Chapter 170 – Seasons Pass, The Disappearance of Yan Yu - Part 2

In the dream, someone was banging on the wooden door of that small house.

THUMP! THUMP! THUMP!

Whoever it was didn’t wait for an answer. The sound soon became the violent pounding of someone trying to force their way in.

Inside, Yan Yu and Sheng'er watched the door warily. For a long time, it held fast—until suddenly, with a creak, it swung open. A thin line of darkness seeped into the room, and a peddler with a grotesque grin peeked around the door frame.

Everything fell eerily silent.

By the window, the white figure remained as before, back turned, unmoving.

Then, all at once, the peddler slipped into the room, that unsettling smile frozen on his face. He dashed straight for Sheng'er, hands outstretched to grab her. Sheng'er raised her walking stick, trying to fend him off. The peddler caught hold of it, and in that moment, everything seemed to freeze in place.

After a brief standstill, Sheng'er’s expression twisted in pain. She opened her mouth to cry out, but no sound emerged.

Yan Yu could hold back no longer. She clenched her fists and swung at the peddler. Even before her blow could land, a suffocating aura of death rushed at her. Yet, she never made contact with him. Just then, the white figure intercepted, blocking her path and also stopping the peddler’s outstretched hand from grabbing Yan Yu.

Behind them, the house’s door groaned and juddered, as though someone on one side was struggling to shut it while someone—or something—on the other side fought to keep it open.

Sheng'er’s strained expression finally eased a bit, yet the stalemate among the three parties persisted. Gradually, though, the little girl’s look of agony returned.

Yan Yu readied her fist again, determined to strike the back of the peddler’s skull, ignoring the creeping dread that made her soul tremble. At this point, she had already grasped the rules of

Feng’er’s

lingering regret.

Feng’er would never allow

her

to die. Anyone who became a threat to Yan Yu would be killed. It wasn’t really vengeance that led Feng’er to kill Bear earlier; it was simply that he had harbored the intent to kill Yan Yu. And so, in a twisted stroke of fortune, her revenge had been taken care of incidentally.

Now, Yan Yu understood the reason behind the night’s events.

Her husband had tried to do a good thing by using the gray rouge compact on Sheng'er. However, that makeup was the power of another ghost, and Sheng'er herself was another kind—a living ghost. When those two ghostly powers collided, the ghost behind the box had come seeking its prey. Clearly, Sheng'er on her own was no match for it.

The ghost’s target was her daughter, so it never triggered Feng’er’s rule—only a threat to Yan Yu herself would rouse Feng’er to kill. So, Yan Yu’s plan now was to

provoke

the ghost and force it into attacking her, so that Feng’er would intervene and save her daughter.

The peddler twisted his head around at an impossible angle, half a circle, and stared at Yan Yu with that crooked grin. A chill ran through her, but she swung her fist anyway. The mere gesture made the frigid aura spike, as if it wanted to devour her very soul. Yet she showed no sign of backing down.

But before her fist could land, the white silhouette whirled around again, intercepting her blow. At that moment, the figure’s long black hair spread out, revealing a pale face covered in spiderweb-like cracks. Those fractures were formed by countless miniature, white-clad women crawling across her face. In the next instant, they peeled away, inching onto the peddler’s body. They managed to cover about half of him before stopping, unable to spread any further.

The peddler continued to grin unnervingly, extending his hand toward Yan Yu once more. As it neared her, the white figure seemed to go berserk; the crawling shapes covering it scurried faster, as though someone had jammed the

fast-forward

button.

The entire house, too, seemed to lose its mind in that dead silence. The door rattled and shook back and forth, as if an invisible force struggled to shut it while another fought just as fiercely to keep it open. And since it couldn’t close, the room itself began to break apart in eerie stillness. Black, iron-like bars emerged—drawn and compressed by some sinister power—encircling the three of them like a giant hollow eggshell.

