Chapter 96: Resistance

……

The time reached the second half of the night.

A blurry, hazy crescent moon hung high in the sky, appearing abnormally distant from this world, impossible to touch.

In a room within the Temple, where there was no chirping of insects.

Ding Mo pulled up Jiang Liuxue, who had nearly rolled off the bed, and stared fixedly at the spear tip on the ground.

The sharp point of that iron spear stood quietly in the ground, as if it had always been there, as if it had always been this way.

Jiang Liuxue seemed to have just woken up at this moment, squirming desperately on the bed, wanting to get away from it.

Seeing this, Ding Mo understood that just now, Jiang Liuxue must have been lured, or rather, bewitched, which caused her to turn over,

and then nearly fall off the bed.

"This thing is too sinister; how did it get into the ground?"

Qin Yifei had also seen what happened just now; he gasped in cold air and likewise moved his chair away.

Ding Mo, on the other hand, stared at this iron spear that had come from nowhere and walked forward.

He pulled it out!

"Hey!" Qin Yifei looked at him in shock.

Jiang Liuxue had already been so frightened that she squirmed off the bed, but due to the continuous shocks, her legs were as soft as noodles, and she couldn't stand up at all,

so she had to crawl to escape in the direction of Ding Mo.

But a shadow quickly enveloped her.

Jiang Liuxue raised her head, looking at the figure in front of her with trembling lips.

It was exactly Ding Mo!

He held the iron spear in one hand and pulled up Jiang Liuxue's hand with the other, stuffing the iron spear into her grip.

?!!

In an instant, Jiang Liuxue was completely stunned, and then, her hand spasmed wildly as if it had touched a soldering iron!

She wanted to throw it away, but Ding Mo gripped her hand, preventing her from letting go.

"What are you doing... no@#￥%......!" She became somewhat incoherent with fear.

In her eyes, this iron spear was simply a soul-reaping vengeful ghost! Yet Ding Mo was forcing her to get close to the "vengeful ghost"?!

But Ding Mo roared: "Don't let go!

"Look closely, you are holding it! It is your hand!

"You can control it!

"Control it, and it won't be able to take your life!"

Listening to Ding Mo's words, Jiang Liuxue froze.

"W-what does this mean?" Qin Yifei walked up and asked in surprise.

Ding Mo then explained, stating his guessed method for breaking the Curse.

Jiang Liuxue, holding the iron spear, listened to Ding Mo's explanation while shedding tears of fear.

But she still shook her head, wanting to throw away the iron spear in her hand—saying it was one thing, but doing it was another.

Qin Yifei was likewise somewhat incredulous.

"Believe me!" Ding Mo looked at the two of them, especially Jiang Liuxue.

"Believe me, you can all survive."

Simply put, the best way to overcome fear is to face it. However, when it came to putting it into practice, Ding Mo could only attempt it.

"Hold it, stare at it, control it. If you do this, it cannot kill you!"

Finally, Ding Mo's resolute words once again made Jiang Liuxue finally muster the courage, and she nodded lightly.

With Ding Mo's support, she stood up and sat back on the bed.

Sitting at the edge of the bed, she held the iron spear with both hands, staring straight at the "nightmare" in her hands without a moment's pause.

Is this enough?

Ding Mo stood to the side, watching her.

To tell the truth, he didn't know either, but this was definitely a meaningful attempt.

The night flowed on, like a black river of water.

...... After a long while, Ding Mo, who was sitting beside Jiang Liuxue, suddenly turned his head to look at Qin Yifei.

Qin Yifei was scratching an itch.

"What... exactly is going on with you?" Ding Mo then asked.

He felt something was wrong.

He remembered that in the first half of the night, from the moment Qin Yifei returned from the restroom, he had been scratching himself repeatedly.

Was it that itchy?

"I-I don't know either, I just feel my back is so itchy..." As Qin Yifei spoke, one hand that had originally been covering his eyes also reached toward his back.

Both hands began to scratch wildly together!

For a time, the sound of "rustling" friction rang out in the room.

"Stop scratching!" Ding Mo realized things were becoming increasingly wrong and said immediately:

"Stop scratching, let me take a look for you."

Saying this, he turned and went to Qin Yifei's back.

Qin Yifei did not refuse, pulling open his clothes to let Ding Mo take a look.

Two seconds later.

"..."

Ding Mo fought back the urge to gasp, his gaze fixed in shock on the terrifying Phenomenon on his back:

It could be seen that over most of the area on Qin Yifei's back, the pores of his skin had become as coarse as a honeycomb!

One hole connected to another, and inside they were stuffed with black, wriggling "sesame seeds"!

