As dusk fell, the lights of thousands of homes illuminated the night, the smoke from cigarettes curled in the air, and the murmur of voices could be faintly heard.

Such a scene too easily stirred up memories of those who had passed away. And for Gu Yan, such memories brought far more pain than heaviness--

Various fragments swirled chaotically in his mind, intertwining and overlapping. The faces that had once lived in every corner of the vast manor were still as vivid as ever one moment, and in the next instant became severed heads rolling under the glare of a cold, sharp blade, their hair in disarray, their faces ashen.

The gushing blood was crimson and hot, splattering on people's bodies and eyes, bringing knife-like pain, like a thorn in the flesh, difficult to remove, becoming the nightmare he could not escape day after day.

While others found it hard to suppress their homesickness under the full moon of the Mid-Autumn Festival, for him it was during the Ghost Festival, facing the fluttering ashes of paper money and two bundles of newly burned spirit money.

So when Su Kun walked into the room, what he saw was the little ghost withdrawing his empty gaze from the window, turning his face and silently crawling into that small coffin, once again enclosing himself in that space.

"Why does it like this little broken coffin so much..." Su Kun muttered under his breath, glancing outside again. There were still people returning from work one after another, holding yellow paper and burning it downstairs, the flames flickering, not knowing when they would go out.

He didn't know who the little ghost's so-called family members were, what their names were, let alone what they looked like. So besides burning a couple bundles of paper money for it, there was nothing he could do.

But even burning those two bundles was for naught, which truly left him a bit depressed. It wasn't that he was really upset about wasting the money spent on buying those things, but rather that he had originally thought doing so could make the little ghost feel a bit better.

Yet it ended up being such a blunder, and the little ghost seemed to be in an even worse mood. It was so foolish he couldn't bear to look directly at it.

Outside, the sky had completely darkened. Su Kun stared blankly at the coffin for a while.

It wasn't until Geng Zimo called out from the kitchen that the meal he had prepared before going downstairs was ready that Su Kun came back to his senses. He hurriedly locked the window latch, drew the curtains, and left the room.

Every year on this day, Su Kun would not linger too late. He would usually eat dinner, take a shower and go to bed early to avoid seeing the shadowy figures floating all over the streets late at night, unable to distinguish between humans and ghosts, scaring him so much he couldn't sleep well all night.

Gu Yan lay at the bottom of the thick coffin, the two stacks of paper money beside him, his hands behind his head. He could hear the movements outside clearly, including Su Kun's low mutter.

He didn't actually like this coffin. Although his current form was very small, in this similarly small space, there was only enough room to turn over normally. No one would enjoy staying in such a narrow and enclosed place. The only advantage he had over normal people was that in this sealed space, he didn't have to worry about suffocation.

If it were before, making him, someone used to being active, lie in such a place for most of the day, even if he showed no expression on his face, he would feel extremely agitated inside.

But it was different now. In this strange world, he wandered as a lonely soul, unable to reach the sky above or the earth below, passing through even copper walls and iron fences. He couldn't touch or feel anything, drifting aimlessly without an anchor.

He wanted to burn a stack of yellow paper for his family members whose souls were scattered who knows where, but he couldn't even pick up the paper itself. He wanted to follow the custom of releasing a river lantern for them by the river, but he couldn't hold a brush or write their names. This feeling was not much better than being blind or deaf, and was even harder to get used to.

He could ride with an iron horse and golden armor, sweating blood, fighting bravely all day long, his feet never touching the ground, his life never at peace. Such days were equally unsettled - one moment a warrior, the next a ghost on the battlefield; today still wielding spear, sword and shield, slaying enemies under his horse, an imposing figure, tomorrow perhaps wrapped in a horse hide as a corpse.

But he could not bear to be like he was now, even the blind and deaf could still be self-reliant, while he was like a useless person. Besides being filled with sorrow missing his deceased family and resentment hating the fatuous emperor, he was in a daze.

This sense of helplessness and powerlessness made the darkness in his heart grow wildly like weeds in the spring breeze.

Pain, melancholy, all kinds of complex and tangled emotions ultimately rushed towards a poisonous hatred. If not controlled, he felt that sooner or later he would become one of those ferocious ghosts depicted in the strange tales, not recognizing his relatives, hurting people and demanding lives without batting an eye.

In such a situation, the only thing that could calm him down was this coffin. Besides Su Kun's jade pendant, this was the only thing he could actually touch.

When he lay in this small and enclosed space, he didn't have to worry about accidentally passing through the bottom of the coffin and sinking down below. The solid hardwood bottom was coated with a thick lacquer, and the smooth, slightly cool touch was the only place in this world where he could feel secure and stable.

Although he didn't like locking himself inside, he was clear that he desperately needed such a space to quell his resentment and murderous intent.

Fortunately, this person who looked similar to the fatuous emperor was worlds apart from him in nature. Whether it was his foolish actions, clean and distinct eyes, the moods and thoughts almost always written on his face without concealment, or even his nagging and muttering to himself, they were slowly wearing down Gu Yan's guard, making him feel that the days in this strange world were not so bleak; the people of this strange world were much kinder than he thought.

He lay silently in the coffin for several days.

These past few days, Su Kun had been running back and forth between S University, the old district, and home. It wasn't too busy, but there definitely wasn't a lack of things to do. The first thing he did every day when he returned to the room was to glance at the coffin to see if the little ghost had come out.

Strangely, since taking the bundle of spirit money Su Kun had burned on the night of the Ghost Festival, it had crawled into the coffin and hadn't come out since. And the small coffin didn't seem very convenient to open from the outside. Coupled with Su Kun not having the guts to lift off someone's roof just like that, he could only look at it from time to time, feeling more and more strange.

He felt that he probably had the so-called Stockholm syndrome, or some other similar problem. The previous days he had been intentionally or unintentionally frightened by the little ghost every day, always on edge, unable to sleep well at night, wishing he could hurry up and invite the little ghost to leave, never to meet again in this life.

However, perhaps it was due to the Ghost Festival that day, but the little ghost's "thank you" had stirred up his nature of forgetting the bad and remembering the good, beaming endlessly with just a little sunshine.

It seemed that all of a sudden, he was no longer afraid of the little ghost. His heart, which had been constantly hanging in suspense, finally settled down after a peaceful night's sleep facing the coffin. He even vaguely began to have the horrifying thought, "If this little ghost always maintains such a calm and peaceful state, it might not be impossible for him to stay here forever."

Of course, as soon as this thought emerged, he immediately suppressed it. However, in the past few days, the little ghost had suddenly become well-behaved, staying quietly in the coffin without coming out to wander around or scare people.

Strangely, Su Kun felt a sense of inexplicable emptiness in his heart. That thought, which he had defined as a moment of horror, slightly resurfaced again.

Su Kun slowly withdrew his gaze from the coffin, staring at the computer screen in a daze. He twitched the corner of his mouth and cursed himself fiercely in his heart: "This damn kid! Are you sick or what..."