Three Ghost Eyes on Yang Jian's forehead and the back of his hand erupted with blinding blood-red light at once.
He forced his three-layer ghost domain to its maximum output, barely holding off the relentless dismemberment attacks.
Red collided with black without a sound, yet the resulting paranormal fluctuations made souls tremble.
Yang Jian felt his ghost domain weakening layer by layer, being dismembered.
He knew that in a battle of attrition, the living could never outlast a true paranormal entity!
He had to defeat her on the level of consciousness!
"Kill her!" Yang Jian shouted as he held off the incoming attacks.
Woof! A low, savage bark suddenly rang out on the Fourth Floor.
The sound ignored physical barriers, piercing straight through the pitch-black ghost domain.
At the sound of the bark, Chao Tianxiang's hands, which had been controlling the ghost domain, abruptly froze. She stood rooted to the spot.
Within Chao Tianxiang's mind, which had been occupied by a paranormal entity but still retained human memories.
A gruesome scene was unfolding.
An enormous fierce dog, radiating savage violence, lunged at her with its fangs bared.
Deep within her consciousness, the massive phantom of a gorilla-like soul beast rose up!
The gorilla swung its thick arm and brought down a vicious punch, smashing the charging fierce dog to pieces!
But before the gorilla could roar in triumph.
Two pairs of scarlet eyes lit up in the darkness.
Two identical fierce dogs emerged from the shadows of her consciousness and savagely tore into it!
The gorilla roared furiously, its fists flying as it killed the two fierce dogs with another two punches.
But the ghost dream's attacks were endless!
The next second, four fierce dogs appeared!
Then eight, then sixteen!
A dense pack of fierce dogs surged like a black tide, instantly engulfing the gorilla's phantom and ravenously devouring the soul beast consciousness left within Chao Tianxiang's soul bone.
Back in reality.
An utterly hideous, distorted expression suddenly appeared on Chao Tianxiang's deathly pale face.
That struggle did not belong to the dead!
She felt the terror of her consciousness being torn apart.
At that moment, this paranormal entity with human thought did something even Yang Jian found unbelievable.
She abruptly turned and rapidly retreated into the dense darkness behind her!
Her ghost domain vanished along with her!
Watching the ghost domain rapidly recede, Yang Jian's gaze grew utterly grave.
"I have to wait until the fierce dogs fully invade her consciousness. Looks like it'll take some time!"
He had intended to immediately expand his ghost domain and press his advantage, but an agonizing pain suddenly erupted deep within his flesh, piercing his heart and gouging his bones!
"Damn it, I'm on the verge of a resurgence again."
Yang Jian clenched his teeth, trying to forcibly suppress the restless paranormal power with his deathly pale Ghost Hand.
The balance had been broken.
The ghost dream's departure had instantly shattered the three-way balance within him.
A single Ghost Hand could not fully suppress the three Ghost Eyes he had already overused!
Only after the ghost dream completely mauled his opponent's consciousness to death and returned to his body could he restore that balance.
Feeling the paranormal forces inside him threatening to spiral out of control at any moment, Yang Jian frowned and thought, Even after gaining control of three paranormal entities, is my life still as fragile as a sheet of paper?
He recalled a suggestion Lin Cheng had made to him a few days earlier.
The only way to completely escape the torment of ghost resurgence was to become something inhuman.
But that path was far too dangerous. The slightest mistake meant death beyond all hope of recovery.
Even more terrifyingly, as his body transformed, his human emotions would gradually disappear, stripped away thread by thread.
Yang Jian lowered his head and looked at his Ghost Hand, which held no warmth, indecision in his eyes.
Just then, a flurry of footsteps broke the deathly silence of the Fourth Floor.
"Yang Jian!" a voice called out, brimming with delighted surprise.
The moment Yu Tianheng saw Yang Jian, an intense desire to survive flared in his eyes.
He rushed up to Yang Jian and declared his intentions without hesitation.
