Chapter 282: Black Sun God and Dark Moon God
The hospital hallway was dimly lit, with a visible gray-black mist swirling at the far end. There weren’t many people around, and those passing by had no idea about the chilling presence lurking inside the hospital. To them, it felt colder than outside, but it wasn’t the kind of cold produced by air conditioning; it was more like a cold that sent shivers straight to the soul, an uncomfortable prickly sensation that didn’t help with the hot weather—it just made them sweat while feeling like needles were poking them in the back.
“I saw it; these guys are way too bold,” Zhao Mingyue hurried toward the opposite building.
Such a thick cloud of grudge indicated at least two Red-clothed Evil Ghosts were operating here, and they were brazenly acting even in broad daylight.
As she quickly made her way, Zhao Mingyue frowned, following the trail of resentment to its deepest source; she was sure she would find their Red-clothed Evil Ghosts.
She couldn’t understand why they were in such a rush, searching for Nianqiu and Feng Xi during the day.
“Bai Yu, can you sense their general direction?”
“Basement.”
“Basement?” Zhao Mingyue reached the elevator, only to discover she needed a keycard to access two floors down.
After exiting the elevator and heading to the stairs, she found the lower staircase was locked. Standing in front of the tightly secured door to the second basement level, she was about to turn away when a black tentacle emerged from her body. After prodding the lock for a few seconds, she heard a click, and the door to the basement swung open.
Since becoming a half-human, half-ghost, Zhao Mingyue wasn’t afraid of cold or heat.
But the moment that door cracked open, she felt a chill race through her body, the cold wind from within made her instinctively huddle her neck.
“Well, that solves that.”
Zhao Mingyue lowered her footfalls.
This floor primarily housed human organs and specimens, the pale light casting eerie shadows in the corridor. It was disturbingly quiet; even the slightest noise would echo terrifyingly. Zhao Mingyue held her breath and quietly moved towards the source of the spreading resentment.
There was no one in the hallway, no ghosts either; it was as if she could hear a sound on the edge of her perception, but every time she tried to focus, it vanished. Zhao Mingyue already knew what this place was—the hospital’s morgue.
Some hospitals collaborated with the police department for storing bodies from crime scenes. Typically, such bodies wouldn’t be kept for more than fifteen days, but some unclaimed bodies piled up over time, especially given the recent uptick in criminal cases, leaving them unattended for ages.
“It feels like there’s too much resentment here; it’s a bit strange.”
Zhao Mingyue frowned; if only two or three Red-clothed Evil Ghosts were here, the resentment wouldn’t be so evenly distributed.
There must be a reason for such a uniform spread of resentment—too many ghosts in one place.
“How many bodies are we talking about, here?”
Zhao Mingyue thought there would be just one or two morgue rooms, but as it turned out, she had already passed three, with several more ahead, from Room One all the way to Room Eight.
Just as she faintly heard something moving in Room Eight, a Red-clothed figure suddenly dashed through the door into the hallway.
At this moment, the ghost was no more than five meters away from Zhao Mingyue.
Noticing her presence, the Red-clothed figure abruptly turned around, but the mass of black tentacles was faster than her; in an instant, they wrapped around her body and violently tore her apart.
Bai Yu didn’t waste time consuming her but used the tentacles to shred her, letting the black mist spread freely in the air. The evil ghost let out a shrill scream, which attracted the attention of three people from Room Eight.
They turned in unison to look at the door, exchanging knowing glances, and stashed the still-beating black heart they held into a plain black box before releasing two other Red-clothed apparitions.
Slowly approaching the door, the leader, wearing a black mask, reached for the doorknob. Just as he pulled the door open, a black tentacle immediately ensnared his body. He struggled desperately, glancing outside to see a young girl in a white coat standing at the door.
Behind her loomed a thick cloud of resentment left by the Red-clothed ghost, within which, the two apparitions they dispatched were firmly ensnared to the ceiling by bl**d Threads, unable to break free.