Seeing this, Yan Yu lunged for Sheng'er, giving her a fierce shove. “Wake up!” she shouted. Yet she never actually touched her daughter; the white figure quickly pushed Sheng'er aside first, apparently refusing to let her come into contact with the peddler. In that moment, the little girl was forcibly swept out of the house.

Then the entire structure caved in, trapping Yan Yu, the peddler, and the white figure within. It wasn’t fully sealed, though; something inside was forcing it apart, like a hollow eggshell being pried open from within. Within that strange shell, all three were locked in a silent, uncanny standoff.

˙·٠✧🐗➶➴🏹✧٠·˙

Meanwhile, back in the real world, Li Yuan stood guard inside the bedroom, Dragon-Fanged Spear gripped in hand, every sense alert to the slightest movement. Suddenly, a piercing cry came from the bed. He spun around—and froze in shock at what he saw.

Sheng'er had woken up. But Yan Yu was fading from sight before his very eyes.

𝕗𝐫𝚎𝗲𝘄𝐞𝕓𝐧𝕠𝘃𝕖𝐥.𝐜𝚘𝚖

He reached out to grab her, only to come up empty-handed, as though trying to catch the moon reflected in water.

“Papa... Papa...” Sheng'er wailed.

Li Yuan scooped her into his arms, reaching out once more to feel the still-warm bedding. But Yan Yu was nowhere to be found.

Cradling his daughter, he murmured gently, “It’s all right... Everything will be fine.”

“Mama... Mama...” The little girl sobbed as she called out for her mother.

Li Yuan’s heart sank. Even so, he forced a reassuring smile. “She’ll come back..."

˙·٠✧🐗➶➴🏹✧٠·˙

The next morning.

Li Yuan remained sleepless and on edge until a new line of text flashed before his eyes, prompting a long exhale of relief.

「

You spent a harmonious night with Yan Yu and gained 7 stat points.

」

“She’s alive,” he muttered in deep relief.

Not long after, he sought out Yan Mu. Because Yan Mu was a disciple of a prominent sect, Li Yuan avoided any mention of Feng’er’s true nature or Yan Yu’s deeper connection to it. He only explained that Yan Yu had been pulled into the black market ghost domain and asked if there was a way to save her.

Yan Mu was momentarily taken aback, then shook his head. “Not unless we involve a high elder from the Holy Tree Temple. I’m just an inner disciple, and the person who brought me into the sect—though a direct disciple—has long since gone his own way.”

He paused, looking torn. “If you want, I could try begging him...”

Li Yuan shook his head.

If word reached a major power, Yan Yu might only trade one peril for another

. Instead, he asked, “Tell me what these ghosts

really

are.”

Yan Mu answered, “No one truly knows. The elders only mention them vaguely. They claim ghosts are grudges given form. Each ghost follows a particular set of rules. Once you enter a ghost domain,

anything

you do might trigger its grudge.

“Undying husks happen to be special because they’ve triggered the grudge, but that grudge never fully completed on them. That’s how they survived and gained certain peculiar abilities.

“As for the ghost grudges themselves, some keep running on their own, even if no one is there to trigger them. Others envelop a certain area, affecting everyone within it. But if you’re outside, you remain safe.”

Li Yuan immediately recalled both the mass grave ghost domain and the carpenter’s workshop ghost domain. The first was like a constantly churning

barracks

producing ghost servants; the second was more like a

mystery box

. In the beginning, you had to physically open the workshop door, but later on, if luck turned against you, just opening your own bedroom door might transport you into that eerie carpenter’s workshop.

It was less like a set of rules and more akin to some kind of

program

.

“And what about the ghost domains?” Li Yuan pressed. “How do they form in the first place?”

Yan Mu replied, “There are many theories, but the most popular is what the old heavenly master calls the Yin-Yang Doomsday theory.

“The old heavenly master taught that everything in this world is composed of Yin and Yang.

