Chapter 25: The Haunted Mansion

  "Now, I'll give each of you a piece of mugwort. You must keep it in your mouths at all times, or else you'll be beaten by the ghostly wall." Ma Shi Jiu handed each of us a green leaf.

  It is well known that on Dragon Boat Festival, every household will insert a sprig of mugwort on the door lintel, among which there are many reasons, one of which is to ward off evil spirits. We quickly put the mugwort in our mouths and followed Cao Zhi.

  The sky had already darkened, and the fog was gradually dispersing. Since our flashlights were out of battery, Mao Shi Jiu gave each of us a candle to light up. The five of us walked in a line through the dense forest, accompanied by the faint glow of the candles, which from afar looked like the twinkling lights emitted by fireflies.

  I mischievously placed the candle flame under my chin, and the candlelight was reflected on my face. I stuck out my tongue at them and made a ghostly face. The faintly lit ghostly face in the darkness was indeed somewhat frightening, but they all said it was boring, which instantly extinguished my playful mood.

  "Hey, you guys are really something. Didn't we often play like this when we were young?" I said with a sprig of mugwort in my mouth, my words slightly indistinct.

  But neither of them paid attention to me, I closed my uninteresting mouth and continued on our way.

  Cao Jingru held a compass in his hand, the needle was constantly rotating, but the rotation angle was not too large, so we could determine the general direction, and we walked along that direction.

  As he walked, the compass suddenly spun around like crazy, Cao Shi Jiu tried to steady it, but the needle seemed possessed and wouldn't listen to commands, making it impossible to determine the ghost's location.

  "Is your compass broken?" I asked with a frown.

  "It must be haunted. Yang Guo, quickly drip a drop of blood on the Luopan, your yin energy physique is simply a ghost-finding treasure." Mao Shi Jiu urged me.

  I bit my finger so hard that it bled, and a drop of blood fell onto the egg. I quickly put my finger in my mouth, afraid to lose another drop of blood, or else I would have to eat several more eggs to make up for it.

  The blood had just dripped onto it, and the compass immediately calmed down as if it had seen its ancestor, pointing straight to the upper right, without even a slight deviation. Now we can confirm the location of the ghost.

  After walking for a short while, a dilapidated wooden hut appeared in our line of sight. How could there be signs of human presence in this desolate wilderness of the primeval forest? Moreover, as soon as we arrived here, the compass needle began to quiver slightly, indicating that the ghost was inside the hut.

  The wooden house was surrounded by several large trees, the dense foliage of which covered the roof. If not for being close to the house, it would be difficult to discover its existence from a distance. The house looked extremely dilapidated, with the door now only half intact and hanging crookedly on its hinges, covered in layers of cobwebs that made one feel uncomfortable all over. The yard in front of the door was overgrown with weeds, and the surrounding area was a dark, oppressive mass. We held candles and examined it inch by inch.

  Ah……suddenly heard Zhang Xinyu's sharp cry.

  "There are dead people's bones, so many!" Seeing Zhang Xinyu pointing at a place while backing away.

  We immediately gathered at the place she pointed to, which turned out to be a pit in the yard, filled with white bones. I picked up a skull and examined it carefully, and indeed it was human bone. Looking at the others, each skull had a hole on top, and I suddenly imagined Zhang Daomei from Ghost Street being sucked dry of his brain marrow, and a wave of nausea washed over me.

  "The ghost is in the wooden house, everyone be on guard." Ma Shi Jiu reminded.

  Mao Shi Jiu walked ahead, took out a wooden sword and cleared away the spider webs surrounding us. He prepared to enter the wooden hut, lightly pushing the half-hanging door on the beam. As soon as he touched it, the door fell down from the beam, giving us all a big fright. Mao Shi Jiu squatted down to examine the fallen wooden door. The base of the door seemed to have been soaked in water and had become deformed. It was called a door, but actually, it was just a piece of wood. The surface had already rotted out with many holes, so it fell off easily when touched, which was quite normal.

  Stepping into the wooden house, it was pitch black inside. Cao Jingru placed nineteen candles in the center of the wooden house, and the candles lit up the entire room.

  The house is filled with a mountain of white bones, and it's unknown how many evil deeds this wicked spirit has committed, or how many people it has killed.

  There is a lot of stagnant water in the house, probably because the fog was too heavy, the wooden house leaked, and the dew on the branches dripped onto the roof and seeped in. The white bones are soaked in the water and turned yellow, the whole house is very empty, except for a few large jars in the corner of the wooden house.

  There are five jars in total, two of which have been opened, and three of which are sealed with red cloth and talismans.

  "There's not just one ghost, you see, these five jars are for sealing ghosts. I reckon some eccentric person sealed five ghosts inside these five jars, but later, tourists who got lost in the primeval forest accidentally opened two of them. Those two ghosts went on a rampage, devouring all the lost or adventurous tourists, no wonder those who ventured into the forest never returned. Today, I must get rid of these evil spirits." Ma Shi Jiu said fiercely.

  "Be careful, I'll take care of the three gourds' ghosts first." After saying that, Mao 19 took out a mud-made bowl with half of the talisman paper stuck on it. He opened another three unopened gourds slightly and placed the bowl against the gap.

  "Tai Shang Lao Jun, urgent as a law, ghosts and spirits advance." Only to see a black thing drilling into the bowl, after which Mao Shi Jiu immediately pasted another half of the talisman paper, successfully capturing the ghost.

