Zhong Cheng kept a close eye on the situation outside the window, his heart in his throat. He even lowered his head and hunched down, using the inside of the bus to hide his figure so no one outside could see him.

The driver saw the whole thing clearly in the rearview mirror.

Watching Zhong Cheng’s sneaky, suspicious movements, the driver frowned deeply. He suspected Zhong Cheng was a thief and secretly kept his guard up. He couldn’t let the guy steal from the other passengers while the bus was moving.

The driver privately judged that Zhong Cheng was still young, handsome enough, and had soft, delicate skin. He was clearly a pretty boy, yet he refused to walk the straight path and had chosen to become a pickpocket, learning from Qie Gelawa.

What a fallen world.

The driver continued staring at him like a tiger watching its prey.

“?”

Zhong Cheng noticed the driver’s caring gaze. He couldn’t understand why the man kept staring at him, or why his eyes looked so fierce.

What was that supposed to mean?

The driver wasn’t gay, was he? He hadn’t taken a liking to him, had he?

Zhong Cheng suddenly felt his asshole clench. He didn’t dare continue their silent eye contact.

Danger!

He watched as the bus slowly pulled out of the station and disappeared farther and farther away.

Once they were well away from the station and he could no longer see its buildings, his tense heart gradually relaxed.

A while later, the bus was traveling along the highway. Only speeding vehicles surrounded them.

Zhong Cheng could finally let his guard down.

“Don’t blame me. I had no choice. You forced me into this. If you want someone to blame, blame this world.”

Zhong Cheng muttered to himself.

To escape the Ghost Emperor, he had been forced to resort to this desperate measure and abandon her at the station.

He hoped she would realize she’d been abandoned and wouldn’t get too angry. More importantly, he hoped she wouldn’t hurt any innocent people while venting her temper.

If innocent people really were injured because of this, Zhong Cheng could only mourn them for one second and say he was sorry.

“Was this too heartless? I should’ve at least paid for her meal.”

For some reason, even though he had finally escaped that sea of suffering, Zhong Cheng felt a little guilty.

It was like abandoning a pet he’d raised on the street without mercy. He’d done something shameful, and his conscience wouldn’t let him rest.

He was definitely overthinking it.

The Ghost Emperor was a vicious and brutal existence. How could he compare her to a pet? Would that even do justice to the word “pet”?

He should compare her to a cold-blooded animal like a crocodile instead.

Once he imagined that he’d abandoned a crocodile, Zhong Cheng immediately felt much better.

Perhaps he only felt uneasy because he hadn’t paid for the meal. He’d eaten without paying, after all, and that was morally difficult to accept.

As a law-abiding, upstanding citizen like Zhong Cheng, eating a free meal could easily trigger his strong sense of morality and make him feel guilty.

He wondered what the Ghost Emperor would do when the restaurant owner demanded payment.

If she paid with ghost coins, would the owner call the police?

Hopefully, the owner wouldn’t call the police.

Zhong Cheng wasn’t worried about the Ghost Emperor’s safety. He was worried about the safety of the officers who came to arrest her.

Two hours later, Zhong Cheng got off the bus and entered the busy airport.

He went to a self-service machine and collected the plane ticket he’d booked in advance.

After waiting in line to pass through security, he waited a little longer before finally boarding the plane.

“I don’t believe you can still chase me into the sky.”

Zhong Cheng looked out the window at the city buildings rapidly shrinking below him and spoke with smug satisfaction.

After that, exhausted and sleepy, Zhong Cheng adjusted his seat, put on an eye mask, and fell into a deep sleep.

The flight attendant woke him once because he was snoring.

…

…

…

Several hours later.

Zhong Cheng rubbed his bleary eyes as he walked out of the airport. Looking at the wide-open scenery outside, he couldn’t help sighing.

This trip back to his hometown had really brought one unbelievable event after another. It had completely overturned everything he thought he knew about the world.

Fortunately, there had been danger without disaster in the end. He had escaped successfully and returned safely.

He gave himself a mental thumbs-up for his cleverness.

This incident was destined to remain unforgettable for the rest of his life. Maybe every night from now on, he’d grow wary of the darkness after turning off the lights.

Perhaps he wouldn’t even dare turn them all off.

Once bitten by a snake, one fears a piece of rope for ten years.

Zhong Cheng definitely wouldn’t return to Bao Hua Village. If he encountered the Ghost Emperor again, he might lose his life for good.

Not far from the airport, many unlicensed cars were parked outside, waiting for passengers. Zhong Cheng had no intention of taking one.

He used his phone to call a Didi instead. With a coupon, it was even cheaper.

…

Zhong Cheng got out of the Didi. In front of him stood a somewhat old residential compound.

Happiness Heights.

