Chapter 56: An Academic Discussion with Xu Yuan

Xia Ta had said the environment in the Living Apartment was incredibly beneficial; even with such severe fractures, he would recover after just three or four days of rest.

Obviously, her prediction was wrong.

His limbs had been snapped inch by inch by the Gray Handprint Pursuing from Pagoda Primary School. Despite such severe injuries, Gao Tian had spent less than half a day back in the Apartment and had already managed to regain sensation in his arms, becoming able to perform the simplest of movements.

This place was truly restorative. Gao Tian even suspected that if a recently deceased corpse was brought in, the Living Apartment could essentially cure it.

Struggling up from the bed, the first thing he did was turn on his mobile phone to check the rewards he had received from this mission.

There was a text message in his inbox. Sent by Living Apartment, it stated that the obtained Supernatural Item was the [Ghost Shroud].

Ghost Shroud effects—

This is an ordinary burial shroud with a normal appearance, but it can counter various supernatural powers.

Once worn, attacks from a Fierce Ghost against the user will be mitigated by about fifty percent. (52%)

Curses and Cognitive Pollution will also be reduced by about ten percent. (15%)

At the same time, as long as the user does not suffer fatal damage to their internal organs or brain, any injury—whether a fracture, severe hemorrhage, or severed limb—will heal at a speed 4,800 times that of a normal person under the protection of the Ghost Shroud.

As long as they do not die, they will be completely restored to normal in just a few minutes.

...

The above were the advantages of the Supernatural Item, the Ghost Shroud.

Its disadvantages were equally dangerous.

After the user wears the Ghost Shroud for a prolonged period, it will further fuse with their physical body. The supernatural powers it can resist will increase over time from the initial fifty percent to sixty percent, seventy percent, and eighty percent.

Mental resistance will also gradually improve.

But the prerequisite for all of this is that the user is not consumed by the Ghost Shroud.

Once the Ghost Shroud reaches 100% absolute resistance, it is absolutely not a good thing for the user, because at that point, it means the Ghost Shroud has completely fused with and consumed them.

It would no longer be a human wearing the Ghost Shroud, but the Ghost Shroud wrapping a human.

By then, the wearer would have long since turned into a new Fierce Ghost.

Similarly, if they die while wearing the Ghost Shroud, the wearer will inevitably turn into an extremely vicious Fierce Ghost.

...

...

After reading the introduction to this reward, Gao Tian was quite satisfied.

Having lost the Black Card as a life-saving measure, he had gained this defensive Supernatural Item, the Ghost Shroud.

Although its survival utility was definitely not as good as the former, the Black Card was a one-time consumable, whereas the Ghost Shroud was a permanent item. Moreover, it could upgrade as the wearing time increased.

It could be considered a decent compensation for Gao Tian's defenses.

Its flaw was also straightforward. There existed a dangerous line of equilibrium between the ability itself and the shroud's backlash.

Before reaching 100%, the higher the defense, the better. 95% defense, 96% defense, 97% defense—this was enough to walk unimpeded through most supernatural incidents.

But once it hit 100%, that Ghost Shroud would truly become his final burial shroud.

After confirming the details of his new Supernatural Item, Gao Tian's heart gave a jolt. He suddenly thought of an... academic question.

Although in the supernatural world, using the word "academic" to describe a question sounded genuinely absurd, Gao Tian couldn't think of a better term to accurately describe his current predicament.

The conflicting effects between different Supernatural Items could create a bug—

For instance, the Ghost Transformation Spear could turn the person it killed into a ghost. Dying while wearing the Ghost Shroud would similarly turn one into a Fierce Ghost.

So the question was: he also had a resurrection-type item in his hands, the Ghost Card, which revived its user after death.

If these items triggered simultaneously, what kind of effect would it produce?

Would this count as a critical bug?

If he killed himself with the Ghost Transformation Spear, could the Ghost Card activate normally?

If he killed his Ghost Shroud-wearing self with the Ghost Transformation Spear and then revived through the Ghost Card, what would the revived entity be?

Human, or a Fierce Ghost?

These questions... had Xu Yuan, or Teacher Xu Yuan, ever thought about them?

Lying on his bed, Gao Tian pondered for a long time.

He gradually realized that an ordinary person like him sitting in a room, trying to figure it out behind closed doors, would definitely yield no results.

After all, he didn't have the means. He couldn't exactly run out into the street and grab two passersby to conduct an experiment.

In this world, there was probably only one person—no, one ghost—who had been an expert in this field while alive.

Xu Yuan, a completer of ten Green Text Missions, the leader of the Galan Society, someone who had researched the Ghost Transformation Spear for half his life. Had he considered this question?

Gao Tian stared at the bright screen of his mobile phone, beginning to hesitate.

A rather bold idea was starting to become irrepressible in his mind.

This "academic" question... perhaps he should just ask Xu Yuan directly.

Asking a ghost a question about ghosts. There was nothing more suitable than this.

Previously, Gao Tian had taken the risk to actively converse with Xu Yuan in the Chat Group a few times.

Separated by the screen, he even vaguely felt that, given the other party's personality, Xu Yuan might genuinely be willing to answer this question. Xu Yuan was a scholarly type; aside from treating human lives like dirt, he took these academic questions quite seriously.

Gao Tian weighed it for a moment, then opened the Chat Group and sent a friend request to Xu Yuan.

