Chapter 216

Chapter 216

Old Zhao was just an ordinary driver, powerless and insignificant. When his boss instructed him to run the red light, could he refuse? Moreover, that traffic light seemed to be malfunctioning. The dashcam recorded everything. Even if the police were to fine him, he could appeal. Hence, when Zhu Yikun made the request, he complied.

As the car smoothly resumed its course, the frantic beat of Zhu Yikun’s heart began to steady.

However, after such a scare, Zhu Yikun’s flirtatious intentions faded. Feeling an inexplicable anxiety, he released the hand of the woman in leather pants, put the cigarette back between his lips, and instinctively reached for the necklace around his neck. Previously, Xie Yinxue had given him a pear blossom bracelet when dealing with an issue involving his childhood friend, Lin Jianxian. She asked him to take it to a nearby temple or Taoist shrine to have monks or priests perform a ritual on it, aiming to guide the spirit of Lin Jianxian to reincarnation.

Zhu Yikun did as he was told and even spent 880,000 yuan on the ceremony.

Once the ritual concluded, following Xie Yinxue's suggestion that the bracelet could ward off evil spirits, Zhu Yikun transformed it into a necklace. Given that Xie Yinxue had slender wrists, and Zhu Yikun couldn’t wear it around his own, this seemed like the best solution to ensure the bracelet was always with him, protecting him from harm.

Since then, Zhu Yikun had been brazen and fearless, crediting the protective bracelet for his luck. As time passed, he became careless, forgetting the superstitions about the dangers of the night, and how picking up strangers might lead to encountering something sinister.

Perhaps it was retribution that, upon reaching for the necklace, he found nothing.

—The protective bracelet that Xie Yinxue had given him was gone.

“Where the hell is my bracelet?!”

Zhu Yikun’s mouth agape, ash from his cigarette burning a hole in his pants, he felt an icy chill shoot from his feet to the top of his head. His eyes widened in terror, his face a mix of shock and fear, contorting grotesquely.

Old Zhao glanced at him through the rearview mirror, “Boss, which bracelet?”

Zhu Yikun, too panicked to explain, smacked the armrest, “Reverse! Go back! I need to find my bracelet!”

“Brother, didn’t you say you'd drive us home?” The woman in leather pants pleaded urgently, “Why are you turning back now?”

At this moment, Zhu Yikun’s lustful thoughts were completely forgotten. Dismissing the group as one would shoo away flies, he barked, “I’m not driving any of you! Get out!”

As he tried to unlock the door to shove them out,

Unexpectedly, a young man in a white hoodie who was squatting on the floor lunged forward, screaming shrilly, “Don’t open the door!”

Zhu Yikun was nearly deafened by the cry. Turning angrily, he saw the young man’s eyes wide with terror, bloodshot and trembling, murmuring, “Don’t open it… outside, outside... there’s a ghost!”

The words "there's a ghost" made Zhu Yikun shiver uncontrollably.

A woman in a blue skirt crawled to him, tears streaming, “Sir, please, just drive us home…”

Zhu Yikun shouted back, “I won’t!”

By now, Zhu Yikun fully realized that his lust had landed him in trouble. All drunkenness vanished, replaced by sober regret. After hearing the young man in the white hoodie shout "there's a ghost outside," he didn't dare to open the door. Fearful of inviting unwanted spirits into the car and adding fuel to the fire, he anxiously urged Old Zhao, "Old Zhao, turn the car around! I need to find my bracelet!"

"Alright, alright..."

Old Zhao, equally distressed by their claims of ghosts, promptly turned the car around at Zhu Yikun's command. When they once again approached the traffic light stuck at "44" seconds, he didn't even pause, driving straight through.

The intersection was only five hundred meters from the nightclub they'd come from. Without another traffic light in between, Old Zhao was dumbfounded when they unexpectedly arrived at another traffic light intersection.

"... Are we there?"

Zhu Yikun thought they had returned to the nightclub. However, when he glanced out of the window, he locked eyes with a pair of dark, bloody sockets. Noticing Zhu Yikun's gaze, the creature grinned, its rotting gums unable to hold its teeth, which tumbled out grotesquely.

"Oh my God!"

Startled, Zhu Yikun fell off his seat, tumbling backward. Regaining his composure, he chose to squat on the car floor with the young folks, resembling frightened turtles. Amidst his tears and cursing, he yelled, "It's all your fault!"

Seeing him in such a state, the young people didn't need to ask what he'd seen through the window. They already knew.

The woman in the black leather pants, the most decisive of the group, retorted, "You're the beast! What do you mean we caused this? If you weren't lusting after me and Nannan, would you have invited us into your car? Blame yourself for being despicable! You got what you deserved!"

"Yes, it's all my fault!" Admitting his errors, Zhu Yikun slapped himself, scolding, "For your lust! For not learning from your mistakes! For letting alcohol cloud your judgment!"

