Yin Shou Shu

Chapter 176 Dark under the lamp

At the edge of the candlelight of the bronze eternal lamp, a woman standing in the shadows, wearing a dirty batik skirt, stared at Ran Qing and the others with a sinister look.

It seemed to be laughing and crying in the darkness.

That weird and eerie look made Ran Qing's hair stand on end.

Aunt Six appeared?
Or is it an illusion?

Ran Qing widened his eyes in shock.

At this moment, Long Zongshu beside him exclaimed in surprise: "Dad..."

In the dim candlelight, the tall and thin Long Zongshu stared blankly at the edge of the candlelight. In the shadow of the edge of the candlelight, there stood a tall and strange man.

This man's facial features are somewhat similar to Long Zongshu's.

But it stood in the darkness, emitting a creepy coldness and chill, as terrifying as a ghost.

At Ran Qing's feet, there was also a cry of surprise from Little Mianhua.

"Auntie!"

Little Cotton looked in another direction, surprised and happy.

In the darkness, another Aunt Six appeared.

It didn't wear a dirty batik skirt, but a black robe and black pants, and its face had fewer wrinkles. But what remained unchanged was its eerie smile in the dark, which was equally creepy.

Mo Li stared blankly in the other direction. At the edge of the candlelight in her field of vision, there was also Aunt Six standing there.

Four figures surrounded them from four directions.

"...It's fake!" Mo Li murmured in a low voice.

Ran Qing also realized this. If three Sixth Aunts appeared at the same time, it would be weird if this really happened.

But Long Zongshu just stared at his father's figure, standing there stiffly and blankly, without any reaction to the movements outside.

Ran Qing hurried forward and shook him twice, but failed to wake Long Zongshu up.

Long Zongshu's cousin huddled beside the coffin in fear, holding his head and trembling with fear.

He did not attract this strange ghost.

Ran Qing suddenly realized something and quickly pulled the dazed Long Zongshu to sit down. At the same time, he said to Mo Li and Xiaomianhua, "Hurry up and squat! Don't let the light shine on you!"

He dragged the stiff Long Zongshu down by force and huddled in the shadow of the edge of the coffin like Long Zongshu's crazy cousin.

The bronze oil lamp standing above the coffin emitted a dim light that illuminated the surroundings, but there was a dark area around the edge of the coffin that could not be illuminated.

As Ran Qing dragged Long Zongshu to squat and curl up in the shadows, two ghostly shadows suddenly disappeared from the edge of the candlelight.

Mo Li quickly squatted down as well.

Little Mianhua was even simpler. She was on all fours and short, so she just slid forward to the dark area under the light at the edge of the coffin, where the overhead light wouldn't reach her.

After everyone shrank into the shadows, the four strange figures at the edge of the candlelight suddenly disappeared.

As if it never existed from the beginning.

This scene confirmed Ran Qing's guess.

“…This thing was made by the Soul Guiding Lamp!”

According to the book "Witchcraft, Ghosts and Magic", the soul-guiding lamp is a bronze artifact made by the evil ghosts of the ancient Luo Kingdom. It can connect to the underworld and reach the ghost world of Wujiang.

The predecessors of ghost-walking people speculated that the evil ghosts of the ancient Luo Kingdom originally came from the ghost world of Wujiang, fled to the human world and enslaved the natives of Zangke.

Later, the ancient Luo Kingdom fell and disappeared, and the soul-guiding lamp fell into the hands of a ghost.

According to the records in "Witchcraft, Ghosts, and Magic", the original soul-guiding lamp was extremely evil and terrifying. It took generations of ghost walkers to suppress its evil nature and transform it into a magical instrument that can help ghost walkers exorcise ghosts. Ran Qing murmured, "Sixth Aunt may have seen the soul-guiding lamp when she first came here, but this soul-guiding lamp has been lost for hundreds of years and is no longer the magical instrument in "Witchcraft, Ghosts, and Magic."

It lost the suppression of the ghost walker and regained its former evil and weird nature.

In addition, Aunt Liu was already a ghost at that time, so it did not take away the soul-guiding lamp.

And now, Ran Qing is very envious of his master's legendary inherited treasure.

But he had calmed down and was no longer surprised. Instead, he was secretly groaning.

"If the soul-guiding lamp returns to its previous evil state, it will be troublesome," Ran Qing looked at the others around him.

Mo Li hugged Xiao Mianhua and curled up at the head of the coffin, where it was closer to the bronze lamp and there was less darkness under the lamp.

Fortunately, Mo Li had a slim figure, and he could curl up with Little Cotton in his arms and barely hide in the shadows.

He, Long Zongshu, and his cousin huddled at the end of the coffin, where the dark area under the light was larger.

After seeing the strange figure hiding in the shadows and out of sight at the edge of the candlelight, Long Zongshu regained consciousness.

He looked at Ran Qing with sweat on his forehead and said, "Ran Qing, I just lost my mind!"

"I can see my dad, and I know that thing isn't my dad, but I can't control my body!"

"Just now, it felt like there was an extra voice inside my body. It was controlling me!"

Long Zongshu's face turned pale.

The situation he described was indeed terrible.

It wasn't that I was deceived by an illusion, but that my body had been taken over by some evil spirit. Although I was conscious, I could do nothing and could only watch helplessly as the extra consciousness in my body controlled my body...

Ran Qing sighed, patted his shoulder and said nothing.

He could understand this feeling of helplessness and horror.

Mo Li, who was curled up at the head of the coffin, said, "If we can't let the soul-guiding lamp shine, can we extinguish it?"

"If you could turn off the lights, you wouldn't be afraid, right?"

Mo Li curled up on the edge of the coffin, the bronze soul-guiding lamp standing just a few centimeters above her head.

She pointed her finger above her head and looked at Ran Qing, asking for his opinion.

Ran Qing shook his head: "No..."

"Once the soul-guiding lamp is lit, it cannot be extinguished."

"According to the book 'Witchcraft and Demonology', there might be a demon inside this bronze lamp."

"Once the soul lamp goes out, the demon inside will become angry and kill the nearest living person."

"If there's no one alive near the soul lamp, it will kill the last person who appears near the lamp..."

Ran Qing's words surprised Mo Li and Xiaomianhua.

Long Zongshu was even more shocked when he heard it: "This thing is so weird, and you dare to use it when you are from the Yinren lineage... It's really amazing."

Ran Qing laughed dryly and said, "But the Soul Guiding Lamp, after being suppressed by the Yin-walking Man, is indeed very suitable for the inheritance of the Yin-walking Man lineage."

Now, when Ran Qing goes in and out of the underworld, he needs to open the underworld altar in advance, set up soul flags in the world of the living, and prepare a lot of guiding incense. Only through a series of troublesome preparations can he avoid getting lost in the underworld.

But hundreds of years ago, ghost walkers only needed to hold the soul-guiding lamp to move freely in and out of the ghost world of Wujiang without worrying about getting lost.

This bronze ghost weapon is indeed the most suitable treasure for people of the Yin lineage.

Although there are many taboos and dangers in its use, compared with its convenience, those taboos and dangers are nothing.

(End of this chapter)