Inside the villa, the power was reset, but unfortunately, most of the light bulbs had exploded. Only a few wall lamps in the corners flickered with a ghostly, faint glow. The first floor was a complete mess, covered in shards and debris.
Kong Xian lay beside the sofa, groaning in pain. His leg was pinned down. Qiu Yan tried to move the upright cabinet, but she lacked the strength; the cabinet remained motionless.
“Master? Handsome Master?” There was not a soul on the first floor. She hurried to the second floor and finally found Wen Yaozhi in the room where she had previously stayed.
“Master,” Qiu Yan stepped into the room cautiously.
The bloody handprints on the wall had dried, yet they remained hair-raising to look at. Wen Yaozhi stood by the nightstand, intently focused on a small crystal ornament.
Qiu Yan’s tone was urgent. “Master, someone downstairs needs help.”
Wen Yaozhi gave a slow, indifferent “Oh.” He then asked, “Did you move this earlier?”
Qiu Yan looked at the crystal ornament and nodded. It had been in the bathroom, and she thought it looked nice, so she had played with it for a while. “Why? Is something wrong?”
Wen Yaozhi was non-committal. The crystal bore traces of a soul attachment. Judging by the strength of the residual soul power, it belonged to a powerful malevolent spirit that had been dead for quite some time.
Qiu Yan was in no mood to discuss crystals. She repeated, “An actor downstairs has his leg pinned under a heavy object. I am not strong enough; I need you to.”
Wen Yaozhi interrupted her bluntly. “Miss Qiu, I signed a contract with you to guarantee your safety only. Aside from that,” he placed the crystal back in its original position.
Qiu Yan closed her eyes. “How much? He is richer than I am.”
Wen Yaozhi’s face remained cold. “Fifty thousand.”
Qiu Yan nearly bit her tongue. This man really dared to open his mouth; he looked like a professional at taking advantage of people in distress. She looked at that face, one that, if placed in the entertainment industry, would make Kong Xian lose sleep out of pure jealousy, and gritted her teeth. “I will pay you a ten thousand deposit now. The balance will be paid by the victim afterward.”
Wen Yaozhi gave a casual “Mhm.”
By the time they returned to the first floor, Kong Xian could no longer scream. He lay weakly on the ground. When he saw Qiu Yan had brought help, his eyes lit up with hope.
Qiu Yan told Kong Xian about Wen Yaozhi’s exorbitant demand. To Kong Xian, this amount of money was nothing, so he agreed immediately.
Wen Yaozhi lifted the upright cabinet with one hand. Halfway through, he paused. “I heard from Miss Qiu that you do not like the actor you previously co-starred with.”
Qiu Yan’s back stiffened, and a flash of panic crossed her eyes. Kong Xian, however, was in no state to notice her expression. He looked at Wen Yaozhi with obvious confusion.
“Lu Xincheng is my friend.” Wen Yaozhi spoke very slowly, his expression almost casual. The thin fabric of his black shirt outlined the powerful, graceful lines of his arms. The heavy wooden cabinet seemed like a feather in his hand that he could let go of at any moment.
Kong Xian’s face turned pale instantly. Lu Xincheng’s friend!
Qiu Yan was equally shocked. Throughout their journey, Wen Yaozhi had never revealed this connection. He had not even proactively mentioned the name Lu Xincheng. Now that she thought about it, he had offered incense for Lu Xincheng in the mourning hall. Who would specifically pay respects to a stranger?
Wen Yaozhi’s face remained as calm and unruffled as ever. If he were wearing a heart rate monitor, one would find that his pulse had not even quickened.
The other two, especially Kong Xian, were pushed to the peak of terror. He watched those five slender fingers supporting the top of the cabinet, the veins visible on the fair back of the hand. Wen Yaozhi did not seem to be using much strength at all, as if he might pull his hand away the next second. If the cabinet fell now, his leg would be ruined.
As Kong Xian trembled and tried to explain, the man’s cold voice reached him first. “But he is already dead, so we no longer have that relationship.”
It took Kong Xian a long time to understand the meaning behind those words. By then, the cabinet had been set upright steadily.
“Forty thousand. Wire it to the bank card; do not use WeChat transfer,” the man demanded coldly. “The withdrawal fees are too expensive.”
After speaking, Wen Yaozhi ignored Kong Xian and walked straight toward a tightly closed room on the first floor.
The Soul Summoning technique had been completed, yet there was not a single ghost to be seen anywhere above ground in the villa. Wen Yaozhi approached the closed study at the corner and knocked. After a few beats, his knocking became impatient. “Come out,” he said, his expression grim.
It was as quiet as if no one were inside.
“You,” a sharp sound followed as his long leg kicked the door open with a resounding bang.
Inside the room, Yang Jingtai watched helplessly as his carefully laid defenses were shattered in an instant. White powder scattered everywhere. The man in black who had forced his way in easily neutralized his momentum and stopped right in front of him.
Upon seeing the intruder, Yang Jingtai’s furious expression froze. After a long moment, his gaze fell upon the man’s golden heterochromatic eyes before shifting to his back.
He stammered, “You are, Mr. Wen?”
The man before him was not only a terror to ghosts but was also illustrious within the Association. Yang Jingtai had not expected to encounter this person while completing a commission. Since the other man was ranked S-class and Yang Jingtai was only A-class, he could only offer a forced smile.
“What a coincidence,” Yang Jingtai said, rubbing his hands on his clothes and respectfully extending them. “What brings you here?”
Wen Yaozhi ignored the hand completely and asked coldly, “Did you perform a Soul Summoning?”
