Survival in an apartment, starting with a stroke of luck on a plane

However, Lin Yu didn't think too much about it. He quickly turned around and followed the trajectory of another soul-guiding smoke back into the fortress. The most important thing at the moment was to find Liu Yue'er's soul.

This time, the fog led him to a dimly lit corner of the stairwell on the ground floor of an old building deep within the walled city.

There are piles of discarded junk here, and the light is almost completely blocked.

Under the faint gray-white light condensed by the mist, Lin Yu could barely make out a blurry, semi-transparent little outline, huddled in the shadow of the stairwell corner, motionless, like an abandoned rag doll.

It was Liu Yue'er's remnant soul.

Lin Yu took a few steps closer and tried calling softly, "Liu Yue'er?"

The outline remained completely unresponsive, not even a ripple appeared.

"Liu Xiangxiang?" Lin Yu changed the name.

Still, deathly silent.

That tiny figure seemed to blend into the darkness, isolating itself from everything outside.

"He really is unconscious..." Lin Yu muttered to himself, confirming that what Boss Wang said was true.

But just as he was feeling overwhelmed, a thought flashed through his mind like lightning—an instinctive reaction.

"Yes, instinct. Maybe we can give it a try."

Lin Yu's eyes sharpened instantly. He glanced at Liu Yue'er with a complicated expression, silently apologizing. Then, with a thought, he equipped the [Fierce and Evil] skill card.

An invisible, chilling aura of malevolence instantly emanated from him, causing the temperature in this dark corner to drop several degrees.

He deliberately lowered his voice, mimicking the landlord's nauseating tone described in the diary, and roared viciously at the blurry silhouette:

"Liu Yue'er! So you were hiding here! I've been looking for you for so long! Don't you recognize me? I'm Han Bo!"

The two characters "Han Bo" were like a red-hot branding iron, fiercely searing the blurry soul image.

The huddled figure trembled violently, like a startled rabbit, and its blurry outline became clear for a moment, revealing the silhouette of a little girl in a tattered dress with a terrified expression.

Before she could even see who was in front of her, she screamed (though no sound came out) and turned to flee for her life into the deeper, darker corner below the stairs.

"It works!" Lin Yu immediately took off to catch up.

Han Bo is the name of that scoundrel landlord.

He dared not pursue too closely, lest he disturb the fragile remnant soul again, and could only keep his distance, chasing the fleeting gray-white trail in the maze-like corridors and narrow alleys.

Like a frightened little beast, Liu Yue'er's remnant soul, relying on some kind of instinctive path memory, wandered around and finally plunged into a cramped corner on the very edge of the fortress, near the back wall, half-hidden by various debris and broken wooden planks.

Lin Yu pushed aside the rotten wood and broken baskets blocking his way, and the scene before him made him pause.

A small, slightly raised mound of earth stood alone at the base of the wall.

In front of the mound, a rough stone slab is stuck crookedly, on which six characters are crookedly carved with sharp stones or something else—"Tomb of Liu Yue'er, a woman."

The handwriting was childish, carrying a sense of despair.

Lin Yu stared silently at the simple, heartbreaking tombstone, his heart filled with mixed emotions.

He sighed silently, took out a few pieces of milk candy and biscuits from his backpack, and gently placed them in front of the tombstone.

Then, he took out a black iron incense stick, lit it, and stuck it into the soft soil in front of the tombstone.

Wisps of smoke rose into the air.

"Little sister Liu Yue'er," Lin Yu's voice was deep and clear, tinged with apology, "I'm really sorry. I have no choice right now. In order to find the truth, I've offended you."

The scent of incense seems to have a natural attraction for lingering souls.

A faint, almost imperceptible grayish-white aura quietly wafted from the mound of earth, coalescing beside the tombstone into the small, translucent figure of a little girl.

Her eyes remained vacant, but she seemed drawn to the scent of incense, staring blankly at the rising wisps of smoke, showing no signs of aggression or fear towards Lin Yu.

Lin Yu waited patiently.

Until the incense stick burned completely out and the last wisp of smoke dissipated into the air.

Without further hesitation, he pulled a shovel from the side pocket of his backpack, aimed it at the small mound of earth, and began to dig.

The soil was dug away shovel by shovel. Liu Yue'er's remnant soul simply "watched" quietly, as if observing something completely unrelated to herself.

The excavation was not deep.

Soon, the shovel tip touched a hard object.

