Her Talent for Courting Death Has Always Been Impressive - Chapter 38 Part 2

“It disguised the house as an independent residence, hiding in residential areas, luring humans to move in. Then it gradually controlled the occupants, turning them into believers, using them to hold more rituals, collecting more ‘food’…”

This is how the name Ghost House No. 71 came about.

“Later it was captured and contained by the Ciji Institute for research,” Pu Han opened his eyes and continued. “It was one of the abominations released during that incident five years ago.”

“I’ve been wanting to ask, why call those people ‘believers’?” Xu Turan asked curiously. “Aren’t they just like people who’ve joined a pyramid scheme and been brainwashed?”

Yang Buqi: …

Now that you mention it, it does seem that way.

Pu Han snorted and shook his head: “This term was borrowed from the abominations. They like to call themselves gods, so naturally their followers are believers… Ghost House No. 71 is actually one of the better ones. Several years ago, there was an omniscient-leaning one abroad that had developed a huge number of believers, but it was eventually taken down by ability users from several organizations working together…”

It was also released in the incident five years ago, and its whereabouts are unknown to this day. In a sense, it shares the same fate as Ghost House No. 71.

Yang Buqi paused, remembering something important: “Wait, that’s not right. I remember in the records left behind, Ghost House No. 71 was only at the ‘Pyre’ level?”

“You mean, after being released by that precognition user, it went through another upgrade?” Xu Turan clicked her tongue. “Is it that capable?”

“It seems so, based on what we know now,” Pu Han nodded. “Obviously, it has made significant progress. It even knows to change its house number… How about that, doesn’t it give you that ‘three years have passed, the dragon king returns’ face-slapping novel déjà vu feeling?”

Xu Turan: “…I understand the logic. But why is the face being slapped on my side? I wasn’t the one who captured it in the first place.”

“I think this is precisely where the problem lies,” Yang Buqi finished adding as much defense to the room as possible, dusted off his hands, and sat down next to Xu Turan. “What’s going on with your brother? Is he a believer?”

Xu Turan carefully recalled the 《Guide to Identifying Abomination Believers》 from the training courses of the past few days, compared it with her observations over the past few days, and shook her head.

“No, he’s just being controlled.”

There had never been any mysterious flesh in the refrigerator, nor were there any materials or runes for performing rituals in the house. Moreover, when he gained a moment of freedom, he still remembered to warn her to escape — this was clearly not something a completely brainwashed person would do.

“That’s a bit strange then,” Yang Buqi frowned. “It controlled your brother, but didn’t use him to take further action… What exactly does it want to do?”

Xu Turan also frowned. For some reason, fragments of what Pu Han had said not long ago suddenly flashed through her mind —

Waiting.

Pu Han said it was waiting.

What was it waiting for?

Of course, while thinking this, Xu Turan didn’t voice this question — heaven knows, Pu Han had nearly rolled down the stairs not long ago just for pursuing this question.

Knowing that now was not the time to dwell on these matters, she wisely changed the subject: “Let’s think about how to get out of here first.”

“Indeed,” Pu Han nodded. “We don’t have much time left.”

He couldn’t beat Ghost House No. 71 one-on-one. Staying in this domain for too long would eventually break him. Once he broke, the shield of ignorance placed on Xu Turan would fail, and Xu Turan would directly face the hallucinations brought by Ghost House No. 71 — with bad luck, two could break at once.

And the reason they still had time to discuss countermeasures now was entirely due to Xu Turan’s passive skill “Confusion” being active. But the upgrade effect of “Confusion” could only last for 24 hours — he didn’t know exactly how Xu Turan had managed this, as he hadn’t “read” that part. Frankly, he didn’t care either.

What he cared about was that once the 24 hours were up and this enhanced effect disappeared, Ghost House No. 71 would break free from its chaotic state. At that point, they would truly have no chance of survival.

Yang Buqi wasn’t aware of the 24-hour time limit, but he knew Pu Han certainly couldn’t hold out for too long. After a brief consideration, he agreed with the other two’s thoughts and opened his bag, pouring out a pile of items.

“I did bring some tools. But I thought the problem was with the Planchette Pen, so the things I prepared are quite ordinary…” He rummaged through the pile of items. Xu Turan, with her sharp eyes, picked up a silver box:

“This looks very similar to the packaging box from Old Jiang’s place.”

Except there was an intricate padlock on the outside, with runes on the lock that she had never seen before.

“Yes, this is a sealing box. It can be used to seal abominations up to the Radiance level…”

Noticing Xu Turan’s eyes lighting up instantly, he added helplessly: “But we don’t have the conditions to use it.”

Although this box had a high upper limit, its actual performance depended on the user’s level and the materials used to assist. If it were to be used to suppress a Pyre level abomination, it would have to be used by an ability user of Torch level or above, and would require the consumption of several Lamp level items.

If it were to be used against a Radiance level abomination, it could only be used by a Radiance level or above ability user, and the items consumed would have to be Pyre level or above, and multiple at that.

On their side, they barely had one Radiance level ability user, but the number of items was definitely not enough.

Xu Turan touched the Planchette Pen in her pocket through her clothes, her brows slightly furrowed.

Come to think of it, this pen had been quiet for a long time for some unknown reason.

She pondered for a moment, then looked at Pu Han again: “By the way, what did you bring?”

“?” Pu Han looked at her curiously, “How did you know I brought something?”

“Stop pretending — you coming here must be because Feifei told you to come,” Xu Turan said with certainty. “If she told you to come, she must have foreseen something, so you guys must have made some preparations… Surely they didn’t just send you here to be cannon fodder?”

Pu Han smiled and indeed took something out of his pocket, placing it on the ground.

“Alright, you guessed right. Time was tight, no time to apply for more tools, so I only brought one rule paper.”

“But this paper’s reaction is a bit slow, the content is delayed. It’ll probably take a while before it can generate suitable escape rules for us.”

Xu Turan: “…?”

She had recently learned about rule papers. This thing was infused with the power of both order and omniscience tendencies, able to summarize loopholes in the domain and others’ experiences based on the user’s current situation and inputted content, generating the latest survival rules on its own, providing ability users with more chances of escape.

Once “rules” are formed, they can also impose certain constraints on the monsters in the domain. If used by an order ability user, the effect would be even better.

Unfortunately, her order level was too low now… Let alone countering, it was difficult to even provide basic defensive functions. In fact, Xu Turan had once asked Pu Han if her order tendency could be of any use, and he only replied with four words:

A drop in the bucket.

That was quite hurtful.

Xu Turan sighed inwardly, picked up the paper and unfolded it. She saw only one line of large red text:

【Do not! Enter! Star Park Villa District No. 17!!】

…It was evident that the delay was indeed a bit excessive.