New Times, New Hell

Chapter 4 - Capturing an Evil Spirit

Yu Zhengdu was shocked by the words of the two girls. At that moment, the girl standing on the far left suddenly threw him a strange smile. Then, her eyes rolled up slowly, until the whites of her eyeballs that were crawling with veins could be seen. Meanwhile, bright red blood began trickling out of her eye sockets.

White eyeballs, red blood tears, coupled with a malicious smile — this scene was as weird as it could get.

Yu Zhengdu, “…”

Yu Zhengdu thanked his ghost company for the first time. After a few days of training his psychological state of mind there, he could still maintain an unchanged expression in the face of such a scene and calmly say to the short-haired girl, “I actually failed to frighten you, I thought my acting was pretty realistic.”

The short-haired girl grinned and said, “It was very realistic, but the method was a bit outdated.”

When the female ghost saw that Yu Zhengdu didn’t get a fright, she felt doubtful for a moment and couldn’t tell if he had seen her or not.

Just as the three of them found a table to sit down, in order to test Yu Zhengdu, the female ghost scuttled to the seat that Yu Zhengdu was going to occupy, then confidently sat down first and looked at Yu Zhengdu proudly, ready to see what his reaction was.

Yu Zhengdu, “…”

It’s time to see who was the better actor.

His expression remained unchanged. As he continued to talk to the two girls, he sat down calmly on the female ghost’s lap.

Female Ghost: my smile is gradually fading away.

Fortunately, at the last moment, the female ghost could not accept having a living person sit on her thigh after all, so she quickly fled just as Yu Zhengdu was about to crush her.

Yu Zhengdu inwardly breathed a sigh of relief. Honestly, he was pretty stressed about actually having to sit on the lap of a female ghost.

Perhaps it was because she was certain that Yu Zhengdu couldn’t see her, but the female ghost was too lazy to harass him anymore. She went back to the short-haired girl and stuck to her closely.

Yu Zhengdu and the two girls introduced themselves to one other. The short-haired girl was named Li Tiantian, and her friend was named Jiang Hong. They both worked in a game company at another building of the park.

Li Tiantian smiled and said, “You’re always alone every time I see you. Why don’t you have lunch with your colleagues?”

Yu Zhengdu said perfunctorily, “My colleagues and I have different tastes, so we can’t eat together.”

Jiang Hong glanced at Yu Zhengdu’s lunch tray and said, “Your taste seems pretty common ah.”

Yu Zhengdu, “Un, they’re the ones with uncommon tastes.”

The three chatted while eating. When Li Tiantian and Jiang Hong learned that Yu Zhengdu had just arrived here to work, they enthusiastically introduced the situation on this side of the Science Park to him. The atmosphere between them wasn’t awkward at all.

But Li Tiantian would stretch and rub her shoulders from time to time. She complained, “I don’t know why, but I’ve always felt very tired recently. My shoulders are always so damn sore, as if they’re being pressed down on by something.”

Jiang Hong said, “Should be an occupational hazard ba, people with desk jobs have the highest chance of getting frozen shoulders, cervical spondylosis and other ailments like that.”

Li Tiantian muttered, “I used to sit like this all the time, but I’ve never felt so tired ah. Also, there seems to be something wrong with my neck recently. It’ll just suddenly start feeling cold from time to time.”

Yu Zhengdu, “…”

He saw that the ghost was currently draping her arm around Li Tiantian’s shoulders, and had even huffed on her neck.

Jiang Hong, “Why don’t you take a day off to go see a doctor one of these days?”

Li Tiantian continued, “I think it’s a problem with my luck. Not only have I been feeling sick lately, but I’ve also been quite unlucky. I was almost hit by a car when I went out the other day. It didn’t rain yesterday, and I don’t know what happened either but I actually stepped into a puddle on the road. I even made a few mistakes in my work too and got scolded by my supervisor&#k2026;”

She rattled on for a while, and seemed to finally realise that Yu Zhengdu was still listening at one side so she stopped in a hurry. Her face was a little red as she said, “Sorry for talking so much all of a sudden.”

