Chapter 123: Iron Hook

White Manor's fame in these parts probably owes more than half of it to the White House.

The first reason it's called the White House is, naturally, the color. When it was first built, pinkish-white plaster covered every wall, and the owner planned to add some decorations. Everything else went smoothly—until they got to this room in the west wing, when strange things started happening one after another, so they had no choice but to leave it. To this day, the White House still clashes with the carved beams and painted rafters of the rest of White Manor, white in a way that gives you the creeps.

'One room, three big locks and three bolts on the door. No matter how hot summer gets, the air around it stays cold, like standing in an ice cellar. The White family head says his father, as a kid, was playing ball once. The ball rolled right up to the door, and when he went to fetch it, he couldn't resist peeking through the crack.'

Jin Ling was delivering this with a straight face when he noticed Wei Wuxian beside him reaching into the coffin, apparently lifting the corpse's eyelids, and he choked up mid-sentence.

Wei Wuxian, hearing him stall, turned to look at him. 'Peeked through the crack?'

The group of young Lan disciples behind him all turned to look too. Jin Ling paused. '…He peeked through the crack, and just stood there, frozen, couldn't move for the longest time. When the family found him and dragged him away, he passed out, ran a high fever, was delirious, couldn't remember a thing, and never dared go near it again.'

'After midnight, nobody leaves their room, nobody goes near the White House—that's their iron rule. But past a certain hour of the night, even though there's no one inside, you can hear old wooden boards creaking like someone's walking on them. And this.'

Jin Ling made two loose fists and gestured, all murder:

'Like a hemp rope slowly tightening, trying to strangle something.'

A few days ago, a White Manor servant was cleaning at dawn, passed by the White House, and noticed a hole the size of a finger poked through the paper window of the wooden door. On the ground by the door, a man lay face-down.

A stranger nobody in White Manor had ever seen—forty-something, face an ugly blue-green, veins bulging, five fingers dug deep into his own chest. Long dead.

The servant freaked out, the master freaked out. After a lot of fuss, the manor guards slapped their desks and concluded: some unlucky thief who broke into the restricted area of White Manor, saw something, triggered a heart condition, scared to death on the spot. As for what exactly he saw—they ripped off all the seals and locks on the White House, searched top to bottom, came up empty.

But with a life lost, the White family head knew he couldn't just play dumb anymore, pretend there was nothing inside the White House.

Leave this evil unchecked and the trouble would never end. Gritting his teeth, he worked up the nerve to go up to Jinlin Terrace and pay a fortune to get the Lanling Jin Sect to come Night Hunt.

That's the backstory.

Lan Jingyi held the coffin lid, on the verge of collapse. 'Senior Wei, are you done yet… how many days has this guy been dead… even a walking corpse doesn't smell this—'

Lan Sizhui helped him hold it, caught between laughter and tears. 'The coffin's crude, this Charitable Mortuary leaks wind and rain with nobody to tend it, a few days is unavoidable. Hang in there, we still have to write our notes.'

Jin Ling snorted. 'A thief, and he gets a coffin to collect his body—that's already generous. You want us to enshrine him like a Buddha?'

Wei Wuxian poked at the corpse for ages, finally lifted his face out of the coffin, pulled off his gloves and tossed them. 'Everyone done looking?'

'Done!'

Wei Wuxian: 'Good. Now tell me—what's the next step?'

Lan Jingyi: 'Soul Summoning!'

Jin Ling scoffed. 'Like I need you to tell me that. I already tried.'

Wei Wuxian: 'How'd it go?'

Jin Ling: 'His obsession wasn't strong, his soul was too weak, and he died of fright anyway. The first seven days are past. He's scattered for good. Can't be summoned back.'

Lan Jingyi: 'Tried or not tried, makes no difference…'

Lan Sizhui quickly said, 'Then let's go check out the White House, let's go. Young Master Jin, thanks for leading the way.' He said this while pushing Lan Jingyi out the door, successfully nipping their next round of pointless bickering in the bud. The group of youths stepped over the threshold, several of them hopping over it, all moving with light steps. Jin Ling was supposed to be leading, but he ended up trailing behind them.

Lan Sizhui asked Jin Ling, 'Has anyone in White Manor ever died an unnatural death? Any old unsolved cases?'

Jin Ling: 'The master swears up and down there's nothing. The few old people who died all passed of natural causes, and there's no bad blood among the household.'

Lan Jingyi: 'Crap, I've got a bad feeling. Whenever someone says that, it definitely means there's something—they're just covering it up tight and refusing to talk.'