He shakily reached for his phone, intending to call Xie Yinxue for help.

"It's pointless. You won't get through," the girl named "Nannan" wearing a blue skirt said, "We've tried multiple times."

Zhu Yikun, refusing to believe her, was soon confronted with the truth. After multiple attempts, the phone's voice stated, "The number you've dialed is out of service."

Nannan commented, "See, I told you..."

"Buzz—"

Mid-sentence, Zhu Yikun's phone vibrated abruptly, almost causing him to throw it in surprise. But upon seeing the caller ID, his fear was replaced with relief. "Mr. Xie, help! I've run into some trouble, I..."

As Zhu Yikun spoke, his voice gradually faded.

"Hee hee hee..."

Because from the other end of the call, all he could hear was laughter.

It was an indescribably eerie laugh, neither male nor female. It seemed distant, approaching slowly, yet as soon as it felt near, it suddenly ceased and vanished.

Finally, it manifested beside your other ear, exhaling a chilling breath and murmured in a voice like a dying old man: "Beware... There's a ghost behind you!"

This time, Zhu Yikun truly threw his phone away.

The phone landed on the front seat, smacking Old Zhao on the head. But Zhu Yikun had no inclination to care about anyone else at the moment. He felt that if he hadn't yet passed through the gate of life and death, he might have been scared to death on the spot by that call.

Even without dropping dead, Zhu Yikun felt he couldn't bear it much longer.

Intense fear can lead to rapid heartbeats, resulting in a suffocating sensation. Most crucially, Zhu Yikun couldn't get through to Xie Yinxue's phone. He had no idea how long this agony would last. An hour? An evening? A week? A month?

The unknown is always the root of terror.

"Ring... Ring..."

While Zhu Yikun discarded his phone, the phones of the others hadn’t stopped, all ringing simultaneously. The woman in the black leather pants, Nannan, and the three boys took out their phones. When they saw the caller ID, shock appeared in their eyes—each person's name was being displayed as the caller.

The woman in black leather pants was named Gong Fanya. Her screen showed that Nannan was calling her.

But Nannan's phone was also ringing. The caller ID showed Bai Wei male, Gao Tuo. Yet, Gao Tuo's phone showed his caller to be another good buddy, Song Qiyuan. In essence, all five of them seemed to be calling each other.

Nannan glanced at Gao Tuo beside her and answered the call.

A panicked voice of a male immediately emanated from the speaker: "Hello? Nannan, where are you?!"

Nannan barely began: "I..."

The voice on the phone, impersonating "Gao Tuo", loudly exclaimed: "Come out quickly! The person next to you isn't me; he's a ghost!"

Everyone in the car instantly turned to look at Gao Tuo.

"I'm human!" Gao Tuo hastily defended, "Don't believe its deceptive tales!"

Gong Fanya, seeing this, also answered her call. Another voice mimicking "Nannan" emerged from the receiver, echoing the sentiments of the fake Gao Tuo: "Hello? Fanya, where are you? Hurry out! The person beside you isn't me; she's a ghost!"

"End the calls." Gong Fanya advised the group, shaking her head. "Don't answer anymore. It's trying to lure us out."

Everyone in the car heeded her words and hung up. But the moment they did, they felt a heavy thud on the vehicle, as if something massive had struck it.

Gao Tuo, Song Qiyuan, and Gong Fanya instinctively looked up at the roof of the car.

Zhu Yikun, not daring to open his eyes, was squatting in his spot, murmuring repeatedly: "Don't panic, I won't die, I won't die, I won't die..."

"Boss... Boss..."

From the driver's seat, Old Zhao, after picking up Zhu Yikun's phone from under the foot mat, began to call out tremulously, "Boss... Mr. Zhu..."

"Old Zhao, what are you shouting about?"

Fearing that Old Zhao might accidentally say his full name, which the ghost could hear, Zhu Yikun pretended not to have heard. He tentatively lifted an eyelid and looked towards Old Zhao along with the others. With that glance, everyone immediately understood what Old Zhao was alarmed about.

—There, on the front hood of the car, stood a pair of bare human legs.

The skin on those legs was wrinkled and rough, tinted with the pale blue hue characteristic of a corpse. Brown age spots dotted the surface, and the toenails were cloudy and yellow, reminiscent of moldy, stinky tofu residue. Every detail screamed one fact to the group—these were the legs of an elderly person.

However, they couldn't see anything above the legs.

"Hehehe..."

As they watched, the group suddenly heard that eerie laughter again.

As it laughed, something else started to fall. Yellowish-white objects, like small stones, "patter" onto the hood. Upon closer inspection, the group realized these weren't stones at all but human teeth.

After the teeth, a head with gray hair and a bloodied face fell, thudding heavily onto the hood. It wore a sinister, malicious grin, bearing its toothless mouth in a grotesque smile at them.

Author's Note:

Ghost: This is what we call a "toothless grin".