Mysterious Revival

Suburbs.

Tonight, the silence here was terrifying. On the nearby asphalt road, not a single vehicle had passed for several hours. The silence engulfed everything around, only occasionally broken by sparse whispers emanating from a few figures huddled under the dim streetlight.

An area within ten kilometers had already been sealed off, with the living forbidden to set foot here—no exceptions.

At the heart of this sealed area, a fierce ghost codenamed Ghost Envoy roamed. Any ordinary person passing by could potentially trigger the Ghost Envoy's loss of control.

Only those possessed by spirits, capable of controlling fierce ghosts, were qualified to enter this seemingly ordinary but extremely dangerous forbidden land.

And tonight, the operation to detain the Ghost Envoy was underway.

The atmosphere all around was oppressive.

The number of people in charge of this operation was small, just five in total.

Li Jun was one of them.

This operation required the use of the Ghost Domain, and also needed a lead ghost manipulator who had encountered the Ghost Envoy, making him a very suitable candidate, but not the most suitable one.

The other three, both men and women, looked somewhat familiar—all top-tier ghost manipulators who had previously attended meetings at the headquarters.

Though few in number, every individual who had made it here from across the country was far from simple, especially those experienced in dealing with ghosts—they were experts in their field.

They were the elite remaining after many ghost manipulators had been eliminated, each with a story that could fill a terrifying horror novel.

"They're here," suddenly, a man squatting and smoking on the ground muttered, his hoarse and low voice echoing in the surroundings.

Almost simultaneously, the others also received corresponding information.

The ghost codenamed Ghost Painting had been successfully lured and was moving this way.

Everything was proceeding exactly as planned.

A chill went through everyone's heart; their faces, sickly pale, were filled with solemnity, for this signal meant that tonight's operation was unavoidable.

No one could be certain of the unknown changes that would result from the collision of two S-class supernatural events.

According to Professor Wang's deductions, there was a high probability of resolving one event, but he also mentioned a small chance of triggering a chain reaction, causing both events to spiral out of control, with great risks involved.

Although preparations had been made for a loss of control, those who would actually come into contact with the ghost were always in grave danger.

Li Jun stood straight under the streetlamp, repeating the same phrase to the others, regardless of whether they were listening or not, "Everyone, remember, all our ghosts combined are nothing compared to the Ghost Envoy. Once targeted by the Ghost Envoy, we are all isolated. However, according to the latest information from Yang Jian, the fundamental rules of the Ghost Envoy were forcefully altered at the original training base, creating a slight change in the 'isolation equals death' scenario."

"The Ghost Envoy will prioritize attacking ordinary people without ghosts. As for whether individuals possessed by a ghost will become targets, no one can be sure. That thing is constantly changing; from Huanggang Village to the laboratory, then to the training base, and now… So our mission is very simple."

"Avoid direct contact, wait for an opportunity. If no opportunity arises, then we do nothing during this operation."

After the failure of Wang Xiaoming's personal attempt to detain the Ghost Envoy, the headquarters had realized the severity of the situation and opted for the most conservative approach. Even if detaining fails, they cannot continue to send people to their deaths.

Otherwise, if a few more ghost manipulators died, the Ghost Envoy would truly become an unsolvable supernatural event.

"To put it simply, we're hoping that the ghost codenamed Ghost Painting can suppress the Ghost Domain of the Ghost Envoy, and then seize the chance to detain," said a man of average appearance squatting on the ground playing with his phone, lifting his head to reveal a pale, feeble smile.

It was like a corpse smiling, eerie and chilling.

"What really intrigues me is that Yang Jian isn't part of the operation this time. I'd prefer him as a partner over you. It's said that his Ghost Domain can now even counter-invade the Ghost Coffin. Li Jun, you can't do that, can you?" a woman with heavy makeup spoke.

Her blusher was so vividly red it looked strangely like blood about to drip down her face.

"Ghost Eye Yang Jian? Heh, that guy is a hothead. The headquarters don't trust him much. The more crucial the matter, the less likely he is to be involved. Eight times out of ten, if he works alone, he messes up," another man leaning against a nearby flickering streetlight sneered.

