Yama Rising

Why would she want to possess someone?

With the pitiful IQs of these two evil ghosts, there was no way they could think of an answer to this question, and they could only look at Qin Ye with admiration in their eyes, awaiting his verdict.

Why am I always accompanied by either idiots or maniacs? There's not a single person that can give me any useful ideas when I need them! Qin Ye pursed his lips as he continued his analysis. "Her goal for possessing someone must be ease of movement. That has always been the objective for evil ghosts looking to possess others. However, why does she need better ease of movement? Does this suggest that there's something here I can do but she is unable to? For some reason, she needs the body of a perfect, handsome, and strong outsider."

Both Ryu Changmin and Kwon Kyung-ho were struck by the urge to scoff at Qin Ye's blatant self-praise, but they didn't dare to say anything.

In reality, Qin Ye wasn't talking to himself to look cool. Instead, he was doing so to arrange his thoughts in the absence of pen and paper. Through articulating his thought process, he would be able to organize his ideas and perhaps come up with new ones.

"Also, if she wants to possess someone, then why didn't she just possess a resident of this building? On top of that, even though she's present in this building, the residents are still all alive. Could it be that she's unable to possess the residents of the Huang Clan's earthen building? If so, then why?"

He thought back to the scene he had witnessed earlier in the afternoon through the window as he continued to ponder the situation. "What could make it so that she's unable to possess the residents of this earthen building? Could it be because they're all dead, or they aren't even humans to begin with?"

After contemplating the matter for several minutes, he stroked his own chin as he mused, "Fate can be a little sporadic at times, but there's one thing it got correct. Everyone here is clearly avoiding me with the exception of Chu Renmei. Even though she's a ghost, she's my only hope in cracking this mystery."

As for any deeper deductions, they simply couldn't be made due to the lack of leads and information.

That was as far as Qin Ye's analysis could take him, and just as he was preparing to lie down for some rest, Fate suddenly emerged before slowly writing on the wall: "Esteemed Lord Qin, there are still four days left until the Cold Suit Festival. As your lowly tool, I must remind you that the four annual ghost festivals are the easiest times for you to find the heinous souls in the forsaken lands. Considering how strange this place is, if you don't find the heinous spirit here on this occasion, then you'll most likely have to wait until the Shangyuan Festival for your next opportunity to solve this mystery."

Qin Ye was quite stunned to hear this. "Is it that hard to do things in the forsaken lands?"

Fate paused momentarily before continuing to write on the wall. "My Lord, you are greatly underestimating these forsaken lands. Why has the Heavenly Dao abandoned these places? Why are Yin talismans unable to be used here? These aren't coincidences. Behind the formation of each forsaken land is a set of extremely complex circumstances. There has been at least one ancient divine ghost that has perished here."

I see... Qin Ye didn't say anything further as he slowly closed his eyes.

In any case, the first day was already behind him.

He slept until the next morning, and as he woke up, he could already see faint rays of golden light spilling in through the windows, which hadn't been completely blocked by the furniture in the room. He yawned before doing some washing up, and only then did he drag the dressing table back to its original spot in the room, thereby allowing full access to the windows.

After that, he opened the window before jumping outside.

Perhaps it was just his imagination, but as he emerged from his sealed room out into the open, he detected a faint fragrance in the air. The fragrance was barely noticeable; perhaps it didn't even exist at all. He paid no heed to it as he began to inspect the Huang Clan's earthen building again.

This was his second day in the earthen building, but the scenery remained completely unchanged from the day before. It was as if this place was trapped in a permanent time loop, doomed to repeat the same day over and over again.

He began to walk around the building. He didn't get a chance to familiarise himself with all of the households in the building yesterday, and today, he was planning to begin collecting information from the left side first.

The residents of the Huang Clan's earthen building weren't very complex or diverse. There were elderly men seated on rocking chairs, resembling corpses as they constantly stared at the locust tree. There were also elderly with disheveled hair, slowly fanning themselves as they carved out a series of abstract humanoid wooden dolls... Every single one of them resembled mental asylum escapees.

