Chapter 40.2 Red Embroidered Shoes 07
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In his panic, he noticed the talisman in his palm, closed his eyes, and hastily stuck it onto the corpse lying on the ground. The grip on his ankle loosened, allowing Director Jin to pull his leg free and run while shouting for help. This time, his voice carried, and Chen Yang swiftly arrived, taking three steps at once to reach the scene of the corpse on the step. “A walking corpse? Kou Xuanling, lend me the peach wood sword.”
Kou Xuanling tossed the peach wood sword, and without looking back, Chen Yang caught it and stabbed the escaping walking corpse on the step. The walking corpse let out a wail and dissolved into a pool of black liquid. Kou Xuanling ran up, receiving the peach wood sword thrown by Chen Yang, and wiped off the dirty residue from its surface.
Suddenly, they heard chaotic screams coming from the fifth floor, so they ran up to investigate. Qiu Shengmin stayed behind to look after Director Jin and Teacher Liu, finding refuge in a classroom. They knew they would only add to the chaos if they went up. Fortunately, they still had two talismans in hand, which they stuck on the classroom door to ward off evil spirits.
When Chen Yang and Kou Xuanling arrived, they found the entrance empty and bloodstains on the floor. They glanced at the scene briefly before knocking on the door three times. The door slowly opened, and upon seeing the two, Ling Hao immediately pulled them inside. “Masters, please save us quickly.”
Chen Yang noticed that there were still six people in the room, while Ling Hao and the others were playing the game called “Ghost at the Door,” originally with a total of fifteen participants. In less than half an hour, nine people had already died—a remarkably swift pace.
“Celestial Master Chen, I’m wealthy. I’ll give you however much money you want if you save my life.”
“Both Celestial Masters, I have money too. If you save me, I’ll give you not just twenty million, but forty million!”
“Celestial Master Chen, Celestial Master Kou…”
The six individuals rushed forward, pleading with Chen Yang and Kou Xuanling. Chen Yang interrupted them, “Hurry up, there’s not much time left. Keep playing.” After a pause, he added, “If there were still a dozen of you left, I might consider intervening.”
The six people didn’t understand Chen Yang’s intentions and were about to inquire but Chen Yang and Kou Xuanling, wearing expressions of disgust, decided to ignore them. Ling Hao quickly grasped their meaning, and the others soon caught on. Only Cheng Dong foolishly continued begging for help, earning the disdain of the others. In unison, they grabbed Cheng Dong and pushed him out the door.
The game they were playing, “Ghost at the Door,” involved fifteen participants. The rules were simple: all fifteen people entered the room together and selected one person to leave the room. Only one person could stand at the entrance, waiting for ten seconds before knocking on the door three times. The door would open, and another person would take their turn. The entire process had to be conducted in complete silence with no communication. The crucial moment arrived when someone opened a door and discovered something following them. At that point, nobody should panic or close the door. They simply needed to blow air to drive away the malicious entity and prevent it from entering.
However, now that nine people had died, it seemed they selfishly and fearfully closed the door upon seeing something behind the person entering, resulting in the unfortunate individual being killed by the entity that followed.
Chen Yang and Kou Xuanling were well aware of this fact and were unwilling to intervene and save them. Ling Hao and the others also understood, so they devised a plan to push the remaining people out and ensure their own survival. At this moment, Cheng Dong was forcefully pushed out the door, angrily shouting curses. However, he still wanted to continue playing, so he silently counted for several seconds before knocking on the door three times. As the door opened, he saw the terrified faces of the people inside looking past him, confirming that there were definitely ghosts behind him.
Cheng Dong’s face turned pale, his pupils widened in fear, cold sweat dripping from his forehead. He trembled uncontrollably, as an eerie chill enveloped him. In that moment, memories flooded his mind. He remembered the person who had been outside the door before him—Teacher Li. And then, he saw her, Bai Yan, the teacher in the red dress and red high heels, following closely behind. But something was terribly wrong. Bai Yan’s eyes lacked pupils, her neck drooped heavily on her chest, and her mouth contorted into a wide-open, twisted expression. To his horror, her unnaturally long tongue extended outward, sending shivers down his spine.
Out of fear, they closed the door, trapping Teacher Li and Bai Yan outside. They heard Teacher Li knocking on the door, calling for help, and then the sound of wild beasts devouring. Teacher Li’s screams gradually faded until there was silence.
Cheng Dong wanted to rush back inside and hoped they wouldn’t close the door. But the door mercilessly shut in front of him, and Cheng Dong threw himself at the door, pounding it while crying out, shouting, cursing, and pleading for help. The people inside the room remained silent, unmoved by his pounding.
