I, the screenwriter, have experienced a resurgence of inspiration.

……

Honestly, that hand is very beautiful.

The fingers are slender with distinct knuckles, and the nails are trimmed to a sharp point.

But Chen Xi recognized that hand.

That hand had poked her face in Aunt Fang's tailor shop.

Chen Shulan.

She appeared out of nowhere, standing right behind Chen Xi.

That face, always covered by a white sheet, peered over Chen Xi's shoulder and cupped the skeletal chin with its hand:

"finally found you."

"Click-clack-click-clack..."

The white bone mandible trembled with a crackling sound, as if trying to bite off Chen Shulan's fingers, but Chen Shulan remained unmoved.

"A man-eating, soul-devouring evil spirit that gathers hundreds of ghosts to burn paper money, attempting to open a passage to the mortal world, shall be beheaded according to the 'Fengdu Law'."

For a moment, Chen Shulan's eyes were blank, but she clearly read the words aloud before her mind cleared again:

"You bastard, you committed crimes in life and were buried on a rooftop, and you still can't behave yourself in death. The underworld officials are here to take you away."

The sound of bones breaking was as crisp as someone snapping a tree branch.

Chen Shulan removed the skull from the skeleton.

"Rip—"

Everyone heard a loud tearing sound, like a tree being uprooted.

Chen Shulan held the corpse in her hand, and the skeletal humanoid figure rapidly shrank.

As it shrank to the last size, the skeleton turned into a cloud of grayish-white smoke.

Chen Shulan took out a celadon bottle from somewhere, uncorked it, and inhaled the smoke.

There was not even a struggle.

They played so effortlessly that it made you wonder if they were even playing the same instance.

"Click".

The cork clicked shut with a crisp sound.

The next second, all the ghosts on the rooftop collapsed at the same time, like a pile of paper figures with their skeletons removed.

Countless ghosts turned to ashes from head to toe.

The grayish-white powder was swept up by the night wind and filled the sky.

Chen Xi closed her eyes, lying half-reclined on the ground, panting heavily. She could feel the dust settling on her hair, shoulders, and arms.

She thought she should know what it was.

Ashes.

Ghosts are remnants of humanity.

When paper is burned, it turns into ashes.

When a person is cremated, their ashes are left behind.

There is no difference between paper ash and cremated remains.

The rooftop fell silent.

Everyone wore expressions of relief, breathing heavily.

……

Kang Xiaojia collapsed to the ground, like a dehydrated fish.

Jiang Chen sat on the ground, leaning against the edge of the rooftop, repeatedly looking at his left hand, which was now just a skeleton.

Wang Lei's paper body was torn to shreds, revealing the bamboo frame and broken bamboo strips.

The mixed-race child, the priest, and Ashan are all alive.

The mixed-race child lay on the ground to calm himself down, the priest leaned against a stone pillar to pray, and Asan picked up an axe to dig up the empty space where Amin's body had disappeared.

But she was destined to gain nothing.

……

……

……

Chen Xi's right arm was still bleeding.

The skin around the wound was black, and blood was seeping out drop by drop from the burned blood vessels, like a chilling thin thread.

She looked down and saw that from her wrist to her elbow, all the flesh was gone, leaving only two white bones.

But strangely, her fingers could still move.

The five fingers of my right hand felt very cold, with a numb, throbbing pain, due to the traction of the exposed tendons.

"Captain, what should we do? I... I can't heal him, waaaaah..."

Kang Xiaojia crawled to Chen Xi's side, took out healing ointment and bandages from her backpack, and began treating herself while crying:

"I upgraded, but it still doesn't save it... What should I do?"

As she trembled, she removed the gauze and applied the ointment to the piece of bone. Chen Xi groaned and gritted her teeth.

"Captain Chen... Captain Chen, you'll be alright..."

Kang Xiaojia's voice trembled violently.

Chen Shulan glanced at it and tilted her head.

