Chapter 42

Zhang Zhiwu stroked his beard, wearing an expression that said “I knew you were going to ask that,” and spoke with a smile. “There are. There are indeed ways for a tenant to coexist harmoniously with the Cat Ghosts, though the setup is quite troublesome.”

Zhou Fangdong breathed a sigh of relief.

That was excellent. A little trouble was no big deal.

Without waiting for Zhou Fangdong to ask further, Zhang Zhiwu took the initiative to explain. “First, you need to paste the four talismans I gave you in the four corners of the room. These charms need to be replaced every month. When the time comes, young friend, you can ask me for more.”

“However, because the resentment of the Cat Ghosts is so fierce, oil stains will still seep out of the walls on the first and fifteenth of every lunar month¹. There will be signs before these greasy stains appear. When you smell the milky scent of a kitten in the room, you can have the tenant of Room 106 go next door to find my disciple and have him recite the ‘Supreme Chapter of the Cat Spirit for House Protection’ a few times in the room.”

“Secondly, the windows must not be opened, otherwise the Cat Ghosts might spread to other rooms…” Halfway through his sentence, Zhang Zhiwu looked at the windows nailed shut with wooden boards and smiled. “Of course, you don’t need to worry too much about that. None of the windows in this apartment can be opened anyway.”

“Additionally, every day at four in the morning, a cup of water needs to be placed at the ‘seed core’ position—which is the doorway of Room 106. You must prick your middle finger with a needle and drop three drops of blood into the water.”

“Finally, there is the layout of the room…” Zhang Zhiwu slowly circled the area. “All mirrors in the room must be covered. For sleeping, try to use a cooling mat… woven rattan is best.”

Watching Zhou Fangdong’s fingers fly across his phone screen as he recorded the instructions, the Taoist added another point: “You cannot make sharp noises in this room, or it will agitate the Cat Ghosts and trigger their ferocity. Things like phone ringtones or alarms should be set to silent or vibrate.”

Zhou Fangdong nodded. “Is that all?”

To be honest, he felt these arrangements were a bit strange. Compared to other rooms where certain actions were prohibited to avoid triggering a ghost’s Killing Pattern, the rules for Room 106 felt more like they were raising a supernatural pet.

“Young friend, the person you choose to live in Room 106 should ideally be a male with strong Yang energy² and robust vitality. The success rate will be higher, and it will more perfectly achieve the effect you desire.”

Zhou Fangdong recalled Hong Zhong’s physique.

With a height of 1.9 meters and a body packed with muscles like a professional bodybuilder, he looked exactly like the type with overflowing Yang energy and vitality. There should be absolutely no need to worry.

“That’s no problem. I can be certain that the tenant moving in has plenty of Yang energy and vitality.”

“Then there is no issue. As long as the tenant strictly follows the rules I’ve mentioned, they can coexist harmoniously with the Cat Ghosts.”

“Understood. Thank you, Taoist Master.” Zhou Fangdong tucked away his phone, feeling satisfied.

This was great. With this Taoist Master around, he didn’t have to rack his brain to come up with Tenant Rules. He just needed to polish what the master had said, and it would be a perfect rental contract.

“If you have nothing else to ask, I shall return to Chuyun Temple. It is time for me to start my shift.”

“Yes, no problem. Please, go ahead with your business, Master.”

As soon as Zhou Fangdong finished speaking, the Zombie Taoist Master vanished directly from Room 106.

After Zhang Zhiwu left, the large black cat that looked like a small leopard was no longer so tense. Its tail stood high with a slight curl at the tip as it paced slowly toward Zhou Fangdong. It rubbed against his leg, gave him a nudge with its head, and then sank back into the floor.

The remaining twenty-odd palm-sized kittens did not follow the large cat into the floor. They scattered to various corners of the room, rolling on the ground, stretching, and licking each other’s fur, their guard completely lowered.

Zhou Fangdong took another walk around the room to check the current state of Room 106.

The area was about a hundred square meters. Now that the oil stains were gone, only dust remained, with no significant trash. However, the furniture was severely damaged and had mostly collapsed, the surfaces covered in cat claw marks.

