Chapter 135: Children’s Laughter (14)
Yan Shixun never got a response from the ghost child. Instead, what came first was a disturbance inside the house.
Just as Yan Shixun’s attention was drawn to a sudden banging sound from inside the fireplace, a loud creak of a door opening echoed from the corridor behind the first-floor living room.
The sound was slow and grating, so sharp it made one’s teeth ache. In the otherwise silent house, it felt like something was crawling up along their backs.
Zhao Zhen, who had also been on full alert and watching the fireplace, was startled by the noise. He hurriedly turned his head to look.
The dark corridor, unlit by any lamp, was completely swallowed by the shadows, but footsteps slowly started to echo.
It sounded like someone’s leather shoes were pressing down on the wooden floor, producing a steady creaking sound, yet when they strained their ears to listen carefully, it seemed like there was nothing at all.
Only the sound of the wind whistling through the cracks in the windows expanded infinitely in the stillness.
No one among them spoke first.
The wick of the kerosene lamp flickered violently a few times, making their shadows on the wall waver and sway as if something else was hiding within the shadows, alive and independent of their bodies.
The shadows flailed their arms and legs wildly across the walls, grinning silently with jagged mouths.
Yan Shixun slowly shifted his gaze toward the direction where the door had first creaked open.
The sound of footsteps on the wooden floor grew closer and clearer, as if someone was steadily approaching the living room.
Yet within their field of vision, the corridor remained completely empty — no figure appeared.
However, the viewers watching the livestream saw it differently.
[Holy sh*t!!! What the hell is that thing?! Is that a person or a ghost? Is it even alive?!]
[Oh—my god!! That guy’s covered in blood!! Is there even that much blood in a human body?!]
[I must be seeing it wrong, right, right? The stuff dripping onto the floor where he walks… that’s just water, right? It has to be water!]
[…Don’t you think water is even creepier? Like, who soaks themselves in water while still wearing their clothes? Now that you said that, all I can think of is a corpse pulled out of a freezer, thawing and dripping…]
[Aaaah don’t say that!! I’d rather it be blood after hearing that!!]
[But with that much blood loss… can he even still be alive?]
[Hiss… wait! Something feels off! Look at Brother Yan’s eyes — he doesn’t seem to be seeing the guy at all. Same with Zhao Zhen. They’re not coroners or detectives, just regular people — if a normal person suddenly saw someone drenched in blood, there’s no way they’d stay this calm! I’d believe Brother Yan being used to it because of experience, but Zhao Zhen and Chi Yan too? That’s weird.]
[Exactly. With how cautious Brother Yan is, there’s no way he’d expose his back to that creepy little boy either! But right now, he’s acting like the kid isn’t even there.]
[Actually, it’s not that. Brother Yan *did* ask about it earlier, right? I think they really can’t see anything, but Brother Yan probably guessed something’s there.]
[…Okay, that’s even scarier. There’s literally a ghost standing right next to you, and you can’t even see it.]
[Holy crap! One second I’m watching them speeding through midnight streets, and the next second I’m thrown into this nightmare — Director Li, are you trying to kill me? My heart’s about to leap out of my chest.]
The audience watched helplessly as the livestream camera abruptly cut from Lu Xingxing’s car to the living room of the Jing residence.
In the deserted concession area at midnight, a lone rickshaw stood by the roadside. Li Xuetang, dressed as a rickshaw puller, was slumped unconscious in the seat, completely defenseless.
Around him, zombies dressed in old-era official uniforms began gathering, drawn by the scent of human flesh. Yellow talismans were stuck on their foreheads, and though their movements were stiff, they slowly shuffled toward Li Xuetang.
In the camera’s frame, one zombie’s bluish-black fingers were already reaching for Li Xuetang’s face.
Amid Lu Xingxing’s desperate scream — “An Nanyuan! Can you stop already?! I said I learned how to deal with zombies, not zombies AND corpses! I told you to tone it down, not turn this into a zombie apocalypse!!” — he noticed Li Xuetang’s presence. He floored the accelerator, aiming to crash into the rickshaw and scatter the approaching zombies.
The audience was holding their breath, hearts hammering wildly.
But the next second, the view spun violently and switched back to the Jing residence.
