Chapter 83: Return

Longshu Temple.

"Take—it—back to—the human world—to do—the unfinished—things—that should have been done—back then—"

The old monk's corpse was completely rotten. His throat swarmed with bugs, his tongue had rotted to sand, and his lips leaked air.

Every word seemed to cause him immense pain. The slurred, indistinct syllables exhausted the last trace of obsession the old monk had retained from life.

Yusheng pressed his palms together, feeling as if a fire burned between his hands. The heat brought him pain.

After his master died, he had retained that tiny sliver of consciousness just to wait in Longshu Temple for Yusheng's arrival, waiting until he could personally entrust this coffin to him—

The pain he had endured after death was unimaginable.

Leaving his physical body in the human world was worse than entering the deepest hell, subjecting him to endless, uninterrupted torment.

Yusheng pressed his palms together even tighter. The mental suffering he endured was a cup of water on a burning cart of wood compared to what his master had gone through all these years.

He had actually thought his master stayed in Longshu Temple because he still hated him, that he wanted to turn into a Fierce Ghost and kill him.

All these years, Yusheng hadn't dared to return to Longshu Temple out of guilt, and out of fear of his master's rotting face.

To hold such thoughts... he had been so ignorant and absurd.

Yusheng opened his eyes.

Before him, the terrifying corpse of the old monk was gone.

All that remained was that Transparent Coffin, clear as glass, resting silently in place. If he shifted his viewing angle even slightly, the Transparent Coffin would disappear. Only from an extremely tricky angle could he barely make out one of its corners.

Yusheng now knew his sole mission for the rest of his life.

He walked up to the Transparent Coffin, picked up the iron chain at one corner, and dragged the coffin behind him. Without looking back, he prepared to leave Longshu Temple.

The first step was to bring this coffin back to reality with him.

Outside the temple, the next Bus 444 should be arriving soon.

It happened just as Yusheng walked down the main path, a moment before he left Longshu Temple.

A series of low, deep roars echoed from the distant mountain range. It sounded like the roar of a bear, yet also like the emotional outburst of a crazed giant.

The terrifying roar was so earth-shattering that the endless stretch of woods began to tremble. Countless blood-red birds were startled into the air, letting out ominous cries as they flew into the distance, heading toward the green sun of the Inner World.

"A bear's roar?"

Yusheng stopped in his tracks, hesitating for a moment. "A bear's roar shouldn't exist in this place."

He thought for a moment. He knew that, for now, he couldn't leave the Inner World.

1

Xia Ta slowly opened her eyes. As the surrounding scenery shifted, she looked back to see the familiar first-floor lobby of the Living Apartment. She had escaped that terrifying fifth floor.

With her right arm hanging limp and gently swaying like a wooden puppet's, Xia Ta walked over to the first-floor emergency medical kit without a word and began treating her wounds. Behind her, following the black hole's teleportation, Jiang Yang and Lan Zhu also arrived safely downstairs.

Only Gao Tian and Zhao Zhenjia were nowhere to be seen.

"Five minutes have passed. Why hasn't Gao Tian come downstairs yet?"

Seeing this, Xia Ta frowned.

This was not a good sign. When they fled the fifth floor, the terrifying thing making the hammer noises had already been very close in the corridor. Delaying for even another minute would have meant certain death. How could Gao Tian drag things out upstairs for five minutes and still not come down?

But the upstairs mission was over. They couldn't possibly run back to the fifth floor to help.

While Xia Ta stood there thinking, a woman's shocked scream rang out from the second floor: "Someone's dead!

"There's a ghost! The second floor isn't safe anymore!"

More and more residents opened their doors to check the situation. Downstairs, Xia Ta and Jiang Yang already had a good idea of what was happening. They had no choice but to push Gao Tian's situation aside and run upstairs to handle the fallout.

The room with the problem was 220. Jiang Yang remembered it belonged to a resident named Li Jin, who had completed two missions. His second mission at Sapphire Mall was done together with Gao Tian and Jin Daxiang.

A massive pool of blood had seeped out from under the door. The person inside had clearly been dead for a long time; the blood had already dried, turned black, and soaked into the apartment's carpet.

Between him and his fellow survivor, Su Jiu, one had died during their third mission, and the other had died right here in the supposedly safe apartment.

"It's the kids from the Children's Home.

"When we went upstairs to investigate, those living kids took the opportunity to sneak down and kill the second-floor residents."

Xia Ta sighed.

Dealing with the living was far more of a headache than dealing with Fierce Ghosts.

Right now, the most important thing was to immediately block the stairwell to the Third Floor. These kids, whose self-perception was that they were ghosts, should still be on the second floor. They couldn't be allowed to escape back up.

"What do you plan to do when you find these kids, Owner?

"Are you going to treat them like ghosts and dispose of them, or treat them like humans and correct their perception?"

Jiang Yang asked.

Xia Ta had already strode over to the second floor. Grabbing the door handle, she effortlessly snapped off more than half the door as easily as twisting open a bottle of soda. "I don't know. But right now, I'm very angry.

