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墨書 Inktalez
I turned around, only to find myself face to face with someone.
Zhang Yi, how did he end up here?
The Black Cat from earlier was cradled in his arms, its green eyes greedily staring at me.
Zhang Yi was taller than I had imagined, standing a head taller than me.
He looked down at me, opening his mouth to speak, but all that came out was a sharp cat-like screech.
Meow... Grrr!
Meow...
The gourd at my waist trembled incessantly; Bao seemed extremely frightened.
He reached out towards me, but I quickly bent down to evade him.
A strange feeling flashed through my mind; something felt off, yet I couldn't pinpoint what it was.
Not catching me right away, Zhang Yi didn't seem anxious. Instead, he grinned widely, revealing two sharp fangs that were anything but human. Could he really be possessed by a Cat Demon?
He walked towards me, his seemingly slow steps oddly resembling a quick flash. One moment he was ten meters away, and the next he was right in front of me.
A foul stench rushed towards my nostrils as his mouth loomed larger before me, expanding beyond what any ordinary person could imagine.
He seemed intent on swallowing my head whole. Seizing the opportunity, I lifted Shiro and aimed it at his head.
It was strange...
My Shiro passed right through his head without causing him any harm.
Liu Qingfeng said that this Shiro was a divine artifact capable of breaking ghosts, so why did it fail against Zhang Yi? Could it be that Zhang Yi was neither ghost nor human?
In an instant, I understood something...
I cut my hand and smeared the blood on Zhang Yi's body. He slowly began to show some fear towards me.
But this was only temporary; it wouldn't last long.
I couldn't afford to ponder too deeply. Relying on my memory, I followed the formation recorded in the Taoist Canon as I walked the Gossip.
I murmured the incantation of Gossip: "One gives birth to two, two gives birth to three, three gives birth to all things..." I quickly traced the yin and yang lines with my feet, moving swiftly according to the methods outlined in the Taoist Canon.
As my pace quickened, Zhang Yi, placed at the center of the hexagram, began to shout louder and louder. A cold wind whispered past my ears as I closed my eyes, shutting out distractions and focusing on my own rhythm.
"Wife, what are you doing?"
The deep and seductive voice of Mu Xuanche floated into my ears, conjuring an image of his handsome face in my mind.
I couldn't help but want to open my eyes to see him...
Suddenly, the gourd at my waist trembled slightly, and just as I was about to open my eyes, they snapped shut once more.
This was an illusion; it had to be an illusion.
In the book, it is said that when starting to draw a formation, one must never open their eyes; otherwise, their soul will be taken away.
This Gossip formation allows the person traversing it to wander between the realms of Yin and Yang, escaping from constraints.
I kept my eyes tightly shut and continued walking, silently reciting the Xuan Zhu Lu, a Taoist text specifically used for calming the mind.
In the darkness, a hand gently brushed across my face, incredibly tender.
"Wife, why don’t you open your eyes to look at me?"
It was Mu Xuanche's voice again, which filled me with rage. Why did he enjoy tempting me so much? This time, I absolutely could not open my eyes.
Gradually, this tactic lost its effect on me, and Mu Xuanche's voice began to fade away.
The temptation was gone.
What would come next?
Before long, I experienced it: the wailing of countless ghosts.
A continuous stream of sorrowful cries filled my ears, each heart-wrenching sob recounting the tragic experiences of those who had suffered.
My eyes grew increasingly heavy with tears, which fell uncontrollably, while my heart was gripped by fear.
"Yan Xi, why don’t you look at your mother? Your mother is suffering here."
My mother's voice floated past me, filled with despair and sorrow, as if it had emerged from a deep wound.
"Yan Xi, you left. Those Evil Spirits came to find me. They tormented me, and my face is covered in scars. Feel it..."
A surge of anger inexplicably rose within me. Those Evil Spirits that harmed my mother—I would eliminate them all.
"Yan Xi, why don't you take a look at Mom..."
The images of spending every day with my mother kept flashing through my mind, causing a painful ache in my heart. I had only one thought now: to open my eyes and see my mother, to check if she was truly unwell.
When I opened my eyes, a green light flew in.
"Ah..."
I screamed as thousands of hands rushed toward me, ready to tear my clothes apart. They treated me like a delicacy, eager to rip into my flesh and devour me.
In a flash of silver light, a strong and powerful arm grabbed me and pulled me away.
I was flung out of the darkness by this force and crashed against the wall before falling down.
The sudden surge of strength, combined with the immense pain on my back, caused a metallic taste to rise in my throat.
"Poof!"
A mouth ful of fresh blood sprayed from my lips, and finally, I felt a bit better.
I regained my composure and opened my eyes to find myself in the courtyard of the Zhang Family.
The coffin lay directly in front of me, quietly resting there, emanating an eerie aura.
Shangguan Mingyue suddenly appeared in front of me, crouching down with concern. "Yan Xi, are you okay?"
I wiped the blood from the corner of my mouth and smiled. "Don't worry, I'm fine."
"Where did you go just now?"