Zhou Fangdong bought two automatic cleaning items from the mall and used them on Room 106.

The moment the cleaning items took effect, the little black cats began to flee in a frenzy, slipping back under the floorboards one by one.

It would take about an hour to finish cleaning… Zhou Fangdong ordered a batch of new furniture on a shopping app and told the shopkeeper to deliver them in an hour.

While waiting for Room 106 to be cleaned, Zhou Fangdong prepared to look for the Liwan Apartments activity room.

He remembered the system saying that this hidden room was located in the apartment’s stairwell.

Upon entering the pitch-black stairwell, Zhou Fangdong found that the little ghosts who usually played there were all gone. There was only a solitary ghostly figure in the corridor—the ghost with the afro wearing a Cleaners uniform, Qian Duolai.

He stood with his back to Zhou Fangdong, looking lonely and desolate as he stared fixedly at the apartment stairs.

Zhou Fangdong suddenly felt a bit guilty. During the days the stairs had been closed, had this ghost been standing guard here the whole time?

The scene before him confirmed his suspicion—Qian Duolai had likely come down from the second floor, but when the stairs were closed, he couldn’t get back. He could only wait blankly in the corridor for the stairs to reopen.

The first time Zhou Fangdong had met him, he had been in this exact pose, staring at the stairs.

Furthermore, as a ghost from the second floor, Qian Duolai’s strength was likely terrifying. His presence in the corridor was probably why the little ghosts who usually played there didn’t dare come out.

He suddenly felt the guy was a bit pitiful… unable to go home, with no ghosts on the first floor to play with him, forced to stand like a statue in the hallway.

Zhou Fangdong sighed softly. He walked to the end of the corridor with his back to the stairs, then began walking forward while feeling along one side of the wall.

He hoped to find the hidden Liwan Apartments activity room this way.

The walls on both sides of the stairwell had no windows or doors. If there was a hidden space in the apartment, it was most likely behind the walls.

If it wasn’t on this side, he would try the other.

He now possessed the key to the activity room. If he touched the area of the hidden room, the key on his person would surely react.

Sure enough, after Zhou Fangdong had walked a short distance, a red light suddenly flashed on the wall. Immediately after, a large red-painted door appeared out of thin air.

Unlike the ordinary single-leaf entrance doors of the tenant rooms, this red door was a double door like those found in an auditorium, featuring two brass-colored metal handles.

Zhou Fangdong gripped the handles, pressed down slowly, and pushed the doors open.

An extremely spacious indoor area revealed itself.

The activity room was massive and very open, measuring over three hundred square meters by his estimate. A large group of little ghosts was playing inside.

At a glance, Zhou Fangdong saw the headless ghosts kicking their own heads like balls, along with the red chair furniture ghosts playing with them.

He had wondered why all these little ghosts used to crowd into the stairwell to play; it turned out there was a hidden activity room right there.

Although the afro ghost from the second floor had taken over the corridor, these little ghosts hadn’t let it bother them, finding plenty of joy within the activity room.

Zhou Fangdong stepped aside to dodge a human head flying toward him, bypassed a group of little girls playing cat’s cradle with intestines, and walked to the center of the activity room to survey his surroundings.

This activity room, spanning over three hundred square meters, was divided into several sections. There was a children’s reading corner, a handicraft area, an indoor slide, and rocking horses… Several headless child ghosts were currently rocking violently on the horses. Because their movements were so fierce, blood sprayed from the cross-sections of their necks, splashing everywhere like fountains.

Fortunately, these little ghosts had no physical forms; otherwise, Zhou Fangdong was truly afraid they would soak him in blood.

In addition to the children’s activity area, the room also contained an adult activity area.

However, unlike the completely open children’s section, the adult area was partitioned into small private rooms, including a Mahjong Room, a board game room, a billiards room, and more…

But the adult Reading Area was not partitioned into a separate room. Instead, it sat right next to the children’s reading corner, separated only by a transparent glass partition.

As far as the eye could see, every area of the activity room bore traces of massive blood splatters. Almost every piece of equipment was stained with dried, dark red blood.

But since everyone playing in the activity room was a ghost, this bloody atmosphere was unexpectedly fitting for the little ghosts… It was a truly unpretentious and perfect haunted house.

