Chapter 19: Ghost-Type

The bus drove steadily along, and at the same time the sun was also setting; the golden glow cast by the sunset on the surfaces of those skyscrapers was gradually fading.

"Jiyang Station. Passengers alighting, please take your belongings and exit through the rear door." The electronic stop-announcer's voice suddenly rang out.

At this stop, the number of people on the bus suddenly increased, not only filling every seat but also leaving five or six people standing.

After the bus had been moving again for three minutes, Fire-Tooth Dog turned its head without warning and barked once at the passenger beside it.

Sitting next to Qiao Sang was a female student wearing the uniform of the Thirty-Seventh Beast-Taming High School, who had boarded the bus at the same stop as Qiao Sang.

The female student glanced at Fire-Tooth Dog and said nothing, only shifting her body a little to the side.

Qiao Sang turned Fire-Tooth Dog around and asked, "What's wrong with you?"

Fire-Tooth Dog looked at the female student.

"Fang?"

It tilted its head, seeming just as confused.

"You'll scare people doing that, you know that?" Qiao Sang said, patting Fire-Tooth Dog's head.

"Fang."

Fire-Tooth Dog answered crisply, turned to look out the bus window, and began enjoying the scenery again.

Seeing this, the female student gave Qiao Sang a friendly smile and said, "I'm fine."

Qiao Sang glanced at the more than ten centimeters of distance that had appeared between them, and was just about to say something.

At that moment Fire-Tooth Dog turned around again, bared its fangs at the female student, looking fierce.

The female student was startled and instinctively started to stand up.

"Can you put this Fire-Tooth Dog away? If it scares someone, are you going to take responsibility?" a male voice spoke up, displeased.

The speaker was standing right beside the female student.

Qiao Sang looked over and saw a man with a square face wearing a gray tank top.

"Yeah, this Fire-Tooth Dog clearly hasn't been properly tamed yet," the auntie in the neighboring seat chimed in immediately.

"There are this many people on the bus, hurry up and put it away," another voice chimed in.

Hearing everyone say this, the female student also looked at Qiao Sang with eager, pleading eyes, hoping she would put Fire-Tooth Dog away.

Qiao Sang frowned and ignored them.

Although she hadn't contracted with Fire-Tooth Dog for long, she knew perfectly well what kind of creature it was — it was a good child.

Besides, it wasn't Fire-Tooth Dog's first time on a bus, and this had never happened before.

"What's wrong with you?" Qiao Sang turned Fire-Tooth Dog to face her and asked.

"Fang."

Fire-Tooth Dog turned its head away with a tsundere air, choosing not to look at Qiao Sang.

It had heard the surrounding people's words and thought its own beast-tamer was going to blame it too.

"Fire-Tooth Dog." Qiao Sang turned its head back, holding it in place with both hands so it had no choice but to look at her.

Fire-Tooth Dog's moist eyes were both stubborn and aggrieved.

Qiao Sang stared into its eyes and said earnestly, word by word: "I trust you, and you should trust me too. If something's going on, you can tell me. You know I can understand what you mean."

Fire-Tooth Dog, hearing its beast-tamer's words, instantly got worked up.

"Fang fang fang!"

"Fang, fang."

"Fang fang fang fang, fang!"

Fire-Tooth Dog gestured with its little paws as it spoke.

Qiao Sang confirmed with it: "You mean something suddenly appeared on her and then suddenly disappeared?"

"Fang!"

Fire-Tooth Dog nodded vigorously.

"That thing suddenly appeared and scared you, right?" Qiao Sang patted Fire-Tooth Dog's head.

"Fang." Fire-Tooth Dog buried its head against Qiao Sang and let out a plaintive cry.

The female student sat beside them watching their interaction, stunned for a long while.

So this is what Fire-Tooth Dog's personality is actually like…

It's kind of cute…

Maybe she should try contracting a fire-type pet beast for her second contract slot too…

"It's fine, it's fine." After soothing it, Qiao Sang turned to look at the female student and said, "You heard everything just now."

The female student came back to her senses and said uncertainly, "You mean something suddenly appeared on me?"

Qiao Sang nodded.

"But…" Before the female student could finish, a voice cut her off directly.

"Listen to her making up nonsense. She just doesn't want to put Fire-Tooth Dog away and is making excuses. I'm warning you, put that Fire-Tooth Dog away right now, or if someone gets hurt, just see how I'll deal with you!" the square-faced man standing beside the female student said viciously.

"Yeah, hurry up and put it away. If someone gets hurt, it'll be too late," the auntie in the neighboring seat echoed.

"Put it away, everyone's uneasy," someone else said.

"I don't think this girl looks like the type to lie. Could there be a wild ghost-type supernatural creature on this bus?" At that moment, a different voice spoke up.

The noisy chatter on the bus instantly fell silent.

When it came to supernatural creatures, the strangest of them all were the ghost types — any paranormal event became reasonable the moment a ghost-type supernatural creature was involved.

Things like objects vanishing for no reason, rooms suddenly losing power and turning cold, were all minor matters.

Ghost-type supernatural creatures were unpredictable in their movements and had eccentric temperaments.

For example, the Possessing Spirit Ghost.

It likes to possess different people. The possessed person remains conscious but cannot control their own body, and can only watch helplessly as their body does all sorts of bizarre things.

Long jump, dancing, diving — those are still fine. But if the possessing spirit happens to enjoy streaking, then that person is cursed with the bad luck of eight lifetimes.

Among those who both love and hate the possessing spirit, the people at the police station take the cake.

The possessing spirit not only possesses the living, it also loves possessing the dead. Two years ago, unidentified corpses would appear out of thin air at the entrance of the Guang City police station every few days.

After examination, some had been dead for a day, a year, or ten years. One of them was the school beauty Lu Baiqian from the sensational missing persons case three years ago.

The police checked the surveillance footage and saw the possessing spirit controlling the corpse to the entrance of the police station.

They hadn't known before, but later the possessing spirit drifted out of the corpse and revealed its own stubby stature, and only then did they realize it was it.

As for love, of course they love that the possessing spirit can inexplicably help the police find corpses they couldn't find themselves.

As for hate, corpses that had only been dead a day or two also get possessed and brought over — isn't this purely destroying the primary crime scene of a homicide case?

Then there's the Ghost-Sucking Lantern, which appears beside lost people and guides them in the right direction, but it requires absorbing a certain amount of their vital essence as the price of exchange.

Sounds like a ghost-type supernatural creature that understands fair exchange, but actually not at all.

Recently, a woman in Nankou City came out of a bar late at night, called a taxi, and then waited by the road. Perhaps she was swaying as she walked, or her eyes were hazy from drinking.

The Ghost-Sucking Lantern just decided she was lost…

Before the taxi even arrived, it forced its "service" on her, sent her home, and then sucked her vital essence, so that when the woman looked in the mirror the next morning after getting up, she thought someone had drained her dry.

The deeds of ghost-type supernatural creatures are truly too numerous to record.

Encountering ones that merely like to play pranks is still fine, but if you run into an evil wild ghost-type supernatural creature, you won't even know how you died.

For a moment, everyone on the No. 66 bus was in a state of panic.