There were too many different kinds of ghosts in the Chat Group. The more one said, the more mistakes one could make. It was better to ask questions privately.

The time spent waiting for Xu Yuan to accept the friend request was merely a few minutes. Yet, lying on the bed, Gao Tian couldn't help feeling as if time had grown sticky, passing much slower than normal.

A moment later, a pure black profile picture bounced up. It was Xu Yuan; he had accepted the request.

After the two became friends, Xu Yuan didn't initiate the conversation. Gao Tian typed a line of text on his mobile phone, roughly outlining his question. He deliberated over it repeatedly, revising it a few times to make himself sound as much like a student seeking guidance as possible, giving Teacher Xu Yuan his due respect.

After sending the message, Gao Tian admitted that his actions were quite risky. However, if he wanted to know the result of a conflict between two Supernatural Items, consulting Xu Yuan was a safer method than testing it out with his own flesh and blood.

Another two minutes passed. An unread message popped up on the mobile phone screen. Upon seeing that black avatar, Gao Tian's breathing stopped for half a second.

Filled with a mix of anticipation and fear, he tapped his phone open to see how Xu Yuan had replied.

[Living Apartment]:

To be able to raise this question shows that you have given it serious thought. That is very good.

But it's a pity.

Do you think my teacher and I never considered something this important while we were alive?

Some Supernatural Items can indeed cooperate with each other, triggering bugs to achieve an effect greater than the sum of their parts. But the Ghost Transformation Spear and other items cannot trigger bugs.

...

When he wasn't killing people, Xu Yuan was indeed quite willing to answer others' questions.

Just like a patient old teacher.

Chatting every day in the group with a bunch of foolish youths like Ghost Cave and Burned Ghost, he was likely extremely lonely at heart. Occasionally running into a normal student asking him for guidance, Xu Yuan would answer with genuine seriousness.

[Memory Ghost]:

Why is that?

Did you and your teacher conduct experiments before?

[Living Apartment]:

We conducted many experiments.

The first time I thought of this idea, the excitement in my heart was exactly like yours, feeling as though I had deciphered the secrets of the Ghost Transformation Spear.

But after telling my teacher, all that greeted me was his calm and weary sigh.

[Living Apartment]:

A human turning into a ghost is an absolutely irreversible process.

It's just like a hen entering a microwave to become a roast chicken; it's a very simple thing. But let me ask you: after the roast chicken comes out of the oven, you eat it, excrete it into the toilet, let it flow through the sewage pipes into the sea, and then it gets eaten by passing fish, both big and small.

Now I scoop up a handful of seawater and tell you that the cells of that hen are in here. If I ask you to turn this handful of seawater back into the original hen, what would you say?

[Memory Ghost]:

Ten thousand percent impossible.

[Living Apartment]:

A person turning into a ghost is a very simple thing.

A ghost turning into a person is an impossible thing.

You ask me what would happen if you had a resurrection-type item and were killed by the Ghost Transformation Spear.

I'm telling you, before your resurrection item is used up, it doesn't count as true death. You can still resurrect, and you won't turn into a ghost.

But once all your resurrection methods are exhausted, then the Ghost Transformation Spear will directly turn you into a ghost.

To sum it up in one sentence—

If you have a resurrection method, resurrection takes priority upon death.

Only when the resurrection methods are exhausted do you become a ghost.

After becoming a ghost, stop thinking about becoming human again. Even if you obtained a new resurrection item, it would be absolutely impossible.

This process is absolutely irreversible.

Being a human, then a ghost, jumping back and forth repeatedly—how could there be such a good thing? If that could truly be done, this world wouldn't have undergone a supernatural revival, sliding into an ever more despairing abyss.

[Memory Ghost]:

I see.

I've learned a lot. Thank you very much.

[Living Apartment]:

It's nothing.

Though I've been a ghost for a long time and have long forgotten many things about being human...

But this question troubled my childhood, youth, early adulthood, and middle age.

Even after becoming a ghost, I never forgot my teacher's dying doubt: what exactly is the secret lying within the Ghost Transformation Spear?

I gave this spear to you also because I wanted to borrow the talent of a new ghost, to see if there could be any new avenues of thought.

After all, you newcomers haven't been ghosts for very long. There are no forbidden zones in your minds. Stumbling around, you might actually be able to see the blind spots that old fogeys like us cannot see.

...

The conversation with Xu Yuan ended just like that.

If he hadn't known that the other party was a ghost, he would have found Xu Yuan's personality surprisingly good, possessing the generosity and patience of an elder scholar.

It seemed that even though he was dead, he still held a lingering obsession regarding the mystery of the Ghost Transformation Spear that had troubled him for half his life.

Gao Tian put down his mobile phone. It seemed that trying to easily exploit a bug with the Ghost Transformation Spear was an impossible task.

Then what exactly was the use of this Ghost Transformation Spear?

Just as Gao Tian was still pondering on his bed, the sound of several people's footsteps rang out outside the door.

Zhao Zhenjia's booming voice couldn't be blocked even by the door:

"What are you guys going over there for now?

"That kid suffered such heavy injuries, he might still be sleeping in bed right now. The way I see it, rather than making a wasted trip, we might as well just come look for him tomorrow.

"Don't tell him about the matter with his room just yet. He's also used up his Black Card now, so when we go upstairs to explore later, we can't bring him along."