Chapter 1 The Next Second

The next second, Jiang Cheng, caught completely off guard, only felt a burst of dizziness, his steps faltering, as if he had been sucked into a huge, dark vortex.

He didn't know how long had passed, but suddenly a solid sensation came from under his feet. As he gradually regained his senses, Jiang Cheng raised his head and found himself in an alley. Before him was a wall, a seemingly solid brick wall covered with tiny cracks. The night sky above told him it was nighttime. It was dark and quiet all around.

Suddenly, a hand reached out from behind and grabbed his arm. Completely instinctively, Jiang Cheng grabbed the other person's wrist, yanked them over, and pinned them against the wall.

Only when he saw the person's face did Jiang Cheng's tense nerves relax a little. His first reaction had been the green ghost hand.

Li Bai, who had been thrown against the wall, couldn't help coughing a few times. "Mr. Jiang... Mr. Jiang, it's me, don't be nervous."

Releasing his hand, he turned around. Fatty and Yao Shunyu were both there. Judging from their expressions, they were also clearly still adjusting to this new world. Fatty even shook his head to clear his mind.

Once everyone had recovered, Yao Shunyu looked around and said in a low voice, "Strange, why didn't we get off the bus this time? Instead, we came directly to a place like this."

Li Bai rubbed his wrist, which had been hurt by Jiang Cheng, and placed his hopes on Jiang Cheng and Wang Fugui. "Mr. Jiang, Mr. Wang, have you ever encountered this situation before?"

"Never, this is also our first time." Jiang Cheng answered truthfully. After a moment, he suddenly asked, "What do you all remember from the bus?"

Hearing this, Li Bai's face turned fearful, his pupils trembling. "A hand, a ghost hand stretched out from the mist and grabbed my shoulder. It was a... a green ghost hand!"

Jiang Cheng paused when he heard this and looked at Li Bai in surprise. "You were also grabbed by a ghost hand?"

Unexpectedly, Li Bai's face was even stranger than Jiang Cheng's. "Of course, the ghost hand grabbed me. It happened so suddenly that I didn't have time to react at all. I called out to you, but none of you responded."

Before Jiang Cheng could speak, Fatty suddenly opened his mouth, trembling. "Li Bai, what are you talking about? The person grabbed by the ghost hand was clearly me!"

Hearing this, everyone realized that something was wrong. Yao Shunyu nodded to Jiang Cheng, confirming the latter's guess. "My experience is the same as yours. I was also grabbed by a ghost hand, and then when I regained consciousness, I was here."

"In my memory, only I was grabbed by the ghost hand. You were all by my side. I remember it very clearly," Yao Shunyu added seriously.

Everyone's memories diverged here, but what they agreed on was that everyone remembered the ghost hand伸出的鬼手from the mist, and they were certain that they had been grabbed by it.

Jiang Cheng tried his best to recall, but he couldn't remember what the ghost looked like at all. It was hidden in the mist and very fast.

"I... I seem to have some impression." Fatty recalled blankly, his brows furrowed together.

"You remember the ghost?" Li Bai asked, "No, I mean, did you... did you see it?"

After a long while, Fatty hesitated and said, "I don't remember very clearly either, but I did see something in the mist. Let me think, it seemed... it seemed like a pair of eyes!"

"That's right, it was a pair of eyes!" Fatty suddenly became excited. "I remember now, those eyes were very strange, they were a pair of... silver eyes!"

Fatty's information stopped there. All he knew was that the ghost had silver eyes and could use some strange method to bring them to this world.

After thinking for a moment, Li Bai asked a very important question, "Everyone, where are we exactly now? Are we on the bus, or... or have we already gotten off?"

No one answered, because no one knew the answer.

At the same time, Jiang Cheng's eyes inadvertently swept over the others. The suddenness of the situation, coupled with his recent experiences, made Jiang Cheng very wary. He suspected the identities of Fatty and the other two.

But a cursory observation was clearly not enough to determine their true identities. Jiang Cheng decided to observe them slowly. They had already entered the mission world, and finding their teammates to join up with was the priority.

After a brief discussion, the group slowly moved forward along the wall, carefully proceeding along one side of the alley.