“Well, this is a delightful surprise,” Zhao Mingyue remarked as she looked at the three inside the room. Just as her words fell, bl**d Threads pierced through the hearts of the two behind her before wrapping around their bodies, starting to devour them whole.
The box they dropped landed on the ground, caught by the bl**d Threads, and the singular remaining individual didn’t even have time to react before meeting their end.
The last survivor was clearly the most prominent of the trio, based on the strength of his soul and aura.
Binding the one remaining member of the Ghost Domain, Bai Yu ensured he wouldn’t wake up anytime soon and injected resentment into his body—this was like injecting poison into a living person.
Controlling the bl**d Threads, she opened a morgue drawer, tossed the Ghost Domain member inside, and closed it. The goal was to buy time and prevent the hospital staff from discovering the issue in the morgue.
This area must have been tampered with by these three; otherwise, there wouldn’t be a single worker in sight.
The hospital would soon realize something was off; for now, they just needed to stall and figure out how to retrieve this guy later.
“Is it really this easy?”
Zhao Mingyue received the box handed over by Bai Yu. She hadn’t even lifted a finger, and within less than a minute, all the Ghost Domain folks had been handled.
“Bai Yu, you make me feel so useless. What’s inside this box?”
As she walked back, Zhao Mingyue opened the wooden box and found it contained a pitch-black heart, emanating resentment, similar to the aura of a Red-clothed Evil Ghost.
She couldn’t even be sure if the heart was solid, as it seemed too eerie for her to risk touching it.
“Let’s put it away for now and get Chen Yunshi to help,” Bai Yu suggested, recalling her vague suspicions about the heart.
If she was right, that would mean specific expertise was needed, and the professional necromancer, Chen Yunshi, could definitely identify it.
Nodding, Zhao Mingyue took out her phone and sent a text to Chen Yunshi, including the hospital’s address and the specific ward where Nianqiu was located.
Chen Yunshi responded quickly, asserting she could arrive in half an hour, though her tone hinted it was actually Qian Mu who typed the reply.
Meanwhile, in a single apartment, Chen Yunshi was soaking in her bathtub. She loved spending her free time lounging in a tub with a glass of red wine.
The reason for her solitude was simple—Qian Mu was unbearably annoying.
Every time it was, “This red wine tastes off,” or “The water’s either too cold or too hot,” she just couldn’t deal. If she told Qian Mu to scram, there would be a back-and-forth banter filled with insults for half an hour. In the end, she wouldn’t get to drink any wine, and the water would be lukewarm.
This wasn’t a one-time occurrence; she was thoroughly fed up with Qian Mu.
They had a deal: she promised to take Qian Mu to certain places for fun, but during her bath time, she was off-limits—no commenting on her wine’s quality, and absolutely no entering the bathroom.
“Yunshi! Yunshi! Chen Yunshi!” Qian Mu yelled, knocking loudly on the bathroom door.
“Shut up!”
“You can’t do this! Put down that roadside red wine of yours. It’s inferior quality, worse than those nameless beverages from corner stores. Didn’t you see those phone videos talking about the science behind it all? You’re not the sharpest tool in the shed, so drinking that stuff is just going to rust that little brain of yours more!”
“I’m telling you now, if you drink that junk and it causes you any issues, I’m not looking after you!”
“Drinking all that junk will only make you…”
Before Qian Mu could finish, Chen Yunshi yanked the bathroom door open. She wore a waterproof cap, a bath towel wrapped around her, and cucumber slices on her face, with one stubborn slice falling off as she glared furiously.
“If you don’t give me a reason today, you’re never watching those garbage videos again! Oh, by the way, the books you bought were with my money, and since I’m short on cash lately, no books for you, alright?”
“You!” Qian Mu’s face hovered in front of Chen Yunshi, and for once, she was at a loss for words.
