Chapter 90#

Ghost Mother#

The Huaicheng Radio Station building was located near the Jiahe Mall.

Dr. Liang drove the car to the bottom of the radio station building and sat alone in the driver’s seat, making no further moves for a long time.

The cold moonlight shone into the car window. Dr. Liang looked numb as he bent down and took out a book from under the passenger seat cushion.

His fingers brushed away the dust and wrinkles on the cover, and a few words gradually became clear.

“Night Voyage” Issue 1.

“Night Voyage” was a book gift issued by the Story Magazine a hundred years ago. Not for sale, worthless. It was very thin, only half the size of a normal magazine, the illustrations were black and white, and the text seemed to have not been carefully typeset, densely clustered together. Everywhere revealed cheapness and perfunctoriness.

The cover of the first issue was a small boat.

On the boat lay a blue schoolbag, an oar, and a paper crane, nothing else. Under the shine of a turbid yellow moon, the small boat sailed into the depths of the blue sea. In the children’s drawing, the floating flowers and waves connected with the white clouds, as if about to sail into the sky.

The edges of the book looked like they had been burned by fire, with curved black marks. Dr. Liang opened the first page. On the title page were four large, crooked characters written by a boy: “Story King”.

The boy’s family was poor, and he didn’t have suitable paper and pens to practice writing when he was young. Over time, his handwriting became distorted and looked very ugly.

Without a pen, naturally, there was no clean notebook, so all his childhood wild thoughts could only be written in the blank spaces of books.

Starting from the first page of the first issue of “Night Voyage”, there were pencil marks in the blank space at the end of every text.

He would write about the people around him. Writing about the snobbish teacher who always arranged for him to clean the toilet, the boy would arrange a toilet ghost to steal all the teacher’s paper when he went to the toilet; writing about the bad-tempered classmate who always bullied him and stuffed snakes into his drawer, the boy thought of a snail that couldn’t be shaken off, following behind the bad guy forever.

A child’s world is pure and flawless, and the ways of revenge are innocent and cute.

At least at that time, the word “death” never appeared in the Story King’s stories.

Dr. Liang flipped through page by page until the end.

Looking at the story he had long known by heart, the one he had to complete after making a deal with the devil.

The page of “Urban Nightwalker” looked as if it had been soaked in water, the handwriting blurred, wrinkled in clumps.

It seemed like someone was writing tremblingly while shedding large drops of tears.

The preface to the “Urban Nightwalker” story was a child’s self-narrative.

[I seem unable to go to high school anymore; I’ve been expelled.]

[None of them believe me. But I didn’t set the fire, nor did I burn the person.]

[That night, I heard a scream and ran out, only to see a group of older boys bullying a boy. They sprayed pepper water into his eyes, poured earthworms into his mouth, knocked out his teeth, tied his feet, and stepped on his hands.

I was terrified. I wanted to run and tell the security guard, but that group of people found me. They dragged me over by my hair.]

[They did to me what they did to that person.]

[They tied my wrists with rope and whipped my calves with sticks. They poured pepper water over my head, and it flowed into my eyes and ears; I was about to go blind. They said I was a little bastard with a mother who gave birth but didn’t raise me.]

[They said they were going to play a game of roasting a whole lamb today.]

[There was an abandoned wooden house in the corner of the school, piled with old newspapers and broken desks and chairs.]

[At first, that group of people just wanted to use branches to light a fire to scare people. But accidentally, sparks fell onto the dry waste paper and firewood, and in an instant, the entire wooden house caught fire. The heat was overwhelming, thick smoke billowed, and they were scared pale and ran away pissing their pants, leaving only me and another boy with his legs tied.]

[It’s getting hotter and hotter in the house, am I going to die? But I don’t want to die, I haven’t grown up yet, I haven’t seen the world outside the stories. I struggled to reach my hands into the fire, burned the rope on my wrists, got up from the ground, picked up my schoolbag and ran out. But at this moment, my ankle was grabbed by that boy. He cried so sadly, asking me to save him.]

[I thought, I should save him too.]

[I struggled to drag him out of the sea of fire, wood splinters cut my arms, sparks ignited my hair. The smoke was thick, choking me to tears. But fortunately, we ran out of the wooden house and were saved. I shouted loudly on the playground, and several parents soon saw us. The parents sent the boy to the hospital, and they asked me if I wanted to see a doctor. I didn’t have money to see a doctor, and Dad wouldn’t give me money. So I shook my head at them and went home carrying my schoolbag.]

[While walking, my hands hurt, my feet hurt, my eyes and ears were also very uncomfortable, but my heart was filled with a warm current. I seem to have done a good deed.]

[…I did a good deed, but no one thinks so.]

[The teacher asked me: If I didn’t set the fire, why did I rush in to save people.]

[This is too absurd. I widened my eyes and gestured with my hands and feet about what happened that day, explaining it from beginning to end, but no one believed me.]

[I held up the strangulation marks on my arm, but the teacher couldn’t see them. He said they weren’t strangulation marks, but caused by me fighting with someone.

I asked those parents, you heard me shouting for help that day, right? The parents all shook their heads; they pretended to be deaf and dumb.

The group of older students hid behind their parents, spreading rumors and slandering that they saw me bullying people.

Everyone was suspecting me. I eagerly looked at the boy I saved.]

[But the boy lowered his head and cried, saying that I was the one who set the fire to burn him.]

The black Bentley drove into the bustling city center. Skyscrapers towered into the clouds, flashing red neon lights like bloody eyes.

On the car radio, the female host’s voice was gentle and sweet, sighing deeply.

