Tao Rui took the female ghost to buy a compass, walked to an empty alley, put the compass on the ground, took out a few copper coins and placed them around to form a tracking array.
"Float up to the compass."
Tao Rui gave a command, and the ghost floated above the compass. She looked down at the coin and said, "Isn't this too simple? Will it work?"
As soon as she finished speaking, the needle on the compass vibrated slightly and suddenly pointed in one direction.
That direction was exactly the ghost girl's villa, and also the place where she died. Then the pointer began to tremble again, and began to change directions, and then stopped in one direction.
The ghost girl whispered, "You found it, right?"
"We found it. Let's go take a look." Tao Rui held the black umbrella over the back seat, allowing the ghost to sit back and watch the scenery unfold. She had been locked up in the villa for a year, resentful every moment of every day and night. Now, suddenly able to see the traffic and pedestrians outside, she felt as if she were in another world, and her emotions were greatly relieved.
Tao Rui placed the compass on the passenger seat and looked in the direction of the needle. The needle changed directions twice along the way, and Tao Rui took several detours before finding it. By the time he arrived, it was already dark.
The compass needle returned to its original position once it was in the correct position, no longer pointing in the right direction. Tao Rui looked around, then down at his feet. "This is the road to the nearby village. No one comes at night. I'll park my car by the roadside, climb down, and drop my belongings here where no one will find them. I can dispose of them later."
The main road is cement, but the small path around the bend is a dirt road. A row of trees lines the roadside, separating the fields from the road. The fields are even a meter lower than the road. This means that if someone hides something in this corner overnight, no one will find it.
He pointed his flashlight at the ground and saw that grass had grown there after a year. He said to himself, "Scan it."
[System: Brother Rui, the scan is complete. There are some burnt ashes buried in the soil. They were burned thoroughly, leaving only a small amount of residue.]
At this time, Tao Rui saw a basketball-sized stone next to him. He looked at the location and shone the flashlight carefully on the stone. After searching for a long time, he finally found some darker traces.
[System: Brother Rui, it's blood!]
Tao Rui: That's right. He threw the clothes here and weighed them down with a rock. There were some bloodstains on the rock. He didn't think anyone would find it, so he just rolled the rock in the dirt and didn't move it. After all, the more traces of handling, the easier it would be to reveal the truth. It was such an inconspicuous place, so no one would notice it.
The ghost girl saw his actions, her hair flying in the wind, "It's my blood! Yang Zhijie changed his clothes here!"
"Yes, I'm going to summon a ghost. Do you know what I should ask later?"
"What?" The ghost was stunned for a moment, her hair falling down. Then she saw Tao Rui take something out of the back of the car, walk to the center of the intersection, and start waving paper money. Then he used a cinnabar pen to draw a pattern on the ground that she couldn't understand, lit a piece of talisman paper, and began to burn the paper money.
The surrounding trees suddenly rustled and the wind blew, and then a ghost old man floated over, followed by a hanged ghost, a water ghost, and a headless ghost holding his head.
"There's food! It smells so good, let me eat something." The old ghost was a starving ghost, and he pounced on the paper money.
"Who am I? Where am I? Why did I suddenly float here uncontrollably?" The headless ghost seemed to be several beats slower in thinking after losing his head.
The water ghost was dripping wet all over. He lowered his head and said, "I'm popular. Be my scapegoat. Come into the water... Come into the water... Why can I leave the water now?"
The hanged ghost was silent. He saw the female ghost first and then screamed first, "Evil ghost! It's an evil ghost! Don't eat me!!"
The hanged ghost turned and ran away. The female ghost frowned and immediately rushed over to slap her back, shouting, "Shut up! What are you yelling about? Stand still, or I'll eat you!"
The female ghost was more powerful than them. The four ghosts were startled and looked at her in fear. "What are you going to do?" They looked at Tao Rui's posture and asked, "Are you raising a ghost?"
Tao Rui shook his head, "I just asked you to come and ask something."
"Why did I leave the water? Do I never have to go back?" The water ghost was most concerned about this and asked Tao Rui while staring at him.
Tao Rui was silent for a moment, "I'll perform rituals to help you attain salvation afterward."
The female ghost finally reacted. She looked at the black umbrella in Tao Rui's hand, which was floating around again, and asked in surprise, "Can I move freely now?"
"It's dark now, and I performed a ritual so you can move freely. After that, everything will be restored to its original state. Of course, if you don't hold grudges, I can help you to be reborn. Okay, let's get down to business." Tao Rui gave a brief explanation, then pointed to the spot where the stone had pressed down on the clothes and asked, "A year ago, around 4 a.m. on October 20th, did you see a car stop here? A man changed his clothes, and then he found time to come back and burn the clothes.
Or if you can't see this side, have you heard anyone mention anything? Are there any witnesses to the incident?"
The four ghosts looked at each other, and the hanged ghost said, "I was hanged on that tree over there. I don't know the date, but one day in the middle of the night, a man sneaked out of a car, wrapped up tightly and smelling of blood. He washed himself, changed his clothes, and left. The next night, he came back, burned everything, and burned a lot of paper money, and then gave me a good meal. I really have to thank him, because I haven't had a full meal in years."
The ghost asked anxiously, "What else did you see?"
"No more." The hanged ghost asked doubtfully, "If I hadn't been dead, I wouldn't have been able to see this far."
Tao Rui asked her, "Did you see his car? What color, make, license plate number, and anything else you can describe about his appearance at the time?"
The hanged man looked at the two of them and asked, "Did that man kill this sister?"
The ghost's eyes were bloodshot, and she gnashed her teeth and said, "I must kill him! He deceived me and killed my whole family. I want him dead!"
