Chapter 16: Thirty seconds, don’t die!

Chapter 16: Thirty seconds, don’t die!

Translator-Rhapsodite

Editor-simpforlife, Proofreader-Ghostie

The pair blindly bolted away. They had no idea how many floors they had been running past. When they regained awareness, they realized that the seemingly endless stairway had finally come to an end, and that a small iron door had appeared in front of them.

There was no time to consider their options—they stumbled against each other and ran towards the only exit.

When they opened the iron door, they realized that they were standing on the roof of the love hotel.

This was odd—to ensure the safety of the guests, the hotel staff would normally lock the rooftop door.

The couple called for help; however, it was just like when the couple yelled and screamed——nobody could hear them. They lived on the third floor, yet they weren’t able to go downstairs. Now they were on the open balcony—— scared, helpless and utterly lost.

“No, no way!”

The woman’s mental state was on the verge of crumbling.

“What should we do? What do we do now?!”

The man didn’t know what to do.

He couldn’t make sense of what was happening. He had only been a witness to a jumper’s accident, and then commented a few sentences. How did he come to be? in the same position as the jumper?!

At this time, the dead Mr.A stalked up the stairs, like a huge spider, climbing towards the door on all fours with his distorted limbs——approaching them step by step.

In his fear and desperation, the man suddenly felt a rush of frenzied courage.

He ran towards the twisted ghost and kicked the bloodied head.

However, Mr. A’s ferocious ghost figure stood up in a split second. In front of the man’s bewildered eyes, he morphed into ‘the Executioner’ who was more than two meters tall. It was dressed in a linen robe and had a sack covering its face.

When Lou Yuanming was still alive, he had never thought that posting a video of Ye Jia’s death online would be the cruelest and most disrespectful deed he could have done to Ye Jia. n0velUsb.C0M

After the video was posted, even when he was scolded by the strange netizens and was forced to delete the video, he still didn’t feel like he had done anything wrong.

——It was not my fault that the house caught on fire!

——Even if I didn’t take the video, the woman would have died anyway!

——There are more disgusting videos on the Internet. What could be so wrong with this?

That’s what Lou Yuanming had thought at the time.

But, that day when Luo Yuanming was placed on the roof by the executioner, he finally felt a strong resentment in his heart.

He felt strong hatred and contempt towards those onlookers below.

So many people were watching him, but no one helped him.

Those people just stood there, waiting for him to die with amused interest on their faces, watching him as if they were watching a monkey play.

When he plummeted from the building, hitting the concrete floor and his head split like a watermelon from the impact, Luo Yuanming felt extremely unwilling and resentful.

——He wanted revenge.

——He wanted those who watched him die to get a taste of what it felt like to die a tragic death.

The Hui Gui, who was searching for a new host, immediately responded to his resentment.

——Thus, Mr. A became the new ‘Executioner’.

——————————-

This time, there was no limit on the number of people who could be punished.

It grabbed the collars of the young man and woman, like lifting two chicks, it lifted them with ease. With one in each hand, it dragged them towards the edge of the roof.

The only thing that surrounded the roof was a circle of waist-high rails. The street in the middle of the night was deserted——If they fell, they would die.

In the beginning, the couple struggled and wailed, but they soon became exhausted and had no strength left to beg for mercy.

Just when they thought they were about to be thrown off the roof, they suddenly heard a chuckle.

“Wait a minute.”

An unfamiliar male voice said softly and slowly, “Put them down.”

The Executioner halted.

It turned slowly and stiffly, like a broken giant wind-up doll.

Bei Quan, dressed in all black, stood ten meters away from the Executioner, followed by Wei Fuyuan.

“It’s a good place.”

Bei Quan looked around, seemingly satisfied with the empty rooftop.

“If we do it here, we won’t have to trouble Zhu Ling to take care of the aftermath for us.”

The Executioner’s face was covered by the sack, and no one could see its expression underneath.

It flung the couple to the side as though it were throwing a garbage bag.

The next moment, the Hui Gui’s whole body was shrouded in black mist.

Poor Wei Fuyuan, who had still been an unshakable atheist three days ago, was now going to confront a fierce ghost face to face.

When the black mist began to rise, Master Wei felt the temperature around him drop by two or three degrees.

The Executioner’s body was extraordinarily tall and the dense black mist considerably amplified it’s tyrannical aura.? Its very presence could shake people to their cores.

The couple were cowering at the feet of the Executioner, soundlessly wilted to the ground, the moment they were touched by the black mist. No movements could be seen from the pair.

“Shit!”

Wei Fuyuan’s forehead was drenched with cold sweat. He held back his instincts to run away from the danger with much difficulty.

“What should we do now?”

“It’s easy.”

Bei Quan replied, “I’m responsible for blocking the ghost, and you’re responsible for protecting me.”

He turned his head abruptly, shock painted all over his face.

“I’m just an ordinary person... I can’t do any magic. How...”

Just as Young Master Wei was about to ask, ‘How can I protect you?’ He noticed the Hui Gui beginning to rush right at them with black mist wrapped around it out of the corner of his eye.

The Hui Gui was fast, but Bei Quan was one step faster.

Without any hesitation, he retreated a few steps and widened the distance between him and the Hui Gui.

Wei Fuyuan: “!!!”

After years of practicing Karate and Kung Fu, he had developed conditioned reflexes and subconsciously assumed a posture of attack in response to the enemy’s advances.

Unexpectedly, Bei Quan cold-heartedly abandoned his layman, who didn’t know anything and took himself to safety first!

Although he was only delayed for a second by the surprise at seeing the other flee, it was too late for Wei Fuyuan to escape.

