The Haunted

It was already past six o'clock in the afternoon when Chi Yan arrived at the bus station. Fortunately, it is summer now, and the sky is still golden, but the golden color has been rendered very thick, and it is no longer as clear and lively as the morning sun. Gives a sense of despondency.

The ticket he bought was for seven o'clock in the evening, but he didn't see the train until ten minutes before. At a quarter past seven, the person in charge at the station arranged for them to board another train. There were still five or six empty seats on this train. , and finally arrived at Suming City, but it took a long time, and there would be stops at several small stations under the county in the middle. The original two-hour drive took more than three hours.The person in charge said that if you are willing to get on this car, you can make up the difference. If you don’t want to wait, you can wait for the dispatch. I don’t know how long it will take.

Chi Yan thought to himself that the time difference between the two would not be long. At least it took a little longer to get on this car, but he would definitely be able to go back. He didn't know how long he would have to wait for the dispatch, so he got into the car and sat in the empty space behind. Next to him sat a sturdy middle-aged man in a casual jacket by the window.

Seeing this, Chi Yan backed down again.He is prone to motion sickness when he doesn't have a good rest. He has been running around all day, and his spirit has been high. He didn't have a serious meal at night. At this time, he already felt a faint headache, so he leaned his head against the car window and closed his eyes, preparing to rest for a while.

I didn't expect to be confused when I closed my eyes.He has been in a half-dream and half-awake state, and can vaguely feel the movement of the bus braking to a stop, and the passengers carrying their luggage and getting off the bus, but he is still groggy and unable to wake up.

When he woke up completely, the sky was already dark, and the night outside the car window was dark, pressing down on people together with the outline of the darker mountains in the distance.Chi Yan took out his phone and took a look. It was already ten twenty, probably not far from Sumin City.The way back was different from the way he had gone, and he didn't know it either.

There were only seven or eight people left in the car, and they should all go to Su Min like him.The elder brother who was sitting next to him might be too crowded, and he no longer knows when he will move to the empty seat in front.He was sitting in the second-to-last row, and behind him was the last row of relatively taller seats. Now, except for him, everyone else was sitting in the front, scattered in the compartment.

Chi Yan flipped through the phone for a while, and felt sleepy, so he turned off the screen and prepared to put it away.Inadvertently, the black screen of the mobile phone reflected the dim yellow light from the dim street lights outside the window, reflecting the face of the person sitting behind him—the face was pale, with flat features, dull and expressionless, and a pair of eyes were staring straight at him.

Immediately Chi Yan's hair stood on end.Pretending to be as if nothing had happened, he picked up the phone again, his hands trembling slightly, he was too scared to move for a moment, and he forgot to think, as if his thinking had frozen instantly.

Chi Yan paused for a while, pretending to be calm, and quietly took out the peace talisman drawn by Zhang Daochang from his pocket—there were two pieces of peace talisman, one was used by him to wrap ashes, and the other was kept close to his body in his pocket all the time.

He glanced at it, and then couldn't help feeling cold, the edge of the yellow talisman had turned black at some point, as if it had been burned by something.

He pretended not to notice the thing behind him all the time, put his backpack on his back and leaned on the armrest of the car, moved to the front of the car, and sat in the back row of the middle-aged man who was sitting next to him before.

He put his bag on the seat next to him. The car had already entered the urban area, and the scenery outside the window became bustling.There were other people nearby, which made him feel a little relieved. Chi Yan took out his phone and glanced at it secretly, his fingers on the screen froze suddenly - that "person" was still sitting behind him, and it moved to the front with him !

Speaking from Chi Yan's personal experience, people's guts are not intimidated. Every time he encounters this kind of thing, especially something that clearly points to him and follows him, he still feels scared, flustered, and terrified. After so many years The only thing I have learned is to at least maintain a superficial calm, and not be so frightened that I don't know what to do, and I just made a big mistake and make any radical moves.

He knew that regardless of whether Ye Yingzhi's ashes Zhang Daochang said would really work, at least his jade could protect him for a while, so he stayed calm until the bus arrived.

But the thing followed him out of the car.

Sumin City is not as prosperous as Shiming City, which is still bustling with traffic in the summer night until the early morning. It was already eleven o'clock at night when we got off the bus. 8 minutes away.

Chi Yan closely followed the middle-aged man who got out of the car earlier, mustered up the courage to strike up a conversation, "Where does eldest brother live?"