"Yang Jian, I want to join the Paranormal Forum. I'll show you how useful I can be!"
Yang Jian raised his head slightly, the scarlet Ghost Eye on his forehead staring coldly at Yu Tianheng.
He was a little baffled.
Was everyone he met today out of their minds?
First that woman with the fox ears wanted to join, and now this guy crackling with electricity wanted in too.
Did they really think the Paranormal Forum was some civilian charity anyone could sign up for?
"Join the forum?" Yang Jian's voice was hoarse, carrying an icy aloofness that kept others at a distance.
He neither refused outright nor agreed.
"We'll talk about it if you survive this paranormal incident."
Yang Jian closed his eyes and ignored him, concentrating on fighting the resurgence within his body.
Meanwhile.
The women's clothing section on the Third Floor of the Rich Benevolence Mall.
Ning Rongrong had reached the Third Floor while chasing Yang Jian, but she still saw no sign of him.
Suddenly, she felt a strange pulsing from the Storage Soul Tool at her waist.
It was as though something alive were frantically leaping around inside.
The Sheepskin Paper!
Ning Rongrong's expression changed. She had just reached into her Soul Tool to take out the Sheepskin Paper when she heard footsteps behind her.
In the dim light, Hu Liena had caught up with her too.
"There's no point hiding it, Ning Rongrong."
Hu Liena parted her red lips, her voice unusually clear in the deathly silence.
"The Sky Screen already broadcast footage of you picking up the Sheepskin Paper at Seventh Middle School in Dachang City to the entire continent."
Ning Rongrong's pupils abruptly contracted, and her heart skipped a beat.
She stared fixedly at Hu Liena, instantly piecing together everything that had happened earlier in the First-Floor Lobby.
"So..." Ning Rongrong gritted her teeth, her voice trembling slightly with anger.
"When you used Bewitchment on the first floor to trick me into going outside, it wasn't about safety at all. You wanted to steal my Sheepskin Paper?!"
Faced with Ning Rongrong's accusation, Hu Liena's expression did not change.
She lightly brushed aside a stray lock of hair by her ear and flatly denied it.
"Young lady, you're overthinking it. I simply thought it would be safer outside."
There was no way she could admit her true intentions. In a place where death lurked everywhere, an open falling-out would benefit neither of them.
Hu Liena lowered her gaze, staring intently at the Soul Tool at Ning Rongrong's waist.
"Hurry up and take it out. If the Sheepskin Paper is giving a warning now, some deadly danger must be approaching!"
Though Ning Rongrong hated Hu Liena bitterly, she knew this was no time for infighting.
She gritted her teeth and pulled the roll of yellowed Sheepskin Paper from her Soul Tool.
The two leaned in together, examining it by the light of the Seven Treasure Glazed Tile Pagoda.
Dark red blood rapidly writhed across the previously blank surface, forming line after line of glaring red words.
[My name is Ning Rongrong. By the time you read this letter, I am already dead...]
At the familiar opening, Ning Rongrong's breath caught, and her face instantly turned deathly pale.
The bloody words continued to appear at an incredible speed, conveying a desperate urgency.
[Today, I will die in the Rich Benevolence Mall.]
When Hu Liena read that sentence, a flicker of terror crossed her beautiful eyes, despite her efforts to remain calm.
Die in the Rich Benevolence Mall? She was right here!
The bloodstains on the Sheepskin Paper suddenly deepened, as though someone were carving the words with a bleeding finger.
[After confronting Yang Jian, the Headless Paranormal Shadow's consciousness was savagely mauled by the ghost dream.] [She was gravely wounded. She needs a new puzzle piece containing mental power to escape the ghost dream's attacks!] [And she has set her sights on Hu Liena.] [She will appear silently behind Hu Liena, remove her head, and obtain a new consciousness.] [Then she will complete her puzzle and kill Yang Jian, who is on the verge of ghost resurgence.] [There will be no survivors in the Rich Benevolence Mall.]
Before you continue