Chapter 363
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Chapter 363: The Residence
Lin Qiye stood behind the door, his mental energy constantly focused on the scene outside.
He saw the white paper figure lightly land on the stone path in front of the gate, its pale face featuring a pair of asymmetrical eyes scanning the surroundings. After sizing up the courtyard where Lin Qiye was hiding for a moment, it turned around and continued its search ahead.
Seeing the paper figure leave, Lin Qiye let out a quiet sigh of relief. In a place like this, if he were to be entangled by a paper figure, his speed might not be enough to shake it off. At that point, the number of paper figures hunting him would only increase, and the scene outside the bronze giant door would inevitably repeat itself.
These paper figures employed too many strange methods, and Lin Qiye had no desire to get involved with them. He just wanted to leave this place as quickly as possible and reunite with his companions outside.
Lin Qiye reached out to try to open the courtyard door and leave, but at that moment, he suddenly froze in place.
The door, which had been easy to open and close, was now completely immovable. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t budge it even slightly!
Lin Qiye’s brow furrowed slightly, a sense of foreboding rising in his heart…
Suddenly—!
A soft sound came from the dark, silent house behind Lin Qiye!
He quickly turned around, his right hand instantly resting on the hilt of his sword, every muscle in his body tensed and ready to strike.
His gaze swept across the pitch-black courtyard and house, confusion filling his eyes.
Before entering this house, he had already scanned everything in the courtyard with his mental energy, confirming that there was no one here. If that was the case, where did that sound just come from?
Lin Qiye meticulously scanned the surroundings with his mental energy, comparing each object with the position it had been in before the sound. After a moment, he finally found the source of the noise.
In the northeast corner of the courtyard, a paper broom had fallen to the ground at some unknown time.
“A paper broom?” Lin Qiye’s brow tightened. He distinctly remembered that the sound had been crisp, as if a hard object had fallen to the ground. Even if it were a broom, it should have been a real one; how could paper make such a sound?
Creak—
Bang—!
The central door of the house suddenly swung open, then quickly closed again, the door colliding with the old threshold and making a faint sound of impact!
Lin Qiye turned sharply to look, spreading his mental energy to its fullest extent!
…Nothing.
There was no one, no object touching that door, yet it had opened by itself and then closed again… as if someone he couldn’t see or sense was opening it.
Lin Qiye’s brow furrowed slightly. He gripped the hilt of his sword, slowly drawing both blades from their sheaths, holding them tightly as he stepped toward the house from which the sound had come.
The locked courtyard door, the suddenly fallen paper broom, the automatically opening and closing door.
All of this seemed to indicate that there was a mysterious force… or a mysterious presence within this house.
But Lin Qiye could not see it.
He reached the entrance of the house, stopping in his tracks. His mental energy had already mapped out the interior, revealing that aside from the pale paper bed, paper money, and paper furniture, there was nothing else.
Lin Qiye couldn’t help but feel puzzled. What were such thin, light paper beds and furniture meant for?
Surely, any creature with a bit of weight would collapse them, right?
Lin Qiye shook his head, casting aside these complicated thoughts and focusing intently, ready to act at any moment.
Even though his mental energy feedback indicated that there was nothing in the house, Lin Qiye did not let his guard down, as he could vaguely guess that whatever was inside… he could neither see nor sense.
A shadowy hue enveloped the door in front of Lin Qiye, and under the push of darkness, the door slowly opened…
Lin Qiye stood at the door with his sword, a faint golden light flickering in his eyes.
Whoosh—!!
As soon as the door opened a crack, a large amount of paper money flew out from the gap, overwhelming Lin Qiye!
His pupils constricted, and he quickly swung his dual blades, the pale blue edges tracing a dense pattern of light in front of him, instantly shredding all the paper money, not a single piece touching his body!
But soon Lin Qiye realized that his actions were unnecessary.
Because the paper money contained no malice; it floated out from the door, dancing in the air… they were just paper offerings.
Just as Lin Qiye was taken aback, the paper furniture inside the house suddenly toppled over, as if someone had bumped into them.
The paper furniture hit the ground, producing a hard collision sound, as if what had fallen was not paper, but real wooden furniture.
Lin Qiye’s brow furrowed slightly as he scanned the room, finding no signs of anyone present.
After hesitating for a moment, he opened his palm and softly chanted:
“Wildfire cannot be extinguished; it grows again with the spring breeze.”
Whoosh—!
A flicker of flame appeared in his hand, and he gently turned his palm, intending to burn all the strange paper furniture and paper money to ashes.
At that moment, a piece of paper money suddenly floated up from the ground!
The paper money trembled as it flew in front of Lin Qiye, who was momentarily stunned by the sight.
On that piece of paper money, several large characters were written in crooked black lines.
—Master, spare me!
Master, spare me?
Lin Qiye stared at these words in shock, standing there in confusion. After a moment, he tentatively spoke, “Are you… human?”
The piece of paper money floated back down to the ground, and the black lines began to write again.
Soon, a second line of text appeared on the paper money.
—We are ghosts, ghosts living here.
Lin Qiye’s brow furrowed tightly.
The third line of text quickly emerged.
—Master, if you truly wish to kill, then just kill me! Spare my wife and daughter; my little girl was just startled and accidentally knocked over the broom in the corner, disturbing you. Please, Master, show mercy!
Upon reading this line, Lin Qiye’s mind immediately recalled the paper broom that had just fallen, and his confusion deepened.
Was it also a ghost that knocked over the paper broom?
However, he still extinguished the flame in his hand. Given the current situation, these ghosts did not seem to pose a threat to him.
Lin Qiye spoke in a deep voice, “Whether you are ghosts or humans, I don’t seem to have offended you. Why lock the door and not let me out?”
The fourth line of text quickly appeared on the paper money, as if fearing that writing slowly would cause Lin Qiye to become furious.
—Master, we didn’t mean to lock the door! All the doors here are like this; the dead can enter, but the living cannot leave. You are a living person; you can come in from outside, but trying to go out from inside… is difficult!
“Your place?” Lin Qiye asked in confusion, “What is this place?”
The ghost paused for a moment, and after a while, wrote two large characters on the paper money.
—Fengdu.