Many of the viewers had still been anxiously complaining, eager to see what was happening with Lu Xingxing and the others. But the moment a man covered in blood appeared, it was as if they had all fallen silent in unison — the barrage of comments on the screen instantly cleared out.
In a livestream with millions of viewers, several seconds passed before any new comments popped up.
This time, however, the audience’s fear and tension were entirely focused on the middle-aged man who had opened the door.
He wore a Taoist robe, but it was noticeably different from modern ones — it resembled the attire from the old days. His dark blue robe was soaked in some liquid, making it impossible to discern its original color under the dim corridor light.
The man staggered as he walked, like his brain couldn’t properly control his limbs, almost toppling over several times. His exposed skin looked uneven and torn, as if chunks of flesh had been ripped away.
Yet he seemed utterly unconcerned about his condition. His dull, lifeless eyes stared blankly as he stumbled straight toward Yan Shixun.
Strangely enough, the man, who showed no reaction to the environment before, suddenly seemed to regain awareness when he neared Yan Shixun. Struggling, he raised a hand toward him.
Many viewers screamed in horror, too terrified to keep watching.
[Aaaah what now! Brother Yan can’t even see him! If he tries to hurt Brother Yan, Brother Yan won’t even have a chance to fight back!]
[Wait, something’s off. It doesn’t look like he wants to hurt Brother Yan — more like he’s begging him for help.]
[Yeah, it really does! He’s even moving his mouth… Holy sh*t! His mouth is full of blood! His teeth look shattered too! Is this guy even still alive?!]
The man gestured at himself, then pointed frantically toward the child beside Yan Shixun. Blood pooled beneath his lifeless eyes, as if forcing blood tears to well up and fall.
He desperately tried to make Yan Shixun understand him, to save him — but Yan Shixun couldn’t see him at all.
The child hugging the ball tilted his head slightly. His small, formal romper suit made him look cute and polite. But when he glanced at the man, sheer terror surfaced on the man’s face, and he reached for Yan Shixun’s arm for protection.
The child gazed at the man with a look of pity, as if mocking his helpless struggle.
Despair?
The child opened his mouth in a sweet, innocent smile.
But his eyes seemed to ask — How does it feel, watching yourself walk toward death?
No one can see you. No one can hear you. To everyone else, you’ve long ceased to exist. All your cries for help will go unanswered. And the exorcists? They’ll just treat you like trash to be eliminated.
No one will help you.
Just like no one helped me back then.
Now….. you finally get a taste of it too.
The man seemed to understand what the child was conveying. His terror grew; he opened his mouth wide as if wanting to scream. But another immense force pressed down upon him, forcibly dragging him away from Yan Shixun and steering him in the opposite direction.
It was as if an invisible hand was pushing him, forcing him, step by step, toward the fireplace.
Yan Shixun stared at the seemingly empty space in front of him, his brow gradually furrowing.
Something felt wrong…
Yan Shixun could feel a cold, oppressive presence drawing closer with each step, as if someone invisible was staring right at him.
Yet there was no malice in that gaze. Instead, it carried an emotion he was familiar with — the same desperate pleading of restless ghosts that used to come to him for help.
The audience watching the livestream was on the verge of losing their minds.
[I knew it! I knew it! That guy and the kid are definitely in on it together! Didn’t you see them just now, like they were communicating? They’re working together!]
[It’s over! What’s going to happen to Brother Yan and Zhao Zhen, wuwuwu! Are those two going to team up against Brother Yan? Brother Yan can’t even see them, how’s he supposed to fight?]
[Uh… something feels off? Where is this going? Why is that guy suddenly walking toward the fireplace… Holy shit!!!! What is he doing? Suicide??]
[He jumped into the fireplace! What the hell is this move!]
[Wasn’t he already dead? He shouldn’t be able to kill himself again, right? And there’s no fire in the fireplace… fire— Holy shit! There’s fire now! I’m never speaking carelessly again. I just said it, and it suddenly caught fire. That’s way too scary!]
[Wait, wasn’t he already dead? Then why is he screaming like that? I’m about to lose my mind from fear. My hand was trembling even when I hurried to turn the volume down.]
[I’d believe it if Brother Yan didn’t react, but Chi Yan and the others are still so calm? I don’t buy it. There’s definitely something wrong here!]