The compound wasn’t large, and the living environment was rather cramped. There was no big garden or elevator, and the tallest building only had seven floors.

It was a compact residential community in the city center.

The buildings were twenty years old. The place was plain and outdated.

It was a little behind the times, but living here was actually quite comfortable. At least the property fees weren’t high, so the management company couldn’t fleece them.

It was in the city center, making transportation convenient. There was also a market nearby, so buying groceries was never a problem.

This was where Zhong Cheng had lived and grown up since childhood.

His father had bought their apartment secondhand back then, so it had been fairly cheap. Now, naturally, it wasn’t cheap anymore.

Even if the building was old, the land itself was valuable.

A location in the city center meant the price could only rise, never fall.

If they wanted to live in a newer building in the future, they could sell this place and buy one elsewhere.

Or they could patiently wait another twenty years for demolition and relocation. That would be even better. They could drive up the price and become holdout residents.

Thinking about it that way, was his family secretly wealthy?

What? They said market regulations would bring housing prices down?

Heh. What a joke. Keep spinning that story, big-time con artists.

News like that could only fool young people who hadn’t experienced society yet. It made them believe they might be able to afford a home within their lifetimes, so they could continue working like diligent little ants and contribute to society’s prosperity.

The older generation would never believe housing prices could fall. It was all deception and all a set-up, because they had lived through it themselves.

Since the beginning of the Republic of China, official announcements had constantly claimed that housing prices would be regulated and brought down.

Yet in this rising great nation, housing prices had never truly fallen.

Even if they really did fall, it would only be by a tiny amount. It would be negligible, and they’d quickly rebound and climb to an even higher peak.

They were just like oil prices.

“Let them fall, let them fall, let them keep falling if they can.”

But the moment they rose even a little, everything would come rushing back.

It was like fighting a boss with everything you had. No matter how many attacks and combos you unleashed, you could only deal one point of damage.

Then the moment the boss counterattacked, one slash would leave you flat on your back.

It was an incredibly helpless reality.

Zhong Cheng strode toward Happiness Heights with a swaggering, devil-may-care gait.

He had survived a great disaster and returned home safely. Naturally, he was in a wonderful mood.

“Good to see you, Uncle De.”

“Zhong Cheng, you’re back after visiting your grandparents? Such a filial boy.”

Uncle De, the security guard, was sitting inside the guard booth. Zhong Cheng was in such a good mood that he took the initiative to greet him.

He wasn’t surprised that Uncle De knew he had returned home to visit his grandparents.

There weren’t many residents in Happiness Heights, and everyone knew one another. They often gathered together for idle gossip, so whenever anything happened, the whole community learned about it quickly.

Sometimes, it happened so fast that it made your jaw drop. There was no way to guard against it.

Whoever’s husband had kidney trouble, whose wife was infertile, which mother-in-law and daughter-in-law were fighting, whose child had ranked what place in school—the residents could know almost everything by the next day.

Anyone who didn’t know better might think this place had a branch of the Chaoyang aunties.

Zhong Cheng had once suspected that they’d secretly created a group chat and simply hadn’t added him. The news always spread far too quickly.

The scariest part was that he had no idea how they passed the information around. Somehow, everyone knew everything without making a sound.

There were no secrets at all.

It was a little frightening.

That was why Zhong Cheng never dared order anything strange online and have it delivered here. Even when he really needed to buy something, he never used Happiness Heights as the shipping address.

He had it sent to a convenience store nearby instead.

He had to pay one yuan for storage, but it was well worth it for the sake of secrecy.

He acted like a spy, cautious and careful at every step.

Perhaps he really did have a talent for this sort of thing.

After saying goodbye to Uncle De, Zhong Cheng entered the compound. He walked to one of the buildings and started climbing the stairs.

As mentioned before, Happiness Heights was an old residential compound with no elevator. Everyone had to use the stairs to go up and down.

Zhong Cheng’s family lived on the third floor, so climbing wasn’t too difficult.

If they lived on the seventh floor, that would be miserable. It would make anyone lose the desire to go downstairs.

“Did the light bulb break?”

Zhong Cheng looked at the flickering bulb and muttered to himself.

The unreliable bulb left the stairwell dim.

Zhong Cheng paid it no mind. It wasn’t the first time a light bulb had broken. It was a minor problem.

He continued climbing.

Then he noticed that it wasn’t only the second and third floors. The bulb on the fourth floor above them was flickering too.

Was the entire building on strike?

Or was there a problem with the voltage?

The dim stairwell gradually filled with an eerie atmosphere.

If this had happened before, Zhong Cheng wouldn’t have thought much of it. But after everything he’d experienced during his trip to Bao Hua Village, he had become suspicious of everything.

Could it be…