Chapter 758: Chapter 573: Arrived_2
Someone’s in the bathroom!!
This sudden realization immediately tensed him up. He slowly stood, first gesturing to Nalan Shuo to stay still, then, holding the Ghost Lantern in his left hand and gripping the Human Bone Staff tightly in his right, he began to approach the bathroom step by step without even putting on his shoes.
At that moment, the bathroom door wasn’t completely closed, leaving a very small crack. Light seeped through the gap, but Yang Xiao remembered clearly that, before he fell asleep, the bathroom light had been off and there had been no gap in the door.
As Yang Xiao drew closer, he noticed that the light spilling from the crack in the bathroom door was flickering. He immediately realized that something was moving inside the bathroom, blocking the light repeatedly. A terrifying image sprang to his mind: a ghost standing in the bathroom, and that ghost... was looking in the mirror.
With a hardened heart, Yang Xiao suddenly charged at the door with the Ghost Lantern, and the next second, he swung the Human Bone Staff ready to strike, but as his vision cleared and he saw the scene inside, his mind went "buzz." It was Nalan Shuo, pulling up his pants.
Faced with Yang Xiao bursting in, Nalan Shuo was also startled, his voice changing, "You... Little Yang, what are you doing?!"
The Ghost Lantern shone on Nalan Shuo, causing no change; the miserable green glow made it hard for Nalan Shuo to keep his eyes open.
Chills ran down his spine. If Nalan Shuo was in the bathroom, then... what was lying on the bed outside?
Without the time to address Nalan Shuo’s confusion, Yang Xiao turned around abruptly, only to find that the previously occupied bed was now empty.
"Gone..."
Yang Xiao’s eyes widened in shock. The series of unexpected events had left him extremely tense. If this continued, he’d be driven to the brink of collapse before even dealing with the Ghost Script.
After listening to Yang Xiao’s explanation, Nalan Shuo too took a sharp intake of cold breath. Yang Xiao picked up the Ghost Lantern and walked alone towards the bed, lifting the blanket in one quick move. The next second, both Yang Xiao and Nalan Shuo’s complexions changed, as the once clean bed was now wet, and when they leaned in close, a putrid smell greeted them.
Nalan Shuo could no longer sit still. He immediately began packing, ready to take Yang Xiao and leave, "We can’t stay here, we need to find another place!"
After what had happened, Yang Xiao naturally understood the seriousness of the situation. He grabbed his backpack and left the room with Nalan Shuo. Even though it was late at night, where to go was now irrelevant; the important thing was that they could no longer stay here.
Yang Xiao led the way, with Nalan Shuo closely behind him. The corridor, once tranquil, now seemed endlessly deep. After walking several dozens of meters, the end still wasn’t in sight; they were experiencing Ghost Hitting the Wall.
At that moment, an icy chill surged in Yang Xiao’s heart. Looking ahead at the limitless corridor, he felt an eerie familiarity. After a moment, he realized it was the same sensation he had while walking on the muddy mountain road in his Ghost Dream.
At that time, the ghost disguised as Director Nalan had been following him, getting closer and closer, and now... Director Nalan was again walking right behind him!
"Little Yang, why have you stopped?" In the next second, Nalan Shuo’s voice rang out from behind him, and perhaps due to psychological effects, Yang Xiao felt as though a cold blade skimmed his skin.
It was a premonitory dream... The Director must have something wrong with him!
Yang Xiao didn’t dare turn around hastily. He steadied his mind and tried to respond with a calm tone, "Director, something’s not right here, maybe we should go back and deal with it for the night?"
"No, we must leave this place immediately," Nalan Shuo’s voice was decisive.
"Wait for me, I need to check if I’ve got everything," Yang Xiao smoothly set his backpack down, then pretending to check its contents, he bent down. Yet, as he peered through his legs to look behind him, the sight confirmed his fears and struck him harshly. A ghostly figure stood behind him, imitating his stance, also peering through its legs at him, its grotesquely sunken face directly aligned with Yang Xiao’s.