"I was walking with you, and then I encountered the Wall of Ghosts. It took me a while to get out."
Hearing Shangguan Mingyue's words made me frown slightly. Why did she encounter the Wall of Ghosts while I faced an Evil Spirit that killed? And who was that hand in the darkness that managed to save me?
"Yan Xi, what happened to you?"
Shangguan Mingyue's question interrupted my thoughts. I looked up and said, "Mingyue, don't you think this place feels less like a haunted area and more like it has been set up with some kind of formation?"
What caught my attention was that Zhang Yi had not been injured after my Shiro's attack. Coupled with everything else that had happened, I suspected something was amiss.
"It should be like that. But the Zhang Family doesn't seem to be significant enough to offend someone with such powerful formation abilities," Shangguan Mingyue analyzed.
I smiled. "Let's take a look at Zhang Yi in the coffin; that will tell us more."
Pulling Shangguan Mingyue closer to the coffin, we found Zhang Yi still lying quietly inside, unchanged from what we saw in the afternoon.
However, I noticed something: there were four large black nails at each corner of the coffin.
These four large iron nails seemed to be used for sealing the coffin; no one had ever seen large nails placed inside a coffin like this.
I asked Shangguan Mingyue to lend a hand as we lifted Zhang Yi from inside.
I pulled out Zhang Yi, and both Shangguan Mingyue and I laughed.
As expected, I had guessed correctly.
Inside the coffin, there was another coffin. It seemed that when Zhang Yi suddenly stood up this afternoon to scare me, it was also to prevent me from discovering this secret.
Grabbing a handy tool nearby, I prepared to open the coffin and examine the body.
After much effort, I managed to lift the coffin beneath the main one.
A foul odor rushed out, and I held my breath against the stench as I turned on my flashlight to investigate inside.
The inner coffin was peculiar; it contained not a person but a decaying animal.
Now I finally understood where the terrible smell on Zhang Yi came from. Who wouldn’t smell bad sleeping on top of a corpse?
However, this coffin was prepared by the Zhang Family, so they must have known about the inner coffin.
After arranging Zhang Yi properly, Shangguan Mingyue and I decided to talk to the Zhang Couple.
Sitting in the main seat of the Zhang Family, I put on a cold demeanor. I picked up a cup of tea brewed by them, took a light sniff, then set it down and said coldly, “What’s going on here?”
The chill in my voice surprised even me. It had an air reminiscent of Mu Xuanche's possession, earning a quiet thumbs-up from Shangguan Mingyue.
Zhang Yuan immediately broke into a cold sweat, wiping his forehead nervously while looking at me. “Great Master, what do you mean? I don’t understand.”
I smirked coldly. “You don’t understand? Do you know about the coffin beneath your son’s coffin? If you don’t get that, do you understand your son’s life?”
In an instant, Zhang Yuan's eyes widened in shock, his face a mask of horror, as if he had been utterly terrified. He rushed in front of me, almost kneeling down, but stopped short when I threw a teacup at him, startled.
His wife followed closely behind, her eyes red and brimming with unshed tears, struggling to speak.
Seeing their hesitation, I decided to apply more pressure: "If you don't want to talk, then I'll just leave."
I stood up to walk out, which truly frightened Zhang Yuan and his wife. Madam Zhang rushed over and clung to my leg. "Great Master, you can't leave! If you go, my son will die. Please, you must save him!"
I pulled Madam Zhang up and fixed my gaze on her. "The only ones who can save your son are you two. If you don't tell me the truth, your son is doomed."
In that moment, Madam Zhang seemed to crumble, and Zhang Yuan appeared to age several years in an instant.
Under my pressing inquiry, Zhang Yuan finally recounted a past event.
It turned out that Zhang Yi had been frail and sickly. Earlier this year, he had inexplicably brought home a cat. Despite being someone who rarely interacted with others, Zhang Yi became deeply attached to this cat. As their only child, Zhang Yuan and his wife naturally doted on him and allowed him to indulge in this affection.
Suddenly, the cat died under strange circumstances—its head was stuck in a tree fork, as if it had hung itself from the branches.
At first, Zhang Yuan and his wife didn't think much of it; they were simply pained by their son's sorrow.
However, they soon sensed something was amiss when Zhang Yi began isolating himself in his room, repeatedly mimicking the sound of a cat's meow.
That sound was eerily identical to that of the deceased Black Cat.
Worried that their son might be haunted by the cat's spirit, they sought help from a Taoist priest.
The priest informed them that the cat had died a tragic death and would come to claim Zhang Yi's life.
In order to save Zhang Yi, they decided to have the Taoist set up this formation at home, allowing Zhang Yi to break free from the entanglement of Black Cat.
Sure enough, after three days, Zhang Yi recovered.
They generously rewarded the Taoist and sent him away, but as a result, Zhang Yi's condition worsened significantly. He crawled out of the coffin he had been lying in and began to bite people incessantly.
Some information flashed through my mind, and I quickly interrupted Zhang Yuan.
"Show me your son's birth date and time."
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