"What's going on?"
Howard Zhang asked, while Sophie Sun pressed tightly against him, shaking her head.
"You two should leave quickly. Dawn is coming—just two hours left. The Soulbound Inn isn’t simple. The three adults on the top floor control everything here. I serve under Gus Sage, one of them, a Blue Wraith. He checks in from time to time."
Sophie Sun spoke, then stood up and tugged her cousin, urging us to leave.
"Wait, Miss Sun, is there really no Ghost Sovereign here?"
I asked, and Sophie Sun shook her head.
"I’ve been to the 20th floor before, when Lord Wraith was there too. The three adults seemed to fear him and obeyed his every word. I was summoned because Lord Wraith took an interest in me. If a Ghost Sovereign were here, why would they fear Lord Wraith? Isn’t the Feast of Ten Thousand Ghosts happening outside? But none of the Blue Wraiths from the Soulbound Inn got an invitation."
"Wait, wait…"
Suddenly, I was surprised and looked at Sophie Sun.
"Isn’t this place supposed to have 21 floors?"
"Who told you that?"
I replied, it was Granny Specter at the registration desk downstairs who said so.
Sophie Sun giggled.
"Oh, Ethan Zhang, that Granny Specter has been at the front desk for who knows how many years. Every time a ghost arrives, she tells them there are 21 floors, warns them not to meet anyone above the 15th floor, and suggests reincarnation as soon as possible. After all these years, she’s still just a low-level Grey Ghost."
"Really?" I looked at Sophie Sun with suspicion, but remembered when I first came to the Soulbound Inn, Granny Specter had changed once—becoming a skeleton ghost. Can a normal Grey Ghost do that?
"You’re being paranoid, Ethan Zhang. I’m telling you, she’s just a janitor. Besides registering the residents here, she’s useless. Don’t listen to her nonsense."
Impossible. My first reaction was that I clearly heard Granny Specter say it twice; it didn’t seem like she was lying to me.
"Is there really no 21st floor here?"
I asked again, but Sophie Sun still shook her head, insisting there’s no 21st floor.
I fell into deep thought. Suddenly, I remembered that Master Jianyun once said the Soulbound Inn has existed for at least a few centuries. But would a Blue Wraith in such a place really fear Lord Wraith?