“Dong— Dong—”
The bells of Ghost Buddha Temple tolled once more. Nan Zhi opened her eyes from her futon and saw Xu Zi sitting at the table. Noticing that she was awake, Xu Zi smiled and teased:
“The bed here is far too hard, and the futon is so scratchy. It’s a good thing you're easy to please, non-fussy, and can sit in meditation so peacefully. If that monk Huiyuan hadn't recognized me, you wouldn't have had to stay in this dilapidated cottage. I really dragged you down this time. Next time, I’ll be sure to give that monk a piece of my mind. We can't just let him cheat you out of your silver for nothing.”
“It’s no trouble at all. Although this cottage is a bit crude, it's quiet enough, and no wandering spirits disturb us at night.”
Nan Zhi rolled off the bed and poured herself a cup of tea to refresh her mouth: “There are less than two or three shichen left before the Gates of Hell open, yet Duan Chunming still hasn't shown his face. I'm afraid our only option is to head to Ruyi Pavilion and try our luck.”
“Once we catch that bastard, I’m going to teach him a proper lesson! Making me wait so long... And to think this run-down place even has bugs at night.”
Xu Zi flipped over a teacup resting upside down on the table, revealing a thumb-sized spider with thin legs and patterned markings: “I hate bugs the most! These nasty things always love burrowing into the mud and chewing on plant roots—they're absolute pests!”
Nan Zhi shifted her gaze over. Seeing the vivid patterns on the spider, she knew it was likely a poisonous species. However, after being toyed with by Xu Zi for who knows how long, it was currently on its last legs, lying belly-up on the verge of death.
A living creature?
She suddenly remembered that there was no life energy whatsoever on the Yin Yang Road. Even Ghost Buddha Temple was dead silent; ever since the two of them had arrived here, they had never heard a single bird chirp or frog croak.
So where had this spider come from?
Hearing Nan Zhi bring this up, Xu Zi realized it as well. Her mouth opened in excitement: “So you're saying someone wants to harm us? Do we know who? What could that person possibly be thinking, sending such a tiny bug to hurt us?”
“There are no living creatures on the Yin Yang Road. This cottage is out of the way; unless someone was intentionally spying on us, how could they have delivered a spider inside? The past couple of days, I felt like someone was watching me. Seeing this today, it certainly wasn't my imagination.”
Nan Zhi tossed the bug onto the ground and stomped it dead before speaking cautiously: “Insects are small and move stealthily; ordinary people wouldn't notice them easily. Besides, seeing as it carries poison, if someone were accidentally bitten, it would prove quite troublesome.”
“This spider is useless against ghosts and demons, so it's clearly directed at you. Could it be an accomplice of that Ma San?”
Xu Zi wasn't afraid at all. Instead, she rubbed her hands together eagerly: “Since they only dare to use such low-class tricks, they can't be anyone formidable. Just watch—if they come back today, I’ll force them to swallow this bug themselves!”
“This spider might just be a probe. The situation inside Ruyi Pavilion is unclear, and now someone is keeping tabs on us. We need to be even more careful tonight.”
Nan Zhi burned the spider's carcass with fire and threw the ashes into the mist before feeling a bit more at ease: “Over the past two days, I've memorized the terrain around Ghost Buddha Temple. No matter where Ruyi Pavilion appears, if we encounter danger, we can be the first to break free and escape.”
—She could reload after death, but those around her could not, so no amount of caution on her part was ever excessive.
Unexpectedly, Xu Zi shook her head: “Ruyi Pavilion isn't a specific building. It's even more mysterious than Ghost Buddha Temple. Once the Gates of Hell open, it will reveal itself naturally. No one knows who opened Ruyi Pavilion, and no one has ever asked. When the time comes, you'll understand its wonders for yourself.”
As the opening of the Gates of Hell drew near, neither of them had the mind for anything else. They thoroughly discussed their backstory and cover excuses, agreed upon secret signals, and only then felt fully prepared.
Finally, when the bells of Ghost Buddha Temple tolled for the fourth time, marking the hour of the Rat at night, the timekeeping grand bell did not stop after completing its usual chime. Instead, it struck a full eighteen times:
“Dong—”
“Dong—”
“Dong—”
Nan Zhi swiftly leaped up to the roof. Accompanying the ringing of the bells, she heard a massive, heavy sound of doors rising above Ghost Buddha Temple—a sharp, dull, hair-raising screech that only occurred when giant stone walls ground open, echoing far and wide.
