The Ghost Lips' Unforgettable Kiss

Chapter 17

I hovered the mouse over a frame, freezing the red stain, and pointed it out to Tang Yuqing.

"Stare at it intently for at least ten seconds without blinking."

"I'm watching."

Tell me what you saw?

"I can't tell... What, it looks like a bleeding hand? My imagination isn't good enough!"

"Maybe it really is a hand, but it's just an illusion in the picture. Do you know that the nine-linked rings have a very ingenious mathematical solution?"

"Mathematics? You know I've always been good at it, you can't be that mysterious, can you?"

"Actually, there is a mathematical pattern in this video."

"What you said is really interesting!"

"I'm not joking. There is indeed a pattern to solving the nine-linked rings. I remember a book on discrete mathematics introduced the nine-linked rings sequence, which is the number of steps to solve the problem. Solving one ring only requires one step, two rings require two steps, and so on. Solving the ninth ring requires 341 steps, namely: 1, 2, 5, 10, 21, 42, 85, 170, 341, ... What does this mean? Look at those red spots on the screen. They appear exactly according to the number of seconds in the nine-linked rings sequence. Now, please extract screenshots from the superimposed video according to 1, 2, 5, 10, 21, 42, 85, 170, 341, and then superimpose them into a new image."

"I'm doing it now, 1 second, 2 seconds, 5 seconds... 341 seconds of erythema... all captured, superimposed..."

Gradually, a sinister and terrifying scene appeared on the laptop screen: a corner of a palace, the surrounding scenery was blurry, and gradually a circular well platform came into focus. Next to the well was a bridal sedan chair, and in front of the sedan chair stood a shadowy figure wearing a black dress and a black veil.

"The Shadow Bride?" I blurted out.

"How terrifying! Yuling, quick, look! She seems to be walking forward!"

"It's very strange. The composite image should be a screenshot, a still image, so why is it moving?"

Terrified and silent. Just as the shadowy bride gradually grew larger and walked towards the screen, suddenly, a pleasant sound of iron rings clashing rang out.

"Ding-dong..."

"Yuqing, listen!"

The shadow on the computer screen is getting bigger, and the ghost bride is walking towards the screen step by step... You can see that she is holding a string of rings in her hand, and there is a dragon-shaped seal embroidered on the black veil. The interior of the car is turning black, and everything is gone.

"Yuqing, Yuqing! Where are you?"

No one answered. In a panic, I pushed the car door open, only to find that it was dark outside as well.

"Yuqing? Yuqing? How are you? Where are you!"

There was still a deathly silence. Just then, the computer screen flickered, and then a horrifying image appeared:

Chapter Fifty Unveiling the Mystery of the Vengeful Spirit

I stared intently at the computer image, unfazed by the black shadows that filled the screen. On the screen, a girl in white was being dragged by a shadow with a black veil and long hair, slowly walking towards a gray-white well in the distance!

“Yuqing!…”

It's Tang Yuqing's clothing. Is it her? Why is this happening? I can't believe she could be suddenly snatched away by a vengeful spirit and leave this car without a sound. I frantically reached for Tang Yuqing's driver's seat, but it was empty. She's really gone! Could she have fallen into the hands of a vengeful spirit?

In the dim light, a white shadow receding outside the car window stung my eyes! It was Tang Yuqing, just a moment ago in the car…

"Put her down!"

I roared and charged at the car door, but the car's anti-theft lock immediately activated, sealing the entire car impenetrably. In the darkness, my head slammed heavily against the tempered glass due to inertia, and blood instantly gushed out. Like a savage beast, I leaped up again, smashing and kicking the car door and glass, but it was all in vain.

"Yuqing, I'm going to save you!"

The car was like a solid iron cage, locking away my madness. Just as I was still in shock and had nowhere to escape, a melodious tinkling sound echoed in my ears. That elegant yet suffocating sound, like a wind chime in the night rain, accompanied by a mournful, cursed song, reverberated in my ears. This was the signal music of the vengeful spirit before it killed; the vengeful spirit wanted to kill Yu Qing! What should I do? I must stop the vengeful spirit from indiscriminately killing the innocent; I must uncover the mystery of the curse! I must rush out and fight it to the death!

