Chapter 15 The Truth

After a brief moment of terror, Jiang Cheng quickly calmed down. Since entering this building, although he couldn't see, Fatty had never left his side. He had been holding Fatty's arm the entire time. In this situation, Fatty couldn't have been replaced, so the abbot was lying!

This abbot is a ghost! All this talk is just to confuse him and trap him here forever!

Realizing this, Jiang Cheng stopped answering the abbot and pulled Fatty, charging backward. To his surprise, the door was easily knocked open, and they escaped without difficulty.

"Donor, do not let illusions cloud your eyes. Return quickly, and when truth and falsehood meet, you will know that what this monk says is true!"

Ignoring the voice behind him, Jiang Cheng dragged Fatty and ran wildly. Fatty's lips were trembling, and his face was purple with fear. "Ghost! That abbot is a ghost! Didn't you see? It…it was lying on top of us, confirming our location by using your voice, Doctor!"

"What did it look like?" Jiang Cheng still couldn't fully open his eyes; everything in front of him was shrouded in a mist.

"That ghost's face was completely rotten, just like…like that Guan Yu ghost." Fatty recalled as he ran. "Its whole body was tattered. Oh, right, I didn't see it clearly, but it seemed to be wearing a kasaya."

"A kasaya…"

Jiang Cheng was increasingly unable to figure out its origin. The temple before him was still gray and dim, as if covered in a layer of cold light. At a fork in the road, the two slowed their pace.

"Where are we going?" Fatty asked, breathless, unsure if it was from fear or running. His face grew increasingly pale.

Jiang Cheng hesitated for a moment. "We're going back for now."

"We're not looking for Monk Huicong anymore?" Fatty's tone was anxious. "We've already broken ties with those flower monks tonight. If we don't find anything, then all this was for nothing. We won't have such a good opportunity again."

Jiang Cheng frowned slightly, but concealed it in the next second. He casually asked, "That makes sense. So, what do you suggest?"

Fatty blurted out without thinking, "It's been so long; it'll be hard to find Monk Huicong now. We can go back to the vicinity of the Merit Hall first and search around. If we don't find any clues, we can look for those who ran off. They might have some leads."

Upon hearing this, Jiang Cheng's heart sank. He knew Fatty's personality. He wasn't particularly smart, but he was extremely obedient. Especially after experiencing the crisis just now, he would never object to his suggestion to temporarily return, let alone return to such a dangerous place like the Merit Hall.

So…there's something wrong with the Fatty beside him!

Although he didn't know how it was done, there was definitely something wrong with Fatty!

Recalling the last few words the abbot had said, Jiang Cheng forced himself to keep the cold sweat from breaking out on his forehead.

"Who's there?"

Jiang Cheng suddenly looked towards a patch of darkness ahead, a small grove of trees. In the night, the trees were shadowy, as if hiding something.

Fatty shrank his neck in fright. "Who? Doctor, what did you see?"

"It looked like a figure flashed by just now. It looked like Huicong." Jiang Cheng lowered his voice, feigning caution. "I'll go around from the left, you go around from the right, and try to catch him."

"Huicong? No way. He would have run far away by now. Who would hide here and wait for us to find them?" Fatty looked at the grove with some doubt.

"Hiding in plain sight."

After saying this, Jiang Cheng gave Fatty a gentle push, then turned and went around the other side of the wall.

Once he heard Fatty's footsteps gradually fading away, Jiang Cheng immediately changed direction. He walked quietly at first, but after going several dozen meters, he immediately started running. Although he couldn't completely remember the way, he knew the general direction and ran towards the room he was staying in.

A moment later, the thing he feared most still happened.

"Thump."

"Thump." "Thump."

…

A strange, muffled sound came from behind. If Jiang Cheng had to describe it, it was like the sound of a pile of rotten flesh being slapped on the ground.

The footsteps weren't fast, far slower than Jiang Cheng's pace, but the speed was by no means slow, and it was gradually approaching him.

"Doctor, I went to look, but I didn't see Huicong."

"Doctor, why are you running?"

"Don't run, wait for me, wait for me, I'm scared!"

"Hee hee hee…"

"Doctor, don't run, I'm Wang Fugui, don't you recognize me? Hee hee hee…I'm about to catch up with you!"

The last sentence made the hairs on Jiang Cheng's back stand on end. The voice was constantly changing, becoming more and more distorted and shrill, twisting from Fatty's voice to a woman's venomous voice.

Jiang Cheng instinctively felt that he had heard this voice somewhere before, but now he was focused on escaping for his life and didn't have time to think about it.

The voice, coupled with the "thump, thump, thump" footsteps, stuck to him like a maggot on a bone, and the sound was sometimes to the left and sometimes to the right. Jiang Cheng couldn't tell what kind of posture the pursuer was using.

Finally, he saw the courtyard in front of him, where he and Fatty were staying. He rushed into the courtyard door like a madman, and the room in front of him was actually lit.

He had extinguished the candle before leaving.

Even more eerie was that a shadow was projected on the window paper, and the shadow was motionless.

Although he knew that rushing in might not be a good choice, Jiang Cheng had no choice now. The footsteps behind him had reached near the courtyard door.

Jiang Cheng didn't stop and directly slammed the door open. In the next second, the shadow on the window leaped up.

Looking at Fatty, who was terrified in the room, Jiang Cheng rushed in without saying a word, then turned around and closed the wooden door tightly. As if worried it wasn't secure enough, he moved a table to prop it against the door.

After a long while, Fatty, still in shock, came to his senses and stammered, "Are…are you a doctor or a ghost?"

It was no wonder Fatty was confused. Jiang Cheng looked quite miserable at the moment. Because he was running blindly, his body and face were scratched with bloody marks by branches. Most terrifying was his hand. Jiang Cheng's right hand was covered in blood.

"Quiet!"

Jiang Cheng leaned against the door, listening quietly to the sounds outside.

It was very quiet outside. The rapid footsteps had disappeared the moment he closed the door.

Jiang Cheng leaned closer and looked out through the crack in the door. It was gray outside, and everything seemed to be still. He moved his vision inch by inch in the limited view until he stopped at a place, behind a tree in the courtyard.

Jiang Cheng turned around, pointed at the candle to Fatty. In the next second, Fatty understood and tiptoed over to blow out the candle.

When he looked outside again, Jiang Cheng couldn't help but gasp. All he saw was half of a woman's body peeking out from behind the tree. The woman was clinging to the tree, looking at him in a very strange posture.

It was that maidservant…