"Let me tell you, that's an evil spirit! Over two and a half meters tall, wrapped in black smoke. He scared me out of my wits and possessed my body!"
She shuddered at this. "Impossible, impossible... Xichen is just sick..."
"It's not an illness, it's a ghost. He's a ghost—the vengeful spirit that lived in this haunted apartment!"
Chen Xi grew visibly agitated, pacing before the floor-to-ceiling windows as if he had nowhere to vent his resentment: "For over a year, he kept me suppressed deep inside, and I could only watch like a bystander as you two fell in love, got married—like being alive and cast into the eighteenth level of hell! Can't you try to understand me?"
"I'm the real victim here!"
He was right.
Lian Xia was a person of normal moral compass. She couldn't redirect her grief and fear onto an innocent Chen Xi. She dropped the knife and slumped to the floor, her face ashen as a corpse, though no tears came.
On the other side, Chen Xi cautiously picked up the knife.
He let out a breath, then tried to comfort Lian Xia, whose face was the color of dirt: "Xiaoxia, you and I can live a good life together from now on. I won't let you down. I'll never go looking for anyone else again—just stay with you. We have a house now..."
"Get away from me. Don't touch me."
"Xiaoxia..."
Lian Xia stared at him with bloodshot eyes: "This isn't your house! He worked night after night, overtime after overtime to earn it. It's all his blood and sweat money. You can't just take it!"
"He used my body. Consider the house his compensation."
"You can live here, sure. But you can't keep his sales director position. A mortgage of fifteen thousand a month—give it two months and the bank will repossess. Go ahead and live here then!"
Chen Xi was rendered speechless and could only force a smile: "But I have you. You're a grad student!"
"My tuition is also paid by Xichen. He's the one supporting me."
The two fell into a long silence. The young man's voice was hoarse: "But he's a ghost, and I'm a human..."
"Shut up! Get out of our apartment!"
Chen Xi couldn't fathom how such a petite, fragile woman had suddenly mustered such strength. She scrambled up from the floor and shoved him with all her might, push after push, until she'd forced him entirely out the door.
Then the dark iron security door slammed shut in his face.
The young man lay on the public hallway floor for a long time, ignoring the curious stares of passersby, his expression approaching numbness.
"She'd rather have a ghost than have me."
He eventually picked himself up, went downstairs, and stepped out of the elevator. It seemed to be a fine day outside.
Chen Xi looked up at the hazy red sun behind banks of clouds, as though fighting to hold something back—but failing. A perfectly healthy person suddenly burst into tears in broad daylight.
"I can't even beat a ghost. Ha. I can't even beat a ghost!"
Chapter 36
Gu Xichen—once one of Wen City's Top Ten Outstanding Young People, and after moving to Shanghai's business world, he'd achieved impressive results there too.
Xuanchen Tech, where he was a partner, had maintained steady profits for years before suddenly announcing losses, plummeting into the scandal of being labeled a fraud. After that, he'd driven onto the highway late one night and was caught in a multi-vehicle collision.
Lian Xia opened her laptop and transcribed each fragmented record into her notebook.
She couldn't even find his photos online—only some very blurry paparazzi shots. She gave up searching for images and turned to various encyclopedias for his biography.
And the cause of his death.
Gu Xichen was a man of fierce determination who could endure hardship. Even bankruptcy shouldn't have driven him to the end of his rope. She wanted to know what unbearable thing he'd faced that made him give up his life.
Fortunately, the mainstream newspapers from that year had covered his story extensively, and she finally found an obituary.
Due to severe depression compounded by sleep disorders, he was diagnosed with liver cancer a year and a half later. He could only entrust a friend to sell off his few properties in Shanghai, repay his investors, and then quietly hanged himself in a rented apartment.
The tragic irony was that he died before turning thirty—a life cut far too short.
Unfolding the old news stories, each headline was heart-stopping, the language flat and dry, yet her eyes reddened line by line.
"Major multi-vehicle collision on the north-south highway..."
"Crushed ribs; delayed medical treatment resulted in paralysis below the lumbar spine..."
"When it rains, it pours. The unicorn tech mogul's glory days are over..."
The cold north wind blew, draining the warmth from Lian Xia's flushed cheeks inch by inch. She silently took out all the remaining incense and packed it into the center of the censer.
"When I was at my lowest, you were by my side. When you were at your lowest, who was there for you?"
"I didn't know that's how you left. So bitter. So, so bitter."
Strangely, she didn't feel grief—just a dryness that had haunted her for so long. Her eyes finally moistened, tears streaming down, while her heart felt numb and hollow, a cold wind whistling through the gap, stripping away every degree of warmth from her body.
The incense gradually burned down. The accumulated ash was scattered by the wind, flying all over the floor. She suddenly jumped up to chase the flying ash.
"Xichen, is that you?"
"Come out and see me, please? Don't worry—I'm not afraid!"
"Xichen, Xichen!"
The room was empty. No response.
Her tears slowly dried at the corners of her eyes. She rummaged through the incense bag at home—sure enough, it was completely empty.
"No, Xichen needs offerings, needs to receive incense smoke... I'll go buy more right now!"
She rushed to the bathroom and quickly cleaned herself up, roughly wiping her tear-stained face with a wet towel, then grabbed her wallet and keys and headed out.
At the ten-yuan shop, the young man wasn't around—only the old man sitting alone at the entrance, staring into space.
"Hello, I want a thousand yuan's worth of incense."
The old man jumped, clambering up from his recliner stuffed with paper effigies: "A thousand yuan? What do you need so much for?"
"For my partner."
The old man fixed her with those terrifying eyes for a long moment: "But he's still alive."
Lian Xia's tears came at once: "How do you know he's still alive?"
"If he's alive, then where is he? I want to find him..."
"He is alive, but he's not here. You can't see him, and he can't see you." The old man waved his hand. "Girl, when it's time to let go, let go. You two have no future."
No matter how Lian Xia wept and pleaded, he clamped his mouth shut like a locked clam—not another word came out.
She had no choice but to take some incense and leave, heartsick.