Departure

"I found something," Vivian said, snapping her fingers lightly. Hao Ren then saw a thin wisp of black mist spread from the corner of the room. The mist quickly contracted, coalescing into several small bats that flew around Vivian's shoulders.

Having spent some time with the two female superheroes at home, Hao Ren was no longer surprised by such surreal things. He was quite familiar with Lily's tail and Vivian's bats. At this moment, he casually teased a bat that flew in front of him, asking curiously while examining the difference between it and a regular bat, "What did you find?"

"Hey, don't mess around. These bats are my clones, and our senses are shared," Vivian waved away Hao Ren's hand, then looked in a certain direction outside the window. "I sent some bats to the old castle, and indeed, I found something abnormal—the smell of undead, at least several hundred years old, and quite a lot of them."

Hao Ren felt a chill run down his spine. Although he was fully prepared, even ready for his new tenant to be an undead, hearing this news still made him feel a bit cold. "There really are? Quite a lot? Raven 12345 said there was only one person... Should we pick one and take it away?"

"Don't say that yet. I found that the undead aura there is different from the ghost stories we heard outside," Vivian shook her head. "The undead aura in the castle is suppressed underground. My bats only detected it when they burrowed into a collapsed tunnel. Although I haven't found the source or the underground entrance yet, I can confirm that the suppression environment is still intact. Theoretically... there shouldn't be any vengeful spirits or anything like that on the surface right now."

Hao Ren thought for a moment and quickly understood what was wrong. "So, there are ghosts in the castle, but they're all suppressed now. By rights, there shouldn't be any ghost sightings near the castle? Then the ghost reports from people nearby..."

"It's hard to say. If it's an extremely powerful undead, it can indeed affect ordinary people within a certain range solely with its spirit, causing them to see illusions or believe false memories, even while sealed. But such powerful undead haven't appeared for many years... Theoretically, they should have been cleared out by the demon hunters."

Hao Ren grimaced and spread his hands. "What is this situation? I'm just a normal person, and now I'm getting mixed up in this."

Just as he was about to say something else, he suddenly saw Vivian's expression change and immediately asked, "What's wrong?"

"That Nangong seems to be preparing to go out," Vivian frowned. "I still have a bat hanging outside his window, and I saw him packing that box of 'tools'... He just opened the door and left!"

"So late?" Hao Ren was a little surprised. "He's really dedicated. He just arrived and is already going out to 'work.' Is this demon hunter actually any good?"

Before, Hao Ren thought Nangong was probably a ghost-busting fraud. Even if he knew some demon hunter knowledge, he wouldn't be a true professional (his flashy appearance suggested otherwise). But he didn't expect the man to go out to work immediately after arriving, without rest. Such dedication wasn't something a typical ghost-busting fraud would have.

Vivian didn't speak, but immediately went to the window to look downstairs, beckoning Hao Ren to join her. "Come and see, he's already left. I'm curious how he plans to get to that old castle. The castle is tens of kilometers away, and he's also a foreigner. He definitely doesn't have a car, and at this hour, he can't find a taxi willing to go to such a remote place—does he really know some secret demon hunter techniques?"

Hao Ren and Vivian leaned side-by-side on the windowsill. They saw Nangong arrive at the hotel entrance and stand there, seemingly lost in thought. He wasn't carrying his enormous travel suitcase, but a smaller black one. He was still wearing a white shirt and black trousers, looking like an ordinary businessman on a short trip. As Vivian said, Nangong was also a foreigner with no connections here, so he naturally had no convenient transportation. How did he plan to travel to the castle, dozens of kilometers away, in the middle of the night?

"If it's a real demon hunter, achieving speeds of over a hundred kilometers per hour is very simple. Some demon hunters can even fly for short distances or teleport over short distances," Vivian frowned. "He's making strange gestures in a certain direction. Could he really know secret arts?"

Hao Ren's mind was suddenly filled with jargon: "Shrink the ground to an inch," "Ride the wind," "Wolf spirit protection," "Ancestral soul." In his mind, Nangong was about to ascend on auspicious clouds. At this point, he wouldn't be surprised if a magic circle suddenly appeared around the small hotel. But in the next moment, he saw a car emerge from behind the hotel. Angus, the hotel's plump owner, drove out. Nangong nodded to Angus and got into the car. Then, an Indian man dressed as a monk and a European man dressed like Batman also got into the car. Hao Ren clearly saw all three of them taking out their wallets to pool money before getting in...

Vivian opened her mouth awkwardly. "Uh, carpooling... It seems the hotel owner has started a new business recently."

Hao Ren: "...I was overthinking it."

It seemed the haunted castle nearby had attracted quite a few strange individuals, even foreigners. He wondered how these paranormal enthusiasts from all over the world had such great initiative. They probably spent their days staring at Earth, looking for places that were haunted.

After Angus drove away with the three international ghost-hunting professionals, Vivian poked Hao Ren's arm. "Let's follow them. We'll make our move tonight."

Hao Ren was confused. "Didn't you say we should stay as far away from the demon hunter as possible, preferably not meeting Nangong?"

"I've changed my mind. What if some of these ghost-hunting professionals are genuinely skilled and find the new tenant before us? Besides, there will definitely be more people coming in the future. We can't just wait for this trend to die down on its own; who knows how long that will take? The longer we wait, the more complications arise."

Hao Ren thought it made sense, but he glanced at the hotel room door with a little unease. "I've had enough sleep, and it's fine if I don't sleep today, but we still have a Sleeping Beauty—Lily won't wake up until midnight. Are we taking her with us?"

Vivian checked her watch. "It's fine. She'll wake up soon. We can rouse her now, and she has a magical ability to follow us around even while sleeping. By the time she reaches the castle, she'll be fully awake. How perfect is that?"

Hao Ren had no more questions and followed Vivian to Lily's room. As expected, the werewolf girl was restlessly tossing and turning on the bed, seemingly in her final few rolls before waking. She was still wearing her usual clothes; she didn't even change when she slept—Vivian had brought her up, and the vampire girl certainly wasn't kind enough to help her change. Now, Hao Ren was saved the trouble.

Although he was quite looking forward to encountering a werewolf girl in a revealing nightgown, just like in the main plot, it was impossible.

"Look, the table leg." Vivian pointed to the table by the bed. Hao Ren's eye twitched as he saw that the wooden table leg had been gnawed down like a candied hawthorn. A thick layer of sawdust was scattered on the floor nearby, and wood chips could be seen on Lily's lips...

Without a doubt, Lily had dreamed of gnawing on large bones at home.

"Hey, big dog, wake up and get to work!" Vivian walked over and roughly pushed Lily off the bed. She fell to the floor with a thud, finally opening her eyes groggily. The first thing she saw when she looked at Hao Ren was, "Oh, Landlord, is it breakfast?"

"Breakfast, my foot!" Vivian pulled Lily up. "Get ready to go to the castle. You're not fully awake yet, so just follow us. We'll explain the details when you wake up over there."

Lily mumbled her agreement, closed her eyes, and stood up, entering scent-tracking mode again. Before falling completely asleep, she said, "Landlord, I dreamed you stewed pork ribs for me just now. The ribs were so delicious~~"

Hao Ren: "..."

A moment later, the three of them had silently left the small hotel. With Vivian's black mist as cover, ordinary people couldn't detect their movements. Since the hotel was on the edge of town, they left the town shortly after leaving the hotel. Looking at the vast wilderness before them, Hao Ren suddenly realized a problem: "They carpooled... What about us?"

A pair of huge bat wings suddenly unfurled behind Vivian, and she smiled brightly. "I'll carry you, and let the big dog run below!"