Lin Yu carefully brushed away the soil, revealing a small black box, about a foot square, made of a peculiar material that was neither wood nor iron.

The surface of the box has no decorations, only mottled marks left by the years, yet it has miraculously not rotted.

Lin Yu didn't dwell on what material the box was made of, and simply opened the lid.

Inside the box lay the small, completely skeletal remains of a child.

Its slender frame, curled up in a silent gesture, speaks volumes about the fragility and impending end of life.

Next to the skeleton's small arm, close to it, was something—a tiger doll made of various scraps of cloth, missing half an ear and faded in color.

The dolls are crudely made, with crooked stitches, yet they exude a clumsy warmth.

The moment Lin Yu's gaze fell upon the tattered doll, he was somewhat surprised; it was actually an equipment recognized by the system.

[Rag Tiger Doll]

Category: Special Items

Level: None

Effect: Awakens a mother's love for her daughter.

Description: A tiger doll made from scraps of cloth.

(Note: This item cannot be taken out of the game world.)

A very special prop.

It cannot be taken out of this world; it seems to be a quest item similar to those in a game.

Lin Yu understood and reached out to pick up the doll.

However, just as his fingertips were about to touch the doll, something unexpected happened.

The remnant soul of Liu Yue'er, which had been quietly floating beside her, seemed to be summoned by some irresistible force. It transformed into a faint stream of light and "whoosh" disappeared directly into the tattered cloth tiger doll.

The doll's eyes, made of black buttons, seemed to flash with an almost imperceptible glimmer for a very brief moment before returning to the dull appearance of a tattered doll.

Lin Yu paused slightly, then picked up the doll.

It feels like coarse cloth to the touch, light and airy, with no unusual energy fluctuations.

He tried calling out to Liu Yue'er, but the doll didn't respond. Having failed to find a solution, Lin Yu carefully placed it in a compartment of his backpack, quickly closed the small box, refilled the mound with soil, restored it to its original state, bowed slightly to the small tombstone, and turned to leave.

The trail seems to have gone cold again.

This journey, aside from yielding a quest item and a bewildered remnant soul residing within it, seems to have made no substantial progress.

Lin Yu returned to his rented apartment with a sense of exhaustion and helplessness.

Pushing open the creaking old wooden door, Lin Yu stepped into his cramped apartment, not even having time to turn on the lights—

Another mutation occurred.

The tattered tiger doll inside the backpack suddenly began to vibrate violently without warning, and then a very faint white light shot out from the gap in the backpack.

The white light landed and instantly transformed into Liu Yue'er's small, semi-transparent phantom soul. Her eyes remained empty as she floated aimlessly in the center of the apartment.

However, at the very moment she appeared.

Om-!

A deep and majestic hum suddenly rang out! The source of the sound was none other than the statue of the True Lord enshrined on the old wooden table in the corner.

The vertical line on the forehead of the deity statue—the third eye—suddenly lit up.

A pure, condensed, and radiant beam of bright white light, imbued with righteous energy, shone down with the precision of a searchlight, instantly enveloping Liu Yue'er's tiny, remnant soul phantom.

"Damn it!" Alarm bells rang in Lin Yu's mind. He cursed himself for being careless. He had forgotten that the statue had a natural restraint on ghosts and instinctively wanted to rush over to stop it.

But what happened next completely froze Lin Yu's movements, leaving only extreme astonishment and disbelief on his face.

The blazing white divine light, imbued with purifying power, did not instantly evaporate Liu Yue'er's weakened remnant soul as it had when eliminating other ghosts.

The white light, like a gentle, warm current, enveloped her, bringing not destruction, but rather... comforting? nourishing?

Even more strangely, Liu Yue'er's originally blurry and seemingly disintegrating soul became solid and clear at a visible speed under the illumination of the white light.

Although still transparent, her outline was distinct, and even the wrinkles of her tattered little dress were faintly visible. In her empty eyes, a faint, bewildered light seemed to slowly gather.

The third eye on the statue's forehead remained lit, its white light steady and gentle. Lin Yu held his breath, not daring to move, completely unable to comprehend this illogical scene before him.

Just then—

call out!call out!call out!

Outside the tightly closed apartment window, several equally pure white streaks of light, like meteors drawn by a spell, suddenly appeared from different directions in the walled city—some from the dark alleyways, others from abandoned rooftops.

There was even a sound that seemed to come from the crack in the door on the fifth floor that was sealed by a talisman—it silently pierced through the wall and flew rapidly into the apartment.

