Chapter 115: Terrifying Murmurs

Time in the Inner World was chaotic, completely out of sync with reality.

They had set out from the Living Apartment at 9:15. Now, across this desolate, unpopulated land of the Inner World, the yellow sky shimmered with a faint red glow, looking as though it were trapped in perpetual dusk.

The living Xu Yuan had said that stars which shouldn't exist had appeared in the sky.

Yusheng had warned them not to look up, saying the stars were growing fewer and fewer.

Gao Tian raised his head and gazed at the Inner World's sky.

What exactly had those two seen up there?

The sky was still too bright to reveal any nighttime stars. However, Gao Tian noticed that the sun hanging high above radiated a sickly, shattered, eerie green light.

It was a bleak, miserable color. Yet the halo and the sunlight it cast remained golden, just like in the normal world. Because of this, newcomers entering the Inner World were usually too terrified to notice that the sun here was vastly different from reality, resembling the underworld itself.

Xia Ta, or perhaps someone else, had once mentioned that the green sun functioned just like a normal one—it could still trigger Supernatural Items that required sunlight. It didn't affect travelers in the Inner World much; they just treated it as a regular sun.

Some ghost hunters had once tried to uncover why the sun here was green and what caused it.

Most of those investigations ended in failure. After all, just surviving the Inner World was an accomplishment in itself. No one was going to build a launch pad and fire a rocket into the sun here.

Gao Tian had considered bringing a small telescope into the Inner World, thinking it might reveal some secrets about the green sun and the starry sky.

But if he could think of it, other ghost hunters definitely had too. Someone had probably already tried it.

He shook his head, banishing the stray thoughts. Right now, Longshu Temple was the priority. If they couldn't survive this hurdle, there was no point thinking about the future.

After parting ways at that bizarrely out-of-place McDonald's with the mysterious old man they suspected to be Old Man Sun, the four of them followed his directions and soon approached an abandoned Buddhist temple rising on the horizon.

Overall, Longshu Temple's exterior matched the intelligence reports. The walls were mottled and ruined, and the main gates, though covered in rust, stood in silent, stubborn defiance. Huge trees with blood-red leaves surrounded the grounds, and weeds grew wildly, exuding an out-of-place vitality.

Buzz, buzz, buzz, buzz.

The closer they got, the more wrong things felt.

At first, Gao Tian thought flies were buzzing around his ears. Then he realized it wasn't that simple. Beneath the strange, ceaseless murmurs were blurry, hyper-fast phrases and chants—words like "Emptiness," "Submit to the Buddha," "Pay Homage," "Immeasurable Nature," and "Unspeakable."

It took Gao Tian a moment to realize that these murmurs were the sounds of countless monks chanting scriptures inside the temple. Jiang Yang drew his twin handguns, carefully aiming at the ruined temple ahead. "Are there a lot of people in there?"

Realizing his slip of the tongue, he quickly corrected himself. "Are there a lot of ghosts?"

Judging by the rusted, peeling gates and the overgrown weeds, it didn't look like anyone lived or practiced cultivation here.

If they pushed the doors open and found the courtyard packed with chanting "monks"—voices blending into that fly-like buzzing—their four-man squad would definitely be walking right into a brutal fight.

"Hold on, let me prepare," Gao Tian said.

Without hesitation, he opened the Luck Jar, releasing his Ghost Luck to its maximum output.

When dealing with the Woman in the Rain or riding the Bus, he had been as frugal as possible, saving his power.

But they were at Longshu Temple now. If he held back here, he'd be an absolute idiot.

The Future Urn had foretold countless prophecies, revealing Gao Tian's various gruesome deaths. Frankly, since his first infection by the Shattered Face Ghost up to now, adding every supernatural event together still wouldn't match the sheer number of ways he could die here.

This place was genuinely haunted.

Above Gao Tian's head, massive black clouds converged into a dark sea.

The sheer volume of Ghost Luck he released at once had reached the same intensity as his battles at the Jinhai Building and with the Ghost Cave.

The murmuring inside the temple didn't vanish; instead, it grew louder, like a swarm of countless flies taking flight.

Jiang Yang led the way with his handguns. "You guys wait here. I'll scout the temple first."

Gao Tian immediately grabbed his arm to stop him. "It's too dangerous. Don't go in.

"Let my Wind Attendant Buddha investigate Longshu Temple first."

With a thought, a puppet made of flowing wind—looking exactly like Gao Tian—materialized in response.

Receiving its orders, the Wind Attendant Buddha strode straight toward the corner ahead, heading for Longshu Temple less than a hundred meters away. Lan Zhu, Wang Wenbo, and the rest stayed on standby at a safe distance.

Just as the Wind Attendant Buddha reached the entrance and prepared to push open the temple doors, Gao Tian's expression drastically changed. His pupils contracted, his face turning uglier than if he had just seen a real ghost.

It wasn't because something happened at the temple entrance.

