East Hall.
Eighteen Halls.
Jiang Lin was unaware that because some human viewers had watched the daily activities of the Drama Department, many of them started acting out scenes with ghost envoys when they died.
"That's all for today. I might be a bit busy recently."
After distributing the rewards to the viewers, Jiang Lin closed the live stream.
He then dispatched several paper effigies to inquire if the ancestors of one of the viewers were still in the underworld.
During his previous trip to the Third Hall, Jiang Lin had seen Qin Zhouzhou use Hellhounds so proficiently that he had planned to contract some Hellhounds upon his return.
However, after learning the art of paper effigy making in the North Hall, he felt it was no longer necessary.
Following that, Jiang Lin summoned Qicai Dan.
He instructed it to take the paper effigies with it to the human world tomorrow after school to check on another viewer.
The viewer was also unsure if they were experiencing a haunting.
"If it's truly a ghost or monster, don't rush to attack. Observe first," Jiang Lin instructed. "If you can handle it, do so. If not, come back to me."
'Understood, Master!'
After Qicai Dan responded, it flew to the side.
It revealed the "robot," a specialty from the West Hall, which had been following closely behind it.
'Master, does it want to come along too?'
Seeing the robot, Jiang Lin felt a slight surprise.
The last time he saw it, it couldn't fly.
Now, it could fly in the air at the same frequency as Qicai Dan.
He took the robot and examined it, noticing a new exhaust port below the small sphere at its base.
The round hole resembled a small flamethrower, emitting a grayish-white flame that maintained its flight.
If one didn't look closely, they wouldn't notice it at all.
Jiang Lin asked Qicai Dan, "When did it start changing?"
He didn't think Qicai Dan had helped modify it.
This was because Qicai Dan didn't understand much about mechanics.
'It seems like it was this afternoon,' Qicai Dan, who had been observing from the side, thought for a moment and said.
'This afternoon, it was tinkering with something in its desk, and the teacher even reprimanded it.'
However, the teacher was also helpless.
This was because the robot was currently unable to communicate at all.
It couldn't speak or write.
Qicai Dan had also tried to teach it to express itself telepathically, but the robot had never managed to learn.
Jiang Lin looked it over briefly and then put it down.
Throughout this process, the robot obediently allowed Jiang Lin to examine it from all angles.
Only after being placed down did it float up again with a whirring sound.
It wobbled in the air.
"It's coming with us tomorrow," Jiang Lin said.
Letting it see more might lead to unexpected surprises.
However, before that...
Jiang Lin used his paper effigy technique to disguise the robot.
It now looked like a pure white sphere.
"Let it appear like this when we're outside," he decided.
After all, it was a specialty from the West Hall.
'Understood, Master! I guarantee the mission will be completed!' Qicai Dan straightened its body.
...
The next day,
As soon as Qicai Dan finished school, it took the disguised robot and a paper effigy to the home of the suspected haunted human viewer.
Behind them,
A small live-streaming sphere flew out and followed.
Meanwhile, Jiang Lin had received two pieces of news from the King of Hell's Hall that morning.
First, the cultivation techniques and skills he brought back from the South Hall would be placed in the mission center.
Ghost envoys could exchange them with performance points.
Second,
A batch of ghost envoys would be assigned to the Eighteenth Squad in three days, and Jiang Lin should be prepared.
Previously, because Jiang Lin was leading a team for the first time, only twenty ghost envoys had been temporarily assigned to allow him to adapt.
Later, he had gone to other underworlds to study, and this matter had been delayed until now.
With the arrival of this new batch of team members, Jiang Lin, as the captain of the Eighteenth Squad, would truly live up to his title.
"Three days..."
After Qicai Dan departed, Jiang Lin went to the Underworld's advanced cultivation room.
He had not neglected his cultivation during his time away studying.
Now, with the system's Yin Qi Pills, he wondered if he could break through his realm again.
