CH 147

Villainous Malevolent Ghost

As Song Xu Yi woke up, she saw the familiar layout of a modern dorm room. She had a pounding headache, and her forehead felt a little warm.

Judging from the celebrity posters on the wall and the room’s layout, Song Xu Yi guessed that this must be a college dormitory. After all, most high school dormitories have strict requirements for hygiene and room layout and do not allow students to post posters in their rooms.

There was movement from the lower bunk, and a beautiful girl was changing her clothes. She tried on several outfits but was not satisfied. When she looked up and met Song Xu Yi’s gaze, her eyes lit up, and she quickly asked, “Which outfit do you think makes me look uglier, Xu Yi?”

Despite her pounding headache, Song Xu Yi sat up and looked at the girl in confusion. Girls usually dressed up to look more beautiful, and it was the first time Song Xu Yi had heard someone wanting to dress less attractively.

However, since she was unfamiliar with this world, Song Xu Yi didn’t express her doubts and instead nodded, carefully selecting a drab-looking suit for the girl that made her look much older and washed out the youth and beauty from her face.

The girl examined herself in the mirror for a long time and seemed extremely satisfied with Song Xu Yi’s choice. She quickly changed into the clothes and brought a glass of water and a few pills to Song Xu Yi. She touched Song Xu Yi’s forehead and said, “Don’t forget to take your medicine, Xu Yi. We don’t have class in the morning, so rest well after taking your medicine. I’ll bring you lunch when I come back.”

Song Xu Yi nodded and took the pills before lying back down on the bed. The girl then took her keys and left the room. Song Xu Yi’s other two roommates were nowhere to be found, leaving her alone in the room. The space suddenly became very quiet after the girl left.

The system still hadn’t appeared, and Song Xu Yi was already used to the fact that the system would go offline for a while. Seeing this, she doesn’t feel disappointed. Feeling drowsy, she soon closed her eyes and fell asleep.

When she woke up again, the dizziness had eased a lot, and Song Xu Yi breathes a sigh of relief. The system also arrived in this small world as soon as Song Xu Yi woke up, and the familiar voice of the system once again sounded in her mind: “Xu Yi, you’re awake!”

The system’s voice sounded strange, as if its teeth were chattering: “We’ve encountered an unknown attack again!”

“What’s more, it’s so annoying! What the hell is going on? I can never contact the Lord God, and this time the unknown attack seems to have become even more hysterical, clinging to me and not letting go. It took me a lot of effort to escape!”

Song Xu Yi raised an eyebrow. Memories of these worlds were always vague to her, and she always felt like something was missing. Just like in the previous world, Song Xu Yi remembered that she had lived to old age, but she couldn’t remember why she had stopped living in that world.

But Song Xu Yi always remembered that the system had gradually come to accept the fact that it couldn’t contact the Lord God, so why did its tone suddenly become… almost fearful?

Song Xu Yi didn’t say anything, and as expected, the system couldn’t help but continue: “Xu Yi, this world is very scary, you need to be prepared!”

Immediately, the system transmitted a plot summary to Song Xu Yi.

Song Xu Yi quickly read through the plot summary, holding her forehead with a headache. Finally, she understood why the system was so afraid of this world –

For some reason, after experiencing a cultivation world, the system had become very fearful of worlds that contained supernatural elements.

However, there may be something in this world that terrifies the system.

The female lead in this world is Xia Tian, the girl who had just given medicine to Song Xu Yi. She comes from a wealthy family, and she and the male lead, Bai Jin, have been childhood friends. Originally, their families were well-matched, with Xia’s family having become newly rich and prosperous in recent years. However, Bai Jin’s family is an ancient and wealthy family that has been prosperous for millions of years. It is said that Bai’s family even had several generations of imperial relatives. According to common perception, Xia Tian had climbed the social ladder by being with Bai Jin, and even Xia’s parents favored her marrying Bai Jin. However, overnight, Bai Jin’s family suddenly began to experience a string of misfortunes.

