Qin Changsheng thought this forest was truly vast.
Following the sounds, the flickering lights behind the dense trees seemed tantalizingly close. Yet no matter how straight a path she and Jiang Zhongxue maintained toward those lights, they never appeared to draw any nearer.
Jiang Zhongxue remained silent as she led the way, while Qin Changsheng hobbled behind. Strangely, this path seemed endless, the boisterous voices ahead sounded as if they were right beside them, the lights so near one could almost touch them. But no matter how directly they advanced toward the light source, they couldn’t close the distance by even a single step.
Qin Changsheng even heard a gunshot.
After the shot rang out, several torchlights vanished. Perhaps disputes had broken out among those waiting outside, causing some to depart with their torches. The remaining two torches flickered erratically as a stern male voice shouted: “Follow her! Let’s see what tricks she’s playing!”
Logically, such clear audibility should mean the source was nearby. But as Qin Changsheng trailed behind Jiang Zhongxue, she gradually realized something was wrong after taking a few more steps.
No matter how they advanced, they couldn’t get closer to either the light or the voices. The forest’s edge seemed to be moving on its own, mischievously extending the path before them into nothingness as they walked.
This was an endless road, clearly seeing the torches ahead, distinctly hearing gunshots and shouts beyond the forest, what should have been merely a dozen steps away remained forever unreachable.
Qin Changsheng’s heart tightened. Jiang Zhongxue continued walking ahead, seemingly unaware. Clutching her anxiety, Qin Changsheng tried to call out a warning, but her throat constricted, she discovered she couldn’t speak.
Horrified, Qin Changsheng felt her throat go dry. Even with maximum effort, she couldn’t utter a single word. An invisible force seemed to be choking her, preventing any sound from escaping.
Jiang Zhongxue ahead showed no reaction, continuing her steady pace. Qin Changsheng raised her hand, wanting to grab Jiang Zhongxue’s, but her heart sank like a stone in a lake, turning completely cold. Unbeknownst to her, she had lost control of her body. Despite her mental struggles, she couldn’t even move a finger.
Helplessly, Qin Changsheng watched Jiang Zhongxue walk normally toward the distant light. Mute and paralyzed, she desperately tried to regain control of her body, but in the night breeze, she remained frozen in mid-step like a solidified ice sculpture.
Something cold and damp began crawling up her ankle, raising goosebumps all over her skin. The moist, chilly tentacles slowly ascended her calf, their slimy bodies writhing and leaving trails of sticky fluid on Qin Changsheng’s skin.
Qin Changsheng was utterly horrified. Her pants blocked her view, so she couldn’t see what kind of monster it was. The cold, slimy creature felt like a scaleless snake, slowly coiling around her ankle with a wet, sticky grip. What chilled her even more was that wherever this damp, icy creature slithered, those parts of her body seemed to detach completely, losing all sensation.
The creature’s mucus appeared to carry a neurotoxin capable of paralyzing nerves.
Jiang Zhongxue seemed completely unaware, continuing to walk forward without ever looking back. Qin Changsheng watched as she disappeared step by step into the darkness, her heart racing with panic. But she forced herself to stay calm, desperately racking her brain for a solution.
What could she do to awaken this slumbering body?
Qin Changsheng had never encountered such a situation before. This was her first time carrying out a mission for the Qin family, and she had already faced danger twice, both times her body had lost control, bringing her to the brink of death. Losing control of her body again?
Suddenly, a flash of inspiration struck her, and her heart surged with excitement. Closing her eyes, she began attempting to separate her soul from her physical shell.
In her intense focus on detaching her soul, Qin Changsheng felt an unexpected sense of relief. Though she had no idea what the creature crawling up her calf was, its mucus contained a paralyzing toxin. Coincidentally, it was climbing up her injured leg, the one with a torn gash on her thigh that had been excruciatingly painful. Now, she felt nothing, and the relief was palpable.
Recalling the sensation of her soul leaving her body earlier, Qin Changsheng poured all her concentration into the effort. The cold, slimy creature continued its ascent, attaching itself to her wound as if sucking her blood.