Yu Zhengdu smiled and said, “That’s all right. If you feel uncomfortable, it’d be better for you to get it checked out at a hospital.”

They finished their meal very quickly. Before leaving, Li Tiantian even added Yu Zhengdu’s WeChat and said, “Since we’re all in the same park, let’s meet again for lunch when we’re free.”

Yu Zhengdu nodded. “Okay.”

He watched Li Tiantian and Jiang Hong leave, unperturbed, then calmly turned around and walked towards the company. Only when he was sure that the ghost could not see him anymore did he finally howl with an “ao——” and almost darted back as if someone was chasing him with a knife.

“Everyone, I, I, I—— I bumped into a ghost——” Yu Zhengdu pushed open the door of the company and shouted.

The ghost colleagues in the office all looked up at him in succession: “…”

The atmosphere was a little awkward for a moment.

Yu Zhengdu also kept silent for a while. The force of his entrance weakened, then he added, “It’s particularly terrifying to bump into ghosts other than you guys…”

At this time, a colleague came out of the pantry with a bowl in hand and asked, “In what way was it terrifying?”

Yu Zhengdu turned his head around to answer him, “She could do a super roll-up of her eyes, and her eyes could even bleed…”

After speaking halfway, he suddenly couldn’t continue any longer. This colleague of his had empty eye sockets — its insides were pitch dark, and his eyeballs were nowhere to be seen.

Yu Zhengdu: “…where are your eyes?”

When his colleague heard this, he lifted the bowl up until it was in front of Yu Zhengdu. Yu Zhengdu looked down, only to see that the bowl was filled with clear water in which two round…eyeballs were soaking. Its black pupils were looking straight at him through the clear water.

His colleague said, “Staring at the computer all day made my eyes a little tired, so I took them out to soak them in eyedrops for a while.”

Yu Zhengdu felt like his whole soul just underwent a thorough baptism. He pressed his hand against his chest and said especially sincerely, “Thank you for toughening my heart. I don’t think that ghost is all that terrifying anymore.”

When Shang Que heard the noise, he came out of the office and asked, “How did you bump into the ghost?”

Yu Zhengdu roughly talked about the situation with the female ghost and finally asked, “Why am I able to see ghosts now? I didn’t have this skill before.”

Shang Que: “Oh, you’re a staff of Hell after signing the contract, that’s part of our employee benefits.”

Yu Zhengdu, “…” He shouldn’t have coveted that bit of social security!

Shang Que continued, “What you met was a Scapegoat Ghost. She’s consuming that girl you’re talking about in preparation for possessing her.”

Yu Zhengdu was not very clear about the classification of ghosts, but he could tell that it was definitely not a good ghost after listening to this description. He nervously said at once, “What should we do then? Is Li Tiantian in danger?”

Shang Que deserved to be called the boss of all ghosts. He said with an indifferent expression, “It’ll be fine as long as we catch her back.”

Yu Zhengdu was surprised. “Our company can even catch ghosts?”

Shang Que smiled. “We’re professionals.”

* * *

The next day, Yu Zhengdu came up with the excuse of giving Li Tiantian something and asked the other two to meet up in the dining hall again. Then, he brought Shang Que along in a valiant effort to catch a ghost.

Sure enough, the ghost was still pestering Li Tiantian. Yu Zhengdu tacitly tossed Shang Que a look, then introduced him to the two girls as if nothing had happened, “This is my boss, he’ll be having lunch with us today.”

Li Tiantian and Jiang Hong’s eyes lit up in an instant. “Your boss is so handsome.”

Shang Que looked nonchalant. “Thank you.”

Several people went to get their lunch together. Yu Zhengdu asked his boss in a soft voice, “That ghost didn’t seem to realise that you’re of the same kind?”

Shang Que revealed a smile that seemed a little belittling. “Judging by her level, she won’t be able to find out if I don’t want her to.”

Yu Zhengdu respectfully gave him a thumbs up. “Boss deserves to be the lord of all ghosts, you’re amazing.”

