Chapter 42

Chapter 42

A day later, Xia Sheng received a call from Qian Yusheng just as she finished her morning classes.

His voice was thick with exhaustion. “Student Xia, something went wrong with our Supernatural Club’s activity last night.

“About that abandoned building… do you know something about it?”

Xia Sheng replied lazily, “The ghost that scared you last night was just an ordinary spirit. By now, the Black and White Impermanence should have already taken it into custody.

“As for your broken hand, it will heal in about a month. You don’t need to worry too much.”

Qian Yusheng was stunned, muttering, “I haven’t even said anything yet, and you already know, Student Xia?”

His tone quickly turned anxious. “Let’s put my situation aside for a moment. I’m actually calling you today because something happened to our Club President.

“After we went out together last night, he hasn’t returned. I’m worried he might be trapped by a ghost.

“Student Xia, you seem to know a lot about these things. Can you help us?”

Xia Sheng had never met this Club President, and since she didn’t have his Birth Date and Time, it was difficult to calculate exactly what he had encountered. She said, “Don’t panic. Tell me everything that happened last night.”

“Okay.” Qian Yusheng took a deep breath, summoning the courage to recall the events of the previous night.

“Last night, the Club President organized a few of us from the Supernatural Club to go to the abandoned building in the south of the city. There was no electricity, so we used our phone lights to head down the stairs.

“Initially, everyone was following closely behind one another, but at some point, we somehow got separated. It was like they just vanished into thin air.

“I had looked at the blueprints before entering; there were only five basement levels. Using my phone light, I went down a few floors, only to find that there were still stairs past the corner of the fifth basement level.

“At first, I thought the other members were playing a prank on me and had given me fake blueprints, so I boldly went down a few more flights.

“Usually, a building’s basement only goes down five or six levels. I had gone down two more and still hadn’t reached the bottom. I started getting creeped out, so I leaned over to see how many flights were left. When I shone my phone light down, the stairs seemed bottomless.

“It felt like something was staring back at me from the depths of that darkness. I panicked and decided to turn back. The moment I turned around, I came face-to-face with a male ghost whose eyes were bulging out of his head.

“I was terrified. I fell and broke my hand, and I didn’t even stop to look for the others. I just ran straight out and caught a taxi to the hospital.

“It seems the other members also made it out. We checked in with each other in our group chat, but when we did a final headcount, we realized the Club President hadn’t returned.

“I called his house, but his parents said he never came home last night.

“A whole night has passed and we still can’t reach him. We suspect he went into that building last night and never came out.

“A few of us from the club went to report it to the police this morning, but when they heard us say he might have been taken by a ghost, they just kicked us out.”

Qian Yusheng spilled all the details in one breath before asking, “Student Xia, do you think there’s a way to solve this?

“Since you were able to predict that I’d encounter a ghost last night, can you figure out the Club President’s current situation?”

“Send me a photo of him.”

“Okay.”

“It needs to be one without any filters.”

“…Alright.”

Qian Yusheng scrolled through the Club President’s social media feed, only to find that every single photo was a heavily edited selfie taken from various flattering angles.
Qian Yusheng had never noticed before, but today he realized that their Club President, a grown man, was surprisingly vain.

He asked the others in the group chat for photos and, after much effort, finally found an unfiltered, unflattering picture of the Club President to send to Xia Sheng.

Soon, Xia Sheng’s reply came through.

“This shouldn’t be much of a problem. His life isn’t in danger for now, so don’t worry too much. I have a full schedule of classes this afternoon, so I’ll head over tonight to take a look.”

Science and engineering majors tended to have heavy course loads, and Xia Sheng’s classes were indeed packed for the day.

Qian Yusheng was still a bit uneasy. “Will it really be okay if we wait that long?”

“It will,” Xia Sheng said with certainty. “The thing beneath that building doesn’t eat people. If it did, none of you would have made it back safely last night.

“Besides, yang energy is strongest during the day. That thing won’t be active now. Even if you went there now, you wouldn’t find anything.”

Qian Yusheng didn’t know who else to turn to for help. Since Xia Sheng had put it that way, he could only wait until evening.

At 7:30 PM, Qian Yusheng met Xia Sheng at the bottom of her apartment building.

The unfinished building was located near the outskirts of the city, and it took nearly an hour by taxi to reach the site.

From a distance, Xia Sheng noticed a car parked in front of the building.

Three people stepped out of the vehicle. One of them was a white-haired old man wearing a bright yellow Taoist robe, looking particularly conspicuous.

By the time Xia Sheng and Qian Yusheng got out of their taxi, the trio had already reached the main entrance of the unfinished building.

The Yellow-robed Daoist noticed the two of them seemingly preparing to enter the building as well and came to a halt.

Though the Yellow-robed Daoist appeared to be of advanced age, his physique was quite robust. He looked like a stern, old-fashioned man.

His gaze fell upon Qian Yusheng and Xia Sheng, and he spoke with a tone of reprimand and gravity. “Young children, this is no place for play. If you’re looking for a place to go on a date, you’d best go elsewhere.”

Qian Yusheng was thin-skinned. Being misunderstood as someone out on a late-night date made him blush uncontrollably. “No, we’re not here on a date.

“I’m a friend of Senior Feng. He went missing here last night, and I’ve come specifically to find him.”

Hearing this, the Yellow-robed Daoist turned to look at the couple behind him, Mr. Feng and Mrs. Feng. “Is this student a friend of your son’s?”

Mrs. Feng had received a call from Qian Yusheng the previous night and recognized his voice. She nodded. “Yes, this is the boy who called me when my son went missing last night.”

When Mrs. Feng first received Qian Yusheng’s call saying her son had been snatched by a ghost, she initially thought it was a prank. It wasn’t until midnight passed and her son hadn’t returned home that she finally began to panic.

Unable to contact her son, she was too worried to sleep. She and her husband went to the unfinished building Qian Yusheng had mentioned to check the situation, only to encounter the same strange phenomena Qian Yusheng had experienced.

The key piece of evidence that confirmed their son had disappeared there was the set of Buddha Beads they found on the steps, which belonged to him.

Mrs. Feng was a Buddhist, and she had personally sought those Buddha Beads from a temple for her son to wear.

When they found the string of beads, it was already broken, which meant something terrible must have happened.

Mrs. Feng had nearly fainted from shock at the time. Her husband was equally anxious and had spent the hours before dawn contacting everyone he knew to find a master to help resolve the matter.

After several referrals, they finally managed to contact Lan Chenghai, a famous Mystic Sect Master in the Capital City.

They had already visited the site once during the day, but Lan Chenghai had told them the ghosts here would only manifest at night. Thus, they had waited until dark to return.

And that was when they ran into Xia Sheng and Qian Yusheng.