Jin Ling: 'Anyway, I confirmed it multiple times. Couldn't get anything out of them, nothing abnormal in what I found. You guys can try again.'

Since he'd already done all the homework he could and checked the White House several times, this time he didn't go into White Manor—just found a random tea stall outside and sat down. Before long, a dark shadow drifted over.

Wei Wuxian sat down across from him. 'Jin Ling.'

Two such refined figures sitting at a tiny tea stall was quite an eye-catching sight, making the tea girl keep glancing back even in the midst of her busy work.

Since parting at Guan Yin Temple, this was the first time Wei Wuxian and Jin Ling had seen each other face to face, and only now were they talking alone. Jin Ling paused, expression unreadable. 'What is it.'

Wei Wuxian: 'How are things at Jinlin Terrace for you?'

Jin Ling: 'Same as always.'

Speaking of which, this White family head's trip to Jinlin Terrace to request a hunt was quite the ordeal.

A few years earlier, when the Lanling Jin Sect was at its peak, even if he'd multiplied his fee by ten he might not have gotten a direct disciple of the Lanling Jin Sect to come. In fact, forget requesting a hunt—a merchant family like the Whites, rich but with no power or face, couldn't even dream of setting foot on the doorstep. But now the cultivation world's situation wasn't what it used to be. Ordinary folks didn't know the details of the upheavals, but they'd heard whispers. The White family head tried his luck with a 'just in case' attitude.

Anxious, he went to the gate, handed over his calling card, explained his purpose. The guard took his bribe, reluctantly went to report, came back and flipped—said the sect leader refused, started shoving him out. He was about to leave—after all, he hadn't really expected to succeed—when he got annoyed that the guard had taken his money and still had the nerve to be rude, so he demanded his red envelope back. Back and forth they argued. Just then, a handsome young man in Golden Star Snowwave robes stepped out of the vermilion gate with a bow in hand, saw the mess, frowned, and asked what was going on.

Now the guard started stammering. The White family head saw the boy was still young but probably high-ranking, and hurriedly explained everything. The boy listened, flew into a rage, slapped the guard right off Jinlin Terrace, and cursed, 'The sect leader said to kick him out? How come I didn't know about that!'

Then he turned to the man. 'You're the Whites, twenty li west of the city? Got it. Go home first, someone will come find you in a few days!'

The White family head went home in a daze. A few days later, a group of sect disciples really did show up at his door—he had no idea the Lanling Jin Sect's sect leader himself had come.

Of course, he had no idea that the Lanling Jin Sect was in complete chaos right now.

The guard hadn't reported to the real sect leader Jin Ling at all—he'd gone to another elder of the Lanling Jin Sect. That elder, hearing that even some merchant had the nerve to climb the Lanling Jin Sect's golden stairs, flew into a rage on the spot, ordered the guard to throw him out. Coincidentally, Jin Ling, on his way to the hunting grounds, stumbled right onto the scene.

Jin Ling knew these family elders all had their airs, prided themselves as a hundred-year clan, refused to lower their status no matter what, wouldn't receive anyone who wasn't nobility. First, he always hated that kind of posturing. Second, he was furious the guard had gone around him to report to someone else, treating him like he didn't exist. Third, he thought of how, when Jin Guangyao was alive, no disciple or guest cultivator would have dared take bribes like that. The more he thought, the angrier he got. Coincidentally, he'd already arranged to Night Hunt with Lan Sizhui, Lan Jingyi, and the others this month—so he came to the Whites' place.

If he's honest with himself, he can't say he didn't at all expect Wei Wuxian to come along too.

The ins and outs of it, Jin Ling hadn't told anyone, but plenty of eyes watched Jinlin Terrace and plenty of mouths had nothing better to do—the story had already reached Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji. Wei Wuxian knew Jin Ling wouldn't want to show weakness, so he said, 'When something comes up, ask your uncle more often.'

Jin Ling said coolly, 'He's not even surnamed Jin.'

Hearing that, Wei Wuxian froze, then caught on, caught between laughter and tears, and smacked the back of his head. 'Speak properly!'

Jin Ling let out an 'ow,' and the face he'd been forcing to stay composed finally cracked.

The slap didn't hurt at all, but Jin Ling acted like he'd suffered the greatest humiliation imaginable—especially hearing the tea girl giggling sweetly nearby, which made it worse. He clutched his head and roared, 'Why are you hitting me!'

