Zhang Huanyu felt the air around him twist strange, like damp fog closing in. He bowed to empty space again and again, then crept back to his seat, face pale as paper.

Hiding behind Zhao Yue, Xiaoxiao Ji wanted another copper coin like earlier, for peace of mind. But the classroom held no trace of Lu Ming, like wind after rain.

In that sliver of recess, Lu Ming had already slipped outside with Nana Toki, like two shadows crossing a doorframe.

With Lu Ming gone, the room swelled noisy, like sparrows at dusk. What happened felt like a brief ripple. Still, whispers spread fast: Lu Ming could commune with spirits.

Lu Ming himself knew nothing, mind lit like a lantern before a cave. He stared at the ghost girl in front of him with frank, burning interest.

“You hauled me out for what?” Her voice rang crisp, like ice on porcelain. “If you’re just staring, I charge.”

Under the Protagonist Lord’s heated gaze, Nana Toki’s skin prickled like fur in a cold wind. Was this guy into ghost girls?

System: “...” The host is truly full of himself.

“You’re an odd one,” Lu Ming said, tone calm like a still pond. “In my years as a Spirit Exorcist, I’ve never met a ghost this self-aware. I’m curious, nothing else.”

Old texts say a person’s ghost keeps only what obsession anchors, like iron chains in river silt. The deeper the obsession, the wilder the temper, stormy and changeable.

Take fierce ghosts for example. Gentle in life like spring rain, savage in death like a winter wolf. Why? Their resentment runs deep, a blade that won’t sheath.

That resentment grants power, a dark wind that lets them chase unfinished grudges.

But this ghost girl was a rarity, a reed among stones. Her spiritual power was thin, her aura weak, like any stray soul by the roadside. Yet her will felt thick, like a living heart.

She looked less like mist and more like a person, warm as a lamp behind paper.

“Do you remember how you died?” Lu Ming asked, voice soft as night rain.

“Me?” Nana Toki drifted, then pointed at herself, like a dragonfly tapping water.

“Mm.”

“You won’t believe it.” She sighed, eyes tilted to the sky’s pale edge. “My beauty killed me.”

“...”

“As the old saying goes, beauty rarely keeps long years.” At a forty-five-degree angle, she gazed upward like a lone crane. “Being a ghost girl is tough.”

From Lu Ming’s angle, she looked like a weathered…ghost, a banner tattered by wind yet oddly proud.

“Any wish you want fulfilled?” His mouth twitched, patience like tea steeped warm. “I can help, so you enter the wheel of rebirth sooner.”

“Wish? I’m a ghost; what wish?” Her eyes slid half-shut, cool as moonlight. “Don’t try to tempt me. You just want me reborn so you owe me nothing.”

Lu Ming: “...” This ghost was sharp, like a needle under silk.

“I’m not planning to reincarnate,” she said, jaw set like a locked gate. “Don’t get crafty.”

“But staying outside the cycle will stain those closest to you,” Lu Ming said, showing the split copper coin, edges ragged like a bitten crescent. “Ghosts are the leftover regret after death.”

“Remain too long in the human world, and your soul scatters like ash in wind. Then even rebirth slips away.”

“And if you wander long, you must draw human vital essence, a theft like frost on crops. I won’t let you harm people.”

“Oh? So what?” Nana Toki floated above his head, arms crossed like a shield, gaze downward like a hawk. “If I choose to scatter, none of your business.”

“...” A mere female ghost, yet she blazed arrogant, like a torch in a temple. Did she take no heed of a Spirit Exorcist?

“If I catch you absorbing essence,” Lu Ming said, voice cold as a blade’s mirror, “I’ll kill you.”

“For now I won’t touch you. You’re weak, and you haven’t harmed anyone. Don’t think I don’t dare.”

“Do as you please—if you can beat me,” Nana Toki said, tone light as drifting snow. “And stop cozying up to Xiaoxiao Ji, or I’ll kill you sooner or later.”

She left that threat like a thorn, then turned and drifted toward Xiaoxiao Ji’s classroom, her figure thin as smoke.

Sunlight doesn’t burn ghosts outright, yet it presses like warm sand. Even so, she slid through it, slow and steady.

Lu Ming stood, gaze heavy as stone, watching her silhouette blur into air. His face twisted strange, like a knot in wood.