The man stiffly lifted his leg, stepping over the small wrought-iron fence in front of the fireplace. Then, forcing his adult body into a space far too cramped for him, he squeezed himself inside.
Just as his figure fully disappeared into the fireplace, a “whoosh!” sounded from within the pitch-black hollow, and flames burst to life. Tongues of fire licked hungrily at the man, mercilessly devouring him whole.
The man threw back his head and let out a heart-wrenching, soul-shaking scream of agony, as though even his very spirit were being scorched, yet all he could do was be burned alive.
The sudden blaze inside the fireplace immediately caught Yan Shixun’s attention. He didn’t even have time to wonder how a fire could ignite without any wood or kindling when he saw a black figure fall from the chimney above, crashing heavily into the flames below.
“Thud!”
It was the same strange noise he had heard just moments before.
Yan Shixun froze for a moment, then quickly realized what it was.
A corpse.
Beside him, Chi Yan cried out in fear, while Zhao Zhen’s voice trembled with uncertainty. “Brother Yan, wh-what was that?”
Yan Shixun didn’t have time to explain. He strode forward quickly, grabbed the ornate iron poker meant for tending firewood, and stuck it into the flames to prod at whatever had fallen down.
His suspicion was soon confirmed—it was indeed a corpse.
But when Yan Shixun flipped the body over, turning its face toward him, he was stunned.
He had seen that face before.
—It was the very same master who had died in the stairwell of the hotel.
The raging fire nearly crawled up the iron poker toward Yan Shixun. He immediately snapped back to his senses. While calling out for Zhao Zhen to find a water source to extinguish the fire, he began muttering the incantation for a talisman to expel evil, trying to stop the fire from its origin.
There had been no kindling, no one to light the fire, and given the strange setting—
Yan Shixun quickly understood that this was a blaze ignited by ghostly energy. Only by dispelling the ghostly presence could the flames be put out.
Zhao Zhen also reacted quickly. He found a bucket of water in the kitchen at the back and ran back at top speed, splashing water onto the corpse’s burning clothes.
The fire quickly weakened and eventually died out completely.
Only the corpse remained, curled up in a grotesque position inside the fireplace, its body blackened by burns, presenting an exceptionally horrifying sight.
Yan Shixun called Zhao Zhen over to help lift the body out of the fireplace.
—The corpse had somehow appeared here with them in such a bizarre way. Moreover, Yan Shixun keenly noticed that the clothes the corpse wore were very different from what he had seen in the hotel stairwell.
Though the fierce flames had rapidly carbonized much of the corpse’s clothing, turning many clues to ash—
Yan Shixun clearly remembered that when Director Li Xuetang had invited the master, the man had died in a casual suit. Now, he was wearing Taoist robes.
Moreover, the Taoist robe wasn’t a modern style, but instead resembled the ancient design from a hundred years ago that Yan Shixun had once seen.
Because of this, Yan Shixun suspected that even the dead man might have held an identity — he might even have been one of the eleven characters from the script.
But just by looking, the answer wouldn’t reveal itself. So, Yan Shixun neatly dragged the body out, intending to inspect it more carefully in a larger space.
Zhao Zhen furrowed his brows tightly. Even with his polished acting skills and years of expression management in the entertainment industry, he couldn’t completely hide his fear and disgust now, barely managing to suppress the urge to recoil.
The audience watching felt a wave of sympathy, genuinely sharing in his horror.
[Zhao Zhen’s expression looks even worse than when my little brother woke up and found a huge cockroach crawling into his mouth…]
[?? Honestly can’t tell who’s more miserable, your brother or Zhao Zhen.]
[How can any normal person stay calm in a scene like this? It’s easy to act tough when you’re just playing a game, but if people actually saw a corpse in real life, who knows how badly they’d cry. Especially since this one was burnt… Just thinking about the smell of burnt pigskin from back home is making me suffocate.]
[Actually, now that I think about it, one of the earlier comments makes sense — Brother Yan really can’t see that person. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have waited until after the fire started to try and save the body.]
[It also seems like he can’t see the child either. Brother Yan walked right past the kid without dodging. If he had seen him, he would have instinctively avoided him. Plus, the kid is really strange — any normal child would’ve been bawling at a scene like this. Even someone as composed and mature as Zhao Zhen nearly threw up, yet that kid just stood there, silently holding a ball and staring at Brother Yan, like he was observing him.]
