Chapter 112 Shuangxi Town (VI) Ghost Blinding

With a dull “thud,” the black Coffin slammed onto the ground.

The sudden impact scattered the clustered mist, and the stirred-up white sand and dust mixed with the white fog, inseparable.

Before Shang Qingbei’s eyes, a crowd churned. Men and women of all ages, dressed in black mourning clothes, stood in a hazy circle. Their phantasmal shadows vaguely made motions of wiping away tears, while wailing sounds like those of Ghosts rose in waves.

“Wuwuwu… such an unfortunate child…”

“Dead, how pitiful, didn’t get to enjoy many days of happiness…”

“Heeheehee, bad luck, couldn’t handle it…”

If the first few sentences still carried a hint of sobbing, the latter ones were clearly filled with a joyous tone, as if they were happy about the deceased’s passing.

Calling it happiness wouldn’t be accurate; the tone was more like the secret delight of surviving a disaster, as if the Sword of Damocles that had been hanging over their heads had finally fallen, grazing them and striking someone else instead.

Goosebumps broke out all over Shang Qingbei, and he shuddered violently.

The already overwhelming cold surged again, as if he were standing naked in the winter wind, his bones being scraped by a knife-like north wind, freezing every corner of his blood vessels and tendons.

A gust of wind came, and the phantoms before his eyes were rustled away into dust on the ground, drifting into the air before slowly settling back down.

All anomalies vanished; there were no Ghosts, no chanting, and the world was suddenly, strangely silent and peaceful.

Only the Coffin, resting quietly amidst the pile of paper money, served as proof that a bizarre event had truly occurred, and that Ghosts had passed through the street.

By the moonlight, Shang Qingbei stared at the bone-white powder scattered around the Coffin, suspecting it was the legendary ashes of the dead.

He shuddered again, and then heard a “whooshing” sound of blowing air behind his ear.

A wisp of cold air stirred his hair, light and nimble like the vibrating wings of a cicada in autumn, making his neck itch.

‘The little Ghost blows out the lamp; it’s not up to you whether it goes out or not.’

Li Yao’s words echoed in his ears. Shang Qingbei turned his head stiffly to see the young man in a white shirt and black trousers standing beside him, his black and white colors like a funeral portrait, hanging loosely against the door, breathing rhythmically.

Shang Qingbei finally let out a sigh of relief, but the anger rebounding from his fear surged like a tide: “Qi Wen, we are both players. Stop treating me like a child and scaring me for no reason—this isn’t fun at all!”

“I’m scaring you?” The young man, thin as paper, raised his eyebrows in confusion. His expression was extremely innocent, as if he were troubled by the baseless accusation.

After two seconds of silence, he smiled in realization: “Why are you so timid? Didn’t Sister Xu say that as long as the yang fire on your shoulders doesn’t go out, Ghosts will fear people?”

These words were spoken with sincerity, as if he were truly comforting a terrified teammate; yet, the smile accompanying them carried a clear sense of mischief, revealing an attitude of coaxing a child.

When Shang Qingbei thought about how he had been scared to the point of fainting, while “Qi Wen” had stood by calmly with his hands in his sleeves, he felt resentful.

How could he not even catch his breath after seeing a Ghost? Is he even human? Even for an experienced player, this is too exaggerated, right?

He became even more convinced that “Qi Wen” was definitely one of those veteran players with significant mental alienation.

As his thoughts touched upon something, Shang Qingbei turned his head to look at the young man and asked suspiciously: “Where is Xu Wen’s makeup mirror? I remember you were holding it in your hand, and it even had the LED light on.”

“The makeup mirror?” The young man tilted his head. His calm face, illuminated by the moonlight, was even whiter than the piles of paper money on the ground, and his bloodless lips were as gray and withered as stone carvings on a tombstone.

A sense of dissonance suddenly grew. Shang Qingbei realized belatedly that the surrounding environment had darkened at some point. The pale moonlight provided light to no avail, instead casting a bizarre color over everything, making the shadows of Ghosts appear even more ominous.

The young man suddenly smiled brilliantly, revealing teeth as fine and white as pebbles: “It must have been left in the courtyard. Come back with me to get it.”

Shang Qingbei felt his wrist being grabbed by a hand like an iron pincer, squeezing his bones until they ached.

The young man looked frail, but his strength was immense, dragging him toward the mansion without giving him a choice.

Something is wrong! This is not right!

Feeling the ice-cold sensation where their skin touched, a terrifying guess arose in the depths of his heart.

He hooked his arm, which was holding the dictionary, around a door pillar to steady himself, and at the same time, hurriedly looked around.

The surrounding environment had become unfamiliar. The houses with white walls and black tiles had all disappeared, leaving only a vast expanse of mist.