Her mind wandered: Could this be a leech? But judging by the sensation on her leg, this leech’s body was thick enough to wrap around her calf at least three times. And with that girth, if it really was a leech, it must have grown to monstrous proportions, perhaps even gained sentience.
Deliberately slowing her breathing, Qin Changsheng gradually guided her soul out of her body. Her eyes remained fixed ahead, but the scene she perceived was entirely different.
She floated in a semi-transparent state, looking down at her own body standing rigidly in place. The torn gash on her thigh was visible through her ripped black athletic pants, the flesh mangled and smeared with mud. The creature attached to her wound was coiled in a bizarre, spiraling pattern inside her pants, clearly some kind of elongated, worm-like organism, likely an unknown species of leech.
But for it to grow this large, even if it was a leech, it had to be the king of leeches.
Qin Changsheng lifted her gaze. Floating in the air, she turned her attention to Yu Yin beside her. Yu Yin’s ghost was also floating, but unlike her own semi-transparent form, Yu Yin’s apparition was deathly pale, with even her eyeballs appearing as translucent crystals.
This time, Yu Yin did not seize the opportunity to possess Qin Changsheng’s body as she had before. Instead, she seemed fearful, hesitating and shrinking back, unwilling to attach herself to this vibrant, living vessel.
Qin Changsheng was both astonished and curious, having never seen anything that could frighten a ferocious ghost to such an extent. However, her current state of soul separation couldn’t last much longer. If she didn’t act quickly, her breathing would cease without the support of her soul, and even if her body didn’t die, her brain would suffer irreversible damage.
As these thoughts raced through her mind, Qin Changsheng grew increasingly anxious. She reached out to push Yu Yin back into her body. But as she extended her hand, her eyes inadvertently caught sight of something strange.
Why was there a white figure clinging to her back?
Before she could process this, Qin Changsheng grabbed hold of Yu Yin. The ghost retained the gruesome appearance of her death, her face was a bloody mess, glassy fluid dripped incessantly from her eyes, and her exposed chest cavity revealed rotting organs. It was a nauseating sight.
But for the sake of her own body, Qin Changsheng had no time to hesitate. Jiang Zhongxue was nowhere to be seen, and if she had also fallen victim to some trap, the situation would become even more dire!
Even though Yu Yin’s decaying flesh offered no clean place to grip, Qin Changsheng gritted her teeth, seized the ghost’s shoulder, and with a swift motion, pushed her toward her own body. Silently, she thought, “Forgive me! I need your help! I’ll burn more paper money for you later!”
Yu Yin let out a piercing shriek, a sound so shrill and filled with resentment it seemed to tear from the depths of hell, like a rooster with its throat ripped out. Qin Changsheng’s urgency grew as she watched Yu Yin stumble toward her rigid body, trembling as she reached out to possess it.
Floating in midair, Qin Changsheng watched with bated breath as Yu Yin’s trembling hands began to merge with her physical form.
Out of the corner of her eye, she noticed a white shadow clinging to her body’s back. But upon closer inspection, it wasn’t a shadow, it was a wisp of faint, white mist. In the darkness, the mist stood out starkly, with no discernible source or destination. It clung to her back like an intimate companion, whispering secrets close to her ear.
Was it just mist? Could mist really take on a human form?!
But Qin Changsheng had no time to ponder this. The immediate priority was reclaiming control of her body!
She watched as Yu Yin began to partially merge with her physical form. Her body and soul resonated, calling for their true owner to return. Qin Changsheng steadied her emotions, raised her hand, narrowed her eyes, and channeled her anger. In the overlapping vision of soul and body, she swung her hand and delivered a fierce slap to Yu Yin!
The slap seemed to strike empty air, but her rigid body abruptly moved, lifting a hand and swinging it forward forcefully!
Yu Yin was thrown out of her body, clutching her half-shattered, bloody face as she staggered backward in the air, glaring at Qin Changsheng with a mix of hatred and fear.
