Love NPC in Nightmare Game - Chapter 136

Chapter 136: Dark Shadow of the Ancient Temple 3

Everyone stayed away and watched as the ghost flew out. They immediately rushed toward the “ghost” that was blown out with great enthusiasm.

The ghost that was blown out lay motionless on the ground, completely drenched, with its face down, so they couldn’t see what it looked like.

Those who were originally curious about the ghost’s appearance slowed their steps.

This person, somehow, seemed to look a bit like…

Everyone looked at the three remaining players of the four-person group.

Those three players also had strange expressions.

Because the person lying on the ground, in terms of both clothes and hair, looked very similar to the player who was dragged into the water jar.

His teammates quickly took a few steps forward, carefully identifying the person on the ground, and then reluctantly raised their heads: “It really is Lin Yi.”

They originally wanted to blow out the ghost, but they ended up blowing out a player instead.

Xue Li’s face flushed red with embarrassment: “I’m sorry! It was all my idea.”

“It’s okay, he was eliminated early on anyway, so this is just a corpse now.” It felt both sympathetic and amusing to see their companion’s “corpse” blown out.

Qian Le looked at the water on the ground, then at the water jar that was restrained by the soil and not completely blown apart, and asked, “So where did the ghost go?”

The explosion’s power was tremendous, with soil flying everywhere. Most of the water jars were shattered into pieces, and the remaining water jar was just a bottom with not much water left inside, making it easy to see at a glance.

“I definitely saw a pair of hands reach out from the water jar and drag Lin Yi in,” one player said, afraid that others wouldn’t believe him.

At the bottom of the water jar, there was nothing but a puddle of water. They didn’t see anyone else besides Lin Yi.

Everyone searched around, with Eddie squatting beside the remaining water jar, looking here and there, but they couldn’t find anything.

Ke Li looked at the mess on the ground, with water trails flowing everywhere, even getting his feet wet. He gazed at his companions still searching for the ghost and suddenly said, “What if this ghost can turn invisible and we can’t see it when it goes into the water?”

It was originally just a guess, but Zhou Zhou nodded in agreement: “It’s possible.”

Ke Li’s smile froze on his face as he looked at the water trails beneath his feet and immediately jumped to a dry area.

Eddie said, “That can’t be possible, otherwise how would we be able to catch it?”

Qian Le walked towards the dry ground and casually said, “We can wait for the water around us to dry up. If the water on the ground dries up, it means the ghost is still in the jar. If there’s an area that remains wet, then it means it really can… Ouch, something is pulling my foot!”

Everyone immediately looked at Qian Le. He was just a step away from the dry ground when a pale hand reached out from the water stain on the ground and firmly grabbed his ankle, pulling him down.

Eddie, who was closest to him, shouted and ran over: “I’ll help you!”

The others also ran towards them. They had originally thought that the hand was just grabbing Qian Le, but his foot was gradually sinking into what seemed like mud beneath the water-soaked ground.

Eddie was the first to arrive and pulled Qian Le’s arm with all his might: “Let’s pull this ghost thing out together!”

The others joined in too. No matter how strong the force of that pale hand was, it couldn’t resist so many people.

Veins bulged on the pale hand’s arm as it gradually emerged. Just as the hand was about to retreat, Alvia, who hadn’t gone to help Qian Le, suddenly grabbed the arm and pulled it out.

The players cursed as they crawled up from the ground. Seeing that Alvia and Zhou Zhou were prepared, they immediately cheered them on.

Zhou Zhou originally wanted to go and help Alvia, since the ghost’s strength was immense and it would take several players together to match it. However, Alvia was now grabbing the ghost’s arm with one hand and slowly dragging it out.

The water stains on the ground connected into a large patch, and the ghost’s entire form gradually emerged.

Its pale skin had no hint of blood color. Its spine protruded from its back, and every rib could be seen on its front, making it look extremely thin. However, its two arms were very muscular. It wore only a tattered pair of pants, with messy long hair hanging down its back, and it made a shrill whistling sound from its mouth.

The dragged-out ghost struggled fiercely, its sharp teeth occasionally trying to bite Alvia, but he dodged them all. Its pupils were very small, making the whites of its eyes appear very prominent.

“Is this the ghost?” The players were extremely curious yet didn’t dare approach, as the ghost’s claws were very sharp, and getting scratched could lead to elimination.

Alvia easily subdued the ghost, but it was too noisy, and its shrill voice made him feel uncomfortable.

Almost at the moment when Alvia frowned, Zhou Zhou noticed it.

He stared at the ghost and asked, “How are we supposed to destroy this water ghost?”

