Chapter 7: Chapter 7: Shattered-Face Ghost
After making sure the dust had settled, Gao Tian finally had a moment to tend to his injured hand.
The bleeding from his finger wasn’t severe. He returned to the bathroom, turned on the faucet to clean the area around the wound, and dried it with a towel. Then, he found a piece of cardboard to use as a splint, placing it on either side of his finger. After straightening the digit, he wrapped it securely with tape.
Gao Tian completed the entire process by himself, using only one hand. Once the pain surpassed a certain threshold, he couldn’t feel it anymore.
After taking care of that, he returned to the study to examine the "inheritance" left behind by the red-eyed man.
The blazing fire released from the urn had burned away "Gao Tian." Now, amidst the ashes, a small piece of a photograph drifted down.
This photo wasn’t part of the ghost, so it wasn’t burned to cinders and sealed away by the urn. He just didn’t understand why the ghost had a photograph hidden inside its body.
Gao Tian walked over and picked up the scorched corner of the photograph from the pile of ashes.
The full picture might have been a family portrait. In the surviving corner was a little girl with chubby cheeks, around seven or eight years old, pouting at the camera. A larger hand rested on her shoulder, likely belonging to an adult man—a father or an older brother—steadying the young girl.
Unfortunately, the ghostly fire had burned away most of the photo. With only this small piece left, it was impossible to see the faces of any other family members besides the little girl.
’Why would this ghost have something like a family photo hidden inside it?’
’Was this thing that important to it?’
Gao Tian guessed that ghosts were, naturally, what people became after death. Since they had once lived, they must have been like ordinary people, with families, friends, and even many happy memories.
After becoming a ghost, an uncontrollable, violent urge to kill was all that remained in their minds. However, some strong emotions and important people from their past lives might have been so deeply embedded in their consciousness that they would cherish them even as a ghost.
This family photo represented the ghost’s former family. Despite its current state of being neither human nor ghost, it might have come from a happy family when it was alive. That would explain why it remained obsessed even after becoming a monster.
Of course, all of this was just Gao Tian’s speculation; he had no proof. He didn’t know much about ghosts, so he could only try to reason things out as best he could with the information he had.
Gao Tian flipped the photo over to look at the back.
It was just a routine check, but he unexpectedly saw that someone had hastily scrawled a few words with a permanent marker on the soot-stained back.
"... Persons’ Apartments.
"15.9.12."
’What is this?’
Gao Tian checked it several times to make sure he wasn’t mistaken.
’The date and location where the photo was taken?’
There were many apartments with names containing words like "benevolence," but names using the word "person" were extremely rare. It was an awkward word for a building name.
’Rich Persons’ Apartments? Good Persons’ Apartments? Kind Persons’ Apartments?’
Gao Tian’s hands suddenly froze.
’...Persons’ Apartments. Living Persons’ Apartments!’
He remembered! In the Jialan Society chat group, the group owner’s ID was also Living Persons’ Apartments!
In the Jialan Society, every user’s name—"Ghost Infant," "Ghost Cave," "Burning Fire Ghost"—was an ominous one. But "Living Persons’ Apartments," the name represented by the group owner, was a real place. This ghost had been there before it died and had taken a precious photograph with its family.
The time was about ten years ago.
Afterward, the owner of the photo had died and become this red-eyed man. Who was he? The little girl’s brother, her father, or even the little girl herself?
Why did this person become a ghost after death, and why was it used by Ghost Cave as a way to find the living person in the chat group?
Gao Tian recalled something. Among the most active members in the chat group, the ones with the highest status were clearly Living Persons’ Apartments and Ghost Cave. One was the group owner, and the other had an uncanny intuition, irrationally sensing that a living person had infiltrated the group.
Ghost Infant was probably a girl. As for the Burning Fire Ghost, its status and popularity were the worst. No matter what it said or what "black packets" it sent, Ghost Cave and the others treated it as if it were invisible, ignoring it completely.
This was also why Ghost Cave and the others hadn’t bothered to look at the urn sent by the Burning Fire Ghost, having no idea what it did. It had become the key to Gao Tian turning the tables.
And now, Ghost Cave was extremely confident in the curse it had unleashed. It was certainly convinced that the living person in the chat group was already dead.
Lost in thought, Gao Tian unconsciously flipped the photo over, returning to the front with the little girl’s face.
Just then, he was shocked to see the little girl in the photo seemingly come to life. The corners of her mouth curled up slightly, giving him a faint, ambiguous smile.
Gao Tian couldn’t believe his eyes. The little girl’s expression in the photo had changed.
It happened in the blink of an eye. The little girl was now as still as an inanimate object again, as if she hadn’t moved at all.
If Gao Tian hadn’t experienced so many surreal things, he would have assumed he’d just seen it wrong due to a trick of the light.
He was certain of his eyes and his memory. ’I’m not wrong. The little girl in the photo moved when I flipped it.’
’This photo must be a supernatural object, too. The little girl in it is also a ghost.’
Without a moment’s delay, Gao Tian quickly folded the photo in half, found a lighter, and burned it to ashes.