Without hesitation, Qin Changsheng reclaimed control of her body and immediately turned around. She pulled her broken phone from her pocket, wielding it as a weapon, and hurled it at the white mist behind her!
Jiang Zhongxue’s voice suddenly rang out, speaking rapidly with a hint of unexpected urgency: “Stop! Qin Changsheng!”
The voice came from a tree above.
But by the time the words were heard, Qin Changsheng could no longer hold back her action. Her phone flew out in a smooth, streamlined arc, piercing straight into the white mist. The mist, like flowing liquid, recoiled in fright, drifting backward like a white river floating in the air, surging away.
Startled by Jiang Zhongxue’s voice, Qin Changsheng looked up. The moonlight illuminated a figure standing above her.
Jiang Zhongxue was perched on a tree, one hand gripping the trunk, her brow furrowed. She leaped down in a controlled motion, landing silently on her feet before quickly straightening up. Without so much as a glance at Qin Changsheng, she frowned, pushed off the ground, and shot forward like an arrow, swiftly chasing after the white mist. In a flash, her figure vanished into the darkness.
Qin Changsheng stood frozen in place, momentarily forgetting to check what had been crawling on her leg. When she finally remembered, she hurriedly looked down and tore open her jeans, gasping in shock at what she saw.
Her injured leg had lost all sensation. From the wound at the base of her thigh downward, a thick, black, leech-like creature was latched onto the injury, seemingly sucking her blood.
The creature was pitch black, its cylindrical body about two fingers wide and at least thirty-four centimeters long. It coiled around Qin Changsheng’s leg, its head buried in her wound, its body writhing. As it sucked blood, ripples seemed to pass over its skin, creating continuous spiral undulations.
Though she had encountered many eerie and monstrous beings, this repulsive thing was a true assault on the senses. The faint moonlight glinted off the creature’s squirming body, and Qin Changsheng nearly jumped out of her skin in fright. Disgusted, goosebumps erupted all over her body. Suppressing the urge to retch, her hair standing on end, she crouched down with difficulty and picked up a dark tree branch.
Too revolted to speak, she carefully tried to pry the creature off her leg with the branch.
At the touch of the branch, the leech-like monster twitched slightly and burrowed deeper, as if trying to evade the disturbance.
Qin Changsheng recalled reading in a book that if a leech burrows into flesh, one must never pull it out by force, as it could break apart and remain inside, causing infection and inflammation. The best way to handle such a situation was to either smoke it out with a cigarette or apply cooling oil to the wound, forcing the leech to detach on its own.
But in this desolate wilderness, where could she find a cigarette? She had bought cooling oil, but Jiang Zhongxue had thrown it away as trash.
The thought filled Qin Changsheng with regret. Why had she tried to act so selfless and handed everything over to Jiang Zhongxue?
She couldn’t afford to hesitate any longer. Seeing how large the creature was, she couldn’t let it keep sucking her blood. If she let it get its fill, she would likely collapse from exhaustion!
Qin Changsheng picked up a branch and carefully attempted to pry off the giant leech. The wound seemed to have been infected by the creature’s mucus, turning the pain into numbness. But the moment she lifted the leech with the stick, an excruciating, heart-wrenching pain shot from the depths of her wound.
Caught off guard by this sudden wave of agony, Qin Changsheng couldn’t help but let out a faint hiss and sucked in a sharp breath. The sensation felt as if someone had started a meat grinder deep inside her wound, shredding the flesh and blood along the way into minced pulp.
Yet, this intense pain only strengthened her resolve to forcefully remove the leech. Whatever this thing was, it clearly meant no good! If it broke off inside, she would just cut open the wound with a knife, she refused to believe she couldn’t dig the thing out!
Gritting her teeth, Qin Changsheng exerted force to pry off the giant leech. To her surprise, it wasn’t as tenacious as she had imagined. In fact, its head came out of her wound with surprising ease, lifted by the branch in her hand. The creature wriggled, coiling its body around the stick.
Watching it squirm made Qin Changsheng nauseous, and she quickly tossed the branch aside. Crouching down to examine her injury, she endured the sharp pain, tore open her jeans, and used her fingers to pry the wound apart, checking for any remnants of the leech.