Everyone raised their heads to look. The hazy mist gradually cleared to reveal a colossal gate towering into the heavens, seemingly connecting sky and earth. Countless grey figures roared out from within the gate like a surging tide filling the sky.
On the gate, ghost generals holding steel pitchforks and iron swords glared in fury. Inside the gate, hideous Ghost Kings opened their bloody maws, their snake-like arms attempting to reach beyond the entrance, only to be forced back into the Gates of Hell. They could only stare fixedly at the living beings outside with eyes full of venom and malice.
That gaze was sinister in the extreme, as if containing all the malice in the world.
Anyone who met their gaze fell into a dazed, mindless stupor, tumbling uncontrollably into the mist to become nourishment for the Yin Yang Road.
The cinnabar-red gates opened slowly. An overwhelming deluge of ghosts, bearing their longing for the mortal realm, gushed forth and flooded onto the Yin Yang Road in a frenzied surge.
Drowned ghosts, hanged ghosts, starved ghosts, burned ghosts, falling ghosts...
These ghosts had died in various ways, yet aside from their physical afflictions, their expressions and appearances were no different from living humans.
Emerging from the gate along with them were shadow monsters. Gaunt and on all fours like beasts, their eyes gleamed with chilling green light like starving wolves as they lunged directly at the travelers on the Yin Yang Road!
A wild cat spirit failed to dodge in time and was tackled head-on by the swarm of ghosts. Before it could even utter a scream, it was devoured down to the bones in the blink of an eye.
Everyone scrambled to avoid these monsters, rushing headlong to hide inside Ghost Buddha Temple. Standing high above, Nan Zhi watched as one of the monsters finished devouring a demon's corpse and immediately pounced on another crane demon.
The crane demon was unwilling to sit by and wait for death; transforming into its true form, it flapped its wings to fly high. However, the mist was far too thick, and after fleeing only a few zhang, it was swarmed by the black monsters and torn to shreds!
Some tried to resist with weapons, but it was all in vain—the monsters had rock-hard hides, and paired with their vast numbers, many living creatures perished beneath their jaws.
A monster flew past above Ghost Buddha Temple. Catching sight of Nan Zhi, it instantly growled low, whimpering in its throat as drops of crimson saliva fell to the ground, corroding a small pit into the dirt;
“Wuuu-wuuu-rrooar...”
The monster lunged straight for her face. Nan Zhi pushed off with the tip of her toes, retreating half a zhang as her Fish-Dragon Guillotine flipped deftly in her grip, cleaving squarely into the monster's wide-open mouth!
“Clack!”
The sound of the blade slicing into flesh and striking bone resounded. Screaming in agony, the monster collapsed to the ground and quickly dissolved into a pile of black mud.
“What kind of monster is this? To think it's so tough to deal with.”
Nan Zhi scooped up a bit of black mud with the tip of her blade to examine it closely, only to feel a foul stench hit her face, making her almost retch.
She looked at the completely unharmed Ghost Buddha Temple, then back at the Yin Yang Road, which was now littered with bones and drenched in blood, and felt a chill creep up her spine:
The monsters inside Ghost Buddha Temple were just two or three stray kittens compared to the massive army of monsters on the Yin Yang Road—a total drop in the bucket.
Was this the reason why everyone insisted on staying inside Ghost Buddha Temple?
“These are hungry ghosts from Hell. They aren't the same as starved ghosts—they're evil ghosts transformed from people who committed heinous sins when they were alive, shrieking in torment. Their throats are no bigger than the eye of a needle, and their bellies feel like they're burning or freezing all day long. No matter how much they eat, they never feel the slightest bit full. A single one is easy to handle—a direct hit with a Metal or Wood attribute spell is guaranteed to turn it to ash. It's only when they come in swarms that it becomes a headache.”
Xu Zi flicked the purple gold bells in her hand, crushing another black monster to death, before finding time to reply to Nan Zhi:
“When the Gates of Hell open on the Yin Yang Road, evil ghosts blocking the way aren't considered much of a threat. Anyone who dares risk coming to the Ghost Market has their own skills and schemes. Cultivation is ultimately a matter of life or death. Those with real skill are beyond the reach of hungry ghosts, while those with good fortune can survive on luck. As for those with neither skill nor fortune who blindly come to this Yin Yang Road to throw their lives away, there's nothing to pity even if they die.”
Rate on N.U.
