Bang!
With a crisp crack, another lightbulb exploded, sending countless tiny shards flying in all directions.
Without fail, the bulb had burst directly above their heads.
Nan Zhi didn't even know how she had reacted so quickly.
Subconsciously, she grabbed Zhang Qiuyu's arm, and the two of them leaned back in a stiff, awkward motion, narrowly avoiding the disaster!
While the two of them escaped unscathed, the others weren't so lucky.
The incident happened so suddenly that when the lightbulb in the stairwell exploded, everyone's vision plunged into darkness for a split second.
The onlookers, whose nerves were already frayed by the matter of Chen Ping, felt the string of logic in their minds snap with a loud pop.
The crowd acted like a spooked herd of horses, immediately shoving one another and screaming at the top of their lungs, attempting to use noise to drown out their terror.
“Waaah, my face!”
“Don't push! Can't you hear me?! Stop pushing!”
“There's a ghost!!”
“Hurry, call 120! Someone fell down!”
“Are you okay? Oh my god, you're bleeding!”
The crowd turned into a chaotic mess.
A young woman's forehead was sliced by a glass shard, leaving a five-centimeter-long trail of blood.
The intern from Nan Zhi's office had tried to shield his eyes with his arm, only to have two shards of glass embed themselves in his elbow.
The male colleague who had been running his mouth met the most pathetic end.
In the panic, someone gave him a shove, and he tumbled straight down the stairs, breaking his arm.
When his work pants were pulled up, his inner calf and outer thigh were covered in horrific purplish-blue bruises, large patches of hematoma staining his flesh in a sight that was truly shocking to behold.
“Ah— Ah— My arm— Is my arm broken? It hurts— It hurts!!”
He gritted his teeth tightly, the whites of his eyes turning red from the sheer agony. Beads of sweat the size of soybeans rolled down his forehead.
Nan Zhi looked over and saw that the angle of his fall had been particularly dangerous. One more inch, and he would have landed on the back of his head.
If that had happened, he would have been crippled if not dead.
She glanced at the ceiling and pursed her lips tightly.
How fierce.
No wonder Master He said vengeful ghosts were difficult to deal with.
That man had almost lost his life just because of a few words of loose talk.
Nan Zhi lowered her eyes, her thoughts shifting as she kept her internal calculations hidden from view.
...
With such a major incident occurring, Master He refused to stay a moment longer, no matter how much Manager Huang pleaded.
“I didn't expect this. I truly didn't expect this ghost to be so fierce.”
“Even while suppressed by the Yang energy of the Dragon Boat Festival and being whipped so many times by the willow branches, he still had the strength to lash out and harm people.”
“Now that blood has been drawn, his ferocity will only increase once night falls. Even in my younger days, I'm afraid I wouldn't have been able to handle him.”
Master He shook his head, his eyes full of lingering fear.
“I was relying on the right time, the right place, and people's blessing today to barely manage a negotiation with him.”
“But who would have thought—that such a variable would occur.”
“Since we've missed such a perfect opportunity, there's no longer any chance of persuading him. I'm afraid he'll even hold a grudge against everyone present today.”
“First me and Xiao Nian, and then everyone in this building.”
“Sigh! It is heaven's will. Everything is heaven's will.”
“Xiao Nian, pack up for Grandpa. Let's go. Didn't you say you wanted to go to Disney? We'll book the tickets tonight and leave under the cover of darkness.”
The young girl in the school uniform obediently began packing their things, her movements exceptionally agile.
“No, wait, Master! Didn't we already reach an agreement? Why... why is he unwilling again?”
Manager Huang was completely dumbfounded.
“Are you saying he's going to cause even more trouble from now on?”
Master He felt a bit ashamed, but no matter how Manager Huang tried to persuade him, he wouldn't budge.
“Ghosts and gods are fickle beings by nature, let alone a vengeful ghost like Chen Ping who is filled with resentful energy.”
