Eaten

Because the lighting in the house was poor, Zhang Chen subconsciously used his Left Hand to hold the stair railing. When he reached the second floor, he wanted to brush off the dust that had stuck to his Left Hand, but when he raised it, there was no dust at all. The entire second floor was even darker than the first. What concerned Zhang Chen even more was the uncomfortable feeling that made his entire body tense.

"Wait, isn't this strange?" Zhang Chen stopped before reaching the room at the far left. "Putting aside the fact that I asked to see her daughter's room without even explaining why I was here, and she agreed without hesitation... the stairs leading to the second floor and the entire upstairs corridor look as though they're cleaned every day." Zhang Chen casually touched a flowerpot beside him. Sure enough, it was spotless.

"Since I'm already here, I should Go See whether there's any important information. I refuse to believe something can happen in broad daylight." Zhang Chen lifted his foot again and slowly walked toward the room on the left. The door was closed. As he approached it, the discomfort around him grew heavier and heavier.

Keeping calm, Zhang Chen gripped the doorknob and turned it to the right. The door slowly opened. A strong scent of floral water drifted out, making Zhang Chen sneeze. The room was pitch-black, so dark that he could not see his hand before his face. One hand covered his nose while the other felt along the wall for the light switch.

"Click." The switch turned on. A faint white light lit up in the center of the ceiling, revealing the room's entire layout. Yet when Zhang Chen saw everything inside, he was utterly shocked.

The entire room was immaculately cleaned. Books were neatly stacked on the desk, the bedding on the bed was comfortable and spotless, and the large mirror before the wardrobe had been polished clean. The only abnormal things were the window, which had been nailed shut with several wooden boards so that not a sliver of light could enter, and the heavy scent of floral water, which had clearly been sprayed only recently.

Yet Zhang Chen's discomfort did not fade. From the moment he stood in the doorway to the moment he entered, the oppressive sensation had become so intense that it was hard for him to breathe.

Looking at the furnishings in the room, it was impossible for it to be so orderly and clean unless someone carefully cleaned it every day. Zhang Chen steadied himself and slowly walked farther in. When he approached the desk, he found that aside from the neatly arranged books, there was also a framed photograph standing on it.

He picked up the frame and saw that it was a wedding photo of two people. Needless to say, the couple in the picture was Wen Juan and her husband. Their appearances were exactly the same as the people Zhang Chen had seen in the Dreamscape, further confirming that the Dreamscape had been real.

"Right, judging from what that old woman said earlier, she should hate this man deeply. Then why did she leave this photograph here when cleaning the room?" Zhang Chen put the frame down again. He opened the drawers one by one, but they contained only girls' daily necessities. There was nothing unusual.

When he reached the last drawer, Zhang Chen found a photo album. Opening it, he saw a seven-year-old little girl on the first page. Looking closely, she should have been Wen Juan as a child. Behind her stood a shorter Girl holding her arm. However, that Girl's face had been scribbled over with black ink, making it impossible to see. On the second page, the two girls had grown up, and a woman in her forties stood behind them. She should have been Grandma Yu. The younger sister was still holding her older sister's arm, but her face was still scribbled out.

Zhang Chen flipped all the way to the end, but did not find a single photograph in which the younger sister's face had not been obscured. However, judging by her figure, the woman who later appeared at Wen Juan's home in the Dreamscape was the younger sister, Wen Jing.

"Drip, drip." The sound of dripping water came from behind Zhang Chen, accompanied by an extremely dangerous feeling. Zhang Chen put down the album and spun around. Yet there was nothing behind him—only the same neat bed. However, the dripping did not stop.

Suddenly, the light went out. The entire room sank into darkness, making the dripping sound even clearer. Zhang Chen also felt as though something was watching him. Unlike the gaze he had felt at Sanxue Temple, this one carried a dense Death Aura. Zhang Chen immediately reached into his bag for his phone, wanting to use it for light.