In a moment of extreme urgency, I frantically groped for a wrench or other striking tool in the dark car. Suddenly, my fingers touched something hard and small on the seat, which made my sensitive nerves jump: it was Yuqing's cell phone.

"My phone! I've got it!" I was incredibly excited, immediately remembering I still had that supernatural SIM card. In the darkness, I hurriedly grabbed my phone, expertly opened the case, and tried to remove the SIM card, but it was empty. Yuqing's phone didn't have a SIM card? ...This is strange!

The tension of saving lives left me no time to think further. I reached deep into my pocket, pulled out the SIM card I had received when I said goodbye to my cousin, and inserted it into the phone slot…

I activated it, and the screen lit up. To my surprise and delight, the paranormal phone card was indeed usable; the screen immediately displayed color. However, a series of eerie and terrifying images suddenly appeared before my eyes: a three-fingered hand was peeling away at a beautiful face with long fingernails, the victim struggling desperately! ...This horrifying and nauseating scene filled me with utter horror. I quickly dialed the paranormal number 0001644004; I had to save Yuqing from the brink of death.

A hissing static accompanied the static on the screen, and the call connected instantly. But the chilling song also blared from the phone. At that moment, what the sound of death meant to me was irrelevant. I shouted in fury:

"A vengeful spirit! Whoever you are, let her go!"

I roared at the car window.

"Did you hear me! Let her go!"

On the computer screen, Tang Yuqing was still being pulled along. She seemed to be unconscious, but she was still struggling desperately. The vengeful spirit's shadow didn't stop, and it was getting closer and closer to the well opening. I anxiously shouted into my phone:

"You devil, kill me if you must! Vengeful spirit, do you think that inflicting the pleasure of revenge on a girl will relieve your pain? You can't, you never will! When you killed them, did you ever think about their youthful years? Did you want all the beauty in the world to be sacrificed for your injustice? You selfish ghost!"

My shouting worked. The terrifying song stopped, the gruesome images on the computer screen disappeared, and a dark figure appeared, standing on the other end of the phone. Although I couldn't see her face, I knew she was watching me. Judging from the way her thick hair swayed in the wind, she was a woman, or, to put it more bluntly, perhaps a long-haired man. I mustered my courage again and spoke in a voice of wisdom and strength:

"Stop playing this death game. I know everything about you—your background, your pain! But the humiliation you suffered back then is no excuse for harming beautiful lives! Now I understand why I'm so lucky to be alive—you didn't kill me. But I don't thank you. You tortured and killed the lovers you possessed, and even went so far as to cruelly murder the women who loved me. I remember when I was little, my sister Pang Zhen kissed my cheek. Perhaps from that moment on, you harbored a narrow-minded resentment, just because my birthday is the same day as yours! Just because I was born in your narrow-minded, suffering place, you treat me like..." I will be your reincarnated spirit! You are resilient and nostalgic, yet cruel and boundless. You couldn't bear to part with the locust tree beside the dry well in the cold Five Kingdoms City, so much so that your incarnation still carries that intoxicating fragrance of bygone days. Yet you are a murderous demon! You are willing to sacrifice a living person's life, to be buried with them after your youthful face has been stripped away, for the suffering you once endured. You absurdly believed that I was your future, and it was for this twisted reason that you made a deal with that bastard Ji Yunsheng to bring me to the Forbidden City, hoping that one day, my soul, carrying your vengeful spirit, will inherit the worthless and non-existent double dragon seal of "Along the River During the Qingming Festival."

"But you can't control everything about me. I'm more cunning and wiser than you. If my death could make you stop, I'd rather be the last groom in your curse, marrying the two princesses of the Chongzhen Emperor—the embodiment of your vengeance—in a ghost marriage, to fulfill your decadent and depraved dreams of love in the mortal world! ...Fine, I'll grant your wish. Open the door, let's make a deal, okay? You selfish devil!"

My fearlessness made me a little carried away, and I became more and more excited as I spoke, because I saw hope. The speed at which Tang Yuqing was being dragged slowed down, which meant that the medium's SIM card had conveyed my voice and emotions to the vengeful spirit.

After a while, a hoarse and sorrowful female voice came from the other end of the phone:

"Don't hate me, I've waited so long for you! I won't allow you to have another woman!..."

