39: Chapter 38 The Strange Apartment Under the Well

As his body gradually descended...

...a world of pitch blackness followed. There was nothing here, only total darkness.

Fortunately, this state did not last long. After a ripple in space, Ye Xiu arrived at an unexpected place.

An old-era building.

He had thought he might encounter powerful Ghost-creatures below, or perhaps monsters that were difficult to kill.

But looking at the apartment building before him...

...the surprise on Ye Xiu's face was palpable.

He observed for a moment, clenched his fist, and directly launched a strike of [Pride of the World].

Boom!

The blood-colored shockwave illuminated the boundless world of darkness.

There was no obstruction.

The light of [Pride of the World] slammed directly into the somewhat dilapidated apartment building.

There was no violent explosion.

The blood-colored shockwave dissipated eerily in front of the building.

It seemed as if there was a rule-based barrier in front of the apartment building, blocking all energy impacts.

"Rules?"

Ye Xiu's expression turned solemn.

He couldn't think of any possibility other than rules that could silently neutralize [Pride of the World].

Looking at the apartment building shrouded in darkness before him...

...he fell silent for a moment.

Then, he stepped inside.

The tap-tap-tap of his footsteps was crisp.

In this silent world, the sound carried very, very far.

Crack...

The iron gate at the entrance was violently pried open.

Ye Xiu walked smoothly into the pitch-black hallway.

The second-floor corridor was very long.

Over thirty meters.

There were ten rooms on each side, all with old security iron doors, and rusty chains hung from them.

It seemed as if they were meant to prevent whatever was inside from coming out.

Ye Xiu applied a bit of force with his foot.

With a boom...

...the security door was kicked open violently. The massive commotion made the entire floor tremble.

The room was about thirty square meters.

The aged furniture was arranged somewhat haphazardly.

In the corner where the refrigerator stood, a dark figure was curled up, its back to the iron door.

Even the sound of the iron door being kicked off its hinges didn't make it look back.

Ye Xiu didn't bother with words.

His Blood-qi transformed into chains and lunged directly at the figure in the corner.

Sizzle...

Wooo...

The crimson chains instantly bound the figure in the corner, and crackling sparks ignited immediately.

It let out a shrill scream.

The sound was very piercing, unlike anything a human could produce.

Only a few seconds passed.

The figure bound by the chains was instantly and completely melted by the scorching flames.

"So weak?"

Ye Xiu shook his head slightly.

The oddities here didn't seem as powerful as he had imagined.

Against his Blood-qi transformed into chains...

...they couldn't even manage to struggle.

Extending his Qi Sense, Ye Xiu wanted to investigate.

But the released Qi Sense was like a stone sinking into the ocean; it instantly lost all sensation in the darkness.

"Blocked by rules?"

Ye Xiu sighed softly. Eerie rules were hard to understand, unlike other rules that fell within his scope of knowledge.

Since his Qi Sense couldn't detect anything...

He simply switched to brute-force mode.

He left the room.

With a boom, he kicked open the door opposite him.

Before he could even step inside...

...he saw a dark shadow rush forward.

"Courting death."

Ye Xiu snorted coldly and reached out, grabbing the rushing shadow directly.

Looking at the Ghost-creature that resembled a corpse, he covered it directly with Blood-qi.

In just an instant...

...the Ghost-creature, held firmly by the neck, immediately exploded with intense sparks like a candle doused in gasoline.

"Fragile."

With Ye Xiu's disdainful snort...

...his figure flickered rapidly as he swept through the entire floor.

Boom

Boom

Boom...

A series of violent roars echoed continuously.

All the apartment rooms along the corridor were soon slaughtered clean.

The Ghost-creatures here didn't seem to have any thoughts.

They were sealed within the apartments.

Facing Ye Xiu's sudden intrusion, they couldn't even manage an instinctive attack before being physically exorcised.

In the stairwell leading to the third floor...

...it was very dark.

A Faceless Man blocked the stairs at the corner.

Ye Xiu had no words to spare.

