Illusion Returns

The tightly closed door seemed to be a veiled indication that Yu Xing's expected "ghostly appearance during the day" had become a reality.

He stared at the door, completely blocking Yu Wan's view. Yu Wan asked, "What's wrong?"

"Something's not right. The cloudy weather might have really caused those ghosts to appear earlier Yu Wan. Ye Ting definitely wouldn't have dared to close this door, which means..." Yu Xing dragged out his words, a deep worry between his brows. He didn't finish his sentence, but Yu Wan had already guessed what he meant.

The next instant, as if in response to his guess, a pool of blood slowly spread from below the crack in the door. The blood spread very quickly, as if a seriously injured person was sitting behind the door, pointing their wound at the crack and letting the blood flow out.

Blood quickly spread to the feet of the two people outside the door. Yu Xing frowned and tried to step aside, but Yu Wan did not dodge or avoid it, letting the blood soak through the soles of her shoes.

Yu Xing tugged at her, pulling Yu Wan to her other side, and reminded her, "Get out of the way."

"What are you hiding from?" Yu Wan seemed somewhat surprised. She lowered her head, glanced at Ye Ming's door, and said to Yu Xing with a hint of worry, "There's nothing there. What's wrong?"

Is there nothing there?

Yu Xing was stunned for a moment, then realized what was happening. He squinted at the ground and saw that there was no blood at all; it was just a hallucination in his mind.

He remembered that when Ye Ming appeared as a ghost, his greatest ability was to create illusions. That time in the bathroom, he was also caught in Ye Ming's illusion, mistakenly believing that Ye Ming had disappeared in the bathtub, and even lay down in the bathtub with Ye Ming.

As a result, he practically walked into a trap and almost drowned in the bathtub at Ye Ming.

So now he should be right, Ye Ming did indeed appear early because of the cloudy weather, and used illusions on him from the very beginning.

Even as a ghost, Ye Ming is still very intelligent. Unlike the Female Ghost who is completely uncommunicative, Ye Ming has been adept at using fancy tricks since day one.

Is Ye Ming trying to Yu Wan that he also has mental problems, thus making her wary of him and laying the groundwork for her to disobey his commands later?

Having witnessed many schemes Yu Xing instantly listed no fewer than five possibilities in his mind. When the sixth possibility appeared, he pursed his lips and said to Yu Wan, "I'm sorry, I was too nervous and misjudged."

"I know you're feeling really unwell right now. Do you think there's something wrong with this door?" Yu Wan comforted him, gently pulled her hand away from Yu Xing's, and returned to the door. Mustering her courage, she gripped the doorknob with her slightly trembling hand, and said firmly, "If you want to relax a bit, you have to break free from your illusions. Why don't we just open the door and see?"

As she spoke, she held up a talisman she had brought with her other hand. The red pigment, perhaps cinnabar, left reassuring patterns on the bright yellow paper.

"This is for warding off ghosts. With it here, even if there are ghosts behind the door, we'll have enough time to escape."

As expected of a paranormal enthusiast, he's covered in props, instantly transforming an unsolvable horror scenario into a battle scenario where he can fight ghosts.

Yu Xing twitched the corner of her mouth behind Yu Wan's head, but didn't reply.

He was now certain that it was the sixth scenario that had crossed his mind earlier.

Yu Wan pressed down on the doorknob with a slight effort; just a little more pressure and the door would open. The knuckles of her other hand, gripping the talisman, were white, suggesting that no matter how calm Yu Wan appeared, she was in fact tense and afraid.

"Ye, Ye Qin, come open the door." She called out, as if to tell Ye Qin that the door was nothing to be afraid of.

Yu Xing smiled and remained standing still, "I didn't expect you to be so bold. Since you're not afraid, then you can open it for me. I'm still worried there might be something inside."

Yu Wan looked at him with pity. "... You're so timid, are you really sure you'll be okay later? How did I end up... knowing a childhood friend like you? Sigh."

It was easy to hear the girl's obvious helplessness towards her childhood friend, whom she had liked for many years.