"You are... Luo Yi!"

I recognized the voice of the vengeful spirit. How could it be Luo Yi? Wasn't she a palace maid from the Republic of China era? Wasn't she that beautiful girl from that time? She was so kind, so pitiful... It couldn't be her. I'd rather believe she's the wronged spirit of Emperor Chongzhen's princess!

"Luo Yi? You're the vengeful spirit? You're deceiving me, I can't believe you, you wouldn't kill a good person..."

The phone disconnected, the white shadow on the screen stopped moving, and the black shadow disappeared into the well. The vengeful spirit finally released Tang Yuqing. Numb weakness and the will to survive caused her to clutch the iron ring that had been strangling her throat, convulsing uncontrollably.

The car door clicked open, and I leaped up frantically, rushing out. Facing a distant white dot, Tang Yuqing staggered to her feet. Her pristine white clothes stood out starkly in the dim light. Having just experienced the heartbreaking separation from her beloved, the overwhelming emotion almost brought tears to my eyes.

I was about to get out of the car and run towards Tang Yuqing when I felt something behind me and turned around. Suddenly, something even more unexpected happened: behind me stood a little girl in a red dress, standing there timidly. Her face was dark, and I couldn't see her legs beneath the hem of her skirt; I could only make out her slender figure and the embroidered shoe on one foot.

"You are... that little girl from the archives building?"

I asked in surprise, a sense of déjà vu washing over me. She seemed there, yet not there, ethereal as a wild chrysanthemum in the wind, shrouded in mist. Her sparse, long hair was pulled back, evoking a fleeting childhood dream. She gazed at me, and suddenly, a strange movement from the little girl nearly made me faint. She floated over and embraced me, her small body as light as a wisp of dried autumn fluff, resting against my chest. She looked up at me with her large, dark eyes. In the pale light, her face had a pitiful outline; her large eyes had no pupils, her pale face resembled a withered hibiscus, and the colorful ribbons in her hair danced in the wind like the wild grass of a graveyard!

"Young lady, who are you...?"

I hugged her cold, bony shoulders. She smiled, responding to my inquiry with her beautiful dimples. In that instant of her sweet smile, I noticed a small mole on her face, and an image hidden in my memory suddenly resurfaced: This little girl in red, wasn't she my cousin Pang Zhen from my childhood? ...

"You are Pang...! How could this be!"

"hehe!……"

She chuckled, then suddenly looked up. I followed her gaze and looked up at the sky, just like when I was little. I would crouch under my sister's thick hair, and on cold, hungry nights, we would look up at the sky together. The heavens were filled with glittering stars. When there was no moon, we would wait for a shooting star to appear, naively imagining a better day when my sister would cook me a delicious meal… Memories of my childhood, relying on my cousin for support, suddenly surfaced as I looked up at the sky. She wore old clothes with several patches, holding my little hands to keep warm. In my memory, I never felt cold. We would go into the mountains together to dig for wild vegetables, and crawl through tree hollows to pick edible things…

Tears streamed down my face as I lowered my head, feeling the warmth that was no more and the icy longing of a past love.

Chapter 51 My Ghost Bride

The little girl in red—my childhood cousin—has disappeared. A red memory, like the last wisp of crimson cloud in the sunset, vanished into my arms. Only then did I realize that there were no bright, twinkling stars in the sky above, and everything around me was still dark. Just like the little match girl who led me to dream of a distant, tantalizing delicacy, I really have some amnesia.

However, that fleeting moment of tenderness was abruptly shattered by the melodious tinkling of jade pendants behind me, and a soul-stirring melody yanked my dream back to reality. Accompanied by the enigmatic chants of vengeful spirits, the music was so plaintive and plaintive that it made me perceive the chaos of death and transcendence. Why is it dark now? I asked myself. Didn't Ji Yunsheng's capture of me and my rescue by Tang Yuqing all happen on the morning of October 9th? My childhood cousin... was that all a dream?

The music sent chills down my spine, and the faint sound of the suona made me feel as if I were walking on icicles. The death music emanating from the eerie car behind me drew my attention back, but no matter what I did, I couldn't see anything strange about it. With my eyes level, I searched for the last ghost.

