Mysterious Awakening

"Follow me, let’s get out of here."

Yang Jian lit the Ghost Candle, temporarily dispelling the surrounding eeriness, and he couldn’t help but breathe a sigh of relief at that moment.

Without thinking further, he immediately attempted to leave the restaurant with Xiong Wenwen.

This operation had already failed, and continuing to stay here would be extremely dangerous, so a retreat was necessary.

The Ghost Candle was burning violently at the moment, its sinister green flame flickering uneasily. The corpses hanging midair still looked at them with smiling faces, emitting creepy laughter.

Without the barrier of the Ghost Domain, even the current Yang Jian couldn’t directly face such supernatural entities, and had to rely on the light of the Ghost Candle to ensure his own safety.

"The burning speed is a bit fast... and it seems to be increasing over time, indicating that the surroundings are becoming more and more dangerous," he mused.

Yang Jian looked at the brand-new Ghost Candle in his hand, his expression darkening slightly.

"You should have left earlier, I almost got killed because of you," Xiong Wenwen complained fearfully, gripping Yang Jian’s arm tightly.

But Yang Jian didn’t feel the slightest bit embarrassed. He said, "Dealing with supernatural events always involves risks. If I had succeeded just now, I could have dealt with a ghost that posed a potentially huge threat right away. Risk and reward are proportional. I did what I could; it’s just bad luck, that’s all."

"Besides, your ability to foresee the future seems to have some issues. You can only predict the outcome when I’m in action; you cannot skip this step and see the end result directly. Otherwise, I wouldn’t have spent those extra seconds trying."

Xiong Wenwen argued, "Do you think predicting the future is that easy? Actions and locations of ghosts are the most obscure to foresee. It requires intense focus, and there’s more than one ghost here. What do you expect me to do?"

"I’m not blaming you, I just didn’t understand your abilities well enough, which led to miscalculations in my actions."

Yang Jian didn’t blame the child, but acknowledged his own mistakes.

He hadn’t expected that Tong Qian’s smiling face snatched from behind her head, combined with the memory-altering ghost and some unknown entity within the hotel would introduce so many variables.

If it were one-on-one, Yang Jian would definitely have been able to handle the situation.

"Then why haven’t you left yet? What are you wandering around here for?" Xiong Wenwen saw Yang Jian strolling around the restaurant with the Ghost Candle and urged him to leave quickly.

Seeing the rows of corpses hanging in midair, each with a bizarre smile, looking straight at her, and those pairs of dim, lifeless eyes following their movements, Xiong Wenwen was terrified to the point of almost crying.

If the Ghost Candle went out, she would die here.

"I need to retrieve the Ghost Rope. We can’t just ignore this ghost; otherwise, the trouble will only grow," Yang Jian spoke softly.

Without his Ghost Domain, the Ghost Rope was out of control. Fortunately, the restaurant wasn’t large. As long as he found the source of the Ghost Rope, he could still retrieve it within a short time; this wasn’t difficult for him.

If left unchecked, the Ghost Rope could cause a disaster; that too wasn’t to be taken lightly.

Soon enough.

Yang Jian saw a strand of Ghost Rope on one of the corpses.

One end of this Ghost Candle was wrapped around a piece of Gold, which stood out especially in the dim surroundings.

This marked Ghost Rope was the source.

"Found it." Yang Jian stepped directly onto the dining table, grabbed the straw rope, and pulled forcefully, taking the rope back. Read latest stories on

Once the Ghost Rope was retrieved and suppressed by the Ghost Candle, it immediately lost that eerie power.

All the corpses hanging in the restaurant fell to the ground simultaneously.

The restaurant was a mess, the bodies emitting a faint stench of decay that was almost enough to make one vomit.

Even without the Ghost Rope’s power, the corpses still emitted strange laughter, as if they were reluctant to let Yang Jian leave easily, wanting him to join their number.

The chilling wind was still howling, seemingly coming from nowhere, whipping the bloodstained newspapers on the floor into the air and blowing them around Yang Jian.

"We’re good now, let’s go."

After retrieving the Ghost Rope, Yang Jian immediately left the restaurant.

However, at that moment, Xiong Wenwen pointed to the floor and said, "Look down."