A seasoned exorcist, yet he couldn’t beat a ghost with no power? What gave her such brazen calm?

...

School finally spilled into evening, the corridors humming like a hive. At the back of the classroom, Lu Ming gathered his desk, movements neat as folding paper.

A small figure stepped to his side and stopped, like a sparrow alighting on a rail.

He looked up, puzzled, eyebrows lifting like reeds. It was the girl he had sought this morning.

“Classmate Lu, do you have more of those copper coins from this morning?” Her voice was small and soft, cotton warm, inviting protection like a kitten’s mew.

Lu Ming remembered her name: Xiaoxiao Ji, light as dew on grass.

“I’ve got some,” he said, eyes kind, like winter sun. “But do you really believe what I told you?”

She clutched her backpack straps, knuckles pale like rice grains. Lu Ming’s gaze finally settled on the figure behind her—Nana Toki, arms folded, face cold as frost.

That ghost had followed the girl all day, yawning in class like a bored cat, doing nothing else. If Lu Ming didn’t know she was self-willed, he’d think she was some game’s deer spirit, ready to possess.

“I—I do believe!” Xiaoxiao blurted, voice trembling like wind through chimes. “I saw that thing last night and this morning!”

“Do you remember how it looked?” Lu Ming asked, tone gentle, a lantern under eaves.

“Of course.” Her words spilled quick, like beads. “A very beautiful woman, in a long white robe, with a white triangular scarf. She drifted slow in the air—terrifying.”

She never noticed Lu Ming’s face grow odd, like ink spreading in water.

“The ghost you saw—does she look like this?” A crisp voice cut in like a bell.

Xiaoxiao turned, nodded fast at Nana Toki. “Yes, exactly like this sis—”

Her voice snapped off, joy flipping to shock like a door in wind. Mom, she’d seen a ghost again.

She twisted to bolt, legs coiling like springs. But Nana Toki was faster, her hand closing on Xiaoxiao’s arm like a clamp.

“Run, run, run—always run.” Her tone was half teasing, half steel. “I don’t even look scary. Why flee every time you see me?”

You’re a ghost. Not running would be sick. The thought flashed, bitter as gall.

“Mmm—mmm—mmm—!” Nana Toki clapped a hand over her mouth, palm cool as river stone. Xiaoxiao’s eyes begged Lu Ming, like a deer pleading across brush.

He hadn’t expected Nana Toki to appear so openly among humans. His surprise rose like steam. It was his first time seeing a ghost linger without siphoning essence.

“Ahem.” He steadied his voice, calm as a temple bell. “Classmate Ji, I think you and this ghost have a misunderstanding. She seems to bear you no malice.”

Misunderstanding my butt; I don’t even know her. If not gagged, Xiaoxiao would have spit those words, sharp as chili.

“Misunderstanding my butt,” Nana Toki said first, knuckles tapping Xiaoxiao’s head like a knuckle on wood. “She’s just timid. Cowardly to the bone.”

“Quiet down, or I’ll keep you awake tonight,” she added, voice chill, a draft under a door.

If anyone else said it, Xiaoxiao might laugh it off. From Nana Toki, the sentence crawled like ice over skin.

The classroom had emptied to only the three of them—two people and one ghost—shadows long like ink strokes. Xiaoxiao knew struggling would only invite madness, so she stilled.

Nana Toki felt the resistance fade, then slowly lifted her hand from the girl’s lips, gesture smooth as silk.

“Done fussing?” she asked, eyebrow arched like a willow leaf.

“Done…” Xiaoxiao tucked her chin, eyes wet like glass.

If she’d known, she’d have gone straight home, like a bird to nest. Who’d expect a ghost to show up at school?

“I’m curious.” Lu Ming’s gaze narrowed, a blade under cloth. “You’re a ghost with no power. You don’t covet her body or her essence. Why cling to this girl?”

He’d guessed a special constitution, a yin-boned fate like cold jade. But she looked ordinary, like any passerby.

Women lean yin by nature, and dead women as ghosts even more so. Two yin together won’t spark some fierce thing.

So why this haunting?

“Why pry into a girl’s private matters?” Nana Toki shot him a look, contempt neat as a flicked fan. “Sexual harassment much?”

“Careful, I’ll call the cops,” she added, words dry as sand.

Lu Ming: “...” You’re a ghost. Which cop would buy that? The thought thinned into a sigh, like smoke in rain.