“How is that possible?”
Zhou Lian’s face was filled with panic, his voice trembling slightly. He had never encountered such an eerie phenomenon before; it had completely exceeded the bounds of his understanding.
The reason he had been able to sit in the position of person in charge was purely because he had benefited from the times. Back then, supernatural incidents in the country were rare, and ghost controllers were rarer still.
After luckily controlling a fierce ghost, he had taken the initiative to throw in his lot with headquarters and barely managed to secure a position. The number of supernatural incidents he had actually handled could be counted on one hand. Now, facing Zhou Deng’s attack, he was utterly helpless.
“Nothing’s impossible.”
Zhou Deng’s voice was calm. “That’s how the supernatural is. Risk and reward coexist. As long as you dare to do it, you’ll definitely come to understand something.”
“If this goes on, you’ll die too!”
“Is that so?”
Zhou Deng pointed at the deathly pale hand beneath his feet. At that moment, both of them were being slowly dragged into the thin layer of dust on the ground, except that Zhou Deng was clearly sinking much more slowly.
“Although I can’t suppress this ghost, I only need to hold out longer than you. Once you’re dead, I can naturally get free.”
“Wait!”
Zhou Lian raised his hand. He was thoroughly panicking now.
“I’ll tell you where that thing is! Let me go!”
“Why didn’t you say so earlier? The attack has already begun. Being able to do this much is already my limit. If I stop now, wouldn’t that be asking me to die?”
Although Zhou Deng said that, his expression was relaxed, and he did not seem to be showing any great difficulty.
“Zhou Deng! What happened before was indeed my fault. We came from the same master’s lineage. Do you really not care about old ties at all?”
The dust had already passed Zhou Lian’s thighs. His feet were gradually turning into deathly pale sand and mud, and the speed of the supernatural erosion was growing faster and faster.
“Same master’s lineage? You’re worthy of saying that?!”
A trace of anger appeared on Zhou Deng’s face.
“If it were before, perhaps I would still have considered the weight of those old fellows. But times are different now. As a ghost controller, you should understand very clearly that as long as I want to, the lives of those people are nothing more than a single thought from me.”
“That’s about enough. It’s time for you to die.”
Zhou Lian could no longer make any sound. His mouth was continuously spewing out large amounts of dust as if he were vomiting water. The fierce ghost inside his body was becoming increasingly restless. Its supernatural power had been stolen, and his own state was rapidly falling out of balance. The fierce ghost was reviving.
Yet at that moment, Zhou Deng caught a faint, strange odor, like a corpse that had been stored for too long and had rotted and gone moldy. The smell made him feel nauseous.
Immediately afterward, a layer of furry gray-white mold visibly grew across the ground, mixed with the stench of a moldy corpse. It kept spreading, gradually pressing toward the two of them.
But when the mold came into contact with the dust emerging from Zhou Lian’s ghost, it stopped. The supernatural powers were clashing, forming a brief equilibrium.
Zhou Deng abruptly turned his head and looked back. His gaze collided with an eerie line of sight.
An incomparably demonic pupil was emitting a cold gray glow, while a faint smear of scarlet condensed at its center.
In the next second, that red light suddenly expanded and actually fused together with the hairy mold on the ground. The reddened mold lunged forward abruptly, forcibly tearing apart the dust beneath Zhou Lian’s feet, almost scattering it completely.
Because of the intervention of this eerie mold, Zhou Lian, who had originally been about to sink underground, was now forcefully halted.
Zhou Lian’s throat squirmed, and he actually spat a gray-white eyeball out of his mouth. With difficulty, he said:
“Haha... Zhou Deng, you’re out of chances. Ghost Eye Yang Jian is here. Headquarters will absolutely not allow you to casually kill a person in charge.”
At this moment, Zhou Deng’s heart trembled violently. His attention had been fixed on that eerie pupil the entire time. The dim scarlet was shining at its center, making one’s heart palpitate.
“Red light... eyes...”
“Ghost Eye Yang Jian. It really is him.”
His gaze shifted to one side. There stood a young man who looked to be about twenty years old, his entire body covered in furry mold. A slit had opened on his forehead, and an eerie pupil lay horizontally in the center.
The young man looked extremely terrifying, as if he had been sealed in a coffin for too long, and the mold had already completely seeped into his body.
The mold spreading across the ground had already stopped. It seemed Yang Jian did not intend to kill him. Even so, Zhou Deng still did not dare make any move.
Ghost Eye Yang Jian—an absolutely taboo name in the supernatural circle. Every time he appeared, it was accompanied by that scarlet ghost domain. Once he made a move, it meant either a ghost would be imprisoned, or... a person would die.
Zhou Lian was now beaming with delight, as if he had grasped a life-saving straw. Yang Jian’s name was far too resounding in the supernatural circle. Even a person in charge like Zhou Lian, who had always kept himself hidden, had heard of him. That signature red light was precisely Yang Jian’s ghost domain.
Excited, he shouted loudly toward that person:
“Captain Yang! I am Zhou Lian, the person in charge of Dayang City! This man is guilty of heinous crimes! He actually dared to openly try to spill my blood in front of a high-ranking person in charge like Captain Yang! He’s simply lawless!”
Zhou Deng shot him a fierce glare, actually frightening Zhou Lian into shrinking back, almost falling to the ground.
He was afraid that Zhou Deng would ignore Yang Jian’s presence in order to kill him. His current condition was extremely poor. If Zhou Deng disregarded the revival of his fierce ghost now, perhaps he really could drag him down right in front of Yang Jian.
“Captain Yang...” Zhou Deng slowly spoke. Under these circumstances, he definitely could not allow Zhou Lian to keep spouting lies there. If Yang Jian truly believed him, Zhou Deng might die in an instant.
“Let me introduce myself. My name is Zhou Deng. During the Hurricane Incident, we originally had a chance to meet, but I was busy dealing with the fierce ghosts released from Ghost Lake in the outer regions, so I missed that opportunity.”
Zhou Deng had read Yang Jian’s files and had also heard about his way of doing things. Yang Jian’s temper was not very good, and his relationship with headquarters was very poor. He probably would not meddle in this kind of internal private grudge.
Moreover, after killing Zhou Lian, he had originally intended to apply to headquarters to be transferred to Dayang City as its person in charge. Combined with the supernatural incidents he had dealt with before, it could be considered making up for his mistakes through merit.
“The grudge between Zhou Lian and me was formed long before we became ghost controllers. He has been guarding that museum here while never doing anything. After I kill him, I will apply to headquarters to become the person in charge here—”
Just then, the young man covered all over in mold suddenly moved. Zhou Deng immediately shut his mouth, not daring to say another word.
The man stiffly raised an arm toward his ear. After a rustling sound, he actually dug a furry, flocculent strip made of mold out of his ear canal.
The man immediately seemed to let out a breath of relief and muttered to himself, “I knew my ear was itching like hell and I couldn’t hear anything. I thought my fierce ghost was about to revive.”
He raised his head and looked at the two of them, then said:
“Sorry about that, you two. Fungus was growing in my ear just now. What were you saying? Something about Ghost Eye Yang Jian? I don’t see Captain Yang.”