Chapter 195: Recover
“Crack—”
The wooden stick hit the mechanical structure inside the piano without any obstruction, and the parts that were already somewhat worn due to time corrosion immediately scattered and broke apart.
Tiny gears and bearings scattered, and the creation that had just looked extremely ingenious instantly turned into a pile of junk.
But the supernatural on the piano had not disappeared.
Those black and white piano keys were still jumping spontaneously, but without the assistance of the steel needle, such jumping was just somewhat eerie-looking and useless.
“The musical sound hasn’t stopped yet?” Zhang Qian raised his eyebrow, realizing the situation wasn’t as simple as he thought.
Although the hollows on the fierce ghost’s body were no longer contracting, the sound coming from inside its body showed no sign of weakening at all.
Compared to before, it seemed somewhat more chaotic?
“No, being able to recall the melody of this tune already explains a lot.” Zhang Qian suddenly realized.
Previously, listening to this music only gave a general feeling, with nothing else remembered, but now he not only remembered the content of the tune from the previous second, but also no longer felt that dizzying sensation.
In other words, the supernatural in the tune had disappeared?
Now this tune likely just sounded unchanged, but actually no longer had the ability to attack memory.
If so, the mannequin should have returned to normal too…
He lightly kicked it once.
The mannequin flew up and was easily caught by Zhang Qian in his hand.
The current mannequin still had limp limbs like it was dead, with no other changes apparent.
However, as the suppression of true qi was released, this guy’s eyelid finally twitched a few times, then slowly opened one one-eyed eye.
“Did I fall asleep?” the mannequin muttered to itself in a somewhat dazed manner.
Looking at the palm in front of it, it felt like it had walked on the edge of life and death, yet couldn’t recall what had just happened.
The attack of the musical sound had nearly wiped out the mannequin’s consciousness; during that time, it completely lost control of its body and perception of the outside world, not even noticing the passage of time.
From the mannequin’s perspective, it had just played the piano, and then inexplicably ended up grabbed by Zhang Qian.
“Right, that piano…”
The mannequin, coming back to its senses, was about to remind him when it turned its head and saw the scrapped piano.
“It’s fine now.”
“What do you mean fine? Quick, think of how we can leave this ghostly place.”
Zhang Qian turned the mannequin’s head to the other side, putting those restless audience members in front of its eyes. “With so many fierce ghosts, once they resurgence, the two of us can’t handle them. Did you remember any more clues from contacting the supernatural this time?”
In the instant the mechanisms inside the piano collapsed, that red-skirted dancer disappeared.
Correspondingly, the singing that could influence the supernatural had also dissipated from inside the hall.
But while the singing disappeared, the audience showed no sign of disappearing.
Instead, they glared covetously at Zhang Qian, their facial expressions even revealing obvious hatred, as if blaming him for ruining this performance.
“The chains can’t hold them much longer. If you still haven’t thought of another way to leave, we’re probably really going to have to return to the corridor through the main entrance…” Zhang Qian said with a serious expression.
In theory, these phantoms weren’t truly fierce ghosts at the start, so being bound by this chain specifically for suppressing fierce ghosts should give them no chance of resistance.
Previously, the influence on this iron chain was mostly due to the amplification of the singing, so now that the dancer had disappeared, the audience phantoms should soon be suppressed again.
However, things were developing in the wrong direction.
Looking around, nearly half of the audience had already stood up from their seats, and the aura they emitted wasn’t something ordinary ghost slaves could have.
It seemed a certain critical point had been broken; now the supernatural power of this audience group far exceeded its initial state.
Even the iron chains couldn’t fully suppress them, not only unable to reduce the number of audience members rising, but even allowing more phantoms to transform into fierce ghosts.
The speed of this transformation was still accelerating; perhaps in less than ten minutes, they could completely break free from the restraint of the iron chains.
“These guys…”
At the sight of the audience, the mannequin’s action involuntarily paused for a moment, but it quickly covered it up.
Although it could roughly guess the identity of these audience members, these memories seemed to offer no help for leaving the music hall.
“I don’t remember contacting any supernatural. In fact, aside from the ghost eye being gone, I didn’t notice any changes in myself.”
The mannequin hesitated, then suggested, “Let’s rush out. Delaying further won’t help.”
Now it seemed this music hall either had no exit or they hadn’t found the right method.
Either way, neither could be solved by spending time, so in the mannequin’s view, it was better to leave early and retreat to the corridor to plan.
“No change in memory, meaning you still don’t know what places the aisle connects to, nor can you confirm if fulfilling the pattern next time can avoid the music hall?” Zhang Qian frowned.
From the mannequin’s previous performance, it only knew the method to leave the aisle but not what was outside it.
If the aisle only connected to the music hall, that would be quite troublesome…
After all, they couldn’t stay in the aisle forever; if next time they entered the music hall and the audience not only hadn’t dispersed but all broke free, what then?
That really would leave no room for maneuver.
“Uh, yeah, I really don’t know…”
The mannequin responded somewhat awkwardly, then quickly added, “But with our abilities, living in the aisle indefinitely shouldn’t be a problem. As long as we wait for your brother ten days or half a month, I don’t believe these guys can still wait here.”
“Our abilities?” Zhang Qian asked mockingly with half-closed eyes.
The mannequin felt a bit guilty and pointed to its hollow eye socket. “Cough cough, as long as the eyeball is put back, I think I can still fight ordinary fierce ghosts.”
“Moreover, my strength can grow stronger. With your help, assembling a new body shouldn’t be hard, right?”
Indeed, the mannequin’s combat power mainly depended on the fierce ghosts it controlled. With the eyeball, it could handle ordinary fierce ghosts; controlling a few more could lead to a qualitative change through quantity.
But there were no conditions now to upgrade it, and no matter how much it upgraded, could it suddenly become stronger than these hundreds of fierce ghosts?
Compared to increasing the mannequin’s hard strength, Zhang Qian had another idea.