Despite the bloody appearance, the room didn’t smell of metallic gore. Instead, there was a somewhat familiar scent of gardenia.

Following the trail of blood splatters, Zhou Fangdong arrived at the place where the blood was most concentrated—the adult Reading Area.

Compared to the low cabinets in the children’s reading corner, which were only waist-high and held few books, the adult Reading Area was more like a miniature library. It actually featured two floor-to-ceiling bookshelves placed against the walls, every shelf packed densely with books.

To the west of the adult Reading Area was the glass partition adjacent to the children’s section. The two massive bookshelves were located on the north and east walls, forming a corner.

Beneath these two bookshelves lay a large pool of blood, where one could vaguely discern a human shape. Beside this bloodstain, several photographs and a few torn-out book pages were scattered.

Zhou Fangdong leaned down and picked up the photos.

He discovered that these photos all depicted the eviscerated corpse of a man. The body looked like a research specimen, photographed from various angles.

Looking at the male corpse in the photos—whose lower face was completely torn away, whose abdominal cavity was hollowed out of organs, and who wore a white lab coat—Zhou Fangdong felt it looked increasingly familiar.

He suddenly remembered that when he had visited Xiao Xiaoyu in Room 105 earlier, he seemed to have seen a similar ghost in her room.

The wounds were identical, both wore white lab coats, and the body shapes looked very similar… Could all this blood in the activity room have been left behind by the ghost from Room 105 when he was alive?

No, the area covered by blood in the activity room was too large. A single human body couldn’t possibly hold that much blood; only a portion of it should belong to him.

However, it was certain that this Reading Area was likely the death scene of the Eviscerated Ghost from Room 105.

Apartment rooms were assigned based on the strength of the resident ghosts. While every tenant who died in a room could potentially become a ghost and claim that room, if they were too weak, the room would be snatched away by other ghosts.

It was highly probable that the Eviscerated Ghost had only moved into Room 105 later.

Zhou Fangdong organized the photos of the corpse and placed them on a nearby table, then picked up the scattered pages from the floor.

He skimmed through the pages. As he read the text that hadn’t been contaminated by blood, Zhou Fangdong’s brow furrowed deeper and deeper.

Finally, he placed the pages together with the photos and took a stick of Offering Incense from his Inventory.

The moment the Offering Incense appeared, the playing child ghosts in the activity room suddenly froze in unison, their necks turning as one to look toward Zhou Fangdong’s position.

“Do any of you know which book these pages were torn from?”

Hearing Zhou Fangdong’s question, the little ghosts in the room looked at each other and eventually shook their heads in unison.

“I… know…” A raspy, unpleasant voice suddenly drifted from his side.

Zhou Fangdong instinctively looked toward the sound.

In the narrow gap between the bookshelves, a pair of crimson eyes emerged.

In a crevice only as wide as a single book, an adult ghost with deathly pale skin was squeezed inside. Because its body was so flat and twisted together, it was impossible to tell the ghost’s gender.

Wet hair clung to its face, and its skin was wrinkled like paper that had been soaked in water.

Noticing Zhou Fangdong staring, the Crevice Ghost shrank further into the gap. Then, it extended a flattened hand, pulled a yellowed ancient book from the shelf, and handed it to Zhou Fangdong.

Zhou Fangdong silently took the book from its hand and handed over the Offering Incense.

Fortunately, his mental fortitude had been tempered by the ghosts in the building over the past few days. Otherwise, that sudden fright would have likely sent him teleporting straight back to his room in the past.

Receiving the Offering Incense, the Crevice Ghost let out a satisfied sigh, and its body melted into the darkness and vanished.

Zhou Fangdong flipped through the ancient book and found the corresponding page numbers for the torn sheets.

The moment he had seen those familiar characters on the pages on the floor, Zhou Fangdong had felt something was wrong.

Now that he had found the book the pages belonged to, he was certain: this thing was a ritual log used by the cultists of the Sigu Society.

The Eviscerated Ghost from Room 105 had likely died during a ritual performed by these cultists.