[Tsk… I’m lying under my covers and I still got chills from that. And it looks like the body fell down from the fireplace. No one even paid attention to the fireplace before, meaning the corpse might have been hidden there all along.]
[Imagine everyone sitting around in the living room, while a dead body was hidden right there with them the entire time… Ugh, I just got goosebumps. This is so terrifying.]
[Director Li, please, no more shots of the corpse! It’s all charred, and some parts have the burnt skin peeling off, exposing flesh and blood vessels underneath. I’m about to throw up, seriously, ugh.]
[Is Director Li maybe being *too* bold? Is this really what a domestic horror film is supposed to be like? I thought it would be something like two people falling in love, fighting, storming off, getting scared by a ghost, only to find out it was all a hallucination caused by untreated mental illness… something along those lines. But this? It’s intense right from the start!]
[Am I the only one starting to think this script wasn’t made by the director but was actually provided by the Heart-Pounding Journey of Ninety-Nine Days production team? It feels way more like their style than something the director would normally shoot.]
[Speaking of Director Li, if it really was him filming, then why was he in that rickshaw by the roadside? Shouldn’t he have been behind the camera? Ahhh, I’m getting so anxious not knowing what happened to him!]
Zhao Zhen fought through the nausea in his gut. After helping Yan Shixun move the corpse out, he immediately threw aside the cloth they had been using to wrap their hands, as if he couldn’t get away fast enough.
Meanwhile, Chi Yan, who had been hiding on the other side of the living room, suddenly seemed to gather her courage. Though hesitant, she eventually walked over to the body.
The moment she got a clear look at the face — surprisingly intact despite the fire — Chi Yan let out a sharp scream, her beautiful eyes widening in terror, her entire face stricken with fear.
Yan Shixun caught her expression without missing a beat. He immediately shot her a suspicious glance and asked, “You know him?”
Chi Yan forced out a stiff smile. “Of course. Wasn’t he the master from the opening ceremony?”
“No.” Yan Shixun slowly straightened up and looked directly at her.
His sharp eyes were like lightning cutting through dark clouds. “You know that’s not what I meant. You knew him even before the opening ceremony, didn’t you?”
“At the ceremony, he kept avoiding making eye contact with you… He clearly didn’t want others to know you two were acquainted.”
Step by step, Yan Shixun slowly pressed closer to her. “You knew each other from years ago, didn’t you? And he helped you do something — something he later regretted and didn’t want anyone to find out about. Why cover it up? Was it something that would get him into trouble? Or was it something so disgraceful it would ruin his reputation today?”
“Chi Yan, the sins clinging to you have nearly devoured your soul. But I bet you know that already. Otherwise, you wouldn’t be so desperate to find people to help you.”
Yan Shixun laughed coldly as he accused, “The ghost child you raised — it was him who helped you back then, wasn’t it?”
The color drained from Chi Yan’s face as she stared at Yan Shixun in horror.
Now, the ghost child had broken free from its master’s control and grown so strong that no one could resist it.
The master who had initially conducted the ritual was already dead — a gruesome, horrifying death. Then who would be next?
And how would they die?
Just then, a soft, childlike giggle echoed through the living room.
“Giggle, giggle, giggle…”
At the same time, Yan Shixun suddenly seemed to sense something. He swiftly turned around, sharp gaze fixed on the floor-to-ceiling windows outside.
It felt like something was approaching — something carrying such a heavy, chilling aura that it was impossible to ignore.
——
Upstairs, the moment Chi Yan’s scream floated up from below, Zhang Wubing’s hands, which had been fastening his buttons, trembled violently. He shrank back like a quail.
He hesitated, wanting to step out of the walk-in closet to check what was happening, but just as he turned around, he met Ye Li’s cold, deathly gaze.
“Hurry up and change,” Ye Li said. Without Yan Shixun around, the warmth and humanity Ye Li usually carried seemed to have disappeared too. “As soon as you’re done, head downstairs.”
In other words: *I don’t want to waste time with you. I just want to find Yan Shixun and stay close to him.*
Somehow, driven by an instinctive fear of death, Zhang Wubing fully understood the unspoken threat behind Ye Li’s words. He quickly ducked his head like a rabbit and desperately fumbled with the buttons, not daring to waste another second.
