IMMFBCG Chapter 21

Chapter 21: Act According to Circumstances

A luxury car sped along the road.

Yu Qi leaned back against his seat, eyes closed in rest, with a long box placed beside him.

The window was slightly open, and as the wind blew in, it scattered the loose strands of hair on his forehead.

Sensing something, he suddenly opened his eyes and looked outside.

The trees outside rushed by swiftly, the scenery outside his window covered in lush greenery.

Yu Qi stared blankly for a while before asking, “How much longer?”

The driver instinctively glanced at the navigation system and replied, “Sir, we should arrive at Ronggui Well in about half an hour.”

Yu Qi responded with a simple nod, then reached over and opened the long box next to him, pulling out the treasured sword inside.

The sword’s blade was smooth and sharp, but because of the seven embedded nails, touching it caused a faint prickle of pain. The nails were arranged in the pattern of the Big Dipper, concentrating the sword’s energy within the constellation.

The Seven-Star Sword was the weapon used by Zhong Kui to ward off evil spirits, capable of exorcising demons and protecting homes.

Their journey was to deliver the Seven-Star Sword to Ronggui Well.

The Tri-Cut Demon-Slaying Sword had been stolen, and Ronggui Well needed a new sword for suppression. The Daoist sect had turned to Yu Qi, asking to borrow his Seven-Star Sword.

Yu Qi withdrew his gaze and placed the sword back into the box.

He glanced at the obsidian beads on his wrist before quickly closing his eyes again in exhaustion.

Seeing that Yu Qi had returned to resting, the driver adjusted the car’s air conditioning, making it slightly warmer.

As the driver continued along, he suddenly noticed a white figure standing in the middle of the road. His face paled, and he swerved sharply to avoid hitting it, driving off to the side.

The jolt from the turn startled Yu Qi awake, and he opened his eyes abruptly. “What’s going on?”

The driver hurriedly explained, “Sir, there was a woman in white standing in the road!”

Hearing this, Yu Qi frowned and looked ahead, but there was nothing there.

The driver’s heart pounded as he recalled the scene, his hands beginning to tremble.

But then, something terrifying happened.

The woman in white, who they had just avoided, appeared once again in front of them!

She stood a short distance away, her ghastly pale face twisted into a strange smile.

The driver, never having seen anything so frightening, panicked and didn’t know what to do. He instinctively closed his eyes, trying not to look, and prepared to steer away again.

A pale yet strong hand suddenly stopped him, gently turning the steering wheel back into place.

The obsidian beads on the young man’s wrist faintly glowed, as if foretelling something.

Yu Qi’s voice was calm yet firm. “Drive through.”

“Sir?” The driver asked in confusion, opening his eyes.

Yu Qi’s expression remained indifferent. He repeated, “Drive through.”

The driver seemed to understand something, and the young man’s calm voice brought him back to his senses. “Understood.”

Taking a deep breath, he trusted Yu Qi’s words, stepped on the gas, and drove straight ahead.

As they approached, the driver could see the unsettling smile on the woman in white’s bluish-pale face.

But just as the car was about to hit her, her figure flickered and scattered like particles, dissolving into tiny points of light before disappearing completely.

The moment the woman vanished, the driver noticed that where he had planned to turn earlier was, in fact, the guardrail by a cliff.

Realizing this, he felt a shiver run down his spine.

If Yu Qi hadn’t stopped him earlier and he had swerved off the road, he and the car would’ve plunged into the abyss below.

The sound of the young man’s familiar cough snapped the driver back to reality. He knew they had just narrowly escaped danger and felt a sense of relief.

Yu Qi covered his mouth with a handkerchief, his eyes calmly gazing forward.

The car continued speeding down the road.

After receiving a phone call, Bai Zi’ang and Xu Zhou had left, leaving only Ye Xue and Bai Liu in the Daoist temple.

Since Xu Zhou, the “jack-of-all-trades,” was absent, the two of them had to figure out lunch on their own.

With an eager expression, Bai Liu said to Ye Xue, “Shishu, I recently learned a new dish. Do you want to try it?”

Although Bai Liu spoke confidently, as if sure of his culinary skills, Ye Xue, knowing Bai Liu’s actual cooking level, wasn’t swayed. Despite his grand claims, she shook her head and said, “I’d prefer to stay alive, thanks.”

Bai Liu couldn’t help but defend himself. “My cooking isn’t that bad!”

Ye Xue smiled and nodded. “Right, it’s not bad. It’s just not fit for human consumption.”

…

After some back and forth, Bai Liu gave in to Ye Xue’s relentless teasing, and they decided to order takeout.

While waiting, Bai Liu remembered what had happened yesterday, and since the female sword still hadn’t been found, he couldn’t help but ask, “Shishu, what happens if Ronggui Well isn’t suppressed by the female sword?”

Though not many malicious spirits had escaped yet, the ones that had were already giving him a headache.

Ye Xue, still reading her book, casually replied, “Without the magical sword keeping them in check, there’d probably be a flood of fierce ghosts, and congratulations—you’d be working overtime.”

“???” Bai Liu looked shocked. “Seriously? Isn’t there another way?”

“Of course…” Ye Xue slowly added, “There is.”

She turned a couple of pages, set her book aside, and continued, “I heard from Shifu that the Daoist sect has already decided to use the Seven-Star Sword temporarily to suppress the malicious spirits, at least until the female sword is found.”

The Seven-Star Sword, also known as Zhong Kui’s Sword, though different in purpose from the Tri-Cut Demon-Slaying Sword, could still be used to exorcise evil and hold the spirits at bay.

