Chapter 1 – Catching Ghosts In The Middle Of The Night

It was night, and a light wind passed through the dimly light street, blowing the rows of red lanterns hanging on the buildings on both sides of the road. The empty street had closed stalls on both sides of it. Only occasionally are a few stray cats seen coming out to search for food making rustling noises. Only one door remained open, ‘Fu Xi Inn’ was brightly lit, and the lanterns hung high in the inn swayed, an old man with a slightly hunched back facing the open door walked in. He stood at the door, looked briefly at the dark sky, and slowly closed the door.

The old man, surnamed Yan, was the lamp watcher in the inn. After he extinguished all the lights in the inn, he fumbled for a matchbox from his pocket, and skillfully: took out and lit one, the flame trembled slightly, and ignited an oil lamp. Old Yan took the long-handled lamp and walked slowly towards the backyard. In the backyard, there are several rooms specially built for long-term workers. At this time, it was late at night, and the doors of all the rooms were closed, and the sound of snoring could be vaguely heard from an unknown room. Old Yan walked slowly, his footsteps making no sounds. He walked to the door of a room with ease, jumped on his tiptoes, picked up the cover of the night watch light hanging on the door, cut off the wick of one section, covered it again, and then slowly went to the other room. The wind suddenly blew flickering the light on the oil lamp, but calm was soon restored.
Afterward, he picked up the long-handled lamp, “Wang Wang! Wang Wang Wang!” A few barks suddenly sounded, Old Yan felt a little suspicious and covered the lampshade in his hand.
There is a kennel next to the horse stable in the backyard of the inn, an old dog lived in it, because of his old age
in the daytime, he just lies in his kennel and ignores people’s attention, let alone bark?
Old Yan squinted, he looked at the place where the dog was staying, a little nervous, his old hunched back curved even more. His hand holding the lamp handle tightened The wind on autumn nights is always cold and a little wet. The old man shivered and felt a little scared inexplicably. “Forget it, it’s okay to be a little ignorant.” Old Yan shrunk and returned to his room.
Under the dim light of the moonlight, a black cloud-like mist on the ground was twisting constantly the wind whirling and rustling around it. In one of the rooms of the inn, a teenager suddenly opened his eyes and quickly got up and got out of bed to check for the abnormality. The dog kept barking, it sounds loud enough to annoy people but everyone else was sound asleep, not at all affected by the dog’s barking, the boy raised his hand and lit a talisman paper, and the red flame leaped into the air illuminating the way ahead. As he got closer, the dog’s barking got clearer when suddenly another footstep came.
” who’s there” suddenly there was a yell, the teenager came to a screeching halt, leaned over, and hid behind the pile of firewood. He saw a man with a lamp walking gradually towards the kennel. At this time, the barking of the dog also stopped. It was so quiet that the man looked around and noticed something on the ground. The man curiously bent slightly and moved the lamp towards the black object to see it. The light hit the dog’s eyes, and immediately a pair of blue eyes stared at him darkly. The man was scared, After taking several steps back, the lamp fell to the ground and the light went out instantly.
The dark mist suddenly pounced on the man. Before he could scream, he fell face forward and fainted. The boy rushed forward. He had no time to carefully check the man’s condition, so he lit a talisman and threw it at him, A small cloud of black mist squeezed out from the man’s head and quickly ran away. “Don’t run!”The young man also chased after it and then disappeared in the moonlight.
The night the forest is dark and foggy, and the black mist used it as an opportunity to conceal himself, but from time to time he would come out and taunt the boy. “If you can’t catch up with me, then you can’t catch up with me…” He sneered. The black fog is arrogant, From time to time, it’ll stop to wait for the teenager, and mockingly ridicule him.
” Damn it ” The young man was annoyed, and after chanting a few spells, he threw it towards the black mist. But he was surprised to see the talisman’s golden light gradually turned into a solid black mist, which still jumped up and down, dodged those ten-day runes, and then gave a gloomy and smug laugh.
“Pay attention to your back before laughing again”. The boy quickly cast spells. The rune made a loop, and while the black fog was not paying attention, it quickly stuck to it. “Ah-” the golden light grew brighter and brighter
The black mist was burning painfully, and the screams became smaller and smaller until the light disappeared.
The young man gasped for breath, angry, “It can be considered solved.”And then he started to look around. Only now did he realize that the black mist was luring him away. He was taken to a strange place, with dense high forests on both sides. The young man thought about it a lot and decided to go back according to the route he came. But when he walked around for a while, he realized
he was back to where he started. “No way, I can’t believe I got lost”
The teenager pinched the ghost-seeking talisman, tossed it and it wandered around in the air for a while and then turned into ashes. He became pissed, and the result
, of course, is that there is a ghost blocking the way.

The boy scratched his head and shouted “Since this is the case, then I am not in hurry to leave.
Now, let’s play with you first.” The young man began to wander around in this maze made by ghosts, and from time to time he would light a fire on talisman and throw them on the ground. If a Dao Xing < a low-level Taoist brat is unlucky and encounters this fire talisman, it will be too much for them to bear, and they'll run away, for fear of burning themselves.
The boy went around in circles he finally couldn't bear "I told you not to go too far, Are you trying to make fun of me?"
"….."
There was no response.
Only yin and threatening wind in the air.

"Okay, you forced me." The young man bit his finger, put the blood on the fire talisman, lit and threw it forward. The fire talisman seemed to have encountered something combustible, rapidly expanding. Seeing the fire getting bigger and bigger, the ghost didn't react at all. "Aren't you afraid ?" The young man was shocked and tried to guess what the other party was up to.
What the hell is that?
"You didn't burn me, then why should I be afraid?" Suddenly a gentle female voice sounded.

The young man fixed his eyes and looked toward the sound. A bridge appeared, a red-clothed woman was sitting on the edge, her fair calf swaying, a charming smile on her face and a big dog lay beside her. " That poor dumb ghost, he couldn't even cry out before it was gone"
The woman's face is enchantingly beautiful, smooth, and clear like mutton jade. The young man watched the fire gradually extinguish, and for a while, he didn't know what to say. it seemed like the woman in front of him isn't human at all.
"What are you"? the teenager asked.