On the flat, open ground, only a large black-and-white mansion rose from the ground before him. Two white paper lanterns hung under the eaves, with a sinister “Double Happiness” character written on them in black ink.

The tightly closed black wooden door was slightly ajar, and dark red blood oozed out from the crack, flowing slowly and stickily toward his feet.

The tall mansion gave the impression of a tomb. A sudden thought struck Shang Qingbei: if he entered, he would die!

“No thanks, Brother Qi. I’ll wait here for you; you go in yourself.” Shang Qingbei looked up at the young man, who was half a head taller than him, and said calmly.

The young man twisted his head at an angle impossible for a human, his deep, dark, lightless eyes looking down at him: “We go in together.”

Shang Qingbei saw that under the moonlight, the young man’s shadow was elongated, yet it was adorned with hairpins, wearing long sleeves and narrow clothes—it was clearly the figure of a woman!

…

“Truly beautiful.” Outside the mansion, Qi Si stared intently at the black Coffin resting before him, unable to help but exclaim in admiration.

Standing to the side, Li Yao fiddled with a stack of paper money in her hands and shook her head: “The Soul-Suppressing Coffin is an object of great misfortune. If there aren’t enough corpses to fill it, it will likely backlash against the living.”

“Is that so?” Qi Si narrowed his eyes and turned to look at the tall woman behind him to the side. “Are ten corpses enough? If not, I can add a few more.”

Li Yao lowered her head as if drowsy, her voice cold and chilly: “How could you have so many corpses?”

Qi Si smiled: “Forgot to mention, I am a Specimen Maker, dealing with piles of corpses all day long.”

He rested his right hand on his left wrist, tapping the surface of the Pocket Watch of Fate intermittently, making a “tap-tap” sound.

Upon the third tap, Li Yao’s slightly distorted voice rang out ominously: “Then tell me, am I a dead person or a living one?”

The pale woman suddenly looked up. On her powdered face, only her lips were as red as blood, and her pupil-less eyes curved into crescent moons, coordinating with her lips and teeth to form a ghastly, ghostly smile.

A chill spread from the soles of his feet, seeping into his limbs and bones, as if a thin layer of frost had formed on his skin.

Qi Si shivered instinctively, yet he pulled his somewhat thin shirt tighter with his hand, tilting his head to stare at the woman before him, as if carefully deliberating the answer he was about to give.

“Humans walk the human path, Ghosts walk the ghost path; humans and Ghosts are on different paths, the yin and yang are on different ways—”

The eerie chanting sounded softly beside the Coffin, mixed with hypocritical wailing:

“Wuwuwu… hurry and get into the Coffin, once you’re in the Coffin, everything will be fine…” “Heeheehee, death is good, once dead, you won’t have to worry about anything anymore…”

The whispering discussions rustled into a chorus, suddenly interrupted by a shrill chant:

“You bring nothing in life, you take nothing in death; fortune and misfortune have their numbers, do not seek blessings or disasters—”

Like a final verdict, it instantly suppressed all other sounds, leaving only its own lingering echo that refused to fade.

“So noisy.” Qi Si sneered, raising his hand to stroke his forehead.

Having received no response for a long time, the woman opened her blood-red mouth, her entire face almost pressing against the tip of Qi Si’s nose: “You’ve seen many corpses, tell me—am I a dead person, or a living one?”

…

“Tick-tock, tick-tock.”

The sound of the water clock by her ear beat with the same frequency, one after another, ceaselessly.

Li Yao felt a palpitation and opened her drowsy eyes to see nothing but red.

The red gauze curtains above her head moved without wind, and a white candle was burning on the bedside table.

The blood-red “Double Happiness” character was pasted on the wooden door directly in front of her, crashing into her sight and stinging her eyes.

Li Yao discovered she was sitting on the edge of the bed, a red wedding dress wrapped heavily and intricately around her, pressing down on her until she couldn’t breathe.

“Where… is this?”

Her thoughts were somewhat chaotic. Li Yao’s last memory was of entering an instance called “Shuangxi Town,” and after gathering some clues, lying on the bed to quickly fall asleep.

So, is this a dream?

She pinched her wrist and felt a faint, stinging pain, realizing then: this was not a dream, but a mechanism of the instance itself.

Is it a death point, or a supplement to the backstory?

Li Yao made a living writing supernatural novels, so she knew a thing or two about spirits and Ghosts. She knew well that the more you feared such things, the more they would seek to trouble you.

Maintaining her composure, she stood up as quietly as possible and moved cautiously toward the door, tentatively reaching out to push it.

The door actually pushed open.

Before her was a completely unfamiliar courtyard. In the center of the flat ground, which was covered in red debris, was an ancient, dark blue-black well, and a woman in red clothes sat by the well.