First, Bai Jin’s father was exposed for having an affair with his female secretary and having a secret child around the same age as Bai Jin. Then, Bai Jin’s devastated mother died in a car accident. The family’s patriarch, Bai Jin’s grandfather, was exposed for participating in a murder case and was sent to prison. Soon after, the once-prominent Bai family fell overnight, and their businesses began to go bankrupt one after another. Bai Jin went from being a privileged young boy to a homeless, wandering teenager.

Xia’s family supported the destitute Bai Jin by providing him with a place to stay and tuition, but they never mentioned the marriage proposal between the two families again.

However, after years of being together, Xia Tian had developed deep feelings for Bai Jin. Even though Bai Jin was now destitute and her parents did not approve of their relationship, Xia Tian still persevered in seeking Bai Jin out.

After going through a major upheaval and experiencing the vicissitudes of life, Bai Jin’s personality gradually became gloomy and negative. He knew that he was not worthy of Xia Tian and therefore changed his warm and caring attitude towards her. He became cold, indifferent, and sharp, trying to use this method to make Xia Tian give up on him. However, Xia Tian persisted in her love for him, helping Bai Jin with his work, tutoring him, and even getting beaten by her own parents for resisting their order to go abroad for further studies, all for the sake of being with Bai Jin.

Thanks to Xia Tian’s continuous efforts, Bai Jin finally overcame his slump and started striving for success for her. He worked hard to establish a company despite setbacks and finally won over Xia’s parents, gaining their approval for their marriage.

At this point, the two should have followed the perfect ending set by the Lord God, but since Song Xu Yi appeared, there was naturally another obstacle.

The problem was with Bai Jin’s ancestral home.

The Bai family had a thousand-year-old ancestral home, which was the birthplace of the family and where all the previous generations of the Bai family had lived. Even when Bai Jin’s grandfather was in prison, he still refused to let Bai Jin sell the house to pay off the debts.

However, Bai Jin’s company is now thriving, and he wants to expand his territory. As every inch of land in the city is precious, and in order to save funds, Bai Jin decided to demolish his ancestral home and start construction on the land.

However, on the very first day of construction, an ominous event occurred: a basement was unearthed beneath Bai Jin’s ancestral home, revealing two corpses.

One of them was a woman’s coffin.

According to the construction workers, there was a stunningly beautiful woman inside the coffin, with vivid eyebrows and eyes that seemed to come to life as they opened the lid. However, by the time Bai Jin arrived, the woman’s body had decomposed, leaving only a skeleton behind. The other corpse was that of a male mummy, clearly a tomb robber, with a hole in the wall revealing where he had broken in.

Bai Jin feared that one of his ancestors might have been buried in the coffin, and he found a feng shui to bless the place and to re-bury the coffin before continuing construction. However, little did he know that this discovery would lead to a series of disasters on the construction site.

At first, several workers inexplicably broke their legs, followed by a few who suddenly went blind. Then, a bloody message appeared on the wall in ancient characters: “Get out!”

Although the country had a developed modern civilization, it still had a strong belief in ghosts and gods. When the workers saw these occurrences, they dared not continue working. Rumors spread throughout the city that the Bai family ancestral home was haunted. However, Bai Jin did not believe in ghosts. He believed that his competitors were behind this and, with the help of Xia Tian, a physics student who didn’t believe in supernatural things, they decided to go back to the ancestral home to see if they could find any clues.

At first, they did not notice anything unusual when they arrived at the ancestral home. It wasn’t until they went deep into the house that a huge boulder fell from above and crushed them both, killing them on the spot.

With the deaths of both the male and female leads, the world line collapsed, and so, Song Xu Yi came to this world.

After reading the plot summary, Song Xu Yi couldn’t help but want to laugh. But she restrained herself from laughing out loud, mindful of the dignity of the system, and accepted the memories of this body.

