Ghost Village

Jin Shu reached the opposite side of the village from where they entered. There was no gate as he had hoped for; instead, it was another wall of fog.

He threw a phoenix claw at it, hoping to disperse it... nothing happened.

"Daddy, Yin'er's scared," Yin'er said, shivering from within the collar of his robes.

"Don't worry, Yin'er, daddy will protect you." Jin Shu was so flustered trying to escape this ghost village that he didn't realize he had called himself Yin'er's dad, even though he constantly tried to teach Yin'er to call him something other than her dad. It seems subconsciously he sees himself as her father.

'How am I going to escape!?' he thought to himself frantically.

"Jejeje!" The ghosts' mocking laughter came from behind him. Jin Shu kept running around the perimeter of the village, looking for a way out. Unfortunately, the wall of fog covered the whole village. 'It must have something to do with the well in the center of the village. That was where these ghosts came from; maybe if I destroy it, I can get rid of all the ghosts.'

Jin Shu turned around and headed back towards the village center. He had to incinerate a few dozen ghosts along the way. His Qi was starting to diminish at an alarming rate. "Damn it! I should have inscribed a Qi Storage Rune on my gun!"

---

He made it back to the village center and could see the dry well sitting in the same place, still spewing out ghosts. He hurriedly formed a phoenix claw with his right hand and threw it at the well.

Bang! The well collapsed into a pile of stone and wood rubble. "That should at least stop them from spawning, right?"

Wooo! Aaah!

Ghostly figures phased through the rubble. "Shit!"

"Jejeje!" came their mocking, creepy laughter.

"Damn it! Now what do I do!?" Jin Shu yelled.

Yin'er poked her head out of his robes. "Daddy, Yin'er smells something yucky that way." She pointed back towards where they initially entered the village.

"Okay, let's see what's there. Maybe it's a way out, or at least something to get rid of these ghosts. You point the way, okay?"

Yin'er nodded silently and continued sniffing the air.

---

They made it back to where they entered the village; however, Jin Shu was almost out of Qi. He could maybe throw two or three more claws, and it didn't help that Su Bing was still passed out.

Yin'er sniffed the air and pointed towards the fog. "Daddy, the yucky smell is in there."

"I was hoping you weren't going to say that," he said in defeat.

Yin'er drooped her head and apologized. "Sorry..."

He petted her head and consoled her. "It's okay, that's not your fault. Let's get out of here."

Jin Shu stepped into the fog while following Yin'er's directions.

---

After walking through the fog for about fifteen minutes, he found an empty spot where there was no fog. Sitting in the middle of the empty space was a creepy hooded figure.

"Jejeje! Well, well, well. Look what we have here, three tasty little treats have found their way to me. Jejeje!" The creepy robed figure laughed; his voice was the same as the ghost that had been chasing them.

"You must be the one who has been controlling those ghosts," Jin Shu stated.

"Jejejeje! Looks like one of the tasty treats is a little smarty. Jeeje!" The robed figure laughed mockingly.

"Are you human or ghost?" Jin Shu asked.

"Jeje! What does it matter whether I'm human or ghost?" the robed figure asked back.

Jin Shu carefully placed Su Bing down, pulled his pistol out, and raised his red glowing left hand. "Well, if you are a ghost, I'll burn you to death, and if you are human, I'll shoot you to death."

The hooded figure stood up and threw their hood back. "Jejeje! Does this answer your question?"

What was revealed from underneath the hood was a white skeletal skull.

"Uh? Honestly, no, but it doesn't really matter. I'll just shoot you and burn you." Jin Shu wasn't sure what a skeleton classified as, so he decided just to use both methods at his disposal.

"Jejeje! I'll admit your phoenix claws are a little unique. However, I doubt you have much Qi left, and you'll have to make it through my ghosts if you want to get to me. Ah, one more thing, how are you going to shoot me without a bow? Jejejejeje!" The skeleton began to laugh hysterically, as hundreds of ghosts appeared from the fog surrounding Jin Shu.

Jin Shu ignored the ghosts for now and threw a phoenix claw with his left hand at the skeleton. Then he fired his M1911 in his right hand.

BANG!

The skeleton had just started to take a step to its left to avoid the phoenix claw flying at it from its right side when a loud bang resounded, echoing in the empty fog. A hole suddenly appeared in its forehead, and the back of its skull exploded into shards, opening a large hole. Its skull burst into flames on account of the Flame Rune inscribed onto the bullet, and the skeleton froze and screamed in agony as its skull burned.

This all happened in a fraction of a second, before the phoenix claw had even made it halfway to the skeleton.

The skeleton reached towards its skull to try and put out the fire burning it. In the next second, the phoenix claw reached it and engulfed its entire body in flames.

"Aaaaah!" The skeleton screamed in agony.

The loud gunshot and the skeleton's screaming caused Su Bing to wake up. She slowly looked around groggily. When she saw the hundreds of ghosts surrounding them and the burning, screaming skeleton, she passed right back out.

"What...? Oh..."

Thud!

Although the skeleton appeared to be in excruciating pain, it also didn't appear to be dying. So, using the last of his Qi, Jin Shu threw another phoenix claw and shot the skeleton again.

BANG!

Due to the skeleton writhing around in pain, the bullet hit its neck, nearly blowing its skull off its shoulders.