His Blood-qi turned into chains and tore him apart directly.

Tap, tap, tap...

Amidst several heavy footsteps...

Ye Xiu arrived at the third-floor corridor. Seeing the same layout as the second floor, he wasn't surprised at all; apartment buildings were mostly identical.

There were rarely exceptions.

The only difference between the third and second floors was that the rooms on the third floor had no chains.

Furthermore, they were all open, which left him somewhat puzzled.

Roar

A roar came from the room at the end of the hallway.

Ye Xiu frowned slightly. With a step, he was instantly deep within the hallway.

Inside the room...

...was a figure bound to a hospital bed with white bandages.

Its face was deathly pale, possessing the unique trait of Ghost-creatures: eyes that were all white with no pupils.

"Let me set you free."

Ye Xiu shook his head slightly, and his Blood-qi turned into chains, lunging straight for the ghost on the bed.

"Don't... kill... me..."

At the critical moment, the ghost spoke in a raspy human voice.

"It actually has self-awareness?"

The chains dissipated. Ye Xiu approached the bed and looked at the ghost trapped by the cloth strips; with a wave of his hand, all the strips snapped.

"What's the situation here? Where is the Source Ghost? If you can't answer, you can die." Ye Xiu asked several questions in succession.

"I've been tied up ever since I gained consciousness..."

The ghost sat up from the bed and answered submissively, "The Source Ghost is a monk. He's on the sixth floor..."

Before it could finish...

Ye Xiu kicked the bed over directly.

His Blood-qi turned into fire.

Instantly burning the stunned ghost to death.

"I don't like being lied to, not even by ghosts."

Ye Xiu turned and left the room. This bound ghost's words were contradictory; it actually thought it could fool him...

The path to the fourth floor was very smooth.

He didn't encounter a single Ghost-creature.

But when Ye Xiu reached the fourth floor, he found that there were many more Ghost-creatures here.

They seemed to be waiting for him, all gathered at the stairwell entrance, rushing to attack the moment he appeared.

Ye Xiu shook his head slightly, and his Blood-qi erupted like a shockwave.

Instantly evaporating all the ghosts.

Before he could make his next move, the ghosts that had been evaporated by the Blood-qi actually rushed out from the rooms again, their numbers increasing.

"Interesting."

Ye Xiu's Blood-qi erupted as he directly activated [Tiangang Body Protection].

The blood-red light was dazzling in the dark hallway. A protective barrier appeared, immediately isolating the impacts of all the ghosts.

The scorching flames, like a chemical weapon, ignited all the rushing ghosts.

Yet even so, these ghosts seemed to have no sense of life or death, as if they were tireless.

They charged forward one after another.

The sizzling sound was constant.

The fire spread, completely igniting the entire hallway.

Seeing the endless stream of ghosts still rushing out of the rooms, Ye Xiu was somewhat speechless. He reached out and condensed a Crescent Blade made of Blood-qi in his hand.

With wide, sweeping strikes...

...he pushed forward all the way, reaching the fifth floor in just a few moments.

"They didn't follow me to the fifth floor?"

Ye Xiu glanced at the endless ghosts stuck on the fourth floor, feeling slightly surprised.

Can they not come up?

He shook his head and didn't investigate further, deciding to finish exploring everything first.

On the fifth floor...

...there was nothing unusual; it was terrifyingly quiet.

Ye Xiu patrolled back and forth but found nothing out of the ordinary, so he had to continue toward the sixth floor.

In the passage to the sixth floor...

A Buddhist [Wan] Symbol was engraved on the stairwell wall, with black blood still flowing over it, looking extremely eerie.

He walked beneath the symbol and observed it for a while.

To his surprise, he found that this [Wan] Buddha Seal contained an extremely subtle rule-based energy that isolated the sixth floor from the fifth.

This discovery greatly surprised Ye Xiu.

Could there really be a monk up there?

With a hint of curiosity, Ye Xiu stepped up. Following a slight tremor of energy, he arrived on the sixth floor.