Raising the Evil Spirit

饲鬼

raising-the-evil-spirit

Doubts and Suspicions

This was the largest hospital in Li City, with a certain history.
The high and low buildings were enclosed in a large courtyard, with early low-rise buildings and newly built high-rises in later years. With different functions and staggered layouts, the tallest inpatient building had a total of 18 floors.
Looking at the windows with twinkling lights on that building, Gu Yan knew that he would not be able to go through every corner here in a short time, and naturally would not be able to absorb all the remnant soul fragments.
He was not a greedy person. He only planned to circle around the entire courtyard a few times this night and devour all the remnant fragments encountered in the yard. As for those in the buildings, that would be dealt with later.
It had to be said that the resources in a place like a hospital were indeed exceptionally abundant. Just the remnants left in the corners of the courtyard were already equivalent to the amount of several days.
After swallowing the last remnant fragment in the courtyard, Gu Yan could even clearly feel the change in his own strength.
He lowered his head and stared at his hands, whose contours had become much clearer, for a long time. Suddenly, he somewhat missed the feeling of his back being in contact with the ground when he had enlarged before...
Unfortunately, after returning to his current state, he tried several times but could not change back. He didn't know if it was because he lacked the same emotional fluctuations as before, or if he hadn't mastered the knack of controlling the changes at will.
However, after devouring so many remnant souls and having quite abundant strength all over his body, would he be able to have even the slightest bit of sensation even if he didn't enlarge?
He raised his head, looked at the courtyard wall in front of him, and after a moment of hesitation, tried to reach out his hand.
When his fingertips were about to touch the wall, Gu Yan almost subconsciously held his non-existent breath. He first paused his movement, slightly frowning, putting all his attention on his fingertips, for fear that he would miss that not-so-obvious feeling with a moment of negligence.
Then he continued to reach out his hand. He watched his fingers touch the wall, and then slowly...
Sink into the wall. =_=
Let alone sensation, there wasn't even a hint of sluggish obstruction. It was as effortless as when he had rolled into the neighboring house from Su Kun's home.
Gu Yan stared at his exposed wrist in silence for a moment, and unwilling to give up, he continued to float forward.
A few seconds later, with his left half of the body in the wall and his right half exposed outside, Gu Yan's face, which originally had a bit of expression, collapsed again: "..." Still no feeling at all.
Maintaining this bizarre state of being half a person, he silently floated from this side of the wall to the other side, and then from the other side, floated back again.
This way of pacing that ordinary people could not do at all finally stopped when he saw Su Kun coming out of the emergency building entrance.
Crawling out from the wall, Gu Yan floated towards Su Kun's direction while reaching out his thumb to wipe the corner of his mouth, lest there be anything unclean left, causing Su Kun to look at him with an expression as if he had swallowed a horse alive and was choking speechlessly.
No matter what, he could accept alienation and fear caused by any reason, but he was particularly averse to being regarded as a monster, especially by Su Kun who was somewhat special to him.
Although his current state was indeed no different from a demon - even though he was already dead, he was still wandering in this unfamiliar world; even though his heartbeat had long ceased, he still clung to the delusion of regaining his life. But he didn't like being reminded and made to remember this fact through people's gazes and eyes.
This was probably what they called a sore spot.
Su Kun hopped down the steps in front of the outpatient building on one foot with the support of Geng Zimo and the car owner. Seeing that he was steady, the car owner let go, picked up the car keys and went to the parking lot.
This hospital was well-known for being busy in Li City. From registration to payment to getting medicine, there was no place that did not require queuing. The car owner had originally determined that even if Su Kun was not deliberately trying to scam him, he must be someone who didn't care about harming others at his own expense.
Who knew that neither Su Kun nor his companion Geng Zimo asked him for a cent of medical expenses, but instead urged him to leave several times, telling him to go back to wherever he should go and not wander around with them.
The car owner, who probably had some masochistic qualities in his nature, not only did not pursue Geng Zimo's somewhat disdainful tone, but instead changed his view of Su Kun and the others. He belatedly felt that he had probably misunderstood them.
So he willingly stayed to help queue, support Su Kun, and even took the initiative to offer to drive Su Kun and Geng Zimo home in the end.
As soon as the car owner left, the obstructed view opened up, and Su Kun almost immediately saw Gu Yan floating towards him.
After Zhang Fuquan treated the big and small cuts on his body, he received a phone call and said goodbye to Su Kun before leaving first. Su Kun looked around. At this time, besides Geng Zimo, there was no one else around him.
So, just as he was about to lower his voice and ask, "Why did you follow me here too?" he felt a coolness in his chest.
Su Kun subconsciously lowered his head, only to see a short, small hand entering his white T-shirt. From the slightly open neckline, one could see that translucent paw pressing on the jade pendant.