But the lights came back on. Standing before Zhang Chen was a woman in a long red dress. A hemp rope hanging from the ceiling was wrapped around her neck. Because she had hanged herself, her eyes bulged horribly outward, bloodshot and wide. Her tongue stretched out to an impossible length. Her whole body was deathly pale, and her arms were covered in scars of varying ages, clearly carved into her flesh one cut at a time.

Suddenly, the female ghost's Left Hand twitched. Then her Right Hand moved as well, while her eyeballs rolled ceaselessly until her Pupils finally turned toward Zhang Chen. The change made Zhang Chen take a small step back, bracing himself against the desk behind him.

"So this room wasn't kept so clean by Grandma Yu. It was this 'Wen Juan,' then." Zhang Chen regained his composure. He was only two steps from the door as he watched the female ghost struggle continuously on the rope.

Zhang Chen immediately turned and ran for the door. Yet just as he was about to leave, an invisible force slammed the door shut. With a click, it locked from the inside.

"I'm done for," Zhang Chen muttered. Turning around, he saw that the red-clothed female ghost had already broken free of the rope and was lying upside down on the bed. Why upside down? Her torso still faced upward, but all four limbs were twisted unnaturally as she crouched on the bed like a spider. Her inverted head had rotated one hundred and eighty degrees, staring fixedly at Zhang Chen.

Zhang Chen kept thinking, What do I do? What do I do? Yet he could not think of any solution. After crouching on the bed for a while, the female ghost moved. She crawled down in a twisted posture, smiled faintly, and lunged straight at Zhang Chen.

Just as she was about to reach him, a sudden change occurred. Zhang Chen, who had been at a loss, suddenly smiled. Threads of saliva ran from the corner of his mouth. At the same moment the female ghost's long nails pierced his arms, Zhang Chen grabbed her with his backhand, slammed her to the ground, and opened his mouth far wider than any normal person could. He bit down toward her head.

The pinned female ghost was unable to move for a moment. Only at the instant Zhang Chen was about to bite her did she manage to break free a little, causing his bite to land on her shoulder instead.

"Crack!" Zhang Chen bit off the female ghost's entire Right Hand in one bite. The freed female ghost crawled like a spider to the farthest corner of the ceiling.

"Ahhh!" The female ghost, having lost her Right Hand, let out a miserable scream that shattered all the glass in the room. Yet Zhang Chen was completely unaffected. He devoured her Right Hand in huge bites, looking as though he enjoyed it immensely. The female ghost, however, showed a trace of fear in her eyes as she watched him.

At that moment, the door crashed open. The person opening it was none other than Grandma Yu. Grandma Yu held a long pair of tailor's scissors in her Right Hand as she stared at Zhang Chen.

"You actually dared to hurt my daughter!" With that, she raised the scissors and charged at Zhang Chen, who was enjoying his meal.

Zhang Chen had eaten all but a few fingers. He stopped only when he sensed someone approaching. Yet the old woman had taken just two steps when a black shadow flashed past and seized her. The shadow was Wen Juan. Seeing her daughter without her Right Hand, the old woman instantly burst into tears, stroking her daughter's body as she wept bitterly.

Yet no one could have expected the female ghost to bite through the old woman's throat in a single bite. The old woman clutched her neck, staring fixedly at her daughter. She truly could not believe that the daughter she loved most had killed her.

The female ghost, on the other hand, did not hesitate in the slightest. Using her Left Hand, she pulled open the wound in the old woman's neck and gulped down the blood pouring out. Before long, a little color returned to the ghost's pale skin. Flesh and blood continuously grew from her severed Right Hand. In less than ten seconds, a perfect new arm had grown out.

Zhang Chen, standing nearby, remained unmoved, as though waiting for the female ghost. The instant her Right Hand grew back, Zhang Chen smiled faintly and licked his lips with his tongue. The female ghost seemed to have been reborn and had become even stronger than before. Tossing aside the corpse in her hand, she crawled up the wall like a spider, then leaped onto the wardrobe and then the window with astonishing speed.