These few thin white lights, carrying a shared aura, unhesitatingly, like weary birds returning to their nests, poured into Liu Yue'er's soul body, which was shrouded in the white light of the divine statue.

With each ray of white light that entered, Liu Yue'er's tiny soul trembled slightly, becoming more solid, and the faint light in her eyes seemed to brighten a little.

As the last ray of white light merged in, the light from the third eye on the statue's forehead began to slowly recede and weaken.

At this moment, Liu Yue'er's soul had become quite clear and stable.

She floated in the white light, and her small body no longer seemed so ethereal.

She blinked blankly, and for the first time, her empty eyes showed signs of focusing.

Her gaze, slowly, with a kind of bewilderment from the depths of her soul, fell on the statue of the True Lord on the altar, which exuded a faint majesty.

A few seconds of silent staring.

Then, the instant the white light from the divine statue's third eye completely faded, Liu Yue'er's soul transformed once again into a soft white light.

This time, she didn't fly anywhere. Instead, like a fledgling returning to its nest, she lightly and proactively flew back into the backpack Lin Yu had placed on the table and disappeared into the tattered tiger doll.

Inside the apartment, the intense white light completely disappeared, leaving only a faint glimmer of light coming in from outside the window.

The statue of the True Lord on the altar returned to its former silence as a clay and wood sculpture, its third eye on its forehead tightly closed, showing no signs of abnormality.

silence.

A deathly silence.

Lin Yu stood there, still in the same position he had been trying to rush over, his mind completely blank.

He looked at the now-calm statue, then at his backpack containing the tattered doll, and looked somewhat bewildered.

The True Lord... helped Liu Yue'er remnant soul to coalesce?

Lin Yu stared at the backpack for a long time before carefully taking out the tattered tiger doll.

The doll felt light and flimsy when I picked it up; it still looked worn and tattered, with dull, lifeless eyes made of black buttons.

He tried calling out softly, "Liu Yue'er? Little sister?" The doll didn't respond at all, and even the faint fluctuations of soul power it had shown earlier subsided, as if the remnant soul inside had fallen into a deep sleep.

"It seems it just came together, so it needs time to recover?" Lin Yu guessed, carefully putting the doll back into the backpack compartment.

His gaze then shifted to the statue of Zhenjun on the altar in the corner, his brow furrowed.

Something's not right, something's really not right.

According to the description of the statue of Qingyuan Daomiao Zhenjun, shouldn't it be able to exterminate ghosts?

But instead of killing Liu Yue'er's remnant soul, Zhenjun took the initiative to help her and restore her soul.

This seems to contradict the power of the idol and its description.

"Could it be that the True Lord can also distinguish between good and evil, and sees that Liu Yue'er is an innocent and pitiful wandering soul who died unjustly, so he makes an exception for her and even helps her?" Lin Yu rubbed his chin.

This is not impossible, after all, Zhenjun is someone he obtained through talent draw, and his level is also displayed as Black#, so it certainly cannot be judged by the level in the game.

However, Lin Yu soon stopped thinking about these things.

Regardless of the motives, the outcome is favorable to Lin Yu.

A Liu Yue'er who has regained her consciousness and whose soul has been restored is undoubtedly the key to unlocking the "truth about the building".

With that thought in mind, he stopped worrying, took out a black iron-grade incense stick from his backpack, lit it respectfully, and placed it in the incense burner in front of the statue.

"Thank you for your help, True Lord." Lin Yu sincerely clasped his hands together and whispered.

Then he shook his head and didn't pursue the matter any further.

He took out the gray orb of light he had obtained after killing the charred corpse and opened it with a thought.

[Obtained: Soul Essence (No Level) x1]

A soul essence without a level has no special effects and cannot enhance spirit; it can only be absorbed by other ghosts.

It's better than nothing, I suppose.

Lin Yu put it away.

The night outside the window was deep, and the walled city returned to its deathly silence.

After a long day of tension, my nerves finally relaxed a little, and a wave of exhaustion washed over me.

He stopped thinking about it, lay down fully clothed on the hard bed, and fell into a deep sleep amidst the lingering smell of paper ash.

In the early morning, sunlight struggled to filter through the dense buildings of the walled city, sparingly casting a few rays of light.

Lin Yu arrived at the agreed meeting point on the first floor of the walled city on time.

Wang Junyue, Liu Dashan, Zhang Jun, and Liu Yueyue were already waiting there.