Loss of Control and Rot

After Yu Xing rose from the dead and explained everything, everyone had more or less pieced together the truth.

Zhou Yongsheng and Zhou Facai had probably been on different sides of the matter. Zhou Facai had regarded Zhou Yongsheng as an ordinary young man and planned to give him the same kind of funeral as the other villagers.

But Zhou Yongsheng had known what was coming. He hadn't wanted to be deprived of his freedom. When his resistance proved futile, he was strangled to death, became a ghost, and began plotting other dirty tricks.

First, he and Zhou Qinghai had happened to be classmates, so after his death, he sent Zhou Qinghai a message and lured him to town to prepare for Zhou Facai's murder.

Then he summoned two of his "idols," the painter San and the Magician Carlos, along with two feng shui masters, two investigators, and a girl who had come of her own accord to find her boyfriend. He planned to turn them into nourishment.

For every villager, every corpse, and every funeral, innocent outsiders would be tricked into staying, then have their lives devoured by special candles lit for the occasion. This gave the corpses in the coffins the properties of the living.

The more people there were, the stronger the corpses would become after the funeral ended.

That was why Zhou Yongsheng had tipped off Yu Xing and Xiao Xuechen, helping them avoid the Bad Luck on the first night—not out of kindness, but because he didn't want the other villagers stealing his nourishment.

Now that Yu Xing had destroyed the candle, Zhou Yongsheng had to kill the outsiders himself before the funeral ended.

As Zhou Yongsheng listened to Yu Xing expose his plan piece by piece, his already terrifying face grew even more sinister.

"Since you're so eager to be the first to die, I'll grant your wish!"

At last, he stopped pretending to be a victim. He sprang forward on both legs and leaped toward Yu Xing.

He looked just like a jiangshi from folk tales!

Yu Xing nimbly dodged, holding the dagger in a reverse grip, ready to defend himself.

"Put out the candles!" he shouted to the others.

"Which ones?" Wei Fan asked.

"All of them." Xiao Xuechen already knew the answer without needing Yu Xing to reply. She quickly regained her composure and spoke at a rapid pace. "Zhou Yongsheng mentioned the candles' origins twice. We'll cut off their source. Put out every candle here, including the ones on both sides of the ancestral hall and the ones the villagers are holding."

"Got it!" Wei Fan trusted Xiao Xuechen almost unconditionally. He immediately headed for the candle stand behind the cushions, along with the Xu brothers, who were moving at the same time.

Zhou Yongsheng's eyes flew open, nearly cracking apart. "No! Drop dead!"

He changed direction and lunged at Xiao Xuechen. Yu Xing gave him a cool glance, snorted, and stepped in to intercept him, driving his dagger into Zhou Yongsheng's forehead as he did.

Ghosts couldn't be killed directly. The right method had to be found. But at least attacks could slow them down and disrupt them.

Ordinary people had little chance against ghosts and could easily get themselves killed. Capable Deduction Players were different. They could use their own offerings to carry out all kinds of direct attacks and buy time for others.

Clearly, Yu Xing had chosen to be the one to hold the ghost back.

The dagger left a hole in Zhou Yongsheng's head. There was no blood inside, only indescribably repulsive matter. Yu Xing moved in close, slipped around behind him, and twisted the blade, making Zhou Yongsheng howl in pain.

"Hmph." Seeing Yu Xing stop the attack for her, Xiao Xuechen curled her lips. A compact black pistol suddenly appeared in her hand.

She aimed at Zhou Yongsheng's head, exposed by Yu Xing, and pulled the trigger without hesitation.

"Bang!"

The gunshot made Yu Xing's eardrums ring and drew everyone else's attention.

"An offering?" Yu Xing murmured, sensing a distinctive aura from the gun, like the sheepskin paper the Xu brothers had.

The bullet struck Zhou Yongsheng in the head. Wisps of black vapor appeared around the impact site, then shaped themselves into chains and wrapped tightly around his head.

Zhou Yongsheng's cries weakened at once, and his movements slowed considerably.

It could restrain ghosts? Yu Xing's eyes lit up, and he took an interest in the gun.

But Zhou Yongsheng was no pushover. He was practically a boss in the game, after all. In just two seconds, the chains shattered and vanished. He grabbed Yu Xing with one hand, his hardened, deformed fingers reaching for Yu Xing's chest. Yu Xing kicked him away with inhuman strength, sending him flying two meters. The nails missed their mark and only grazed Yu Xing's arm.

