End of the Road Escape

Zhang Anzai saw the eerie humanoid figure within the black mist seemingly split its head diagonally down the middle, the two halves twisting outward to strike a pose of inquisitive tilting.

Combined with the state of its hands earlier, it was highly likely this ghost had been killed by a vehicle and thoroughly crushed in the process.

Regardless, their car surged forward instantly. Feeling the push against his back as the old clunker erupted with speed, Zhang Anzai gave a fierce thumbs-up to the Yiwu trinkets: "Who said these modern knick-knacks were useless? Praise be to the great God of Industry..."

Although they had escaped for the moment, even if Chen Xing beside him could push the performance of their old Santana to its absolute limit, the best they could do was compress a two-hour drive into two hours flat.

What did that mean? Zhang Anzai had entered the instance less than an hour after getting off work, and now, having driven back and forth on this highway and stopped at gas stations twice, he had already spent the better part of the night.

Checking the time, there were only two hours of rest left; it would soon be 7:00 AM, and he had to go to work.

He didn't care much about whether he would have to multitask and let his physical body head to his workstation if he couldn't make it back in time; the real issue was whether he could even get away at all.

Two hours was enough to finish the drive, but the question remained: would the vengeful spirit behind them not catch up again?

"Need to find a way to lure it away..." Zhang Anzai recalled what he knew about the characteristics of ghosts in the Reflected World.

With that, he decisively tore off another sheet of paper and began to trim.

As expected, when he accidentally glanced at the rearview mirror, the road behind looked perfectly normal at first glance, just the highway and the night sky.

But after a few careful looks, that mysterious black mist came rolling back again. The horrifying ghost's body shattered and reassembled, chasing their speeding car step by step, already closing the distance.

"Screech—" The brake pads groaned again. The ghost seemed to have grown smarter; instead of rushing to catch up, it released its black mist ahead of time to reach their rear tires, and the car's speed immediately began to drop.

Yet, at this very moment, Zhang Anzai trimmed away the final flaw on his paper cutting.

"Whoosh!" He opened the window, and the wind rushed in violently, nearly extinguishing the incense stick he had wedged into the gap of the passenger-side storage compartment.

But just then, a magpie, adorned with black and white feathers that revealed a hint of cyan upon closer inspection, actually flew out from inside the car.

The window was quickly rolled shut. As the magpie flapped its wings and flew away, their car speed instantly surged back up.

"Sure enough, this ghost is the mindless type; it'll chase anything that's alive." Zhang Anzai glanced back; the black mist had already veered off to pursue the magpie heading toward the wilderness.

Of course, this wouldn't delay it for long, so he decisively tore off another sheet of paper and began to trim.

At the same time, he bowed toward the clod of dirt in the bag under the windshield, cracked the window open a sliver, and shouted: "Return, oh soul! Return, oh soul! Zhang Anzai!! Chen Xing!!!"

Soul-calling—a ritual that was essentially unavoidable for families in the south who had lost a loved one.

In ancient times, whenever someone fell ill or was thought to be possessed, they rarely escaped this practice.

Whether in reality or in the instance, Zhang Anzai had heard of and even seen this operation, so the process wasn't unfamiliar to him, though calling his own soul was a first.

The ritual was definitely incorrect, but with a conceptual weapon sitting right beside him, Zhang Anzai wasn't afraid it wouldn't work.

In the story, the grandmother had succeeded, so the person beside him would naturally believe they would succeed too. Once he believed, everything would come to pass.

"But... tsk, what a pain!" Zhang Anzai had already folded a paper ingot. This thing was the same; southerners were generally no strangers to it, and many children had helped their families fold them when they were young.

The only thing missing from their ritual was burning the paper and incense to persuade the ghost to let them go.

But the problem was that folding a certain amount of paper ingots took time. He glanced at the rearview mirror, and the ghost behind them had caught up once again.

Clearly, some abilities were not universally applicable between ghosts.

Zhang Anzai had told Chen Xing earlier that this ghost was located near the 45-mile marker. Yet, even after the corpse was dug up, it had still pursued them.

Moreover, he had hinted that since Chen Xing hadn't been caught by ghosts as a child, he shouldn't be caught now, yet they were still being dragged down. This proved that Chen Xing's ability didn't fully affect this ghost.

Even the location of the ghost's corpse was likely not influenced by him.

Zhang Anzai had no choice but to speed up his movements, finishing the paper ingots at his fastest pace, then decisively tearing off another sheet of paper and folding it twice.

"Snip, snip..." Paper scraps flew everywhere.

Then, just as their car speed was dragged down again and the rear began to fishtail, as if it were about to be brought to a halt, two palm-sized butterflies flew out of the window.

A four-fold paper cutting, double butterflies—a slightly more advanced operation Zhang Anzai hadn't learned too long ago.

Regardless, butterflies counted as living things. Although they didn't fly very fast, there were two of them, and their trajectories were different, so they should be able to delay the ghost slightly.

At this moment, Zhang Anzai decisively pulled out his lighter, ignited the two folded paper ingots, and tossed them out of the car: "Buddy, let us go. We're just passing through; why make things difficult for us?"

Zhang Anzai didn't know any sacrificial chants to beg for a ghost's forgiveness. In any case, the decisive factor in the story wasn't begging for forgiveness, but the soul-calling ritual that allowed Chen Xing's soul to return to his body.

Everything now was just to ensure they could successfully reach the boundary of Highway 44.

"Whoosh!" A while later, another stack of paper—which he had folded well and trimmed slightly with scissors to become a proper paper ingot—was tossed out the window while burning.

Zhang Anzai's nerves were taut; he didn't dare relax for a second. But things were going smoothly; they had already sped past the gas station.

He trimmed some paper money and incense, lit them, and tossed them out, alternating with living creatures he threw out, finally making it through this half of the journey.

The ghost was still chasing from behind, and the range of the black mist seemed to be growing, covering the wilderness and forests on both sides and extending upward. It now looked like a black sandstorm.

The outline of the ghost itself hadn't expanded, but clearly, the spectacle was becoming increasingly terrifying.

Zhang Anzai held his breath and focused; he didn't dare make a single mistake with his blade. He was dizzy from the car, which was being jerked left and right by the ghost's influence while speeding, but he had no time to adjust.

If he were even a second too slow, the ghost's hand would immediately grab their rear bumper.

But after being on edge all night, he wasn't about to give up now.

"I've gone this far, I have to get the hell out of here!" Zhang Anzai gritted his teeth and tossed out another handful of paper money.