Wei Wuxian: 'I hit you to make you think about your uncle. A man who hates getting involved in other people's business, and he went to someone else's house to throw his weight around for you, took all that gossip and finger-pointing. You say he doesn't even have the surname Jin—imagine him hearing that. Wouldn't that break his heart?'

Jin Ling froze, then flared up. 'That's not what I meant! I—'

Wei Wuxian countered, 'Then what did you mean?'

Jin Ling: 'I! I…'

The first 'I' had plenty of fire behind it; the second 'I' leaked out, deflated. Wei Wuxian said, 'I I I—let me say it for you. Here's what you mean: Jiang Cheng is your uncle, sure, but to the Lanling Jin Sect he's still an outsider. He's already stepped in a few times to help you, but if he keeps reaching too far, meddling too much on someone else's turf, it'll give people ammunition to attack him later, won't it?'

Jin Ling, furious: 'Nonsense! You already knew that! Then why'd you hit me!'

Wei Wuxian smacked him again without missing a beat. 'That's exactly why I hit you! Can't you say things nicely? Such good words—how do they always come out extra ugly from your mouth!'

Jin Ling hugged his head and yelled, 'Lan Wangji's not here so you just hit me like this!'

Wei Wuxian: 'If he were here, I'd say the word and he'd help me hit you together. Believe it or not.'

Jin Ling, in disbelief: 'I'm the sect leader!!!'

Wei Wuxian smirked. 'Sect leaders I've hit—no fewer than eighty, maybe a hundred.'

Jin Ling jumped up to bolt from the tea stall. 'Hit me again and I'm leaving!'

'Get back here!' Wei Wuxian grabbed him by the back of the collar, hauled him back like a chick, smacked him down on the bench. 'Not hitting you anymore. Sit properly.'

Jin Ling stayed wary, saw that he really didn't mean to hit again, and reluctantly sat still. The women at the tea stall, seeing the commotion finally settle, came over smiling to refill the water. Wei Wuxian picked up his tea bowl, took a sip, and suddenly said, 'A-Ling.'

Jin Ling glared at him. 'What.'

Wei Wuxian just smiled. 'Seeing you this time—you've grown up a lot.'

Jin Ling froze.

Wei Wuxian rubbed his chin. 'You look, mm, a lot more reliable now. I'm happy, but also a bit… how to put it. Actually, the way you used to be, all dopey, that was pretty cute too.'

Jin Ling was starting to squirm again.

Wei Wuxian suddenly reached out, threw an arm around his shoulder hard, and ruffled his hair wildly. 'But anyway, seeing you, you little brat, just makes me happy! Ha ha!'

Jin Ling didn't care that his hair was a mess, sprang off the bench and bolted for the door. Wei Wuxian smacked him back down again. 'Where are you going?'

Jin Ling's neck was red. He growled, 'I'm going to check the White House!'

Wei Wuxian: 'Haven't you already looked at it?'

Jin Ling: 'I'm! Going! To! Check! It! Again!'

Wei Wuxian: 'Since you've already looked a few times, looking again probably won't turn up anything new. Why don't you help me check something else.'

Jin Ling was terrified he'd say something mushy again. He'd rather take a big slap than get used to being patted on the head and hugged while hearing sweet talk. The way this guy could shout about wanting to sleep with Hanguang-jun in public—god knows what might come out of his mouth. He quickly said, 'Fine! What do you want me to look into?'

Wei Wuxian: 'See if there's a strange person around here—someone whose face was slashed dozens of times, eyelids and both lips cut off.'

Jin Ling, hearing he wasn't making it up, said, 'I can, but why would you look into something like—'

Suddenly, the tea girl who was refilling their water said, 'You're talking about the Hook-handed Ghost, right?'

Wei Wuxian turned. 'Hook-handed Ghost?'

'Yeah.' The tea girl had probably been listening in for fun, and the moment she got the chance, she jumped right in. 'No mouth, no eyelids—that's gotta be him. You don't sound local, young master—surprised you know about him.'

Jin Ling: 'I'm local too, and I've never heard of him.'

The tea girl: 'You're young, so it's not weird you haven't heard. But this guy used to be famous.'

Wei Wuxian: 'Famous? What kind of famous?'

The tea girl: 'Not the good kind of famous. I heard this from my great-grandmother's mother when I was little—you can imagine how long ago that was. This Hook-handed Ghost, nobody knows his name. He was a blacksmith—poor, but skilled, decent-looking, honest and hardworking. He had a wife, really beautiful, and he treated her well. But she didn't treat him so well. She found herself another man outside, didn't want her husband anymore, so… she killed him!'