  I've seen so many ghost-catching scenes on TV using jars and bottles, but when I saw one using a bowl, I couldn't help but laugh out loud.

  "Come into the bowl." I laughed to myself with a "heh heh".

  In the end, they were all frozen by my joke and rolled their eyes.

  When I received the third ghost, there was no movement inside, and the ghost did not come out of the jar.

  "The ghost quickly enters, receive." Mao Shi Jiu read it again, but there was still no response from the jar.

  "There can't be none in here, right?"

  Cao Jing Yu was also puzzled, and directly tore off the talisman paper on the jar to investigate. Just as he opened the red cloth, a black air rushed out of the jar and flew towards him, hitting his body with a loud crash.

  "Think you can possess me?" Fortunately, I was prepared and still had the mugwort in my mouth, so the black air was repelled. The black air didn't linger and turned to attack others, but they all dodged it one by one. I think that ghost must have been frustrated, seeing that things weren't going its way. Wanting to escape, it was ultimately sucked into Mao Shi's bowl.

  "These few ghosts aren't very intelligent and are relatively easy to deal with, but the remaining two might be more difficult to handle. Where are they now? We'll need your blood again." Mao Shi Jiu wanted my blood again, so I painfully reopened the wound from just before and squeezed out a drop for him.

  Cao Jingyu took out the compass again, dripped blood on it, and the compass began to rotate. It couldn't stabilize in any direction, front, back, left, or right. Cao Jingyu held the compass vertically, pointing towards the ground, and the needle suddenly pointed in the opposite direction.

  "There's a ghost on top." Mao Shi Jiu suddenly lifted his head.

  As expected, on the ceiling of the wooden house, under the reflection of candlelight, there was a ghost shadow with its claws open, drooling and staring at us, as if it had taken all of us for delicious food.

  The ghostly shadow flashed down again, flying towards me once more. The aura was too heavy, and it seemed to be summoning ghosts. This time, the ghostly shadow didn't come for my body, but instead flew straight for my head. It wanted to devour my brain. At this moment, I was at a loss, and all I saw was the jade pendant on my chest flashing once, and then Chang Ai'er, dressed in white, charged up to my head, opening her bloody mouth wide. The ghostly shadow was startled by Chang Ai'er's sudden appearance and stopped in its tracks. The two sides began to stare each other down. The ghostly shadow bit down on Chang Ai'er's neck, and she let out a pained cry, being too weak and small.

  "Quickly, Cao Zhi Xian!" I shouted loudly.

  Cao Jingyu swiftly mounted his horse and thrust the wooden sword towards Guiying, who let out a pained cry and released her grip on Chang Aiyue's neck before flying out of the wooden hut.

  Mao Shi Jiu saw a ghostly figure and wanted to escape, but was chased out. By the time we reacted, Mao Shi Jiu had already been chased very far away.

  "Ai A, are you okay?" I asked, as A often got bitten by a ghost for saving me.

  "It's okay, be careful, I feel like there's another one nearby." Chang Ai reminded.

  "We're done for, we've fallen into the demon's trap. Mao Shi Jiu has been lured out and now we're isolated and helpless, at the mercy of another demon." Unexpectedly, Li Jian Tian actually reacted in time.

  "It's coming, you guys run fast, I'll hold it back first." Chang Ai Ai shouted loudly.

  The four of us immediately ran towards the door, but when we reached it, we found that the ghost had blocked it with thick branches and we couldn't get out.

  At this moment, a gust of wind suddenly rose, and I felt a sudden darkness in front of me. The candles in the room went out. From all sides came the sound of "shasha", like branches trembling. I immediately turned pale, my first reaction was to protect Lin Mo.

  We retreated into a corner of the cabin and I pulled out a lighter from my backpack, lighting up a small flame.

  "I went to light the candles." I trembled as I walked towards the center of the wooden house, and when I reached the center, a face was lit up, with its tongue stretched out, just like how they scared me. It's really karma. I dare not play this game again from now on.

  In my anxiety, I threw the lighter at the ghost's body, and it dodged with a twist. The only bright spot in the room was gone, and darkness returned once again.

  "Be careful, back away." Came the voice of Chang Ai Ai, and then I felt something floating in front of me. It was Chang Ai Ai, the ghost wanted to eat me, but she blocked it for me again.

  At this moment, I suddenly remembered something. I quickly ran to the backpack and took out the Town Ghost Golden Goblet. As soon as it was taken out, the golden goblet seemed to sense that there was a ghostly presence, shining brightly and illuminating the entire wooden house. All that could be seen was a monster with a pale face, green lips, only a few strands of hair, hunched over, its whole body shriveled up like it had been drained of all life, grasping at Chang Ai's neck.

  The golden light shone into the ghost's eyes at the same time, and the ghost immediately let go of its hands, covering its face and trying to avoid the golden light. The ghost was indeed afraid of the golden gourd, and Chang Ai Ai was also very scared, knowing that I had made it, and directly hid in the jade pendant. And I stepped closer and closer to the ghost, which became even more frightened, transforming into a shadow and trying to escape.

  I had a sudden inspiration and immediately imitated the handprint that Mao Shiying had once made, "Taishang Laojun, urgent as a law decree, ghosts gather." As I imitated it, I aimed the golden gourd at the ghostly shadow.

  The result had just been read out when a strange thing happened - the golden light disappeared.