Having devoted myself to guiding souls, I was surrounded by them after my death.

"Thump—!!"

An unprecedentedly loud voice rang out, and Su Yining and Luo Xiaoyu both gritted their teeth, covered their heads, and staggered a few steps.

However, Chen Shi stubbornly endured the pressure and tightened the ropes, causing the piano to begin to scorch and billow with black smoke. After a few seconds, it became completely silent.

As soon as the piano stopped playing, the students who had been controlled instantly collapsed to the ground as if their souls had been ripped out.

"Is it all done?"

Chen Shi jumped off the piano, kicked it a few more times, and only retracted the rope after confirming that the piano would not cause any more trouble.

At the same time, Luo Xiaoyu squatted down, poked one of the students' heads with her hand, and then put her finger under the student's nose to check for breathing.

"Um……"

Seeing that the other party had completely given up struggling and was still alive, she twisted her wrist, and the silver chain instantly returned to her palm, turning into a silver spiral the size of her palm.

"call."

Luo Xiaoyu breathed a sigh of relief and fastened the silver chain to her waist.

"Senior, are you alright?" Chen Shi stepped forward.

"I'm fine, but that piano just now seemed to only play one piece."

Su Yining immediately pointed out the suspicious points:

"Even when you suppress it, it still plays the same dance tune, just at a faster tempo."

"You can only play one song?"

Chen Shi noted down the suspicious points in his mind.

"This evil spirit is very strange; it can hide in mirrors and control musical instruments to play music."

There are two attack modes when Ling Cage is not activated?

Is it that tricky?

We must find and eliminate the evil spirit as soon as possible.

and……

He glanced at the time; it was already past ten o'clock.

The "Teacher Hu" mentioned by the students still hasn't shown up.

It's pretty much a done deal; Hu Lizhang is the mastermind behind it all, and most likely a member of the Prosperous Flower Society.

His task now is clear: deal with the evil spirit, find and kill Hu Lizhang, and then find the body fragments to help Su Yining recall the past.

Just as Chen Shi was sorting out his thoughts, Su Yining's crimson eyes suddenly narrowed, and she stared straight ahead.

Following the gaze, one could see that Luo Xiaoyu had somehow already grasped a red-tasseled spear, her youthful face filled with murderous intent.

"Bridge Bean Sacks!"

Chen Shi immediately stepped between the two and explained:

"Um..."

He suddenly realized that he didn't know the girl's name. He wanted to call her "madam" or "miss," but that felt inappropriate. Calling her "child" also felt a bit off.

After thinking for a moment, Chen Shi skipped the formality of addressing him and went straight to the point:

"Wait, she's not a malevolent spirit. You're the ferryman, right? You should be able to tell that she's different from a malevolent spirit, right?"

He reached out and poked Su Yining's waist:

"Have you ever seen any other evil spirit as intelligent and human as her?"

"Hey, why are you making such a fuss about your senior like she's a dog?" Su Yining nudged Chen Shi.

Upon seeing him, Luo Xiaoyu hesitated for a moment, and her murderous aura subsided somewhat.

"Well……"

She gripped the red-tasseled spear tightly, still somewhat hesitant.

Seeing this, Chen Shi quickly thought...

From what we can see, this girl doesn't have any other malicious intent; she just doesn't believe in Su Yining's spirit body.

How can I gain her trust? This girl is very skilled; I might not be able to handle her if I try to fight her head-on.

Suddenly, he remembered what Jiang Liu had said when she handed him the token:

"This is the ferryman's badge. Every ferryman has one. Your current rank will be printed on the badge... It acknowledges and gives you this symbol. It was sent by Song Qingmei."

"If we compare all the ferrymen to a school, this is the ferrymen's school uniform. If you wear the school uniform, the head teacher won't bother you."

Oh, right, that token.

Chen Shi quickly took out the token and showed it to Luo Xiaoyu:

"Look, I'm a ferryman too, you can trust me."

He held the token in his palm, showing the front side.

Luo Xiaoyu was taken aback, her rosy cheeks flushed as she leaned closer and squinted at the token.

A few seconds later, the character "一" appeared on the front of the token—the Ferryman's Token only displays characters when it is held by its original owner.

This is precisely why it becomes an effective symbol of identity.

"Oh!"

Luo Xiaoyu's shoulders trembled, and she let out a gasp. Then she waved her hand, and the red-tasseled spear instantly transformed into a string of red ropes that wrapped around her ankles.

It actually works!

Su Yining breathed a sigh of relief.

