Chapter Thirty-Nine: Understanding the Rules

Chapter Thirty-Nine

After finishing the charitable congee, all the survivors had already gone into hiding, and Beggars’ Alley sank into an eerie stillness.

According to the warning from the young man distributing the food at the Confucius Temple, after the meal, the vengeful ghost would arrive. Thus, everyone had concealed themselves as if playing a game of hide and seek.

At this moment, the only beings brazen enough to wander the streets would be the vengeful ghost itself.

...

The ghost had arrived!

Zhao Fusheng’s hair stood on end. Her first thought was: the oppressive force of the ghost was terrifying.

In this critical moment, she reflexively reached into her bosom and pulled out the box of lamp oil that Paper Man Zhang had given her.

According to both Paper Man Zhang and Zhang Chuanshi, this lamp oil could shield her from the ghost’s gaze. So long as she stayed within the lamp’s light, the ghost would not be able to discover her presence.

With that in mind, Zhao Fusheng felt somewhat reassured.

Once she had a protective talisman, her fear began to subside, and her curiosity and adventurous spirit quickly surged forth again.

She had entered Beggars’ Alley precisely to resolve the ghostly disaster; now that the ghost was before her, how could she shrink away?

Inhaling and exhaling deeply several times, she forced down her instinct to flee, crawled toward the door, and, with her heart pounding wildly, carefully pried open a crack in the old, decrepit door.

Even a slight movement of the door made a sound, louder than usual in the oppressive silence.

At the noise, Zhao Fusheng’s mind went momentarily blank, her heart racing, hands trembling so much that she nearly dropped the lamp oil box.

She paused, tightened her grip on the box, and forced herself to calm down.

The crisis did not immediately descend upon her. Suddenly, she remembered what Fan Bisi had once said—there were rules.

Vengeful ghosts always killed according to rules.

Once the rule was triggered, even holding your breath and keeping still would not spare you; but if you did not break the rule, even in the same room as the ghost, death was not certain.

From what she had observed since entering the alley, it seemed the ghost’s killing was linked to the “register.”

On that “register,” the unfortunate “Sun Fu,” who had been called first, was clearly the next to trigger the ghost’s murderous rule.

With this thought, Zhao Fusheng’s mind grew agile again.

Summoning her courage, she pressed her head close to the door crack. After all, she was here to deal with ghosts. Even though she had been reborn into this era and had long expected to confront ghosts, Zhao Fusheng still took a moment to steel herself. Then, with a sudden movement, she opened her eyes.

The scene on the street unfolded before her.

The alley was deserted; at some point, thick, black miasma had begun to roll through the air. A damp, moldy stench arose, intertwined with the sharp tang of blood and the unique rot of corpses—a stench of death that invaded Zhao Fusheng’s nostrils.

Holding her breath, she stared into the ghostly haze.

Within the black mist, a vague figure drifted slowly.

Click, clack, click—the footsteps sounded. That stiff figure emerged from the fog, growing clearer as it approached the street where Zhao Fusheng was hiding.

A ghost!

She could not yet make out its face, but the chilling aura and oppressive dread unique to vengeful ghosts had already swept over her. The closer it came, the more its outline broke free from the shroud of mist.

One hand gripped the doorframe, Zhao Fusheng struggled to steady her trembling body, suppressing her urge to flee.

She knew that fear would only ruin her chances. If she did not seize this moment to memorize the ghost’s features, she would be doomed when her turn came to trigger the rule.

Eyes wide, she watched as the “shadow” took step after step out of the black fog.

When she finally saw the ghost’s appearance, her expression darkened.

The ghost before her was nothing like the headless specter Liu Wu had described. This one had a head!

Its body was emaciated and slightly hunched, limbs thin as sticks. Its head, covered in tangled gray-white hair, perched atop a long, skinny neck. What caught Zhao Fusheng’s attention were its hands, hanging between its knees—one long, one short.

Bloodstains mottled its body; the exposed skin was a patchwork of livid bruises and mottled corpse spots.

A blood-encrusted headband hung askew, covering one lifeless, gray eye; the other was glazed over with a film of mist.

Its corpse was so rigid that its knees did not bend as it walked, and its steps struck the ground heavily, making its movements bizarre—no one could ever mistake such a thing for a living person.

...

Zhao Fusheng’s face grew ashen.

She knew Fan Bisi and Paper Man Zhang were not to be trusted. They knew she was investigating the ghostly case and perhaps hoped she would die here, so they had not told her everything about the ghost.

She had been cautious and well-prepared before entering the alley, but it turned out the worst had happened—the ghost haunting Beggars’ Alley was not the same as the headless ghost from the Liu family’s disaster forty years ago.

The two ghosts’ features were utterly different; all her previous clues were now useless.

But then she thought: perhaps things were not so hopeless. Liu Wu had mentioned that the headless ghost of forty years ago killed by taking heads. Perhaps the ghost’s present head was not its original one, but one it had stolen from a victim.

That thought calmed her a little.

She tried to examine the ghost’s neck for signs of stitching, but the thick fog and her own instinctive terror made it impossible to see clearly.