Yang Xiao’s tense heartstrings finally snapped, yielding no response; facing face-to-face with the ghostly figure, he was tackled to the ground, and the next second, endless darkness surged in, causing him to lose consciousness instantly.
Cold...
Very cold...
The ground below him was both cold and hard, and something kept slapping his back, an extremely uncomfortable sensation.
After an unknown amount of time, following a convulsion, he finally woke up. It took him a full 10 seconds to fully grasp his current predicament: he was lying prone on a riverbank, with large, smoothed stones beneath him, and the continuous slap of waves against his back; behind him was a pitch-black river.
This familiar sensation snapped him awake; he was in the Nightmare World, but he couldn’t be sure until he saw Nalan Shuo.
The riverbank was shrouded in dense fog, exuding an eerie aura everywhere. As Yang Xiao stood up, he quickly realized that more terrifying than the ghosts around him was the rapid loss of body heat. Soaked to the bone, a gust of frigid wind nearly froze him solid.
His clothes had been replaced with a brown coarse cloth garment. He stripped off the wet clothes, wrung them out as fast as possible, put them back on, and in the area close to his body, he found a very soft white silk cloth.
The silk cloth originally had writing on it, but the ink had blurred beyond recognition after being soaked in water. However, on the back of the silk, Yang Xiao found a sewn "Shou" character.
This immediately made him think of Fushou Manor; the character for "Shou" on the cloth was vivid red, which was unsettlingly peculiar amidst these surroundings.
After stowing the silk cloth, there were no places nearby to shelter from the wind. Knowing he couldn’t stay by the river, he plunged straight into the thick fog. After all, he didn’t believe he would freeze to death before encountering any ghosts. That would be too miserable. Things turned out a bit smoother than he anticipated, and after struggling for a few minutes, he spotted a light in the distance. As he approached, he discovered the light was emanating from a wooden building resembling a temple, small in scale, only a few dozen square meters, and now in a state of disrepair. The light flickered through the cracks of the old wooden doors, strong one moment and faint the next.
The temple in the mist looked ominous, facing the great river with bare surroundings, not even a tree in sight.
Given a choice, Yang Xiao would rather seek warmth at a wild grave than approach this desolate temple, but it was too late to consider whether there were ghosts inside or not. A few more minutes in the cold, and he would freeze stiff.
Dying at the hands of a ghost or being frozen to death; the former seemed slightly less ignominious. And even if he did run into a ghost, it wasn’t a certain death.
As he approached within a dozen meters of the dilapidated temple, Yang Xiao suddenly halted. Through the faint light, he saw a trail of muddy footprints on the ground, all heading toward the large temple doors.
He hastened his pace, reached the worn wooden door, and pushed it open. Inside the small, decrepit temple, a fire was burning, and at that moment, a few people dressed similarly to Yang Xiao were huddled together around the fire for warmth.
There were five people in total, men and women, and most importantly, Yang Xiao’s gaze instantly met Nalan Shuo’s, who was sitting by the bonfire and looking up at him.
Suppressing the joy in his heart, Yang Xiao’s gaze briefly collided with Nalan Shuo’s before quickly darting away. A burly voice then broke the silence, carrying a warm enthusiasm, "Young brother, come, hurry and warm yourself by the fire!"
The speaker was a bald man with several fierce scars like centipedes sitting atop his head; the scars had already healed. The man didn’t stand, just shifted his body, vacating a spot beside him, and looked at Yang Xiao with a smile, patting the empty space next to him warmly, "Don’t be shy, meeting here is fate."
Giving thanks, Yang Xiao went over and sat down, and only then did he begin to observe the others around him, watching their faces lit to a dark red by the flames, and Yang Xiao sensed a terrifying calmness.
They were all veteran players.
No doubt about it.