Cheng Dong turned around and saw the vice principal, directors, teachers, and classmates who had died during the game. They were in a pitiful state, surrounding him, grabbing his limbs, and starting to gnaw on them.
A piercing scream echoed from outside the door. Inside the room, only Chen Yang, Kou Xuanling, and five others remained. Kou Xuanling opened the door, grabbed Cheng Dong, and threw him into the classroom, while Chen Yang whipped the malevolent ghosts with the red string around his wrist, lifting them up. Just as Kou Xuanling took out the peachwood sword, they heard the classroom door slam shut behind them. Shaking his head, Kou Xuanling coldly rebuked, “No hope for them!”
Chen Yang captured the spirits he had caught and sealed them inside a dice. He looked at the tightly closed classroom door and remarked, “If they had a chance to be saved, how could they have attracted these evil spirits?”
In the game “Ghost at the Door,” the entities that followed behind people outside the door were the debts those people owed. Thus, they sought revenge, and the deaths of the previous nine people were deserved punishments.
Kou Xuanling: “I just brought Cheng Dong into the classroom and caught a glimpse of a red figure following behind.”
“You must have mistaken, I didn’t see anything.”
Kou Xuanling fell silent for a moment. “Yes, I must have been mistaken.”
After dealing with the evil spirits outside the door, Kou Xuanling kicked open the classroom door, and a strong smell of blood instantly assaulted their senses. They stepped inside, turned on the lights, and what they saw was the gruesome sight of the six people who had met their demise, with the floor covered in fresh blood. Behind the six bodies stood Bai Yan, now transformed into a malevolent ghost.
Bai Yan: “Celestial Master?” Her voice had become coarse and unpleasant, likely due to the damage caused by hanging herself, altering the tone of her spirit’s voice as well.
“Bai Yan, is your vengeance over?”
Bai Yan didn’t speak.
“It should be over now. The mastermind who harmed you and drove you to your death has been killed by your own hands. It’s time to end it.”
“No. No!! How can it end? It can never end! Have you seen what this school has become? People have their humanity, and ghosts have their nature, but they lack even the most basic human qualities. They are nothing but a group of beasts! Selfish and cold-blooded, how many lives have they destroyed? They don’t deserve any sympathy. The victims can easily turn into perpetrators. No matter how kind you are to them, once it involves their own interests, they will turn heartless and betray you. Harming others, killing others—without hesitation, fear, remorse, or guilt. Are they worthy of living? They only deserve to die in fear and despair.” Bai Yan transitioned from calmness to madness, and finally returned to a state of calm. “You are celestial masters, and you haven’t harmed anyone. I can let you leave, as long as you promise to stay away from Jinshui High School and leave immediately.”
Kou Xuanling: “I’m afraid that as soon as we turn around, you will command the ghosts to attack us.”
Chen Yang: “You understand the nature of humans and ghosts, so you should also know that there are laws in both the mortal realm and the spirit realm. They killed you, and even if the mortal realm cannot punish your murderers, the Court of Great Yin records their sins. Similarly, if you take a life, the mortal realm may not be able to hold you accountable, but the underworld will record your sins. The people you previously killed may have deserved their fate, and their deaths may have been justified, but we cannot overlook the fact that you now plan to harm more innocent individuals. We cannot stand idly by in such a situation!”
Bai Yan, provoked into a rage, weakened the powers of Chen Yang and Kou Xuanling with the Ghost Portal Formation, causing her own strength to surge. The doors and windows of the classroom were tightly shut, and the lights flickered incessantly. Bai Yan hovered in mid-air, her long hair billowing, revealing a terrifying appearance reminiscent of her death. The six corpses lying before her slowly rose, launching an attack on Kou Xuanling and Chen Yang.
Chen Yang held one end of his red string in each hand, entangling the approaching undead’s hands to impede their movements, and then dislocated their joints. With their hands and feet joints dislocated, the corpses struggled and crawled on the ground, trying to bite at Chen Yang. He raised his foot and forcefully stepped on their heads, taking a few steps back, while the corpses struggled to move even with great effort, only managing small steps.
Kou Xuanling also dislocated the joints of the corpses, rendering them immobilized. Then, the two of them closed in on Bai Yan from opposite sides. Bai Yan’s red skirt billowed as she seized hold of the red string in Chen Yang’s hand, while her other hand gripped Kou Xuanling’s peachwood sword, seemingly unaffected by the harm caused by the two artifacts. With a strong tug, she brought the two of them closer, gripping their necks.
