Chapter 9: Don't Touch It—You Can't Handle It!

"Your grandfather?" 

Xu Yang froze, memories flooding back—early mornings carrying his schoolbag, evenings waiting at the school gate, those nights listening to ghost stories. "Xu Guanghui was just an ordinary man." 

"If he was ordinary, why would underworld factions target him?" Detective Wang stood abruptly. "There are things I can't disclose, but if you know anything—" 

*Underworld factions?* 

The term would've sounded laughable weeks ago. But now, with a ghost hovering behind him sipping phantom tea, Xu Yang's worldview had cracked open. He recalled Grandfather's "demon-slaying" tales he'd dismissed as bedtime fiction—could those have been true? 

"Detective," Xu Yang pressed, "could you share what you've found?" 

"You plan to investigate alone?" The detective's gaze sharpened. "This has crossed into dangerous territory. I understand your filial duty, but—" 

A metallic tang cut through the air. 

Both men turned to the shop's entrance. Crimson droplets speckled the pavement near a cracked tree planter. Detective Wang's eyes tracked upward to the shattered second-floor window. 

Xu Yang's throat tightened. He'd been too hungover to notice the broken glass earlier. Now the implications crashed over him—someone had broken in last night. Someone *alive*. 

The detective's mustache twitched with unasked questions. Without another word, he departed, leaving tire marks heavier than his suspicions. 

Back upstairs, Xu Yang faced the spectral roomate. "You said it was a thief?" 

The ghost's hair rippled as blood-red characters materialized: 

[He tried taking your grandfather's things. I... persuaded him to leave.] 

*Persuaded.* The dark stains on the windowsill told a different story. 

Xu Yang knelt before an antique leather trunk dusted with funeral incense ash. His fingers trembled on the latch—this was Grandfather's sacred relic, the chest he'd once been beaten for touching. 

The hinges groaned open, releasing memories in a puff of camphor. 

Neatly folded ritual robes. Cinnabar inkpots. A sandalwood ruyi scepter. And beneath it all— 

"Ha!" Xu Yang lifted the unremarkable wooden sword, its surface blackened as if by lightning. "Old man, you wouldn't even let me hold this as a kid. Now look—" 

*Swish!* 

The female ghost materialized across the room, her usual composure shattered. Charred peach wood—a thousand-year thunderstruck trunk! How did this clueless mortal possess such a relic? 

Xu Yang noticed her retreat. He grabbed a yellow talisman adorned with esoteric sigils. The ghost flinched as if struck. 

Crimson warnings blazed midair: 

[STOP! That talisman's power could—] 

"Scare you?" Xu Yang's grin turned wolfish. He waved the parchment, driving the spectral woman behind curtains. "Or... *hurt* you?" 

The sword hummed in his grip, resonating with forgotten bloodlines. Grandfather's voice echoed through years: *"When the time comes, you'll understand."* 

That time had come.