"I'll beat them up first.

"The kind of beating where I beat them half to death."

Before them, as the door to 220 slowly opened, the stench of blood grew even stronger.

The scene inside defied description. Out in the corridor, some of the more timid residents didn't even make a sound before going limp and fainting on the floor.

Two children sat on the floor, observing Li Jin. Hearing someone enter, they looked up and offered Xia Ta a faint, eerie smile. "Who are you?"

Smiling, Xia Ta slowly walked in. "The person here to collect you.

"It's going to hurt a little, so bear with it.

"This upcoming beating might make you wish you were never born.

"Relax, I promise I won't beat you to death—you don't get off that easy."

Gao Tian and Zhao Zhenjia had found a Mirror on the Third Floor. Pressing against it, they summoned a Wind Attendant Buddha on the outside and pulled it into the mirror, successfully returning to reality. Seeing them come downstairs, Jiang Yang was so nervous he could barely stand. Lan Zhu slapped Gao Tian hard on the shoulder, demanding to be taken to the Mirror World to play again. Only Xia Ta offered a faint smile and said, 'Welcome back.'

Her hand was bleeding; it seemed she had just beaten someone up.

Her knuckles were a bit deformed, showing just how satisfying that beating had been.

A few days later.

Xia Ta handled all the fallout.

The Children's Home had housed twenty children. One of them was kicked to death by Zhao Zhenjia's soccer ball on the fourth floor. The other nineteen were dragged out one by one and subdued before they could head downstairs to ambush the second-floor residents.

Some had been in the Children's Home for seven or eight years, and the longest for over a decade.

Over the next few days.

The children were sent to Xia Ta's hometown. A teacher surnamed Yang lived there—a part-time electrician whose methods for correcting children were a bit radical—but for kids coming out of the Children's Home, they were a perfect fit.

The rooms that had become murder scenes were automatically cleaned by the Living Apartment.

Even though the Children's Home incident was over, many apartment residents still firmly believed the place was no longer a safe haven and moved out one after another.

During Xia Ta's absence, Jiang Yang temporarily took over as the new Owner.

Faced with this situation, he made no effort to stop them. He could only let time prove everything.

While the apartment's future might not be absolutely safe, compared to the increasingly chaotic outside world, it was far safer.

The mission rewards received by the Upstairs Team:

Xia Ta entered a fourth-floor room (413) once, and a fifth-floor room (525) once.

She obtained one Black Card and one Gray Card.

Zhao Zhenjia, Jiang Yang, Lan Zhu, and Gao Tian each entered fourth-floor rooms twice (413, Mirror Alley, or the Study).

They each obtained two Black Cards.

These rewards automatically appeared in their respective rooms.

—

Xia Ta had also obtained this Gray Card from the fifth floor. Gao Tian had naturally warned her in advance about just how scammy the card could be.

At first, he had even suspected Yusheng screwed him over on purpose.

Now it seemed the fifth-floor reward was simply the scammy Gray Card. It was Yusheng's first time getting it as well; he hadn't known its effects were this outrageous.

Every rule in the Living Apartment had been tested and proven by the residents with their own blood and lives.

The sixth day after returning from the fifth floor.

According to Yusheng's prophecy, Gao Tian wouldn't die upstairs, nor would he die during his fourth Green Text Mission. But he would die in the interval between these two events.

The Gray Card, on the other hand, stated that Gao Tian would die three months later, which was much later than Yusheng's prophecy. When the time came, it would automatically teleport him away right before his death.

The death flags hanging over his head were getting a bit too numerous.

—

But when you have too many lice, they stop itching. Having triggered so many death flags, he actually felt a strange sense of relaxation.

If anything, he was quite curious about exactly how he was going to die.

On the news, bizarre incidents occurred more and more frequently. All sectors of society were urging ordinary people not to go out unless absolutely necessary, and if they did, to avoid crowded places. If they encountered anything strange at home, they were told to call the emergency hotline immediately.

During this period, Gao Tian simply stayed inside the Living Apartment, not taking a single step outside.

He decided to play the turtle and hide in his shell.

The Children's Home incident was over, and for now, no ghosts from the fourth or fifth floors were coming down to kill anyone. No matter how violently the supernatural incidents raged in society, he just stayed in his room and didn't cross the threshold.

Taking shelter in the apartment couldn't be called absolutely safe, but comparatively, it was the most stable option.

While holing up in the apartment, he frequently used the fitness equipment on the first floor.

In supernatural incidents, physical fitness and stamina were quite important. To put it bluntly: running fast might not guarantee you outrun a ghost, but as long as you ran faster than the people around you, you might keep your life.

Before he knew it, two weeks had passed.

During this time, the apartment had been calm and peaceful; absolutely nothing had happened.

Xia Ta hadn't returned.

Yusheng still hadn't returned either.

There was still some time before his fourth Green Text Mission.

Everything was fine, very quiet.

It was like a small pocket of tranquility before a storm.

[End of Volume One: Walker in the Mirror]