Episode 358

Durand’s gaze flickered as he said to the rest, “The second story… is filled with the energy from supernatural beings. These are all the angry ghosts of gods who died!”

“Angry ghosts of gods who died!” Everyone gasped. It was already hard to deal with nasty ghosts. If their powers were not suppressed, they would not be afraid. But their powers were usually suppressed to a certain extent when going through Challenges, so even they had to escape when they encountered such ghosts. Worse still, these were the dead spirits of gods.

They exchanged glances, unsure of what to do next. Getting through the second story had become something impossible suddenly. Durand tried to take one step forward, and the jade piece exploded and turned into nothing but powder.

“Oh no,” Durand exclaimed as cold sweat dripped down his forehead. “This will not do. The way ahead is too dangerous. That piece of jade was an A Grade Spirit Power item, and it could hold up for a long time against even the most aggressive ghosts. But before I had even gone near to the ghosts of the second floor, it exploded… I’m afraid these ghosts of dead gods are no weaker than living gods, and because of their current state, they’re going to be more aggressive than gods and there’s no way to communicate with them.”

The five of them seemed to be stuck. They had to keep going upward, since staying here was pointless. They couldn’t possibly stay in this building forever.

“Su Jin, your psychokinesis should have some effect on ghosts, no?” Natasha asked Su Jin.

But Su Jin smiled sadly and shook his head as he said, “I can deal with ordinary ghosts and killing them isn’t a problem. But these are ghosts of dead gods, so you could say they’re immortals of sorts.”

Su Jin admitted to being unable to handle these ghosts. Even if he had become a god and had god levels of psychokinesis, he might be able to handle one or two such ghosts. But he wasn’t a god, and there were definitely more than one or two such ghosts on the second floor. These ghosts were having a party on the second floor!

Just then, Oscar suddenly piped up, “Why don’t… I give it a shot?”

“You?” Everyone turned to look at him.

“To a certain extent, my shadow Spirit Power is an ability to move into a different dimension. While ghosts are not the same as humans, they belong to this world. I’ve been able to hide myself completely from ordinary ghosts and escaped by hiding in the shadows, but… I’m not sure if that works with these god level ghosts,” explained Oscar.

Durand immediately stuffed his teleportation crystal into Oscar’s hand and said, “Mark this place as your return point and come back immediately if you face any danger!”

Oscar took a deep breath, then nodded gravely. He transformed into a shadow and moved along the floor of the second story. The results delighted everyone, because the ghosts really did not notice Oscar in shadow form at all.

Once Oscar was certain everything was fine, he returned to the team and nodded at them before using his powers to hide everyone in his shadow. This was nothing new to Su Jin, since Situ Jin had hidden him in his shadow before too.

Oscar’s shadow moved slowly across the floor, and when they were about halfway through, new people entered the second story. The group was stunned to see who had arrived. These people were not owners, but a group of monsters – vampires, werewolves, and mummies!

These monsters were enveloped in a peaceful glow accompanied by the low sound of religious chanting. The ghosts on the second story seemed to hate the glow and moved away from it, so the group of monsters were able to head for the third story without any trouble.

“What’s going on?” Everyone was confused. Where did those monsters come from? Did this place allow monsters from other Challenges to enter the building too?

“Ignore them, let’s concentrate on our journey and get through this place alive first,” Natasha said to Oscar. This was not the time to get distracted.

Oscar agreed that they certainly had no time or energy to think about anything else now, so he refocused and continued moving toward the stairs that would bring them to the third story. Oscar did not dare to move too quickly, so it took a good ten minutes to cross the entire second story. That group of monsters probably took less than a minute.

Once they got to the staircase, the pressure they felt from the ghosts immediately disappeared. The staircase between each floor seemed to be a safe zone. They would be fine as long as they remained on the steps.

They noticed that the group of monsters were also resting on the steps. Oscar hid the group in a dark corner and asked, “What do we do now? Run over and kill them all?”

“Don’t be rash, let’s watch and wait first. I’m afraid these monsters are not as simple as we think they are,” said Durand calmly.

After giving it a thought, Su Jin asked Oscar, “Can my psychokinesis travel through your shadow?”

“No problem, I just need to crack open a small hole for you.” Oscar did just that and Su Jin’s psychokinesis was able to move out through the hole.

He sent his psychokinesis to travel around the monsters to take a closer look. There were also five monsters in total, and they also seemed to be from the same team. Su Jin was about to scan one of them when one of the vampire’s widened his eyes and let out a low shout.

Su Jin instantly sensed an equally powerful beam of psychokinesis coming at him and he cut his psychokinesis off immediately. Thankfully, he had cut it off quickly enough, so the vampire could not locate his group.

After the psychokinesis was cut off, the vampire looked puzzled, while a werewolf next to him seemed to have said something to tease him, except nobody in Su Jin’s group understood what language they were speaking.

“How’s it?” asked Shen Wu.

Su Jin had a grim look on his face as he replied, “These aren’t monsters. They’re just like us. They’re owners, Handbook owners.”

“That’s impossible,” said Shen Wu immediately. “Wait, are you saying there are owners who’ve transformed themselves into monsters before entering the Grave of the Gods? That’s ridiculous. Any other owners besides those at our level are courting death if they come in.”

Su Jin eyed Shen Wu, then said frostily, “I did not say they transformed themselves. I said, they’re owners, just like us. They’re Handbook owners too.”

Natasha got it first and clarified, “Mr. Su, are you saying that… vampires, werewolves and mummies have also been chosen by the Handbook?”

Su Jin was silent for a moment before nodding slightly. “I don’t really know exactly what’s going on, but these monster owners don’t seem to belong to the same system as us. I had a peek at their Handbooks just now, and they’re pretty much the same as us, except that none of the words are in a language that exists anywhere on Earth. I think… there’s more than one of Hell’s Handbook in the universe.”

Everyone had a look of disbelief on their faces and were about to argue some more when Su Jin said, “I’ve seen gods, a lot of them. I’m the one who caused the mess that made the Handbook change so many rules. I was going through a Level A Challenge, but everything got messed up because an elder god interfered with the Challenge.

“During that Challenge, I ran into all sorts of gods. Gods that are human shaped are just a small group of gods, so I’ve always guessed that… Earth might be just one of the many places that have been chosen by the Handbook, and that there are many, many other places in the universe that are being controlled by the Handbook, except that they are populated by creatures from other races.”

Su Jin made all of them pause. They realized that they all had indeed come in contact with elder gods and even current gods. It was true that human shaped gods formed a very small portion of the gods they had come in contact with, while the large majority were actually all sorts of creatures. They hadn’t given it much thought before, but… Su Jin’s words had enlightened them. Humans were only a small population of owners, and only formed one of the many places selected by the Handbook!

Durand couldn’t help but lick his lips. If that was really the case, he could already foresee a war between races in the future.