Te Rang

Beyond the high walls, a cool, pale moon hung in the sky, its scattered light illuminating the Tao River flowing below Bishu Bay.

The Tao River was one of Qinzhou's three main waterways. Ancient Tablet Town lay upstream, so the river was not very wide here. The clear water plunging down from Xuanhu Waterfall nourished the farmland and the green, layered mountain ranges. Farther downstream, after rushing east for more than a thousand kilometers, the Tao River joined the Yangtze.

"Not a bad view." A middle-aged man in gray casual clothes stood on the tree-lined path outside Bishuiwan Manor. Leaning against the marble railing carved with Clivia reliefs, he admired the Tao River rushing below.

Behind him stood a man in work clothes and suspenders, wearing a baseball cap for shade. Rather than admire the Tao River with the man in casual clothes, he turned his deep-set gaze toward Bishuiwan Manor behind the high walls.

If Feng Yushu had been there, she would have been astonished to recognize the middle-aged man in casual clothes as her husband, Bai Fugui—the New Homeland Group's largest shareholder and executive president.

The man in work clothes was a construction worker responsible for hauling materials around Bishuiwan Manor.

"Are you sure 'Zhaoyou' is in there?" the construction worker asked in a low, hoarse voice.

Though it was a question, there was not the slightest trace of doubt in his tone, nor any expression on his face. It was as if he wasn't the one speaking, but some vocal component inside him—a soulless parrot in a human skin.

"I'm sure. Zhaoyou is in the manor," Bai Fugui replied quietly. "Tai Su sensed its arrival."

"Tai Su..." The construction worker pondered for a moment, then accepted his answer. "Can you find out who freed Zhaoyou?"

"No." Bai Fugui shook his head. "I know you need Zhaoyou, need its ability to avert bad luck... but you can't rush something like this."

"Zhaoyou has been occupying this land for many, many, many years. You know its condition has always been fairly stable. Among all the known Ghosts, it's one of the most stable."

"But in recent years, for some unknown reason we can't uncover, Zhaoyou's mental state has steadily deteriorated. It's become Disqualified, teetering on the edge of madness, and the 'door' connecting this area to the Present World has begun to grow unstable."

"I originally planned to use the scenic-area construction project as a cover, disguise the deaths as construction accidents, and find the 'door' so I could go in and take Zhaoyou away. But who could have expected..."

Who could have expected Zhaoyou's mental state to worsen far faster than he'd anticipated? Before he could put his plan into action, Zhaoyou had been freed.

And the world that existed through its attachment to Zhaoyou had shattered and fallen apart with it.

"The door may have opened unpredictably, causing some people from the Present World to stray into Zhaoyou's world," the construction worker mused. "So far, we've confirmed three. They're all dead."

"Dead people are worthless," Bai Fugui said. "We're looking for the living—the person who cracked Zhaoyou's rule and made it back alive with Zhaoyou from the world's reflection."

"He's in this manor," Bai Fugui emphasized.

"Can you confirm exactly who it is?" the construction worker asked again.

Bai Fugui shook his head.

"Fine..." The construction worker nodded expressionlessly. "Have Tuyu seal off the manor. I'm going to release 'Te Rang'... Remember to clean up afterward."

"Understood." Bai Fugui nodded.

With that, the construction worker turned and walked up the steps to the main entrance of Bishuiwan Manor.

He pulled a red candle and a match from his overalls pocket, lit the candle, and set it down directly in front of the gate.

The feeble candle flame flickered pitifully beneath the bright moonlight. The construction worker stared expressionlessly at the burning red candle by his feet, then clasped his hands around his head and twisted hard—

Crack. His neck snapped.

The construction worker had broken his own neck. He died in front of the manor gate.

The dim candlelight fell upon the man's warm, freshly dead body. A gurgling rasp came from the construction worker's already lifeless throat, and a thick, pitch-black shadow crawled out from beneath his corpse. As if driven by the candlelight, it darted into the manor in a flash.

After the "shadow" entered the manor, Bai Fugui approached the high wall and slowly pressed his palm against its white marble surface.

The moon inside the manor went out.

Looking down at the construction worker lying before the gate, Bai Fugui sighed and shook his head. "You're even willing to release 'Te Rang'... Looks like your condition really is getting worse."

Otherwise, he wouldn't be in such a hurry to get Zhaoyou and use it to prolong his life.

"Now we'll see whether that lucky person who cracked Zhaoyou can hold out against 'Te Rang' until 'Tuyu's' seal is lifted."

Bai Fugui bent down, grabbed the construction worker's ankle, and dragged the body away from Bishuiwan Manor.

He didn't care that his wife and daughter were still inside. Having a family member die at Te Rang's hands would actually make those suspicious people less likely to suspect him.

Besides, Baizhi... would never die, no matter what.

Even if she wanted to.

After Bai Fugui left, the manor, cut off from the outside world, plunged into darkness and chaos.

"There are Ghosts everywhere." The first line in Baizhi's high school diary seemed especially glaring to Ning Zhe now.

Shouts and desperate screams rang out repeatedly from the brightly lit manor. "There's a haunting!" and "Someone's dead!" echoed beneath the night sky, filling it with a noisy chaos.

Amid the turmoil, Ning Zhe saw a crowd pour out of the brightly lit manor, jostling to get through the entrance as they ran for the gate as if their lives depended on it. Yet Ning Zhe couldn't see whatever—or whoever—was chasing them.

The panicked crowd ran in a blind rush down Welcoming Avenue, directly in front of the manor's main gate. The tall pomelo trees lining the road rustled in the evening breeze.

With a thud, the man at the front of the crowd suddenly dropped dead, crumpling to the ground without warning. He stopped breathing altogether.

The rest of the crowd cried out in alarm and scattered, but then another person fell and died without warning.

It was as if an invisible Evil Ghost were roaming the manor, patiently hunting everyone there, one by one.

"Ghosts..." Feng Yushu's face turned deathly pale, her eyes full of fear and unease. "Ning Zhe? Why are there Ghosts here?"

"Why ask me? Who am I supposed to ask?" Ning Zhe shook his head, returned the iPad to Feng Yushu, and turned back into a small, nimble Magpie. "I'll go check things out. Stay right here. Don't move."

The Ghost wandering Bishuiwan Manor seemed even more vicious than Snake God Zhaoyou and Wandering Ghost Taiyi, and far more efficient at killing. In just a few minutes, more than a dozen gardeners and cleaners had fallen in a heap along Welcoming Avenue in front of the manor's main gate.

"It's different from Taiyi and Zhaoyou... What's this Ghost's killing rule?"

Ning Zhe flapped his wings, flew low over Welcoming Avenue, and landed on a pomelo tree branch beside the road. Tilting his head, he studied the bodies below.

But before he could take a closer look, a thick, pitch-black shadow flashed past. Ning Zhe's vision went black, and he tumbled headfirst from the tree.

—The Magpie was dead.