No, Ding Mo felt that compared to sesame seeds, these things were more like insects shaped like sesame seeds!

Dense clusters of black sesame-seed insects wriggled within the pores; most of Qin Yifei's back had already become their nest.

There were even signs that they were constantly spreading to other areas!

If this continued, he estimated that in less than an hour, Qin Yifei would transform into a human "honeycomb insect nest"!

If such a thing really happened, then perhaps there would be one more Guaishou attacking them!

"..." Ding Mo clenched his fists, not knowing whether he should kill Qin Yifei right now,

or try to save him.

"What's wrong?" Seeing Ding Mo's prolonged silence, Qin Yifei felt strange, and at the same time, he scratched himself again.

Ding Mo could see his fingertips scraping across the "honeycomb"-like wrinkled skin, kicking up a black "Tide."

Forcing back the chill in his heart, Ding Mo put on a smile and said:

"No, it's nothing."

As he spoke, he went to the wall and extinguished the oil lamp.

The room plunged into darkness in an instant.

"Ding Mo? What are you doing?" His actions made Qin Yifei feel a bit strange.

But in the darkness, Ding Mo turned around, took a breath, and suddenly said solemnly:

"Qin Yifei, listen to me."

"... What exactly is wrong!" His demeanor made Qin Yifei realize something:

"Is... is there something on my back!?"

A trace of terror leaked into Qin Yifei's voice; he struggled to twist his neck, wanting to see clearly.

But leaving aside the limitations of human anatomy, Ding Mo had long since extinguished the oil lamp, and he could see nothing.

"Listen to me!" Ding Mo said to him:

"I led you to control 'Zhu Dechang' and drove away 'Zhou Lan'; don't you trust me?"

"I... trust you."

"Since that's the case, I'll ask you now: do you still remember the scriptures recited during morning and evening lessons?"

"I remember. Should I recite them now?" Qin Yifei was somewhat uneasy.

"Yes." Ding Mo walked in front of him and nodded at him calmly.

"Recite. Do not stop until I tell you to."

"..." Qin Yifei was silent for a moment, then finally said:

"Is there an abnormality appearing on my body? And is it on my back?"

Ding Mo knew he couldn't lie to him, so he nodded:

"Yes. Trust me, don't keep scratching, just recite.

"Because I just realized one thing."

"What?" Qin Yifei looked at him, his hand subconsciously wanting to scratch, but he forced himself to stop.

He felt that something was wrong now too; his back was so itchy, so itchy that he wanted to peel his back open to see if there were thousands of insects crawling inside!

Ding Mo replied earnestly at this moment: "The scriptures recited during morning and evening lessons can help us resist these abnormalities!

"This is also the reason why the Abbot and the others have been able to survive for so long in this eerie Temple."

He fabricated the lie without changing his expression.

"Then I..." Qin Yifei hesitated.

"Trust me! Don't investigate, just recite the scriptures!"

"..."

Thus, Qin Yifei endured the itching that almost exceeded human limits, closed his eyes, sat cross-legged, formed seals with his hands, and began to recite.

In truth, the recitations of the past two days were not enough for him to memorize these scriptures.

But Qin Yifei wanted to survive.

So, regardless of how much he remembered, he would just recite whatever lines he could recall!

"@%R#$*......"

Ding Mo stood to the side, watching him.

Because the distance was very close, even in the darkness, Ding Mo could see some things clearly.

As the sound of the recitation rose, the "honeycomb" on Qin Yifei's body continued to spread without a moment's pause!

These "sesame insects" even began to grow wings, fluttering about one or two meters around him!

"Just like this, stay focused, don't open your eyes!" Ding Mo, who had already stepped back a few paces, guided him from the side:

"Except for my voice, no matter what noises you hear, do not pay them any mind!"

As the words fell, Qin Yifei's voice became increasingly solemn and grave, as if he were focused to the extreme.

Ding Mo watched for a while, let out a slight sigh of relief, and sat back down on the edge of the bed.

In fact, the honeycomb had already spread to Qin Yifei's head, yet Qin Yifei's sanity was strangely unaffected.

Ding Mo could only pray for him, praying that if things continued this way, there would still be a turning point.

Otherwise, the moment Qin Yifei stopped and discovered his current appearance, his "Threshold" would likely hit rock bottom instantly!

Ding Mo thought, and finally had the chance to glance at his own retina:

【Threshold: 98%】

It was already the middle of the night.

During the first half of the night, a bout of close-quarters contact with the Flesh-Ear Monster had caused him to lose quite a bit of "Threshold,"

yet conversely, when he clashed with Zhou Lan, his "Threshold" had hardly dropped at all.