Chapter 259: Wraith (6) – No Sound, No Light

In the right-hand room on the second floor, Qiu Xin stood motionless as a statue at the window, staring at the corpse hanging outside the pane.

The corpse’s blood-shot eyes glared back, as though determined to see straight through her, pierce her body, and survey the entire room.

“Drip, drip…”

Thick blood streamed from the neck stump and wrists, cascading off the sill like a tiny waterfall and pooling across the floor.

A few drops, as if flicked by some mischievous invisible force, defied physics and splattered her cloth shoes, sending a cool, living chill that seemed to suck at her skin.

Something’s happening outside—step out and I’m in danger; stay in and how do I finish the kill quest?

If I haven’t killed someone before the stroke of Zi, who knows what the Scholar’s rule and my role will do to me… Qiu Xin backed away step by step, drew a curved sabre from her inventory and gripped it in her right hand.

“Sss… sss…”

Fingers rubbed the paper window outside, soft and scratchy, clawing at her heart.

Even at a distance and in dim light, she could picture the unknown Ghost pressing its body to the paper, feeling about for a weak spot to break in.

The gruesome images flashed through her mind without raising much fear.

People fear Ghosts only because they fear death; once you’ve seen enough of it, dying doesn’t seem so terrible.

She kept her face blank, held the knife loosely, tilted her head and watched the window.

The rubbing continued; the lantern in her left hand quivered in sympathy, its flame flickering like a faulty bulb.

But how could a lantern have bad contact?

Sensing something, she glanced toward Tang Yu’s bedside table.

Tang Yu’s lantern was shivering too, tilting with no one to steady it, as though an invisible hand pushed from the side. For a moment she saw flames licking the sheets—how would it feel to die in fire, bright and warm?

Before the thought finished she vaulted across Tang Yu’s bed and caught the lantern just before it hit the floor.

She landed right on Tang Yu; the frame groaned in protest.

Even with calming incense, death at the door and all that noise—Tang Yu had to wake.

The young man in black slowly opened sleepy eyes, focused, and snapped wide: “You… what are you…?”

Qiu Xin had Tang Yu’s lantern between her teeth, her own in her left hand, and a sabre in her right.

Calmly looking down, she motioned for him to take the lantern from her mouth.

He obeyed in a daze.

She exhaled. “Something’s wrong; whatever’s outside is coming in. Got anything that works against a horde of Ghosts?”

“Pop—”

As if to prove her point, the paper window was punctured in an instant. A long white bone claw shot through, groping blindly like a begging animal.

Tang Yu came to his senses, pulled a long scroll covered in ink-characters from his inventory and held it before him.

【Name: Ink-Soul Scroll】

【Type: Item】

【Effect: Opens a door only spirits can enter for 60s; suspected to lead to an unknown dimension. Cool-down: 24h.】

【Note: An unknown poet wrote these verses with his soul, never knowing his creation was a Ritual and his work a corruption.】

“Let’s hope they’re mindless—this thing only works on wandering, half-awake spirits…”

He rushed to the window and stared at the ghost-hand inside.

It was pale and slender, fingers distinct, skin wrinkled, but the nails were white-stone claws—clearly a tiger’s!

“Probably Wraiths. Odds they’re mindless look low.”

He tucked the scroll under his arm and drew the blade at his waist. “They shouldn’t come in—Zi Hour hasn’t struck, and the Scholar said no window, no problem, right?”

“Maybe.” Qiu Xin sounded listless.

She lifted her lantern, stood behind Tang Yu and stared silently at his back.

Only half an hour to Zi; going out to kill might be too late. Why not kill the room-mate for insurance?

Everyone dies sooner or later; earlier might mean earlier reincarnation… doing nothing and just dying sounds fine too… She weighed the idea seriously… In the centre room upstairs, Lin Chen finally fell asleep under Qi Si’s threats and urging.

Qi Si, lantern in hand, sat erect on the bedside and continued reading the Underworld Record.

He hadn’t had the book long; the traditional vertical columns made for slow going and he hadn’t finished a full pass.