“Touché, fine, let’s drop it!”
Pulling out Chen Yunshi’s phone, Qian Mu opened the messaging app and enlarged the photo Zhao Mingyue had sent. “Your little number one fan ran into some trouble and needs your help. I’ve already told her we’ll be there in half an hour, and you’ve wasted four minutes already.”
Wanting to yell at Qian Mu, Chen Yunshi snatched the phone to scrutinize the picture closely.
“Cursed heart…”
“What?”
Without explaining, she placed the phone on the table, hurried into the bedroom to change into a fresh outfit, tied her hair in a simple ponytail, grabbed the keys, and dashed out.
Qian Mu attempted to retrieve the phone from the table, but Chen Yunshi stopped her.
“If you delete my contacts again, I swear I’ll k*ll you.”
“What’s wrong with you?” Qian Mu seemed unfazed. “That Mr. Li obviously has impure intentions toward you. Who just calls a single woman ‘Master’? I’m just trying to help, okay?”
“That’s a believer I’m developing!”
Twenty minutes later, Chen Yunshi arrived at the hospital where Zhao Mingyue was.
After parking, she walked into a quiet little park under the hospital.
The tiny park was deserted, and in the corner, she spotted Bai Yu and Zhao Mingyue sitting on a bench.
“Check this out.”
As soon as Chen Yunshi arrived, Bai Yu tossed her the wooden box.
Standing under the shade of a tree, Chen Yunshi opened the box, and a faint black mist wafted out. She took the heart from within, holding it in her palm to examine it closely.
“Cursed heart for sacrificial use; this was extracted from an evil ghost’s body. It looks like it’s been nurtured, and it’s packed with power.”
“The primary use of this thing is to open a portal, which can be more broadly understood as either the gate to hell or the ghost gate of this world.”
“I’ve studied ghost gates, and there are real and fake ones. The last evil god was connected to a true gate, you get what I mean?”
After finishing, Bai Yu nodded, and she gave a rough overview of the ghost gate, deities, and the Ghost Domain.
After a moment of silence, Chen Yunshi spoke.
“Your theory checks out.”
“Drugs crafted from spirits can mend souls and heal injuries. If we go by what you said, they may well aim to acquire these to restore that deity you mentioned.”
Bai Yu took back the cursed heart, a sudden thought struck her.
If this heart could open a true gate, and the actions of the Ghost Domain members suggested the Dark Moon God hadn’t fully awakened yet…
Could she find the true essence of the Dark Moon God inside?
“Burning Heart didn’t lie; she mentioned this once before when she was recruiting believers. At one point, she went off about it being useless in a way that would only trap her even more, likely referring to the spirit behind the ghost gate.”
“I can feel it too; the malevolent energy and curses I exchanged for belief seem to carry others’ marks.”
“But back then, without an embryo to channel that energy, I had no idea how to develop my abilities. I couldn’t access the power of belief; that energy in my body counteracted the malice I had inside, weakening me.”
“My three sisters had their heads full of schemes.”
“When I dared to change my power, they lunged at me in my vulnerability.”
“That’s why I asked Yunshi to help sever my ties with the past.”
“The reason I was so weak back then was that I had almost depleted my malevolent energy.”
Qian Mu chimed in, weaving herself around Bai Yu.
“Malevolence and belief.”
Bai Yu frowned, as she too had plenty of malevolent power within her.
The two forces seemed to exist in opposition; belief was too ethereal for her to grasp. She had never encountered it before, not even heard of it; she had no clue it could function as a power.
Perhaps due to the world’s different rules, this world leaned towards spiritual abilities, where ghosts and evil gods were driven by mental force.
Meanwhile, belief represented a purer form of mental energy, qualifying as a force in this context, somewhat akin to malevolence.
But where would she even source belief power? She lacked the evil god’s curse to alter others’ perceptions.
Unless she tapped into the strength of the Black Sun Godmother.