Zhang Chen merely stood still, but his eyes remained locked on the female ghost's movements. Suddenly, she leaped onto the ceiling directly above him and dove down, her ten fingers turning into claws as she tried to split open Zhang Chen's head. Zhang Chen moved as well. The instant she descended, he stepped back, extended his Right Hand, and grabbed her head. He smashed it viciously against the floor, spraying red and yellow fluids all over his body.

The female ghost, now reduced to only a body, began crumbling apart piece by piece. At most, she would vanish completely within five minutes. Seeing this, Zhang Chen let out a long howl. His mouth grew even larger than before, and he swallowed the female ghost on the ground in a single bite.

"Burp..." Zhang Chen sat on the floor and let out a full belch. Then a voice sounded.

Zhang Chen, you have devoured a complete Low-Level Corpse Ghoul. Saturation gained: 18%. Limbs strengthened. No skill acquired.

Zhang Chen

Main Soul State: Activated

Main Soul: Gluttonous Ghost

Saturation: 18%

Compatibility with current **: 30%

Secondary Soul State: Not Activated

Number of Skill Slots: 3

Used Skill Slots: 0

Physical Condition: Poor

Perception Ability: High

Overall Evaluation: Poor

After the voice faded, veins bulged across Zhang Chen's limbs, and muscles became faintly visible. His whole body seemed to be undergoing some kind of transformation. In less than half a minute, Zhang Chen seemed to regain consciousness. The blood and brain matter covering his Hands gradually turned into specks of light and vanished into the air.

"That voice just now was..."

Zhang Chen stood up and casually swung his hand, producing a faint sound like tearing wind. Then he pushed off hard with both feet. With a bang, his head struck the ceiling, which was a full two and a half meters high.

"Did I do this? How am I this strong? I remember everything that happened just now perfectly, but it feels like I wasn't the one who did it."

Looking at Grandma Yu in the corner, her neck torn open, Zhang Chen could not help feeling somewhat emotional. He stood up from the ground. He had spent quite a bit of time here, and the floral water scent in the room had already faded. In its place was a dense bloody smell from the corner, mixed with the stench of decay.

Zhang Chen walked to the bed and grabbed the covering bedding with both Hands, tearing it away with force. This was not a bed at all. It was clearly a coffin. A rectangular space just large enough to hold one person had been hollowed out in the middle of it. Inside lay a corpse that was nearly nothing but bones. Countless maggots burrowed in and out of her body. Beside her were many chickens and ducks; some had already turned into skeletons, while others had only recently died.

"This must be Wen Juan's real body." Zhang Chen sighed and was about to turn away when he suddenly noticed something. He walked over to Wen Juan's skull, used both Hands to pry open Wen Juan's mouth, and found a yellow talisman paper inside. Zhang Chen took it out with his Right Hand. The writing on it was completely different from the one he had received from the old monk, and it had been written in blood. After putting it away, Zhang Chen did not linger and immediately left the scene.

"The police will probably come looking for me within the next few days. Forget it. I should deal with this first." Zhang Chen thought again of the photographs and the old woman's words.

"If Wen Juan's younger sister Wen Jing was the woman who appeared later in the Dreamscape, and Wen Juan was deeply obsessed with her husband in the Dreamscape, along with that white slip of paper issued by the hospital, then everything seems to make sense. Sure enough, it wasn't as simple as I thought last time." Zhang Chen sat on the bus home, looking out the window. He had basically found the answer. Checking the time, he saw it was only 11:20. There was still some time before lunch.

"If things are as I suspect, then the resentment in my bathroom is truly very strong."

"Driver, I'm getting off at the Sanxue Temple intersection." Before going home, Zhang Chen still wanted to visit the temple and ask the old monk. After all, the old monk had told him to uncover the truth of the matter, but had not told him how to resolve it. He had only said that Zhang Chen was no ordinary person, and that as long as he got to the bottom of it, he would be able to handle the matter.