The Sigu Society again… Just how many apartment tenants had been killed by this cult? Did those cultists treat Liwan Apartments as their personal property? They were truly hell-bent on tormenting the people in this building.

Zhou Fangdong fell into deep thought as he looked at a note written in blood beneath a ritual on one of the pages: “Can summon the Evil God.”

Since ghosts existed in this world, was it possible that the Evil God worshipped by the Sigu Society was also real?

Could this summoning ritual actually bring forth an Evil God?

In Jinxi District of Linjiang City, at Unit 2, Building 6 of Penghu Gardens, Zhu Di walked out of the apartment entrance in her pajamas, carrying a trash bag.

She looked a bit listless. She tossed the trash bag into the bin and swayed unsteadily as she turned back.

Even though it was already past eight in the morning, she felt like she hadn’t had enough sleep and wanted to go back home for a nap.

Ever since she had that strange dream, Zhu Di had been suffering from insomnia.

As soon as she closed her eyes, the image of six bald men holding hands and dancing on a stage would automatically pop into her head. That hauntingly rhythmic scene was truly torturous.

Zhu Di yawned and walked up the stairs.

As she reached the landing, she nearly collided with someone.

She quickly apologized, “Sorry, so sorry, I didn’t notice someone was here.”

“It’s fine…” A deep, magnetic voice spoke. “Little girl, have you been troubled by nightmares every night lately?”

Hearing that pleasant voice, Zhu Di instinctively looked up.

For a split second, she thought she saw another black bald head… No, it wasn’t a bald man, but a middle-aged man wearing a skullcap and a grey traditional long coat. His attire made him look like a cross-talk comedian.

Compared to that magnetic voice, the middle-aged man’s face was somewhat disappointing.

It wasn’t that he was ugly; he was just too ordinary. His features were so common and lacked any distinguishing characteristics that it was impossible to remember what he looked like.

When the middle-aged man asked if she was troubled by nightmares, Zhu Di hesitated and didn’t respond.

She felt a certain air of charlatanism about him, as if the moment she spoke, he would claim she was haunted by evil spirits and needed to buy a talisman for 998 yuan to resolve the issue.

Besides, noticing she had nightmares wasn’t exactly a feat of divine insight; anyone who wasn’t blind could see how heavy the dark circles under her eyes were.

As if sensing the distrust in Zhu Di’s eyes, the middle-aged man in a skullcap smiled and continued, “You dreamed of six bald men, didn’t you?”

Zhu Di’s eyes widened.

Incredible! She had never told anyone the contents of her nightmares—how did this man know?

The middle-aged man in a skullcap smiled without saying another word. He handed her a piece of talisman paper folded into a triangle. “Place this under your pillow, and you won’t have those nightmares anymore… Don’t worry, it’s free. I’m not charging you; consider it my good deed for the day.”

Zhu Di took the paper gratefully. “Thank you, Master.”

Zhou Fangdong stored the ancient book, which supposedly could summon an Evil God, into his inventory and stepped out of the activity room.

As soon as he exited, he saw the ghost with the afro again, standing in the hallway like a pining statue, staring longingly at the stairs.

Zhou Fangdong thought for a moment and walked toward the stairwell.

He was preparing to reopen the apartment stairs.

Room 106 was almost ready. Once Hong Zhong moved in, Main Quest 1 would be completed immediately. To rent out all the rooms in the apartment, he would eventually have to head up to the second floor anyway.

Furthermore, he had already warned the tenants on the first floor not to leave their rooms at night, so reopening the stairs shouldn’t cause any issues.

Zhang Zhiwu, who frequently left his room for nighttime strolls, didn’t count. He was a Ghost Tenant and a Zombie Taoist Master; his strength far exceeded the ghosts in the hallway. Rather than worrying about him being attacked by the apartment stairs at night, one should worry about whether the stairs could successfully escape his attacks.

With that thought, Zhou Fangdong took the Red Sandalwood Spirit Tablet from his inventory and placed it on the step marked with the mummified corpse pattern. Then, he lit a stick of Offering Incense before the tablet.

As the sandalwood smoke drifted, a faint vibration echoed from above the stairs… The walkway leading to the second floor of the apartment opened once more.

Translator’s Notes