“Strange.” Zhang Wubing had been about to walk out of the cloakroom, but he suddenly felt that something about the huge full-length mirror seemed off. Under the pressure of feeling like Ye Li was about to kill him with his glare, he reluctantly stepped back and stood in front of the mirror again, carefully examining it to figure out what had caught his attention.
Then Zhang Wubing noticed that although the surface of the mirror seemed uneven, when he ran his hand over it, it felt smooth without any dents.
Feeling puzzled, Zhang Wubing followed the strange pattern with his fingers, pressing along the surface.
When he reached the very bottom, he frowned at the mirror for a long moment. Then, without meaning to, his fingers brushed against something, and with a loud “bang!”, the edge of the mirror suddenly popped open, revealing a crack.
Caught completely off guard, Zhang Wubing let out a startled yell and stumbled back two steps.
Yan Li, who had just been about to push open the door and leave, froze in his tracks and turned back, looking at Zhang Wubing with an expressionless face.
All Zhang Wubing could hear was the pounding of his own heart, thumping wildly in his ears. As he watched in tense silence, barely daring to breathe, the mirror seemed to be pushed outward by some invisible force, the crack at its edge slowly widening.
A strand of black hair tumbled out from inside the mirror and fell onto the floor.
At that moment, Zhang Wubing instinctively opened his mouth to shout for Brother Yan to save him, feeling like his heart was about to leap out of his throat.
But in the next second, as the mirror swung open to a certain angle, a heavy object inside suddenly lost its support, crashing out through the opening and falling to the ground.
Zhang Wubing almost performed a standing high jump right then and there.
What stopped him was the face that appeared from amidst the black hair—a familiar face.
It was Bai Shuang, who had been missing all this time.
Zhang Wubing hadn’t expected this at all. He froze for a couple of seconds, then hurriedly rushed forward, anxiously reaching out to check Bai Shuang’s pulse.
Bai Shuang had always been a sweet and lovable girl, but now, she had lost her signature smile. Her face was as pale as paper, and she lay unconscious on the ground. Her skin was so cold that when Zhang Wubing touched her, he almost thought he was touching a corpse.
Fortunately, Zhang Wubing quickly realized that although Bai Shuang’s pulse was weak, it was still beating.
He was so overwhelmed with relief that he nearly burst into tears. Out of habit, he turned around, wanting to call out to Yan Shixun: “Brother Yan, Bai Shuang seems to have lost consciousness, she needs…”
Halfway through speaking, Zhang Wubing remembered—Yan Shixun wasn’t here.
But he was too timid to trouble Ye Li. For some reason, he always felt that Ye Li’s gaze toward him was frightening, especially whenever he got close to Yan Shixun.
Smooth, silky fabric slid across the floor, and a magnificent long skirt shimmered beautifully with every step. Ye Li walked over at a slow, unhurried pace, lowering his crow-feather-like eyelashes to look at Bai Shuang, lying on the ground.
“She’s not dead,” Ye Li said. Then, seeing Zhang Wubing’s nervous, tearful face, he paused for a moment and reluctantly added, “Don’t worry.”
“Her name isn’t listed in Fengdu. Her time hasn’t come yet.”
For Ye Li, this was already the best attitude he could muster toward anyone besides Yan Shixun. But clearly, Zhang Wubing didn’t feel the same.
Sniffling, Zhang Wubing spoke with a voice still choked with suppressed sobs, “Then why won’t she wake up?”
Ye Li looked at him expressionlessly.
—If those past exorcists, who had once been desperate and fearful but could never get the gods and spirits to help them, saw Zhang Wubing behaving like this, they would probably have been scared to the point of fainting.
Those exorcists, once full of despair and helplessness, had knelt between heaven and earth, begging for a miracle of life, hoping the great Dao would not be so heartless. Yet, both heaven’s Dao and the gods had coldly rejected them. Fengdu never softened toward life and death.
Thus, even exorcists and cultivators who enjoyed great fame and status in the mortal world had learned that the gods were merciless.
Yet now, after a few seconds of silence, Ye Li still opened his mouth: “Her head.”
Ye Li raised his long, slender fingers and pointed in the air at Bai Shuang’s hair, then explained to the still clueless Zhang Wubing, “There’s a wound on her head.”
