Xie Yuting chased after it, and I followed closely behind, with Da Xiong running last, carrying Liang Qian on his back.

Catching the faint white light reflecting off the ice, I saw a figure with disheveled hair; by its build, it seemed to be a woman.

But after taking a couple of steps, I suddenly noticed something—my legs instantly went weak with fright, and I couldn't run at all.

Because I saw that the woman wasn't running! Her feet were lifted off the ground; she was practically floating along.

Da Xiong abruptly stopped too, shouting, "Xie Yuting, stop chasing! That's a goddamn ghost!"

To be honest, after everything I’d experienced up to this point, I had developed a certain resistance to things like zombies and monsters, but when it came to ghosts, I had absolutely zero defense. Those intangible, unexplainable things could always strike the deepest nerve of fear within you.

And a ghost appearing in this ancient village must surely be one of the vengeful spirits of the Wei people. I imagined her having a monstrous face covered in hair, wandering this deserted village for two thousand years, and the hair all over my body stood on end.

I saw that Xie Yuting showed no sign of stopping. He was closer to the female specter than we were, so he must have seen her more clearly. Why wasn't he scared? Did he really think he was invincible just because he was holding an Evil-Slaying Blade?

Though I was terrified, I was more worried about his safety, so I forced myself to follow, but Da Xiong flat-out refused to move forward anymore. I knew that he, who usually feared nothing on earth, was most afraid of ghosts.

The ghostly figure drifted towards the room with the light on at an incredible speed. Although Xie Yuting was running fast, he couldn't catch up at all.

From a distance, I saw the shadow slip into the house, while Xie Yuting stopped not far from the entrance.

When I finally jogged up, breathless, Xie Yuting blocked me and asked, "Did you see that thing clearly?"

I nodded, my face pale, and said, "It was a floater... I never thought ghosts were real."

Xie Yuting shook his head and said, "Ghosts don't bleed... Look." He pointed to a trail of dark spots on the ground.

When I looked, sure enough, there were some darkened smears, and a faint scent of blood hung in the air around them.

Faced with this bizarre situation, I was completely stunned. I thought to myself, this isn't some anti-gravity space; if that person wasn't a ghost, how could she float? Was this some kind of special ability of the Wei people?

The ghostly figure made no sound after entering the room. I followed closely behind Xie Yuting as we cautiously crept toward the window.

We crouched low, hugging the wall, and slowly made our way beneath the window.

I saw that Xie Yuting’s hand holding the blade was white from gripping it too tightly; his face was as pale as the ice, and he looked extremely tense.

Then he whispered to me, "You stand up and check the situation inside the room..."

I shook my head like a rattle drum and told him, "I'm too timid; you go first. If you scare yourself to death, I'll call an ambulance for you..."

Xie Yuting gave a slight smile, took a deep breath, and stood up, brandishing his blade.

I looked up at his face, trying to decipher something in his expression.

But all I could see was the yellow lamplight illuminating his features, giving him a flickering appearance, his expression shifting between dark and uncertain.

Thinking he was frozen with fear, I tugged at his trouser leg and asked, "Xie Yuting, what's wrong?"

Xie Yuting made a sharp sound and said, "There's no one in here..."

I thought to myself, I clearly saw the shadow go in; how could it be empty? He must be trying to trick me into looking inside, but I wouldn't fall for it.

After watching for a while and seeing that I was still stubbornly squatting on the ground, his expression grew grave, and he told me, "Hurry, let's go in and look."

He pulled me up, and the two of us walked in through the front door. Upon entering, indeed, the room was deserted.

This room was slightly more spacious than the one we had previously entered. The furnishings were still simple. In the middle of the room sat an oval-shaped slab of gray stone. The surface was smooth but bore the marks of chopping and hacking, suggesting it had been used to cut up something in the past.

Resting on this stone slab was a miner's lamp, emitting a faint yellow glow.

This lamp was the type encased in glass all around with a 200-watt bulb in the center, a handheld lantern. Since it ran on batteries, it was definitely modern equipment.

This implied someone had reached this place before us, but they had vanished now.

Beside the miner's lamp lay a backpack and some plastic packaging bags. I walked over and was overjoyed to find crackers and instant noodles!

Those junk foods I used to disdain in the dorm—the taste now brought such nostalgia. It had been several days since I had eaten anything proper or slept a full night; I felt my nerves were on the verge of collapse.

Xie Yuting picked up an unopened package of instant noodles and said to me, "This was left by the survey team."

Seeing these things, I suddenly felt as if I had tossed the horror of moments ago to the back of my mind. I opened a can of cola and took a drink. The taste hit my mouth, and I nearly cried from emotion. I had never tasted such delicious cola in my life; I felt like a savage.

Xie Yuting didn't stop me. He was a very self-controlled person. Although I saw him swallowing hard several times, he pretended to be unconcerned and began examining the backpack. Inside, he found some glow sticks, a coil of nylon rope, and a few bullets.

While he checked the backpack, I examined every item displayed in the room. There were also some mask-like decorations on the walls, but they were all wooden and mostly decayed, so it was impossible to tell what they originally looked like.

The most attention-grabbing item was a square stone altar tucked into the corner farthest from the wall. On the altar sat a round disk that appeared to be made of bronze.

Curiosity piqued, I walked over to inspect it closely. I found the disk's design very strange; it was quite plump, and viewed from the side, it looked somewhat like a flying saucer from a TV show. In the center of this 'flying saucer' were two symmetrical, small circular holes.

"What is this thing? Do they have to enshrine it on an altar..." I turned to ask Xie Yuting.

Xie Yuting had already put the food back into the backpack and slung it over his shoulder. He took a swig from a bottle of mineral water, then came over to my side to look at the object too.

As the two of us intently studied it, the surroundings suddenly fell silent, and then I heard a very eerie sound.

"Thump-thump... thump-thump..." It sounded like a heartbeat...

I glanced at Xie Yuting beside me; he looked back at me too. We both knew this heartbeat wasn't ours, but was coming from the wall opposite us.

"What's going on? Is there someone inside the wall?" I whispered to Xie Yuting.

We both moved toward the wall following the sound, then pressed our ears against it. After listening for a moment, Xie Yuting shook his head at me.

But I pointed at the disk on the stone altar and said, "It seems to be this... Could this be some kind of mechanism, and that person just opened some passage and escaped?"

Xie Yuting seemed to have noticed the strangeness of the disk as well. Just as he reached out to touch it, there was a loud "Bang!" of a gunshot from outside the door. The disk in front of us was shattered to pieces, and some reddish fluid splattered onto the wall. I smelled a scent of warm, fresh blood.

"Don't touch that thing..." A woman stood at the doorway, telling us weakly. Judging by her voice, she could collapse at any moment.