Why does this place feel so familiar? It's the Forbidden City... How could Tang Yuqing have driven his car into the Forbidden City?

The white figure in front of me gradually grew larger. Tang Yuqing walked towards me, but I suddenly felt a nameless fear. An instinct made me avoid the attraction of her gaze, and as I moved to the back of the car, my eyes lowered, I inadvertently caught a glimpse of the license plate. At that moment, I could only describe my feelings as shock. It was as if I had discovered a huge secret. The license plate of this car had several raised red characters: Y0-1644.

A haunted car with red lettering! The vengeful spirit 1644? Was it the ghost car driven by Tang Yuqing? It suddenly dawned on me—could this be the car that the so-called "manager" who came to pick up my "cousin" when she disappeared be? Could the true meaning of the "red lettering" that Luo Yi reminded me of when she hugged me at the Forbidden City Night be this death license plate? Tang Yuqing, it was Pang Zhen she picked up at the Afang Hotel all those years ago! ...An overwhelming fear suddenly gripped my heart. Tang Yuqing, whom I had never doubted, had become a ghost after I exposed the truth about the vengeful spirit. My heart began to sink painfully.

Holding my phone, I couldn't help but recall the fact that there was no SIM card inside when I opened the back cover. And why did my cousin leave me a SIM card chip when her "zombie" phone was smashed by Tang Yuqing and she was gone forever? She was trying her last to tell me the truth.

Tang Yuqing, she can drive a supernatural car and find me precisely at Wan'an Cemetery. What does this mean? Could an ordinary police officer have such supernatural abilities? There is only one answer: she must have died long ago. There is no doubt that a vengeful spirit possesses her and is controlling the resurrection of a zombie!

She was the most insidious ghost; she possessed modern knowledge and could utilize the internet… she was omnipotent. Just then, that terrifying song echoed in my ears again, and I suddenly snapped back to reality. The song was interspersed with the tinkling of jade pendants, a light and melodious sound that would ignite a man's inner strength, compelling him to greet the adorned, bejeweled enchantress in the distance. I recognized it as the joyful sound of an ancient bride's cherry-blossom shoes touching the ground and her flowing skirt billowing in the wind before she boarded her bridal sedan chair—definitely not the monotonous tinkling of rain-soaked bells I'd heard before.

Instinctively, I turned on my phone. Under the eerie blue light of the screen, a scene completely opposite to the image of Tang Yuqing being released by the vengeful spirit suddenly appeared. On the screen, a woman in a police uniform, her body stiff and her hair disheveled, was being mercilessly dragged by a long-haired, dark figure until she entered the well and slowly disappeared inside. An embroidered shoe slipped from the corpse's ankle, remaining by the well platform. Although I couldn't see her face clearly, I already knew that the deceased was Ning Yu, Ji Yunsheng's assistant!

Tang Yuqing walked towards me with a smile. She was no longer staggering, but rather graceful and ethereal. Her white dress had somehow been replaced by a flowing and elegant skirt, and the tinkling sound of her jade pendants emanated from her. She seemed to be holding something in her hand—a scroll painting. This inexplicable action left me speechless.

The chilling song immediately filled my surroundings, and I even grasped its rhythm, unable to resist singing along:

"The medicine peddler's carriage and horses number sixteen, the old man passed away amidst the gentle breeze and smoke, the two bridges are forever covered with millet and sorghum, east of the Bian River, who remembers those bygone days..."

Death was not far away. I knew she was the legendary vengeful princess. I glanced at Tang Yuqing and couldn't help but smile bitterly. I was going to die with this murderous devil, for my sister... and for a sliver of affection in the dark. Then I suddenly opened the eerie car door and climbed inside. But as soon as I entered the car, the dome light suddenly turned bright red. I looked around the car and was immediately horrified. The car's dome light was a beating heart! The leather seats were the color of human skin, and even the steering wheel handle was sticky and soft.

Before I could recover from the shock, another horrifying scene appeared before my eyes: rows of photos of dead people in ghost marriages scrolled across Tang Yuqing's laptop screen. The brides, still with their eyes rolled back, smiled as they crawled out of the screen, turning into living zombies, leaping over the windshield, and heading towards Tang Yuqing.