“A person’s physical body is Yang, while the soul is Yin. The same principle applies to the world at large. Yin and Yang unite to generate all things. Yet as Yin and Yang rotate through cycles of merging and separating, we’ve reached a stage where they pull apart. So, the meat fields and ghost domains have appeared.

“Meat fields represent Yang, and ghost domains represent Yin. But this separation has only just begun. As time goes on, the meat fields will produce ever more potent forms of flesh, while the ghost domains will become increasingly terrifying. Meanwhile, ordinary farmland will grow barren and desolate, until eventually it turns to sand and wasteland.

“Ghosts are born of these ghost domains. Their rules are deeply intertwined with an entity within that domain, yet the ghost is no longer that entity’s former self; it’s merely a lingering obsession.”

This explanation dispelled many of Li Yuan’s doubts. Suddenly, he had another thought. “What if one ghost is lured into another ghost’s domain? What happens then?”

Yan Mu gave a wry smile. “They typically fuse into a new ghost that combines aspects of both. Which ghost’s traits come out on top depends on circumstances. But that’s a terrifying prospect. Every martial artist tries their best to prevent such a thing.”

Li Yuan pressed on. “Is there a way to

end

a ghost?”

Yan Mu hesitated. “You can seal or suppress them, but you can’t truly eliminate them. The old heavenly master of the sect said that ghosts are extreme Yin, and a martial artist’s shadow blood is extreme Yang. If you have an ancestral seal, you can restrain a ghost. With enough power, a martial artist can even drive roaming ghosts back into their domain—though they’ll only stay sealed for a time before reappearing.

“He also talked about what might happen in the future. As the Yin-Yang Doomsday looms, ghost domains will grow stronger and stronger, and powerful martial artists will have to station themselves near the most dangerous domains to keep them under control. But that’s just buying time. No one knows how things will ultimately turn out.”

Yan Mu sighed. “Right now, two camps exist among the martial artist sects. One faction wants to share our cultivation techniques with the public, arguing that only by broadening martial arts can we nurture more powerful fighters. The other side refuses to open up the teachings; they claim there aren’t enough resources, but I suspect that’s not the real reason. After all, as meat fields keep growing stronger, they yield plenty of resources for many martial artists, and hunting demonic beasts also provides a good supply.”

Li Yuan went silent at that. He suspected the true motive behind refusing to share martial teachings was more dire. If achieving the leap from sixth rank to fifth rank was really as brutal a process as he envisioned, then

opening the teachings to all

might well mean turning the human realm into a living hell. Those calling for openness likely knew it too, but didn’t dare say so outright. The path of martial cultivation may lead to towering heights, but it was perilously narrow—a road where only one person could pass if many tried to walk it together.

Yan Mu clenched his fists. “The undying husk aren’t even human anymore. They’ve suddenly shown up in the Jade Capital, and who knows what they’re planning. I have a bad feeling about it.”

Li Yuan asked, “Can you recognize an undying husk on sight?”

Shaking his head, Yan Mu replied grimly, “Aside from a few with obvious traits, you really can’t. If they hide among people, nobody can tell. Of course, in a fair fight, they’re still no match for a trained martial artist.”

Li Yuan pondered a moment. “Since undying husks have human bodies powered by some ghostly grudge, is it possible for them to fully master that ghost’s power? Or for the ghost to gain control over them? A ghost by itself lacks human intelligence, following only its set rules. But if it suddenly gained a human’s wits, wouldn’t that be

far

more terrifying?”

Yan Mu went pale. “That...shouldn’t be possible.”

But the notion evidently rattled him enough to make it hard to continue.

Li Yuan clapped him on the shoulder. “Don’t do anything rash. Let me think things over.”

Later that day, Pang Yuanhua visited the ghost street marketplace and returned to report.

“Senior, something strange happened at the ancient street. That peddler who was always selling rouge and face powder has vanished. The undying husks there are talking about it.”

Li Yuan only said, “I see. Keep an eye on things for me.”