Ghost-faced Man

Outside the old district.

The man who had just deployed his Forbidden Ruin sat beside a signboard. He turned to look at the half of the old district that stood still like a canvas, shook his head helplessly, then pulled out his phone and started playing a match-three game.

"Brother, why are you sitting here playing on your phone in the middle of the night? Aren't you afraid your ass will get cold?"

Not long after, a pedestrian crossed over from the opposite side of the road. The sight immediately amused him.

The man glanced up at him, then lowered his head and continued tapping away. "Nothing to do. I'm bored."

The pedestrian smiled, pulled a cigarette from his pocket, and offered it to the man.

The man waved him off and said seriously, "No smoking during work hours."

"Heh, squatting on the roadside playing on your phone counts as work?" The pedestrian laughed.

"Yeah."

"Fine, then." The pedestrian shrugged, got up, and headed toward the street behind the man.

"Where are you going?" the man suddenly asked.

"Home."

"You can't go back. At least, not right now."

The pedestrian raised an eyebrow. "What do you mean?"

"This road is closed for now. You can go back once it's open." The man pointed at the signboard behind him.

Following his finger, the pedestrian saw the inexplicable signboard standing in the middle of the road. Just as he was about to say something, a faint glimmer flashed across the four words: "No Entry Ahead."

The pedestrian's gaze immediately went blank.

A few seconds later, he stiffly turned around and slowly walked back the way he had come, his eyes filled with confusion...

The man seemed entirely unsurprised. Just as he was about to resume his game, another man's voice suddenly sounded through his earpiece.

"Zhao Kongcheng!!"

The instant that voice rang out, the man sprang up from the ground. The leisure and fatigue vanished from his face, replaced by utter seriousness!

"Here! Captain, what happened?"

"There's a problem. A Ghost-faced King emerged among this group of Ghost-faced Men. While we were surrounding the other Ghost-faced Men, it suddenly attacked and severely injured Hong Ying, then escaped the range of the Forbidden Ruin through the sewers."

"A Ghost-faced King?" Zhao Kongcheng's expression changed. "Which direction did it run? I'll intercept it!"

"No, Kongcheng. You're not suited for combat. You can't beat a Ghost-faced King. I'll pursue it."

Zhao Kongcheng froze. "Then I..."

"After the Ghost-faced King escaped, two more Ghost-faced Men took the chance to flee into the sewers. The others are busy clearing out the remaining Ghost-faced Men and can't get away."

"Which direction?"

"Southeast."

"Got it."

A sharp glint flashed in Zhao Kongcheng's eyes. He raced to the other end of the street, jumped into a black van, slammed on the accelerator, and sped away amid a roar of engines.

On the passenger seat beside him lay a neatly folded black-and-red cloak,

and a sheathed straight blade!

"All right, I need to turn here. I'm heading off first."

Wang Shao stopped and turned back to the four people behind him.

Just then, Li Yifei seemed to suddenly remember something and said, "Wang Shao, if I remember right, doesn't your home sit beside the old district?"

"Yeah. What about it?"

"...Nothing. Just be careful on your way home."

Wang Shao's mouth twitched slightly. Rolling his eyes, he said, "If you have something to say, say it. Don't stop halfway and leave people feeling uneasy."

Li Yifei hesitated for a moment. "I heard the old district hasn't been peaceful lately. There's a deranged serial killer!"

"A deranged serial killer? Is that for real?" Jiang Qian sounded doubtful.

"Of course it's real!" Li Yifei looked around and lowered his voice. "You might not know this, but over the past few days, more than ten people have died in the old district."

"More than ten people? Impossible. If something that big had happened, the news would have reported it already." Wang Shao shook his head.

"Heh, why is it impossible? I'm telling you, this is suspicious. Someone higher up forcibly suppressed the news. If my dad didn't work at the police station, I wouldn't know about it either."

"Suspicious? How?"

"It's said..." Li Yifei paused and lowered his voice further.

"It's said that the victims had their entire faces skinned off. All that remained were bloody scraps of flesh and protruding eyeballs. The methods were extremely brutal!"

The slightly cool evening wind swept past. Hearing those words, they felt a chill shoot from the soles of their feet straight to the tops of their heads!

"Li Yifei! Are you sick? Why are you saying this stuff in the middle of the night?!" Jiang Qian's face went pale. She instinctively looked around the silent street and snapped angrily.

This place was already close to the old district, in a remote part of Cangnan City. Evening self-study had ended close to ten, and there wasn't a single pedestrian on the road. Combined with Li Yifei's words, it was genuinely unsettling.

It wasn't just her. Even Wang Shao and Liu Yuan, the two grown men, were a little scared. Wang Shao glanced at the narrow alley he was about to take and suddenly felt a bit guilty...

If Li Yifei's words had merely made them somewhat afraid, then Lin Qiye's next words made their scalps go numb!

After thinking for a moment, Lin Qiye spoke quietly. "Are you sure... people did those things?"

"Qiye, you..." Jiang Qian trembled!

The corners of Wang Shao and Liu Yuan's mouths twitched as they immediately looked at Lin Qiye strangely.

Well, well, Lin Qiye. Who would have thought you were the one hiding the deepest?

Li Yifei stared at Lin Qiye in surprise. "You think so too?"

"Shut up, shut up, shut up!" Jiang Qian finally couldn't take it anymore. She reached out and viciously pinched Li Yifei's arm, making him cry out in pain on the spot.

"Don't tell ghost stories in the middle of the night!! I still have to go home later!"

Li Yifei clutched his arm, grimacing in pain as he hid off to the side and muttered, "But this isn't a ghost story..."

Wang Shao shrugged. "I'm not wasting time talking nonsense with you people. I don't believe in any of this supernatural crap anyway. I'm leaving."

Wang Shao's figure gradually disappeared into the narrow alley.

Jiang Qian shot Li Yifei another glare, walked a few steps forward, then suddenly stopped.

She sniffed hard, her brows furrowing slightly,

and a trace of confusion appeared in her eyes.

Turning around, she asked, "Do you guys smell something rotten?"

"Something rotten?"

"Like... the smell of something decaying."

"I don't smell anything. Liu Yuan, what about you?"

"Me neither... Urgh!!"

Before Liu Yuan and Li Yifei could finish speaking, their expressions abruptly changed. They covered their noses and looked around in terror.

Lin Qiye was just about to say something when an utterly nauseating stench suddenly flooded his nostrils. It felt like throwing a piece of meat that had rotted for over ten days into a septic tank, then mixing it with a dozen rotten eggs. Just one whiff made his stomach churn violently.

It was the foulest smell Lin Qiye had ever encountered in his life.

As for Jiang Qian, whose nose was the most sensitive, she directly crouched down and began vomiting.

"Fuck, what the hell smells so bad?!" Li Yifei shouted, covering his nose.

"I don't know." Lin Qiye frowned slightly. After a moment, he pointed toward the alley Wang Shao had taken.

"But judging by the direction the smell is coming from, it seems to be coming from there."

The next moment, a miserable scream rang out from nearby, echoing through the silent night sky.