Chapter 53: Finally Awake, Later Than I Expected

"No, no, no!! Fang Xiu, what's going on here? This can't be real, it must be an illusion!

Hurry up, and send them home!" Lin Ziyang broke down.

Fang Xiu smiled slightly and said, "We can start now."

The next moment, the eerie creatures slowly surrounded the two of them....

...

Dong dong dong...

The sound of knocking on the door rang out.

Fang Xiu calmly looked at the door being knocked on. The scene of being dismembered by the eerie creatures still echoed in his mind. Not bad, pain +1

It was time for Lin Ziyang to feel the pain.

He slowly stood up.

Tap, tap, tap...

He walked step by step toward the door.

Soon, he stopped at the door.

At this moment, he and Lin Ziyang were separated by a door. He was inside the door, while Lin Ziyang was pressed against the outside of the door, his bloodshot eye pressed against the peephole.

Lin Ziyang was slightly excited. He heard Fang Xiu's footsteps. All he needed to do was wait for Fang Xiu to peek through the peephole. Just one glance would suffice.

Fang Xiu inside the door tilted his head slightly, as if trying to peek through the peephole. Just as he leaned forward, suddenly, his sleeve fluttered, and a silver flash appeared.

A scalpel was suddenly in Fang Xiu's hand.

In the blink of an eye, whoosh!

The scalpel turned into a silver light and plunged fiercely into the peephole.

"Ah!!!" A piercing scream rang out.

The scalpel pierced through the peephole without any resistance and plunged fiercely into Lin Ziyang's eyeball.

Lin Ziyang instantly lost sight in one eye, but with his strength, losing one eye was insufficient to completely neutralize his combat ability.

However, do not forget Fang Xiu's ability.

The Pain Ability activated, and the pitch-black spiritual energy flowed through the scalpel into Lin Ziyang's body.

In an instant, an indescribable, overwhelming pain surged throughout his entire body.

In that moment, Lin Ziyang felt as though he had been killed dozens of times, beaten into a pulp, eaten raw, beheaded...

The pain of dozens of deaths erupted all at once.

Lin Ziyang couldn't even last a second, his vision went black, and he collapsed to the ground, falling into a coma.

Bang!

Fang Xiu pulled out the scalpel and opened the door.

Looking at Lin Ziyang lying on the ground covered in blood, he calmly grabbed Lin Ziyang's ankle and dragged him into the house like a dead dog.

Bang!

The door slammed shut, and the hallway fell silent once more.

Moments later, the motion-activated lights turned off, and the darkness hid the bloodstains.

Inside the house, Fang Xiu began searching Lin Ziyang's body. He liked the idea of a trump card, something that could turn the tide in a desperate situation, but he didn't like others having one.

He was currently a newly promoted Spirit Tamer, and knew nothing about the various techniques and trump cards of Spirit Tamers. Therefore, to avoid being outmaneuvered by Lin Ziyang during the torture, a search was necessary.

Fang Xiu did not kill Lin Ziyang. In fact, with his ability to inflict pain, he could have easily taken Lin Ziyang's life the moment the scalpel pierced his skin.

But he did not do so, after all, he had promised Lin Ziyang that he would help him with the slow execution.

As a person, one must keep one's word.

Soon, Fang Xiu searched Lin Ziyang's body and found five spirit coins, some loose change, a mobile phone, a car key, and a bronze candlestick with an odd shape.

He first picked up the bronze candlestick, and the moment it touched his hand, he could clearly feel a cold, eerie aura invading his body.

"A strange artifact?"

Feeling this familiar sensation, Fang Xiu was certain he hadn't misjudged it—the bronze candlestick was indeed a strange artifact.

It seemed Lin Ziyang's strength and status were no small matter; he even possessed a strange artifact.

Although this artifact felt significantly inferior to the scalpel, it was still a strange artifact.

Fang Xiu speculated that Lin Ziyang's strength, even if not that of a second-tier Spirit Master, was at least close to second-tier, making him a senior first-tier Spirit Master.

The latter possibility was higher. Though he didn't know the strength of a second-tier Spirit Master, it shouldn't be enough to be knocked out with a single strike.

After examining it for a moment, he put down the bronze candlestick and picked up Lin Ziyang's phone.

Surprisingly, the phone had no password.

There were two possibilities: either Lin Ziyang was confident in his own abilities, or he had lost control of his spiritual energy, causing his mind to frequently descend into madness, and he feared he might forget the password.

However, none of this concerned Fang Xiu; the lack of a password saved him the trouble of cracking it.

He began to browse through the phone.

Five minutes later, he obtained the information he sought.

Lin Ziyang was a member of the Light Club.

The specifics of the Light Club were unknown, but it was likely an organization formed by civilian spirit tamers.

"A group of people attacked by strange forces, yet they named themselves the Light Club?"

Additionally, Fang Xiu discovered numerous videos on Lin Ziyang's phone, mostly graphic footage of him brutally killing others.

There were also some simple details about purchasing spirit incense on the black market.

This also explained why Lin Ziyang had so few spirit coins—he likely spent them all on spirit incense.

It seemed that spirit incense couldn't completely suppress spiritual chaos; it only provided temporary relief.

After that, Fang Xiu smashed the phone to pieces to prevent any tracking.

He then grabbed a sheet, wrapped Lin Ziyang's entire body in it, and carried him away.

Under the cover of night, and since this was an old, dilapidated neighborhood, Fang Xiu easily found Lin Ziyang's car, threw him inside, and drove straight to the warehouse.

The warehouse's address was also found on Lin Ziyang's phone.

Because this guy had once ordered takeout from the warehouse when he was hungry.

If you ask how Fang Xiu knew, it's simple: Lin Ziyang had recorded a video of himself receiving the delivery and brutally killing the deliveryman.

Now Fang Xiu began to understand why it was said that a spirit master whose spiritual control had gone haywire could sometimes be more terrifying than the supernatural itself.

....

Lin Ziyang slowly came to, still unsure of what had happened, when he felt an excruciating pain in his left eye.

"Ahhh!"

He couldn't help but let out a piercing scream.

His remaining eye instinctively scanned the surroundings.

The more he looked, the more familiar it seemed—this was his own warehouse!

Wait! Why am I tied up?

Lin Ziyang was horrified to discover that he was tied to an iron chair in the center of the warehouse.

Not far away, a young man was repairing a meat grinder.

"You're finally awake, later than I expected."

The young man said calmly, his back turned to Lin Ziyang.

Roar!

The meat grinder was fixed, and the blades inside spun rapidly, emitting a piercing noise.

"Who are you! Who are you!" Lin Ziyang shouted in terror, staring at the meat grinder. Clearly, he had realized something.

"Oh? You came to my house in the middle of the night knocking on the door, yet you don't know who I am?"

Lin Ziyang's pupils suddenly contracted: "You're Fang Xiu!"

He instantly recalled that he had been preparing to ambush Fang Xiu through the peephole, only to have a knife stab directly into his eye, and then ended up here.