The Restless Spirit's Father

It was only late afternoon, but the sun had already hidden itself behind the tall buildings. Li Feng only had a sliver of light that helped him see his very body in that paddy. Right now, he could only turn and stare at the little girl approaching him.

This girl seemed to be a hit-and-run victim as well. What made it harder for Li Feng to accept was that the girl only wore a blood-smeared dress. Her fingernails were rather broken and covered in mud, same with her feet.

She must have suffered so badly to wake up as a ghost in an untrimmed paddy-looking place.

Li Feng's stomach felt like it was being twisted beyond he could handle. He failed to stop himself from involuntarily retching until bile began to flood his mouth.

However, he had to curl in place due to the pain. Saliva and bile dripped from his mouth as he kept on listening to the little girl's calling. His eyes were closed shut, but he could somehow tell that the girl was just less than a meter away from him.

"Help... please help me..." Li Feng whispered as he cried. His legs were useless while he was severely paralyzed by pain. His body then fell to the side as he collapsed. Half of his face sunk into the mud while his legs began to make small kicks as if reacting to reflex.

However, it wasn't enough to help him escape.

"Big Brother... why aren't you taking Xiao Su home?!" The little girl screamed at his ear as she lunged at him. Her freezing hands gripped at Li Feng's arm and face with inhuman force, her broken nails clawing at his face again.

"I'm sorry... I'm sorry... Mommy, Daddy... please help me..."

Li Feng cried as much as he hated himself. He didn't use to be like this. His father was correct; where did the brave Li Feng go? Why was he such a mush of flesh now that he couldn't even protect himself? What exactly did Mian Tianni and Guangru do to him?

"Mommy... Daddy..." He continued to call out as he was being attacked by the little girl. He only managed to move his arm to cover his face and his ear from the little girl. She kept on screaming and clawing at him. He could even taste blood and mud dripping into the corner of his mouth.

"Mommy... Daddy..."

"Mommy..."

"Daddy..."

Visions of a small child flashed across Li Feng's mind. The place was dark, but he could hear painful screaming coming from a grown woman.

Bang! Bang! Bang! He could feel getting hit again and again, and at every hit, a part of his body fell apart. Bang! His leg was busted. Bang! His stomach burst. Bang! His skull broke open.

Indistinct voices of males and females soon came to his earshot. They seemed to be calling something a demon or unholy; their voices were loud and angry that he couldn't imagine them doing anything else but beating someone up with blunt objects.

The noises and the pain soon subsided... until another scene seemed to play. It was always dark, but there was always a crying woman and an angry mob. Li Feng could no longer hear the little girl or even feel the pain of his stomach and his arm.

However, he was too pulled into the vivid feeling of his visions.

"Mommy... Daddy..." He heard someone else speak the words he uttered before. The next visions were of a tall creature, looking down at humans who were hurling words and water at it. Shamans? Yes, around four to five shamans were trying to exorcise the creature.

"Why? What's wrong with what I want? I just want to have a mommy... a daddy..." Li Feng felt like he could identify the voice, but it was so grotesque that it wasn't coming from a human being. "I just want to have a mommy... a daddy..."

"...who are you?" Li Feng heard his own voice, but he couldn't feel his lips.

Just as he spoke, all the other noises vanished in the background. Soon, in that darkness, a figure loomed before Li Feng's very face. The hollow face that seemed like a tree bark with holes grew close. It was as if he was having pareidolia as he looked at that dark-brown piece of wood in front of him.

Breath. He then felt a cold breath against his face. His eyes then grew wider as he was sent to a shock because of fear. The thing in front of him was alive; it's not a piece of wood. Wait, wood? A dead tree?!

"Guangru!" Li Feng knew he screamed, but he still couldn't feel anything on his body.

The ancient entity that had plagued the city even before it was a city was not poking its face against his. If he had indeed a feel of his body, he would have leaked a lot. The very entity that was sealed and had been spreading miasma all over the place was now right in front of him!

However, the demon only retreated back into the darkness. He didn't respond to Li Feng; neither did he touch the young man.

Li Feng only started crying again as he couldn't shake off the feeling that he was going to die at that time. The demon's favorite food was young men and who practiced shamanism. Right now... that was him.

