Red Paper Over the Eyes

Inside a public restroom.

Water gushed from the tap as Yang Jian washed the foul-smelling blood from his face.

Feeling the cool tap water, he calmed down considerably.

"So I really was the one with the problem. That ghost could alter a person's memories, forcibly inserting someone who never existed into my mind and making me feel nothing was wrong. Even with this eye, I couldn't spot any clues."

"If Liu Xiaoyu hadn't reminded me, I'd probably still be living at home with that ghost."

He raised his head and looked at the mirror before him.

The eye on Yang Jian's face had vanished, and for the moment, he looked normal again.

"Hello, Yang Jian, please respond if you can hear me. Please respond if you can hear me. This is Liu Xiaoyu." Suddenly, the satellite-positioning phone beside the sink rang.

The call had not disconnected from earlier until now.

"It's me." Yang Jian picked up the phone.

"What happened over there?" Liu Xiaoyu asked.

"You guessed right. My father really did die in a car accident when I was in elementary school. That thing in the house wasn't human. It was a ghost."

"You escaped?"

"Yes." Yang Jian wiped the water from his face. Then he suddenly noticed a piece of red paper stuck to the back of his hand.

It was a fragment of that newspaper from earlier.

"That's good. Can you tell me roughly what that ghost was like?" Liu Xiaoyu asked.

"That ghost can tamper with people's memories. I don't know its movement pattern or how it kills, but earlier, a bloodstained newspaper wrapped around my face and nearly suffocated me to death. That's all I know for now."

"Alright." Liu Xiaoyu quickly recorded the information on her end.

"If my dad was a ghost, then what about my mom? Where is she? And roughly when did this ghost appear? You should be able to pull surveillance footage from around here. Can you check for me?" Yang Jian asked.

"I can look into it for you," Liu Xiaoyu said. "But from now on, you'll need to cooperate with our work."

"What kind of work?" Yang Jian asked.

"For now, it's just simple information-gathering. If you discover the existence of any vengeful ghost, you must report it immediately," Liu Xiaoyu said.

"What do I get out of it?" Yang Jian asked.

"You want me to work for you without even paying me? I looked at that website. If there's no tangible benefit, I refuse to work for you." Yang Jian spoke very seriously.

"We don't need to discuss that topic yet. I have something else to deal with here. We'll talk next time." Yang Jian did not continue the conversation and hung up.

"Beep." Hearing the call disconnect, Liu Xiaoyu was furious.

Yang Jian had not made an excuse to hang up. At this moment, he needed to deal with the red paper stuck to the back of his hand.

He tore off the palm-sized piece of red paper, intending to throw it away.

This thing had been held in the ghost's hand all along. It gave off an eerie, sinister feeling. Keeping it on him was probably not a good idea.

However, just as he tore off the red paper.

The skin where it had been stuck suddenly split open in intense pain.

A red eye emerged once more.

At the same time, an unusual squirming sensation spread throughout his body.

The eyes within his body began to stir restlessly. It seemed that using their power earlier had awakened them from their slumber.

"Could it be..."

Yang Jian looked at the red paper in his hand. Rather than throwing it away, he stuck it back onto the back of his hand, directly covering that eye.

The red eye immediately closed, and the strange squirming sensation in his flesh and blood vanished.

It seemed that everything had returned to calm.

"Just as I thought, this red paper can suppress this eye's power, though not completely. But it can slow the eye's revival." Yang Jian was immediately delighted by this discovery.

Then he recalled those words: only ghosts could deal with ghosts.

If the eyes inside his body counted as ghosts, then the red newspaper was also a ghost.

The powers of the two ghosts collided, restraining each other.

Perhaps that was the key to survival.

No, that wasn't right.

Yang Jian frowned again. "If that guess is correct, why didn't the eyes get suppressed when that Ghost Infant bit me in the school building? Why did the stimulation make them revive even faster?"

The red newspaper. The Ghost Infant.

What was the difference between them?

After thinking it over.

Yang Jian decided he could leave that question for later. Since the red newspaper could suppress the six eyes in his body, he had to take the risk of retrieving it.

Because it was his chance to survive.