“They say you shouldn't bring up a person's shortcomings or strike them in the face, yet that young man just had to say those things in front of so many people...”
“Sigh... Just Scattering Rice to Question Spirits has already consumed too much of my vitality. I truly have no way to deal with him. I think you all should seek someone more capable.”
As he spoke, perhaps feeling a bit guilty, Master He added another sentence.
“In three days, that vengeful ghost's ferocity will surely reach its peak.”
“I reckon that with his current power, he shouldn't be able to leave this building for the time being.”
“Don't worry too much. Maybe in a couple of days, he'll think better of it on his own and stop making trouble.”
Listen to what you're saying.
If he could 'think better of it,' would he have jumped off the building in the first place?
Manager Huang wiped his sweat frantically, feeling his clothes soaked through. When the wind blew, a chill ran down his back.
“Master, Master, don't go! Let's think of another way.”
“Since he's injured, why don't we strike while the iron is hot and just finish him off?”
“Or else... or else I'll set up a monument for him in the company, a memorial tablet! I'll burn incense every day, okay?”
“Can you just tell him to stop messing with me! If this keeps up, I'll want to go to the rooftop too!”
With so many people injured at once, three or four ambulances had driven straight to the bottom of the building, creating quite a commotion.
Anyone who didn't know better would think a violent crime had occurred in their building.
Forget about whether the media would report on it.
In this age of self-media, even the smallest thing could become a trending topic, let alone with so many eyes watching on the scene.
Could he sew all their mouths shut?
With such a massive blunder, he would likely lose his job.
The most despairing part was that the ghost hadn't been removed.
He had hired a master to drive out the evil, but after all that work, the ghost had only become fiercer.
In the past, this ghost had mostly just scared people or created some psychological pressure.
Today was just great—he was exploding lightbulbs to injure people!
The ambulances had taken several people away in one go!
Would someone die next?
What kind of exorcism was this?
Were you here to give the vengeful ghost a buff?
Or were you sent by a competitor to ruin me?
“Master, you can't do this! Don't you people care about 'subduing demons and eliminating monsters'?”
“How can you just leave us behind like this?”
Manager Huang's voice began to take on a sob.
“Master, please think of something. Those words weren't said by someone from our company.”
“Why is this ghost so unreasonable? Every debt has its debtor; go find whoever exploited you! What does it have to do with me?!”
He wasn't just worried about losing his job anymore.
He was more worried that the ghost had added him to its grudge list too!
“You want to reason with a ghost? See if that works!”
“Even if he's injured, he's still a vengeful ghost. If it comes down to a life-and-death struggle, it's not certain who would destroy whom!”
Master He's eyes widened in anger as he spoke righteously.
“Everything was settled, but who knew a hothead would jump out and stimulate Chen Ping's ghost into a frenzy?”
“I take money to do a job, but I'm not here to die for you.”
“If I can subdue it, I'll give it my all. If I can't, I'm obviously going to run!”
With that, the old man slung his gear over his back and vanished into the chaos with his granddaughter.
Despite his old limbs, he ran quite fast.
Facing the mess on the ground, Manager Huang couldn't even manage a bitter smile.
He hadn't gone crazy yet; he wouldn't say things like 'we've all been targeted by a vengeful ghost, we're dead, hurry and run' in front of so many people.
Instead, Manager Huang announced on the spot that everyone could leave work two hours early tonight.
Fortunately, the scene was so chaotic that no one truly cared about the unnatural expression on his face.
...
“...Nan Zhi, your reactions were so fast just now.”
Zhang Qiuyu sat at her workstation, still shaken.
She was still in a daze, her facial expression sluggish, like an old computer running slowly.
She had been completely stunned at the time, only realizing what had happened when the people around her started wailing.
The gaze she directed at Nan Zhi was filled with confusion.
How had Nan Zhi managed to pull her away when no one else had reacted?
It felt...
As if she had known the lightbulb above their heads was going to explode.
Rate on N.U.
