Chapter 78: Hanging In Midair Means Certain Death
At this moment, Jiang Shan and Ren Ying, the three of them, were all standing dozens of meters away from the wooden house. Before figuring out that unknown ghost’s killing pattern, none of them dared to approach the wooden house.
Any fierce ghost appearing here, if taken out, would at least be an A-level supernatural event. With everyone’s current abilities, they absolutely couldn’t withstand the fierce ghost’s attack.
Despair permeated the hearts of Jiang Shan and the others.
“Dong~”
The solemn knocking sound filled with Buddhist piety exploded in the ears of the three once again.
“Second time.”
Ren Ying’s face was grim. Previously, when she encountered supernatural events at the missionary’s place, she used ordinary people to probe the way—hundreds at most, a dozen at least—and she could roughly deduce the ghost’s killing pattern.
But in this current situation…
Wolves in front and tigers behind. If they couldn’t figure out the killing pattern of that invisible ghost near the wooden house, in another minute they would suffer the wooden fish ghost’s attack.
At this moment,
The one-minute death countdown began.
“Why didn’t Zhang Dongxing get attacked when he first went near the wooden house, but something happened when he went to save Liu Yingying? Was it because he touched a ghost? No, that’s not right. Liu Yingying’s body isn’t a ghost, so he wasn’t attacked because he touched a ghost.”
Staying in place wasn’t a solution either. Even without knowing that ghost’s killing pattern, Jiang Shan would definitely enter the area near the wooden house in the few seconds before the wooden fish ghost knocked.
Even if it might lead to an attack from that unknown ghost, it was still better than dying under the wooden fish ghost’s curse.
So he now began walking toward the wooden house. To observe the situation, this time Jiang Shan didn’t use his ghost domain to travel.
As he approached, he discovered that the soil color near the wooden house was very weird.
The mud outside the ghost village was that faint red soaked in fresh blood, but the mud around the wooden house was a chilling bright red.
It was as if there had once been a massive slaughterhouse here, with fresh blood flowing into this land ceaselessly over decades, dyeing the mud here scarlet.
But how could that be possible?
Just as he reached the edge where the two kinds of mud met, Jiang Shan stopped. His gaze followed this edge and began to extend.
His current position was southeast of the wooden house, while Liu Yingying and Zhang Dongxing were hanging northeast of the wooden house. The two of them were right near that edge as well.
Jiang Shan looked down at the time,
Forty seconds left.
“Liu Yingying ran to the wooden house and got attacked only when she stepped on this mud. This chilling cold feeling—looks like the soil near the wooden house is a ghost.”
Jiang Shan thought to himself while looking at Liu Yingying’s footprints on the ground, but another doubt immediately surged in his mind:
“If stepping on this ghost soil leads to an attack, why was Zhang Dongxing fine? He was the first to touch the ghost soil, but he only had a problem when saving Liu Yingying.”
“What is the common point between these two?”
While Jiang Shan was frowning and pondering, he saw Ren Ying and Ren Xue also walk to the edge of the ghost soil. Seeing Ren Ying’s ugly expression, it was clear she had also discovered the existence of the ghost soil.
Not far from Liu Yingying’s footprints, Jiang Shan saw Zhang Dongxing’s footprints.
Compared to the spaced footprints from Liu Yingying’s running, Zhang Dongxing’s footprints were one deep, one shallow.
“The two entered the ghost soil with different movements. Liu Yingying was running, while Zhang Dongxing…”
Jiang Shan glanced at Zhang Dongxing, who was being hung in the air and struggling nonstop, and carefully observed the anomalies on his body.
Perhaps because that black line was too thin, or maybe because that ghost was missing a puzzle piece, the two were just like they were hanged—during these forty seconds of being suspended, no supernatural effects acted on them at all.
Such a gentle attack method was rare among ghosts.
Soon, Jiang Shan noticed that Zhang Dongxing’s calf was bound with a “bandage” torn from clothes. It looked like his calf was injured.
At this time, 15 seconds remained until the wooden fish ghost knocked the wooden fish.
“So it seems Zhang Dongxing limped in, while Liu Yingying ran in?”
Thinking of running and combining it with Zhang Dongxing’s attack situation, Jiang Shan suddenly thought of something:
“Most people think running is front foot forward, back foot following, alternating on the ground. But actually, during running, the person is airborne. Zhang Dongxing limped into the ghost soil, his feet not leaving the ground, so he wasn’t attacked at first.”
“While Liu Yingying ran into the ghost soil, her feet airborne—that’s why she was hoisted up the instant she entered. As for Zhang Dongxing, he climbed onto the table to save Liu Yingying, and during that process of climbing the table, his feet also became airborne, and he was hoisted up right after.”
Jiang Shan’s eyes flickered. He glanced at Ren Ying and Ren Xue, hesitated for a moment, then said to them:
“Walk in, don’t let your feet leave the ground, don’t run.”
After saying that, Jiang Shan unhesitatingly walked into the range of the ghost soil, then headed toward Liu Yingying’s position.
Initially, Jiang Shan hadn’t wanted to tell Ren Ying and the other about the suspected ghost soil’s killing pattern. He wanted to use the wooden fish ghost to kill them, but after weighing the pros and cons, he gave up the idea.
If he couldn’t permanently detain the fierce ghosts in their bodies once and for all, then these two couldn’t be killed for now.
The moment he stepped on the ghost soil, chilling cold seeped through his shoes from the soles toward Jiang Shan’s brain. The slightly sinking foot sensation and this chill were like countless hands underfoot pulling him underground, dragging him into the abyss.
This was a ghost.
Walking on the ghost soil, Jiang Shan was completely certain. By now, he had arrived below Liu Yingying and Zhang Dongxing. Their bodies were struggling and twisting nonstop.
Unlike Liu Yingying, behind Zhang Dongxing was a gray figure that had already taken on a human silhouette.
The luck ghost extended its gray blurry arms and began rocking Zhang Dongxing’s body side to side. But because the luck ghost had no physical form, even under its interference, the amplitude of Zhang Dongxing’s body’s sway was pitifully small.
Jiang Shan knew the luck ghost wouldn’t do something meaningless, so…
Gray fog immediately spread and enveloped the two. Zhang Dongxing and Liu Yingying, in Jiang Shan’s ghost domain, began swinging violently.
A few short seconds later,
As the two fell to the ground, this meant the fierce ghost’s attack had been resolved by him so simply and easily.
Jiang Shan felt doubt in his heart. The ghost porcelain woman he encountered along the way, and this unknown ghost—their attacks both gave off a “docile” feeling.
Compared to the fierce ghosts he had encountered before, these two ghosts seemed uninterested in killing people.
Everything here revealed an incomprehensible weirdness.
After thinking for a while, Jiang Shan temporarily suppressed these doubts.
Now was not the time to relax vigilance.
His gaze stayed on the wooden fish ghost. In three seconds, the wooden fish ghost would strike the third knock on the wooden fish. Although Zhang Dongxing wouldn’t deceive him, Jiang Shan always only looked at the results.
Now, he was ready at any moment to paste the face-covering cloth printed with the crying face onto his own face.
As time ticked away bit by bit,
When Jiang Shan saw the wooden fish ghost make the knocking motion but heard no sound, he couldn’t help but breathe a long sigh of relief.
No matter what, he had survived.
