My mind was in utter chaos. Of the three people present, only Leo Liu remained truly calm; the other two kept shouting. Now that I was a ghost, there was no way to explain myself to them—even if I tried, they wouldn't believe me.
It felt as if I had witnessed this scene before, and I could even recall their names with perfect clarity. I had no idea why I felt this way.
I glanced at Leo Liu, then slowly floated upward.
"No matter what you think, when I arrived, David Wu was already dead."
A wave of ghostly energy—likely from a Blue Wraith—was emanating from a distant graveyard on the lower left side of the village. I decided to check it out. If it were just an ordinary vengeful ghost, dealing with them would have caused much more commotion.
Soon, I arrived at the graveyard. There were several ghosts here, and I immediately sensed the presence of that Blue Wraith near a small hill behind the cemetery. I floated toward it.
Looking around, I saw a few white-robed ghosts drifting and patrolling the perimeter of the graveyard. Judging by their appearance, they must have been villagers from here.
All of this seemed strange to me. The ghosts paid me no mind. Then I spotted a younger white-robed ghost—a girl. I was surprised and stopped, but in a flash, I rushed toward her.
"Are you Yuna Darong?"
I asked. The ghost girl in front of me was indeed Yuna Darong—I had seen her before. She was Darren Rong's younger sister, her cheeks still plump and round. I grabbed Yuna Darong and kept questioning her, but at that moment, she quietly lifted her head and gave me a strange, inexplicable look.
"Our Darong Family has lived here for generations."
A cold, chilling voice echoed out. I looked toward the small hill, where a ghostly green light began to shimmer. It was this Blue Wraith that killed David Wu—judging by the lingering ghost aura on his corpse. In an instant, I flew right up to the Blue Wraith and pressed my Hell's Sentinel to its throat.
"Tell me—what is really going on in this place?"
I stared at the Blue Wraith before me, its hair wild and disheveled. Yet, something about its voice sounded familiar. Suddenly, a breeze swept through, lifting its long hair and revealing its true face.
"Village chief?"
I was stunned. The figure before me was Jonas Darong, the Harmony Village chief who vanished fourteen years ago—father to Miles Darong, the current chief.
"Stranger, go back. This place belongs to our Darong Family. The peace of this deserted village should not be disturbed." With a whoosh, the village chief transformed into a stream of green light particles and vanished.
In that instant, murderous energy spilled out from my body, covering everything nearby. I tried to block the green light, but it passed right through my energy and disappeared.
The ghosts that had lingered in the graveyard also vanished along with it.
The wind howled, and within the breeze came a sound like whispered crying.
Suddenly, I sensed something and hurried toward the village. When I arrived, I was shocked—the murderous energy I used to trap Leo Liu, Tiger Li, and Mason Zhao was still there, but the three of them had vanished without a trace.
Even David Wu's corpse on the ground had disappeared.
I was stunned. What had just happened? Who could bypass my Specter Web and silently take those three away? Suddenly, I saw light coming from a distant house. I rushed over.
A pair of eyes stared at me through the crack in the door. I wasn't mistaken. With a whoosh, I flew into the house, but inside, I was even more surprised—it was completely empty. No one was there, yet I was certain I'd seen and felt someone watching me.
I looked around the house—bare walls, nothing inside, as if no one lived here. I phased through the wall into another house, but it was exactly the same.
There was nothing in the house. Then I realized, the entire village was empty—not a single person anywhere. I searched everywhere, above the village, across the river to the temple, through the woods, but I found no one.
Dawn had broken. The distant sky turned pale. I sat quietly on a rooftop, the wind howling past my ears. This place was silent—there was nothing left.
Then, with a creak, I looked over in surprise—a door opened from one house, and a villager came out, busying themselves, carrying bowls of food outside.
Gradually, the whole village bustled with noise. Villagers moved from the lower village to the upper village, gathering together. Every household brought out tables and chairs, preparing food—the whole place was unusually lively.
I stared, mouth agape. With a whoosh, I floated down into the crowd of villagers. They couldn't see me; they laughed and chatted, talking about today's festive occasion—New Year's Day.
Suddenly, my head started buzzing. Today really was New Year's Day—when I arrived last night, it was January 1st, 2013. But something felt wrong.
I glanced inside a family's doorway—there, hanging in the living room, was a brand-new calendar. My eyes widened and I rushed over to it.
The calendar showed January 1st, 2000.
It was as if a voice in my head was saying something—everything was chaos. Clutching my head, pain splitting my skull, I quickly slipped behind a house, took on the form of a villager, and extended my Specter Web.
"What's the date today?"
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Pretending to be half-awake, I asked a villager. He told me it was January 1st, 2000.
No matter how many times I asked, the villagers all gave the same answer: January 1st, 2000.
I returned to the graveyard and searched everywhere—nothing. The ghosts I saw last night had vanished, not even a trace of ghostly energy remained.
But then I noticed something odd. In the middle of several graves, a mound of earth had been piled up—it looked like a new grave.
The color of the soil was different from the rest. I walked over, stretched out my hands, murderous energy spilling out as I started moving the earth. I dug deeper—and soon, I saw it.
It was people. I quickly dug faster. When all the dirt was cleared away, I saw them—the four members of the Ghost Burial Squad, all dead.
I stared quietly at them. Their faces looked peaceful, but someone had painted red, black, and yellow streaks across their cheeks—like camouflage, on both sides.
As for the cause of death—except for David Wu, whose chest and organs had been removed—the others' causes were all unknown.
I began using my Specter Web to examine their bodies, closing my eyes as black threads pierced into them. If there were no external wounds, then it had to be internal.
"Organ failure?"
My eyes widened as I stared at Leo Liu and the others' corpses. Their organs, without exception, had died of failure. I'd seen this before in the Ghost Burial Squad—their hearts and other organs looked as old as those of people in their eighties or nineties, completely worn out. The cause of death was simply that their organs had stopped working.
No wonder their faces looked so peaceful in death, without a trace of pain—just as if they'd died of old age.
The village erupted with celebration—someone played the suona, others beat drums.
There was nothing to be found, no clues at all. This place seemed like any ordinary village, with nothing suspicious—yet it was filled with enormous mysteries.
By nightfall, the village's noisy bustle finally began to settle into silence.
I sat on the rooftop, watching the distance as the last rays of light vanished into the mountains. The villagers returned to the village and began to rest.
I kept searching myself, hoping to find something, but came up empty. I decided to visit the cemetery again. When I arrived, I saw the exposed corpses of the four Ghost Burial Squad members and decided to check their belongings. No one or anything had disturbed the bodies.
"Come back, Spirit Snake."
With a whoosh, the Spirit Snake emerged from the ground and returned to my body. I had left it here to keep watch in the morning, but it found nothing.
I started checking their backpacks, rummaging through and finding some ghost-hunting tools and mission records, along with relics from the late twentieth century—a pager and a brick phone. I took out the pager and pressed the button; the time displayed was still January 1, 2000.
Time ticked by, and it was almost midnight. I began to shovel dirt, burying the three corpses.
I returned to the village again. Most of the villagers, worn out from the festivities, had gone to rest, but the banquet tables remained; it seemed another grand feast would be held the next day.
Entering a villager's home, I saw that the tired villagers had already fallen asleep. Nothing seemed amiss. The empty house I saw last night felt like nothing but a dream.
At that moment, a surge of Ghost Aura appeared on the street. I immediately looked outside and saw a greenish glow drifting past.