The amount of silence made Li Feng flinch. For some reason, he felt like his eyes were becoming very heavy. He ended up closing his eyes even if the darkness around him didn't change. However, when he opened his eyes the next minute, he managed to spy a glimpse of the night sky above him.

After checking a little like moving the limbs that he could, he realized he was still in the paddy-looking place where he once was. He then looked around to see no little girl ghost around him. The wounds on his arm were also gone... as well as the churning in his stomach.

Slowly, he managed to sit up and turn behind him.

He wished he didn't.

A hand shot to his mouth as he retched from a different stimulus. The body of a young girl was behind him. Her skin was already decaying badly, but some parts seemed to be preserved by the mud.

It could be seen as she had been dead for more than a month. Since he wasn't used to seeing the dead... only their ghosts, he turned away and managed to calm himself down.

For now, he only wanted to curl up and hide from anything that would intrigue his eye.

...

Soft slurping sounds followed the young man who was taking a walk alone. He had a cup on his left hand from where he was drinking soft drinks from noisily, and his right hand was full because of a flashlight.

It was already past ten in the evening, but he was wandering the area like he was lost. The only reason why he wasn't reported by anyone yet was that he was wearing jogger attire.

"Ruan Lang, we're very close!" A sweet voice of a woman echoed as an apparition latched behind him, her c.h.e.s.t against his head. Her chin was on top, and she was humming lowly. The man she clung at wasn't really that calm as her cleavage was deep enough to make him blush.

"Ling, where exactly are you leading me?" Ruan Jin murmured as he flung his flashlight around. He looked like some jogger who went out and lost their dog along the way. He only needed to call out for a name while moving his flashlight.

"We're looking for a lost dog. Guangru said he should be here somewhere..." Ye Ling finally said why she pulled Ruan Jin from his bed in the middle of the night. However, she seemed to be the least concerned about an actual lost dog.

"Huh? Why didn't you just ask animal control—argh, forget it. If the dog bites me, it's on you!" Ruan Jin didn't like frights and dogs just the same. Now that Ye Ling wanted him to look for a lost dog, it was asking too much from him.

He then looked at the somewhat deserted road that Ye Ling led him to.

There seemed to be nothing here. It was so far from the houses that he had been walking in the dark for an hour. The place didn't have street lights anymore as if it was indeed an old road that was already decommissioned by the city.

What made it really stand out were the tall weeds that grew beyond the road. Ruan Jin had seen so many movies that if he threw a body in there, no one would even know.

That was when something felt like cl.i.c.k.i.n.g inside his head. The gears also started to turn. Ruan Jin swallowed the lump in his throat as he walked closer to the edge of the road and then peered down at the dark and surprisingly deep soil plagued by weeds.

Ye Ling said that Guangru said it should be around this place. Didn't that mean that Guangru found a lost dog in this place? Considering the child, why would it look for a dog?

Wrong! It was never a dog; what Guangru found was a person!

Gathering all the strength he could put into his diaphragm, Ruan Jin began calling out, "Hello?! Is there anyone there?!" He then waved his flashlight across the paddy-looking field just past the asphalt he was standing on. "Somebody?!

"Can someone hear me?!"

Thunder! It was as if Ruan Jin's voice was thunder, it shook Li Feng awake. He could certainly hear a voice from a distance. He tried to move, but he was already out there for a very long time. His arms couldn't even move anymore... much less his mouth make noises.

However, someone was already there; how could he not do his best to attract their attention?

Li Feng reached out and grasped at a thick portion of the tall weeds around him. He then shook it as much as could. Hopefully, this could be seen by the man calling out.

"Holy shit!" Ruan Jin did see it since Ye Ling pointed it out. Armed with nothing but a flashlight, he jumped down the paddy and felt the mud sticking to his shoe. However, he cared too little about it. Someone was responding to his call!

"F.u.c.k, it smells like someone died in here!" Soon enough, his nose was assaulted by the smell of decay. Since he was in film studies, he knew how dead bodies smell just so they know how to actually describe it. "Hey! Are you still there?!"

Li Feng's eyes widened as he heard the voice again. It sounded like someone he knew. He had lost the strength to move so he had let go of the weeds. Who knew that in a few seconds, a light hit his feet. A scream would then echo.

Ruan Jin hurried to the owner of the feet he saw, and he couldn't help but curse.

"F.u.c.k me running! Li Feng, are you still alive?!"