Chapter 14: The Painter
Xu Shaowen held the game console and walked at the forefront. The wound on his waist had stopped bleeding, but this was not a good sign. No longer bleeding meant his body no longer belonged to an ordinary person and had begun to be assimilated by the fierce ghost.
Along the way, the paintings became increasingly dense. Fortunately, those without possession could not exert any ability and were easily dealt with by Zhang Qian. Any fish that slipped through the net were also eliminated by Feng Quan, who was protecting the rear of the team.
“It should be right ahead.” Xu Shaowen stopped. The character in the game could no longer move forward; it would die on the spot as soon as it respawned.
He put away the game console with some reluctance. “My ghost is no longer effective. Next, it will depend on you guys.”
Feng Quan took the initiative to speak at this time. “Let me do it. This range is still no problem for me.”
As soon as he finished speaking, a gray misty fog began to invade this space.
Feng Quan merged his figure into the mist. Since becoming a ghost controller, he had never felt so comfortable. “The fierce ghost is like it has crashed… No matter how I urge it, there is no response. My state is better than ever before, yet my strength is stronger than ever before.”
It must be known that a ghost controller’s strength mainly depends on the fierce ghost they control and the degree of resurgence of the fierce ghost. Generally, the closer a ghost controller is to resurgence, the stronger they are. Feng Quan was now in a special situation.
Not worried about resurgence and able to perfectly use fierce ghost power, he even felt a bit elated and wanted to test his limit, to see if he could fill this eerie space.
“Pa—”
“What are you grinning about there? Where’s the ghost? Found it?” Zhang Qian slapped him back to reality, feeling a bit worried in his heart. Could the treatment have made him stupid?
Feng Quan, who had been slapped, was not angry but happy. He clearly felt his emotions, which at least meant he was becoming more and more like an ordinary person.
But now business was more important.
“There are too many fierce ghosts here. The ghost mist can’t distinguish who the main one is, but the so-called painter’s terror level must be extremely high, so the ghost mist may not be able to trap it. I just need to find the void in the ghost mist…”
Feng Quan analyzed in his mind and mobilized the ghost mist to probe everywhere. Finally, he discovered a place that even the ghost mist could not approach.
“It’s right here!”
Everyone stepped into it and found that the surrounding environment suddenly changed drastically.
The originally pitch black space became bright. In the not-too-large room were piled many paints, easels, and other tools. It seemed to be someone’s studio.
Many completed paintings were casually placed around. The fierce ghost portraits on them had ferocious gazes but could not break free from the restraint of the paper.
A figure in green clothes was hunched over the paper, painting intently, completely ignoring the arrival of Zhang Qian and the others. Fresh red paint occasionally spilled with its actions. At an angle they could not see, a group portrait belonging to all of them was about to be completed.
“We’ve been attacked by the ghost!” Wang Shang, walking at the end of the team, suddenly said urgently. “This feeling is very strange. My hand is disappearing!”
Zhang Qian looked in the direction of the voice and found that Wang Shang’s entire body had become semi-transparent, as if it could be erased from this world at any moment.
Not only that, Xu Shaowen, Zhang Han, and Feng Quan’s bodies were also affected, showing different degrees of phantomization. Only Zhang Qian was unaffected.
“Damn it, when did we trigger the killing pattern.” Feng Quan’s figure flickered, unable to successfully turn into mist. The ghost mist seemed to have been transferred elsewhere; he could no longer feel it. “The ghost mist’s power has been affected!”
He gritted his teeth looking at his illusory arms. Why was this ghostly thing so eager when tormenting him, but useless when it came to others?
Zhang Qian made a decisive decision, shattering the easel blocking his way with one palm and charging toward the painter opposite.
At first, he was worried about triggering the killing pattern and did not dare to act rashly. Now that they had been attacked, there was no need to hesitate.
However, it was already too late.
The painter had started painting when Zhang Qian and the others stepped into the darkness and had already completed most of it.
In the horrified gazes of the four, it made the final stroke and then turned into a phantom and disappeared.
“It ran?” Zhang Qian tapped the ground with one foot to stop his forward momentum and observed the surrounding space, trying to find traces of the painter.
“Wait, Big Brother Zhang!” Xu Shaowen suddenly said in surprise. “We seem to be fine.”
Zhang Qian turned around and indeed saw that the four of them had returned to normal. “Could the ghost give up halfway?”
“I don’t know. Let me test it.” Xu Shaowen took out the game console. The pixel character had not died for a long time and was even dancing in the game. “It should be safe now, but we still need to be careful.”
Zhang Qian had already arrived in front of the painting the painter had just drawn. “It seems its attack failed.”
This painting was very eerie. Against a pitch black background, six people were groping forward, but except for Wang Shang at the end, the others did not look normal.
Half of Feng Quan’s body had turned into gray mist, a skinned bloody corpse was crouching on Zhang Han’s back, and Xu Shaowen was leading a phantom figure that looked very much like himself.
This painter had actually painted out the fierce ghosts controlled by everyone, as if analyzing their abilities and then replicating them into the painting.
The painter’s technique was very good. Each person’s expression was perfectly captured. Only Zhang Qian’s position was a chaotic mess. Various paints were piled thickly on it, as if the painter had encountered something impossible to depict and finally gave up, leaving a half-finished product.
“Wang Shang had almost completely disappeared just now. If he had fully disappeared, he would probably have been sent into the world inside the painting.” Zhang Qian touched the paper, but there was nothing special about it. “It can kill silently. If we hadn’t entered the studio, we probably wouldn’t even know how we died.”
He just didn’t know what it would taste like.
“Why did the attack fail? We couldn’t resist at all.” Feng Quan also curiously came over and awkwardly flattered, “It was your merit, Zhang Qian. You’re really amazing. Even the fierce ghost doesn’t know what you are.”
“Stop. If you can’t praise someone, then say less.”
“Big Brother Zhang, which way next? Do we need to scout now?” Xu Shaowen fiddled with the game console. There was an exit glowing white on the game screen.
“Right away.” Zhang Qian scanned around. There were at least twenty or thirty fierce ghost portraits in this studio. The box Feng Quan had given was still empty. Wouldn’t it be a waste not to pack them up and take them?
He got to work, channeling true qi into his hand and easily prying off the nearest portrait.
However, before he could be happy, the portrait turned into a puddle of pus on the ground, emitting a foul, nauseating smell like rotten meat fermented for months.
“Fakes?” Zhang Qian was unwilling to give up and tore off several more under the resentful gaze of the fierce ghost in the painting. Without exception, all these paintings decayed, leaving only a few puddles of disgusting black mucus.