The ghost wandered aimlessly up and down the street, then turned at the alley’s end and disappeared into the night, its footsteps fading away.

Zhao Fusheng, heart pounding, kept her face pressed to the door crack, listening for any distant screams, but none came.

The ghost had vanished. As Zhao Fusheng wondered whether to light her ghostly lamp and venture out—

Click, clack, click—the heavy footsteps returned.

The ghost had come back, and quickly.

Soon, the stench of blood and rot swept through the alley again as the ghost reappeared from the far end.

At the corner, it suddenly turned, its ghastly, bruised face swiveling toward Zhao Fusheng, who was peering out through the door crack from afar.

!!!

That look made Zhao Fusheng’s heart clench, but just as she thought doom was upon her, the ghost turned away and ambled slowly toward the house directly opposite.

It walked along the threshold. The people inside had already heard the ghost’s approach.

Those who had survived this long in Beggars’ Alley were even more attuned to the ghost’s presence than Zhao Fusheng. Knowing their end was near, those hidden within these houses held their breath in terror.

The ghost passed by house after house, finally stopping before a tightly shut door. It stood still for a moment, then began to knock.

Thunk! Thunk thunk!

This behavior took Zhao Fusheng by surprise. She had not expected a ghost to be so “courteous,” knocking before entering.

The absurdity of it distracted her from her fear for a moment. Of course, no one inside dared open the door.

But when the inhabitants realized they were the ghost’s chosen prey, a wail of utter despair rang out from within.

The sobbing echoed down the street.

Thunk thunk thunk!

Oblivious to the screams, the ghost continued to knock.

On the third knock, its solid form began to dissolve. Its ghastly, bruised body liquefied like tar and seeped into the door, melting a gaping hole.

Through the darkness, Zhao Fusheng saw the ghost’s silhouette reconstitute itself inside. It dragged its heavy, rigid body into the house, and then the shadow was swallowed by darkness. Moments later, a man’s shrill, terrified scream pierced the silence.

“Ah—”

But the scream was abruptly cut off, followed by the sickening sounds of tearing flesh.

Within the ghostly domain that shrouded Beggars’ Alley, all was so quiet that a pin drop could be heard. The survivors held their breath in terror.

In such silence, even the faintest sound was magnified.

The splatter of blood, the slick, wet squelch as if a giant hand were stirring mud, reached Zhao Fusheng’s ears with dreadful clarity.

Tension, fear, and the relief of having survived mingled with the stench of blood and the acrid reek of viscera.

The sated ghost soon emerged from the darkness, now changed from before.

Its once-shriveled belly was now grotesquely distended, as if it had eaten its fill. Loops of bloody intestines hung from its body and arms, dripping with blood and undigested filth.

In its hand, it carried a human head—eyes wide in death, mouth agape to reveal sparse, bloodstained yellow teeth, terror and agony forever etched into the unfortunate man’s face.

Zhao Fusheng had witnessed a ghostly hunt with her own eyes, shaken to the core.

No dossier from the Demon Suppression Bureau could capture the horror of this scene.

But she knew this was not the time for fear. Forcing herself to ignore her terror, she fixed her gaze on the face of the severed head.

Despite the contorted expression of pain, Zhao Fusheng recognized him—it was Sun Fu, the first person called during the distribution at the temple.

The ghost’s killings were indeed following the “register.”

In other words, the charity meal at the temple was linked to the killings, and the “register” was no ordinary item, but something intimately tied to the ghost.

From what she had deduced, anyone who had accepted a bowl from the temple was likely entered into the register. The ghost would hunt according to that list; the first called would become the target in the next round.

Her mind worked quickly. The simplest way to avoid the ghost’s rule was not to accept the temple’s food. If your name was not on the register, the ghost would not see you. If Fan Bisi’s rules were accurate, you could even stand before the ghost and go unnoticed if you hadn’t broken the rule.

With this realization, Zhao Fusheng’s face turned grim.

She saw the darkness of human nature. The survivors must have known this all along, yet at the temple, someone had forced the young man’s charity rice into her hands, ensuring her name would be added to the register.

Anger and disgust boiled within her, quickly turning to murderous intent—she longed to drag out the malicious survivor and let him taste the ghost’s wrath.

She soon realized that this violent impulse was not normal. She had once tapped into the power of a vengeful ghost, and though she had used the Divine Register’s merit to dispel its influence, the aftereffects were stronger than she had imagined.

Though she had shaken off the ghost’s control, its influence lingered. She struggled to calm herself and focus once more on the ghost’s rules.

The ghost hunted according to the register, and she had figured out how to avoid it, but that was no longer possible now. Beggars’ Alley was sealed by the ghostly domain; the survivors had nowhere to run.

To live, one must eat. For those with no other choice, the temple’s charity was their only hope—even knowing the meal could be their last, they could not refuse it.

Zhao Fusheng could already guess the rest: the survivors clung to life through the temple’s charity, and the ghost claimed victims from the register—a perfect deadlock, leaving those trapped here to wait helplessly for death.

If she did not enter the alley, did not drive out the ghost, did not complete her mission, everyone would perish here.