Then she disappeared, vanishing into thin air like a wisp of smoke.

But two or three seconds later, she reappeared, holding a large clump of dark grass in her hand.

Use this.

She raised her chin, revealing a troubled expression, but tossed the grass to Kang Xiaojia:

"Nonsense! The evil aura spewed out by the demon can't be healed with ordinary medicine!"

Kang Xiaojia quickly took the dark, lumpy "grass," and a system notification immediately popped up:

[Leafless Black Needle Grass: An herb that grows only at the boundary between Yin and Yang, where extreme Yin and extreme Yang meet. Its sap can regenerate flesh and bone. (It can be used to refine White Bone Elixir, Hair Growth Pill, and Great Blood Tonifying Pill.)]

Kang Xiaojia froze for a second, then went crazy, chewing the herbs with her mouth and carefully applying the black juice little by little to Chen Xi's exposed wound.

—The juice seeped into the bone as soon as it touched it.

The black liquid slowly seeped into the bone, and Chen Xi immediately felt a chill spreading from the wound.

A few seconds later, the icy feeling turned into a tingling sensation.

A thin, transparent membrane begins to appear on the bone, like newly formed fascia.

Wang Lei's eyes remained fixed on the clump of grass.

Half of his paper-thin face was gone; the remaining half was twisted, and in his single eye, a light of almost insane longing flickered.

His body was torn apart, and half of his body was made of paper.

If the leafless black-haired needle can regenerate flesh and blood, could it also grow back into a human body?

His lips moved, but no sound came out.

He wanted to ask Chen Shulan to leave him some, but he didn't dare offend this female ghost who looked very intimidating.

—The other side almost wiped out the entire Lu family, an annihilation!

……

……

Chen Xi took a few deep breaths to suppress the pain, then looked up at Chen Shulan:

"Cooperation...we did it, and we found the last evil spirit. Now it's your turn...give us the information of the building's residents."

Chen Xi's voice was hoarse, but every word was clear.

Chen Shulan looked at her and suddenly smiled, but there was no warmth in her smile.

She tilted her head slightly, as if examining a ridiculous toy:

"You little cop, you're really something. You know perfectly well that I'm Chen Shulan, the one who killed the Lu family, yet you still trust me so much. It makes me feel a little guilty."

Chen Shulan spoke slowly, her voice drawn out in the wind on the rooftop, like a thin thread that made everyone's hearts clench:

"I'm a ghost."

Chen Xi looked at her.

"You are human beings."

Chen Shulan took another step closer and squatted down in front of Chen Xi. A strand of long hair slipped down from behind her ear and hung down beside her face like a black curtain.

Chen Xi finally saw her face clearly, which was covered by a white cloth.

Half a hideous ghost face, half a beautiful human face.

It appears both extremely beautiful and extremely terrifying.

"Didn't you even ask what my main quest and side quests are?"

Chen Xi's pupils contracted to their maximum size in that instant.

The hair on the back of her neck stood on end, and a chill that seemed to seep from her very bones coursed through her body like an electric current.

When exactly?

At the tailor shop?

Was it during our first meeting?

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

Why would she unconditionally believe in a ghost?

She should have asked long ago; she had always known—Chen Shulan was a ghost.

Ghosts and living people are natural enemies.

Chen Shulan straightened up, a smug smile on her face, as if she had just finished a brilliant game of chess, and Chen Xi was the piece she was most satisfied with.

"Nonsense."

Chen Shulan said.

The next second, the sky above their heads darkened.

It was a darkness deeper than night, like a giant curtain hanging down from the sky, obscuring the entire expanse.

Chen Xi stiffly raised his head and saw two huge shadows floating above the rooftop, parallel to the entire building, like two slowly moving mountains.

Black Impermanence and White Impermanence.

Chen Shulan chuckled softly:

"My profession is 'impermanence,' and I am impermanence myself, girl."