Chen Yang, struggling to breathe, noticed a noose slowly descending from above, aiming for his and Kou Xuanling’s necks. It was a hanging ghost’s noose, difficult to remove once ensnared. Chen Yang lowered his gaze, still holding one end of the red string in his hand, his fingertips touching an ancient bronze coin. He then flicked the bronze coin out of the red string, clenching it between his fingers and presenting it before Bai Yan.
Bai Yan was taken aback and in a moment of distraction, Chen Yang affixed the ancient copper coin on the center of her forehead. Instantly, Yang energy converged, immobilizing Bai Yan’s soul. Kou Xuanling took the opportunity to kick Bai Yan away, grasping the peachwood sword and thrusting it towards her chest. Meanwhile, Chen Yang formed a restraining mudra, pressing the ancient copper coin between his thumbs, exerting a force that subdued Bai Yan, much like the Great Emperor of Fengdu subduing spirits. Taking three quick steps, they sealed off Bai Yan’s escape route from both the front and back. Chen Yang placed the ancient copper coin on Bai Yan’s forehead, and in an instant, a golden light of Yang energy appeared, entrapping Bai Yan and eroding the Yin and Yang energy within her.
Du Shuo made his way unhindered through the vacant lot in the back hill, entering the bungalow where Bai Yan had committed suicide. After inspecting the surroundings, his gaze settled on the ceiling beam. He took two steps forward and stopped, turning to find Bai Feng standing at the doorway.
Bai Feng, whose seemingly harmless appearance had deceived many, instinctively sensed that the man before him was not easy to deal with. He dared not act rashly and issued a warning, “Don’t meddle in this, or you won’t even know how you died.”
“A Southern voodoo insect master?” Du Shuo calmly stated Bai Feng’s origin, ignoring his sudden change in expression. He retrieved a half-human-height stake of white jade from the ceiling beam, held it in his palm, and walked out of the house. Under Bai Feng’s gaze, he shattered the stake.
As the stake of white jade shattered, a terrifying aura of Yin energy surged forth like a tidal wave from the area around the mountain behind Jinshui High School, extending throughout the entire deep mountains centered around the school. Celestial masters in the capital city with considerable cultivation sensed the overwhelming Yin energy and rushed over overnight. Naturally, some individuals reported the situation to the Daoist Association and the Dafu Office.
Bai Feng exclaimed in terror, “Who are you?” How could he crush the Ghost-Taming Stake barehanded? He should know that the stake imprisoned lonely spirits and wild ghosts, which were inherently imbued with Yin and Yang energy. Even celestial masters needed to handle them with caution, to avoid being backlashed. “Could you be a Supreme Clarity Celestial Master?!”
“The details don’t matter. What matters is that you shouldn’t have set up the Ghost Portal Formation and then posted an order to deceive the celestial masters into coming here.”
Bai Feng retreated as he watched Du Shuo closing in. “Ordinary people can’t handle the fierce malevolent ghosts inside. I can only bring celestial masters in to uncover the truth and clear my sister’s name.”
As he spoke, faint rustling sounds came from underground, and soon the ground began to churn. A swarm of insects crawled up to the surface, but within a few steps, they all perished. Shocked, Bai Feng stared at Du Shuo as if he were a monster. He commanded all the insects that resided within nearby corpses to attack Du Shuo and then fled without looking back.
Du Shuo stood his ground and did not pursue. When those insects came within two meters of him, they all died. There was no need to chase after Bai Feng. The insects would backlash and cause his demise.
Chen Yang’s restraining mudra, the ancient bronze coin, Kou Xuanling’s peachwood sword, and the spiritual talisman experienced a significant increase in their magical power after the stake of white jade was shattered. They completely suppressed Bai Yan, rendering her powerless, and sealed her inside a dice. Afterward, the two of them collected all the lonely spirits and wild ghosts fleeing in all directions around the school building, capturing them effortlessly within the dice.
Fortunately, the City Lord here sensed the overwhelming Yin energy and dispatched ghost officials to deal with the lonely spirits and wild ghosts. Celestial masters from the vicinity also hurried over, joining forces to capture the fleeing lonely spirits and wild ghosts in the deep mountains and within the city.
The lonely spirits and wild ghosts, who had thought themselves mighty kings in the mountains, now truly experienced the might of the underworld officials and celestial masters. Reflecting on their past foolishness and ignorance, they regretted their actions, but it was too late. They could only flee in shame, but they were ultimately apprehended.
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