Ke Li was still recalling: “It’s called a water ghost?”

The others had already started proposing ideas.

Xue Li: “Stab it with a knife?”

Ke Li: “Snap its neck?”

As soon as he finished speaking, Alvia simply and efficiently snapped the ghost’s neck. However, to everyone’s shock, the ghost’s neck was extremely flexible and twisted back in the next moment, viciously baring its teeth at Alvia.

“Do we have a knife?”

“I have one here.”

But stabbing with a knife didn’t work either. The water ghost looked weak, but the knife couldn’t pierce it at all.

Qian Le scratched his head: “Why don’t we try burning it with fire?”

The water ghost seemed to understand the players’ words and suddenly turned towards Qian Le, glaring at him with hatred.

After all, this was just a game. Although everyone felt a bit uncomfortable, they still tied the water ghost to a pillar and set it on fire.

The water ghost’s shrill screams rang out, and everyone felt uncomfortable and turned their heads away, feeling that this method was a bit cruel.

Afterward, the screams gradually subsided, and the fire slowly died out. When everyone thought they had finally succeeded in destroying the first ghost, Zhou Zhou shook his head while looking at the quest panel: “It’s not dead.”

“How is that possible? Wasn’t it burned to death?”

Xue Li also opened the quest panel and found that a number had appeared on it at some point.

0/10

“Does this mean there are ten ghosts in total, and we haven’t destroyed any of them yet?”

Xue Li raised her head and looked towards the fire pit, but unfortunately, the smoke was too thick to see anything clearly.

Once the smoke cleared, everyone went over and discovered that there was nothing left on the pillar, the water ghost had escaped.

Alvia looked at a small puddle of water not far from the ground, which was about to dry up, and also frowned: “We were careless. That ghost can escape to anywhere as long as there’s water.”

“I knew this ghost instance couldn’t be that simple. Now we can’t even catch the first one.”

“Even if we catch it, how do we destroy it?”

“Let’s keep burning it with fire. I’ll go look for some combustible materials and see if they can be used.”

As everyone discussed, they avoided the areas with water.

Qian Le also tiptoed around the water stains on the ground. However, the exploded water jar had a large capacity, and there were water trails all over the courtyard, so it was inevitable to step on some no matter how careful he was.

“That ghost is back!” Qian Le shouted. This time, the water ghost emerged halfway from the ground and desperately dragged Qian Le downwards. In the blink of an eye, Qian Le’s legs were submerged.

He clung to the ground while shouting indignantly, “Why is it always me? Can’t you grab someone else for a change?”

The water ghost paid no heed and within seconds, half of Qian Le’s body had sunk in. The others ran over, but this time, the water ghost simply let go and submerged into the ground.

When everyone thought the water ghost had escaped, Qian Le started shouting again.

“Quick, quick, pull me out, it’s grabbing my feet from below!”

Half of Qian Le’s body had already sunk into the ground. The water ghost was very cunning, submerging underground where the players couldn’t reach it.

Qian Le was eventually pulled out, looking like he had fallen into water with half his body drenched.

When Qian Le was sinking, Zhou Zhou had also tried to enter the area around him, but the ground was hard and cold, and players couldn’t go underground.

Qian Le was already exhausted and didn’t care if the ground had water or not, lying on his back and panting heavily. The other players vigilantly watched the water stains around them, afraid that the water ghost would suddenly emerge again.

The situation had reached a stalemate. The water ghost took advantage of its abilities to harass them occasionally, and it seemed to harbor a particular hatred towards Qian Le, charging straight at him several times.

In the end, it was Alvia who used Qian Le as bait to catch the water ghost.

The players found some vegetable oil in the temple’s kitchen and originally thought fire attacks would work, but it only caused the water ghost to sizzle and screech in pain.

The water ghost’s skin could secrete water, quickly extinguishing the raging flames.

Now everyone surrounded this tenacious water ghost, but no one had a solution.

As night fell, the water ghost, as if knowing that the players present were powerless against it, let out a series of hideous, eerie laughter that sounded like nails scratching a chalkboard, making everyone uncomfortable.

Ke Li clenched his teeth, wishing he could find something to stuff the ghost’s mouth.

The others also frowned.

Xue Li simply covered her ears: “We can’t keep dragging this on. There are still nine more ghosts, so how can we possibly complete the quest this way?”

These ghosts must have weaknesses, and the method to destroy them might need to be found within the temple. Alvia carefully recalled the various things he had seen in the temple, wondering if any of them could be used to destroy the ghosts.