The dead gay classmate Su silently turned his face away: "..." Fuck, this little ghost's chest-assaulting skills are getting more and more proficient!
With the concept of not wasting a single drop as long as it was food, Gu Yan did not let go of the remnant souls attached to Su Kun's jade pendant even after devouring all the remnant souls in the entire courtyard. However, the amount on this jade pendant was not small, much more than usual, which was inseparable from the nature of the hospital itself.
As the coolness of the jade pendant slowly weakened, Su Kun, who finally turned his head back, discovered that the transparency of the little ghost had changed again. It was not only brighter than the previous days, but also brighter than before on the road. The lines were not so faint either.
This made Su Kun recall the previous scene - the enlarged Gu Yan's appearance was much more distinct than his miniaturized form, with clear contours, looking not much different from a normal person.
If it weren't for that cold body temperature and the completely motionless chest, Su Kun was almost deceived by that real touch into thinking he had come back to life again.
He was pulled back by the inertia, serving as a meat cushion for Su Kun. His muscles all over his body were hard with a sense of fullness. Although not soft, it was much more comfortable than directly falling on the ground. Due to the pulling of the action, the neckline and front of his entire shirt became loose, vaguely revealing just the right amount of pectoral muscles...
Wait! It seems to have gone in a strange direction! _(:з」∠)_
The gay Su Kun hurriedly suppressed his wandering thoughts, coughed a couple of times to compose himself, thanked the driver who had pulled up to the curb, and then pulled Geng Zimo into the back seat.
The car windows were tinted with a film, allowing those inside to see out but preventing those outside from seeing in clearly. Su Kun felt a bit drowsy from the gentle rocking of the moving car, while unabashedly staring out the window at the expressionless little ghost floating alongside the car all the way home, his mind seemingly both chaotic and blank at the same time.
Perhaps it was due to the effectiveness of the hospital medication, or Su Kun's own strong cockroach-like physique and self-healing ability, but after just two or three days of recuperating at home, the swelling had completely subsided and he could move around normally again.
Fortunately, it happened to be a weekend, so Geng Zimo was home and could basically take care of many things for Su Kun.
However, while it was one thing to ask for help with high-difficulty tasks like taking a shower, Su Kun wasn't very accustomed to relying on others for trivial little things.
So for small tasks like rummaging through the computer desk drawer for a pair of headphones or grabbing the nail clippers from the living room coffee table, he mostly still hopped around and did them himself.
Little did he know that his actions and behaviors had a significant emotional impact on Gu Yan.
Ever since Gu Yan had the epiphany on the street that "Su Kun is an extraordinary person, and no matter what, he must protect him in order to feel more of life's existence," he felt that his heart had undergone some changes.
To be precise, he wasn't a particularly passionate person - back then, he had poured all his hot-blooded passion onto the battlefield and horseback, to the point that when there were no battles and he was far from that chaotic land, he was like finally calmed water, rarely stirred by even a ripple of emotion, sometimes even appearing too cold-hearted.
It was the same after coming to this world; aside from his hatred for that fatuous emperor, he seldom experienced emotional fluctuations.
But over the past two days, when he watched Su Kun lift his foot wrapped like a pig trotter and hop around in and out of the room, he rarely felt a strange sensation.
Of course, it didn't reach the level of pity or heartache, but he suddenly felt a bit of regret: if only he could touch objects, then he could occasionally lend a hand and save this person from living so strenuously.
This indirectly intensified Gu Yan's desire to regain a physical body, and also indirectly led him to escalate his "chest assault" on Su Kun.
His increasingly skilled movements caused the clueless gay Su Kun to feel a bit awkward in his helplessness, because during the two days and three nights he was recuperating at home, he dreamed almost every day of an adult version of Gu Yan, with a deadpan face somewhat similar to his little form, unhesitatingly reaching his paws towards his chest.
This was really...
Fucking terrifying! QAQ
But what he was thankful for was that such dreams didn't last long, disappearing without a trace along with the healing of his foot injury.
The day his foot could move, Su Kun couldn't sit still. He started fiddling with his almost-there entrepreneurial grand plan again.
However, the infant spirit he encountered that day forced him to have a shred of doubt about the owner of the bean paste shop, Zhang Fuquan. Although at the hospital, Zhang Fuquan had roughly explained to Su Kun the reason he knew something was chasing him - apparently it was because he didn't pay attention to the rules when visiting the ancestral cemetery in his hometown during Qingming Festival this year.
At first he didn't notice, but later something happened in his hometown, and he realized something was wrong, so he had to ask a master for help. The master he invited was the man who had dinner with him at the private cuisine restaurant that day.
But Su Kun still had some reservations.
However, the little ghost had already been swallowed by Gu Yan, so even if there were deeper hidden details, it was probably impossible to find out. Therefore, Su Kun had no choice but to temporarily put this knot aside.

Raising the Evil Spirit

Raising the Evil Spirit

Chapter 34 - Doubts and Suspicions

Night