Thunder roared and struck down the vengeful ghost.
"What?" Xu Yi was still a little dazed. After her mind cleared, she looked around and saw fox demon corpses spreading outwards from her. The corpses were piled up, some as tall as three people... She was so frightened that she jumped up and asked Wu Zi with a pale face, "What...what...what's going on?"
Wu Zi supported his exhausted body with his arms before saying to Xu Yi, "It's all your fault, you did it."
"Me?" Xu Yi was surprised. She looked at the mutilated corpse beside her, the blood and body parts all over the ground making her face turn pale... She felt physically nauseous and started to vomit... She vomited for a long time but nothing came out...
She looked at Wu Zi in horror, stammering, "I...I did it?" Standing amidst the body parts, tears streaming down her face, she cried out, "How could this be? How could this be?"
Wu Zi waved his hand to comfort him, "It's alright... You only killed fox demons, you didn't hurt anyone else... This is a good thing, consider it a way to help them pass on."
"A ritual for the soul to be delivered?" Xu Yi choked up, mechanically repeating Wu Zi's words: "A ritual for the soul to be delivered? Is it a ritual for the soul to be delivered?"
“Yes,” Wu Zi nodded, “You have ended their evil lives. It’s a good thing for them, and it’s a good thing for you too. Don’t be afraid…”
"Don't be afraid, don't be afraid..." Xu Yi gradually calmed down with Wu Zi's comforting words, and then saw Wu Zi sit cross-legged and begin chanting incantations for salvation...
Xu Yi saw tiny yellow lights leap from the corpse, then gradually gather in the sky, drifting higher and farther away... She felt her soul shaken, and the burden in her heart lightened considerably...
After a long time, when all the corpses had stopped emitting any light, the fox demon's body vanished with the wind... The earth returned to its most ordinary appearance, the dark clouds in the sky dispersed, revealing the stars that had been hiding behind them... They twinkled and shone... as if everything had returned to normal...
In this perfectly still moment, Xu Yi and Wu Zi clearly felt the air vibrate, and then the surrounding air barriers cracked and shattered into powder...
The magic array has vanished… Wu Zi sighed, “It seems that the monk from many years ago foresaw this outcome, which is why he used the array to trap the fox demons…”
Xu Yi nodded in bewilderment.
Wu Zi stood up, dusted himself off, and was about to help Xu Yi up when a sudden clap of thunder roared from the sky, striking right in front of Wu Zi's feet... The force of the thunder knocked Wu Zi back more than ten steps before he could regain his footing... He stared in astonishment at the thunder, watching the lightning gather in the dark clouds, and then, startled, looked at Xu Yi...
Xu Yi sensed it even more keenly than Wu Zi. Looking at the lightning streaking through the dark clouds, Xu Yi was quite certain that it was coming for him...
Confused, she turned to Wu Zi and asked, "Why are these lightning bolts striking me? Didn't you say I did a good deed?" No sooner had she finished speaking than a bolt of lightning struck down from the sky, heading straight for Xu Yi… Xu Yi was struck and coughed up blood, and a chilling ghostly aura began to emanate from her body…
Seeing the ghostly aura emanating from Xu Yi, Wu Zi finally understood why there was heavenly lightning. He quickly roared at Xu Yi, "It's ghostly aura! You just unconsciously absorbed all the ghostly aura on the mountain. Heaven and earth must have sensed the ghostly aura on you to send down this lightning punishment..."
"Ghostly energy?" Xu Yi watched as the black gas emanating from her body slid to the ground, forming a thick black mist around her. She felt completely drained, so tired and sleepy... but she had a gut feeling that if she fell asleep, she would never wake up again, so she stubbornly kept her eyes open...
Just then, an even larger bolt of lightning struck her from the sky, causing excruciating pain in her internal organs... Unable to suppress the blood welling in her throat, she vomited onto the ground... Mouthfuls of blood gushed out continuously, soaking the grass in front of her...
The grass, stained with her blood, turned yellow instantly… She weakly looked up at Wu Zi: “Wu…Wu Zi…” She saw Wu Zi running towards her with bloodshot eyes, but every step he took was blocked by heavenly lightning, preventing him from getting any closer… She saw Wu Zi summon the mirror-like magical artifact and chant an incantation, but the artifact only trembled slightly on the ground and did not take flight… She saw Wu Zi bite his finger, and blood flowed like water from his fingertip towards the mirror… but the mirror only trembled more, still unable to fly…
Her heart sank; she knew Wu Zi couldn't save her...
A massive surge of energy gathered in the sky, coalescing into a bolt of lightning as thick as an arm, hurtling towards her... She knew perfectly well she would die from this thunderbolt. Weakly looking up at the approaching lightning, she was about to close her eyes and end this ghostly existence when she saw a wisp of golden energy shoot from between her brows, stopping the lightning just three inches from her eyebrow... The enormous lightning bolt and the wisp of golden light collided, and vanished silently into the air... Then the dark clouds in the sky dispersed, leaving not a trace...
The last wisp of golden light returned to her brow, transforming into a warm, comforting force that healed her body from top to bottom. Unable to hold on any longer, she collapsed... Afraid to sleep, she could only silently keep her eyes wide open, watching the bright stars twinkle in the sky...