Jiang Lin affixed the system-issued cultivation room stabilizer to the four corners and exchanged his points for Yin Qi Pills.
He sat down cross-legged and began to cultivate.
Yin Qi permeated the cultivation room.
...
Human World.
As Qicai Dan and the others arrived at the scholar's home, the live-streaming sphere also turned on its camera.
"Big streamer, I'm here~"
"Good afternoon, Ghost Envoy~"
A group of viewers flooded in, only to find no one there.
They looked around but couldn't see the streamer.
"Where's my streamer? Where's my big streamer? (very big jpg.)"
"Didn't the Ghost Envoy say they were busy recently? They probably won't be out."
"Let me guess, the streamer is probably grinding again. After grinding the Third Hall, now grinding the East Hall."
"So, is it just Qicai Dan out for training today?"
As the camera panned, the viewers also saw the egg, the sphere, and the paper effigy.
They couldn't help but be surprised.
This, this team is growing...
Is Qicai Dan the boss?
"I feel like the scene is a bit strange..."
"It's already unusual to have an egg out on a mission."
"Qicai Dan: The Years I Was Boss?"
...
In the live broadcast, Qicai Dan had already surveyed the house.
The viewer's home was quite nice, a three-bedroom, two-living room layout.
It was mainly decorated in an elegant style, with several ink wash paintings hanging on the walls.
The bookshelves in the study were also filled with books.
The house carried a scent of scholarly books and ink.
It was evident that compared to electronic products, this family preferred original paper books and pens, both brush and fountain.
At this moment,
There was only a middle-aged woman and a seventeen or eighteen-year-old teenager, who was asleep, in the house.
Despite it being only three or four in the afternoon, the woman was simmering pumpkin porridge in the kitchen.
She was peeling beans and occasionally glancing towards the bedroom.
Her well-maintained face inadvertently revealed a hint of worry.
The porridge in the clay pot was bubbling.
The woman quickly took out a spoon to stir it and turned down the heat below.
As soon as she finished, a voice suddenly sounded from behind her:
"I want to eat."
The woman turned around abruptly and saw the teenager, who should have been lying in the bedroom, had somehow gotten up.
He was standing silently at the kitchen doorway.
Looking at her expressionlessly.
The woman's pupils constricted for a moment, then a smile appeared on her face:
"Okay, Ranran, sit down. Dinner will be ready soon."
"Mm."
The teenager turned and returned to the living room.
In the kitchen,
The woman's heart pounded, and it took a while for her to calm down from the shock.
She took a deep breath and turned off the stove.
She scooped a full bowl of pumpkin porridge and brought it to the dining table in the living room.
Having been simmered for a long time, the pumpkin was soft and almost blended with the white rice.
The aroma of pumpkin mixed with the aroma of rice, making it very sweet.
"Ranran, be careful, it's hot," the woman said, handing him the spoon and instructing him.
The teenager was handsome, with delicate features, bearing some resemblance to the woman.
The hand that took the spoon was also well-defined, slender, and clean.
It was a pair of hands very suitable for playing the piano.
Watching the teenager start to eat the porridge, the woman did not relax.
Her tightly clenched hands at her sides showed her tension.
"What did you give me to eat?"
After only two bites, the teenager's movements stopped.
The spoon hit the table.
He looked at the woman with a sinister gaze.
The woman's heart sank. "N-nothing..."
In that bowl, there were only ashes from two burnt talismans...
She had tasted it, and it shouldn't have had any flavor.
"This is not tasty!"
The teenager became impatient and slapped his hand.
*Slap!*
The entire bowl of porridge was spilled on the floor.
"I want to eat meat, I want to eat meat!"
"I want to eat delicious food!"
He pounded the table, as if wanting to flip the entire table over.
"You ate an hour ago..." the woman said, but before she could finish, she was intimidated by the teenager's cold, bloodthirsty gaze.
"Are you trying to starve me to death!?" the teenager roared, his tone frantic.
He was like a hungry beast.
...