Understanding this, Zhao Fusheng let out a long sigh. Another life was lost.

The ghost, satisfied, left the way it had come, its footsteps fading into the shrouded night.

The survivors all breathed a sigh of relief, muffled sobs rising in the silence.

These sounds were a signal. Those trapped here had perhaps discovered the ghost’s killing rules even before Zhao Fusheng; forced to wait for death, they lived each day in terror and fleeting relief, the cycle repeating endlessly.

The black mist filled every corner, despair and relief mingling with the ghostly aura, spreading through the domain.

Having pieced together the clues, Zhao Fusheng quickly realized a flaw in her thinking:

“No, that’s not right.”

She had previously assumed the ghost appeared after every meal and claimed one life.

But then she recalled that the houses in the ghostly domain were strictly one person per room, and that the young man distributing food had urged her to find an empty house.

This meant the ghost’s rules might be based on “rooms” rather than “people.”

When the ghost knocked, the person inside was instantly marked as prey, their death all but certain.

She still did not know the ghost’s origin, how it killed, but she was certain it was not the same as the headless ghost from Liu Huacheng’s birthday banquet forty years ago.

Though she had been forced into this case, Paper Man Zhang had indeed tricked her, luring her into a deadly trap.

At least she had burned down Paper Man Zhang’s lair—a small act of revenge in advance.

She began to ponder the ghost’s origin.

It was clearly tied to the temple’s charity, to the register, and the temple itself had once been the Liu clan’s ancestral hall—there must be a connection.

The young man overseeing the charity was the key to the mystery.

With that thought, Zhao Fusheng’s gaze grew deep.

She sank to the floor, regained her strength, put the lamp oil back into her bosom, then crawled back into a corner and sat down.

Though she had prepared herself and even harbored a ghost, witnessing a killing firsthand was still a shock for one born in peaceful times.

Seeing death in person was far more harrowing than any dream.

Fan Bisi’s warning echoed in her mind: dealing with ghosts is a near-certain death.

She touched the lamp oil, checked the soul register she carried, and felt for the Divine Register’s talisman within her mind—only then did she feel a little more at ease.

The ghost had already left, but the tension in Beggars’ Alley had not dissipated.

Everyone was filled with terror—the air was thick with the scent of blood, death hanging over the street, entering the lungs of every survivor.

Though Zhao Fusheng knew she was temporarily safe, she was not yet prepared to confront the ghost head-on.

The young man’s warning at the temple still rang in her ears, making her reluctant to risk opening the door.

Time ticked by. The black mist slowly faded, replaced by a gray haze. The oppressive chill receded like a tide.

Zhao Fusheng slowly stood, flexing her limbs. She had much to do today and could not waste time waiting for death.

After a night to recover, she had adjusted her mindset.

When her numb limbs regained their agility, she finally opened the door she had pressed shut all night.

As the door creaked open, she could sense eyes peering at her from every direction, just as she had spied on the ghost the night before.

She turned her head, uncomfortable, and caught the furtive glances quickly sliding away—only to return, bold and unashamed, to settle on her once more.

She frowned.

Time was short; she had no need to waste it confronting these people.

With that, she hurriedly looked toward the temple.

Since entering the alley yesterday, she had noticed that there was no day or night in the ghostly domain, but subtle clues allowed her to judge the time.

The young man’s words at the temple had suggested it was “night.”

The ghost appeared at night, and after it left, there would be a brief “safe period.” When the black mist turned gray, that was likely “day.”

The temple was as conspicuous as ever within the domain, its lanterns still burning.

Zhao Fusheng composed herself and strode toward the temple.

Her memory was excellent, and with her life at stake, she had memorized every detail of the buildings and streets, both before and after receiving the charity meal.

Such caution had served her well in her work, and now it might just save her life.

She soon arrived at the temple.

Compared to last night, the temple was a stark contrast.

The courtyard was deserted, the stone table where congee had been distributed was empty, everything cleared away.

There was no wind, no bird or insect song. After the ghost’s killing, the survivors had hidden themselves, and the silence was absolute.

The temple door stood wide open, the lantern light illuminating half the hall, the place utterly still, not a trace of living presence.

The flagstones before the temple were wet, as if a heavy rain had just washed them, filling the cracks with water and releasing an earthy scent.

But perhaps because she had witnessed the ghost’s killing, Zhao Fusheng fancied she could still smell a faint trace of blood and mold.

She bowed her head, sniffed her clothes, and glanced over the freshly washed ground.

Dawn was near; the ghost had only just vanished, and no one dared venture out.

Within the domain, there was no day or night—no rain could possibly fall. The wet ground must have been deliberately washed.

She bit her lip, feeling the cracked skin.

Looking up, she saw the temple lanterns still burning, casting their pale light over the blue signboard and the empty square.

Standing in that patch of light, Zhao Fusheng felt an instinctive discomfort, a desire to hide herself.

Deprived of the bustle of crowds, the brightly lit temple seemed all the more eerie and forbidding—a place to chill the soul.

(Today’s update merges three chapters—over 6,000 words.)

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(End of chapter)