I turned on the fog lights, the crimson spotlights illuminating Tang Yuqing's snow-white clothes. I silently gazed at the ghost bride before me. She was no longer the Tang Yuqing of my memories, the beauty of the police academy; she was the angel of death. She was so beautiful, so captivating. She was still smiling, slowly approaching me, gradually opening her arms.

A beautiful wedding dress, a group of glamorous bridesmaids surrounding Tang Yuqing. I glanced at my watch helplessly. From the time Tang Yuqing disappeared to her appearance as a bride in a white dress, a full fifteen minutes had passed. In another minute and forty-four seconds, she might be getting into my bridal sedan chair, and my time would be up.

The angel of death was calling, and my anger reached its peak. I started the car instantly, wanting to drive recklessly and kill this transformed female devil. But when I saw her happy and charming face and her outstretched arms, and the pious devotion of the dead in their ghost marriages, my heart softened, and a tear welled up in my eye.

I won't kill her like she killed my cousin, even though she's a ruthless killer and utterly wicked; I simply can't do it. I'm going to destroy this malevolent, haunted car and the vengeful spirit's "bridal sedan chair"! I'm going to crash the car into the distant palace wall and then perish. Then I slammed on the gas, reversing. But something strange happened: the steering wheel malfunctioned, and the car roared, stubbornly heading straight towards Tang Yuqing.

Chapter Fifty-Two: The Unforgettable Kiss After Clothes Fell Off

It was a strange force, the first and last time I ever felt such a sinister attraction in my life. Before I could react, the Mercedes Benz sprinted forward, heading straight for Tang Yuqing's body. Just before the impact, the scarlet headlights shone on Tang Yuqing, like colorful firecrackers igniting simultaneously. The bride's white dress glowed. She closed her eyes and smiled happily, as if waiting for a long-awaited reunion. Her outstretched arms became the final silhouette of my ghost bride longing for a passionate embrace.

"Bang! Crash!"

Blood splattered like a thousand peach blossoms against the shattered car window. The car dragged her body forward at breakneck speed. Half of her beautiful, blood-stained face was stuck to the glass. The windshield wipers malfunctioned and swung erratically. An arm that had been severed from the car, with three fingers waving back and forth, seemed to be beckon to the troubled world, or perhaps to wave goodbye to a sinful fate.

With a loud crash, the car struck the well platform ahead. The immense inertia threw Tang Yuqing's body into the air, where it arced through the blood-red light before landing in the grass on the other side of the well.

I snapped out of my semi-conscious state, enduring excruciating pain, and crawled out of the car from the driver's seat. The stench of blood filled the air. The car's fuel tank had been punctured. I quickly took off my clothes, trying to plug the leak, but a viscous liquid splattered onto my face. My hands convulsed. The fuel leaking from the tank wasn't gasoline, but gushing, sticky, foul-smelling blood.

I silently stood up, and finally, in the grass in front of the well, I saw a faceless, limbless corpse dressed in wedding attire. She lay sprawled under an old locust tree, her face badly mutilated, shards of glass embedded in it, her long, thick black hair covering her face—a gruesome sight. The sight of her beauty, trampled in an instant, brought tears to my eyes. I gently lifted her head, hoping she was still alive.

The howling wind tousled her blood-stained hair, obscuring her beautiful face; only her bleeding red lips seemed to still tremble slightly. I knelt there, my hand pressed against her heart, though no blood flowed from it. That mechanical care was the only thing I could do for her. I knew I was holding nothing more than a resurrected shell, a lifeless corpse, yet my mind uncontrollably drifted to Yuqing's cheerful and beautiful face when we first met on campus.

"Yu Ling!..."

She suddenly moved and made a faint sound.

"Yuqing! It's me!... Why did you drive that car... to hit yourself?"

I shouted excitedly and picked her up, but then I didn't know how to put her down. All four of her limbs were broken, and her arms were mangled. Large patches of cold blood had spread to my chest, and the cold made me feel as if I were in an ice cave three feet below.

She still stubbornly made her voice heard:

"I'm sorry, I lied to you. I can't curse you to die... I'm so happy to be in your arms."

"Yuqing, can I save you? Do you need an ambulance...?"