Clearly, this tea girl had been poisoned by this legend since childhood, so when she poisoned others, she did it with vivid detail, her tone and expressions perfectly matched. Jin Ling was startled and exclaimed inwardly, 'Indeed, the most venomous is a woman's heart!' But Wei Wuxian had dealt with Malevolent Corpse and evil spirits for years; he'd heard at least a thousand similar stories, the tropes were all stale. He just rested his chin on his hand and listened expressionlessly. The tea girl continued: 'This woman was afraid someone would recognize the corpse as her husband, so she cut off his eyelids and slashed his face dozens of times. Also, afraid that after death he would go to the underworld and file a complaint before the judge, she saw a newly forged Iron Hook on the blacksmith's table and used it to hook out his tongue...'

Suddenly, someone said, 'How could his wife do that? Using such a monstrous method to hurt her own husband!'

Jin Ling had been listening intently, and the voice made his scalp prickle. He looked back and found Lan Sizhui, Lan Jingyi, and the others had come out of White Manor and were crowding behind him, all listening with rapt attention. That outburst had been Lan Jingyi's. The tea girl said, 'Eh, men's and women's stories all come down to the same thing—tired of the poor, tired of the old, who knows. Anyway, the blacksmith ended up looking like that, neither man nor ghost, half-dead. The poisonous wife secretly dumped him at the West City Graveyard. Crows love dead flesh and rotting meat, but they took one look at his face and didn't dare peck a single bite…'

Lan Jingyi, the kind of person who gets emotionally invested in any story he hears—a perfect audience—said, '…That's too much… too much! Didn't the people who killed him get any comeuppance?'

The tea girl: 'He did! How could he not. The blacksmith, even after all that, somehow survived. One night he crawled out of the graveyard, went home, and his wife was lying there pretending nothing had happened. Her throat—' she gestured, '—he hooked it open with one swing.'

The young disciples' expressions were complicated—horrified, but also wanting to exhale. The tea girl went on, 'After he killed his wife, he slashed her face too, hooked out her tongue, but his Malevolent Qi didn't fade. From then on, he started killing any pretty woman he saw!'

Lan Jingyi froze, deeply shaken. 'That's not right. Revenge is one thing, but other pretty women—what did they ever do to him?'

The tea girl: 'Right, but he didn't care. His face had become that horrible ghost thing, every pretty woman reminded him of his wife, the hatred in his heart—what could he do? Anyway, for a long time after, young women didn't dare walk alone once it got even a little dark. Even staying home, without a father, brother, or husband there, they didn't dare sleep. Because every now and then, a woman's body with her tongue hooked out would be dumped by the road…'

Jin Ling: 'Nobody could catch him?'

The tea girl: 'Couldn't catch him. After killing his wife, the blacksmith just vanished, didn't live in his old house anymore, moved around like he was possessed, his movements and techniques were anything but ordinary—how could regular people catch him? Anyway, I heard it took several years before he was subdued. Only then could everyone sleep peacefully! Amitabha, thank heavens.'

They left the tea stall and returned to the Charitable Mortuary. Lan Sizhui said, 'Senior Wei, this Hook-handed Ghost you suddenly thought to look into—is he connected to the evil at White Manor?'

Wei Wuxian: 'Naturally.'

Jin Ling had guessed as much, but still had to ask, 'How are they connected?'

Wei Wuxian opened the coffin lid again. 'In this thief's corpse.'

Everyone covered their noses again. Jin Ling: 'I've looked at this thief's corpse plenty of times.'

Wei Wuxian grabbed him and pulled him over. 'Which just means you didn't look carefully enough.'

He patted Jin Ling's shoulder, then suddenly pressed down. Jin Ling's head dipped, and he came face to face with the thief's corpse in the coffin—face blue-green, eyes wide open. A wave of stench hit him. Wei Wuxian: 'Look at his eyes.'

Jin Ling squinted at the corpse's dull, lifeless eyeballs. One look, and a chill ran from his heels to the crown of his head. Lan Sizhui, sensing something off, immediately leaned in to look too.

In the corpse's black pupils, the reflection wasn't his own.

A stranger's face, almost filling the pupil—skin bumpy and uneven, covered in knife scars, no eyelids, no lips.

Lan Jingyi hopped up and down behind them, wanting to look but too scared to come closer. 'Sizhui, what… what did you see?'

Lan Sizhui waved him back without looking. 'Don't come over.'

