Chapter 82: Instant Suppression

A fierce wind tore between sky and ground, and in an instant the temperature dropped several degrees.

Ji Li jabbed at the latch with a screwdriver, but after several tries the door still wouldn’t open.

Just then, a warm yellow light flared inside, halting his movements.

He froze, quickly tucked the tool away, and pressed himself against the wall.

Moments later, a maid stepped out carrying a lamp.

She didn’t leave right away. Instead, she looked carefully from side to side before finally walking off.

Ji Li emerged from the shadows, watched the maid’s retreating figure, then fixed his gaze on the door she’d left ajar.

He pushed lightly; a rush of cold air poured out. Swiftly steadying the panel to keep it from creaking, he slipped inside.

It was Ji Li’s first time entering someone’s home like this, and an unbidden tension ran through him.

Beyond the threshold was the same reception room as before.

Now it lay in darkness, with only faint shafts of moonlight piercing through, visibility almost nil.

Ji Li hesitated, refraining from taking out his flashlight. Instead, he pulled out the lighter Fang Shenyan had given him.

He didn’t know how big the elderly woman’s house was, but the layout was unlikely to be too complex.

He barely glanced at the reception room, heading straight for the screen.

Behind it stretched a short corridor.

At its end, two rooms lay to the left and right.

Clutching the hot lighter, Ji Li crept forward step by step. Nothing strange occurred.

Still, even with the main door shut, a breeze seemed to drift through the space.

The lighter’s flame trembled, casting four wavering shadows of Ji Li across the walls.

Before long, the flame was nearly spent.

Even through his gloves the metal felt hot, so he extinguished the light.

By then he had reached the corridor’s end, standing between two paths.

He tried to recall where the hidden chamber had been when the elderly woman and Chen Fu spoke, and finally looked toward the left.

But just then, the third persona’s voice echoed in his mind:

“On the right—there’s a fragrance, the same scent as the bridal sedan!”

Ji Li froze. He remembered the secret room was on the left, yet the elderly woman was closely tied to the sedan, and now the third persona had caught its fragrance.

The choice became a dilemma.

After a long pause, Ji Li sighed and stepped toward the right-hand passage.

Perhaps that chamber was only for discussion; what mattered now was whether the elderly woman was connected to the ghost bride.

Though nothing in their conversation had mentioned the bride, Ji Li remained convinced.

The elderly woman, whose face perfectly matched the woman in the painting, must be bound to the ghost.

“Straight ahead, about fifteen steps, then turn left!”

In the pitch-black darkness, Ji Li followed the third persona’s instructions. He himself still smelled nothing.

In matters of the senses, he was far inferior to the third persona, even though they shared the same body.

Suddenly, a chill swept down from above, stirring his hair.

“Someone? Or a ghost?!”

Ji Li had no time to answer. He jerked his head up toward the ceiling.

There, a gap.

Half of it was pitch black, the other half revealing a patch of sky.

Moonlight and cold air streamed through that opening.

Holding his breath, Ji Li frowned at the odd sight for two seconds before realization struck. He snatched out the lighter and flicked it on again.

This time, he saw a roof tile had been shifted, exposing a stretch of starry sky.

But the shadow that had just blocked the view was gone.

“Someone! Someone was lying on the roof, watching me!”

“How could that be? At this hour, who else would be in the Li Mansion?” the third persona muttered in confusion.

From all the intelligence they had gathered, only two forces existed here:

the staffs, and the elderly woman with her people.

“Could it be a ghost?”

Ji Li shook his head with certainty, his eyes fixed on the opened section of roof. In a low voice he said:

“That just now was clearly a living person lifting the tile—a face blocking the moonlight, spying on me, even if only for an instant.”

The waters of the Li Mansion were becoming ever more muddled.

He paused for a moment, then let the thought go. The purpose of coming here was to uncover the link between the elderly woman and the ghost bride.

“Almost there.”

Guided by the third persona and the faint glow of the lighter, Ji Li soon arrived before a door.

It looked old and worn, not the sort of room someone of status should live in.

And judging by its twisting approach, it was far too hidden to be a proper master bedroom.

Ji Li hesitated, placed a hand on the panel, then pushed it open without further thought.

As the door swung inward, a red light—heavy with silence and unease—washed over his face.

Cre-eak…

The door opened fully. Bathed in red light, Ji Li had yet to step inside, but it felt as if he was already part of the room.

The space was just as he had suspected: completely sealed.

Not a single window. Several red lanterns hung on the walls, their glow flooding every corner.

If he had to stay here, Ji Li thought, it would feel no different from lying in a coffin—stifling to the point of suffocation.

Then he saw her: a figure lying on the bed.

The elderly woman, the one with an aged soul but a young body.

She lay on her back, fully clothed, legs straight, her lively face twisted under the lantern light into something ghastly.

“She looks like a corpse…”

That was the only thought shared by Ji Li, the second persona, and the third alike.

But when Ji Li turned, the true purpose of this venture finally revealed itself.

On the wall opposite the bed stood a small altar.

There were no offerings upon it, only a slanted portrait.

The ghost bride.

And it showed her original state—her face still hidden beneath a full veil of red silk.

Ji Li’s body trembled. As expected!

The ghost bride was here, mere steps from the elderly woman, as if they even slept in the same place.

Then he noticed something strange: the bride in the painting looked slightly different from when he had first seen her.

There were faint new shadows.

The red lanterns distorted his sight, making it hard to discern clearly.

He took two steps closer, focusing on the bride—no, on the wall behind her in the picture.

The next instant, a cold arm shot out from the painting!

It clamped hard around Ji Li’s throat, crushing the air from his chest.

He felt the strength, the overwhelming pressure, the agony of suffocation.

In half a second, Ji Li vanished from where he stood.

On the bed, the elderly woman’s limbs and face twitched, as though she was about to awaken.