"Whoosh—" A cold wind rose outside. In the distance, the trees swayed with a violent rustle.
At this moment, inside Old Wang's house, though it seemed empty, two faint breaths lingered.
On the rooftop, the inner beams formed neat rows. Near the middle, however, a large gap interrupted them—one beam was missing!
"Hmph! The hour of the rat is almost here. I'll use you, evil spirit, as the sacrifice!" Between the row of pillars with the gap, a faint voice muttered to itself.
Had he not spoken, even Feng Ling might not have noticed him at all!
"No wonder! This fellow Xu Banxian knows a concealment technique! But does he not know that yin creatures can easily sense the yang energy in a person's body?"
Feng Ling clicked his tongue, closed his eyes, and hid beneath the bed while sensing every trace within the room.
His spiritual senses detected every change in the air currents, temperature, and breathing.
"Whoosh—whoosh—!"
A sound like wind rose in the courtyard and grew louder and louder.
But it was not wind. Thick waves of white mist billowed through the courtyard.
As the White Mist passed through the trees, layer upon layer of Frost formed on them, like pristine snow. Yet this was the height of summer!
As the mist poured in from all directions, the two people inside the house couldn't help but shiver.
A heavy thudding sound rang out outside. Both their hearts leapt into their throats, and the cold seemed to deepen.
Had anyone been in the courtyard, they would have seen a pillar exuding Black Qi floating above the White Mist and bumping against the air currents.
Though the pillar seemed to drift aimlessly, it steadily drew closer to the house.
"Bang—!" A soft impact sounded as a section of wood forced its way through the wall.
At the sight of the wooden stake, Feng Ling and Xu Banxian tensed. They held their breath and stared straight ahead without moving their eyes.
The wooden stake, wreathed in Black Qi, took a long time to squeeze all the way inside. The wait was agonizing.
"Thud, thud thud... crash!"
The long pillar floated through the room, colliding with anything in its path and shattering several clay pots.
Sharp, piercing cracks rang across the floor. Fragments flew close to Feng Ling's brow, yet he remained perfectly still.
A shadow...
Remembering what Old Wang had said that day, Feng Ling glanced at the wall without thinking.
Sure enough! A faint, barely perceptible silhouette stood there, hazy as tonight's moonlight...
Wait, that's wrong!
Tonight's mist was too thick for moonlight to pass through—so how could it look hazy?
"Creak, creak..."
A bone-chilling sound rang out.
Right after, the roof shook with a rumbling tremor as the pillar returned to its place, sealing the gap shut!
Hidden nearby, Xu Banxian looked back with a trembling heart at the Black Qi-wreathed pillar less than a foot from his heel. Though saliva caught painfully in his throat, he dared not swallow or make a sound.
Before he could suppress his terror, a ghostly shadow covered in blue appeared beneath the pillar. It raised its head and swept its gaze across the room... Ha!!
Its face was blue-faced and fanged indeed!
The instant the Ghostly Shadow appeared, the room's temperature dropped by at least five degrees. Frost formed over both Feng Ling and Xu Banxian.
Feng Ling's body trembled once, while Xu Banxian shuddered twice.
Where he hid, invisible, there was nothing to see—except a string of frost condensing in midair, floating there strangely, trembling twice as well!
Xu Banxian cursed under his breath, "Oh no." The floating Ghostly Shadow below hovered three feet above the ground, seemed to sense him, and turned its gaze toward the roof again.
Set against its blue-faced, fanged visage, a pair of ghost eyes gleamed with a gorgeous, sapphire-like light.
Xu Banxian's heart lurched, and he felt as though he had fallen into an ice cellar. The ghost's raised head and face grew more malicious and ferocious.
"Hiss!" Xu Banxian could hold back no longer. Feng Ling assumed the Ghostly Shadow had spotted him.
But before either of them could launch an attack, a scene that filled them with both shock and fury unfolded!
From beneath the bed, Feng Ling watched a pitch-black rope swaying overhead, covered in Deathly Energy, as it dropped from above.
"Hah, hah—..."
The Vicious Ghost let out wail after wail, each one sounding like the cry of someone drowning and struggling.
A faint reflection shook on the ground. Feng Ling thought he saw two ghostly feet kicking from side to side, as though fighting for their lives.
On the beam, Xu Banxian arched his ox-like nose and stared down. His pupils shrank.
From his vantage point crouched up there, the scene was far more direct and clear than what could be seen from under the bed!
The rope had noosed the Vicious Ghost's entire neck and strangled it. Its long black tongue hung from its mouth, and its upper body was hunched over. Its blue Ghost Hands pressed against its ghostly legs while its lower half kicked back and forth...
It thrashed without end, seemingly enjoying every moment!
Hanging itself! A hanging ghost, hanging itself!
A Hanging Ghost... was actually hanging itself?!
"Hiss!" Xu Banxian was horrified. They had "luckily" stumbled upon such a terrifying sight, and his eyes twitched wildly. "You're already fucking dead from hanging, so what's the point of hanging yourself again?"
In his shock and fury, Xu Banxian couldn't help grumbling this to himself—but the answer was about to be revealed!
Bang!! The rope snapped, and a wail tinged with panic rang out.
Feng Ling saw the shadow on the ground grow rapidly larger. A blue Ghostly Shadow crashed down.
The Ghostly Shadow slammed into the floor and twitched twice in pain before going still.
A pair of blue pupils shone with an eerie, seductive glow into the strange space beneath the bed...
Damn it! The Ghostly Qi rope had snapped, sending it crashing down—and it had landed right there!
"Thunderbolt Art!"
Without a moment's hesitation, Feng Ling struck first, unleashing torrents of violent lightning.
"Gwah!!" Terrified by the aura of Lightning, the blue Ghostly Shadow retreated at top speed.
Feng Ling seized the opening, leapt out, and hurled a condensed bolt of raging Lightning at it.
Level nine?!
Level nine?! Feng Ling's heart jolted as he stared at the seductive figure spinning at breakneck speed and frantically patting its burning backside...
An afterimage!
That's right—it was moving so fast that all it left behind was one long afterimage!
"Sizzle, sizzle!" A puff of acrid black smoke billowed up, and the last flicker of flame died out.
"No... it's not level nine!" Watching the ghostly shadow that had stopped slowly turn its head, Feng Ling's heart lurched as a terrifying answer surfaced in his mind!
"A level ten hanging ghost!" A trembling voice called down from the roof—Xu Banxian confirmed the unbelievable conclusion for Feng Ling!
After witnessing Feng Ling's brief clash with the Ghostly Shadow, Xu Banxian was astonished to discover that Feng Ling possessed Eighth-Revolution Cultivation. He was horrified to realize that the Hanging Ghost was level ten.
Almost as soon as Xu Banxian spoke, a Talisman bearing a black-lined palm print and bursting with Golden Radiance shot toward the blue Ghostly Shadow with thunderbolt force!
"Boom!!"
A massive explosion roared out, cool gusts of wind scattering the black smoke.
Feng Ling's eyes twitched as he stared ahead—the blast had reduced more than half of Old Wang's House to rubble!
Feng Ling was certain Xu Banxian's strike would have stripped at least a layer of skin from him. But only a layer of skin. As for... dying?
Sorry, but his Original Body wasn't even here!
The world was wonderfully unpredictable. Xu Banxian had marveled at Feng Ling's cultivation one moment; the next, Feng Ling was marveling at Xu Banxian's Magical Treasure!
"What a fine treasure!" A faint light entered Feng Ling's eyes.
Xu Banxian's current burst of power was temporary, but what could forcibly raise a seventh-transformation cultivator's strength to nearly the Tenth Transformation?
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