Lan Jingyi quickly said, 'Oh!' and stepped back several paces.

Lan Sizhui lifted his head. 'Come to think of it, I have heard folk tales like this. Sometimes the eyes "record" what a person saw right before they died. Didn't expect it to actually be true.'

Wei Wuxian: 'Only sometimes, though. Because this thief was scared to death—whatever he saw must've left an incredibly deep, indelible impression, which is why it worked. In other cases it might not record anything, and in a few more days when the corpse rots completely, we probably wouldn't see it at all.'

Jin Ling still had his doubts. 'If it's so unreliable and it's just a folk tale, can we really trust it?'

Wei Wuxian: 'Trust it or not, let's investigate and try. Better than sitting on our hands.'

Either way, there was progress. Lan Sizhui decided to go look around the West City Graveyard, Wei Wuxian said he'd go with him, and the rest would investigate the Hook-handed Ghost. Hearsay couldn't be trusted—the more they could verify, the better.

Jin Ling, partly because he couldn't stand Lan Jingyi, partly because he figured wherever Wei Wuxian was going would be the better training, but figured nobody else knew the Lanling area well and without him leading the way there'd be trouble, agreed on the spot. The group arranged to meet back at White Manor in the evening. After their investigations, the intel they gathered was pretty much the same as what the tea girl had said—the circulating version was basically consistent—so Jin Ling and the others headed back to White Manor first.

By dusk, Jin Ling had paced back and forth across White Manor's main hall a few times, traded a few rounds of bickering with Lan Jingyi, and still no sign of Wei Wuxian and Lan Sizhui. He was about to head to the west of the city to look for them when the front door was thrown open with a bang.

Lan Sizhui burst in first. He seemed to be holding something hot in his hand—the moment he crossed the threshold, he let go and dropped it on the ground.

It was about the size of a palm, wrapped in layers and layers of yellow joss paper, with a wet crimson seeping through. The surface of the talisman paper was stained with blood. Wei Wuxian followed him in, stepped over the threshold at his leisure, saw everyone crowd around and yelled, 'Back off, back off! It's dangerous!'

So everyone scattered again with a whoosh. The thing seemed corrosive—it slowly ate away the talisman paper wrapped around it, revealing what was inside.

A rusty Iron Hook!

Not only rusty, but bright with fresh blood, as if just ripped bloody out of human flesh. Jin Ling: 'The Hook-handed Ghost's Iron Hook?'

Lan Sizhui's Blue Clan Uniform had burn marks and bloodstains on it. He was slightly out of breath, his face a little flushed. 'Yes! Something's attached to it—don't touch it with your hands!'

The Iron Hook began to tremble violently. Lan Sizhui: 'Close the door! Don't let it get out! If it runs again, I don't know if I can catch it!'

Lan Jingyi was the first to rush over, slammed the door shut with a bang, pressed his back hard against it, and shouted, 'Exorcism Talismans! Everyone, hit it with Exorcism Talismans!'

Hundreds of Exorcism Talismans crackled down on it in an instant. If the White Manor household hadn't been warned by Jin Ling and hidden in the east wing, the flames shooting skyward and white lightning flashing wildly would've been terrifying. Before long, the talismans ran out, and before anyone could catch their breath, the Iron Hook started bleeding again.

Not even a moment's rest!

Lan Sizhui had no more talismans on him. Suddenly he heard Lan Jingyi shout, 'Kitchen! Get to the kitchen! Salt salt salt! Get the salt!'

At his reminder, several youths dashed into the kitchen, grabbed the salt jar, and flung a handful of pure white salt onto the Iron Hook. That did the trick—as if frying in hot oil, the rusty Iron Hook sizzled and spat out white foam and steam.

A smell like burning rotten flesh filled the hall, and the fresh blood on the Iron Hook seemed to be slowly being absorbed by the white salt. One youth said, 'We're almost out of salt too! What do we do next?'

Seeing the Iron Hook was about to bleed again, and this couldn't go on, Lan Jingyi said, 'We'll just melt the damn thing!'

Jin Ling: 'Can't melt it!'

Lan Sizhui, however: 'Good, melt it!'

He immediately took off his Blue Clan Uniform outer robe, threw it over the Iron Hook, wrapped it up, and ran to the kitchen, throwing it into the furnace. Seeing this, Jin Ling's eyes blazed. 'Lan Sizhui! Lan Jingyi being dumb is one thing, but how are you dumb too! You think this little fire is gonna melt it?!'