The parts he’d read were a hodge-podge: Wraith lore, lantern taboos for night travel, plus ghost stories of unknown truth.

What caught his eye was the line “When man dies he becomes a Ghost; when Ghost dies he becomes a Zhan” followed by pages of brush-written notes.

They included the missing second half “When Zhan dies he becomes Nothingness,” and a quotation: “Sightless is called Yi, soundless is called Xi; colourless is Yi, soundless is Xi.”

So… how do the stages “man,” “Ghost,” “Zhan,” “Nothingness” relate to this dungeon?

In the hush came again the soft scratch of nails on the window, growing steadily louder, like a pet vying for attention.

Qi Si ignored it and kept reading.

After a while the sound changed tactics and began tapping the wooden window-frame.

“Tap, tap, tap…”

The knocks were tireless, evenly spaced—like a clock, or a drum keeping time.

Qi Si finally raised his eyes and glanced at the noisy window.

Through a hole in the paper he caught intermittent glints of ghost-green light, flickering where the paper was thin.

Eyes or scales—impossible to tell from such a fragment.

Only by opening the window could he see the whole thing—yet that might invite the Ghost inside.

After all, the Scholar had said: open the window at night and Wraiths will enter.

But was the thing outside truly a Wraith—or something else?

The hint couldn’t be useless; so far neither “Zhan” nor “Nothingness” had appeared—could they be timed to show up now?

If a “Wraith” died and became a “Zhan” or something else, would it still count as “Wraith” faction? Would its traits change?

Qi Si rubbed his chin with interest, turned to the page on “ghost-fire” and traced a line with his finger—

“Man carries a lantern, a Ghost lights a candle. Walk the hills at night, see a distant lamp of green— that is ghost-fire.”

ghost-fire was nowhere to be found, but green flames—Qi Si had those.

Once again he stripped the paper shade from the lantern, exposing the milky-white candle inside; in the eerie gloom it looked unsettlingly like human bone.

The moment the once-warm orange flame met the air it leapt a full inch higher, and in the blink of an eye every layer—from outer tongues to the core—turned a ghastly, sickly green, cold enough to make the skin crawl.

It was as if some switch had been thrown: the temperature around him plummeted several degrees, and a choking, oppressive sensation closed in, like being trapped underground, never touched by daylight, ringed by countless invisible corpses.

Qi Si unfastened the Pocket Watch of Fate and held it in his palm, watching the hands while counting the seconds, then stood and walked to the window.

The paper window, previously translucent enough to show faint shadows outside, was now crowded layer upon layer with ghostly silhouettes, as though smeared with great clots of black mud, dyed a filthy ink.

Qi Si reached to push the window; as expected he met strong resistance, as if a vast ocean pressed against the other side and he were a man locked in a sunken ship, futilely shoving at the hatch.

Thanks to the Cursed Pendulum’s blessing, Qi Si’s current strength sat well above the average adult male.

He switched to his elbow, leaned in, and concentrated all his force on that joint until the window yielded a narrow crack.

A bitter, bone-biting wind knifed into the room, carrying formless black shadows that poured through the gap like seawater, flooding every corner.

Within seconds the entire room was submerged in thick, inky darkness, save for one trembling green candle-flame flickering in Qi Si’s hand.

Unable to read the Pocket Watch of Fate, Qi Si could only count his pulse to gauge the seconds.

In the darkness every sense sharpened; he caught a sudden reek of blood bursting nearby—from Lin Chen’s bed.

Looks like the Wraiths, while slipping in, had seized a quick kill, slaughtering a sleeping innocent.

In an instant the shadows surrounded Qi Si, clustering greedily around the pale candle’s green flame, pressing in until they nearly pressed against it.

Qi Si almost heard the sound of sniffing and swallowing, a craving so intense it felt intoxicating.

Eleven seconds, twelve seconds… with no more phantoms pushing from outside, the window drifted open with a faint creak.

Qi Si simply tossed the candle straight out the window.

The ghost-fire-green flame streaked through the darkness, describing a smooth arc as it landed far away.

The shadows howled and chased after it, sweeping back through the window like a receding tide, taking the black gloom with them and leaving only bloody chaos behind.