Shang Que: “…the ‘king’ of all ghosts.”

Yu Zhengdu, “It’s the same, it’s the same.”

They sat down after getting their food and Li Tiantian looked at Yu Zhengdu, appearing slightly embarrassed. “You said in your WeChat message that you have something you want to give me. What is it?”

Yu Zhengdu remembered his excuse and quickly took out a small box from his pocket to hand it over. “This.”

“That’s so kind of you.” Li Tiantian uncovered it, brimming with expectations as she opened it, and then, “…”

Yu Zhengdu said, “Didn’t you say you had a problem with your luck? Our company deals with personal health management. This is our company’s magnet, it can change your luck and give you a health boost.”

Li Tiantian, “…”

Jiang Hong, “…”

The box clearly contained a very plain pebble that wasn’t unusual in any way. At most, you could say that it was a little more smooth and round, and was washed to be a little cleaner than most.

Li Tiantian’s smile froze. “Thank you.”

The female ghost seemed to find Yu Zhengdu’s words particularly ridiculous. She approached Li Tiantian on purpose and huffed a breath onto her face, her provocation completely undisguised.

Li Tiantian touched her face subconsciously. Yu Zhengdu also poked Shang Que’s thigh under the table. Shang Que turned to look at him, appearing like he didn’t quite comprehend Yu Zhengdu’s action.

Yu Zhengdu looked at him with a smile and frantically hinted at him with his gaze: hurry and do something ah!

Evidently, Shang Que has not yet fostered an exchange-of-gazes rapport with him, so he just stared at Yu Zhengdu blankly. Yu Zhengdu, “…”

Yu Zhengdu had to resort to leaning close to his ear and he tried his best to suppress his voice, “Why aren’t you doing anything yet? That ghost is being way too arrogant!”

Shang Que has been a ghost for a long time, but this was the first time a human leaned in so close to talk to him. The warm breath that only a living person could have swept past his ear; it was an experience he had never experienced before.

Shang Que patted the back of his hand gently and said, “Calm down.”

After he spoke, he suddenly smiled in the direction of the female ghost.

The female ghost was stunned. She wasn’t sure if he was looking at her, then she saw him lift his chin again. The female ghost glanced in the direction where he was looking at and saw two ghosts in the distance; they wielded sticks as they rushed through the crowd aggressively, and shouted at the ghost while rushing over, “That one over there, that ghost! You’re under arrest.”

The other also cried out, “Face that wall, put your hands on your head and squat down. Male ghosts on the left, female ghosts on the right——”

The female ghost, who had been clinging onto Li Tiantian, shrieked in misery upon seeing this. She abruptly sprung up on the spot and dashed madly out of the canteen while crying, “I didn’t do anything bad, I was just passing by——”

Yu Zhengdu, “…”

Two of his ghost colleagues pursued her relentlessly and didn’t forget to shoot their mouths off while doing so, “Behave yourself. If you didn’t do anything bad, what are you running for?!”

“Come back with us to assist in our investigation, you won’t be able to get away——”

Yu Zhengdu, “…”

If he hadn’t known that these were ghosts, he would have thought he had bumped into an anti-pornography operation.

Shang Que then laughed and explained to him, “I don’t need to act personally for such a trivial matter.”

Yu Zhengdu nodded numbly, then respectfully picked up his braised pork with his chopsticks to place it onto Shang Que’s plate. “Boss, you’ve worked hard. Eat more braised pork.”

Jiang Hong, who was sitting opposite, finally couldn’t endure it any longer. She sent a WeChat message to Li Tiantian secretly on her mobile phone: [I can’t stand it anymore. Not only is this guy a miserly stone-giver, but he’s also a bootlicker]

Li Tiantian: [Don’t say anything more, I want to die…]

At the same time, Shang Que looked down at the braised pork in front of him and contemplated deeply.

Only then did Yu Zhengdu react. He quickly took the pork back and said, “I almost forgot, you don’t eat this…”

While he was mid-sentence, the pork on his chopsticks was stopped.

Shang Que said, “Then I’ll try it ba.”