"Xu Yi?" Wu Zi ran over in a few steps, helped her up, and asked anxiously, "How are you? How are you?"
She recalled the calm and indifferent gaze the mountain king had given her, and the words he had once spoken came to mind: "I will grant you an opportunity."
She weakly called out the name of the Mountain King, wanting to tell Wu Zi that it was the Mountain King who had saved her. Wu Zi leaned closer and, hearing the faint sound of the word "Mountain King," nodded with reddened eyes, forcing an awkward smile: "It's...it's the Mountain King, I know, I know..."
Only after hearing Wu Zi's words did she feel at ease and close her eyes, falling into a deep sleep.
She didn't know how long she had slept. When she woke up and opened her eyes, she found herself lying in a thatched hut. She looked at her no longer transparent body, touched the dry grass beneath her, and was just as she was wondering when she heard Wu Zi's voice: "You're awake?"
“Hmm,” she nodded, then deliberately patted the bed with her hand again, saying happily, “Wu Zi, I can touch the bed now.”
“Yes,” Wu Zi nodded with a smile, “It was a blessing in disguise. The lightning didn’t scatter you, but instead solidified the ghostly energy that was wandering in your body. Now you can touch objects like a normal person and can be seen by people.”
"Really? That's great!"
She skipped off the bed, walked past Wu Zi, and ran quickly outside. She stretched out her palm and saw the sunlight resting steadily on her hand, no longer penetrating her fingers to fall to the ground... Overjoyed, she turned and ran towards Wu Zi at the door, shouting, "Wu Zi, I'm pregnant!"
Seeing Xu Yi jumping around excitedly, Wu Zi laughed along, but still corrected her: "This doesn't count as a body. It's just that your ghostly energy has solidified so that people can see you and touch things in the human world."
"Oh, is that so? That's good too. I'm becoming more like a human being."
Wu Zi smiled and agreed, "Yes, it looks more human now."
Xu Yi happily spun around in place when she heard someone call her: "Miss Xu".
She stopped and looked at the person who had come in: "Chenchen, are you alright?"
"Yes," Chenchen nodded deeply, "I must thank you for saving me, young lady." He then bowed to her.
In her drowsy state, she had already recalled her actions as a vengeful ghost, and smiled shyly: "It was just a coincidence, but I ended up scaring you. I'm really sorry."
He chuckled softly and said tactfully, "Miss Xu can be quite frightening when she's angry, but since you saved me, thank you anyway."
"You're welcome, you're welcome." She waved her hand generously.
Chenchen then turned to Wu Zi: "Brother Wu, the villagers know that you have eliminated the demon and want to thank you, so they have set up a banquet at the village chief's house. We hope you will do us the honor of attending."
"Is there food?" Xu Yi's eyes lit up, and she ran over to Wu Zi, wanting to go with him.
Seeing Xu Yi's bright eyes, Wu Zi nodded in agreement: "You can come with me, but since you don't have a shadow now, be careful when you walk and look in the mirror, don't scare the villagers."
"Okay." Xu Yi nodded quickly.
"You must also control yourself and not turn into a vengeful ghost again."
"Mm." Xu Yi nodded again.
"Let's go then," Wu Zi said, taking Xu Yi's hand and leading her toward the village chief's house.
After a joyful thank-you dinner, Wu Zi took Xu Yi back to the house from earlier that day. He set up a formation around the house before saying to Xu Yi, "Try again to see if you can turn back into a vengeful ghost."
"Huh? Okay, I'll try..." Xu Yi kept imagining what she would look like as a vengeful ghost, but no matter how she imagined it, her body didn't change at all... Xu Yi was speechless: "I can't turn back... What's going on?"
"Think back to how you became a vengeful ghost, and try to reconstruct your feelings at that time?"
"Back then? Back then I saw Chenchen being drained of her life force by the fox demon. No matter how much I shouted for them to stop, it was no use, so..." As Xu Yi spoke, she clearly felt a strong sense of resentment and anger rising within her body. Then her hair and nails began to grow wildly, gradually resembling the image of the vengeful ghost in her memory...
"Alright, Xu Yi, stop thinking about it. Forget about the scene you just remembered," Wu Zi quickly stopped her.
“Okay,” Xu Yi nodded, taking a few deep breaths to suppress the resentment and anger that had just welled up inside her… But after a while, Xu Yi saw her fingernails and hair growing wildly, and waves of ghostly energy emanating from her body and surrounding her… The more she tried to control it, the less she could…
Xu Yi panicked: "Wu Zi, what should we do? I... I can't control this ghostly energy... My hair is still growing, and so are my nails, what should I do, what should I do?"
"You...you stay conscious and forget those emotions. Think about other scenes, like the twinkling stars in the sky, the glistening water droplets on the grass, and the delicious food you just ate..." Wu Zi hurriedly said.
"Delicious?" Xu Yi quickly focused her attention on the food she had just eaten... recalling what the food looked like and savoring its taste...
After a long, long time, the negative emotions in her heart slowly faded and dissipated... Xu Yi quickly raised her hand, and only after seeing her normal fingers did she breathe a long sigh of relief...
Wu Zi was even more nervous than Xu Yi, because Wu Zi had absolutely no way to deal with Xu Yi's vengeful ghost form. He could only secretly resolve not to let Xu Yi turn back into a vengeful ghost form again...
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