Chaos, yet only one person had died.

At first glance nothing had shifted; even the creases in sheet and quilt looked exactly as before the window opened.

Only Lin Chen lay motionless, blood seeping from mouth and nose, already breathless.

Twenty-five, twenty-six… Calm, Qi Si stepped to the corpse, checked from head to toe, and confirmed the soul had fled—utterly, irrevocably dead.

Who could have guessed the Wraiths would outdo tigers in cruelty? Their victim wasn’t even offered the chance to join them—tigers at least leave the soul to become a Wraith.

Qi Si was amused by his own ill-timed sense of humour.

With that odd smile curling his lips he backed toward the wall, taking in the whole room at a glance.

Forty-three, forty-four… Click.

The bedside lantern quivered, as if nudged by wind, looking ready to topple.

In his mind flashed an image of blazing sheets and flames licking the rafters—likely the result if the lantern really fell.

Qi Si judged the distance and decided it was too far.

Too lazy to dash and catch it, he simply turned the Pocket Watch of Fate’s gear.

“One-minute rewind” effect activated; this effect cannot be used again in this instance.

Outside, the black shadows abruptly rewound into the room, then ebbed away again, the window slamming shut in their wake.

Spilled blood flowed back into the body, leaving no trace; cold flesh warmed, breath returned to mouth and nose.

The candle flung outside flew back into his hand, not a single drop of wax spilled.

Time returned to the instant before the window opened; except for Qi Si, no one remembered that vanished minute.

Lin Chen lay safely in bed, breathing slow and even, apparently deep asleep.

The paper lantern sat safely on the bedside cabinet, positioned so it could not easily fall—ever so slightly shifted from where he remembered.

Qi Si sat on the bed, propped his chin on one hand, and sank into thought.

That single window-opening had yielded plenty of useful information.

First, the candle inside the lantern was the so-called “Guiding Green Lantern”; the Ghosts outside coveted it, most likely to seize a player’s lantern and light their own way.

Second, those Ghosts possessed solid forms and made sounds when moving; they were no disembodied spirits, merely common Ghosts.

Lastly, some unseen force wanted to topple the lantern—its stance opposed the Ghosts trying to steal it outside the Residence, for reasons unknown.

Qi Si narrowed his eyes, tapping his chin: “Among Ghosts, the ones hiding among Townsfolk are indistinguishable from humans and move mainly before the hour of zi.

“Others can only haunt the Corpse-Pit, yet every nightfall they assault the Residence… the reasons are hard to ignore.”

Outside the Residence, Qiu Xin strode along a sparsely travelled road wrapped in a black cloak.

Having no fear of death, she had climbed out of the Residence window—relying on her status as a Wraith—and, as expected, drew no attack from the Ghosts.

Near the hour of zi, the few Townsfolk still abroad hurried along, scattering into narrow twisting alleys toward home.

There was no moon above, no lanterns anywhere; not a glimmer of light met the eye.

Yet none of the Townsfolk carried lamps; accustomed to life and movement in darkness, they walked naturally, unhindered by night.

By contrast, Qiu Xin with her lantern looked completely out of place.

Not that she cared.

To her those NPCs were pigs awaiting slaughter, and she would wield the butcher’s knife.

Purpose clear, she studied the sparse crowd until she spotted a stooped figure among them.

Whether the others were human or Wraiths was unclear, but this particular townsperson was undeniably human—a consensus the players had reached long ago.

Qiu Xin closed in without a sound and reached out to tap the man’s shoulder.

Clang—

The man’s watchmans gong crashed to the ground.

Thud—

The man pitched forward, rigid, and hit the dirt.

You have used today’s identity effect, killing one person.

You must kill the next person within twelve hours.

Two system lines refreshed, marking the task complete.

Head lowered, Qiu Xin tugged the brim of her hat lower still, turned, and strode swiftly away.

Behind her the night-watch sounded—

“Bang, bang, bang!”

Qiu Xin spun around.

The corpse still lay motionless; the sound came unaided from the fallen gong.

After three strikes, the gong produced a hoarse human voice:

“Third watch of zi, all is well!”