[Just like that, our protagonist was expelled from school for arson, breaking the law and discipline, and having a bad nature. He hugged his schoolbag alone and walked out of the school gate amidst the class bell.]

[Poor little boy, his life seems to have lost direction from this moment on.]

Ye Sheng turned his head to open the window, a thin layer of hostility appearing in his glazed, indifferent eyes.

Ning Weichen drove the car towards Jiahe Mall. After listening to this story, the corners of his crimson lips hooked up, smiling yet not smiling: “Baby, I have a premonition. The story of the Urban Nightwalker should be coming to an end.”

Ye Sheng lowered his eyes, playing with his phone.

Ning Weichen: “Maybe we are walking towards his ending right now.”

Ye Sheng said, “Isn’t that just right?”

Ning Weichen said, “True.”

Luo Xingyan went with them.

Luo Xingyan stood on the top floor of the building, his pale golden pupils looking straight at the Jiahe Mall area. His fingers fiddled with the headset, making an emergency call to the Bureau of Paranormal Investigation.

When Cheng Ze received the call, her tone was puzzled: “Senior brother, did something happen?”

Luo Xingyan: “Notify all personnel to blockade the Jiahe Mall area.”

Cheng Ze: “Jiahe Mall?!”

Luo Xingyan nodded: “Yes. Report to the headquarters that the Story King has appeared. Now everyone from the Huaicheng Bureau of Paranormal Investigation, come to Jiahe Mall.” As an S-class executor, the more dangerous and urgent the situation, the calmer Luo Xingyan became. He ground his slightly itchy teeth, suppressed his explosive temper, hooked the chain in his hand across the sky to the rooftop of the opposite building, and leaped across the air.

Cheng Ze hung up the phone, her heart still pounding. The Story King appeared? Tianshu had no instructions, but Senior Brother Luo said the Story King appeared.

—The mentor called her back then saying that the Prophet predicted many dangerous things would happen in Huaicheng in the future.

Could this be it?

Cheng Ze gritted her teeth, quickly calmed down, and made a call to the Huaicheng government.

In the brightly lit and crowded Jiahe Plaza business district, an emergency notification was suddenly broadcast from the sky.

The mall will have a complete power and network outage in one hour. The government ordered all people shopping and working nearby to leave quickly, otherwise, they would bear the consequences.

Police cars stopped in front of the mall, sirens blaring deafeningly, and even a swarm of drones flew over to monitor the area.

Fortunately, it was already eleven or twelve o’clock at night, and there were not many people in the mall. Under the police’s evacuation, people left quickly and orderly.

The car drove to the bottom of the radio station building. Ye Sheng looked up at this behemoth.

The headquarters of “Little Mouth Tells Stories” was here. At the top of the building was a logo of lips. The lips were open, revealing a bit of teeth, inside were the tongue and throat. Like a person opening their mouth to tell a story.

The lights in the radio station building were almost all out, only on the 24th floor, a light was still on.

After getting out of the car, Ye Sheng walked inside.

Ning Weichen followed in, leisurely finding the switch for the stairwell lights on the wall. Next to the stairs was the elevator. Ye Sheng walked in and pressed the button for the 24th floor.

Ning Weichen walked into the elevator, looked around and said, “This elevator must have been used for decades.” The elevator was old and covered with various posters. The numbers on the buttons were almost illegible, the interior was narrow, and the corners were blackened.

When it started, it seemed to vibrate twice.

Ye Sheng looked up at the floor numbers. Ning Weichen, however, looked thoughtfully at the poster next to him. The radio station would select the most popular radio host every year. The woman on the poster had curly hair reaching her waist and regular features.

He suddenly spoke, saying lightly: “Brother, do you remember the identities of Qin Wenrui’s three wives?”

Ye Sheng had a very good memory, photographic, and said indifferently: “The first wife was a commercial marriage, the daughter of a wealthy merchant in the neighboring province; the second wife was a minor celebrity. The third wife was born in an orphanage.”

Ning Weichen smiled and said, “Really amazing, brother, but we seem to have never paid attention to the profession of the third wife.”

“Before I came to Huaicheng, Butler Li gave me a file on everyone in the Qin family.”

Ning Weichen’s eyes were unfathomable. When talking about the Qin family, his tone was gentle and casual.

“After Qin Wenrui entered middle age, he began to suffer from insomnia. He feared retribution and was superstitious about ghosts and gods. Every night before going to bed, he needed someone to recite Buddhist scriptures in his ear. Qin Wenrui’s third wife had a unique voice. If I guessed correctly, besides being an orphan, she should have been a radio host before marrying into the Qin family.”

Ning Weichen reached out his hand, touched the gap of the elevator door, and his slender fingers pulled out a pale golden hair from inside.

Ning Weichen chuckled lightly: “Baby, it seems someone arrived before us.”

Ye Sheng stared at that pale golden hair, his eyes dark and unclear. He always had a silhouette of Hera on his phone.

The ancient Greek goddess in charge of childbirth possessed long pale golden hair, and the decorations on her snow-white long dress were pomegranates and peacock feathers symbolizing fertility and blessings. Hera was very tall, and because the clothes were too loose and shrouded in a layer of black mist, people couldn’t see the appearance or figure clearly.

He had already determined that the Urban Nightwalker was Dr. Liang, but now he felt that although Hera was human, she was not just human.

The elevator reached the 24th floor. Ning Weichen opened the elevator and stepped forward.

Ye Sheng took out his phone and took a picture of that golden hair. This time, the search actually produced results.

[Category Section: Story King]

[Ghost Name: Ghost Mother]

[Ghost Level: A+ Class]

[Overview: Granting Life and Death]

No extra words, only four words.

Granting Life and Death.