was almost pulled off, but suddenly there was a loud sound of a copper bell that distracted the zombie immortal, allowing Ling Dao Ren to escape with his life."
"I took the opportunity to hide."
"And then Ling Dao Ren ran off. He must have gone to find the source of the bell ringing."
"I guessed that it was you who made the bell sound. I didn't expect that you would actually come all the way here."
"Did you follow us in, or did you come through some other way?"
"Do you have a way out?"
A continuous stream of words reached my ears.
The feeling of emptiness is gradually becoming more real.
It's He Changli who is weaving ghost stories, gradually leading me astray...
I slightly bit my tongue, and I didn't make a sound. I still didn't turn around.
"Yes... the little girl from the Cao family also came in. Ah, she was unlucky, her head was chopped off by the zombie immortal. We need to leave as soon as possible. Ling Dao Ren left, and the zombie immortal chased after him, he's definitely doomed. Just like that, out of all of us, only two of us are still alive."
He Changli's words echoed in my ears, seemingly whispering and then repeating over and over again.
If it weren't for Xiao Yan's hiss earlier, I might have been unable to resist and truly been bewitched by the ghost.
"Xiao Yan, the youth who reveals spirits?"
He Changli called out to me again.
I still didn't pay attention to He Changli, but I slowly reached into my pocket, holding a talisman in my hand.
Three lights protect me, ghosts from behind start speaking. If I don't turn around, ghosts are hard to do anything to me. At most, it would just be a scare.
But I can't just stand here frozen like this.
I have to make a choice!
My hand is sweating, my body is tauter, and I'm about to turn around!