As usual, the system seemed to be following the principle of assigning high-status identities for easy tasks, and it gave Song Xu Yi the role of a wealthy family’s only daughter, who was also the best friend of the female lead Xia Tian.

The original host was also studying physics and was a typical research maniac who aimed to become a world-renowned scientist. In the plot summary, the original host was supposed to investigate the ancestral home but escaped unscathed because the mission from the research institute was temporarily postponed.

At this time, the original host was still a senior in college, while the female lead Xia Tian was still working with Bai Jin. Due to Xia Tian’s stunning appearance in the past, others coveted her beauty, causing trouble for Bai Jin. Afterwards, whenever Xia Tian went to work with Bai Jin, she would wear unsuitable clothes to try to hide her looks.

“System, don’t be afraid,” Song Xu Yi thought for a moment and comforted the system, “Perhaps everything is just a coincidence. There are no ghosts in this world, and this task is not difficult. Let’s try to stay in this world for a few more years and make sure that Bai Jin doesn’t dig the foundation of the ancestral home, so that we won’t end up like the plot summary.”

However, the system still seemed to be deeply troubled and sighed heavily, “You don’t understand!”

Song Xu Yi didn’t understand, but the system’s heart skipped a beat when it saw the stunning woman in the coffin in the plot summary. The system couldn’t help but feel scared, thinking of the incident in another world where it was sealed by the main villain.

However, the system soon felt relieved. If the villain in this world was a female ghost, she might not be able to leave the house and lose her ability to covet Song Xu Yi. Moreover, even if the female ghost’s body was beautiful before her death, after so many years, she would not look good. Song Xu Yi, who was a lover of beauty, would definitely not like the female ghost anymore!

Song Xu Yi didn’t understand the system’s thoughts. After seeing the system’s mood change once again, she felt that the system’s temperament was like that of a child – fickle. After getting up and taking a shower, Xia Tian returned to the dormitory with Song Xu Yi’s promised meal, as well as many snacks and daily necessities.

Noticing that Song Xu Yi’s fever had subsided and she was feeling better, Xia Tian visibly breathed a sigh of relief. “I was worried about your health. But now that you’re feeling better, you can rest well tomorrow, and the day after tomorrow, when we have a seven-day break, you can come with me to visit Bai Jin’s ancestral home…”

Song Xu Yi blinked, only then did she remember that Xia Tian’s parents didn’t want her to have any contact with Bai Jin, and they were extremely strict in controlling her. However, Xia Tian was obsessed with visiting Bai’s “only the fiancée is allowed to visit” ancestral home. Recently, Xia Tian’s relationship with Bai Jin had improved, and Bai Jin had invited Xia Tian to visit his home. During the seven-day holiday, Xia Tian planned to stay in the ancestral home for a few days but was afraid of being discovered by her parents, so she used Song Xu Yi as an excuse, saying that she was going to an ancient villa in the deep mountains with her.

Before Song Xu Yi came to this world, the original owner had already promised Xia Tian to accompany her to the ancestral home for a few days.

Song Xu Yi’s first reaction was to try to persuade Xia Tian not to go to the ancestral home. However, Song Xu Yi probed a bit and found out that Xia Tian was determined to follow the “fiancées are supposed to visit” family rule of the Bai family. She was also afraid that changing her mind would cause their hard-won good relationship with Bai Jin to deteriorate again. So Xia Tian insisted on going to the ancestral home.

Song Xu Yi had no choice but to agree to accompany Xia Tian.

Since Song Xu Yi agreed to go to the ancestral home with Xia Tian, the system started to feel uneasy. It desperately urged Song Xu Yi to buy some metaphysical items in this world, not only for her own sake but also for Xia Tian’s safety.

“Xu Yi! Even if you don’t care about yourself, think about Xia Tian. We need to be prepared for anything…”

Amidst the constant nagging of the system, Song Xu Yi had no choice but to comply. The next day, when they had no classes, they went to a nearby metaphysical shop to buy some items.