The entire earthen building was enshrouded under a suffocating cloud of deathly silence, loneliness, oppression, and insanity. All of the residents were like zombies who had lost the ability to think, and not a single one of them paid any heed to Qin Ye, even though he had tried all types of methods to get their attention and initiate conversation.

Over two hours later, he returned to the same spot he had visited the day before.

The woman in the plain cheongsam was still there, and there seemed to be no end to the cold suits that she had to cut out. The same music was being played in the room, and the windows and door were still tightly shut.

However, in the instant that Qin Ye approached her, she raised her head in a stunned manner and stared directly at him.

Only then did Qin Ye discover that the woman's eyes were of a bright red color. It was impossible to describe this color. It was like the insanity concealed behind a veil of rationality.

Her body remained completely still while her head tilted to the left, then to the right at extremely gruesome angles. After a long while, she finally spoke. "I can't believe you're still alive."

This was the first person to have initiated a conversation with him!

Qin Ye was becoming more and more convinced that this was a problem-solving task, and upon fulfilling certain conditions, he would unlock certain NPCs. It seemed that the condition to unlock the conversation feature with this woman was surviving the first day.

"You seem very surprised," he said with a smile.

"I am." The woman leaned on the railing beside her before pulling out a pack of cigarettes. "Want one?"

"No, thanks."

The woman then pulled out a box of matches and gently lit one to ignite her cigarette. She took a puff from the cigarette before blowing out a cloud of turquoise smoke, then cast a slightly spaced-out gaze toward the top of the locust tree. "Not smoking is a good habit..."

She wasn't particularly beautiful, with a long face and small eyes. However, her figure was exceptional and even though she was leaning against the railing, her alluring curves were clearly visible. Unfortunately, Qin Ye had no interest in someone like her as he had no idea whether she was even a ghost or a human.

"Did you meet her?" The woman tapped her cigarette against the railing as she said in a raspy voice, "You're the first person in all these years to have not died on the night after you heard that song."

"Who are you?" Qin Ye asked as he raised an eyebrow.

"I am Huang Xiaoqing," the woman murmured as she looked up at the dark sky with a forlorn expression. "I am Bu Wantian's little sister."

Bu Wantian? Who's that? 

Qin Ye's brows furrowed slightly upon hearing this, but in the next instant, he abruptly raised his head to stare at the woman with a stunned expression.

Bu Wantian...

The husband of Chu Renmei in the movie, "A Wicked Ghost", was named none other than Bu Wantian! 

I didn't know that he had a sister! Hold on... Bu Wantian, Huang Xiaoqing... 

"His surname isn't Huang?" Qin Ye asked as he appraised Huang Xiaoqing with an intense gaze. "Everyone in the Huang Clan's village bears the Huang surname, so why is his surname Bu?"

Huang Xiaoqing's answer was very simple. "He inherited our mother's surname. My mother's family was quite affluent back in the day, and she married someone from the Huang Clan under the condition that their son had to take on her surname. My father agreed, and that's why my brother has the Bu surname."

I see... Hold on, that's still not right! 

A window seemed to have been opened up in Qin Ye's mind, allowing him to think of many more things.

Previously, his focus had always been on Chu Renmei as she had left an extremely deep impression on him. However, as a result, he failed to consider the movie she had come from, "A Wicked Ghost"!

From the very beginning, he had been of the opinion that reality was separate from the plot of the movie. After all, that was just a movie, but thinking about it now, why couldn't the two overlap?

Was a fusion between a movie and reality really all that preposterous?

Even Chu Renmei had appeared, so why couldn't this be the setting where the events in the movie had unfolded?

Furthermore, what was even more of a coincidence was that the movie had begun with a game of evocation, and as a result, they had invoked the vengeful spirit of Chu Renmei, which had already killed 66 people. This game was set... in none other than a place called the Huang Clan's village!

It was the same setting, it was the same plot, and it was the same Chu Renmei. Who was to say that "A Wicked Ghost" wasn't actually an embellished documentary?