Rather, he saw that the Ghost Luck gathering above his head was depleting at a massive rate, dozens of times faster than usual. The dark clouds that should have lasted for dozens of hours were vanishing; just standing still and doing nothing, a quarter of it was already gone.

It reminded him of the old mobile phone he had used for seven years at school. A full hundred percent battery would inexplicably drop into the red after just scrolling through a few videos.

This wasn't right. Ghost Luck couldn't possibly drain this fast.

Something had gone wrong.

Simultaneously, the rapid, blurry chanting echoing from the temple began to accelerate. The voices grew increasingly frenzied, completely devoid of a monk's peaceful aura. Instead, they sounded like wild beasts catching the scent of blood—bloodthirsty and violent.

As the chanting sped up, the dark clouds above Gao Tian's head visibly vanished at an equal pace.

It was as if an invisible, gaping maw was taking massive bites out of the black clouds, chewing them up.

Could the murmurs of these ghost monks actively consume the Fortune of Ghost Luck?

Gao Tian quickly made his judgment.

He immediately changed his mind, twisting the Luck Jar open to suck the majority of the released Ghost Luck back inside.

As the final drop of surviving Ghost Luck was locked away, the vicious, murmuring chants of the monks in the temple gradually slowed down again, as if they had lost their prey.

Even so, compared to normal Buddhist chanting, it remained garbled and sickening to hear, feeling just like being swarmed by flies.

Standing to the side, Lan Zhu seemed to notice something and asked loudly, "How strange, how strange.

Did you guys notice that the speed of these dead monks' chanting keeps fluctuating?

Just a moment ago it was so fast it sounded like they were spitting the words out, and then suddenly, it slowed right down."

Wang Wenbo, the pragmatic tech guy, nodded. "Yeah, I felt it too.

Give me a second. I'm going to record these sounds on my electronic wristwatch and analyze exactly what scriptures these ghost monks are chanting."

Gao Tian knew his deduction was ninety percent correct.

The others couldn't see the Ghost Luck representing Fortune above his head, but they could faintly sense what the monks' murmuring was targeting.

He clearly understood now why there was such a high probability he would die at Longshu Temple.

His biggest trump card—endless Fortune—was being countered and drained by the fly-like curses of these terrifying monks.

Until he entered Longshu Temple, Gao Tian didn't dare open the Luck Jar again.

Now, he had to use it sparingly, releasing Ghost Luck only at critical moments.

Of course, deep down, he wasn't going to surrender and just accept his fate of dying in Longshu Temple.

Regardless, he couldn't afford to panic. He would assess the situation and act accordingly.

Ghost Luck wasn't completely useless, it just couldn't be wielded with the same reckless luxury as at the Jinhai Building, where he had left it running out of sheer convenience.

In the blink of an eye, the Wind Attendant Buddha had reached the temple doors.

"Gao Tian" pushed forward with both arms. Although the two doors were heavy, someone had clearly pushed them open once before, shifting the clogged mud at the base. With a bit of effort, the Wind Attendant Buddha successfully forced them open.

The moment it stepped foot into Longshu Temple, the massive doors slammed shut behind it, completely blocking any line of sight from the outside. It was impossible to see what was happening within.

"Damn it, what the hell is inside?"

Impatient as always, Lan Zhu grabbed Gao Tian by the collar and shouted her question.

Gao Tian pushed her away. "Don't touch me, I'm controlling the Wind Attendant Buddha.

"Jiang Yang, pull this crazy woman back so she doesn't interrupt me."

After shoving Lan Zhu away, Gao Tian finally focused his mind, sharing the vision of the Wind Attendant Buddha that had entered Longshu Temple to check the interior.

Truthfully, his biggest fear was that the temple would be packed with hordes of Fierce Ghosts. The Wind Attendant Buddha could have been instantly destroyed the second it walked in, without seeing a single thing.

Fortunately, his fears didn't come to pass.

Longshu Temple was utterly quiet. Aside from the lush, blood-red trees lining both sides of the main path, not a single figure was in sight.

Several plump crows stood in the trees with their wings tucked. They didn't caw, nor did they show any fear at the intruder. If they hadn't occasionally twitched or shifted positions on the branches, Gao Tian would have thought they were fake.

The bluestone path beneath its feet led straight toward the severely dilapidated main hall.

The largest hall in all of Longshu Temple was completely ragged, having lacked maintenance for years.

The Bodhisattva statues, which should have had kind and merciful expressions, looked like they were bearing sinister sneers due to the faded paint around their eyes.

The Vajrapani warriors glared with wide, furious eyes, but covered in dust and viewed from this angle, they simply looked sinister and eerie.

That bizarre, collective murmur of chanting still lingered stubbornly in his ears. Yet, he couldn't spot a single one of the monks producing the sound; they were hidden somewhere within the vast, empty temple.

"Gao Tian, do you see anyone inside?"

Seeing Gao Tian stand perfectly still for so long, Jiang Yang finally broke the silence.

Gao Tian shook his head. "So far, I haven't seen a single soul in the temple courtyard.

"I'm directing the Wind Attendant Buddha deeper inside to investigate."