Lan Jingyi flew into a rage. 'Who are you calling dumb?? What do you mean, "Lan Jingyi being dumb is one thing"?!'

Lan Sizhui: 'Not enough fire? Then add more!'

He formed a hand seal, and the flames instantly exploded with a wave of scorching heat!

The others caught on at once and did the same. Jin Ling and Lan Jingyi stopped bickering, focusing on their hand seals. The fire under the furnace roared up, burning red-hot, casting their faces in red.

They waited on edge for what felt like ages, and finally the Iron Hook gradually disappeared in the blazing fire. Seeing no sudden change, Lan Jingyi asked nervously, 'Is it done? Is it done?'

Lan Sizhui exhaled. After a moment, he went to check, turned back, and said, 'The Iron Hook is gone.'

The attached thing was gone, so the Malevolent Qi should be gone too.

Everyone breathed a sigh of relief, especially Lan Jingyi, who was the happiest. 'I told you we could melt it! We obviously could! Hahahaha…'

He was happy, but Jin Ling was bummed. He'd barely played any real role in this Night Hunt, so there was no training to speak of. He secretly regretted not insisting on going with Wei Wuxian to find the Iron Hook during the day. Next time, no more running errands in the rear.

But Wei Wuxian said, 'You guys are way too sloppy with the wrap-up. Solved or not—how can you call it done at this point? Don't we need to verify?'

Hearing that, Jin Ling's spirits lifted. 'How do we verify?'

Wei Wuxian: 'Someone goes in and stays the night.'

'…'

Wei Wuxian: 'If someone stays the night inside and nothing happens, then we can slap our chests and say it's truly resolved, right?'

Lan Jingyi: 'Who exactly do you want to do that…'

Jin Ling jumped in immediately: 'I'll do it!'

Wei Wuxian didn't even need to look to know what he was thinking. He patted his head and smiled. 'If you get the chance, do well.'

Jin Ling, unhappy: 'Don't pat my head. Haven't you heard? A man's head shouldn't be touched.'

Wei Wuxian: 'That was definitely your uncle. Up to you whether you listen.'

'Hey!' Jin Ling was shocked. 'Who was it that just told me to ask him about things more often!'

White Manor arranged food and lodging for everyone, so the group stayed in the east wing that night. Jin Ling went alone to the west wing.

The Gusu Lan Sect, the Lan Clan, still strictly followed their daily schedule and rose early the next morning. Before Lan Sizhui left, Lan Wangji had instructed him to make sure to drag Wei Wuxian down for breakfast, so he spent nearly half an hour using every trick he knew to finally drag Wei Wuxian downstairs. When he reached the main hall, Lan Jingyi was helping the servants of White Manor distribute porridge. Lan Sizhui was about to go help when he saw Jin Ling walk in with two dark circles under his eyes.

The whole group silently stared at him. Jin Ling sat down to Wei Wuxian's left. Wei Wuxian: 'Morning.'

Jin Ling, face forcibly composed, nodded. 'Morning.'

Everyone else nodded too. 'Morning.'

After a moment, seeing he didn't seem inclined to speak, Wei Wuxian pointed at his own eyes. 'Those…'

Once he was sure he looked reasonably calm, Jin Ling finally spoke.

He said, 'Just as I thought. It wasn't cleaned up properly.'

Everyone tensed up.

Last night, after Jin Ling entered the White House, he looked around.

The room's furnishings were extremely simple—almost no furniture, just one bed. The bed was against the wall, covered in dust.

Jin Ling touched it once and couldn't stand it. No servant dared come near this place, and there was no way he could lie down on something like that. He had no choice but to fetch water himself and clean it up before barely managing to lie down.

Face to the wall, back to the room.

A mirror hidden in his palm.

Turning the mirror, he could get a rough view of the room behind him.

Jin Ling waited most of the night, but the mirror only showed pitch-black darkness. So he turned the mirror this way and that, just starting to enjoy himself a bit, when suddenly a flash of glaring white swept across the mirror's surface.

His heart went cold. He steadied himself and slowly turned the mirror back.

The mirror finally showed something.

Hearing this, Lan Jingyi said in a trembling voice, 'What did the mirror show? The Hook-handed Ghost…?'

Jin Ling: 'No. A chair.'

Lan Jingyi was about to breathe a sigh of relief, but on second thought, every hair on his body stood on end.

What was there to be relieved about? Jin Ling had clearly just said the room had 'extremely simple furnishings, almost no furniture, just one bed.' If that's the case…

Then where the hell did this chair come from?!