"I have to go home again."

Yang Jian's gaze was grave. He took a deep breath and strode out of the public restroom, preparing to return home and take a risk.

But just as he stepped out of the restroom, four or five young men approached him. They looked like idle street punks.

"Brother, using the restroom? Don't leave yet. Meeting is fate. How about we discuss something?" One young man's eyes lit up when he saw Yang Jian. He immediately walked over and draped an arm over his shoulder.

"What is it?" Yang Jian glanced at him.

"Nothing much. Just getting acquainted. My name's A Fei. What's your name, brother?" asked the young man who called himself A Fei.

"Yang Jian."

A Fei grinned. "Then we're friends. Since we're friends, shouldn't you help a friend in trouble? I'm a little short on cash today. Yang Jian, could you lend me some money? Don't worry, I'll pay you back tomorrow when you come here. Not a cent less."

Tilting his head, Yang Jian looked at him. "Borrow money? Looks more like you're trying to rob and extort me. But if you're going to rob and extort someone, couldn't you pick a normal target? I haven't been very normal lately. You'd better stay away from me. I'm afraid I might lose control and accidentally commit a crime."

"You've got quite the mouth on you, kid. A Fei asking to borrow money is giving you face. Don't be ungrateful. If you want to die, just say so. I'll make it happen."

A young man beside them pressed a small knife against Yang Jian's face.

"Friend, don't do this. It won't end well if something happens. Let me go, and we'll pretend none of this ever happened today. How about it?" Yang Jian said.

"Not happening. You're not leaving until you hand over the money." The young man with the knife chuckled.

"Brother, just consider it a loan from me. I'll pay you back next time we meet. We're friends, so don't make things so absolute." A Fei sneered teasingly from the side.

"Since you put it that way, I have no choice. The money's in my pants pocket. Take it yourself," Yang Jian said.

"Good. At least you know what's good for you."

The young man holding the knife grew excited. He reached into Yang Jian's pocket, ready to take the money.

But the instant his hand went in, he suddenly felt something cold inside the pocket, like a glass marble.

He pulled it out instinctively.

Then the knife-wielding young man saw that his hand was covered in blood. In his palm, he held a red eye. The red eye slowly turned, staring at him with an eerie gaze.

"Ah!"

The young man with the knife screamed in terror, his face turning pale as he staggered backward.

However, as he retreated.

Everything around them had somehow turned scarlet.

The apartment buildings, streetlamps, moon in the sky, even the ground—everything seemed shrouded in a layer of red light.

"Since we're friends, you won't mind helping me test the Ghost Domain, right?" Yang Jian slowly walked out of the restroom.

A Fei's eyes widened instantly.

Yang Jian had walked out of the restroom, so who was the person whose shoulder he had his arm around?

At that moment, he did not even dare turn around. He could only feel that the person beneath his arm was ice-cold, like a corpse.

"A ghost! A ghost!"

A Fei's face turned deathly pale. He spun around and ran for his life, fleeing the public restroom. The other punks also turned and ran in terror.

Yang Jian looked at the back of his hand.

The outline of an eye appeared beneath the red paper, but it was quickly pressed down by the paper. Then the eye emerged again, as though the two were fighting each other.

"With six eyes growing out, I can use the Ghost Domain. But now that one is covered by the red paper, I can still use the Ghost Domain with five eyes, and the ghost's revival has been stopped."

He felt pain from five places on his body splitting open.

Five fields of vision flowed into his mind.

Everything around him came clearly under his control.

"Six eyes are the limit my body can withstand, but with five, the situation is clearly much better. There are still side effects, but they aren't nearly as obvious." Yang Jian's gaze shifted slightly as he roughly figured out his limit.

"If I get that red newspaper and use it to cover all six eyes, would that mean I can use a vengeful ghost's power without any side effects? Would I no longer need to worry about the consequences of a ghost's revival?"

"But before that, I need to master this Ghost Domain."

Yang Jian looked at the fleeing punks. They could not have been better test subjects.

Mastering the Ghost Domain was the foundation he needed for dealing with vengeful ghosts next time, so using a vengeful ghost's power once was necessary, not a waste.