The fuzzy jacket was ripped open, leaving two streaks of blood across the solid muscle of Yu Xing's arm. He felt the pain and glanced down carelessly.

This wound... wasn't fatal.

And nonfatal injuries, for him...

The next second, as Zhou Yongsheng hit the ground, the two bloody streaks had already begun to heal.

He made sure not to let anyone see the wound.

One necessary death was already the most he could reveal in front of others. He could explain that away as the effect of an offering with severe limitations.

But if people realized that all his injuries healed quickly... that would be a problem.

The dagger in his hand reflected the flickering light, and Yu Xing looked excited.

While Yu Xing and Xiao Xuechen faced Zhou Yongsheng head-on, Carlos wasn't idle either.

"Zhou Qinghai, tell the villagers not to move." Seeing several villagers about to rise and attack, Carlos gave Zhou Qinghai an order.

Zhou Qinghai looked frightened. "H-how do I get them to stay still?"

"Just tell them."

"Oh, right!" Zhou Qinghai craned his neck and shouted at the villagers kneeling outside the ancestral hall. "Don't move! Don't you move!"

The villagers exchanged disgruntled looks, but since the village chief was their leader, they obediently did as he said.

Carlos ran into the crowd of villagers, gripped his little knife, and sliced at a burning wick.

Pfft.

The candle went out with a tiny sound.

He glanced at Zhou Yongsheng, Yu Xing, and Xiao Xuechen, then immediately continued. One by one, the candle flames vanished.

The Xu brothers and Wei Fan were quickly putting out the candles on both sides of the ancestral hall as well.

It seemed the matter could end without a hitch.

But Zhou Yongsheng wasn't about to let his plan fall apart so easily. Seeing that Yu Xing was even less human than he was, and that Xiao Xuechen was too far away to kill easily, he took advantage of his position and returned to the black coffin.

He pressed both hands against the coffin and repeated the words Zhou Facai had recited earlier, his voice hoarse and indistinct. "The departed do not linger; beyond life and death, they neither die out nor fade..."

A nameless panic welled up inside every human present.

When the coffin lid had been knocked aside earlier, the candle tray holding the special candle had fallen to the ground. Candle wax had spilled everywhere. Away from the tray, it quickly cooled and hardened, leaving several scars on the floor.

As Zhou Yongsheng chanted, both the candle tray and the black coffin began to tremble, as if they had reached some kind of resonance.

Xiao Xuechen was ready to fire a second shot, but suddenly her hands and feet turned cold. Her gaze kept being drawn toward the candle tray, and she couldn't focus at all.

The flesh on her forearm also began to soften for no apparent reason, as if it were about to rot away.

Horrified, she realized she had been cursed. She immediately used the first ability of the Eye of Life, drawing on fifteen percent of her blood to create a shield no one else could see.

The decay in her muscles slowed at once. Fighting through the dizziness from blood loss, she gritted her teeth, raised her gun, and fired again.

Inevitably, the shot went wide and hit Zhou Yongsheng in the leg. But he didn't need to move just then, so the sluggishness in his leg did nothing to interrupt his chant.

Carlos's hand holding the knife jerked, almost stabbing himself. His green eyes darkened slightly. He stopped himself in time, then reached out and took a new paper doll.

He whispered, "Take the misfortune..."

The moment it appeared, the paper doll flailed its arms wildly for a moment, then rapidly decayed into a pile of ash.

"So it's control, disruption, and decay?" After sacrificing the paper doll, Carlos regained control of his body. Without wasting a second, he pinched out the candle wicks even faster.

The villagers whose candles had been extinguished started looking less and less human in the darkness, and the malice in their eyes grew stronger. Fortunately, most still obeyed Zhou Qinghai and didn't attack.

But one or two had their will overcome by the power around the black coffin and candle tray. They scrambled to their feet, tossed aside their candles, and rushed toward the living.

The others were affected to varying degrees, and their efficiency dropped sharply. Xu Hong was unlucky: he was near the entrance to the ancestral hall and, having lost control of his body, accidentally fell onto the ground. A surging villager caught him, and pain pierced through him at once.

Several villagers surrounded Xu Hong, their hard claws leaving hole after hole in his body. Xu Hong screamed, making Xu Yuan roar in anguish. "Brother!"