According to his experience, this kind of adult man in his prime has a lot of yang, and those things will be far away.For example, when he was in college, his three roommates were all young and young. When he lived in the dormitory, the frequency of encountering evil spirits or being entangled by ghosts was much lower than when he lived alone now.

The man took two wrong steps to the side without any trace, moved a little further away from Chi Yan, and then replied hesitantly: "Tianlong Court."

Tianlong Court is next to Chi Yan's residential area, he was overjoyed, and slowly chatted with the man and walked to the main road.

Chi Yan was quite afraid that he would take a taxi late at night alone, if he was walking on the road, even if he saw something, he would just run away and pretend he didn't see it, but if he took a taxi and met a non-human driver, it would not be so easy to run.On the main road, he took advantage of the situation and proposed that the two of them should share a car to go back. The man hesitated and agreed.

After the taxi stopped, Chi Yan sat in the co-pilot, and the man sat in the back seat. Chi Yan took a special look to see that since they got into the car, that thing stopped and didn't follow.

Chi Yan reported the name of the place and went to Huarong New District. This is the newly developed CBD, and it can be regarded as the most prosperous place in Su Min. Chi Yan's unit and residence are all there.

The driver was a young guy, and he reminded Chi Yan, "The handsome guy is wearing a seat belt, why don't you sit in the back, the co-pilot is not as spacious as the back."

Chi Yan looked at the back seat, smiled and said: "It's okay, save the crowd."

The driver glanced at him, didn't speak, didn't know what he was thinking, and started the car silently.

The elder brother hadn't spoken to each other since getting in the car, but the two of them were not familiar with each other, so Chi Yan didn't care, and silently looked at the familiar street scene outside the window.

When he got to the place, Chi Yan took out his wallet to pay, he turned his head and saw that the elder brother had already got off the station at some time and was waiting outside the car.Tianlong Court is still a 10-minute walk from here, but it's not too far away, Chi Yan didn't find it strange.

The driver brother took the RMB and looked at it twice, then looked up at Chi Yan, as if he wanted to say something, but finally shut up.

When Chi Yan got out of the car, the elder brother nodded to him and said, "Thank you."

Chi Yan thought he was talking about the taxi fare, so he smiled, waved his hands and said, "It's okay." He should say thank you.

The middle-aged man said: "Little brother, then I'll go home and have a look, so let's just say goodbye."

Chi Yan also said goodbye to the other party with a smile, and turned around to go to his own community.

Hearing the other party muttering in a low voice: "There seems to be something on you, I dare not get too close to you."

The smile that Chi Yan had no time to take back froze on his face.

He looked back with a stiff face, just in time to see the back of the middle-aged man going away. Under the bright orange street light at the gate of the community, he could clearly see it without a shadow.

Chi Yan's hands were trembling, he could barely hold the key, he quickly ran into the building, he didn't even dare to go in after the elevator door opened - he was afraid of encountering something again.

The memories of his childhood have faded. Since his grandmother gave him the jade, although he has encountered evil, he has almost never "seen" these unclean things in succession in the past few days.

He touched the jade on his chest, and inadvertently came across the small porcelain vase containing Ye Yingzhi's ashes, silently comforting himself that no matter what he saw, just pretend he didn't see it and ignore it, at least they didn't dare to harm him directly.

Consoling himself in this way, he finally arrived at the door of the house smoothly, looked around suspiciously, and then opened the door and entered.

The moment he turned on the light and closed the door, he almost completely lost his strength and collapsed on the ground.

But soon Chi Yan persevered to pull himself together again, found out the tablet and the incense burner that had been prepared, and placed them neatly on a table in the living room.This scene was funny and weird, but Chi Yan lived alone and had no guests at home, so he didn't care.

According to Daoist Zhang, he had to carry Ye Yingzhi's ashes to protect himself, and from the day he carried them, he had to enshrine Ye Yingzhi's tablet every morning and evening.

He didn't dare to be negligent, since Ye Yingzhi's ashes had already been brought with him, he lit three sticks of incense and offered them to the memorial tablet when he came back.

The custom-made tablet is black all over, with six golden characters "Ye's Welcome Spirit" engraved on it.

Chi Yan bowed his head respectfully with the incense in his hand, and then inserted the incense into the incense burner in front of the tablet.

Behind him stood a black figure, silently watching him doing all this.