The startled Comrade Su Kun was still a bit dazed, staring foolishly as Geng Zimo took out a hammer, steel rod, boxing gloves, and a massage stick from the cabinet filled with various odds and ends...

"Wait! There's something strange mixed in there!" Su Kun's wandering mind was finally called back by the magical massage stick. His mouth opened wide enough to swallow an egg as he looked at Geng Zimo with an even more stupid expression than before.

His trembling finger pointed at the black stick: "You actually secretly keep this kind of thing?! Wouldn't it be unsanitary to put it here?!" Σ(っ °Д °;)っ

Geng Zimo: "..." He also really wanted to know why there would be this kind of thing in the odds and ends cabinet! And did this guy grab the wrong point again...

Facts proved that fighting poison with poison was always the most effective method. After being startled twice in a row, upon remembering that the toolbox and miscellaneous items in this cabinet were all left by the landlord, Su Kun instantly regained his composure.

He patted the misunderstood Geng Zimo and said, "I'll go make dinner." With that, he rolled into the kitchen in a flash to avoid being beaten up one-sidedly.

Li City had been experiencing sustained high temperatures recently. The sultry weather made the house feel like a steamer, and the hottest place besides the sun-drenched balcony was the kitchen. The temperature in the past few days made people too lazy to move and lacking appetite.

Moreover, every time Su Kun entered the kitchen, he felt like he had been boiled, so their dinners were generally kept as simple as possible.

Geng Zimo came back early today and put the congee on to simmer. At this time, the kitchen was filled with the fragrance of rice porridge. The heavy rain outside had lessened and was estimated to stop in a few minutes. Seeing that it was no longer raining heavily, Su Kun opened the window halfway. The damp, cool air from the rain instantly poured in, and the originally hot and stuffy kitchen quickly became much more comfortable, lifting people's moods as well.

Taking a small pumpkin from the cupboard, Su Kun began to busy himself. Although on weekdays when drinking congee, it was usually paired with some pickled vegetables, when there was enough time and he was in a good mood, Su Kun would make some snacks, changing up the variety and rarely repeating, either sweet or savory. Paired with the fragrant and glutinous rice porridge, they were invariably delicious.

His movements were very skilled - shredding, salting, draining, adding flour, mixing seasonings, all handled in an orderly manner with perfect timing. By the time Geng Zimo came to the kitchen to take a peek while getting water, he had already started frying. The pumpkin shred cakes slowly changed color in the pan, the edges turning crisp and golden, and the aroma instantly filled the kitchen.

Geng Zimo picked up chopsticks and bowls with satisfaction, waiting to eat.

But who knew, after Su Kun put a plate of freshly fried pumpkin cakes on the dining table, instead of sitting down, he threw out a sentence "You eat first" and went into his own bedroom, leaving Geng Zimo baffled, not knowing whether to eat or wait.

Just as Geng Zimo was staring at the golden crispy pumpkin cakes pretending to be aloof, Su Kun was standing in front of the bedside table in the bedroom, engaged in a staring contest with that deep brown coffin.

While frying the cakes in the kitchen earlier, he couldn't help recalling what happened before. He replayed the little ghost's entire movements over and over in his mind. No matter how he thought about it, the conclusion was "that little ghost was indeed helping him remove the watermelon seeds stuck to his face".

This was not scientific!

Obviously in their previous encounters, that little ghost almost always had red eyes, staring at his neck all the time, clearly thinking about how to quickly and fiercely twist it off.

How could it suddenly change in just one night? If it weren't for the memory of nearly being strangled to death before, Su Kun would almost think this was heading towards a loving development.

But no matter what, in Su Kun's view, the little ghost's actions were a kind of indirect active goodwill. For someone like Su Kun, who would beam brilliantly with a little sunshine and follow the stick after being beaten, he must reciprocate the goodwill doubly, preferably wiping away any residual hostility in the little ghost's heart so it would no longer harbor thoughts of killing him.