Xu Yuan pulled a talisman from the small bag he carried. It burst into flames, burning his hand so badly that the pain was unbearable.

Enduring the pain, Xu Yuan forced himself to move and flung the talisman at the villagers.

The villagers were wary of it and let go of Xu Hong. Xu Yuan seized the chance to drag his brother away. Seeing his brother badly wounded all over, Xu Yuan lost his head and didn't even notice that his own neck was beginning to rot.

Only three candles remained lit on the candle stand on their side.

Yu Xing shook his wrist. After Xiao Xuechen fired her second shot, he had already moved in behind Zhou Yongsheng.

Keeping part of his attention on the others, he had realized that things were going badly. His leg showed signs of decay too, but his body kept repairing it, over and over. The decay and recovery brought him more pain, but at least they couldn't cause him any real harm.

The control and disruption, meanwhile, had no effect on him.

They had to hurry.

Wei Fan was unexpectedly steady. The indiscriminate attack from the black coffin and candle tray seemed to have affected him less than the others. He was quickly pinching out the wicks, and soon every candle on his side would be extinguished.

Zhou Yongsheng watched everything with smug satisfaction and continued chanting. "With the eyes of the living and the breath of the dead, bear witness..."

"Bear witness to the wisdom of solving the problem at its source." Yu Xing swung his dagger into Zhou Yongsheng's head, knocking his already broken spine askew.

Then, instead of pressing the attack, Yu Xing rolled over to the candle tray on the ground and reached out to pick it up.

"Mine." He seized the tray and smoothly broke its resonance with the black coffin, forcibly halting the invisible curse.

A steady stream of bone-chilling cold seeped from the tray into his body, and weakness rushed over him.

He began to tremble and raised his eyes to look around.

At that very moment, Carlos pinched out the last candle outside the ancestral hall.

Wei Fan extinguished every candle on the right side of the ancestral hall.

But...

On the left, Xu Yuan and Xu Hong were clearly in bad shape. One had suffered severe injuries and was probably stabbed through a vital spot; the other had decay around his neck, which was just as fatal. And several villagers had broken free of the burning talismans and were rushing toward them.

Three candles remained.

"Die! Hahahaha..." Seeing the chaos around him, Zhou Yongsheng thought victory was within his grasp.

He leaped to the candle stand and guarded the last three candles.

All he had to do now was wait for the twins to die first. At that moment, the villagers whose minds he had disrupted belonged to him. Once he killed the outsiders, his power would increase, and the others would be left weakened by decay and loss of control. None of them would escape.

His funeral would end perfectly.

But someone he had overlooked made his laughter die in his throat.

At some point, Zhou Qinghai had run in front of the Xu brothers. He was holding a large cushion.

His role was "village chief," which meant the rules protected him here. Zhou Yongsheng's curse had no effect on him at all.

Facing the villagers charging at him, he shouted, "Aaaah, you bastards, die!" and swung the cushion around wildly with his eyes shut.

His strength was nothing compared to the villagers', but he still bought the Xu brothers a little time to survive.

Yu Xing's lips curved. "Not bad."

He darted to a good angle and raised his dagger. Under Zhou Yongsheng's horrified gaze, he flung it toward the three candles.

He was now on the extended line passing through the three candles. The dagger might take all three out in one go!

Zhou Yongsheng roared and lunged, finally swatting the dagger away before it could reach them.

"Fucking hell!" Wei Fan swore furiously at the sight. But the next moment, all three candles went out at once!

What had happened?

With the last three candles gone, darkness swallowed the ancestral hall. In the dim space, everyone saw something make a wide arc through the air and back again.

Yu Xing reached out and caught the cold object. Looking at the candle tray he had used like a boomerang, he felt quite pleased.

The dagger had been bait. The moment he threw it, he had sent the candle tray flying with a different technique, aiming it along a trajectory that struck the candles.

Plan successful.

Disbelief spread across Zhou Yongsheng's face. Under everyone's expectant gaze, he gradually froze.

...Without its "source," he had become a genuine corpse, devoid of life.

The villagers also collapsed to the ground one by one.

[The funeral has been interrupted]

[The funeral cycle has been broken, lifting the Coffin Village curse. All corpses have returned to normal.]

[Rest for one night, then leave Coffin Village at eight tomorrow morning.]

Several Deduction prompts appeared one after another in everyone's minds. The mission was now complete.

But...the injuries hadn't disappeared, and some were still hovering at death's door.