Until it was mixed with the black dust left over from the red-eyed man, the eerie photograph remained quiet and didn’t cause any trouble. Fortunately, this allowed Gao Tian to breathe a small sigh of relief.
Then, he turned and picked up the urn that held the remains of the red-eyed man.
The urn’s purpose wasn’t just to force ghosts and humans to play a game and then seal the loser. More importantly, if a human defeated a ghost and sealed it inside, they could acquire the ghost’s "murder rule."
As Gao Tian pressed his fingers against the urn’s surface, bits of information, not in written form, flowed into his mind little by little.
The murder rule of this Shattered-Face Ghost was simple. It needed to make eye contact with its target five times. With each instance of eye contact, it would acquire one of the person’s facial features. After the fifth time, it would take their entire face.
This not only meant that the human whose face was copied would die a sudden, violent death no matter where they were, but it also meant the Shattered-Face Ghost would gain all their memories, taking over the victim’s identity and moving within their social circles.
Of course, the "eye contact" had to be voluntary on the victim’s part. And a single instance of "eye contact," no matter how long it lasted, only counted as one time. To initiate the next instance, the Shattered-Face Ghost had to resort to supernatural theatrics—like knocking on a window or sitting on a swing—to attract Gao Tian’s attention and make him turn his head willingly.
Otherwise, the ghost could have just smashed the window, broken in, and forced Gao Tian’s head into a deep, loving gaze. It wouldn’t have needed to go through all the trouble of watching him get in a car and chasing him all the way to the park.
Back then, Gao Tian had been forced to open the black packet in the chat group. He saw a direct image of the Shattered-Face Ghost’s face, and the ghost, in turn, felt the gaze of a human upon it, which is why it began its pursuit of Gao Tian.
However, that was only one-sided gazing from Gao Tian, so the Shattered-Face Ghost didn’t copy any of his facial features that time.
In the alley, the first instance of eye contact.
At the glass window, the second instance.
At the police station, the third instance.
On the swing in the park, the fourth instance.
There was supposed to be one more instance of eye contact, which would have triggered the rule and caused Gao Tian’s immediate, violent death. But he had opened the second black packet just in time and obtained the urn. This directly nullified the Shattered-Face Ghost’s murder rule, forcing it to wait until they were at the apartment to settle things with Gao Tian through a game.
Additionally, the Shattered-Face Ghost’s murder rule wasn’t just effective against humans; it worked on other ghosts as well.
However, since every ghost is an immortal and indestructible entity, collecting a ghost’s facial features wouldn’t cause it to die on the spot.
But if the Shattered-Face Ghost made eye contact with another ghost five times, it could copy one of their murder rules for its own use.
These were the full abilities of the Shattered-Face Ghost. And now, thanks to the urn, they had become Gao Tian’s abilities.
Gao Tian now possessed the power of a ghost.
Make eye contact with a person five times, and they die violently. Gao Tian gets their memories and face.
Make eye contact with a ghost five times, and steal one of its murder rules.
Watching the gray sky outside gradually brighten, Gao Tian knew dawn was breaking. He also knew he couldn’t stay in this apartment building filled with dead people. He packed a few things, put the urn in his backpack, and hurriedly left his apartment in Ping Shui Apartments.
「* * *」
The chat group on his phone, named Jialan Society, remained silent. Ever since Ghost Cave released the cursed black packet, no one had said a word.
’Honestly, the logic of these ghost users is bizarre. Since the Burning Fire Ghost is a ghost itself, why would it develop an urn specifically designed to deal with ghosts? What benefit could it possibly get from that?’
In fact, Gao Tian checked the history of black packets sent by other users. The cryptic and obscure terms they had used back then were now gradually becoming clear.
Things like whether the "Spirit-Sucking Pot" could withstand the curse of the Human-Skin Doll, or if Ghost Cave would have avoided a total wipeout during the Rainy Woman incident if it had obtained the "Blood Shroud"...
Now, it was all perfectly clear. The things the users were talking about were all supernatural items used to fight ghosts. They were comparing which items could counter specific powerful ghosts.
The user named Ghost Cave had been particularly active. Based on its conversations with others, Gao Tian could deduce that its entire family, including itself, had all died in an incident involving the Rainy Woman.
As for the contradictory behavior of these ghost users, Gao Tian had a flash of inspiration, and an explanation suddenly formed in his mind.
’Could it be possible that—’
’When the users in this group were alive, they were professionals who wielded supernatural items and specialized in fighting ghosts.’
’But that line of work is inherently high-risk. It’s not surprising that so many of them died. After death, they became ghosts themselves and began to kill indiscriminately, unable to restrain their own abyssal desires.’
’But even after becoming ghosts, the instincts and values shaped by their former profession couldn’t be changed. These ghosts who fight ghosts were still following their instincts, seriously discussing how to deal with other ghosts.’
To test his theory, Gao Tian typed the words "Jialan Society" into a search engine, trying to find any clues or traces on different forums—perhaps even leads left behind when they were still alive.
At first, Gao Tian didn’t have high hopes.
