Free Web NovelChapter 962: Chapter 681: Ghost Phone
He was a slightly overweight man, sitting on a sofa facing the door, showing no reaction when the door opened.
"Dead..."
Yang Xiao was the first to walk in, enlarging the green light of the Ghost Lantern to cover the entire room as he surveyed the surroundings. The room’s furnishings were simple, mostly old and cheap furniture, with many empty liquor bottles on the coffee table in front of the man, filling the air with a pungent alcohol odor.
Beibei put on a pair of silver gloves and approached the body for examination, while Yang Xiao stood by with the lantern on alert, his gaze inadvertently shifting to a row of photos on the wall.
The photos showed a young man in dark blue work clothes, sporting a fashionable hairstyle popular at the time, standing with arms akimbo in front of an iron gate, with rows of factory buildings behind him and many men and women in blue work clothes coming and going.
Moving his gaze, another large photo on the wall caught his eye. It was a wedding picture, the groom wearing a clearly ill-fitting suit and a broad red tie, recognizable as the young man from the previous photo. The bride, however, was unrecognizable because her face had been viciously slashed with a sharp object, giving it a somewhat terrifying appearance at first glance.
Yang Xiao turned his head, looking at the middle-aged man dead on the sofa, undoubtedly the groom from the photos.
The room was in disarray, containing only the man’s clothes, leading Yang Xiao to deduce that the man was likely divorced and harbored great resentment towards his ex-wife.
Meanwhile, Beibei’s examination yielded results; she slowly stood up holding the man’s removed jacket, "The body is already cold, he’s been dead for some time now, at least 3 to 4 hours, livor mortis has also appeared."
Just like the previous Dark Army members who were killed, there were no obvious wounds on the man’s body. Yang Xiao lifted the Ghost Lantern closer to the man’s back and sure enough, found a pitch-black handprint there, with long and slender fingers – it was that ghost.
From the man’s death state, it seemed very sudden, without any signs, there was no expression of fear on his face, but rather some anger.
Beibei found a mobile phone in the man’s pants pocket, its screen full of cracks but fortunately still powered on, showing a prompt to enter a power-on password. freewёbnoνel.com
Rustling...
Suddenly, both Yang Xiao and Beibei heard a faint noise, pinpointing it coming from a wardrobe by the wall.
The wardrobe door was half-open, not looking like it could hide anything. Yang Xiao gestured for Beibei to fall back and guard the doorway while he, with the Ghost Lantern in his left hand, cautiously approached the wardrobe, his right hand firmly clutching the Human Bone Staff.
Subconsciously, Yang Xiao felt the Human Bone Staff was much more effective against intangible entities like ghosts compared to the Ghost Bamboo Stick. ƒreewebηoveℓ.com
Using the Human Bone Staff, he slowly opened the wardrobe door fully. The scene inside startled him: the back panel of the wardrobe had been removed, revealing directly the wall, which had an old wooden door embedded in it with some light faintly visible through the cracks.
Gently pushing with the Human Bone Staff, the wooden door opened, leading into what appeared to be a bedroom with a small cartoon nightlight glowing on the wall.
Yang Xiao’s gaze was drawn to the single bed, the quilt on it bulging as if someone were hiding underneath, strangely trembling slightly, and the unstable wooden bed creaking softly.
Moving his gaze down, there were two pairs of worn plastic slippers by the bed, small enough to fit children, indicating this was a child’s bedroom.
Yang Xiao stepped into the wardrobe and entered the bedroom, accidentally stepping on a plastic bag, which made a noise, causing the quilt on the bed to tremble even more violently, unclear whether the person underneath was human or ghost. Yang Xiao dared not to recklessly use his magic artifact, and instead pulled the blanket back after approaching, covering it instantly with the green light from the Ghost Lantern.
"Hit me, but don’t hit my little sister!!"
The next second, Yang Xiao frowned; under the quilt were two children, a boy and a girl, with the boy slightly older, tightly embracing his sister and shielding her in his arms.
The two children were wearing thin clothes, their faces showing panic and even reluctant to raise their heads. Their exposed arms and legs were covered in green and purple bruises, marks left from beatings. The green light shone on them, revealing no abnormalities.
"Don’t be afraid, I’m not a bad person, you are safe now," Yang Xiao took a few steps back, trying not to scare the two pitiful children.
Upon hearing this, the two children looked up, staring at Yang Xiao for a moment before looking towards the door. The boy hugged his sister, who was shorter than him, even tighter. Through the gaps in her brother’s arms, the girl blinked her pitiful big eyes at Yang Xiao, her voice weakly urging, "Dad doesn’t allow us to talk to strangers, you... you should leave quickly, dad has a bad temper, he will drive you out as well."
"Don’t be scared, kids, your dad is asleep. We are from the community, just stopping by to check on you."
Beibei’s voice came from behind, clearly her appearance with just a smile was much more comforting compared to Yang Xiao holding a Ghost Lantern in one hand and a Human Bone Staff in the other. She smiled gently at the two children and casually took out a piece of chocolate from her pocket, throwing it to them.
The boy was quick, catching the chocolate, peeling off the outer tin foil, breaking off a piece and putting it into his sister’s mouth, then wrapping the rest and stuffing it into his sister’s pant pocket before cautiously getting down from the bed with his sister.
Yang Xiao gave Beibei an inquiring look, and she nodded understandingly. The boy cautiously walked out of the bedroom, and indeed, saw the man on the sofa. However, his head was now covered with clothing, leaning back on the sofa, still clutching a bottle of liquor, appearing as if he had drunkenly fallen asleep.