Zhang Wubing suddenly understood, exclaiming, “Oh, oh, oh! Why didn’t you say so earlier?”
Ye Li: “……”
He silently reminded himself that if he wanted to maintain his marriage with Yan Shixun, he also had to accept this “daughter” and couldn’t just turn his back and leave.
Otherwise, Yan Shixun would surely ask him why he hadn’t brought their “daughter” back with him.
Suppressing his impatience, Ye Li forced himself to stay calm, watching Zhang Wubing clumsily examine the top of Bai Shuang’s head.
Unlike the fumbling Zhang Wubing, Ye Li seemed able to see the truth of the world itself. With just one glance, he understood that Bai Shuang had fainted and become weak because someone had struck her head.
If Zhang Wubing were more experienced, he would have noticed that there were blood clots at the roots of Bai Shuang’s hair, traces of blunt force trauma, and even a small piece of glass tangled in her hair. These matched the shattered wine glass downstairs in the living room.
Chi Yan had told Yan Shixun that when she woke up, she had fallen onto the carpet, and there had been broken glass beside her. Yet now, some glass shards had somehow ended up in Bai Shuang’s hair on the second floor, where she had been knocked unconscious and then hidden behind a mirror.
Ye Li lifted his eyelids slightly, his cold gaze settling on the mirror in front of him.
The second floor was divided into two sections—one side belonged to Lin Ting, the other to Jing Bin’s two daughters.
Perhaps because they were of similar age, or because they got along well, the two girls shared a study room and a walk-in closet. It was clear that at their age, they were naturally playful.
Ye Li, who had once walked through storms of bullets and fire, had coldly observed this world from up close, yet stray bullets had never touched him.
In that era, following the guidance of the Dao, Ye Li had once encountered Jing Bin.
Dressed in a meticulously tailored suit, Jing Bin had stood at the street corner, passionately addressing the youth, while also bending down with a gentle smile to help vendors pick up their fallen goods.
Ye Li had once spoken with Jing Bin.
“All I seek is a clear and bright world,” Jing Bin had said, his eyes pure and resolute. “If I could hear the Dao in the morning, I would be willing to die that very evening.”
Thus, Ye Li understood that Jing Bin had always been fully aware of his situation from the very beginning. He knew that if he continued to pursue his ideals, he would offend many, be targeted, and possibly assassinated.
Jing Bin did not care about his own life, but he deeply cared about the safety of his family. He entrusted Jing Xiuwen to friends he could trust, ran tirelessly for Lin Ting’s sake, and naturally, he would not overlook the two underage children at home.
The mirror that Bai Shuang had been stuffed into was actually a hidden safe room that Jing Bin had prepared for his children.
The mirror used imported technology from that era, concealing a small space behind it, big enough to shelter two or three people. In times of crisis, the girls could have hidden there to escape danger.
Yet now, that tiny safe room had been used by someone to hide Bai Shuang’s unconscious body.
Her head had been smashed, and she was rapidly losing strength and body heat. Wearing only a thin school uniform, if she had been left hidden behind that mirror overnight in this season’s temperatures, it was almost certain she wouldn’t have survived until sunrise.
And the one who had harmed her…
Ye Li lowered his gaze, sweeping it across Bai Shuang—and immediately understood.
“Ah! Found it!” Zhang Wubing exclaimed. Because Bai Shuang was a girl, he had been hesitant about checking her injury. He nervously fumbled around the top of her head for a long time, fists clenched tightly, before finally locating the wound.
Zhang Wubing immediately turned around, beaming with excitement, seeking praise from Ye Li: “It’s true! She really has a wound! You’re amazing—how did you figure it out?”
Having already understood everything, Ye Li turned around coldly, patience completely exhausted. He had no intention of wasting more time with Zhang Wubing.
—Perhaps because he had spent too much time around Yan Shixun, Ye Li had unconsciously raised his expectations for other people to Yan Shixun’s level, assuming others would be just as sharp and intelligent.
But now, watching Zhang Wubing fumble as if locating a single wound was a world-ending task, Ye Li was reminded once again of the true nature of the mortal world.
Seeing Ye Li abruptly walk away, Zhang Wubing froze in place. “Eh? Hey, hey, hey? Why are you leaving?”
