Chapter 160: Foundation Laying

"Oh." Ning Zhe nodded and casually shoved the compact mirror into his pocket.

Xia Xia Yubing froze. Not? You really are going to…

She became even more certain Ning Zhe was a mental aberration.

Not just mentally twisted, but physically too—switching between male and female, some kind of shape-shifting monster that had leapt out of a roadside thicket.

Because after disproving his first hypothesis, Ning Zhe had switched his form back to Feng Yu's appearance: beautiful, jade-like hands holding a purple sunshade edged with lace, walking gracefully along the moonlit, silent street, poised and elegant.

Xia Xia Yubing realized that this self-styled "Ning Zhe" didn't merely alter his physique, clothing, or outward appearance each time he changed—he transformed completely: voice, posture, personality, and aura alike.

Feng Yu's gentle dignity, Yu Zi's defiant arrogance, Lin Lin Zhiyuan's optimistic moderation…

Not some crude disguise, pretending to be someone else—but a true, inner-to-outer metamorphosis into an entirely different person.

"So that's why he said 'we' back then?" Xia Xia Yubing's heart fluttered nervously; she stole a glance at Ning Zhe's swaying, alluring back, and a thought suddenly surfaced in her mind:

"Is he one person… or many?"

Ning Zhe had no idea, and didn't care, about Xia Xia Yubing's inner musings.

He held the umbrella with both hands, stepping lightly as he walked down the street; the buildings of Zuanju Town were mostly timber-framed earthen brick and tile houses, long abandoned and neglected, now crumbling unevenly under wind and rain.

Only a few homes built by wealthier families still stood intact, scattered like sparse shrubs across a wasteland.

Beneath the bright moonlight, two hunched silhouettes could barely be made out, peering slightly from a gap in a collapsed courtyard wall; upon closer look, they were two weathered stone statues, their surfaces overgrown with moss.

One statue depicted an elderly man in Ming-era robes with wide, flowing sleeves, exuding an immortal's aura; his facial features had been worn away by wind and rain into indistinct shapes, leaving only faint outlines of his eyebrows and beard.

His right hand rested behind his back, his left arm extended straight, index finger pointing toward the opposite side of the street—clearly a statue of "The Immortal Pointing the Way," commonly placed at scenic entrances or mountain paths.

The other statue was a girl in a ballet skirt, a white dove carved from stone perched on her shoulder, its wings echoing the fluttering hem of her dress.

Ning Zhe had seen this ballet-dancer statue before—he saw it every day. Similar statues stood in flowerbeds at primary and secondary schools in Gubei Town and surrounding villages, all ordered together before Zuanju Town was abandoned, during the old school's renovation when bulk discounts were offered.

A matching male dancer statue, holding the girl's arm and embracing her waist as if dancing, was missing here; this female dancer was likely a defective piece from that same batch.

Though he knew intellectually these were merely shaped stones, seeing two such statues side by side at the broken courtyard wall, facing the street in the dead of night, gave the eerie impression of two living people leaning from windows, silently watching the outside world.

Even Ning Zhe, with his formidable mental resilience, furrowed his brow slightly; Xia Xia Yubing turned pale—she had never believed in ghosts or spirits, but thanks to Ning Zhe, she was starting to.

I really owe your whole family… Xia Xia Yubing hurried forward three steps at a time, closing the distance between herself and Ning Zhe, following closely behind him as she rushed onward, leaving the old man and the ballet dancer far behind.

"Again with this…"

As they drew nearer, Xia Xia Yubing heard a low murmur coming from beneath the sunshade.

"What's wrong?" Xia Xia Yubing asked nervously.

"Something's off. Don't get too far from me from now on—if you die, I might not be able to save you." Ning Zhe said calmly.

Xia Xia Yubing nodded, about to step closer, when Ning Zhe raised a hand to stop her.

"Don't get too close either. Don't suddenly approach me—or I'll kill you."

He was currently using Feng Yu's identity; if anyone stepped on his shadow, he would die.

…Though Ye Yao's rules could nearly perfectly compensate for this flaw in Te Rang, Ning Zhe still preferred caution.

"Oh…" Xia Xia Yubing was annoyed but didn't show it; she was used to Ning Zhe's neuroticism and unpredictability.

He's a lunatic. Don't argue with a lunatic, especially one with a gun. "By the way, I also saw a strange statue earlier…" Xia Xia Yubing recalled Ning Zhe crouching by the roadside as if observing something, and asked.

"You mean the child statue buried upside-down beside the street, with only one foot sticking out?" Ning Zhe turned his head, umbrella held steady, and glanced at her: "You're interested in that?"

Xia Xia Yubing nodded.

"Just a sacrifice," Ning Zhe murmured.

"It's an ancient custom: before construction, at least one living person was buried at each of the four cardinal corners—east, south, west, north. The ancients believed only by offering a human life to the land could a building be stabilized, withstand natural disasters, and resist collapse. This practice was called 'foundation laying.'

In modern society, live human sacrifices are rare; paper figures, straw dolls, talismans, or animal bones are used instead. In northern Qinzhou, they use fired clay dolls; in the south, they use stone carvings.

The stone foot you saw earlier was buried at the eastern corner of that large courtyard. I've checked the other three corners—west, south, north—and all four held identical stone statues."

Rare? So it still happens… Xia Xia Yubing's face paled; she couldn't fathom how anyone could kill people just to build a house.

Ning Zhe paid no attention to Xia Xia Yubing's expression; his eyes narrowed slightly as he softly clicked his tongue.

"Gone again." He muttered to himself.

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He was currently using Feng Yu's identity; perhaps because it was a simulated, artificial rule, his Te Rang's perceptual range was not as extensive as Feng Yu's true self, unable to cover the entire Zuanju Town. This felt more like holding a torch in a dark cave.

As they neared the town center, the massive four-faced Buddha statue—five to six stories tall—entered the "torch's" illuminated range: that was the limit of Te Rang's perception.

Ning Zhe clearly sensed a hurried figure sprinting out from beneath a dark building, rushing into the town's center, then vanishing.

That person was likely the livestreamer who had called Xia Xia Yubing earlier—Jiang Han.

Once he reached the town center, his shadow vanished—either he died, or he ran beneath the Buddha's lotus pedestal, hidden by its shadow. Ning Zhe believed it was the latter.

But Jiang Han was not the only shadow appearing within Te Rang's perception.

As Ning Zhe walked forward with Xia Xia Yubing, he occasionally sensed two or three shadowy figures entering Te Rang's perception from the edges of the "torch's" light—some tall, some short, some stout, some thin.

As Ning Zhe advanced, more and more of these shadows kept entering Te Rang's "vision."

But strangely, the moment these shadows entered Te Rang's perception, they vanished almost instantly.

Not like Jiang Han's, who disappeared by running into the shadow of a building—those losses had a process. Te Rang clearly sensed Jiang Han's foot vanish first, then his hand, half his body, then the other foot… until he was entirely gone.

That was Jiang Han moving from open ground into the Buddha's shadow.

But these groups of shadows, entering from the periphery of perception, vanished without warning—no transition, no movement from light into darkness. They simply disappeared.

Like a drop of ink dissolving into an endless ocean.

He remembered clearly: two of those shadows vanished precisely at the gap in the courtyard wall he'd seen earlier.

Ning Zhe held the umbrella with both hands and walked a little further. At the edge of his vision, five new shadows quietly appeared.

Then quietly vanished.

"What's going on…"

(End of Chapter)