When they finally emerged from the alley, the scene before them shocked everyone. In front of them was a street, lined with a large number of wooden buildings, quaint and elegant, with paper lanterns hanging under the eaves.

However, these lanterns were all extinguished. As a gust of wind blew, the lanterns swayed slightly, like pale human faces hidden in the darkness.

With the help of the faint starlight, the paper lanterns stretched into a continuous expanse, and further away was a shadow left by the buildings. The shadows were clearly distinct from the pitch-black night, making the street seem endlessly long.

A brief observation was enough to determine that this mission was set in ancient times, and that this was a relatively large ancient town. Although it was night, the numerous shops were enough to infer the prosperity of this street during the day.

Jiang Cheng suddenly noticed a building diagonally across the street. A plaque hung above the building, and he could vaguely make out the four characters *Fu An* Inn.

"*Fu An* Inn..."

Fatty, Yao Shunyu, and Li Bai also noticed the inn.

At first, Jiang Cheng only felt that something was strange, but after a moment, Jiang Cheng suddenly felt a inexplicable chill. He knew what the problem was.

This inn was inconspicuous on the whole street, and it was not directly facing their direction. Normally, they would not have noticed it, but it was as if something was attracting them in the dark. All four of them had noticed this inn almost simultaneously.

The others also realized this. It seemed that their mission was likely related to this inn. Fatty cautiously asked everyone if they should seek lodging there, after all, it was an inn.

Moreover, it was late at night and the temperature was very low. Spending the whole night outside sounded miserable.

"I think it's better not to. This area... this area is too strange." Li Bai said in a low voice, his eyes couldn't help but scan the sides of the street.

"That's right, I think we shouldn't for now either. This street looks very prosperous, and there should be many people living around here, but it's terribly quiet now."

"Also, since it's an inn, even at night there would be candles lit in the lobby, prepared for travelers who might arrive late. Inns don't extinguish candles, that's the rule, but look, not to mention leaving candles lit, there isn't even a single lantern lit on the entire street. Are the people in this city all dead?" Yao Shunyu's voice revealed vigilance.

"Don't go over there, let's retreat, let's find another place to spend the night."

Jiang Cheng's opinion was the same as Li Bai and Yao Shunyu's. This inn, and the entire street, were full of strangeness. Before figuring out all of this, Jiang Cheng decided it was better to be cautious.

After briefly identifying the direction, Jiang Cheng and his group walked along the side of the street towards the other side of the town, listening intently for any movement inside the dark buildings nearby.

"Where are we going?" Fatty couldn't help but ask in a low voice.

Yao Shunyu, who was closest to him, replied, "According to the direction of this street, we were in a relatively central location just now, and now we are moving towards the edge. Ancient cities were difficult to build very large, let's try to find the edge of this city, it might be safer there."

Although he didn't quite understand, since the doctor didn't object, there must be a reason. Fatty cautiously followed behind the doctor. The group walked on the empty street, and the more they walked, the more uneasy they felt. Just like Yao Shunyu had said, it seemed like there really wasn't anyone here, it was a ghost town.

But gradually, they saw light ahead.

It was firelight!

A row of wooden fences blocked one side of the street. Looking further ahead, not far away was a high city wall. No, to be precise, it was a gate tower.

The gate tower stood tall in the darkness, like a huge monster. Below it was the city gate, wide enough for two cars to drive through side by side. At this moment, the city gate was tightly closed.

The firelight was not far behind the city gate, to the left and right, raised to about the height of a person, and at the intersection of the firelight and the darkness, several figures stood.

The figures were wearing gray clothes and clutching spears in their hands, standing straight.

"They are soldiers guarding the city at night." After the group hid, Yao Shunyu said softly.

Ancient siege methods were relatively simple, and large cities with strong walls were easy to defend and difficult to attack, often leaving the attacking side helpless. The gate needed to be heavily guarded to prevent the enemy from launching a coordinated attack from the inside, opening the city gate, and letting the enemy in.

Seeing people, Fatty finally breathed a sigh of relief.

But slowly, the atmosphere around them changed, because everyone had noticed something very strange. They had been hiding nearby for ten minutes, but the soldiers guarding the city hadn't moved at all, not even to change their posture.