Although people in this world believed in ghosts and gods, and there were many movies and TV shows related to them, encounters with the supernatural were rare in real life. Most of the items sold in the so-called “metaphysical shops” around the school were popular items such as “peach blossom charms,” “fortune bracelets,” and “academic success charms.”

When the shop owner, who wore a large gold chain, heard that Song Xu Yi wanted to buy items to expel evil spirits, he was taken aback. But when he heard that they were going to explore an ancestral home and wanted to ensure their safety, he scratched his head and pulled out a large box from under the pile of peach blossom charms.

“Don’t underestimate these charms and talismans,” the shop owner sighed. “My ancestors were the most famous Taoist masters back in the day. They even received blessings from Master Bai Yutian…”

Master Bai Yutian was a legendary figure in this country. It was said that he was born into a famous family of Taoist masters, and he had a natural talent for restraining evil spirits and was gifted in metaphysics. During his reign, he expelled plagues, subdued evil spirits, wrote metaphysical textbooks, and did countless good deeds. He was revered as the ancestor of metaphysics. Unfortunately, this kind-hearted man did not have a good ending. After expelling a demon one day, he and the evil spirit perished together, leaving later generations full of regret.

Nowadays, eight out of ten metaphysical scammers will use the name of Master Bai Yutian as a banner to deceive people. Saying this, the shop owner opened a large box and looked at Song Xu Yi with sincerity. “In the past, my grandfather was the only master in ten miles and eight villages. These are the charms he drew, and there are not many left in my generation. Since you are destined to have them, I will sell you five charms at a discounted price of one thousand yuan each.”

Song Xu Yi glanced at the peach blossom charms outside the shop that cost only fifty yuan each and knew that the shop owner was trying to rip her off because of her branded clothes. She had no intention of buying, but the system howled, “Xu Yi, hurry up and buy…” Unable to resist the system’s crying, Song Xu Yi tried to negotiate with the shop owner and finally reluctantly bought three charms at six hundred yuan each.

“It’s all because you are destined to have them! If it were an ordinary person, I would never sell these charms at such a low price! These charms are guaranteed to keep you safe and sound, and evil spirits will not dare to approach you!” The shop owner claimed.

The shop owner couldn’t conceal the satisfaction in his eyes after making a hefty profit, but he still put on a regretful expression as he packed the three charms into a box. Glancing around, he picked up a bead strung on a red string from the box and handed it to Song Xu Yi, saying, “This bead is also a cursed stone passed down from my ancestors. My grandfather said it was a family treasure. I had it examined by an expert, and although its appearance isn’t valuable, it looks quite beautiful and is suitable for young girls like you. Consider it a free gift…”

“It’s all fate…”

A protective charm is a jade item containing a drop of a sorcerer’s blood. The blood of a powerful sorcerer not only has a blessing effect but also can expel evil spirits. In ancient times, they were often rare and priceless commodities. However, since protective charms were hard to come by, a group of protective charms peddlers emerged, selling and wholesaling low-quality protective charms under various banners.

Later, to show off their prestige, great sorcerers often chose rare and valuable jade as their protective charms. The protective charm given to Song Xu Yi by the shop owner had a bright red blood color, but the material was the cheapest jadeite, which great sorcerers wouldn’t even bother to use. It was worth only a few dozen dollars in the market.

But this bead was too beautiful. The red blood-like lines flowed through the translucent jadeite stone, and when Song Xu Yi touched it, she felt a warm and comfortable sensation all over her body. She couldn’t help but put the bead on her wrist.

Upon seeing that Song Xu Yi had purchased a protective charm, the system finally calmed down a bit. However, it continued to worry, “Xu Yi, I heard that those evil spirits will use a beautiful appearance to deceive people, but behind it, there are actually rotting bones. Don’t be fooled by the appearance of the evil spirits…”

Song Xu Yi made numerous promises to the system and assured it that she would never remove the protective charm under any circumstances. Eventually, the system quieted down.