The woman’s hair was very long, dragging all the way to the ground. She looked like a sculpture woven from hair, motionless and silent.

Li Yao watched quietly; experience told her that this woman was definitely a Ghost.

She held her breath and retreated into the room with small steps, wanting only to wait until dawn to end this inexplicable plot.

Her elbow hit the door leaf, making a light “snap” sound.

The woman turned her head abruptly, her cold gaze nailing itself to Li Yao’s face: “Save me… please save me… can you?”

…

Qi Si had dealt with the woman who was clearly a Ghost, and was walking back to the mansion with a leisurely gait, closing the door behind him.

Things tonight were truly not right.

He had woken up for no reason in the middle of the night, and as soon as he opened his eyes, he saw the Ghost that Xier had transformed into crouching by his bed. The stench of decay hit his nose, and he was almost disgusted to the point of vomiting.

Not long after, Li Yao also woke up and asked him if he wanted to go out and take a look together.

Out of familiarity and interest in a certain charlatan-like temperament, plus the mentality of “since I’m already awake, it would be a loss not to go out and look,” he readily agreed.

The two went out together and stood outside the mansion for a while, watching the funeral procession arrive with music and drums, and placing the Coffin at the door.

Then, Li Yao inexplicably turned into a Ghost.

Thinking about it now, everything was permeated with a palpable strangeness.

Even the mode of thinking that led to making decisions was very strange, more like following intuition rather than reason.

This feeling was bad, making Qi Si feel that he was leaning toward the group of idiots like Chang Xu.

“An instance that can affect judgment… I hope this influence won’t be carried over to reality, otherwise I might as well die immediately.” Qi Si thought listlessly, walking straight toward the east wing room and pushing the door open.

The four teammates were sleeping like dead pigs; from left to right, they were Li Yao, Liu Bingding, Du Xiaoyu, and Shang Qingbei.

The bed in the middle that belonged to him was empty, the cotton mat still retaining some warmth.

“Have I only been gone for such a short while? Was I the only one affected, or is there some other situation?” Qi Si thought aimlessly, reaching out toward Du Xiaoyu’s bed.

Du Xiaoyu, that guy, was sleeping soundly, snoring thunderously, with a puddle of drool by his pillow.

Even when Qi Si roughly lifted his pillow and took the phone from underneath, he showed no sign of waking up at all.

Qi Si stood to the side and pressed the phone’s power button.

With a bright startup chime, the blue light shone onto his face, which was as white as a Ghost’s, lighting up his complexion in patches of light and dark.

This phone had been played with for so long, yet the battery was still full.

Qi Si’s fingers swiped flexibly on the screen, tapped into the phonebook, and dialed the only contact.

The phone rang not far away. Heard through the door, it sounded elusive, but he could still determine where it was coming from.

—It was in the Coffin outside the door; Xu Wen’s phone was in the Coffin.

“Xu Wen is indeed dead. It seems that saves the trouble of communicating.” Qi Si shoved his hands into his pockets, which seemed to be bulging with something.

He grabbed a handful out, only to find it was a handful of shredded paper money.

What’s going on? When did these things get on him? Why did he have absolutely no memory of it?

Qi Si’s initiative was always strong. Having doubts, he immediately climbed out of bed, crept to Li Yao’s bedside, and reached into her pocket.

After his fingertips touched the rough surface of the paper money, he quickly withdrew his hand and gently tucked the blanket back into its original state.

He did the same to the other sleeping players and reached the conclusion he wanted.

“Only Li Yao and I have paper money in our pockets. What is the principle behind this?”

Qi Si sat back on his bed and fell into deep thought.

Shuangxi Town is a Ghost town, and paper money is ghost money. Does the instance putting paper money on players mean it wants the players to spend it?

Or does it mean that someone has already died and become a Ghost, which is why there would be paper money on them?

Qi Si rubbed his chin, thinking with great interest: If I become a Ghost, it would be convenient; it would be better to just kill all the other players.

Of course, it’s not a hassle now either.

Regardless of whether I am a Ghost or not, I can kill someone first to test it out.

Qi Si pulled a blade from his wristband and slashed at the back of Liu Bingding’s neck beside him.

The expected resistance of cutting through skin did not appear; the blade passed through the flesh as if through a phantom, touching no solid object, and naturally, it could not cause any damage.

Can’t kill them?

Qi Si narrowed his eyes slightly and gave Du Xiaoyu on the other side a slash, but the result was identical.

He didn’t believe it and tried it on everyone; not a single person shed even a drop of blood.

On the system interface, a line of prompt text refreshed silently:

【In this instance, you cannot kill players who are asleep】