Free Web NovelChapter 97: Chapter 15: You Are the Next to Be Imprisoned
Gazing at the twenty Joker cards in his hand, Gao Tian wore a thoughtful expression.
"I see."
"So, you people from the Jialan Society have run out of tricks. All you can do is resort to such cheap tactics. Distorting reality to a certain extent... is this your final trump card?"
"If you think you can avoid drawing the single numbered card out of these twenty-one, then by all means, give it a try."
The Ghost Infant’s five wooden fingers hovered over Gao Tian’s hand of twenty-one cards and began to choose.
Logically speaking, with twenty Jokers out of twenty-one cards, drawing one should have been a near certainty. The probability of drawing the single ordinary numbered card was less than 5%.
Besides, even if its luck was so terrible that it failed to draw a Joker, once the single numbered card was drawn, the opponent would be left with twenty cards that were all Jokers.
In that case, all it had to do was survive the next round. After the opponent took his turn, on the Ghost Infant’s second draw, the kid would be dead for sure.
But for some reason, as the Ghost Infant’s hand hovered over Gao Tian’s twenty-one cards, it felt a sudden, inexplicable wave of terror.
’Fear?’
’How long has it been since I’ve felt this emotion?’
’Isn’t that a base, meaningless chemical reaction in the brain, something only the living possess?’
The Ghost Infant had always believed that since it was already dead, and a person couldn’t die a second time, there was nothing left in the world for it to fear.
Twenty Jokers out of twenty-one cards. It only had to draw one to win. But for some reason, it just couldn’t bring itself to make a move.
Gao Tian said,
"Let me tell you your only chance of winning."
"It’s to turn all twenty-one of these cards into Jokers."
"But you can’t do that, can you?"
"As long as you’ve left me with one numbered card—just one."
"Then the moment you draw, you’ve already lost."
Time was running out for the hesitating Ghost Infant.
The gray powder swirling from the cinerary box spun around it, urging it to hurry up and choose a card.
The Ghost Infant didn’t understand. Probability was clearly on its side, yet it was the one who was afraid. It felt as if it were the one cornered and desperate.
’Does this even make sense?’
The Ghost Infant knew Gao Tian’s luck was good right now, but it refused to believe his luck was *so* good that it would fail to draw one of the twenty Jokers, while he would succeed in drawing his one winning card on his turn, not even leaving it a second round.
It had no other choice. It randomly tapped a card and made its first draw.
The moment the face of the card was revealed, the Ghost Infant felt as if it had been plunged into a bottomless abyss.
Unfortunately—
It knew it had lost.
It was an ordinary numbered card. Of course it was.
’So this is a person of immense luck. Luck so good it defies all rules.’
In fact, when it was Gao Tian’s turn, before he had even started to draw, the Ghost Infant was already so hopeless that it voluntarily closed its eyes, awaiting fate’s judgment.
Having witnessed Gao Tian’s absolute confidence and his absurdly unreasonable luck, the Ghost Infant already understood what was coming.
’Ghost Cave, it’s up to you now.’
Like a revolving lantern, scenes from its past flashed before its eyes one by one, like a video recording.
’To think I was such a failure as a Ghost Hunter when I was alive, and now, after death, I’m a failure as a ghost too.’
It was Gao Tian’s turn. Without a moment’s thought, he made his choice.
"Third card from the left."
This was the power of fortune. In the unseen world, he had a powerful feeling that the card he wanted was in that exact spot. There was no reasoning, no clues—just pure instinct.
The card Gao Tian chose slowly turned over.
A Joker.
A one-in-twenty-one probability, and Gao Tian had hit it.
The cinerary box began to vibrate violently. Countless specks of ash flew out in a frenzy, instantly engulfing the Ghost Infant’s body.
In the distance, Ghost Cave saw this scene. Although it didn’t know exactly what had happened, its instincts screamed that something was terribly wrong. Its hollow skull, like a torn mouth, opened to its widest extent, as if trying to let out a silent roar.
"Stop! You bastard!"
When the scene settled, Gao Tian stood atop a giant rock, holding the now-closed cinerary box, not a speck of dust on him. Above his head, a massive black cloud of ghostly fortune swirled. He was majestic and imposing, like a god of war.
Jialan Society, Ghost Infant, containment successful!
...
...
After containing the Ghost Infant, Gao Tian immediately began to acquire its murder rule.
Of course, the Ghost Infant possessed countless Supernatural Artifacts of its own. It had undergone special modification by the Jialan Society, and had more than one ghost and its murder rule stitched into its body, such as the venomously resentful woman’s face on its back.
However, because the containment had just occurred, Gao Tian had only mastered one of its murder rules so far.
This murder rule was very simple, and it was the Ghost Infant’s signature ability.
Whoever it points at will give birth to a Ghost Infant within their body in a matter of seconds. All of their life force and flesh are drained and digested, becoming nutrients for the growing Ghost Infant.
Both men and women could be targets of this rule.