If it could consciously take that little broken coffin and leave together, letting him suffer fewer scares in the future, that would be even better _(:з」∠)_

Therefore, after finishing dinner, he stood dazedly in front of the coffin, intending to show daily care to soften the little ghost.

He wanted to call the little ghost out, but after opening his mouth, he realized that he seemed to still not know the little ghost's name and had no idea how to address it. He twitched the corner of his mouth and hesitated for a moment before finally knocking on the coffin lid in the manner of knocking on a door.

After the third knock, the coffin lid slid open halfway and the little ghost poked its head out, looking at him expressionlessly. Its body was semi-transparent, the outline very faint and the color very pale. Only those eyes were a sheet of ink-black, and Su Kun could see his own face reflected in them.

"Um..." Su Kun found that this seemed to be the first time he had actively sought out the little ghost to talk without being startled. He was even a bit nervous. He cleared his throat, intending to ask: do you need me to burn or offer anything to you. But the words that came out became: "Are you hungry? Do you want to eat something?"

The expressionless little ghost: "..."

Su Kun hurriedly explained: "I mean, what do you usually eat?" Damn, the more he explained, the weirder it sounded!

The little ghost's dark eyes stared at him: "Eat... what?"

"Oh, stop!" Su Kun felt chills down his spine from the stare, his hair standing on end. He immediately made a pause gesture: "...That, that, I suddenly don't want to know anymore." =_=

The little ghost continued to stare at him: "..."

Su Kun: "..." QAQ

"I, I was wrong, pretend I never came in. You, you were sleeping inside just now? Then continue, continue hahahahaha..." He laughed with a mourning expression while quickly dashing out of the bedroom, looking as if someone had lit his pants on fire.

As he bounced out, he didn't forget to turn off the bedroom light. Until that crazy-looking back disappeared out the door and turned into the dining room, Gu Yan still maintained his posture of poking his head out, looking a bit blankly at where Su Kun had just been standing.

Just now, it seemed... he had scared someone away again?

The reason it says "again" is because before Su Kun, when General Gu was still alive, the number of people scared away by him was simply countless.

The root of this situation lies in Gu Yan's habit, which is hard to say whether it's good or bad. Whenever others talk to him, he always habitually stares into the other person's eyes. On one hand, it shows that he listens very attentively; on the other hand, he can also tell from the speaker's eyes whether their words are true or false, and how credible they are.

It's just that he himself has sharp sword-like eyebrows, and the corners of his eyes are slightly upturned, giving him a fierce and ruthless look. Moreover, in most cases, he doesn't have much facial expression, making him appear even more unapproachable. Those wolf-like deep eyes always give people an inscrutable feeling.

In the past, when leading troops into battle, if his deputy or subordinates were stared at by him for too long, they would often unconsciously stand at attention, tense up, and subconsciously suspect if they had done something stupid again. Those who were up to no good would feel a bit guilty, hanging by a thread, not knowing how much had been seen through. Those with slightly poorer mental fortitude, such as Comrade Su Kun who was scheming to have him take his coffin and leave, would directly flee in panic.

In fact, Gu Yan didn't think that much at all. He was just a bit stunned by Su Kun's questioning and didn't know how to answer.

After all, for Gu Yan, he merely lost consciousness for a period of time amidst the excruciating pain of slow slicing. When he woke up again, he had already arrived in this unfamiliar world. Before he had time to accept and adapt, he had turned into a wisp of a soul. He had no idea how a soul was supposed to live, with no one to ask and no object of reference.

Apart from finding that fatuous emperor to exact revenge, he couldn't even find a reason for him to linger in this world without being cast into reincarnation.

Besides this coffin, the only connection he could find between this mortal world and himself was Su Kun. Whether it was his face that closely resembled that fatuous emperor, or that strange warm current-like aura on his body...

Thinking of this, Gu Yan suddenly remembered that when Su Kun had just returned earlier, he had actually emerged from the coffin to say something. It's just that he was distracted by Su Kun's bloody wide-open mouth and that watermelon seed, so he forgot. But now he remembered again...