Yang Jian looked down and only then did he notice a series of dense, black footprints on the carpet of the restaurant. These footprints were disorderly, like someone had wandered aimlessly around the place for several laps, especially near where they had been standing—there, the footprints were particularly concentrated.

It seemed as though someone had been waiting right there for Yang Jian and Xiong Wenwen to emerge from the Ghost Domain.

"It’s the ghost from the second floor of the hotel; it seems to have entered from outside and hadn’t left the second floor since. It was probably distracted by the Ghost Candle earlier and has now left.

Fortunately, we were inside the Ghost Domain, so the ghost couldn’t find us, or we would’ve had to face another unknown terror," said Yang Jian, observing the black footprints covering the floor and discovering a set that led out of the restaurant.

The footsteps from before were no longer audible.

"Now’s not the time to deal with this thing. We need to temporarily retreat and rethink our strategy. The best course of action is to find Tong Qian and verify whether she’s truly dead. If she is, we have to retrieve any voice recordings left on her satellite-positioned phone."

Yang Jian led Xiong Wenwen out of the restaurant, safely and without incident.

The corpses did not chase after them.

The Ghost Candle kept the terror at bay and suppressed it; within the candlelight, he and Xiong Wenwen were absolutely safe.

Once they left the restaurant, indeed, the flame of the Ghost Candle began to burn at a slower rate.

This proved that they were moving away from danger.

"Let’s head back to the lobby first," said Yang Jian.

Yang Jian did not extinguish the Ghost Candle; instead, he still held onto it as they walked through the dimly lit corridor.

That series of black footprints seemed to have passed through here as well, extending to the end of the corridor where they disappeared at the intersection.

Yes.

The footprints just vanished, mysteriously disappearing.

It was uncertain whether they moved to the third floor, remained on the second floor, or perhaps descended back to the lobby on the first floor, or were even lurking nearby.

"Where did that thing go?" asked Xiong Wenwen fearfully. He did not use his power and had no idea about the ghost’s location.

"Since the Ghost Candle isn’t reacting, at least it’s not nearby. We can only guess that the thing is wandering on the second floor. But it’s an unknown ghost and not my main target this time. Don’t focus on it for now, unless it shows itself," Yang Jian replied.

Yang Jian glanced around and ignored it, heading toward the direction of the lobby.

There were too many bizarre things around; he decided to let this one go and not to actively target it.

Soon.

He and Xiong Wenwen returned to the lobby.

This area seemed safe, and no strange things followed them; the Ghost Candle’s flame had slowed to its least rapid pace.

It was then that Yang Jian decided to blow out the Ghost Candle.

The eerie green flame went out.

Looking back at the dim corridor, nothing came out, and that creeping laughter had disappeared as well.

It appeared the first skirmish between Yang Jian and the ghost had ended there.

Neither could do much about the other at the moment.

But Yang Jian knew he was at a disadvantage this time because he was facing a ghost, and he was human. Any encounter that wasn’t successful was a failure since he couldn’t afford multiple probings.

He momentarily set aside all such thoughts.

"Where are Feng Quan and Guo Fan?" he asked.

He scanned the lobby, only to find that the two who had been arguing incessantly with a female receptionist were now nowhere to be seen.

He walked down the stairs to take a closer look.

Yang Jian’s face darkened.

They were indeed not in the lobby.

He then looked over at the reception desk.

The female receptionist was still standing there motionless, her expression identical to before, wearing a smile, albeit a slightly stiff one.

"They must have run off after hearing the commotion," Xiong Wenwen said, annoyed. "Here we are, fighting for our lives, and they’re selling us out."

"It’s not possible they ran off," said Yang Jian, who knew Feng Quan well.

An ambitious man, he would never leave Z City with his tail between his legs.

The only possibilities were two: either they had ventured deeper into the hotel to investigate, or they had encountered danger and gotten caught up in some horrific incident.

Yang Jian’s judgment leaned towards the former.

The two must have gone to explore deeper into the hotel.

The elevator had signs of use; it had originally been stopped at the first floor but was now at the fourth.

This meant that Feng Quan and Guo Fan likely went to the fourth floor of the hotel.

Visit and read more novel to help us update chapter quickly. Thank you so much!