Blood gushed from the wound like a spring, but there was no trace of anything black. Qin Changsheng let out a sigh of relief. The moment she remembered the leech again, she limped over, stopping half a meter away to observe the branch.
Under the moonlight, Qin Changsheng froze.
The creature that had been coiled around the branch like a leech now held its body upright like a snake. It wasn’t a snake, it didn’t even have scales. Its dark, thick body squirmed, and its head was oval-shaped.
She identified it as the head because the oval part was now facing her, supported by its body in mid-air. On the oval head, there was nothing but a circular sucker filled with rows upon rows of serrated teeth.
The blood that had stained the teeth receded, revealing their original bone-white color, fine and densely packed, like a tight cluster of white sunflower seeds, blooming toward Qin Changsheng.
Her scalp tingled with horror, and she nearly stumbled backward, bumping into someone behind her.
Was this still a leech? Forget a king leech, what leech could grow such a large set of flesh-tearing teeth? This was clearly a monster!
Feeling a touch from behind, Qin Changsheng almost screamed. Jiang Zhongxue’s voice came just in time: “It’s me.”
Qin Changsheng’s cry was cut off in her throat, her heart racing wildly as she turned around. Jiang Zhongxue stepped out from behind her, his expression extremely grave. Without even glancing at the battered, chest-heaving Qin Changsheng, he walked straight up to the monster with the sucker full of serrations, his voice filled with disgust: “They couldn’t get their hands on a real Long Zhi, so they had to create this freakish monstrosity as a substitute?””
The monster opened its sucker wide, layer upon layer of sharp, pale teeth inside sending chills down one’s spine.
Qin Changsheng stood at the very back, carefully observing Jiang Zhongxue’s movements. She had originally wondered how Jiang Zhongxue would deal with the monster, but she never expected Jiang Zhongxue to walk up to the creature without changing her expression and brutally stomp on it.
Without the slightest hesitation, Jiang Zhongxue brought her foot down on the monster’s body. The creature struggled wildly, but she stomped it deep into the soil, leaving only its roots exposed, thrashing and whipping about frantically. With a cold twist of her foot, Jiang Zhongxue crushed the monster’s entire head into a bloody pulp.
Qin Changsheng stared in stunned silence.
Jiang Zhongxue lifted her foot and walked back as if nothing had happened. Watching her so effortlessly crush a monster she had never even heard of, Qin Changsheng found herself at a loss for words.
But after a moment, she let out a soft sigh. It was clear that Jiang Zhongxue had been using her as bait, wasn’t she?
She had allowed Qin Changsheng to be controlled and placed in danger alone. But in the end, Qin Changsheng had thrown her phone at the swirling white mist, scaring off the prey Jiang Zhongxue had been waiting for. So, were they even now?
Qin Changsheng shrugged. Jiang Zhongxue looked at her and said, “That white mist recognizes me.”
Qin Changsheng absentmindedly hummed in response. The torch ahead was still burning, separated from them by a thin layer of trees at the forest’s edge, making the distance seem unusually short.
But she couldn’t tell whether the torch was far away or right before her eyes.
Jiang Zhongxue paused for a moment before adding, “If I’m here, that white mist won’t appear. The last time we escaped the Ghost Forest, it was because I was with you, so the mist didn’t show up.”
Qin Changsheng listened and hummed again, then instinctively asked, “Are you explaining yourself to me? Apologizing?”
As soon as the words left her mouth, Qin Changsheng realized how blunt they sounded.
Jiang Zhongxue fell silent for a moment, her gaze steady as she replied calmly, “If your corpse were lying here right now, I would still say these words to you. I just want you to understand why I left you here. Even in death, you should know the truth.”
Qin Changsheng let out an “oh,” feeling as if a weight had been lifted from her chest. See, Jiang Zhongxue was just that unfeeling. Even though she had said so many touching words when they were on the brink of death, now that the situation had changed, she could immediately treat Qin Changsheng as a pawn to lure the enemy, exposing her to danger.