But Li Jun calmly stated, "Yang Jian... is a very special person. He's rebellious and not easily constrained. We are a bit more steady."

In the time it took to speak,

the quiet surroundings gradually began to turn to a hazy grey, and from the sky continuously fell some seemingly insubstantial things, like grey fog concreting, or as if clumps of cold, gloomy air. It took only a blink of an eye for everything around to be enveloped by the haze, and all that the naked eye could see had changed.

There was no color here anymore, even the dim, yellow streetlights were now grey, and they too were covered in this stuff.

Someone stretched out a hand to catch a cluster of the substance that floated in front of their eyes, lightly rubbed it in their hand, leaving a grey trace on their palm.

"This is... paper ash?" The person exclaimed softly, finding it somewhat inconceivable.

Originally, this hazy everything was formed by the drifting dispersion of ashes left after something had burnt.

"This is the Ghost Domain drawn by ghost painting."

Li Jun deeply furrowed his brow, "It seems Leuk San was much faster than anticipated; he's successfully lured the ghost painting here."

"Based on our previous judgment, there were no paintings nearby, nor had we seen any artwork, so it's highly likely we could avoid becoming a target of the ghost painting, and at the same time, this Ghost Domain could possibly suppress the Ghost Envoys, so everyone had better prepare in advance."

Looking at the constantly falling ashes around, the world had completely changed its appearance, and for some reason, Li Jun felt even more weighed down than before.

The ghost had not yet appeared.

But just the covering of Ghost Domain already exuded an air of despair like the day of reckoning.

In this hazy world, there was no vitality, no living creatures, only deathly silence, and the ash that seemed to fall endlessly.

"There's no need for discussion, if things go south, we bail." The man who had been playing with his phone stopped his actions and slowly stood up.

"Right, since Leuk San completed his task, where is he then? Why haven't we seen him?" the woman with heavy makeup inquired.

The others shifted their gaze, beginning to survey the surroundings for traces of Leuk San.

"Thud!"

However, in the next moment, what appeared to be a body suddenly fell from the grey sky above and smashed to the ground in front of everyone, instantly becoming mangled beyond recognition.

But it was still possible to discern that the corpse was Leuk San who had joined the operation earlier.

"It's not a body, but a paper effigy..." Someone went over to check and found it was an effigy made of paper, only crafted to look quite realistic, which had led the group to mistake it for an actual corpse.

"Paper effigy Leuk San." Li Jun immediately recalled the information dossier on this Leuk San.

This was a very mysterious ghost manipulator, and aside from knowing that his surname was Leuk, even his given name was false; no system records included him, and even on an identity level, no person by this name could be verified—the Leuk San seemed to appear out of nowhere in the world, with not a single piece of information proving his existence.

Some speculated that Leuk San was merely a stand-in, with the real individual hidden away.

"An airplane can't fly for long within the Ghost Domain, Professor Wang's calculations were very accurate. After persisting to this point, the airplane completely lost control, but fortunately, as expected, the ghost painting was lured to J city."

Inside the broken paper effigy which was hollow, a yellowed hand reached out, then a twisted figure crawled out slowly from within the effigy.

Soon enough, a man in his twenties, with a waxen complexion and a somewhat sickly appearance, emerged in front of everyone.

"But the Ghost Domain of the ghost painting is very peculiar; one of my paper effigies died inside. In theory, my paper effigies are like ghosts, thought to withstand the assault from the ghost painting, but unexpectedly..." Leuk San looked at the hollow paper effigy on the ground.

The paper effigy's eyes were wide open, staring back at him with an eerie expression, as if it had died unwillingly.

"I think there's substantial concealment in foreign intelligence information."

"Where's the painting ghost?" Li Jun asked.

Leuk San pointed to the woods not far away, "The plane crashed there, it should be inside."

"Keep away from it, our target is the Ghost Envoy." Li Jun said and then headed towards the valley.

He needed to verify whether the Ghost Domain of the Ghost Envoy was suppressed; if it had failed, they would need to retreat immediately; but if successful, the next step of the detainment operation would commence.