It was late at night.
Since his rebirth, Hu Jiu had been constantly on the move. Now that things had finally settled down, he wasn't sleepy in the slightest.
He got up and took a hot shower. Steam coated the bathroom mirror like a thin layer of mist, blurring the reflection of Hu Jiu's face.
He was good-looking and well-built, with a small dimple on the right side of his face. He looked gentle and modest, yet there was something inexplicably strange about him.
Shen was a conceptualized, incorporeal vicious ghost. It hadn't replaced any part of Hu Jiu's body; it merely gave his whole person an incongruous air.
Compared with those Ghost Tamers who had become so warped they no longer looked human, their bodies reeking of an unmistakable stench of decay, he was in remarkably good shape.
After his shower, he lay lazily on the bed. Even with his eyes closed, he couldn't sleep, so he opened them and considered what to do next.
He would probably have visitors tomorrow.
His movements couldn't escape the surveillance cameras that lined the streets, and he had no intention of hiding them. After what happened in Lizhou, headquarters would find him sooner or later.
Although headquarters was a bit of a trap at this point, Hu Jiu would still choose to join it.
After all, it was part of the state apparatus, with the most abundant resources and the most powerful intelligence network. No civilian organization could compare.
Resources would surely go first to loyal insiders or Ghost Tamers powerful enough to be irreplaceable. Hu Jiu didn't expect to fleece headquarters for much; what he needed more were the various powers he would be granted after joining.
A city usually had only one or two Ghost Tamer criminal police officers from headquarters, responsible for handling local supernatural incidents. Within their jurisdiction, they had the authority to issue administrative orders, mobilize resources, and even inflict harm legally.
Official status and privileges would be a great help to Hu Jiu as he built up his strength for a future breakthrough. Until he had the power to flip the table, he wouldn't lightly fall out with headquarters.
In the early days of the supernatural outbreaks, all sorts of civilian Ghost Tamer organizations had sprung up, arrogant and unrestrained. Later, however, headquarters gradually grew stronger, and those troublemakers were either recruited or purged.
Headquarters ran deep in the later years. Given Hu Jiu's standing in his previous life, he hadn't been privy to much of its inner workings. He only remembered that headquarters had openly put forward three terrifying super experts—
The man hailed as the foremost figure in the country's supernatural circles, codenamed [Human-Faced Tree], had countless clones and was an army unto himself. He was headquarters' ace for dealing with supernatural incidents;
Of the other two, one was codenamed [Beauty Goddess], and the other [Pen Fairy]. Both were mysterious; all anyone knew was that neither had ever been defeated since appearing on the scene.
Those alone were astonishing enough on the surface. Who knew whether headquarters had any other hidden cards? Hu Jiu didn't dare underestimate Ghost Tamers trained with the resources of an entire nation behind them.
Fortunately, that was a long way off. For now, headquarters was somewhat weak.
Sunlight pierced the thin mist and streamed through the glass window, shining with a golden glow.
Hu Jiu had watched night give way to dawn without sleeping a wink.
He received several calls from unfamiliar numbers, but declined every one. It wasn't until the afternoon that a rough knock sounded at the door.
He took the Bloodstained White Silk from the body bag and opened the door with a fake smile.
Two uniformed men stood outside, their expressions stern and impatient. But when they saw the scene inside the room, their expressions changed at once.
"Please, come in," Hu Jiu said with a smile, his face deathly pale and utterly bloodless. Behind him, the White Sash floated in midair, stirring without a breeze. An eerie, bone-chilling aura swept over them, enough to make them shudder at a glance.
The two men hesitated, then steeled themselves and entered. The older man spoke first, his tone exceedingly cautious. "Hello, Mr. Hu. Let me introduce myself. I'm Qian Ying, a police officer with Linjiang City's special department. I apologize for disturbing you today, but our investigation showed that you visited Lizhou City yesterday. A special case occurred there, and as an eyewitness, we need your cooperation."
Hu Jiu nodded, quite satisfied with their attitude. He hated pointless displays of arrogance followed by face-slapping. It was better to lay his cards on the table from the start and effectively avoid unnecessary conflict and friction.
Regarding the supernatural incident in Lizhou, he chose only a few unimportant details to recount. Qian Ying recorded them just as perfunctorily. In less than ten minutes, he acted as though he had finished his assignment, rose to leave, and offered a carefully worded reminder before going: "Mr. Hu, a superior may contact you personally later..."
Hu Jiu said he understood. "Take care on your way out."
Once outside, Qian Ying felt cold sweat covering his back. The young man accompanying him frowned and asked, "Captain Qian, is it really appropriate for us to be so perfunctory?"
Qian Ying rubbed his temples. "Xiao Zhang, this matter is already beyond our capabilities. Don't meddle in things we shouldn't be handling!"
Perhaps because Hu Jiu had seemed so mild-mannered just now, Xiao Zhang came to his senses, his fear receding as his dissatisfaction grew. "Hu Jiu was acting suspiciously. He clearly concealed a great deal, and might not have spoken a single word of truth."
The supernatural interfered with electronic equipment, and the main surveillance cameras in downtown Lizhou City had also been destroyed in advance by Wei Xiyuan and Zhou Long, leaving them with no footage. But a camera farther away had caught sight of Hu Jiu carrying a Golden Corpse Bag.
At first, they thought Hu Jiu was just some passerby who had been tempted by the sight of valuables. The officials responsible had come to investigate because they feared there might be something extraordinary in the body bag, and wanted to find and deal with it early.
Qian Ying couldn't be bothered with Xiao Zhang's muttering. He quickly led him away and handed responsibility over to a higher-level official. Professional matters should be left to professionals.
After they left, Hu Jiu's home, which had looked like a haunted house, quickly returned to normal. The corpse-like "Hu Jiu" also dissolved into the air.
The real Hu Jiu stood by the door, his entire body covered by a phantom to achieve an effect resembling invisibility. He couldn't afford to be unguarded around others, and since a phantom could handle them anyway, why should he come out in person?
For now, the ordinary phantoms created by the Mirage Ghost had no physical substance, making them a very useful support ability. Replicating and simulating vicious ghosts was the real killing move. But as the Mirage Ghost's revival progressed, perhaps it could even turn the unreal into reality...
An hour later.
A knock sounded at the door again, but this time, before Hu Jiu could open it, a visitor exuding a strange fragrance had already entered.
Looking at the damaged door, Hu Jiu raised an eyebrow and turned his gaze to the uninvited guest. "Forcing your way into someone's home isn't a good habit."
The tall man sat casually on the sofa as though he had come back to his own home. "Don't misunderstand. I mean no harm. I'm Liu Mingguang, the person in charge of Linjiang City's special department. I won't waste words. I came to learn how you became a Ghost Tamer, as well as the full story of the supernatural incident in downtown Lizhou City, so I can report back to my superiors."
His manner was arrogant, and his tone somewhat cold and harsh. "I don't need to explain what 'Ghost Tamers' and 'supernatural incidents' are, do I? You should already know something about that kind of supernatural power. This is a serious matter, so I hope you'll give me an honest account without leaving out any details."