Yang Jingtai broke into a cold sweat. “Yes.”
Wen Yaozhi’s eyes were as cold as ice. “Who gave you the nerve to summon souls in this house!”
“I,” Yang Jingtai fell silent under the pressure of those heterochromatic eyes. He could not reveal his employer’s shady commission, so he played dumb. “The commission I accepted required me to summon a new soul and suppress it. I did not realize there would be so many people here, nor did I expect.”
The malevolent energy of the entire building originated from the basement. However, because it was suppressed by spells, an ordinary Taoist could not see it unless they possessed Yin-Yang eyes like Wen Yaozhi. After the Soul Summoning, the soul power had become unprecedentedly active.
Wen Yaozhi looked at the half-open door to the basement, his pale gold eye flashing. What was down there now was definitely not as simple as one or two malevolent spirits.
Yang Jingtai clearly felt it too. His face turned solemn. “I will call the employer immediately; I am not taking this job.”
“Fine,” Wen Yaozhi said, crossing his arms with a heavy gaze. “Tell him that I will take over.”
Yang Jingtai had only intended to retreat to save face; he had not expected Wen Yaozhi to actually hijack the job. He twitched the corner of his mouth awkwardly. “The situation down there is unknown. Why take the risk?”
“To make money, of course.” These words sounded very grating to Yang Jingtai’s ears.
Though he was a decade older than the man, he could only hold his breath and change the subject. “Several actors and the director have already run down there. I am afraid something is about to happen.”
Wen Yaozhi did not want to waste any more words and walked straight toward the basement. “Know your own limits. Once you get down there, it will be too late to back out.”
Yang Jingtai’s face darkened as he followed downstairs a few steps behind. Behind them, Qiu Yan’s panicked voice drifted over, “There, you cannot go down there!”
The two figures ignored her, vanishing into the darkness one after the other. Qiu Yan held onto the doorframe, her gaze clouded. Besides worry, there was a faint flicker of unknown emotion.
The basement of the villa was no ordinary cellar. In terms of depth, it was far deeper than a typical home’s basement.
Five people had entered. Li Xuexin regretted it almost immediately; the basement was extremely eerie. They could only rely on the faint light from their phone flashlights. Despite their fear, they did not dare turn back and continued downward. After descending about sixty steps, they reached the bottom.
The space was vast. It was not used for storage or as a wine cellar; it was empty and felt like a massive air-raid shelter.
“This looks a lot like the mineshafts I saw in my hometown when I was a kid.”
Among the five people who had come down, two were stagehands. The one speaking was Xiao Zhang, a younger member with less seniority.
“How could Director Dai’s villa have a mine?” Hu Xiaonian, who had long, wavy black hair, remarked casually. “I think it might be a set prepared by Director Dai.”
“You still have the heart to chat? Hurry and find another exit,” Li Xuexin interrupted. “There is no cell signal here either.”
Fang Ming looked back at the stairs they had descended with lingering fear. “Do you think that ghost will chase us down here?”
“Do not jinx us,” Hu Xiaonian snapped.
“Is it wrong for us to be here? Director Dai explicitly warned us not to enter,” said Li Zheng, the male second lead in his early forties, who was a cautious person. He had been the last to enter after Fang Ming opened the door, but since everyone else had gone down, he did not dare stay on the first floor alone.
Before he could finish his sentence, a whistling sound echoed from a distance. Wall lamps along the corridor flickered on with a dim yellow light, leaving everyone in shock. A rustic black track appeared ahead.
“I was right,” Xiao Zhang said, walking onto the track and kneeling to examine it. “This is a specialized track for mine carts. I have seen them before.”
A rhythmic clang-clank sound grew louder as it approached. An old-fashioned mine cart rolled slowly along the track toward them. This appearance was quite bizarre, and everyone watched the pitch-black cart with curiosity.
The cart emitted an intensely blinding light, and everyone instinctively covered their eyes. The rhythmic sound grew closer. Li Xuexin looked through the gaps in his fingers and his heart suddenly tightened. The mine cart was packed with people. Just as he was about to cry out in surprise, a dull braking sound rang out.
The mine cart stopped right in front of them. The person sitting at the front jumped off. His movements carried a trace of subtle stiffness and heaviness.
“Who are you?” Standing at the very front, Xiao Zhang squinted his eyes against the blinding light from the person’s helmet, trying to see their face.
The person remained silent for a moment before slowly raising their left hand.
A dull thud sounded.
A heavy iron shovel slammed hard into Xiao Zhang’s head. The young stagehand did not even make a sound. His body swayed before collapsing to the ground.
Screams erupted as everyone scattered like birds and beasts. The basement lights were heat-sensitive. A few seconds after everyone fled, the lights clicked off, plunging everything into total darkness.
In the dark, the remaining malevolent spirits swarmed off the mine cart. They wore identical work uniforms, dusty and tattered. Some of the searchlights on their helmets were dead, while others emitted a blinding yellow light. They were eager to divide and devour the person on the ground.
Several heads bumped together, only to find they had missed. The person on the ground was gone. Only a small pool of blood remained. The spirits scrambled to the floor, quickly licking the blood clean before falling into a brief state of confusion.
The lingering heat of living breath remained in the air. They followed the lead spirit and began walking slowly in one direction.
In a dark corner behind them, five slender fingers let go. The body in his hand lost its protection and slumped softly to the ground. Lu Xincheng checked the young man’s breathing. The young stagehand’s eyes were tightly shut, and a faint breath came from his nose.
After moving the person to a ventilated spot and settling him safely, Lu Xincheng followed the miner ghosts deeper into the cave.