The second phoenix claw hit it, and its skull completely fell off its body, crashing to the ground and shattering into three pieces.

"Aaaaah! YOU DAMN CHILD! HOW DARE YOU DESTROY MY BODY!!!" A black mass of fog that vaguely resembled a human shape flew out of the shattered skull.

Jin Shu was out of Qi, and it seemed that he wasn't able to kill the skeleton or the ghost in the skeletal body—whatever it was that had caused them to be trapped in this ghost village.

The only thing Jin Shu had left was his pistol, so he shot the ghostly black mass of fog, hoping that the Flame Rune could at least deal some damage to it.

BANG!

"Aaaah!" The black fog caught fire and screamed.

It seemed the Flame Rune was indeed effective against it. So Jin Shu emptied the rest of his magazine into the black fog.

BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG!

"Aaaaaaaah!!!! STOP!! YOU BASTARD!! I'M GOING TO RIP YOU TO PIECES AND FEAST ON YOUR HEART!!" The black fog screamed at the top of its lungs... if it had lungs?

As Jin Shu released the magazine from his pistol and began to reload a new one, the black fog rushed towards him. It reached him just as he finished reloading; however, it was too late to shoot it now.

The black fog formed two clawed hands and reached towards Jin Shu to rip him apart. However, before it could reach him, a little silver winged tiger burst from Jin Shu's robes with a golden glow emitting from the King symbol on its forehead. "Get away from Daddy!" yelled Yin'er.

A golden glow with a slightly silver tint burst out from Yin'er's body. When the golden glow touched a ghost, they vanished, and when it touched the black fog, the fog started to slowly disappear.

"Aaah! Aah! What is this!? What's happening to—" The black fog screamed and disappeared. All of the hundreds of ghosts and the thick wall of fog disappeared along with it.

Thud!

Yin'er fell down from where she was floating in the air.

"Yin'er!!" Jin Shu shouted worriedly while running to where she fell. He quickly checked her for wounds, worried that she could be hurt. Luckily, she didn't seem injured anywhere. "Phew! She must have just passed out from Qi exhaustion."

He opened his backpack, pulled out a sleeping bag, and placed it on the ground. Then he carefully picked Yin'er up and placed her on the sleeping bag. Then he picked up Su Bing and placed her down next to Yin'er.

After he was done laying the two passed-out girls down, he walked up to the skeleton that had just finished burning. There wasn't much left of the skeleton except for its right hand that had a ring on its middle finger; the rest of the skeleton was burned to ashes.

Jin Shu bent down, picked up the skeletal hand, pried the ring off its finger, and inspected it.

It was surprisingly a space ring. A Space Ring was an incredibly rare runic tool that could be used to store any inanimate objects.

Although he had never used a Space Ring before, his mother had one and taught him how to use it. He just needed to infuse a small amount of Qi into the ring, and he would be able to sense what was inside. Jin Shu sat down and rested for a moment to wait for some Qi to recover. When it did, he infused a small amount into the ring to see what it had inside.

The ring had about one hundred feet of space. That was quite a large amount of space; his mother's ring was handed down from her Master as one of her Master's greatest treasures, and it had only two hundred feet of space.

The hundred feet of space was less than half-filled with various things, some he recognized and some he did not. Of the things he recognized, the most prominent was a small pile of Qi stones. A Qi stone was a resource highly sought after by cultivators, as they were special stones filled with naturally purified Qi that could be extracted for cultivation.

The next thing he recognized was a collection of scrolls. He used his Qi and pulled them out. The scrolls appeared in the air right above his hand. As this was his first time pulling something out of a Space Ring, he slightly missed where he wanted the scrolls to appear, and they fell to the ground.

Clatter!

He reached down and picked the scrolls up. There were four scrolls in total. He set three of them down next to where he was sitting and opened one up. The first words on the scroll were written in big bold letters. It read: THE DIARY OF THE GREAT LICH SHA ZI.

Jin Shu read the first sentence: I, THE GREAT LICH SHA ZI, AM THE MOST POWERFUL BEING IN THE UNIVERSE.

Jin Shu threw it away and picked up the next scroll. He opened it... and quickly threw it away. When it landed a few feet away, it rolled open slightly. From the words that peeked out, it read: THE DIARY OF THE GREAT LICH SHA ZI PART 2.

Jin Shu picked up the third scroll. He opened it slightly, getting ready to throw it; however, he paused, then opened it all the way. This scroll read: Ghost Control Method.

As he read the scroll, a frown appeared on his face, and his left hand glowed red, quickly setting the scroll on fire, burning it to ashes. This scroll had recorded the ways in which to control ghosts; however, they involved hurting and killing humans, so Jin Shu burned it so that no one else could see it again.

Jin Shu reached down and grabbed the final scroll. He unrolled it, and this one had no words; it was a map. By the looks of it, it was a treasure map. Jin Shu didn't recognize the place depicted on the map. He rolled it back up and decided to reference it with his map and Su Bing, when she awoke, later.

Those were the only things he recognized in the ring, but he took one more look just in case he missed anything, and indeed, he had missed something—a small glass bottle. He pulled it out and read the label: Aphro—

Bang! Crack! Bang! Bang!

Jin Shu threw the bottle on the ground and stomped on it.