"What... what's wrong with them?"

Jiang Cheng turned his head and mouthed two words to the other three. Fatty felt a chill in his heart when he saw it. Jiang Cheng had said the words "dead."

What's going on?

There wasn't a trace of human warmth in the whole city. They had finally stumbled upon a few people, and they were soldiers guarding the city, but they were dead!

Yao Shunyu pondered for a moment and told Jiang Cheng and the others to wait here. He quietly retreated, circled around, found a good angle, and observed the soldiers from another direction.

As a gust of wind blew, making the firelight flicker, Yao Shunyu finally saw clearly that these soldiers were not dead people, but scarecrows.

Straw had been stuffed into their clothes to prop them up, and then they had been made into scarecrows.

Because the workmanship was clever and they were hidden at the intersection of the firelight and the darkness, they hadn't noticed it at first. But just as Yao Shunyu was about to go back and explain the situation to Jiang Cheng and the others, he suddenly heard a very soft sound behind him, like... some kind of footstep.

When Yao Shunyu and Jiang Cheng's group met again, he looked slightly embarrassed. His hands were tied behind his back, his mouth was covered, and standing next to him were several people.

There were quite a few of them, four men and two women. Judging from their clothes, they were all dressed in modern attire, which meant that these people were their teammates.

"I said, there's no need for this, right? We're all teammates."

Fatty frowned as he looked at Yao Shunyu's appearance. It was easy to tell who was on their side from their clothing. He couldn't figure out what the other party was trying to do.

"Whether you're teammates or not, you don't get to decide. We still need to investigate." One of the men, who was very thin and had a wound on his forehead, looked gloomy.

Fortunately, after some probing, the other party finally lowered their guard. The group didn't dare to stay here for long, so Jiang Cheng and the others followed the other team to their resting place.

It was a stable not far from the city wall. There were no horses in the stable, it was empty, but behind the stable there was a small room filled with piles of fodder.

After the group entered, they sat directly on the fodder, which was much warmer here than outside.

"You... there are only four of you?" An old man wearing a dark trench coat looked at Jiang Cheng and asked. The man's gaze wasn't sharp, but it was very dignified, suggesting that he was a high-ranking and powerful figure in real life.

"Yes, there are only four of us. We came together," Jiang Cheng didn't hide anything.

After chatting for a while, Jiang Cheng roughly understood the composition of the group. There were six people in total, but only two of them had come together, the other four were lone wolves.

Even more rare was that the two who had come together were a couple, the man was in his early 50s, and the woman, perhaps because she took good care of herself, looked to be around 30.

It was obvious that someone was terribly cold and was constantly shivering, but the old man in the trench coat only said faintly, "You have to bear with it. We can't light a fire in this situation. No one knows what kind of ghosts are in this city."

"Did you see those scarecrows just now?" The old man slowly rubbed his hands and looked at Jiang Cheng and asked.

"We saw them."

"What do you think?"

After hesitating for a moment, Jiang Cheng expressed his opinion, "Something must have happened in this city. It's very dangerous at night, so every household is keeping their doors shut, and those who can have already fled. Even the soldiers responsible for guarding the city don't dare to be on duty at night, but they don't dare to disobey military orders, so they had to make a few scarecrows to deal with the situation."

"Mm," the old man responded. "That's what we think too. And when we first arrived, did you notice that inn, the *Fu An* Inn?"

Jiang Cheng nodded. "We noticed it. That inn is very strange, it's like something is attracting us."

"Did you go to take a look?" The old man pressed.

"No."

A trace of regret flashed in the old man's eyes. It was obvious that the old man and his group had also noticed that there was something strange about the inn, but for their own safety, they didn't go to look. When they met Jiang Cheng's group, the old man naturally thought of this question.

"What are your plans next?"

Yao Shunyu, who had been untied, was also a pragmatic person. He didn't show any dissatisfaction with the old man's group for tying him up, and asked formally.

The old man leaned back against the pile of fodder and let out a long breath. "We'll wait, wait until dawn. If no one comes looking for us, we'll go take a look at that inn. I have a feeling that something will happen there."