Encountering the Ghostly Wall

"Time is tight—forget about the Shanyin Art for now."

Zhao Han immediately packed up, stuffing all the spoils into the System Space in one go.

Then he propped Wang Bao's corpse upright against the table.

Since the tent had lamplight inside, anyone outside could see a figure sitting there, which wouldn't arouse suspicion.

Cutting a slit in the back of the tent, Zhao Han went to the kitchen and crammed food into his space.

Dried meat and flatbreads—a massive amount of food filled the space to the brim.

There were also torches, cloth, lamp oil, and a Fire Starter. Traveling on a dark night like this was impossible without fire.

Zhao Han's body after crossing over was just a farmer's—malnourished, lacking vitamins, and suffering from night blindness.

He had to have torches ready.

His clothes were stained with blood, so Zhao Han took them off and put them on inside out; no one would notice.

Leaving the kitchen, torch in hand, he walked across the pitch-black Mine and ran into a patrol team.

Leading them was none other than Wang Liang, the one who had leaked Zhao Han's information earlier.

"Brother Zhao, Brother Zhao—good evening." Wang Liang smiled.

He still thought Zhao Han didn't know he'd spilled the info.

The other gang members also greeted him warmly, their eyes full of envy.

After all, Zhao Han had crossed the class divide, leaping from an ordinary gang member to an Elite Gang Member—that was the dream of their entire lives.

"All good, all good. You lot go on patrol; I have something to discuss with Little Wang."

Zhao Han waved them off, and the others shot Wang Liang envious looks, knowing he'd caught Zhao Han's attention.

Wang Liang actually believed Zhao Han had business with him. The moment the patrol left, Zhao Han reached out and grabbed his throat.

Then, amid Wang Liang's desperate struggles and terrified gaze—

With a twist, a crack sounded, and Wang Liang was dead.

After killing Wang Liang, Zhao Han tossed him aside like trash into a dark corner, dusted off his hands, and headed straight for the gate.

"Who goes there! Where are you going this late at night?" The ordinary gang member guarding the gate immediately blocked Zhao Han.

Zhao Da wasn't inside—he'd been on the day shift.

"This is Leader Wang's token. I've been ordered on an errand." Zhao Han tossed Wang Bao's identity token over for them to inspect.

Seeing it was the new Leader Wang Bao's token, the guards respectfully returned it.

"Take care, Brother Zhao!"

Leaving the Mine, Zhao Han headed south along the Official Road in the opposite direction of Blackwater County—a show for the guards.

After walking a stretch until the Mine was out of sight, Zhao Han cut through a patch of woodland and looped back north, bypassing the Mine, then followed the Official Road toward Blackwater County.

"Woo... woo..."

The wind howled through the forest.

Though Zhao Han had reached Skin Refining, boosting his resistance to both cold and heat, he still couldn't help tightening his clothes.

Not from the cold—

But from fear.

Fear that some ghost or monster would appear in the woods and snuff out his insignificant little life.

This goddamn world—chaos and demons and monsters all at once—how was an ordinary person supposed to survive?

"Fuck me, speak of the devil."

Zhao Han took a few more steps, but his peripheral vision suddenly caught sight of a grave mound in the woods to his right.

It looked old—the tombstone was cracked and illegible, the mound standing alone and desolate.

This was really going to cost him his life.

His feet moved instantly, and Zhao Han panicked, trying to sprint out of the area.

"Hope it's just an ordinary grave... if it's not... forget it, I don't even want to think about it..."

But after running a few hundred meters, Zhao Han's eyes again caught the grave mound in the woods to his right.

The same grave mound.

"It's over. It's really over." Zhao Han's face twisted in horror.

He'd run into a ghost—trapped in a Ghostly Wall's Ghostly Technique.

Ghostly Wall was one of the most basic Ghostly Techniques, only frequently used by Lesser Ghosts; even so, it had trapped and killed plenty of Martial Artists.

This damned chaotic world. These damned monsters.

"There has to be a way to break it." Zhao Han stopped walking, stood still, and headed straight for the grave mound.

Back when he was fleeing with the Refugees, Zhao Han had encountered this kind of thing before.

The way they'd gotten out back then was when a seven-year-old kid got so scared he pissed himself, and the urine happened to land on a buried skeleton—Virgin Boy Urine broke the Ghostly Wall's Ghostly Technique.

This time, he wasn't so lucky. Although Zhao Han was a virgin, without finding the medium the ghost was anchored to, he was helpless.

He could only steel his nerves and head toward the grave mound—it was the only option left.

Arriving at the grave mound, Zhao Han's first move was to look at the inscription on the tombstone.

Unfortunately, the years had worn it away, and he couldn't make it out.

Zhao Han circled the grave mound once, then finally stopped in front of the tombstone.

He reached out to touch it.

"So cold!"

Before his fingers even made contact, a biting chill forced Zhao Han to yank his hand back.

The cold was bone-deep, as if an invisible wall of ice shrouded the grave.

Zhao Han stood frozen in place, at a complete loss.

Nearly half an hour passed, and the surrounding cold only grew more intense. With no other choice, Zhao Han decided to gamble.

"Better to try anything than wait to die. Either way, I'm dead—I'd rather go out with some dignity."

He dropped his pants and urinated on the grave mound, hoping his virgin boy urine would work.

"Sssss..."

To Zhao Han's surprise, it actually did.

It was as if the invisible ice wall, meeting the warm virgin boy urine, instantly softened, dissolving into white mist that scattered in all directions.

At the same time, the surrounding cold eased considerably.

"It works. Well then, no hard feelings."

Zhao Han immediately took water from the System Space and drank. In one go, he downed two liters—equivalent to a large bottle of Lei Bi.

Soon, the urge to pee returned, and Zhao Han kept going.

With this second wave of virgin boy urine, the cold was mostly dispelled, and the grave mound no longer felt so terrifying.

Zhao Han bolted, thinking he had broken the Ghostly Wall.

But after running four or five hundred meters, he ended up right back at the edge of the grave.

"No end to this, huh? Damn it!"

Fury surged in Zhao Han's heart. He pulled out his machete, using it as a shovel to start digging up the grave.

He wanted to see just what the hell was trapping him here.

If he was going to die, he'd at least die knowing why.

After about ten minutes of relentless effort, Zhao Han unearthed a rotting straw mat. A foul stench hit his nose, nearly making him gag.

Bearing the smell, he dragged the mat onto the ground and unrolled it.

Inside was a decayed corpse, its rotting flesh still clinging to the bones. The stench came from it.

What was surprising was that the corpse held an ounce of gold in its hands, and copper coins were embedded in its forehead, both wrists, and both ankles.

At the same time, one copper coin was clenched between its teeth, and one each was stuck in its chest and navel.

That made eight copper coins in total, plus one ounce of gold.

"This looks like some kind of formation."

Zhao Han wasn't a complete novice. Having read fantasy and horror novels and watched movies back on Blue Star, he had some idea.

As for what kind of formation it was—who the hell knew?

Zhao Han circled the corpse, observing it from every angle, trying to make sense of it.

"There's gold and copper coins, but no silver."

He noticed a key detail.

Logically, silver was worth more than copper coins, so using silver should have been more effective.

But there was none.

"Could it be that silver repels ghosts? I've heard some countries on Blue Star say that too."

Zhao Han suddenly remembered a zombie movie he'd watched, where the way to fight foreign ghosts was with onions and silver crucifixes.