Zhou Zhou hadn’t said a word. He was rummaging through his pocket for something, and after a while, he turned around to look everywhere. Xue Li didn’t understand what he was doing either.

Everyone stayed in the courtyard, with illumination tools placed beside the giant incense burner, so it wasn’t too dark. The water ghost watched the players with furrowed brows, its eerie laughter sounding very smug, while its long hair behind it was slowly growing at an extremely slow pace.

Qian Le couldn’t figure it out either. After struggling with the water ghost for so long, he was utterly exhausted. He dragged a meditation cushion from the main hall and sat cross-legged on it to rest.

As if his sixth sense activated, he suddenly turned his head to look behind him, but there was nothing there.

He turned his head back suspiciously, observing the water ghost’s tightly bound appearance, feeling that he might have been overthinking things.

The jet-black hair grew stealthily, threading its way through the damp ground where his body was obstructing the view.

The water ghost’s body always maintained a surface moisture, so the ground where it was had already become damp, even accumulating water stains. Its hair threaded through the water trails, moving flexibly as if alive.

A very small circular water stain gradually appeared behind Qian Le, and the circle kept expanding, eventually forming a water stain the size of a fist.

At the moment Zhou Zhou and Alvia noticed it, the water ghost’s hair emerged rapidly from the circular water stain and coiled tightly around Qian Le’s neck.

Qian Le didn’t even have a chance to scream for help before his neck was tightly constricted.

Seemingly with the intention to kill Qian Le, the water ghost’s hair tightened its coils, and within a few breaths, Qian Le’s face turned red.

Some of the others tried to help remove the hair, while others charged at the water ghost, demanding it to stop immediately.

But this time, the water ghost was determined to kill Qian Le, so the players were temporarily helpless.

“The knife! Quick, use a knife to cut the hair!” Xue Li shouted frantically.

One of the three-player team members carried a knife, and he hurriedly took it out, trying to cut the water ghost’s hair.

But its hair was as tenacious as its skin, and the knife couldn’t cut through it at all.

“It’s not working! I can’t cut it!”

The water ghost seemed excited, its black lips curled into a malicious grin.

Just as everyone thought Qian Le was doomed this time, a pale white hand reached out in front of the water ghost and placed a yellow rectangular paper talisman on its forehead.

In the next moment, the water ghost, still wearing that malicious grin, froze as if a pause button had been pressed.

The hair also seemed to lose its vitality, detaching from Qian Le’s neck and gently falling to the ground without a sound.

Qian Le could finally breathe again. He gasped deeply, his entire face turning blue from being choked, just a little more and he would have been eliminated.

Everyone looked at the hand that had produced the talisman and turned their gaze to its owner, Zhou Zhou.

“Zhou Zhou, what did you do? What item is this? It’s so effective,” Xue Li said excitedly.

Under everyone’s scrutiny, Zhou Zhou innocently shook his head: “I don’t know. I just found it in my clothes pocket when I felt around earlier.”

Ke Li instinctively patted his own pocket. It was completely empty, with nothing in it.

The yellow talisman pasted on the water ghost’s forehead had red symbols, but no one could understand what those symbols meant.

Eddie was very interested in this and originally wanted to take a closer look at what kind of paper or item this was. However, he noticed that the paper talisman began to move on its own without any wind, and then it started to burn from the bottom.

Eddie exclaimed anxiously, “Not good, the talisman is burning!”

From the moment the talisman began burning, Alvia and Zhou Zhou realized that their surroundings had instantly changed. A layer of smoke pervaded the area, growing thicker the closer it was to them.

Everyone immediately sensed that something was wrong and huddled together tightly, vigilantly watching their surroundings.

Alvia suddenly looked to the side and saw a person appear out of thin air beside the water ghost. This person was even taller than Heya, standing over three meters tall.

The smoke obscured the person’s face, but everyone could feel the presence of a very powerful and formidable aura.

“Could it be the water ghost’s companion coming to rescue it?” Qian Le couldn’t help but speculate.

This person walked straight towards the water ghost, getting closer and closer to them as well.

Contrary to Qian Le’s guess, the water ghost, having revived after the talisman burned, didn’t show any joy at seeing a companion. Instead, it looked terrified, its bound body twisting violently as if trying to escape, and it kept emitting shrill cries of terror and fear, even more frightened than when it was being burned earlier.

As the person gradually approached, everyone was shocked to see his face and figure through the smoke. Qian Le and Ke Li’s mouths hung open, and Xue Li even began to wonder if there was something wrong with her eyes.

Zhou Zhou looked up at the person, his eyes wide with astonishment as well.

“How can it be him!?”