She didn't want to tear her school uniform again.

Then, she took out a token, the same style, but with a palm-sized cloth hamster plush toy hanging on it.

The doll looked very old, covered with patches and stitches of varying depths.

Even though it's old, the hamster plush toy is spotless, with fluffy fur and neat stitching.

"Ok?"

Chen Shi stared at the hamster doll, feeling that it looked somewhat familiar.

He vaguely remembered that he had given someone a similar hamster plushie before, but he couldn't remember exactly when it was.

Oh well, it's a common model anyway, nothing unusual.

He turned his attention back to the token, and saw words slowly appearing on the sign...

【two】

A second-level ferryman, this little girl?

"Excuse me, what's your name?" Chen Shi asked.

"Oh……"

Luo Xiaoyu took back her token, timidly took out a handbook, and began to write with a "rustling" sound.

The fierce aura she had just displayed during the battle vanished instantly, replaced by the shyness of a little girl who had gotten separated from her parents.

Then, she flipped through the notebook:

"My name is Luo Xiaoyu."

"My name is Chen Shi, Chen as in old and Shi as in time."

Chen Shi was puzzled—he had clearly heard Luo Xiaoyu speak just now, so why did she need to write on paper?

"That's my senior, Su Yining. You can rest assured, she's not that kind of dangerous spirit."

He was about to introduce Su Yining when he suddenly heard a gasp:

"babble!?"

"what happened?"

"??"

Chen Shi and Luo Xiaoyu turned around like pilots with 100% synchronization in the Pacific Rim, only to see Su Yining's face turn deathly pale:

"Chen Shi... these students, their faces are gone!"

Chapter 63 The Cage in the Mirror

"Your face is gone?"

Chen Shi was startled and started running over at the same time as Luo Xiaoyu.

Upon closer inspection, I realized that the student's facial features had vanished at some point!

"What!?"

Looking around, all the students lay on the ground as if their souls had been ripped out. Their youthful faces had completely disappeared; they had no eyes, no ears, no mouth or nose, and all that remained on their faces was a pale, flat expanse of flesh.

It's like a clay doll that's been smeared on the face, its features completely erased, leaving only an unfinished head.

"How could this be?"

Su Yining's crimson eyes trembled:

"Weren't they fine just a moment ago? How come the situation worsened after the piano was suppressed?"

Beside her, Luo Xiaoyu also looked astonished, but immediately stepped forward, squatted down with her petite body, and reached out to pinch the students' faces, trying to discover something through intuition...

Immediately afterwards, she took out a notebook, scribbled a few lines, and then flipped it over.

Chen Shi and Su Yining simultaneously leaned closer, pressing their heads against the booklet to stare intently at it:

"It's still that same evil spirit from the school."

"I must find the evil spirit and lure it out of the spirit cage to begin the exorcism, otherwise it may have an irreversible impact on these students."

To exorcise a malevolent spirit, one must know how it died in life.

In the absence of sufficient information, to analyze how the evil spirit died, it is necessary to bring out the spirit cage and analyze it.

Immediately afterwards, Luo Xiaoyu's beautiful eyes narrowed, and she frowned slightly as she looked at the token at Chen Shi's waist. Her crescent-shaped eyes showed a hint of reluctance.

She flipped back to the notebook and quickly wrote something down, then handed the paper over, hiding her head behind the notebook to avoid eye contact.

"What did you write this time?"

Chen Shi continued to peer at the characters.

This way of communicating is too troublesome! What's wrong with Luo Xiaoyu? I clearly heard her speak just now, so why do we have to communicate by writing? Is there some unspeakable reason for her?

Forget it, the ferrymen are all strange, each one with their own quirks.

Like the dull Zhang Chengkang, the heavily made-up Song Qingmei, and that arrogant crow...

In comparison, Jiang Liu seems more like a normal person.

He squinted at the handbook, where it read:

"This evil spirit is very powerful and has been entrenched in the school for a long time. It's not easy to deal with."

“You’re a Level 1 Ferryman, this isn’t something you can handle. You’d better leave and leave this to me.”

"Once the Spirit Cage is created, you won't be able to get out."

What do you mean? We were just having such a pleasant collaboration, and now you're saying something hurtful?

He looked up, glancing at Luo Xiaoyu through the handbook. The latter, upon meeting his gaze, immediately closed her eyes and nodded vigorously, letting out a muffled groan.

"Uh-huh!"

Chen Shi smiled knowingly and said:

"Thank you for your concern, but I won't leave."