Chapter 9

Chapter 9

Suddenly, a few lines flashed through my mind.

“Reversed Script. Everything is reversed. Reversed.”

“This isn’t the real Zenlei Water Village.”

I jolted all over and lowered my head in disbelief to look at the water.

“I know where the real Zenlei Water Village is!”

“Lu Duogong created Reversed Script because he came to a Mirror World, where the writing is reversed.”

Lu Lingzhu looked completely baffled.

“What do you mean? The real Zenlei Water Village is underwater? Then how are we supposed to get in?”

Song Feifei said, “Do we just lie down in the water and pass through?”

Lu Lingzhu said, “Then let Qiao Moyu try first.”

As soon as she said that, she suddenly sprang high into the air and kicked me in the back with all her strength.

I didn’t have time to react at all. My body lurched forward on instinct, and I slammed face-first into the water.

The water was only ten centimeters deep, but it felt like I’d fallen from a great height. The pain was brutal.

Water splashed everywhere. Stars burst in my vision, and I struggled to my feet in utter embarrassment.

“Lu Lingzhu, are you freaking insane?!”

I cursed as I wiped the water off my face. Then, when I opened my eyes again, I realized everyone else had disappeared.

I was back in the village. Two rows of stilt houses flanked a strip of glaring water, and I was the only one standing there.

Moonlight shimmered across the surface, sending out tiny ripples in concentric rings. Suddenly, I felt a little dizzy.

So I’d already entered the mirror world inside the water? Then what about Lu Lingzhu and the others-had they come in too?

“Lu Lingzhu-Jiang Haoyan-”

I started walking forward as I shouted their names.

Dark clouds pressed low overhead, and a drizzle hung in the air. Everything around me was dead silent. In my field of view, there was nothing but the layered black silhouettes of the stilt houses on both sides and the faintly glowing water.

I pulled the Peach Wood Sword from my bag and gripped it in one hand. With the other, I formed the Thunder Hand Seal, carefully scanning my surroundings as I moved forward.

I walked for a long time, but the village remained empty, as if I were the only person here.

This path should have been very short, but the water before me stretched endlessly into the distance. Dense rows of stilt houses lined both sides, and no matter how far I walked, I couldn’t seem to reach the end.

I gradually lost patience and slashed at the water at random with the Peach Wood Sword.

“Where is everybody? Where did you all run off to?”

With that slash, the water ahead suddenly began to churn violently. A tiny black dot slowly rose from the surface. Centered on that dot, ripples spread outward in widening rings.

I immediately stopped and cautiously stepped back twice, shrinking behind a wooden pillar beneath the house beside me.

The black dot kept rising.

A human head emerged.

Long black hair hung down like seaweed, spreading through the water.

Behind the hair was a deathly pale face, with straight brows and eyes and exaggerated rouge. My eyes flew wide open.

It was a paper effigy!

The paper figure staggered upright out of the water, tilted its head back to stare at the sky, and spread its arms to stretch itself. After standing there for a moment, it first extended its left hand, then twisted its right arm hard until it was coiled like a twisted rope.

“Splash, splash, splash-”

Water poured off in sheets, and the paper-made arm instantly gained a flesh tone, looking like a normal human arm.

After wringing dry the right arm, the paper figure went on to twist out the moisture from its left hand and both legs one by one. It kept its head lowered as it did this, its long hair plastered across its face.

Now its limbs were all normal human limbs, but its head and torso were still paper-thin and pasted together, making it look extremely eerie.

I found it utterly unbelievable.

Paper effigy crafting is a specialized trade, one of the Four Minor Yin Gates.

Among the people I knew, the Zhu Family was already the leading force in that line. They could use paper effigies to bridge the yin and yang realms, enter the underworld, and even serve as substitutes for living people to ward off disaster and extend life. But I’d never seen anyone who could turn a paper figure into a real person.

To cultivate paper effigy techniques to this level-just who was behind it?

I put my hand on the Peach Wood Sword and leaned out, intending to grab that paper effigy and figure out the secret behind all this.

I never expected that the moment I took a single step…

Countless ripples suddenly spread across the surface of the water.

Everywhere I looked, circles after circles of waves formed, and from the water within my sight, dozens of dark, bobbing heads slowly rose.

These paper effigies included men and women, old and young. They were made with astonishing lifelikeness, and their hair was clearly sewn on with real hair, attached to the top of their heads.

I immediately pulled back into cover.

With so many paper effigies, I couldn’t afford to act rashly.