The water ghost raised his head and said grimly: "All unfaithful men deserve to die!"
The hanged ghost also said: "Yes, I was abandoned by others, and I was so depressed that I hanged myself. Woo woo woo, I was so stupid. I was only eighteen when I died..."
The ghost old man secretly took a sip of the paper money and nodded, "This man deserves to die, deserves to die."
The hanged ghost sobbed and tried to recall, and after a long while, he said, "I don't recognize the car. The license plate... It looks like 216. I remembered those three numbers because February 16th was my birthday. I didn't pay attention to the first one. That car was black." She looked at Tao Rui's car and said, "It's smaller than this one, a shabby car, similar to the cars in this village."
"What's the pattern on that car logo? Can you recognize it?" Tao Rui took out his cell phone to find the car logo and asked her to identify it.
The hanged man looked at it carefully for a while, pointed at a car logo and said, "This one, this one, I remember it was like this."
The headless ghost said slowly, "My neighbor said... after playing poker, he saw a will-o'-the-wisp and fell into a ditch. When he got up, he saw someone burning paper. Burning paper on the highway in the middle of the night, and it wasn't even from the village, it was terrifying."
The ghost immediately looked at him, "Who is your neighbor? Did he see Yang Zhijie's face? Can he recognize him?"
"...I don't know. He just said it was bad luck, that's all. He also told his kid to stay away from that place and not get involved with anything."
Tao Rui asked the headless ghost, "Where do you live? What's your neighbor's name?"
The headless ghost told him the address and added sheepishly, "I was buried in a wasteland. Li Dong moved here later and built a house next to mine, so I treated him as my neighbor."
Tao Rui was a little surprised. He looked at his condition and it was obvious that someone had chopped off his head, but he didn't turn into a ghost.
Tao Rui asked, "How did you die? How could you stay in the world of the living without any resentment or hatred?"
The headless ghost was stunned for a moment, then said, "Ah, I encountered a thug in the city. I bravely stood up for justice, and the thug came to retaliate against me, killing me and burying me. But I soon heard from passersby that the thug had fought with someone and was already dead. So I don't have any hatred for him anymore. It's just that no one knows where I was buried. My parents thought I was missing and went out to look for me, so I stayed here to wait for news from them."
Tao Rui was silent for a moment, then said, "I'll help you find them. You all go back first. I'll come back tomorrow."
"No, no, I just barely managed to get a bite to eat. Master, please let me follow you. Isn't there a ghost with you?" The ghostly old man suddenly floated to Tao Rui's side, begging him. He had starved to death, his obsession with food keeping him in the world. Nothing was more important than food.
The water ghost also looked up and said, "I don't want to go back. Please take me in."
When the headless ghost heard them say this, he touched the head in his arms and said, "I have been buried there for several years. Can you not let me go back? I can help you find clues. I know everyone in the village. Just let me move freely."
The hanged ghost also looked at Tao Rui eagerly, "I helped a lot, and you still want me to hang on the tree? Wuuwuwu..."
The female ghost looked at Tao Rui. Although she didn't say anything, Tao Rui understood immediately that she didn't want to go back either. She was trapped in that sad and hateful villa and didn't want to go back for even a second.
Tao Rui shrugged, "Okay, then all of you come home with me."
You can't burn paper money or attract ghosts in the car, so after he cleared the road, he opened the black umbrella and put it on the back seat of the car. Five ghosts were squeezed like pieces of paper, hiding under the black umbrella one by one.
As Tao Rui drove into the city, they gasped at the buildings and vehicles on either side. Even the most sinister and silent water ghosts stared outside. This was the taste of freedom, something they hadn't tasted in ages. Even though they had to hide under an umbrella and follow a master who could kill them at any moment, all to avenge a vicious ghost, they all felt incredibly lucky today.
When Tao Rui drove the car back home, they saw the beautiful garden, swimming pool, and large villa, and they felt that being an informant was worth it! They had never been to such a beautiful place in their lives!
The housekeeper came forward to take Tao Rui's black umbrella and asked curiously, "Is it raining outside? Mr. Tao, why are you holding an umbrella?"
Tao Rui shook his head and said, "Go back to your room and rest. I have something else to do."
"Okay." The butler immediately understood. After all, Tao Rui was a master, so doing strange things didn't seem strange at all. He wasn't afraid either. If he was, he wouldn't have come here to be a butler. Tao Rui said that he had a lot of yang energy and was immune to all kinds of evil.
Tao Rui stored a lot of crystal cores in the world of the end of the world. He put down his umbrella, buried the crystal cores in different locations in the yard, and set up formations. Soon, his entire villa became an area where ghosts could move freely.
As he put away his umbrella, he instructed, "Don't step outside the courtyard wall. You can do whatever you want, but don't scare my servants."
"I know, I know. Don't worry." The ghostly old man was the first to run out. He had lived in the village until he was over fifty, hadn't seen much of the world, and was eager to see what was going on. And besides, Tao Rui had just gone out for something. The villa was suddenly filled with the aroma of food. He wouldn't feel hungry no matter where he went. He could eat anytime, and he was so happy.
Except for the female ghost who was still with Tao Rui, the other four ghosts all floated around, quickly touring the villa and looking for things that interested them to study.
Tao Rui sent a message to Cao Heping, telling him that he had found the murderer's clothes and asked him to call back tomorrow.
The female ghost saw Tao Rui patiently searching for evidence bit by bit. She expressed her gratitude to him from the bottom of her heart and said earnestly, "Thank you. I haven't introduced myself yet. My name is Lu Yaxin."
Tao Rui already knew her name, but he still reached out and shook her hand. "Nice to meet you, Lu Yaxin."
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