“I thought… I thought we were finally getting closer QAQ.”
Ye Li: He suddenly realized—maybe he didn’t actually need a daughter. Having Yan Shixun was more than enough.
Descending the stairs, Ye Li’s steps halted when he caught sight of the living room scene.
While he and Zhang Wubing were upstairs, the rest of the production team had found their way into the Jing residence.
Lu Xingxing sat on the sofa, clutching his head with both hands, looking utterly miserable, on the verge of tears—a pitiful sight completely at odds with his flamboyant, glittering green suit adorned with sparkling diamonds.
On the carpet beside the sofa lay a half-charred corpse.
Yan Shixun’s coat tail was lifted slightly by his elbow. He stood nearby with his hands on his hips, frowning deeply as he studied the body, trying to glean some useful information.
An Nanyuan sat stiffly, uneasily staring at the corpse, clearly frightened. In contrast, Song Ci, seated beside him, was mocking his cowardice with a sneer.
As for Li Xuetang, he was leaning heavily against a cabinet by the wall, still visibly shaken and struggling to adjust to the situation.
In that silent, oppressive atmosphere, even the faint sound of Ye Li’s gown brushing against the steps as he descended the gilded staircase made the already tense, jumpy people instinctively look up.
The moment they saw Ye Li, awe flashed through their eyes, as if their vision had been suddenly illuminated.
Ye Li’s figure was by no means androgynous. On the contrary, he had a solid, tall frame, standing at about 1.9 meters, with a physique comparable to that of a top male model—making it instantly obvious that he was a grown man.
However, the long skirt—which should have been worn by a woman—did not look the slightest bit out of place on him. Instead, it gave off a mysterious and ancient kind of beauty.
Lu Xingxing stared blankly at Yan Li for a long time before he hesitantly shifted his gaze away.
Yan Shixun hurriedly looked up at Ye Li and asked, “You’re back. Where’s Xiao Bing? Wasn’t he changing clothes? What happened—couldn’t button up?”
Ye Li indifferently withdrew his gaze from the others and turned to Yan Shixun. “When I was coming downstairs, it seemed like something interesting happened here?”
Smiling naturally, he leaned closer to Yan Shixun and said, “Coincidentally, I also discovered a few things upstairs.”
Ye Li took hold of Yan Shixun’s hand and led him toward the stairs.
Meanwhile, Li Xuetang asked curiously, “I still recognize the others, but who’s this?”
Ye Li gave a perfunctory, emotionless self-introduction, as if simply brushing him off.
“Assistant director.”
As Lu Xingxing stood up, he lightly patted Director Li Xuetang on the shoulder and advised in a tone of someone experienced, “Sometimes it’s better not to be too curious.”
“Ever heard the saying ‘curiosity killed the cat’?” Lu Xingxing shrugged, clearly unconcerned about Ye Li’s true identity.
To him, it was enough that this person was someone his master uncle Yan Shixun brought along.
Besides, he had a vague feeling that the pressure this man gave off was even more overwhelming than that of his grandmaster, Taoist Li. Even the current abbot of Haiyun Temple and the other senior Taoist masters could not bring about this sense of danger.
“Maybe he’ll be Master Aunt one day,” Lu Xingxing added offhandedly, raising his arm and slinging it casually over Director Li Xuetang’s shoulders, as if they were long-time buddies.
Strangely enough, by the time they had walked from the living room to the stairs, Li Xuetang felt that he had somehow grown much closer to Lu Xingxing.
He vaguely sensed that something was off, but for the life of him, he couldn’t recall what it was.
Trailing behind them and having witnessed the whole scene, An Nanyuan let out an amazed sigh: So this was the power of natural friendliness? No one could resist the warmth of Lu Xingxing’s mouth.
Meanwhile, when Ye Li heard Lu Xingxing call him “Master Aunt,” the smile at the corners of his lips deepened slightly.
It seemed the Taoists from Haiyun Temple truly cultivated more profoundly than those from other places.
He recalled that Shixun’s master, Li Chengyun, also came from Haiyun Temple.
Perhaps next time a Taoist from Haiyun Temple came seeking his help, he would consider giving them a response.
Ye Li chuckled lightly and tightened his grip on Yan Shixun’s hand.
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