The Hui Gui pounced on him. Its right hand reached out and went straight for his neck.

How could Wei Fuyuan defeat a resentful ghost?!

He dodged sideways, protecting his vital points with his elbow while turning his other arm over and clasped the ghost’s right hand.

Wei Fuyuan didn’t expect that he’d actually be able to touch the Hui Gui.

——A chill ran through his palm.

Young master Wei felt like he had been submerged in frosty water. The black mist around the ghost felt like the tentacles of a venomous jellyfish——sending a cold wave that could freeze every bone in his four limbs.

But at that moment, Wei Fuyuan saw a faint golden light emerging from his palm.

This light acted as an invisible barrier, blocking the assault of the black mist.

Wei Fuyuan swung his arm down and managed to effectively block the Hui Gui’s elbow. At the same time, he flew sideways and kicked his opponent’s waist.

He landed a first-rate kick on the Hui Gui.

If it had been an ordinary person, a rib would have been shattered by the impact, yet the tall ghost merely shook its body slightly.

“Fuck!”

——Wei Fuyuan’s heart instantly became cold.

“It’s impossible to fight it!”

He swiftly turned back and saw that Bei Quan had retreated ten meters away. He was writing and drawing rapidly in the void with a brush in one hand. Wei Fuyuan was confused and didn’t understand what Bei Quan was doing.

——Did this spell casting have a reading manual!?

“Hold on!”

As the boss, Bei Quan issued a single instruction, “Thirty seconds, don’t die!”

Young Master Wei was about to explode.

But now, he couldn’t waste time thinking too much about it.

Wei Fuyuan’s kick appeared to have fully enraged the ghost. The dark mist stretched out far and resembled a frantically moving tentacle. It lashed at him, cutting through the freezing air.

——Thirty seconds!

Bei Quan had asked him to hold on for thirty seconds!

Wei Fuyuan clenched his teeth and braced himself to face the Hui Gui’s attack head-on.

From the perspective of a person with good fighting skills, the Hui Gui’s tactics were very plain and disorderly, and they all relied on brute force to fight.

But the icy black mist which radiated a sensation of steel needles piercing the body,? made Young Master Wei feel like a hedgehog. Had it not been for the protection of the golden light——he would have already frozen to death.

It was a matter of life and death, Wei Fuyuan had no choice but to maintain 100 percent focus to withstand the ghost’s onslaught with swift movements and minimize the area coming in contact with the black energy as much as possible.

However, every second felt like a year to Master Wei.

——How long has it been?

He asked himself in his heart.

Wei Fuyuan wanted to glance back several times to see what Bei Quan was doing. 30 seconds had already passed, so why was Bei Quan not still using his weapon or whatever it was he wanted to use?!

Finally, just as he was about to be unable to hold on any longer, Bei Quan’s voice sounded behind him.

“Xiao Wei, get out of the way!”

His voice sounded commanding, almost unrefined.

Wei Fuyuan had no time to ponder over anything. He barely managed to dodge the Hui Gui’s grasp, and jumped to the side before falling on the ground where he rolled on the spot.

At the same time, Bei Quan drew a long stick out of nowhere, raised it with one hand and created a two-meter-long snow-white satin out of thin air. On the other hand, he held a brush and drew something strange in the air.

The next moment, a red light shot up, and an extremely complex rune appeared in front of him.

The blazing red rune struck the Hui Gui, quickly morphing into countless thin red threads which firmly bound the black mist in multiple circles.

The Hui Gui struggled violently, as if it were in extreme agony.

But it wasn’t able to break away from those seemingly fragile red strings.

The red silk string became tighter and tighter. The ghost tied by it was like a twisted sausage; it gradually lost the appearance of an Executioner and became smaller and smaller until it reached the size of a fist.

Bei Quan leaned over and threw the snow-white satin.

The satin danced like a snake, and the Executioner was tightly wrapped by it.

“Okay, it’s over.”

Bei Quan put the brush away and walked towards the white satin.

He untied the satin that had been entangled in a ball and re-wrapped it around a stick.

Both the red silk string and the ghost vanished. There was only a faint gray shadow on the satin. Bei Quan held it in his palm. It appeared hazy——as though it would vanish with a breath.

“What is that?”

Although this cluster of gray shadows didn’t seem to be lethal, Wei Fuyuan had suffered enough in the past few days, and he was afraid of getting too close.

Bei Quan replied, “It is Luo Yuanming’s soul.”

He opened the suitcase, put the white satin and brush away, took out a small bottle and put the gray shadow inside it.

“He was lucky. He was only possessed by the Hui Gui for a short while and didn’t have the time to kill. His resentment was not too strong, and he was able to get over it. ” Bei Quan smiled, “I’ll send him to Longquan Temple and ask the Taoist priests to recite scriptures for him. It should take a year and a half, more or less.”

Wei Fuyuan: “...”

Seeing him stay quiet, Bei Quan tilted his head again, “Why, did you presume that I can read the Sutra of Supreme Salvation? It’s the work of professionals, no doubt.”

Wei Fuyuan choked.

“I wasn’t thinking about that...”

He shook his arm, which was sore for some reason after fighting with the Hui Gui, and decided to put his doubts aside for the time being.

“What about these two?”

Wei Fuyuan pointed to the two lovers still lying on the ground.

“Just leave them there,” Bei Quan replied, “The weather is fairly warm now, and they won’t freeze to death.”

Then, he picked up the suitcase, turned around and walked towards the exit of the roof.

“When they wake up, they will probably just think that they had a nightmare.”

Author’s Note-

The author has something to say: The first arc is over, yay!

The inspiration for this story comes from the Japanese urban legend: Ape Dream, and the location of the fire is the news that is known to me~