If it were Ye Qin himself, even just to prevent the girl he liked from looking down on him, he would have gone to open the door to prove himself. Unfortunately, it was Yu Xing standing there, and he had no intention of disappointing his future girlfriend. Instead, he tried to Yu Wan: "I'm sorry, I didn't pay attention to these things before. I only just realized how powerful they are now, and I'm really scared. Unlike you, you know them so well."

"Actually, you're scared too, aren't you? Why don't we leave and get away from here? I'll take you to see other rooms."

"... No, Ye Qin, you need to understand that this house is fraught with danger. You can't just pass through this room and solve everything." Yu Wan shook her head, pushed open the door instantly, and stretched out the ghost-suppressing talisman in her hand.

The talisman showed no unusual activity. Yu Wan looked at the furnishings in the room Yu Wan some tension, then breathed a sigh of relief, "See? I told you it didn't... What's that?"

"What?" Yu Xing asked, standing still.

"Although there are no ghosts in this room, there seems to be something on Ye Ming's desk... it looks like a bloodstained key?" Yu Wan took two steps into the room, Yu Xing watched her disappear through the doorway. He then heard Yu Wan say from inside, "This key has a strange shape. Is it used to open a special door? Or do you have some kind of safe or something? It's stained with blood. Based on my experience reading ghost stories, this should be a very important key... Where are you?"

Not seeing Ye Qin following, Yu Wan called out twice towards the outside, "Ye Qin, where are you? Don't scare me!"

Yu Xing smiled and replied, "It's okay, I'm standing outside. Did you get the key? If you did, come out."

Yu Wan "Oh," and added, "Aren't you going to come in and take a look? What if we miss something?"

"You're so capable, you must be very experienced. There shouldn't be any rooms you've checked. I'll go to Ye Ting's room first to see if there are any new anomalies," Yu Xing said, turning to leave.

"Ye Qin!" Yu Wan's tone sounded displeased. "You're really going to leave me alone in this room? Ye Qin, I thought that since you called me here to help, you'd at least care about me a little. I risked my life to help you. Even though you don't know much about the supernatural and it won't be of much help, you should at least stay with me."

"Sorry, first of all, you misunderstood. It was Yu Wan who came to help me on her Yu Wan initiative, not me who asked her for help. Although that sounds like something a jerk would say, it's the truth. So, if you don't understand the situation, don't say so much, or you'll end up like this, giving yourself away." Yu Xing replied from outside.

Strangely enough, even after he said those words, Yu Wan remained in the room and did not come out to confront him.

Only a growing anger, mixed with embarrassment and confusion, came from inside the room. "What do you mean by this? What did I reveal? I think you're the one who revealed it, you black-hearted devil! I came to help you, but I made a mistake."

"Oh, by the way, that talisman you're holding isn't for warding off ghosts. Downstairs, Yu Wan mentioned that these talismans are used to sense the location of ghosts," Yu Xing's tone became increasingly flippant, as if deliberately provoking the other party. "Ye Ming, my dear older brother, you really like playing this tactic of underestimating your opponent, don't you? First, you use an easily detectable illusion to fool me, then when the illusion breaks, you follow up with an even more difficult-to-discern illusion, like pretending to disappear in the bathroom. But do you think the same trick will work on me twice?"

There was sudden silence in the room, and no one answered.

"What a pity. Last time the environment was simple, so you managed it. This time, you know Yu Wan even less than I do. Where did you get the confidence to impersonate Yu Wan and trick me into your room?" Yu Xing took two steps back and laughed, "I don't have any other skills, except for an exceptionally good memory. Why can't you understand a top student who can memorize a talisman pattern after seeing it only once?"

"By the way, I think your memory probably isn't as good after becoming a ghost. Since you were able to mimic the patterns of the ghost-sensing talisman, it means Yu Wan is using it right now. Let me guess, what should the scene outside the illusion look like? She and I just walked into the hallway, probably halfway between your room and mine. She was using the talisman to sense ghosts and noticed something, looking around uncertainly, while I was rendered speechless by your illusion..."

Yu Xing threw a long string of words at the things in the room, as if he had seen reality even though he wasn't actually there.

This was undoubtedly humiliating for a ghost skilled in illusions. Although Yu Xing didn't know if ghosts could feel humiliation, he just wanted to be happy.

He stood there waiting, and the room fell silent, as if the room had already given up and knew there was no way to trick him into coming in.