Who could provide proof that Chu Renmei was actually just a fictional character?

If that's true, then I have a lot more leads to investigate... His heart rate was beginning to spike, but he immediately repressed his excitement and continued to listen.

"It was around the late 90s..." Huang Xiaoqing took a puff of her cigarette as she said in a slow voice, "Some people came to investigate the incident surrounding Chu Renmei. They proclaimed themselves to be journalists from Hong Kong, as well as a few construction workers who claimed that they had seen a ghost and wanted to investigate this place. To be honest, I found it quite amusing as they didn't have the slightest idea what kind of place they had just arrived at. 100 years ago, this place was called the Huang Clan's village. Everyone in the entire village had the Huang surname, and it was at that time that this earthen building was constructed. At the time, my brother, Bu Wantian, was a school teacher."

Huang Xiaoqing tucked a few stray strands of hair behind her ear as a faint smile appeared on her face, and she cast her gaze toward the fourth floor. "He was the one who planted this tree, and his wife was Chu Renmei."

Everything is a perfect match with the plot of the movie! Qin Ye took a meaningful glance at Huag Xiaoqing, but didn't interrupt her.

She continued, "However, he quickly attracted the attention of a wealthy family's young mistress with his handsome looks, and he had an affair with her. However, due to the fact that he was married to Chu Renmei, their relationship could never progress. Thus... they hatched an idea. I no longer recall exactly what had happened..."

She heaved a faint sigh here before continuing, "All I remember is that my sister-in-law was stoned to death, and I'll never forget the look in her eyes as she died... Those were no longer the eyes of a human. She didn't cry, nor did she scream. All she did was stare blankly at everyone, just like an evil ghost in the night. Throughout the entire stoning, she didn't blink once, and the mere sight of her sent chills running down everyone's spines. In the end, her body was tossed away on a barren mountain."

After finishing her story, she heaved a faint sigh before throwing away her cigarette butt.

Qin Ye waited for a minute before raising an eyebrow. "Is that it?"

"That's it" Huang Xiaoqing waved a hand in a dismissive manner. "I only told you all of this because I've been lonely for far too long; who knows if you're going to even survive past tonight?"

"Can I ask you a question?"

Huang Xiaoqing picked up her scissors again. She didn't say anything, but she didn't refuse, either.

Qin Ye approached her before asking in a quiet voice, "Have all of the other residents of the Huang Clan's village lived here as long as you have?"

Huang Xiaoqing had begun to cut out more cold suits, and only after half a minute had passed did she reply, "Everyone here has lived here their entire lives, and most of them have watched me grow up."

"Alright, that's all I needed to know." Qin Ye stood up with a smile and continued to stroll around the building.

However, by the time he made it back to the entrance of his own room, his expression had already become extremely grim.

"My Lord." Kwon Kyung-ho emerged from the windowpane and asked, "Has something happened?"

Qin Ye took a glance at him before relaying everything that Huang Xiaoqing had said to him in her exact words. He then asked, "Do you hear something wrong with her story?"

"I don't..." Ryu Changmin and Kwon Kyung-ho exchanged a clueless glance. There didn't seem to be anything amiss.

Even though it was still daytime, the sky was just as dark as it was in the night, and a cold smile appeared on Qin Ye's face as he cast his gaze upward. "All of this happened over 100 years ago. Huang Xiaoqing is Bu Wantian's sister. Setting aside whether Chu Renmei would spare her, even if she did spare her, how old would she be right now? 120? 150? What about those elderly people who watched her grow up? How old would they be? Over 200? What kind of a village is this?"

Kwon Kyung-ho drew a sharp breath upon hearing this. "H... How is that possible?! This completely goes against the laws of the world!"

Qin Ye smiled and said, "That's why this place is called a forsaken land."

"The more I think about it, the more terrifying it gets..."

The isolated earthen building, the vanished village, the locust tree that turned day into night, the evil ghost from over a century ago, and... a bunch of immortal monsters?