Once the Ghost Infant grows to a certain point, it will burst out of the host’s body and leave. It becomes a new, independent ghost, completely obedient to its master’s commands.
During this process, if the body the Ghost Infant bursts from belongs to a living person, that person will surely die.
If it’s a powerful ghost, the impregnated ghost will fall into a period of dormancy, and during that time, its own murder rule might even be stolen.
Fortunately, just as a Ghost Infant was about to burst out of a victim’s belly earlier, Gao Tian had activated his Terror Blade in time to sacrifice them. Otherwise, if a few more Ghost Infants had appeared, dealing with them would have been much more troublesome.
After mastering the Ghost Infant’s murder rule, Gao Tian, holding the Terror Blade, slowly turned to face the direction of Ghost Cave’s descent.
In the entire building, only the two of them—one man, one ghost—remained. This was the final showdown.
Ghost Cave clung silently to a huge rock, still maintaining its downward trajectory. It didn’t have Gao Tian’s immense luck, which allowed him to stand on a crumbling stone slab as if it were solid ground. If Ghost Cave dared to show off like that, gravity would have sent it into a dizzying spin.
Strangely, despite seeing its companion get sucked into Gao Tian’s cinerary box, Ghost Cave, which was usually prone to rampages, was unusually calm. It showed no sign of rage or recklessness.
The man and the ghost observed each other from a distance. Neither spoke.
It was like the calm before the storm.
A moment later, Ghost Cave was the first to speak.
"I must apologize to you, Memory Ghost."
"I underestimated your abilities. I shouldn’t have flown straight here to find you without any prior investigation."
"Perhaps after becoming a ghost, this organ inside my skull has completely rotted and atrophied. My intelligence has declined significantly compared to when I was alive."
It tapped its empty skull, as if expressing its helplessness.
"If I were still human, I wouldn’t have been so arrogant as to attack directly. No matter how weak the enemy, I would always observe carefully and act only after forming a plan."
"I should have noticed it sooner. The you before you walked into the mirror and the you after you walked out are like two different people, completely different beings. Although your abilities and your murder rule haven’t changed much, Ghost Infant and I found that we couldn’t beat you at all."
"Before Ghost Infant was contained, it was screaming desperately at me. It must have discovered some pattern about you and was trying to pass that information to me. A pity it was contained anyway. I’m too stupid to figure out what key factor caused this qualitative change in you."
Gao Tian raised his Terror Blade, interrupting it.
"Blah, blah, blah. Are you done with all this nonsense yet?"
"If you’re done, let’s just get this over with."
"You’re the next one to be contained."
Gao Tian hadn’t yet decided how to deal with Ghost Cave.
The second cinerary box was originally prepared for Ghost Cave. He hadn’t expected the Ghost Infant to use a substitute doll, sacrificing itself to be contained in order to save Ghost Cave.
But it didn’t matter. The outcome would be the same.
Gao Tian’s initial plan was to temporarily release the Shattered-Face Ghost, and use the newly empty box to contain Ghost Cave.
After all, when he first encountered the Shattered-Face Ghost, he was just an ordinary person, and a ghost was an entity he was completely incapable of handling.
Now, even if he temporarily released the Shattered-Face Ghost, Gao Tian had the ability to deal with it.
As Gao Tian was thinking, Ghost Cave muttered to itself and continued speaking.
"No, no, no, you don’t understand my meaning at all, Memory Ghost."
"Although you are very strong right now, in this game, the one who loses in the end... will still be you."
"Ghost Infant’s final roar before it was contained made me realize something—this abnormal state you’re in right now isn’t permanent. It’s a temporary state you’ve entered."
Like an old monk, Ghost Cave slowly sat down cross-legged amidst the constantly falling debris and continued to explain,
"If you were always in this state, you wouldn’t have been killed by us twice in the beginning. This means that entering this state requires some kind of trigger, and once that trigger is gone, the state will disappear with it."
"In that case, the way to eliminate you is very simple."
"All I need to do is isolate myself from you and drag this out for as long as possible. I just have to wait until your current state naturally disappears and you turn back into an ordinary person. Then, killing you will be as easy as crushing an ant."
"I’m not wrong, am I, Memory Ghost?"
As it spoke, a container like crystal glass slowly grew around Ghost Cave. Like a cocoon, it was completely enveloped within, totally cut off from the outside world.
Before entering the mysterious cocoon, Ghost Cave left a final message:
"Currently, the effect of the Supernatural Artifact I’ve activated is simple. Once inside the cocoon, no attack from the outside world can affect what’s inside. Likewise, no attack from inside the cocoon can affect the outside world."
"The cocoon lasts for ten hours. And until that time is up, not even I can deactivate it."
"Right now, you are trapped in this Ghost Realm and you can’t break through my ’cocoon.’ When ten hours have passed, I’ll assess whether that state of yours is over. At that time, I can emerge from the cocoon and casually kill the you who has returned to being an ordinary person."