The next instant, Yu Xing felt something extremely hot pressed against his forehead. The moment it touched his skin, it felt like it was burning, but he couldn't see anything.

"Ye Qin!"

The girl's call grew louder as it drew nearer. Suddenly, everything before him cracked and shattered. Then, starting from the cracks, his vision collapsed abruptly, revealing a completely different scene.

He was standing at the door of Ye Ming's room, much closer than in the hallucination he had just experienced. He was practically pressed against the closed door, one hand on the doorknob, as if he was about to open it at any moment.

Yu Wan clung tightly to his waist from behind, pressing a talisman to his forehead with one hand, her voice booming from beside his ear. "Are you out of your mind? Wake up!"

The force pulling him backward was so obvious that Yu Xing finally felt the reality.

"Waaah, don't go in, don't go in, please don't go in, there must be a ghost inside!" Yu Wan had been pulling him Yu Wan who knows how long, and her voice was now trembling with sobs. After she finished sticking the talisman on, she started to reach out and pull at Yu Xing's hand that was on the doorknob.

"Alright, alright, I'm awake." Yu Xing immediately let go and turned around, Yu Wan's gaze, whose eyes were red. He was stunned for a moment; the worry and despair in Yu Wan's eyes were genuine. He hadn't encountered such intense emotions in real life for a long time.

The most recent time seemed to be about ten years ago, for some reason... He had seen that emotion in Zhu Yan's eyes before, but he couldn't remember.

"Alright, it's alright now, don't worry." Seeing such warm and sincere emotions again, Yu Xing couldn't help but feel gratified for the Yu Wan and Ye Qin. Regardless of whether the subject of the deduction was Ye Qin or not, in such a terrifying experience, there was a girl who would genuinely risk her life to come for Ye Qin.

He gently hugged Yu Wan, patting her back, which was soaked Yu Wan cold sweat, as if comforting a child. You see, he had seen Yu Wan at school every day for the past week. Yu Wan had always been a carefree, cheerful and generous person, and had never been so vulnerable before. It seemed that he had really frightened Yu Wan when he fell into the illusion.

"That scared me to death..." Yu Wan breathed a sigh of relief Yu Wan him return to normal, and looked up at him, "Let's get away from this door!"

She pulled Yu Xing back several steps until they were a few meters away from the door before she spoke up, "What's wrong with you? You suddenly walked towards that door as if you were going to open it. I told you several times that there's a ghost behind that door, but you wouldn't listen."

"I'm sorry, I couldn't hear you when you were saying those things," Yu Xing said apologetically. "From my perspective, that door suddenly bled, and I wanted to pull you away, but you went through that door and kept trying to lure me in too. I sensed something was wrong and stopped where I was, thinking that you must have a way to pull me out of this hallucination."

"How... how can you be so sure I can save you? What if I can't?" Yu Wan felt a wave of fear Yu Wan hearing his words.

Yu Xing said, "You can definitely do it. You mentioned it downstairs; you have a talisman that can pull people out of their hallucinations."

Yu Wan: "..."

So it wasn't blind trust after all. Okay, then it's alright.

Although it didn't deserve her being so moved, at least she remembered what she said, right?

"It's... it's fine. I was just..." Yu Wan for a moment, then quickly recovered and told him what had happened after Yu Xing fell into a hallucination.

As soon as she reached the middle of the two doors, Yu Xing noticed that Ye Ming's door shouldn't be closed. Just to be on the safe side, after confirming Yu Xing's vigilance, she took out a talisman for sensing ghosts. Sure enough, she sensed the aura of a ghost at Ye Ming's door. When she sensed a ghost in front of her, the talisman heated up.

Just as she was about to warn Yu Xing to be careful, Yu Xing walked to the door. Startled, she saw that Yu Xing was acting strangely and knew that Yu Xing had fallen into an illusion. Without thinking, she grabbed Yu Xing and dragged her back tightly, which resulted in the situation just now.

Therefore, Yu Wan deduced that the moment Yu Xing entered the hallucination was the moment he said Ye Ting dared not close the door.

After listening, Yu Xing felt a surge of emotion.

Good heavens, why didn't they give him such a reliable teammate from the very beginning of the simulation?