By this time, the original owner of the body had entered her senior year of college. Song Xu Yi, in this body, planned to continue her studies as a graduate student at the same university, and she was very diligent in her studies. After purchasing the protective charm, she followed the original owner’s study schedule and self-studied for an entire afternoon until she returned to the dormitory after 9 pm. At this point, Xia Tian and her two roommates had already returned.

When Song Xu Yi arrived, her three roommates were watching a horror movie. In the movie, the female ghost had a beautiful face one moment and turned into a pile of walking skeletons the next… The three girls laughed nervously and said, “What’s there to be afraid of? We are materialist students in the physics department. We won’t be scared of such fictional stories…” However, their eyes wandered, and they couldn’t bear to look at the screen anymore. Song Xu Yi listened to the system’s screams in her mind, sighed silently, and helplessly packed her things for the next day’s visit to the ancestral home.

As if afraid, the other three girls quickly finished washing up and climbed into bed after watching the movie. Song Xu Yi was the last one to turn off the light and climb into bed.

However, Song Xu Yi did not fall asleep right away. Her roommates couldn’t sleep either, so Song Xu Yi had to chat with them endlessly. When her roommates finally fell asleep, the system began to tremble in Song Xu Yi’s mind, “Xu, Xu Yi, are you asleep yet?”

Knowing that the system was afraid, Song Xu Yi chatted with it for a while, and then put it into sleep mode when it wasn’t paying attention. Finally, her mind became quiet, and Song Xu Yi fell into a deep sleep. Little did she know that she would begin to dream that night.

It was a very strange dream.

In the dream, Song Xu Yi emerged from a dark passageway and found herself transformed into a baby lying in a cradle. A beautiful but melancholic woman often cried beside her cradle. Song Xu Yi slowly understood what the woman was saying. The woman was the legitimate wife of the household, but her husband was unfaithful and had taken many concubines after she was unable to bear any more children. She gave birth to a daughter, but lost the ability to conceive forever. The woman was extremely worried about her own and her daughter’s future, but she was too gentle to know how to seek a better life for herself and her daughter.

Apart from humans, through the eyes of the baby, Song Xu Yi saw countless strange and bizarre evil spirits: some only had half a body, some had blood and tears flowing from their eyes, some had long tongues, and some had two heads… These evil spirits constantly hovered around the baby’s bedroom, trying to break into the room to scare the little baby. However, the protective charms on the windows kept all the evil spirits outside, and the baby never cried.

As the woman only gave birth to a daughter, the master of the household became increasingly neglectful towards her. The servants followed suit and treated the woman even more harshly. The only source of comfort for the woman was her daughter, who was kind-hearted and considerate despite enduring various forms of mistreatment.

In the blink of an eye, the infant had grown to three years old. The little girl was intelligent and cute, like a small ball of sticky rice. She had never asked about her father and was always attentive to her mother, winning the affection of those around her. However, only Song Xu Yi knew that the little girl would chat with invisible spirits when no one was around. Through these spirits, she had already understood the reason behind her mother’s sadness and melancholy.

The turning point occurred when the girl turned three years old.

On that day, the patriarch of the household, who was also a powerful sorcerer, had just returned from dispelling spirits. A vaguely familiar little girl stood before him with a serious expression on her face.

“There’s a hanged ghost on your back!” she said.

The sorcerer was naturally not afraid of a hanged ghost, but he was amazed by the little girl’s ability to see spirits. After all, in the world of magic, talent was highly valued, and those born with Yin and Yang eyes often became unparalleled geniuses.

……

“Xu Yi, wake up! It’s time to go to class!” It was Xia Tian’s voice that woke Song Xu Yi up. She didn’t expect to have such a strange dream. It was probably because she had bought talismans and watched horror movies yesterday. Song Xu Yi yawned and didn’t think much about it. She quickly washed up and went to class with Xia Tian.

Just after class, Song Xu Yi received a call from the driver saying that the car to the ancestral home was already waiting at the school gate.

The author has something to say:

The first day without tripping a flag.

Hehe.