Hearing this, Bai Liu finally felt relieved, thinking to himself that Uncle Ye Xue’s way of pausing mid-sentence was truly nerve-wracking.

After a while, Bai Liu received a call from the delivery driver, saying the food had arrived.

However, since there were visitors at the temple and both of them were busy, they asked the driver to leave the food by the back door.

But when Ye Xue and Bai Liu finally managed to make time to go to the back door, they found the delivery was missing.

Bai Liu was furious and shouted, “What the heck? Who’s so low to steal food from a temple? Aren’t they afraid of getting seriously bad luck?!”

Ye Xue pondered for a moment, then waved toward the trees near the back door and asked, “Did you see anyone take our delivery while you were here?”

The ghost on duty at Xuanzhen Temple that day was a traffic accident ghost. He and Chen Su worked in shifts, one taking the day shift and the other the night, and they would swap again next month.

The traffic accident ghost floated down from the tree, looking a little drowsy. Ghosts tend to sleep more during the day. He vaguely recalled hearing someone taking something, but since he was too tired, he didn’t pay much attention. Little did he expect that the person had stolen Ye Xue and Bai Liu’s delivery.

The ghost instantly grew angry as well. “So it was your stuff, Daoist! No wonder that person seemed so shady. You could tell right away they weren’t a good person! They even took the leftover fruit we had!”

Initially, the ghost and Chen Su had eaten some of the fruit, so he let it slide and didn’t bother to confront the living person. But now, realizing it had led to the temple’s food being stolen, he became even more worked up, cursing the thief for their lack of morals.

Eager to make up for the oversight, the ghost offered to help Ye Xue and Bai Liu track down the food thief as a way to atone.

However, Ye Xue wasn’t comfortable using the food anymore since it had been touched by someone else, even if the thief hadn’t eaten it.

Bai Liu, though, was too angry to let the matter go so easily. He furiously asked the ghost to lead the way.

Following the thief’s lingering scent, the ghost led them to a residential area.

It was a desolate place, sparsely populated, with a few dilapidated buildings awaiting demolition nearby.

The ghost carefully sniffed the air around them several times before nodding and confirming, “The scent is here. This is the place.”

Ye Xue looked around the area, deep in thought.

Bai Liu frowned, asking, “This place is remote. How did that person go out of their way to come here just to steal our delivery?”

The ghost replied, “Maybe they were just casting a wide net. When I saw them earlier, they were holding two other deliveries, so I didn’t think much of it.”

Ye Xue, however, remained silent, unusually quiet.

Noticing her behavior, Bai Liu turned to her and asked, “Uncle, why aren’t you saying anything?”

Ye Xue, staring at the old residential building in front of them, asked, “Don’t you think it’s too quiet here? There isn’t a single sound.”

As soon as she pointed it out, Bai Liu realized that they indeed hadn’t heard a thing on their way here.

It was odd—no matter how remote, there should’ve been some noise.

The three of them fell into silence.

Suddenly, a faint, foul stench wafted through the air. Ye Xue wrinkled her nose slightly, trying to block it.

Bai Liu sniffed and asked curiously, “What’s that smell? It stinks. Did a toilet get clogged around here?”

The ghost’s face turned pale, and he nervously looked towards the stairwell. When he saw what was there, his voice trembled as he stammered, “D-Daoist…”

Ye Xue, noticing the ghost’s unusual expression, followed his gaze.

Someone was coming down the stairs. Their movements were slow and awkward, their limbs unnaturally contorted, making their walk look painfully deliberate. Their hands were twisted into unnatural angles, performing movements that no normal person could achieve.

Suddenly, as if they realized something, they raised their head and looked toward Ye Xue and the others, giving them a grotesque smile. Their face was covered in blood, with only faint traces of their features still recognizable.

With a crack, the figure twisted their hands back into a normal position, their eerie eyes fixed on the group as they continued to descend.

It was the same swindler Ye Xue and Bai Liu had encountered the day before.

Ye Xue exclaimed in shock, “He’s possessed by an evil ghost!”

Yesterday, when she saw this so-called sorcerer, she noticed a dark cloud hanging over his forehead—a sure sign of impending misfortune.

That’s why Ye Xue had stopped to listen to what he had to say.

But before she could warn him, the swindler, fearing he would be reported for stealing Daoist artifacts, had packed up and fled in a hurry.

Now, they had crossed paths with him again, but this time he was possessed by a malicious spirit.

It was unclear what exactly he had provoked to end up in this state, but an evil ghost had latched onto him.

At this moment, Bai Liu felt a wave of conflicting emotions. Who would’ve thought a simple trip to fetch their delivery would lead them straight to a ghost—one as dangerous as this?

The situation was problematic, too. They had left the temple unarmed, without any proper tools to deal with such a violent spirit. Handling it would be difficult.

But they couldn’t let the ghost escape either. If it got loose in a populated area, it would surely cause chaos.

They needed to figure out a way to hold it back until they could notify Wei Xingteng and the others.

Thinking this, Bai Liu instinctively looked at Ye Xue.

Ye Xue immediately understood and gave a slight nod.

The traffic accident ghost, having never seen anything like this before, was frozen in fear. His voice trembled as he pleaded, “Daoist, we should run! This ghost is too strong! We can’t handle it!”

But his plea was met with silence. The area remained deathly quiet.

As the evil spirit descended the stairs, getting closer and closer, the ghost nervously turned back to look at Ye Xue and Bai Liu, only to find that they had already run far away.

The ghost blinked in disbelief, “???”

Ye Xue, noticing the ghost still standing there dumbfounded, shouted, “What are you doing just standing there? Run!”

She had never seen a ghost so clueless!