Chapter 53: Chapter 53: I Have an Appointment with the Deities

"It’s over."

Tang Qianqian looked at the Congyun Hotel, which had returned to silence. The sudden earthquake had paused for a moment, and when the violent shaking completely stopped and the hotel once again sunk into silence, the ghost stories that had revived at midnight no longer made any noise. "It seems that the senior has won."

She finally let go of the anxiety she had been holding on to.

Even among the invincible, there are disparities. The senior honored the promise and at least this time, maintained the position as "the strongest."

"Stop struggling. The venom injected into your body is from the Poison Fang of a rattlesnake. With such a large dose, you will be paralyzed for at least the next ten minutes."

After getting beaten up by the Red-eyed Demon last time, she had reflected upon it.

The senior had said that evil spirits reveal their true form only in the instant they attack. To harm them, one must seize that brief moment.

But not everyone in the world is as powerful as the senior. Moreover, according to the manuscript, the physical functions of most evil spirits are far stronger than humans. In such a situation with such a huge gap between enemy and ally, adopting an approach with such a low margin for error, in her opinion, was akin to seeking death.

So, in the domain of exorcising evil spirits, is there an easier method?

After hours of research, Tang Qianqian came to an important conclusion—to strike at the true body.

Evil spirits have strong physical functions and often possess strange abilities, but their true bodies can be injured and can die just like theirs. The manuscript also mentioned that evil spirits appear in the form of dreamland. Once their true bodies are awakened, they dissipate.

Not long ago, she had confirmed through various means that the waitress was a human, a living and breathing human just like them.

So she was quite sure that the poison of Poison Fang was effective.

"Even though you can’t move your hands and feet, you should still be able to speak. You have ten minutes to defend yourself, like convincing us that you were coerced by the lady and essentially are a good girl with a pure nature..."

"Qian Yun, that’s my name."

Unexpectedly, the waitress lying on the ground didn’t use the tactic of feigning pity again. Even though she was in a hopeless situation, she continued to smile.

This was the first time Tang Qianqian saw Qian Yun smile.

It was a crazy, charmless smile that reminded her of extremists seen on television news.

Perhaps for the sake of establishing their authority, the Universe Company would occasionally film the security department catching criminals. The most memorable to her was a middle-aged man cornered into a desperate situation, standing on the roof of the company building, directly facing the Hover Cars that had him completely surrounded.

At the edge of life, the man spread his arms, his face showing a similar smile.

That was also the first time Tang Qianqian saw the effects of a bomb explosion outside of movies and TV dramas. The firelight engulfed the middle-aged man in the blink of an eye, the alarm bell ringing to the skies. The live broadcast was cut off in a few seconds.

"The ghost stories of Congyun Hotel, I wrote them all."

Organizing material, making paranormal modifications, then publishing them online to guide discussions and turn Congyun Hotel into a holy site for supernatural enthusiasts—it was a labor-intensive process. "How shall I put it? This is my hobby."

There was no fear in Qian Yun’s eyes. She lay on the red carpet spread out on the stairs, everything here was exactly as she had seen in her childhood.

Since the moment of her birth, Congyun Hotel had been half-dead like this.

Poorly managed and deserted, but it was still enough to scrape by.

The stories she heard most from her elders were of the days when Congyun Hotel was glorious. Every day as she lay in bed, her mother would tell stories about the founder of Congyun Hotel, claiming that their ancestors had connections with the deities from the heavens.

"Everyone believes that deities are kind, saying that there are just too many matters to attend to in the heavens, and once they have dealt with all that, they will return here. By then, the hotel will revitalize."

Qian Yun had once thought so, too.

So from a young age, she had prepared herself, learning to manage everything within the hotel, so that when the deities arrived, Congyun Hotel could be restored to its most prosperous era under her management.

"In the year I turned seven, when my parents left saying they had to go on a long trip to negotiate a very important deal, I never saw them again after that."

She paused, then continued, "Later the deities indeed came—they brought news related to my parents, saying they had encountered a car accident on their journey, and it was already too late when they were taken to the hospital. In addition, there were some IOUs... that should be called the legal department, I guess. They informed me that the hotel had accumulated a huge amount of debt due to years of poor management and, according to legal regulations, the company had the right to mortgage the hotel."

From that moment, Qian Yun realized the deities were not, and had never planned to, help them.

"After all the deities had left, one of them stayed behind and told me things I never knew... My mother never told me about the existence of the fifth floor of the hotel, nor that our ancestors had confined their wives there. The deity who stayed made a deal with me; he said if I could find the way to the fifth floor and acquire the knowledge hidden there, he could figure out a way to help me with the company’s debt problem."

Realization dawned on Tang Qianqian upon hearing this.

The accidental death of the Extraterrestrials at Congyun Hotel was actually a carefully planned murder.

A murder initiated from within the company for the sake of climbing to a higher position.

She joined the conversation, "The price was for you to awaken the lady and kill him during the supervisor’s inspection, as a recompense, he would help sort out the debt issue."

Without the filter of "deities," this was the real internal struggle of Universe Company.

"If what you’re saying is true, we might indeed consider it."

This complex web of relationships left Tang Qianqian feeling conflicted; they were not police officers, and even when faced with criminals, they had no authority to handle them.

Qian Yun lay there on the ground, seemingly bereft of the power to resist. To act against her now would breach the ’Self-Defense’ law.

But if Qian Yun was telling the truth, then handing her over to the police would seal her fate.

This matter involved the internal strife of Universe Company, and to keep the informed parties silent forever, the company executives who had now replaced their superiors would make sure Qian Yun couldn’t provide testimony detrimental to them.

Tang Qianqian couldn’t help feeling a twinge of sorrow, "I do feel quite sorry for you."

"No need."

The smile on Qian Yun’s face grew more chilling. Despite Qian Yun being the one lying incapacitated on the floor, Tang Qianqian suddenly felt a shiver down her spine.

The smile was all too familiar.

The man who blew up a bomb on top of the company building in the TV news had left her with a deep psychological shadow, causing her to have nightmares for over a month.

"I’m not telling you this to garner your sympathy; I just want to let you know that deities can be killed, too."

"Hmm?"

"Their bodily structure isn’t much different from ours, they will die if killed."

The pupils of Qian Yun sparkled with a crimson glow. For a moment, Tang Qianqian felt as if something had overlapped with her, "The lady said they would inevitably come back, just as they did with our ancestors... so I must practice my abilities well, for the sake of those to come, I need to kill them."

At this point, she paused, then corrected herself, "No, I need to kill them all!"

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by Aunomay Read